Varin did not hate the desert.
Hate was too gentle a word. Hate implied distance, a clean emotion you could set down and walk away from. What he felt was closer to spite, a deep and personal loathing that crawled under his skin and stayed there. If the gods asked him to name one place worth erasing from existence, he would not hesitate. He was half convinced this wasteland was Muspelheim itself, heat pressed flat and stretched wide, and he kept glancing at the horizon, expecting Surtr to rise up and accuse them of trespassing.
He almost wished it would happen. Death by fire giant sounded merciful compared to this.
They had left the ship hours ago, moored along the river under the watch of something Vivi called a kung fu dugong. Varin still did not trust it, no matter how politely it bowed. Anything that smiled that much in a place like this was suspicious. Now they were trekking inland toward somewhere important. The name escaped him. His brain felt like it was cooking in his skull, and he suspected memory loss was just another symptom of heatstroke setting in.
He was feeling it now. The heat crawled through clothes, through skin, into bone. Sweat clung uselessly to him, evaporating before it could do any good. If this kept up, even he was going to start slowing.
Chopper had already hit that wall.
Zoro carried him without complaint, the little reindeer slung over his shoulder like a sack of rice. Chopper tried to protest at first, stubborn as always, but even that faded into tired grumbling. Varin respected the hell out of that. The kid was built for snow and forests, not sand that burned your feet through your boots.
They were resting now in a narrow valley of stone, jagged walls offering the bare minimum of shade. The only reason they were here at all was because Luffy had gotten outsmarted by birds..... Again.
Varin still did not understand how that kept happening.
One moment, they had supplies. The next, birds. Then shouting. Then Luffy running back empty-handed, smiling like he had not just lost most of what they owned. Somehow, they had replaced the food at least, thanks to Luffy running from a massive beast that Vivi identified as a sandora dragon.
It died the moment Zoro and Sanji stood up. Then another one appeared behind them.
That was when Vivi mentioned they hunted in pairs. Varin had learned several things since entering Alabasta. One of them was that the princess was terrible at warning them ahead of time. She always waited until the danger was already trying to kill them. Sandstorms were a thing, apparently. They learned that when one slammed into them in the middle of the night. Poisonous creatures were everywhere. That came up right after Luffy tried to eat a scorpion alive.
Varin was still convinced his captain's stupidity was more toxic than any venom native to the desert.
After dealing with the second dragon, they had declared a rest. Even Luffy had not argued, which was saying something. They sat now in the thin shade, supplies spread out in front of them, and the reality of their situation was finally settling in.
They were low. On water. On food. For him, patience.
Varin sat with his back against the stone, silver eyes narrowed against the glare. "This place is cursed," he muttered.
Usopp nodded immediately. "Finally, someone says it."
Nami was already counting what little they had left, expression tight. Vivi knelt nearby, quiet, guilt written all over her face like it was her fault things went wrong. Luffy sat cross-legged in the sand, gnawing on a bone like it wasn't his fault things went wrong.
Varin watched them all and exhaled slowly. Out of supplies. Heat that killed faster than blades. And somewhere ahead, a warlord who wanted a country dead. And a marine Captain looking for them. Aye. This was bad.
A few minutes later, Vivi approached him again, careful with her steps like she thought the ground might crack if she moved wrong. She held the canteen out with both hands. It was light. Too light. Varin knew without touching it that it was likely everything they had left.
He shook his head before she could even speak. "I'm fine, lass. Save it for the others."
Her fingers tightened around the metal. "Varin." A warning, soft but firm.
He sighed and looked away, eyes tracing the rippling heat above the sand. "I mean it. Zoro's carryin' Chopper. Nami's pushin' herself harder than she lets on. Luffy's… well. Luffy." A faint huff escaped him. "They need it more."
What he did not say was that he was counting on his Devil Fruit. On the way, his body did not work the same as theirs. On the stretch of time before the Straw Hats ever found him, when eating was impossible and hunger faded into something distant. Water, though, was another matter. Back then, it had never been scarce. Ice and snow stretched forever in every direction. Grab a handful and drink, nothing more to it. Thirst had been an inconvenience at worst. Here, there was nothing but sand that burned to the touch and air that felt like it was trying to steal the moisture straight from his lungs. He did not know how far his fruit stretched when it came to that.
He kept that to himself. Partly because worrying Vivi would not help anyone. Mostly because he did not want to sit through a lecture delivered with those earnest eyes and that unshakable belief that caring hard enough could bend reality. She was not wrong. She was just not built the way he was. She had never had to experience what he did, never had gone hungry because of isolation, weakness.
Varin shook his head hard, chasing the thoughts away before they could sink their teeth in again, and followed Vivi's earlier directions with his gaze. Endless sand, heat shimmer, rocks that looked like teeth jutting out of the earth. Somewhere out there was where they were supposed to be headed.
Then there was the camel. Of course, there was a camel.
Luffy, instead of chasing the birds that stole their supplies like any sane person might have tried, had apparently picked a fight with a plant. A carnivorous one, judging by the state of it. In the process, he had saved a camel. The same camel, Chopper realised after a second, that had helped him earlier. He couldn't even bring himself to be annoyed. At this point, the way the world bent itself around Luffy felt less like a coincidence and more like some kind of natural law. Stars aligned, luck twisted, and Idiocy paid dividends.
He watched as the camel huffed and stamped, very clearly refusing to let any of the men get close. It snapped its teeth when Usopp tried. It kicked sand when Sanji approached. Zoro eyed it like he was debating whether wrestling it would count as exercise. That was when Chopper told them he wouldn't let men ride.
Varin sighed. "Well," he muttered, pushing himself up, joints protesting. "At least it's got taste."
It was obvious what should happen. Nami and Vivi were the weakest, not fighters in the way the others were. Chopper was small and already struggling due to the heat. Let the camel carry them.
Unfortunately, simple and sensible rarely survived first contact with this crew. Sanji drew his leg back, frustration written all over his face, ready to kick the camel into submission, simply because it was more perverted than he was.
Varin moved. He grabbed Sanji's ankle mid-swing, his iron grip stopping the kick dead. Sanji twisted, startled. "Oi, what the hell—"
"Kick it, and you'll just make it worse," Varin said, releasing him and stepping past before the cook could argue.
The camel finally noticed him properly then. Its ears flattened. Its eyes went wide. Its legs trembled. Just like every other animal he'd met since leaving that rock.
Varin slowed his approach, movements deliberate, calm. He could feel it, the instinctual recognition, the way beasts reacted to him like they were staring at something bigger and sharper than a man had any right to be. He didn't fight it. This time, he leaned into it.
He reached the camel and slung an arm loosely around its thick neck, casual, like he was greeting an old friend at a tavern. The animal shook so badly it felt like it might vibrate straight out of his grasp, but it didn't bolt.
"Easy, lad," Varin murmured, voice low, steady. "No one's eatin' anyone today."
The camel let out a strangled noise.
Varin leaned in a bit closer, lowering his voice further. "Listen. You can keep doing your thing. Spittin, complainin, judgin us silently. All fine by me." He glanced back over his shoulder at the group. "But you're gonna carry Chopper too."
The camel stiffened.
"Aye, I know," Varin continued, tone almost sympathetic. "Not ideal. But hear me out. The girls aren't built for fighting, not like the rest of us. Chopper is, even if he's small. If something jumps you again, you want the little doctor able to help, aye?"
The camel shook harder.
Varin gave its neck a gentle squeeze, just enough to remind it who had the leverage. "And between you and me," he added quietly, "if we get attacked again, I'll be the one dealing with it. Same as before. You just gotta walk."
Slowly, painfully slowly, the camel's resistance ebbed. Its shaking lessened, breaths evening out into unhappy huffs instead of panicked gasps.
Varin straightened and patted its neck once. "Good lad."
He turned back to the crew. "Right. Nami. Vivi. Up you go. Chopper too."
Chopper blinked. "Eh, Me too?"
"Aye," Varin said. "Doctor needs to stay upright."
Nami stared between Varin and the camel, then smirked. "You're terrifying, you know that?"
"Been told," he replied dryly.
As they started arranging themselves, the camel cast Varin a long, resentful look. Varin met its gaze and gave it a crooked grin. "Don't worry. Captain'll probably get us lost again before you have to carry us far." The camel groaned. Varin figured that was fair.
And so they began walking.
Most of the journey blurred together into an endless stretch of sand and heat, boots sinking, soles burning, the horizon refusing to move no matter how long they marched toward it. Varin stayed near the front, one hand occasionally resting against Eyelash's flank to keep the camel from drifting or getting any clever ideas about bolting. Nami had named the beast almost immediately, and somehow the name stuck, as if it had always been Eyelash and simply needed someone loud enough to announce it.
The others trailed behind them in a loose line. Varin's longer stride and broader frame made it easier for him to match the camel's pace, and he kept himself positioned so he could glance back whenever the path narrowed or the terrain shifted. He did not like being too far ahead in a place like this. The desert felt wrong, too open, too quiet, like it was waiting.
Vivi front beside Nami, and after a while, her voice filled the space between the footfalls. She started talking about her childhood, at first hesitantly, then with more warmth as the words came easier. About growing up in Alabasta. About sneaking out of the palace to play with the children in the city instead of attending lessons she barely cared about. About some kid named Koza.
Varin listened without interrupting, eyes forward, ears tuned to more than just her voice. Koza, she said, had been stubborn even as a kid, loud but honest. Someone who never backed down once he believed something was right. She talked about scraped knees, stolen food, and laughter under the sun. About the day bandits tried to take her, and how Koza had thrown himself between her and them without hesitation.
Nami asked questions, quiet ones. The kind meant to understand, not to pry. Varin said little, but he absorbed every word. He could hear the shift in Vivi's tone when the memories turned heavier. How the gap between palace and people widened as they grew older. How misunderstandings festered. How ideals twisted when fed anger and drought.
They stopped briefly at a small village partway through the journey. It barely deserved the name. A handful of buildings. It was guarded, apparently, by 'rebels'. Three of them. Children, really, are trying far too hard to look intimidating. They demanded to know who the crew was, hands shaking around makeshift weapons.
At Vivi's quiet request, the crew played along.
They tested them. Not cruelly. Just enough to see if they would run when pressed. They didn't. The kids stood their ground, fear written plainly on their faces, but determination there too. It was enough for Vivi. She smiled at them, thanked them, and the tension drained out of the village like air from a punctured skin.
They traded a bit of food for some water. A few supplies. Not much, but more than they had before.
Once they were moving again, Vivi continued her story.
She spoke of Yuba Oasis. A city carved out of the desert by sheer will. Built by Koza and his father when the land still had hope in it. How the water dried up. How the people stayed anyway. How anger grew where faith once lived. And how Yuba had become the heart of the rebel army. By the time she finished, the sun was lower, though no less merciless.
Varin finally spoke, breaking his long silence. "Sounds like a place built by stubborn people."
Vivi smiled faintly. "Yes."
He nodded once. "Those are usually the ones worth protecting."
Yuba was a bust.
Varin knew it before they even stepped fully into the ruins. The stars overhead burned bright and merciless, painting everything in pale silver and shadow, and what they revealed made his stomach sink. Buildings lay half swallowed by sand, walls collapsed inward as if the desert had grown tired of pretending this place mattered. Dead trees clawed at the sky, their roots exposed and twisted, and scattered among the dunes were bones. Too many of them. Animals, sure. But not all.
It felt wrong. Quiet in a way that pressed on the ears.
There was only one living soul in sight. A man bent over the sand, digging with bare hands, not with the care of someone making a grave, but with the desperation of someone searching for something he refused to believe was gone. When he noticed them, he straightened, wiped his brow, and smiled like a host greeting guests to a thriving town instead of a corpse.
"Welcome to Yuba," he said warmly. "Not much left, but it was famous for its hotels once. You're free to stay as long as you like."
The words didn't match the place. That alone put Varin on edge.
Things soured quickly when the rebels were mentioned. The man's smile cracked, then shattered. He began throwing whatever he could get his hands on, shouting, voice raw with frustration and grief. He ranted about betrayal, about people giving up, about how they had all left. Moved on to a place called Katorea.
Luffy, blissfully unaware of the tension thickening the air, turned to Vivi. "Hey, is Katorea close?"
Vivi froze.
"…It's back the way we came," she said quietly.
Chopper perked up. "That's where Eyelash saved me."
Varin stared at the sand for a long moment before tilting his head back toward the stars. "By Thor," he muttered under his breath, "why do the gods hate me so much?"
Nami elbowed him sharply in the ribs. He didn't even argue.
Then Luffy did what Luffy always did. He said Vivi's name. Loud. Like it meant nothing more than calling a friend.
The man stopped moving. Slowly, he turned. His eyes fixed on Vivi like she was something torn straight from memory. He took a step toward her. Then another. His breath caught, and his hands began to tremble.
"Vivi…?" he whispered, voice cracking.
Varin shifted immediately, placing himself just slightly ahead of her; he did not bare his teeth. But every muscle in his body tightened. Devil Fruits existed. Tricks existed. Faces could lie. He was not letting his guard down again, like when Bon Caly escaped.
The old man seemed barely aware of him. His gaze never left Vivi. "Princess…?" he said again, disbelief and hope warring in his expression.
Vivi swallowed hard and stepped forward, gently touching Varin's arm as she passed him. "Toto," she said softly.
At that, the man broke. He dropped to his knees in the sand, hands clawing at his chest as sobs tore out of him. Years of grief poured free in broken gasps, the kind that came from holding something in too long and finally breaking under its weight. Vivi knelt with him without hesitation, hands gripping his shoulders, her own tears falling fast and unrestrained.
"Vi," Varin cut in quietly, before anyone else could speak. His voice was low, flat, carrying none of the warmth he'd had moments ago. "What's Crocodile's power? Fruit, sword, both?"
Vivi looked up at him, startled, eyes red and glassy. She hesitated, then swallowed. "Uh… devil fruit. The Sand Sand Fruit. It's… It's one of Alabasta's holy symbols."
That did it. Varin straightened slowly, the motion deliberate, like something heavy locking into place. "Right," he muttered. He turned away from them without another word. "Do your thing. We're stayin' the night anyway."
He walked off toward the far end of the ruined town, boots crunching softly against sand and broken stone. He didn't look back. Didn't need to. He could still hear Toto and Vivi behind him, voices breaking, grief spilling out between them, and the others beginning to settle in, setting up camp among the dead buildings like this was just another stop on the road.
Yuba had been a city once. Now it was a carcass. The further he walked, the more it made sense. Daily sandstorms, Toto had said. Buildings buried slowly, methodically. A man who could become sand. Who could summon it, control it. Starve a city to death and blame it on the weather.
He stopped near the edge of town, staring out at the dunes where the stars met the earth in a harsh, unforgiving line. He was angry. Not the hot, explosive kind. This was Heavier, the kind that settled into your bones and stayed there.
He wasn't sure what it was aimed at. At Crocodile, for grinding this place down until nothing remained but grief and ghosts. Or at himself, for realizing that part of him didn't care about the lives lost here. Not really. They weren't his people. Weren't his home. They were strangers swallowed by a desert he already hated. That thought sat ugly in his chest, heavy and sour, and he let it sit there, because pretending it wasn't real felt worse.
Then footsteps shifted the sand behind him.
"Varin," Luffy said.
No grin. No wandering attention. Just his name, said clean and simple.
Varin glanced over his shoulder. Luffy had dropped down beside him, legs crossed, elbows resting on his knees, staring out at the desert like it had personally offended him. That alone was enough to pull Varin fully out of his own head.
"Yeah?" he replied, waiting.
"If Vivi talks to you before we leave tomorrow," Luffy said, voice steady, "don't say anything about where we should head. I know you're smart enough to know she wants to save everyone. But that's not possible."
Varin studied him for a moment. Not the captain yelling orders or laughing through danger, but the one who understood limits. The one who knew when saving everyone would get everyone killed. "Aye, Captain," Varin said at last, turning his gaze back to the dunes. "I can do that."
The desert stretched on forever, unchanged, uncaring. Same as it had been hours ago. Same as it would be tomorrow.
"You know," Varin added after a beat, voice lower now, more reflective, "I don't think we've had a proper talk. Just us two. Not since I joined."
Luffy hummed softly, like he'd been expecting that. "Yeah," he said. "We haven't."
"You got no problems with me fightin' Crocodile, do ya?" Varin asked. It wasn't bravado. It was a real question, one he didn't bother dressing up. He kept his eyes on the dunes instead of Luffy, watching the wind carve shallow lines through the sand. When he was younger, stories told by firelight about cocky captains who thought strength was a title, not something earned. Men who'd throw themselves at monsters like his family just to prove they were still on top of their own crews.
Luffy blinked at him. "Huh?" He turned his head, genuinely confused. "Why would I?"
Varin glanced over, one brow lifting slightly. "Just askin'. Some captains don't usually like someone else steppin' up to the biggest threat. Pride thing."
Luffy stared at him for a second longer, then snorted.
"He's still gettin' punched at the end of the day, isn't he?"
That was it. No edge. No insecurity. No weighing of pride or rank.
Varin let out a short laugh before he could stop himself. "By the gods," he muttered. "You really are somethin' else."
Luffy shrugged, stretching his arms over his head, hands lacing behind his neck. "I don't care who hits him. As long as he goes down. Vivi wants her country back. Crocodile's in the way. So we break him."
Simple. Brutally simple.
Varin nodded slowly. "Aye. Fair enough."
There was a pause, then Luffy added, more serious now, "Just don't die. That'd be annoying."
Varin huffed. "No promises. But I'll do my best to inconvenience fate."
Luffy grinned at that, wide and sharp and familiar. "Good. Then we're good."
Varin was quiet for a beat, then cleared his throat like he was nudging a thought out into the open.
"Ah. Probably should ask, you bein' captain and all." He kept his eyes forward, tone casual but not careless. "Usopp's talked about this girl back home. Kaya. Real kind, real sharp. From the way he tells it, she's studying to be a doctor. Smart type. Gentle, but tougher than she looks."
Luffy hummed, listening.
"He mentioned her a few times," Varin went on. "Said she helped him when nobody else did. Took him serious when the rest of the village laughed." A faint snort. "Promised I'd ask, if we ever swung back that way, whether she might wanna see the world. Figure Chopper wouldn't hate havin' another medical brain around. Two heads an' all that."
He finally glanced at Luffy then. "Didn't wanna go makin' promises or invitin' folks without clearin' it with you first."
Luffy was quiet for a second, chewing on it in that way he did when he was actually thinking.
"A doctor, huh," he said at last. "Chopper'd probably like that."
Varin nodded. "That's what I figured."
Luffy grinned, easy as breathing. "If she wants to come, she can come. I don't really care where people start. Long as they wanna sail."
That simple answer again. No weighing pros and cons. No suspicion.
Varin felt something ease in his chest. "Aye. Thought you'd say somethin' like that."
Luffy leaned back, hands behind his head. "Just don't make it weird. If she says no, that's fine too."
Varin chuckled. "Wouldn't dream of it, captain."
They sat a while longer after that. Luffy talked, in that loose wandering way of his, about how he got his Devil Fruit. A chest in a bar. Hunger. No second thoughts. Varin listened, nodded once, not surprised in the slightest. It tracked perfectly. Of course, the future king of idiots ate a mysterious fruit because he was hungry.
When Varin mentioned he smelled food, Luffy froze mid-sentence, eyes going wide. Then he was on his feet and gone, sprinting back toward camp like his life depended on it, yelling something about meat.
That left Varin alone again.
He leaned back, hands braced in the sand. The desert was almost pleasant at night. The heat bled out of the dunes, replaced by a dry cold that sat just shy of uncomfortable. If he focused, he could almost pretend it was snow-cooled stone instead of endless sand. Almost.
Footsteps approached. Soft. Too controlled to be Luffy. Too heavy to be Vivi. The sand muted most of it, but the faint clink of metal gave it away before Varin even turned his head.
"Zoro," Varin said, shifting his gaze up toward the swordsman as he stopped nearby. "What brings ya to my corner. Captain sent ya to fetch me or somethin."
"Nah," Zoro replied, dropping down beside him, settling into the same spot Luffy had abandoned. "Ero cook's doin' his usual pervy servant thing. Figured I'd step away before he loses a limb. Too loud to sleep over there anyway."
"Aye," Varin huffed. "I can hear it from here. An' I've got better hearing than most, so that's not really sayin somethin' to be fair." He glanced sideways at Zoro. "Seems like everyone wants a one-on-one lately. Think Sanji's the only one I haven't had a proper talk with yet."
Zoro snorted. "Lucky bastard."
They sat in silence for a bit. Not awkward. Just there. The kind of quiet that didn't demand filling.
"You fight weird," Zoro said eventually, eyes forward.
Varin smiled faintly. "That's a compliment or a complaint."
"Observation," Zoro replied. "You don't move like a normal brawler. Or a swordsman. Or any style I know."
"Aye, not sure on my style myself to be honest," Varin hummed.
"Aye, not sure on my style myself to be honest," Varin hummed. It wasn't false humility either. He'd tried to put a name to it before and always came up empty.
He shifted in the sand, one knee drawn up, gaze unfocused as he spoke. "I can brawl well enough. Got the strength for it. But when the claws come out, they don't sit right with fists." He flexed his fingers slightly, imagining the weight and curve of them. "They go to the wrist. Changes how you throw a punch. Makes it… messy."
He glanced at Zoro. "Told ya before, I used an axe. Back when I was younger. Heavy head, long haft. Worked fine then. Still would, probably. But now?" He shook his head. "Feels counterproductive. Same as just swingin' my fists like nothin's changed."
The truth of it settled heavy in his chest. "My fruit's my main weapon. Everything else feels like pretendin'. Like I'm fightin' around what I actually am instead of with it."
He exhaled through his nose. "Problem is, wolves ain't built for pretty cuts. Claws aren't like a cat's. They're for grip. For holdin' on." His jaw tightened slightly. "Real damage comes from the bite. From gettin close enough that there's no space left."
He didn't look at Zoro when he finished. "An' that's not always smart in a world full of devil fruits and blades longer than I am tall."
The wind rolled through the ruins again, whispering through broken stone and half-buried walls. Zoro didn't interrupt. He never did when someone was thinking themselves into something dangerous.
Varin was quiet for a long moment, eyes fixed on the dark stretch of sand beyond the campfires. Then he spoke, low and slow. "Though… that does give me an idea."
Zoro's gaze slid sideways to him.
"My biggest problem's always numbers," Varin went on. "I can win. Just not fast. One body at a time, one mistake at a time." He stopped there, the thought finishing itself somewhere behind his eyes.
Silence stretched. Then Varin's mouth curled, sharp and unmistakable. Not a smile. A baring of teeth. "Yeah," he said softly. "I've got an idea." The grin widened, more wolf than man. "And I don't reckon it's gonna be good for anyone on the other end of it."