Welcome to the mini-documentary "A Pirate's Day."
Morning light filtered through the porthole and dappled across Kael Grylls's face.
He yawned forever, then shuffled out of the cabin at a lazy drift.
The deck was a battlefield of hangovers. Last night's barrels lay keeled over like fallen giants, and a soft haze of rum still perfumed the air.
Scopper Gaban was using an empty cask for a pillow and snoring like a foghorn. Silvers Rayleigh had dozed off against a bulkhead, glasses askew, the faintest, most peaceful smile on his lips.
Ah yes, the Mona Rayleigh smile.
A few of the younger hands sprawled wherever gravity had won, limbs at impossible angles, like survivors of a vicious brawl instead of a party.
Kael tiptoed through the field of "corpses," careful not to step on anyone's head.
He reached the bow.
"Kael!"
A voice full of battle-lust barked behind him.
Kael did not bother to lift an eyelid. He kept walking.
Douglas Bullet was shirtless, every muscle cabled tight. He was bench-pressing a ship's anchor as if it were a dumbbell. The moment he spotted Kael, he dropped the anchor with a crash that rattled a few hungover souls right out of their dreams.
"Fight me, now!" Bullet set his stance, eyes blazing.
Kael, still facing away, waved at him like he was shooing a fly.
Ever since that day, the war maniac had become a talking parrot. Same time, same place, same line. More punctual than the ship's bell.
Ignoring the stare burning a hole between his shoulder blades, Kael walked to the prow.
"Morning, Kael!" Shanks was there with a wooden practice blade, trying to capture the shape of Roger's swordplay. Sweat soaked his flame-red hair.
Beside him, Buggy flipped a pair of daggers with all the flourish in the world and almost nicked the red nose he was so proud of. He jolted like he had seen his life flash by.
"Your center of gravity is way too high, Shanks," Kael said, voice languid. "A sword does not swing with the arm alone. Let your waist drive the whole body. Right now you are just arm-chopping. That will not kill anyone."
He flicked a look at Buggy. "And you. A weapon is an extension of the body. If you cannot control your own hands, how are you going to control the blade? You almost poked your nose. Try hitting an enemy like that."
"Mind your own business!" Buggy's face went scarlet. His mouth refused to yield, but his wrists grew a lot more honest.
Shanks's eyes lit. He lowered the practice blade and began correcting his stance.
Kael said nothing more. He strolled to his personal cask of orange juice, tapped a cup full, and took a long, cold, sweet pull that made his eyes half-close with contentment.
He flopped onto his private deck lounger, limbs everywhere, sunglasses sliding into place, one leg rocking idly.
Sea breeze, warm sun, gulls crying in the distance like a lullaby.
He sighed, entirely satisfied. "What a plain, simple, boring day."
…End of documentary…
The words had barely left his mouth.
Whooooop!
A needle-sharp whine tore in from far off. It arrived almost instantly.
Boom!!!
A black cannonball exploded less than ten meters off the bow, lifting a wall of ocean.
The waterfall that followed baptized Kael from head to toe. He went from beach mode to drowned revenant in under a second, and his freshly poured orange juice vanished into the sea with tragic efficiency.
His relaxed expression calcified.
He sat frozen in his soaked lounger, long hair plastered to his forehead, water dripping from his jaw. He looked exactly like the sort of water ghost sailors tell stories about.
He could feel his favorite floral shirt clinging cold to his skin.
"Who fired a Conqueror-coated cannonball…" Kael's voice rose from the abyss.
The blast sobered the ship in one heartbeat.
"What happened?"
"Are we under attack?"
Groggy pirates shot upright, sleep gone.
"What's going on? Is it party time again?" Gol D. Roger poked his head out of the captain's cabin, a single cowlick standing tall, excitement already bright in his eyes.
Before anyone could answer, a voice like a war drum rolled in from the horizon.
"Bwahahahaha! Roger! I see your ship! This time you are not getting away!"
They turned to look. A massive dog-headed Navy warship was cutting the waves straight at the Oro Jackson.
At the prow stood a mountain of a man in a white coat of Justice, hands on hips and a grin big enough to split the sky.
"It's Garp!" Shanks yelped.
"The Navy Hero…" Bullet's gaze sharpened, the fire of battle flaring again, only now fixed on a different prey.
"Tch. This crazy old man…" Gaban pushed his sunglasses up with a sigh of long practice.
Roger saw who it was and grinned wider.
He vaulted to the rail and shouted, hands on hips, "Yo, Garp! Still haunting me like a stubborn ghost, huh? Missed me that much?"
"Can it! I am here to arrest you, Roger!" Monkey D. Garp bellowed, snatching up a cannonball one-handed. Muscles knotted down his arm as he hurled it like a pitcher with a grudge.
"Kūhahahaha! You will have to do better than that!"
A pulse of invisible pressure blasted out from Roger.
Across the gap, Garp's spirit surged to match.
Black-red lightning flickered into being and collided midair, painting the sky a menacing bruise.
The sea between the ships split under the weight of their wills. Water sheared aside as if the ocean itself chose to make room for two legends to shout at each other.
Every youngster on deck, Shanks and Buggy included, felt their hearts lurch in their chests and their lungs forget the trick of breathing beneath the clash of Conqueror's Haki.
"Kūhahahaha! Garp, you always make an entrance like this. Afraid people will not notice you?" Roger laughed from the rail.
"Stuff it, Roger! I have chased you halfway across the Grand Line!" Garp roared back, that beloved blast-furnace voice shaking the rigging. "Be good and come along to Impel Down!"
"Kūhahahaha! That depends on whether you can manage it!"
They traded lines across the water with the easy intimacy of old enemies who know each other too well. The crushing pressure that had choked the air a moment ago felt suspiciously like their version of a handshake.
"Hey, Garp!" Gaban called, nudging his shades. "Since we are already here, how about you two go fight and we start a party, per tradition? Pretty sure I smell roasted meat on your ship."
The word party lit up every eye. Even the wary ones started to gleam with expectation.
"Oooooooh!"
"Party, party!"
They had done this dance with the Navy Hero before.
Garp froze, grin faltering. He scratched his head and wore an expression pirates would one day carve into cautionary figureheads.
"Ah, about that…" He hemmed and hawed. "Sorry. The last few parties with you lot got back to Kong. He said if I keep going easy on you, he is cutting off my senbei for a whole year."
The Navy and pirates turned to statues at once.
Rayleigh's mouth twitched and he nearly missed the deck. Gaban's sunglasses slid right off his nose. Shanks and Buggy stood there, jaws unhinged wide enough for a seagull to nest.
For senbei… The Navy Hero was going to get serious for rice crackers.
"Kūhahahaha!" Roger doubled over, tears of mirth threatening, "Garp, you never change! Fine! In that case, a proper fight it is!"
"Glad you finally said something smart!" Garp launched without another word. Both legs slammed the deck and he rocketed from the warship, crossing the Haki-torn sea trench like a human cannon round.
"Men, move in! Board them! Catch a few and we feast tonight!"
"Sir, yes, sir!"
Navy soldiers answered with a roar, weapons flashing as they readied the grapnels.
"We are up too!" Roger snapped, and the Oro Jackson erupted into motion. Pirates howled back, grinning like wolves that had found their moon.
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