-Broadcast-
There is no free lunch in the world. Trafalgar Law watched with cold calculation as "Momoko" entered the secret laboratory. Whatever lay hidden within those walls—whatever made Donquixote Doflamingo and Caesar Clown invest such resources—he intended to discover. The more his enemies cared about something, the more interested Law became.
His curiosity, ruthless and clinical, had pushed a child not yet ten years old into the abyss.
Caesar Clown naturally accepted an experimental subject delivered directly to his door. Even if the boy might be a spy sent by Law, what could he accomplish? Once Caesar had him on the operating table, the child would be sliced open like all the others.
What harm could one small child possibly do?
Kozuki Momonosuke was led by the hand through sterile corridors by a female experimenter. He didn't see the mad scientist Law had warned him about—not that he'd expected personal attention. Caesar Clown wouldn't bother greeting new experimental material personally. The boy wasn't important enough.
The secret laboratory's external defenses were extraordinarily tight. Hundreds of armed personnel stood guard, all wearing Marine uniforms. Whether they were genuine Marine soldiers or merely dressed to blend in remained unclear. Under Vice Admiral Vergo's operation, everything here remained hidden from Marine Headquarters—completely undetectable to oversight.
Various facilities showed signs of recent construction. The secret laboratory couldn't have been built more than a few months ago, yet it was already fully operational. The rushed timeline showed in the corners—post-construction inspectors still worked at certain stations, making final adjustments.
The first floor appeared mundane enough. Clinical. Professional.
That's where they stripped Momonosuke naked.
Two female experimenters worked with mechanical efficiency, disinfecting his small body with cold, astringent chemicals. Then came the injection—a syringe filled with milky liquid they pushed directly into his arm without warning or explanation.
Within seconds, Momonosuke's vision blurred. The world tilted sideways. His legs gave out, and he collapsed into one woman's arms, consciousness fading to black.
After completing the standard intake procedure, the experimenters transferred the sedated subject to the laboratory's second level. This was where the real work happened—where Caesar Clown's experimental materials met their ultimate destinies.
-Unknown Time Later-
Consciousness returned gradually, reluctantly. Kozuki Momonosuke's eyes fluttered open to find himself submerged in colorless liquid, an oxygen mask secured over his mouth and nose. He could breathe, though each inhalation tasted chemical, wrong.
Through the glass container imprisoning him, he could see the laboratory beyond.
Oh gods...
Humans in every conceivable state filled glass containers as far as the eye could see. Embryos preserved in formaldehyde. Fetuses at various stages of development. Newborns and infants, some normal, others displaying severe deformities. Children, adults, elderly—all suspended in their transparent prisons. Beyond complete bodies were dissected specimens: organs arranged by type, limbs severed and catalogued, and most common of all, brain tissue floating in preservative solution.
Momonosuke found himself positioned among a cluster of child-sized containers. The realization—that he was just another specimen in this collection—made bile rise in his throat despite the oxygen mask.
This creepy, horrific scene ignited both rage and terror in the boy's heart. Though he'd eaten corpses to survive, those had been dead things—tools for staying alive. But these specimens in the glass containers had been living people. To sacrifice humanity itself in the name of science? Caesar Clown wasn't a scientist. He was a monster wearing human skin.
The anesthetic's effects should have lasted hours. But the artificial Devil Fruit in Momonosuke's body granted abnormally high drug resistance. He'd awakened far earlier than the experimenters expected.
And now that he was conscious, he had no intention of staying trapped.
Momonosuke tried punching the glass first. His fist barely created ripples in the viscous fluid, generating no meaningful force. The confined space prevented proper movement.
Then I'll use something harder.
He touched his own head with one hand, making a grim decision. His skull had survived a fall that should have killed him—the Devil Fruit had reinforced his bone structure beyond human norms.
Time to test exactly how much.
Momonosuke began slamming his forehead against the glass container's inner surface. Again. And again. And again.
According to common sense, these specialized containers couldn't be broken from the inside by ordinary humans. But Kozuki Momonosuke was no longer ordinary. The artificial Devil Fruit's influence had increased his skull's hardness and rigidity beyond critical thresholds. By focusing hundreds of impacts on a single point, he could create cumulative stress fractures.
THUNK. THUNK. THUNK.
Blood clouded the nutrient solution around his face. His forehead split open, crimson streaming from the wound. But he didn't stop. Couldn't stop.
After hundreds of impacts, spider-web cracks finally appeared on the container's outer surface.
CRASH.
The glass shattered. Nutrient solution gushed out, carrying Momonosuke with it onto the cold laboratory floor. He gasped, ripping off the oxygen mask, pulling out the various needles and tubes that had been inserted throughout his body.
"Finally..." He coughed up chemical-tasting fluid, voice raw. "This place is disgusting. How many people did they capture?"
Momonosuke checked his body as he stood on shaking legs. Nothing was missing—all his parts remained attached—but several liters of blood had been extracted. His head wound throbbed but wasn't serious. The real problem was weakness. His legs could barely support his weight.
But he forced himself forward, limping through the laboratory's horror gallery.
As he walked, more victims from other races revealed themselves. Caesar Clown practiced absolute equality in his atrocities—his collection included specimens from virtually every sentient species across the seas.
A mermaid, bisected at the waist, her beautiful scales now clouded in preservative.
Multiple Fish-Man specimens, their powerful bodies reduced to anatomical displays.
A pair of legs from the Longleg Tribe, severed mid-thigh.
Arms from the Longarm Tribe, their extra joints labeled and measured.
Organs from Tontatta dwarves, so tiny they required magnifying equipment to study properly.
Heads from giants, each the size of a small house.
And more. So many more.
Every glass container bore a label beneath it, explaining in clinical detail which race the specimen originated from, which body part had been harvested, the experimental number assigned. Sometimes Caesar Clown had arranged displays that were deliberately cruel—combining specimens in ways designed to mock their relationships in life.
Momonosuke's scalp tingled with revulsion. His hands clenched into fists as rage warred with nausea.
These were people. They had names. They had families. They had lives.
Then he stopped.
His entire body went rigid. The blood drained from his face.
No. Please, no. Not him.
In a massive glass container—one designed for giant-sized specimens—floated a severed head.
Unlike other giants in the collection, this one had distinctive features: two curved horns protruding from the skull, wild red hair, sharp fangs visible through partially opened lips, and light green skin that seemed wrong in death.
Next to the container, displayed like a treasured artifact, sat a hand-woven straw hat.
Momonosuke's legs gave out. He collapsed to his knees, eyes fixed on the label beneath the container. Each word was a knife to his heart:
SPECIMEN #847
ORIGIN: One of the 43 pirate crews under the Whitebeard Pirates
SUBJECT: Little Oars Jr., Captain of the Oars Pirates
BLOODLINE: Descendant of Oars the Continent-Puller, suspected Ancient Giant heritage
NOTES: Close friend of Fire Fist Ace. Straw hat (displayed adjacent) was handmade gift from Portgas D. Ace, symbol of their friendship.
Tears began streaming down Momonosuke's cheeks. The dam he'd built around his emotions—the wall that had let him survive eating corpses, endure isolation, accept necessary cruelty—cracked and shattered.
All of Kozuki Momonosuke's fantasies about the Whitebeard Pirates helping him reclaim Wano Country dissolved in that moment. The tears wouldn't stop. The boy was on the verge of complete psychological collapse under the accumulated weight of horror and loss.
"Why...?" His voice emerged as a broken whisper. "Why did it have to end like this?"
He looked at Ace's handmade straw hat—a symbol of friendship between the Fire Fist and the gentle giant. Rage surged through grief. Momonosuke kicked the hat away violently.
"If you hadn't existed," he snarled through tears at the absent Ace, "if you hadn't been Roger's son, if you hadn't been captured—the Whitebeard Pirates wouldn't have been destroyed! Little Oars Jr. wouldn't have had his head cut off and preserved like a trophy!"
While lamenting Little Oars Jr.'s tragic fate, Kozuki Momonosuke also wept for his own bleak future. With the Whitebeard Pirates annihilated, how could Wano Country possibly be saved? His few remaining retainers could never match the Four Emperors Kaido. Was Wano destined to remain under Kurozumi Orochi's rule forever?
"I'm alone," Momonosuke sobbed, pressing his forehead against the cold glass container. "Completely alone. There's no one left who can help me. I'm eight years old and I'm alone and I don't know what to do—"
Then the head opened its eyes.
Momonosuke's words died in his throat. He froze, tears still wet on his face, unable to process what he was seeing.
Little Oars Jr.'s massive eyes—clouded but aware—focused on him. The giant's jaw moved slowly, laboriously, producing sounds that shouldn't have been possible from a severed head.
"Momo... Kozuki... Momo..."
The voice was wet, distorted by preservative fluid and trauma, but undeniably conscious.
He's alive. Gods above and below, he's still alive. They cut off his head and he's STILL ALIVE.
"Little Oars?" Momonosuke's voice came out as a horrified squeak. "You're... how are you..."
The giant's eyes held such pain—not physical, but emotional. Recognition and sorrow mixed with something that might have been relief.
"Help..." The single word took enormous effort. "Me..."
Kozuki Momonosuke knelt before the container, face to face with the still-living horror of Caesar Clown's cruelest experiment, and felt whatever remained of his childhood die.
In that moment, he understood: there were fates worse than death. Caesar Clown didn't just kill his victims—he kept them alive, conscious, suffering, so he could study how long they'd endure.
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