Bullet's departure was like a stone dropped into a calm lake. It created a small ripple on the Oro Jackson, but the ship's boundless energy and the vastness of the sea quickly swallowed it. This crew never paused for anyone; it carried too many grand dreams to ever stop moving forward.
Days later, as they sailed through a peaceful stretch of the Grand Line, the afternoon sun cast a lazy golden glow over the deck. Seagulls soared in their wake, and everything was calm and quiet. But for a crew of pirates brimming with energy, quiet was just another word for boring.
"Hey, you lazy bums! If you've got nothing better to do, let's have a song!"
It was Roger's booming voice that shattered the silence. He stood with one foot propped on the ship's railing, a bottle of rum in hand and his signature grin plastered across his face.
"Oh, oh, oh! Singing!" Shanks and Buggy were the first to respond, sliding down the ropes from the crow's nest.
Other crew members put down their tasks and gathered around, eager smiles on their faces, ready for the show.
"What are we singing, Captain?" Jabba asked, leaning against the main mast while polishing his axes.
"Is that even a question?" Roger took a huge gulp of rum and wiped his mouth. "It's gotta be 'Binks's Sake'!"
"Yo-hohoho, Yo-hohoho..."
Roger kicked things off. His singing voice was... powerful, but it had all the accuracy of a cannonball trying to swat a fly. He made up for his lack of talent with sheer volume. Immediately, the rest of the crew joined in, their own terrible voices adding to the pirate anthem.
"Gather up all of the crew, it's time to ship out Binks's brew..."
Kozuki Oden's voice was the loudest, sung in the dramatic style of Wano theater. His off-key warbling sounded more like a Kabuki performance than a sea shanty. Buggy strained his vocal cords, trying to hit a high note that could overpower everyone else, but he only managed a sound like a shrieking seagull. Shanks tried to keep a rhythm, but surrounded by the sonic chaos, he quickly lost his way and ended up laughing too hard to sing.
Rayleigh held his drink, his mouth twitching as he tried to maintain his dignity as vice-captain, but the deep frown on his face revealed the intense suffering he was enduring. This wasn't a choir; it was a catastrophe. A gang of tone-deaf pirates was paying their highest respects to music by murdering it at the top of their lungs.
Kyle leaned against the stern, fiddling with a Tone Dial he'd picked up in Skypiea. His expression was a mask of calm, but inside, he was in agony. His Wave-Wave Fruit made his perception of sound a hundred times more sensitive than a normal person's. To him, the crew's singing felt like a thousand tiny needles being stabbed into his eardrums.
"I say... Kyle..." Spencer, another crewmate, leaned over, his face pale. "Your fruit controls 'waves,' doesn't it? Sound waves are waves too, right? Can't you... do something?" He gestured toward Roger, who was singing his heart out. "If the Captain keeps this up, the Sea Kings are going to think we're torturing something and come tear the ship apart."
Kyle blinked. A brilliant idea suddenly sparked in his mind. He's right. Sound waves are just waves. It was a bit like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut, but he couldn't take it anymore. A playful smile spread across his face.
"Well... I suppose it's not impossible."
He cleared his throat and closed his eyes. An invisible wave of energy spread out from him, silently blanketing the entire deck. The crew kept singing, oblivious.
"...Wave the flag and let it fly, our pride and joy to the sky..."
Then, a miracle happened. The chaotic, clashing noise was suddenly smoothed over by an invisible hand. Roger's rough voice was corrected into a powerful, magnetic baritone. Oden's strange warbling became a dramatic, story-filled aria. Buggy's piercing shriek transformed into a clear, beautiful tenor. Every voice was perfectly tuned and blended into a flawless harmony.
Even more incredibly, an entire orchestra seemed to appear out of thin air. A steady, powerful drumbeat, created by the compression of air, matched the rhythm of their hearts. The sound of bagpipes, formed from the friction of swirling air currents, carried the feeling of a salty sea breeze. Deep bass, crisp guitars, and even a grand piano joined in, weaving together into a magnificent symphony.
Kyle stood perfectly still, but he had become a maestro conducting a phantom orchestra, with the Oro Jackson as his stage. As the crew sang, they slowly realized something was wrong—or rather, something was perfectly right.
"Huh?" Buggy stopped, pointing at his own throat in disbelief. "Was... was that my voice?" He cleared his throat and tentatively sang a line. "It's time to ship out Binks's brew~"
The voice that came out was mellow, rich, and so beautiful it gave him goosebumps.
"A genius! I'm a musical genius!" Buggy declared, placing his hands on his hips and laughing at the sky. "Not only am I a genius in combat, but I was a born singer!"
Shanks also noticed what was happening and turned to Kyle, his eyes sparkling. "Kyle! Was that you? That's incredible!"
"Hahaha!" Roger's laugh was even louder than his singing. "This is fantastic! Kyle, you magnificent bastard, you're a genius!"
Far from stopping, the captain and his crew sang with even more passion. With Kyle's "million-dollar tuning" backing them up, they could pour all of their energy into the song without restraint. Set against the perfect symphony, their rendition of "Binks's Sake" became an epic anthem. The song was filled with their trust in each other, their acceptance of a pirate's fate, and their endless longing for the adventure that lay ahead.
The setting sun painted the sea in shades of gold as the world's freest men sang their song on the world's most legendary ship.
When the final note faded, a brief silence fell over the deck. Everyone was still lost in the magic of the perfect chorus they had just created.
"Ahem." Buggy cleared his throat, striking what he thought was a cool pose, ready to bless the world with a solo performance. "Yo-hohoho..."
The sound that came out was the same old familiar, grating squawk. Kyle had already withdrawn his power and was watching with a mischievous grin.
For a second, the crew froze. Then, the entire ship exploded with laughter.
"Pfft— HAHAHAHAHAHA!"
"Buggy! You're a total fake!" Shanks yelled, rolling on the deck with laughter.
"Shut up! It was your fault! You all threw me off!" Buggy's face turned beet red as he chased Shanks around the ship in a rage.
Roger walked over and slapped Kyle on the back so hard he nearly sent him overboard. "Hahaha! Well done, Kyle! From now on, you're the official Chief Musician of the Roger Pirates!"
Kyle rubbed his sore back and smiled. Bathed in the warm glow of the setting sun, surrounded by his laughing, chaotic nakama, the Oro Jackson sailed on.
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