The humid, salty air in the hidden cove was thick with the scent of damp pitchstone and the distant, sweet decay of jungle flora. From a ledge dense with broad-leafed philodendron and strangler figs, Vitus Quinctilius Varo watched, a statue of obsidian armor and cold calculation. His elongated limbs, folded in a way that would be impossible for a typical human, kept him perfectly still. Beside him, five of his most disciplined crewmen from the Black Revenge lay in wait, their breathing shallow, their hands on the hilts of cutlasses and the stocks of flintlock pistols.
Through the leaves, Vitus observed the tableau below. The small, battered vessel—a hybrid craft with a sleek, predatory look despite its patches—was moored in the rocky inlet. On the narrow strip of gravel beach, the mismatched crew was unloading their haul.
With a soft, almost inaudible click, Vitus raised a small, snail-shaped transponder to his lips. Its shell was the color of tarnished brass. When the other end connected with a soft puru-puru, he whispered, his Latinate accent crisp even in a murmur. "I have them in my sights, Captain. They are moored at a rocky cove on the eastern lee. Should I engage and secure the vessel for interrogation?"
The voice that crackled back through the receiver was Jeanne de Clisson's, sharp and clear despite the static. "Hold your position. Just monitor. If they depart, we will follow them with the ship. I want to see where their den is before we spring the trap."
Vitus's jaw tightened minutely, a subtle sign of disagreement, but his voice remained obedient. "Copy that. Standing by." The line went dead with a final click. His sightless eyes, which saw only the shifting probabilities of the future, remained fixed on the group below. He had seen a dozen outcomes in the next five minutes, and in over half of them, a swift, violent strike now would have yielded the vessel and its secrets. But Jeanne's order was the only future that mattered.
Down on the beach, the last sack of rice was heaved into the vessel's small hold by Atlas, his rust-red fur glistening with a light sheen of sweat. Eliane, her oversized chef's jacket smudged with flour and something green, performed a final mental tally, her small hands twitching as she counted. "Well, that's all of it. The fresh vegetables, the salted fish, the tubers… we should be good for a while with this."
Vesta, who had been leaning against the hull tuning Mikasi—currently in the form of a serene, pearlescent lute—beamed. "Great! Now that that is done, we should—"
She didn't get to finish. Jannali's hand shot out, grabbing the collar of Vesta's colorful top. "No concerts, no encores, no nothin' that involves drawin' a crowd bigger than us four, got it?" Jannali's tone left no room for argument, her vowels flattening with impatience.
Atlas chuckled, a low, rumbling sound as he bit into a crisp apple. "We wait for the boss to return with the jellyfish and the devil-fruit holder. Then we go."
Vesta's face fell into an epic pout. "Aww… but who knows how long that will take! The creative spirit is a fleeting muse!"
Eliane giggled, wiping her hands. "You can play for us. A private show."
Vesta considered this, her rainbow hair dimming, then brighten again. "Hmm. There is a new song I've been working on that needs a test audience… 'Ode to a Reluctant Spear-Wielder.' It's got a real complex rhythm."
Jannali sighed, the sound of a woman defeated by sheer, bubbly persistence. "Fine. But inside the sub. If we have to make a mad dash, we don't want bystanders gettin' flattened."
Atlas, finishing his apple, tossed the core into the jungle. "Let's wait outside. Who knows when we'll be on dry land again. I want to feel the sun." Filling out of the sub, Atlas strode to a large, sun-warmed boulder and leaned against it, crossing his arms, his lynx-like ears twitching at the jungle sounds.
Up on the ledge, Vitus watched them settle. Vesta sat on a rock, cradling Mikasi, who shifted into a small, intricate harp. She began to play. The melody that drifted up was… ambitious. It was a chaotic, over-enthusiastic composition that tried to be epic, melancholic, and whimsical all at once, resulting in a series of slightly discordant notes.
Jannali winced, tapping her golden hoop earring. "The rhythm's off, mate. You're rushin' the bridge."
Eliane offered gently, "Maybe fewer key changes? It's making my stomach feel funny."
Atlas just smirked, his eyes closed against the sun. "Sounds like a seagull fighting an accordion."
It was at this moment of vulnerable, distracted critique that Vitus's Den Den Mushi rang again, its shell blushing an urgent pink. He snapped it open. "What is it?"
William Fitz-Alyn's voice, panting and dripping with fury, snarled from the receiver. "Vitus! We need reinforcements at the ruins! The Celestial brat—"
Vitus cut him off, his voice a cold blade. "Don't tell me you lost him."
"Will you let me finish!" William roared. "Some woman showed up and interrupted us! Thinks she intends to take the prize for herself!"
A cold clarity settled over Vitus. "You mean to tell me," he said, each word dripping with disdain, "that you, a Long-Leg commander, and your team could not handle one woman?"
"No, you stone-brained centurion, I'm callin' you because there's no way she's alone!" William shot back, the sound of sloshing water in the background. "I see her skiff! She has to have a larger vessel or a crew nearby! We're swimming back to the sloop now!"
Vitus's future-sight flickered. The isolated crew on the beach. The mysterious, powerful woman at the ruins. The skiff. The pieces connected into a single, logical thread. His head turned slowly back toward the cove, where Vesta hit a particularly sour note and Eliane giggled. "Yeah," Vitus murmured into the snail, his blind eyes narrowing. "And I think I might know exactly who they are."
He snapped the transponder shut without another word and pocketed it. The peaceful probability timelines in his mind vanished, replaced by a single, decisive path. He looked at his five crewmen. Their eyes were on him, waiting.
"Everyone," Vitus stated, his voice losing its whisper, becoming the resonant tone of a field commander. "We go in five. Subdue the Mink first. He is the primary threat. Capture the others alive for questioning."
One of the men, a grizzled sailor with a scar across his lip, hesitated. "Sir, what about the Captain's order? To just watch?"
Vitus stood, his lorica segmentata plates scraping. "Don't worry about the Captain. She will be on board once she hears the whole story." He gripped the shaft of his long partisan spear, The Standard-Bearer. The golden eagle at its base glaring. "Now. GO!"
They erupted from the foliage not with a roar, but with the terrifying silence of professionals. Six shadows became six armed men charging down the rocky slope.
On the beach, Atlas's eyes snapped open. He was moving before the others even registered the threat, pushing off the boulder. A grin spread across his face, fierce and eager. "Good. I needed a little exercise to kill the time."
Jannali cursed, a rich, creative expletive. Her hands flew to her hip, and with a sharp shink-shink of segments locking, "Anhur's Whisper" extended to its full length, the dark seastone tip gleaming. "Vesta, get behind me! Eliane, get to the hatch!"
But Eliane didn't run. Her small face, usually so bright, had set into a mask of grim determination. She reached into her bag and pulled out her bamboo practice sword, the one she used for learning basic stances from Marya. Her hands trembled slightly, but she held it up.
Jannali stared. "You think you're ready for this, love?"
Eliane shook her head, her silvery ponytail swishing. "No," she said, her voice small but clear. "But I am not running."
A smirk, genuine and fierce, touched Jannali's lips. "Good. But don't get caught either. Stay with me."
Vesta stood up, swallowing hard, her colorful costume suddenly seeming absurdly bright against the grey rock. "Um… maybe we should talk about this? Music soothes the savage beast?" Mikasi vibrated in her hand, shifting from a harp to a small, defensive-looking drum. "But…" Vesta stammered, "I don't know any fight songs!"
The fight was chaos, but a chaos where the supply crew shone with shocking competence.
Atlas met the first two pirates head-on. He didn't bother with his maces. His body became a blur of rust-red motion. He ducked under a wild cutlass swing, his own hand shooting out to grab the attacker's wrist. There was a sickening crack as bones gave way, followed by an Electro-charged punch to the man's sternum that blasted him back, convulsing, into a third comrade. His laughter was a taunt. "Too slow! Your movements scream your intentions!"
Jannali was a whirlwind of calculated defense. Her spear was a blur, its seastone tip a deterrent she used with masterful control. She parried a flintlock shot with the shaft, the bullet ricocheting harmlessly off the alloy. With a flick of her wrist, she sent one of her "Echo Boomerangs" spinning. It didn't strike to kill; it caromed off a rock, then the hull of their vessel, and smacked the pistol from another pirate's hand with stunning force before returning to her grip. "Try harder, ya drongos!" she yelled. "I've faced sea kings with more fight in 'em!"
Even Vesta, in her panic, contributed. At a shouted cue from Jannali—"Now, songbird!"—she beat a frantic, jarring rhythm on Mikasi-Drum. The disorienting, off-beat cacophony didn't hurt the attackers, but it broke their concentration, causing one to flinch at a crucial moment, leaving him open for Atlas to plant a foot in his chest and send him flying into the lagoon.
Eliane stayed close to Jannali's back, her bamboo sword held in a basic guard. When a pirate, seeing her as the weak link, lunged for her, Jannali intercepted with a spear thrust that gashed his arm. But Eliane, reacting on pure instinct, stepped forward and brought her practice sword down on the man's knee with a solid thwack. It wouldn't break bone, but the surprise and pain made him howl and stagger back. Her eyes were wide with fear and a spark of triumph.
It looked like they were winning. Vitus, who had hung back, observing with his future-sight, had seen this outcome as a strong possibility. He saw Atlas disarming his fourth opponent, saw Jannali's confident smirk, saw the opening.
He moved.
He didn't charge. He took three long, measured strides forward, his elongated arm drawing back, and then he threw his spear, The Standard-Bearer. It wasn't aimed at Atlas or Jannali.
It flew in a perfect, humming arc over the melee, a gleaming line of polished metal. Jannali saw it from the corner of her eye. "Eliane, DOWN!" she screamed.
Eliane dropped. The spear sailed over her head—and embedded itself with a deep thunk into the hull of their vessel, right beside the closed hatch. It was a distraction, a brilliant one. Everyone's eyes flicked toward the sound for a fraction of a second.
That was all Vitus needed. He was already there. While Atlas was turned, dealing with a foe, Vitus's other elongated arm snaked out with impossible reach. He didn't grab for Eliane. He grabbed the shaft of his own quivering spear, used it as a pivot, and in one fluid, continuous motion, swung his body around it. His other hand, holding the curved dagger The Veto, came to rest not at Eliane's throat, but with its needle-point pressed gently against the delicate skin just below her ear. He stood behind her, a tower of black armor, his head tilted.
The fight stopped.
Atlas froze, his fist pulled back, electricity crackling around it. Jannali's spear-point wavered. Vesta's drumming died with a final, pathetic thump.
Eliane gasped, rigid in Vitus's grip. She could feel the cold metal of his armor against her back, the terrifying, unwavering pressure of the blade.
"Drop your weapons," Vitus commanded, his voice echoing in the sudden silence of the cove. "Or the child learns the finality of a surgical strike."
Jannali's face drained of color. Her knuckles were white on her spear. She looked at Eliane's wide, terrified blue eyes, at the way her small hands were clenched around her useless bamboo sword. All her tracker's instincts, all her cunning, screamed that this was a trap, that surrendering meant capture, interrogation, maybe worse for all of them.
But she also saw the little chef who talked to her vegetables, who got flour on her nose, who was her crew.
"Jannali, don't!" Atlas growled, his body trembling with the urge to fight. "I can take him!"
"You cannot," Vitus stated flatly. "I have seen the next seven seconds. You move, she dies. You summon your Electro, the convulsion of my arm drives the blade home. There is no future where you save her and defeat me. Only futures where she bleeds out on this gravel."
He was right. The dreadful certainty in his voice was undeniable.
Tears of pure frustration welled in Jannali's eyes. Her shoulders slumped. The proud, extended spear in her hands felt like a lead weight. With a sound of utter defeat, she let it fall. It clattered loudly on the stones.
"Anhur's Whisper," she whispered, as if apologizing to the weapon.
Atlas let out a roar of pure, impotent rage. The blue Electro around his fists flared and then died. He slowly lowered his hands, his furious gaze locked on Vitus. "If you hurt her..."
"You are in no position to make threats," Vitus said. He looked at Vesta, who was crying silent, glittery tears. "You. The instrument. Toss it into the water. Gently."
Sobbing, Vesta kissed Mikasi's surface. The guitar gave a soft, mournful strum of its own accord. Then, with a heartbroken cry, Vesta threw it into the lagoon. It sank with a glimmer of pearlescent light.
Vitus nodded to his remaining crewmen. Two moved forward, retrieving Jannali's spear and boomerangs. Another two approached Atlas with heavy seastone manacles.
The fight was over. They had been winning on strength, but they had lost to cold, ruthless strategy. As the manacles clicked shut around Atlas's wrists, extinguishing his Electro completely, Jannali could only watch, her heart a stone in her chest, as the victorious pirates closed in around them.
-----
The name hung in the cold, dead air of the Sunken Ruins, a ghost given sound. The oppressive silence that followed was broken only by the distant, indifferent crash of waves against the outer rocks and the soft, anxious bloop from a quivering Jelly.
Marya Zaleska stood frozen. The disciplined stillness was no longer a chosen philosophy; it was a paralysis that had locked her joints. Every calculated plan, every step of this mission to secure a key for the Gate of Lethe, evaporated from her mind, replaced by a white, static roar. Her golden eyes, usually observing the world from a guarded distance, were wide, the rings within them stark against the sudden raw shock.
Jelly watched, his starry eyes darting between his motionless friend and the confused, dirty child. He bounced in place, a nervous, jiggling rhythm on the mossy stone. Bloop-bloop. Worry-wobble.
Then, the stillness shattered into motion. Marya marched back toward Sanza, her combat boots striking the ancient green stone with a finality that echoed. The calm, observant hunter was gone, replaced by something far more intense and personal.
Sanza Kaplan Figarland swallowed hard, the sound audible in the quiet. He took a stumbling step backward, his own bravado crumbling under the force of her focused presence. The woman who had saved him now looked at him not as a prize or a key, but as a source of world-altering information. Her expression was a storm contained behind glass—furious, pained, and terrifyingly sharp.
She closed the final step and, without ceremony, bent and grabbed the front of his grimy, tailored bomber jacket. She lifted him until his feet dangled a few inches above the ground, bringing him eye-to-eye with her. The scent of salt, childlike sweat, and expensive, rain-soaked fabric filled the space between them.
"What," Marya repeated, her voice a low, strained wire, each word measured and heavy, "did you just say?"
Sanza squirmed in her grip, his entitlement warring with a primal, childlike fear. "I said… Micah! Why do you look like my big brother Micah?" His voice wavered, trying for defiance but landing on a squeak.
Marya's eyes narrowed, her jaw so tight a muscle flickered along its line. The name, spoken twice, was a key turning in a long-rusted lock. "What is his full name?"
Sanza kicked his legs, trying to free himself. "What is it to you? It's not like you—" His protest was cut off as Marya jerked him forward, so close their noses almost touched. He could see the faint, permanent black void-veins tracing up her neck, the absolute intensity in her golden eyes.
"My brother's name," she hissed, the words leaving her lips like a forbidden confession, "is Dracule Micah Aliter."
The effect on Sanza was immediate. His struggling ceased. His heavy Gallagher eyebrows shot upward. He blinked, his piercing, judgmental eyes wide with genuine, uncalculated surprise. "He… he is your brother?"
The confirmation, from this terrifying woman's own mouth, sent a dizzying spin through the world. Marya forced a long, slow breath through her nose, fighting to reassert control over the tidal wave of emotion. "Where is he?"
The shock on Sanza's face morphed back into a scowl of arrogant defiance. He was on familiar ground now: bargaining, leveraging. "Why should I tell you? You're just some… some pirate!" He spat the last word.
Marya didn't shake him. She didn't shout. She simply drew him an inch closer, her gaze boring into his. The quiet in her voice was more threatening than any roar. "Where. Is. He."
The authority in her tone, the sheer, uncompromising will behind it, broke through his noble posturing. His chest heaved with quick, frightened breaths. "He's in the Holy Land! Where else would he be? He's a Figarland!" The name was a shield, but his voice trembled as he held it up.
Marya's fingers opened. Sanza dropped to the damp stone with an undignified flump. He scrambled to his feet, his small hands brushing frantically at his jacket and trousers as if to wipe away the humiliation. He puffed out his chest, standing as tall as his eight-year-old frame could manage, trying to recapture his lost dignity.
"Now you see! You will take me there at once! I command it! I am a Celestial Dragon, and you will—"
But Marya had already turned away. Her back was to him, her shoulders a tense, straight line under the black leather of her Heart Pirates jacket. She stared at the jagged horizon where the ruins met the grey sky, her mind a churning maelstrom.
"Damn it," she cursed, the word sharp and quiet. Her father's face, Dracule Mihawk's stern, impassive features, flashed in her mind. A brother. A brother in Mary Geoise. A brother raised as a Figarland, a God's Knight. The pieces of her own fractured history—her mother's research, her father's silence, the void that was her family—rearranged themselves into a new, horrifying picture.
She began to pace, her boots wearing a path on the ancient stone. She muttered to herself, the words a low, furious stream. "What the hell, father… Why would you… hide him? Give him to them?" She stopped, her head bowing. The answer presented itself with cold, logical cruelty. "Of course you did." Her lips thinned into a bloodless line. The stern, resolved expression of a woman making a decision that would split her world in two settled over her features.
Her head snapped around, her gaze landing on Sanza once more.
He had been mid-tirade. "—and you will be rewarded! My father will see to it! So, you will—" He stumbled backwards under the force of her look, then, with a visible effort, forced his little spine straight again, puffing out his chest in a show of false bravery.
Marya cut through his demands like a blade through silk. "We're leaving." Her voice was flat, final.
Sanza's face flushed crimson with outrage. He stomped his foot, a childish gesture of ultimate authority. "I am not going anywhere until you say you are going to take me back to the Holy Land! I demand it!"
Marya took a deep, steadying breath, the last vestige of her calm. Her eyes flicked to Jelly, who had been bouncing in place, a silent, worried spectator to the human drama. "Jelly," she said, her tone shifting to one of clear command. "Bind him."
Jelly's entire demeanor changed. The anxiety melted away, replaced by a sense of joyful purpose. Here was a task he understood! "Aye, sir!" he chirped. His azure body coiled in on itself, compressing into a tight, spring-like spiral. "Coiling squeeze time!"
"Wha—? Unhand me! You gelatinous plebian!" Sanza shrieked, but Jelly was a blur of happy blue motion. He launched himself, wrapping around Sanza in a series of fast, secure loops, pinning the boy's arms firmly to his sides. The Mythical Zoan power within Sanza flickered—a flash of white fur at his wrists—but the surprise and the sheer, sticky, rubbery hold of the jellyfish was complete.
"Mmmph! Mmmph-mmmph!" Sanza's protests were muffled as Jelly, taking initiative, extended a small, gelatinous tendril to cover the boy's mouth.
Marya walked over. She looked down at the bound, writhing, furious bundle of noble lineage and incredible power. Without a word, she bent and scooped him up, tossing him over her shoulder like a sack of particularly noisy potatoes. He was surprisingly light.
"Right," she said, more to herself than anyone. She turned, her eyes scanning the labyrinth of stone one last time, not for enemies, but as if marking the place where her old life had ended. "Let's go." She strode back the way she had come, toward the hidden skiff and the waiting sea, Jelly bouncing happily alongside, and Sanza Kaplan Figarland, the key to the Gate of Lethe, muffled and furious over her shoulder. The mission had just become infinitely more personal.
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