Fate

<i>Hoodoo Island, North Blue</i>

"Kid, you and Bonney stay on the boat. I got this information from Doflamingo's informant, so he's probably going to try something. Gem, you and Killer are with me."

Rex then disembarks from his ship, feeling a strange, ominous feeling the moment he does so. This island was… strange.

"Captain… do you feel that too?" Killer asks, his hand hovering a millimeter above his sword. "Just what kind of person is this crewmate your planning on having us recruit?"

"He is… unique."

As the trio walk into town, the ominous aura only seems to grow. All the townspeople wore white garbs and a small white hat and seemed to ignore the trio as if they weren't there.

Life in the town seemed to be going on as normal, only the trio were markedly invisible. It was sort of like that eerie scene in a horror movie when a character discovers that they're a ghost.

Rex quickly looks down at the ground, sighing as he sees that he's not a transparent, floating spirit. Still, there is something odd going on.

Deciding to find it out, Rex grabs a civilian who seemed to command some respect and drags them into an alleyway.

"What's going on here?"

"Ah, a spirit has abducted me! Help me masters!" The civilian acts as if he cannot see Rex whatsoever and tries to struggle away from him.

"Enough of this farce!" Rex says, getting irritated. "Where. Is. Basil. Hawkins!?"

The man has a confused expression on his face. "Hawkins? That's who you're looking for?"

Rex nods, loosening his grip on the man.

"Ah thank Bondye! You have come to take the scourge of Hoodoo away!" The man says, his fear turning into ecstatic glee.

The man then explains how, hours before Rex had arrived, a Hoodoo fortune teller foresaw that a great divergence in fate would arrive to the village. The fortune teller claimed that by housing this divergence, great turmoil would come to their village and one person would be taken away from the island, their fate forever twisted.

"I see…" Rex says, genuinely surprised that this old fortune teller was able to accurately predict his arrival. It seemed there was something to this island…

"If you just want Hawkins, the village will be happy to turn him over to you. That man is an abomination to the fine art of Hoodoo!" The man snorts, before giving Rex detailed information as to Hawkins' location.

Rex frowns. This seemed way too easy.

Still, Rex wasn't the kind of person to look a gift horse in the mouth, and decided to move to the location.

The moment he leaves, the man's face twists and contorts into an evil smile. Several others appear behind him with similar grins as the man reveals a single hair he had taken from Rex.

"Rejoice my brothers and sisters, for the ritual, begins!"

Meanwhile, at the shores of the island, four pirate ships arrive, each of their captains bearing a wide grin on their faces.

"200 million? For a kid whose barely wet behind the ears? Trebol must be losing his touch!" A brash, obese captain says with a grin.

"Don't underestimate the boy. I have heard he possesses a mythic Zoan type devil fruit." A more silent, pensive captain adds.

"We needn't worry about that! I paid some good expense for a sea stone tip for my spear. As long as I run him through, we needn't worry about any devil fruit!" A grinning woman says, flourishing her brand new spear in the other captains' eyes.

"What of the other devil fruit user. This Kid?"

"You don't need to worry about that… I'll handle Kid myself." The last man says a wide grin under his masked face. If Rex had seen him, he would recognize him as Gladius, the strongest cadre in the Pica Army.

This was going to be a tough fight for Kid.

"Ugh, why couldn't this friend of yours live on the beach, or on a nice sunny resort in the forest." Gem whines, wiping beads of sweat off his face as he ascends the volcano. Each sweat droplet creates a small, firecracker-esque explosion as it lands.

"What can I say, my friends are all interesting people? Have you ever met someone strong who lived a nice peaceful life on the beach?"

Gem raises his finger to protest this, only for it to fall down.

The trio then continue scaling the mountain with difficulty, eventually reaching the summit. At the summit, they meet two strange men, in the midst of a spar.

"Electro!" A large cat mink roared, his body coursing with a bright blue electricity as he charged at his opponent.

"The Fool, a fitting card for your brazen attack. Now you dodge!"

Hawkins then forms a straw sword, whipping at Faust, viciously. Rex squints as he sees Hawkins' lack of restraint in combat, was he that confident in his ability to see the future.

The cat mink tumbles out of the way, just in the nick of time, his claws digging into the mountain's stone face to quickly regain his footing. He then proceeds to run animalistically on his four limbs towards Hawkins.

Rex watches the fight intently, feeling that he had been snubbed to be born a human. Fishmen could breathe underwater, Giants could lift ships with their bare hands and Minks could control electricity. What could humans do?

The only uniquely human capability Rex could think of from the manga was Conqueror's Haki, but that might have only been a coincidence.

Still, Rex watched the fight intently from the sidelines. From what he could tell, Hawkins was nowhere near as strong as he was in canon, but he was still strong enough to be a senior officer. If Rex had to place him at the moment, it would be below Killer, but above Bonney without her fruit. With her fruit, Bonney was difficult to place.

"I think we should go over and introduce ourselves, don't you?"

Clap! Clap! Clap! Rex leaves his hidey hole with a slow clap for Hawkins and Faust.

The two immediately go on guard, worried about a surreptitious attack.

"So, you were the ominous lurker I saw in the cards. What have you come here for?"

"Oh, your cards didn't tell you as much?"

Hawkins frowns, as it was indeed odd to him that his fortune telling had revealed so little.

Not unlike Shyarly at fishman island, Hawkins had always had a talent for reading the future. At six, he predicted a great king's execution, months later, he predicted a massacre in the West Blue and since then, many large world events had been predicted some way or another through his Tarot readings.

However, when faced with this ominous lurker, Hawkins' talents seemed to fail him.

"You are a divergence in destiny. Something that is, but never should have been. As such, my scrying of you is… obscured."

Rex frowns, this was the second time he had heard something like this on this island. Of course, he knew very well that his presence had shifted the 'destiny' of this world in so many ways, but he was unnerved that so many others came to the same conclusion.

"Well, my purpose is simple, I'd like you to join my crew, the King Pirates!"

"Oh, what an intriguing proposal." Hawkins says with a strange look, withdrawing a deck of cards. "Let us see what fate has to say on this matter."

Taking four cards, Hawkins flips them up. The reversed Emperor, the reversed Seven of Wands, the Eight of Swords, the Two of Cups.

Hawkins smiles bitterly as he reads the cards. "I don't have a choice, do I?"

Rex grins, finding Hawkins to be extremely reasonable. While he didn't know exactly what Hawkins had 'read' in the cards, it seemed he had discovered that one way or another, Rex was going to recruit him, willing or not.

"Faust, pack up our things, we're leaving with the King Pirates."

On the King Gucci.

"Are you expecting company?" Rose asked Kid, reading through the newspaper as she sees a ship approaching out of the corner of her eye.

"No." Kid says with a frown.

If it was just one ship, Kid wasn't sure if it meant anything. Maybe they were merchants for the island.

The ship kept drawing nearer and nearer to the King Gucci making Kid feel an ominous feeling in his stomach.

Kid closes his eyes, feeling out the ship in front of him. It seemed to contain a sizeable amount of metal, but none of it was moving. Was the ship abandoned?

Kid widens his eyes. "It's a trap!"

In an instant, Kid mobilizes a massive amount of metal to form a wall protecting the King Gucci, moments later, the ship explodes.

Then, three ships appear in the distance, surrounding the King Gucci from the sea. Dozens of men come charging at the ship from the shore, climbing their way up the ship.

"Battle stations!"

Boom! A large explosion of the ground sends a blue-haired figure and another immense shadow flying towards the ship.

Landing on the bow of the King Gucci, Gladius immediately rushes towards Kid, knowing from Doflamingo that his fruit was the most dangerous among the King pirates. Even more dangerous than the captain's mythic Zoan.

Drawing his gun, Gladius immediately fires a spray of Pamu Pamu bullets at Kid.

Kid grins using his magnetism to deviate the bullet passed him. However, Gladius activates his ability, causing the bullet to detonate behind him, throwing him forward sending shrapnel fragments into his back.

Kid quickly stabilizes himself but grimaces as he stares down Gladius. Looking to his fellow officers, Kid finds that Bonney is being held back by a large, overweight man while the other crew members are dealing with the attackers at sea.

"You, where do you rank among that bastard Doflamingo's cadres!?" Kid asked, wanting to know where his opponent stood.

"Insolent bastard!" Gladius roared, engaged that the first mate of a small pirate group dared take his captain's name in vain. "I rank second among the elite officers, below the Captain, the four staff officers and one other of my peers."

Kid grins. "That's good! I'll use your corpse to send Doflamingo a message. I only tango with the best!"

Kid then leaps forward, condensing a full set of metal armor around his body.

"MECHA FIST!"

On the mainland, Rex has also run into problems, as he is leaving with Hawkins and Bonney, Rex finds three parties waiting for him at the bottom of the hill. One of the groups was the man he had roughed up earlier, followed by a dozen other similarly dressed acolytes, then the other two were moderately famous pirate groups.

"Well, it seems you're a busy man, my new captain. I don't need my cards to see that this is a bad situation."

"Why would you say that?" Rex laughed. "I could take all these fools down myself!"

"Maybe you can, but the fates will not be so kind as to let you!" The Hoodoo priest says, stabbing a knife into his left arm.

Killer and Gem are shocked, but Rex and Hawkins know exactly what is going on. Rex clenches his teeth as an identical wound to the one the priest had inflicted on himself appeared in his own shoulder.

"Voodoo!" Hawkins cries, narrowing his eyes at the practitioner. Hawkins himself had dabbled in the art but was nowhere near as successful as the priest yet.

Rex shook his head, he had originally thought the art was unique to the Wara Wara no Mi user, but it seems it was some kind of martial art. Hypnosis maybe?

Killer and Gem move to help their captain, but are blocked by the two other pirates. As for Hawkins, he is unsure as to whether or not he should intervene.

The battle erupts at once. Killer begins fighting with the spear wielding woman while Gem takes on the tall, silent captain. Both were powerful pirates with bounties of over 30 million Berries, making them difficult opponents. Not to mention they had their full crews with them, aiding from the sides.

As for Rex's own opponent, he was just annoying. The man was basically just running away inflicting wounds on his own body which would then be transferred to Rex.

Rex dashed after him, but it takes him a minute before he finally has the man in a chokehold.

"Haha, what will you do to me?" The priest says with a grin. "Any wound inflicted on me will transfer to you! That includes death!"

Rex nods, recalling the ability, but he also knew its weakness. Ensuring that the other captains weren't looking, Rex grins.

Suddenly, a zipper forms under his left armpit, and quickly unzips his left arm like the removable sleeve from a jacket.

"I'm going to take your left arm." Rex says, ripping the man's arm off, he screams in agony.

"Then your right." Rex says, switching arms before he rips the right arm off.

"Both legs too." The man is now rolling on the ground, bleeding out.

"Then I'll let you bleed out." Rex says, turning his back and walking away.

The captains, who see this brutal scene have a slight fear in their eyes. They had met the priest in town and after he had shown his Voodoo to them, they had thought he would be useful. To see him so ruthlessly tortured…

The silent man tries to leave first, sending his men to block Gem.

"Janko 'the Wise', huh?" Rex says, dashing in front of the captain in moments. He was really pissed off at this point as the blood had ruined his clothing. "Not so wise today, eh?"

Rex dropkicks Janko furiously with the captain raising both his arms to block. However, as he does that, Janko feels Rex's leg soften and wrap around his arms. Before he can even react, Rex slams him down into the ground and stomps on his head, smashing his 'wise' brains into pulp.

"Now you're just Janko the brainless." Rex says, before turning to the woman pirate fighting Killer. "Reko 'The Heart Piercer' Sheila. 'Heart Piercer' well that one's just too easy."

Sheila tenses up at Rex's comment, causing Killer's slash to cut off her right arm. Her spear tumbles to the ground and Sheila tries to grab it, but Killer kicks it to Rex.

"Sea stone, huh?" Rex says investigating the spear head.

Sheila's eyes narrow down into points. She tries to flee, but Killer puts both his blades on either side of her neck. Killer knew that Rex was mad, and the only resolution to this was the deaths of people who had ruined his jacket.

"You know the thing about sea stone? It's only good if you can land a hit!" Rex says, plunging the spear into Sheila's chest. "Guess you're just Sheila 'the Heart Pierced' now. In the next life, don't mess with a man's jacket!"

At this point, Gem has made his rounds of the battlefield, taking out all the pirates. With his explosive devil fruit, numbers had no effect on him, allowing him to fight dozens of fodder with ease.

"Come on, you couldn't have said it at least once?" Rex asks with a pout.

"I will never say those idiotic words until the day I die!"

"I'm gonna hold you to that!" Rex said. "On your deathbed I expect you to say those words a thousand times to make up for all the times you could have said them when you were alive."

Hawkins just shakes his head. It seemed he was joining a truly eccentric pirate group.

Rex returns to the King Gucci, pleased to see that neither it, nor his crew were damaged. Barring one member that is.

"Having fun, Kid?" Rex asks playfully, seeing that Kid was the only injured member.

Jidanbo was having a look at him, treating a number of shrapnel wounds.

"Of cours…" Kid starts, but grimaces in pain as Jidanbo removes yet another bullet fragment from his back.

Rex just pats Kid on the shoulder before going to Bonney to get the full story. At the end of it, Rex is somewhat surprised.

"So Kid beat Gladius?" Rex asks incredulously.

While Gladius was weaker than Trebol, Rex knew that even he would not have an easy time against the spiky haired cadre in a fight. After all, Trebol had a convenient weakness to exploit, for Gladius, Rex couldn't think of one.

"Well, he had a little help." Bonney says, pointing to a relaxed Rose who was lounging on the deck reading.

"Help, what help! That useless lazy pile of garbage just sat and watched me get beaten up only to 'help' at the last moment!" Kid says, recalling the fight.

Kid had been doing okay against Gladius, staying on the defensive until Gladius had blasted a whole in Kid's armor and used Punc Hair to launch his hair darts into Kid. After that, Rose had used Poison Pink to heal Kid and beat up the exhausted Gladius, using his own poison against him in her attacks. Eventually, Gladius had been forced into a retreat, having members of the Donquixote pirates cover for him as he fled in a rowboat.

Rex was impressed. For one, he had never asked Rose if she had unlocked Poison Pink yet, feeling that it would be troublesome to explain how he knew it. Since she hadn't revealed it, Rex always felt that that was a defense mechanism against himself, and didn't mind all that much. But now that she had…

"Good job." Rex says, giving Rose a big thumbs up.

"Why are you congratulating her, I did all the work!?" Kid complains, feeling that everyone was harping on the fact that Rose had landed the finishing blow.

Rex ignores him, turning to Hawkins. "So Mr. Fortune man, how does this work? Do I rub your head for good luck? Do you need me to fit a quarter somewhere? Make with the predictions!"

Hawkins frowns at this, not knowing exactly what Rex wanted.

"What do you want me to predict?"

"How about…"