CH - 75

You can't just stop and ask for directions when looting somebody's ship," Fein said angrily.

"Of course I can. It's better than spending the next hour looking through the whole ship. She was very helpful."

Fein grumbled. He knew Jory was right, and was even more surprised that it had worked. "Whatever. Let's just hurry up!"

And they kept running until they found it. Jory burst through the door like a cannonball, making a huge resonating slam sound.

There were half a dozen people inside, cleaning up from having made dinner for the clients who had paid outrageous amounts of money to get their fat asses on this ship.

"Everybody out!" Jory yelled.

There was panic as the people tried to understand what was going on.

"HE SAID, EVERYBODY OUT!" Fein roared.

The panic turned into motion as everybody dropped what they were doing and began to file out the door the pirates had just come through.

Fein laughed once they had. "Man, you suck at this."

"Halcen was right. You are crazy."

"Oh shut up. Let's get to work. We don't have all day."

Jory shrugged. They began rummaging through the containers, fridges, and cabinets that held all the items they were looking to steal.

"What the fuck?" Fein shouted as he became exasperated.

"There's so little here," Jory agreed in disappointment.

"Why? Isn't this supposed to be some kind of cruise ship? They should have all this food!"

"Maybe they're on the tail end?" Jory said. "Maybe they're heading to Loguetown or Corteano to resupply?"

"Shit. I guess so. I know you can't keep certain perishables around for very long, but this is fucking ridiculous."

"So what do we do?"

"Well, we take what they have and move on."

"Yeah… I guess that's all we can do."

Halcen, Grey, and Morkine began running across the deck of the Zaika. They were stopped by a few random guards here and there, but they were easy to dispatch. They rushed through the ship. They were trying to find where all the rich people were hanging out. It was evening. They must have had some kind of activity going on and this was a big enough ship to keep all the fat cats from the East Blue preoccupied.

Finally, they came to the gala. There was a stage set with a jazz performance going on. There were tables set up around the sides and a dance floor in front. There was special lighting. And all the guests were there, about fifty of them. They were all dressed in elegant clothing; stunning dresses that showed off excessive amount of flesh, fancy hats that didn't quite cover the bald spots, and designer suits that you paid more for the name than the quality. They sat around eating dinner or dancing along with the music. It was quite a sight. Halcen became giddy.

"And here, we go," he said quietly. He began descending the stairs to their event. "Ladies and gentlemen!" He shouted.

The performance continued. Nobody had heard him. Apparently they hadn't been alerted there were pirates robbing their ship. He growled to himself in frustration. "LADIES AND GENTLEMAN!" he shouted at the top of his lungs.

Again, no response.

Halcen lifted his pistol into the air and fired it. The hash BANG! overpowered the music and everyone jumped. The performance ceased and there was a sudden drop in music and everyone looked around to see what had happened. They all turned their attention to the pirates.

"I don't mean to be rude," Halcen said, "but I need your attention. We came here tonight… well quite frankly to rob you," Halcen laughed.

"Boo!" one of the men shouted from the crowd.

Halcen spotted the man. "Now that was rude." Halcen took out his pistol and shot the man.

His body fell to the ground and he began to bleed out. People in the crowd screamed.

"NOW! NOW!" Halcen shouted. "Let's keep our mouths closed. We've already eliminated your protection, so your screaming really won't be productive. Best save your voice."

"What do you want?!"

"I already told you… we're here to rob you. So if you could all line up in an orderly manner, we'll be going down the line and taking all your money."

"This is absurd. You can't treat us this way!"

"We can and we will. How do you think it is that you can all afford to live these fancy lives? You steal and you take advantage of the poor. Do you really think anyone is gonna feel sorry for you? Sorry that a few rich pricks got what they deserved? I doubt it."

The crowd was quiet.

"Now go ahead and line up."

They all began to form a semi-straight line, giving Halcen evil eyes.

"Cash at the ready!" Halcen shouted. "And no funny business!" He held out a large bag for them to fill as they came.

They all came through and dropped off the cash they had on their person, pulling it from their wallets and purses. When it was all done, Halcen rummaged through the bag. "What? Is this it? This is all you fuckers carry? This is barely enough for buy a fucking sandwich."

"What did you expect? This is an all expense paid trip. We don't carry cash."

Halcen was irritated. He had expected the spoiled swine to carry more money on them than that. He wanted a serious payout. "Alright, fine," Halcen said. "This time, I want everything. Purses, wallets, watches, jewelry too."

"This is ridiculous!"

"Don't talk to me like that!" Halcen shouted in aggravation. "I swear to God I'll put a bullet in you too!" The complaints stopped.

The party goers lined up in order again. This time they threw all the valuables they had on them in the bag. Clinks and whoops filled the bag until the line had fulfilled itself. Halcen looked through the bag. He still was not satisfied. "I'm really fucking disappointed in you all," the pirate captain snarled. He pulled out his pistol and shot a random dude in the crowd. He wasn't aiming to kill, just hurt.

The man to the ground and cried out in pain. "Oh god, somebody help!"

Halcen turned with the bag and signaled for Grey and Morkine to follow him. "Let's get out of here."

They met Jory and Fein out at the rope ladder. They were only carrying a bag each of what they were able to transport from the galley without breaking or spilling.

"Is that it?" Halcen asked, annoyed.

"The whole place was fucking barren," Fein said.

"Did you guys get some goods?" Jory asked.

Halcen shook his head in aggravation.

"What happened?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Performance issues?" Fein asked.

"You wanna go, punk?"

"Yeah, let's go! Rematch!"

"Guys!" Grey shouted.

"Alright, let's get out of here!" Halcen said.

"Morkine?" Jory said.

"Hmm?" Morkine responded.

"What happened to your shoulder?"

Morkine looked over his left shoulder to see blood soaking his shirt. "Oh."

"Morkine?" Halcen said.

"Oh yeah, I got shot."

"And you didn't think to bring this up?"

"We were on mission, Captain. I didn't want to slow you down."

"You're a fucking idiot," Halcen said.

Grey looked at his shoulder from the back. "I can fix it up. Let's get you down to the Black Tail."

"Let's leave this nightmare fucking ship behind."

They all descended the rope ladder. Fein and Jory took their goods to the kitchen to store them. Halcen took the bag of treasure down below deck and shoved it all inside the chest where he was keeping his Devil Fruit money he'd gotten from Max. The small amount he added seemed insignificant to what was already in there.

Grey took Morkine down to the washroom to get him cleaned up. "It doesn't look like the bullet's still in there," he said. "I'm gonna clean the wound out and stitch it up."

"Sounds good," Morkine said.

Grey went about it. "You know, you're a weird guy."

"How so?"

"Well you show up and join us because I took out Buggy, who you say you only joined originally because he worked with Roger back in the day. This wound doesn't seem to even phase you. You're especially light for someone of your height, and somehow aren't usually hungry. You carry around a sword you don't use. You're just a very mysterious guy."

"One could say the same of you, Grey."

Grey chuckled. "Fair enough."

Once Grey had finished up, Morkine and him left the washroom.

"Thank you," Morkine said, graciously.

"Anytime, bud."

Grey went to the kitchen to find Halcen sitting by himself. Halcen was working on a chocolate bar. Grey went to grab himself some water. "What's going on?" he asked as he sat down.

"I just… I thought it would be different."

"What?"

"Being a pirate."

"How so?"

"Well… We finally get together a real crew, we have a name, we have a ship and a flag… and it all seems so lackluster. I remember when I first joined Whitebeard's crew, it was all so… grand."

"You were thirteen, Halcen. You were just a kid. You were going through a lot. You leaned into pirating to get you through. Now you're an adult. You've changed. You're not gonna look at things the same way."

"Not just that, but we went through all this trouble for half a bag of jewelry from some back-talking rich fucks, and two bags of soon to expire food. And Morkine got shot!"

"Pirating is risky business. You know that. Sometimes it doesn't work out."

"Yeah, but like this? It just… doesn't sit right."

"So what are you thinking?"

"I don't know, man. I just… maybe I made an error in judgment somewhere down the line." He sat back and sighed.

"What do you want to be about it?"

"For now? I still want talk to Shanks. That's still my plan A. We'll be in Architao Island soon. We should get some sleep."