Chapter Six
With an effort, Tashigi kept her hand from the hilt of her sword. "Captain, surely you wouldn't kill me when I hadn't even drawn blade against you --"
"It'd be a great deal easier than killing you when you had," he cut in. "Let's not play games, Claw. I know about your little approaches to our host. Did you honestly think I'd tolerate that kind of disloyalty?"
There was something in the way he phrased that, something which nagged at Tashigi. If Kuro had wanted to impress Bonney, he could easily have revealed her as a Marine spy and turned her over. She was sure that Bonney could do all sorts of interesting and unpleasant things with Marine spies. Which meant that Kuro might be playing a role here, just as much as ever, and she just needed to work out what it was and what her own part should be in reply.
It would help, she felt, if he could give her a few more clues. But if this was meant to look like a convincing fight . . .
"Don't think I haven't heard what you're planning," she snapped back, letting her hand close round the hilt of her sword. "Were you going to sell me out, then? Me and your crew as well? Was I just supposed to lie down and wait to die?"
There. She hadn't misread it. There was just a fraction of a shadow of approval in his eyes. "Foolish pirate," he said. "It would have been better for you if you had."
She backed away from him down the corridor. They had to get somewhere where they could talk without being overheard. "Just let me go, sir," she suggested. "Let me take service elsewhere. I've no call to want you dead if we can part on good terms."
"There's only one place that this can go, Claw," he said blandly. "Prepare yourself."
His blades scraped against each other. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end.
She backed further away, coming out into a large room with the ubiquitous paintings on the walls. A small group of mingled pirates and Marines who'd been playing cards in the corner looked up as they came in, and promptly scattered to the corners to cower there.
Tashigi wished she had a reputation that dramatic.
Kuro burst into motion, too fast for Tashigi to follow his passage. His blades whirred through the air. She felt herself lose a lock of hair, parrying frantically as she was forced back and further back again, ducking and stepping, her knee complaining at a particular sidestep, and came to a halt midway through the room panting for air.
He really was that good. She was torn between admiration, fear, and a hope that he might just be good enough to get them both out of it and deal with the matter, and just a touch of annoyance that he was so much better than she was.
"It seems that I will have to extend myself," he said calmly. "Congratulations on your brief survival, Claw --"
Tashigi's brain whirred like paddlewheels, and clicked up some remarkably precise descriptions of what Kuro's ultimate attack was, as delivered by people who'd viewed the dead afterwards.
"It won't last long."
With a brief moment of prayer to any gods that had a soft spot for Marines -- after all, surely there had to be some -- she hit the ground and lay there flat as the air above her exploded in blades and screams.
A long breath later, there was silence. Kuro was standing above her, blades splayed out like claws, and the air was thick with plaster. It cascaded down from the walls where the paintings had been sliced into scrawls, and it dusted her in white, and powdered her glasses.
Kuro prodded her with a foot.
If he had wanted me dead, I'd be dead, so since I'm not dead . . .
She didn't grunt or cough. She lay there like a sack of potatoes, one eye flicking open for a moment then closing again.
"So perish all traitors," Kuro said calmly. "Can any of you gentlemen tell me where to find Bonney?"
One of the cowering pirates was forced out of corner by the combined pressure of everyone else trying to hide behind him. "Um, she's probably in the map room, sir."
"Excellent," Kuro said. "You may lead me there."
"Yessir," the pirate whimpered.
Kuro walked away. He didn't look back at her.
---
Tashigi lay there and thought. She realised that she had a very limited period of time. Captain Kuro had bought her that much, and bought himself a little longer to operate as Bonney's apparent ally. There had to be something that she could do.
So what did she know? She knew that Bonney was working through the painted designs on the walls. What she didn't know was how long their effect lasted. She knew from a report about the Goldenweek woman that her effects worked instantaneously but also wore off pretty much instantaneously. But Kuro had sliced the paintings in this room to bits, and the pirates weren't immediately turning on each other or getting arrested by the Marines, so the effect couldn't be instantaneous here. But it couldn't be permanent, either, or Bonney would already have minions out all over the place, and wouldn't have to keep her growing band here like this.
And there hadn't been any ships patrolling the area, either. Not even Marines. So logically, the effect might not even last the day.
The pirates and marines grumbled to each other, then left the room, muttering about how someone else could remove her body.
If only she had Colonel Smoker in his right mind, to take charge and sort it out . . .
Colonel Smoker . . .
Smoke . . .
Marine bases were generally laid out the same way, or at least on the same principles. Her mind was working properly now, flipping down card after card in a particularly smooth and successful solitaire pattern. They were arranged so that they could be defended from fixed strongpoints inside the base, in the event of pirate invasions, and that included internal anti-intruder mechanisms to rout pirate scum out of the place. She'd heard of some places that were rigged up to allow water flow to be directed through the tunnels and passages to flush the place clear. Nothing like that here, but it should have the standard smoke bombs in the armoury, and the standard ventilation systems.
Fill the place with smoke, and vision no longer became an issue.
And even if it didn't break Bonney's hold on her minions, she and Captain Kuro were used to operating with reduced vision. Far more so than anyone else here.
She let her eyelids flicker open. The room was empty.
In a single motion she was up, tripping over, picking herself up again, and running.
---
Fortunately the news wasn't generally out yet that she was dead. Tashigi had considered draping herself in a bloody sheet and claiming to be a ghost -- or, more reasonably, finding ordinary clothing and pretending to be a servant -- but the first was the sort of excess she'd expect from Straw Hat Luffy's crew, and the second would probably require her to take off her glasses, so neither was acceptable.
What was more, everyone's loyalty to Bonney was working in Tashigi's favour. She was able to get right up next to the two guards on the Armoury door (both Marines, sadly, they should have had better instincts about standing guard, she'd have to speak to their commanding officer about it) while claiming to be on orders from Bonney before they thought to say, "Huh?"
They didn't have a chance to say anything else.
She propped their unconscious bodies against the wall, rifles draped across their chests, and hoped that they'd pass for asleep to the casual observer. One of them had been carrying the key, and it turned easily in the lock. Too easily. This argued current use. That was bad.
Tashigi stepped into the Armoury, and realised just how bad it was.
The stocks of rifles were seriously depleted. The same for cutlasses, powder, bullets, cannonballs . . . all the basics that a crew of raiders would need. It all argued that Bonney was on the cusp of moving. She and Captain Kuro had got there just in time. Fortunately, there was still an acceptable stack of smoke bombs. She suspected that this was because they weren't convenient weapons for open-deck warfare; the wind usually carried the smoke away too fast.
For a moment, the immensity of what she was about to do seized her. She was about to assault a Marine Base. Good officers just didn't do things like that. She was going up single-handed (well, unless you counted Kuro and his crew) against a whole horde of hypnotised and probably still, she reflected glumly, extremely competent fighters (and please, please let Colonel Smoker somehow stay out of it all till it was sorted out). What was she thinking?
She leaned her head against the cold wall for a moment, and took a deep breath.
The stupid image of Straw Hat Luffy came to her mind. Furious, battered, exhausted, but still able to fight, demanding that she tell him where Crocodile was. Was she going to do any less than a pirate?
Tashigi gritted her teeth. No. She was not. And what was more, she had a time limit. It wasn't just until Bonney found out that she was still alive; it was until the Straw Hats got here, because if they fell under Bonney's mesmerism, then her window of opportunity would be very firmly shut.
She began fitting detonators to smoke bombs and setting timers.
---
Sneaking up the stairs with a wet cloth over her face, Tashigi decided that her attack had been a qualified success. The screams and crashes coming from all around suggested general confusion, but there weren't any cries of, "Arrest all the pirates!" either. She'd hidden in the basement to start with, so as to avoid the first wave of explosions. The headquarters was now full of thick white smoke which hung crisply in the air, veiling walls, combatants, ceilings, floors, and the door five inches from her nose which treacherously got in the way.
As stealthily as she could after that thud, she swung the door open and prowled down the corridor. She'd drawn her sword; anyone getting in her way was going down first and she'd ask questions later.
A screaming group of three pirates reeled past her, punching each other vigorously. She faded back against the wall, letting them stagger past. Nobody seemed to be having dramatic recoveries from hypnosis yet, much to her regret; this three were just arguing about a dice game, each blaming the other for setting the place on fire in order to cover palming the dice.
A more organised patrol of Marines came tramping down the corridor. They'd fixed wet kerchiefs across their faces, like her. Tashigi scrambled behind the door, hand tightening round the hilt of her sword. She was sure she could take them, but the longer she avoided patrols, the better her chance of reaching Bonney.
The Marines stamped past. With a long breath that she didn't realised she'd been holding, Tashigi sidled out again, and continued on, coming to a small door in the wall. Now if this was the standard layout, it should give onto a gallery on the main hall where Bonney had been holding court. She clicked it barely open, let it slowly swing enough to let her through, then fell to hands and knees and crawled through the opening, keeping below the balcony level.
"I find your statement unconvincing," Bonney said. She was sitting upright in her chair now rather than lounging in it, lips thin with irritation, below and to Tashigi's left. There was less smoke in this room, Tashigi noted; unfortunately she hadn't managed to leave any of the smoke bombs close to it. Most of the senior officers and captains had left, though Tashigi could make out Colonel Smoker chewing on a pair of cigars. Kuro was the focus of all eyes, standing near the centre of the room. He was still wearing his blade-gloves, and his glasses shone through the drifting haze like evil moons.
Kuro shrugged. "I killed her. What more needs to be said?"
"I'm told her body's gone."
"Not my concern." Kuro smiled distantly. "I'm more interested in living enemies than dead ones."
"Perhaps you can be a little more talkative under pressure." Bonney snapped her fingers. "Colonel Smoker --"
Kuro was already moving, blades scything towards her. Of course he wouldn't be stupid enough to stand there and let her finish an order to capture him. But Colonel Smoker was moving too, body erupting into thick white coils of smoke that spun through the air faster than metal or flesh. He snatched Kuro out of the air mid-pounce, and held him there, body dangling, ten swords cutting at the air impotently.
"-- yes. Thank you." Bonney took a long breath. "Well, I think that we can skip the polite questioning and go straight to the unpleasant bit, don't you? Let's start with . . ."
Tashigi slid her left hand up the side of her face to adjust her glasses. She should retreat. She should leave Kuro and take the opportunity to get out of there, find his crew, regroup, get away, report on the situation to Black Cage Hina. She should do a lot of things.
But it wouldn't be honourable, and it wouldn't be loyal, and most of all, it wouldn't be just. And if a Marine didn't have justice, they had nothing at all.
Better not to wait for a moment; better to make her own moment. She swung herself up to perch on the balcony, and threw herself out in a rolling somersault, landing two steps behind Bonney.
She felt her knee scream at the landing. She didn't have time for that.
One step.
Bonney was good physically, but she wasn't that good. She hadn't been fast enough to expect Kuro's attack. She was only just beginning to turn.
Two steps.
Tashigi had her blade at Bonney's neck. She grabbed Bonney's left wrist as the woman reached for a knife and twisted it up behind her back, using it to hold her steady. "No further, Madam Bonney" she said. "Or someone dies. Probably you."
---
One Piece Fanfic