4/7

Then, eyes a few millimeters of blood pressure away from glowing red, she advanced on us until she was just out of kicking range. The clouds tightened around us, a promise inherent in their binds. "Jones… I'll give you one chance to tell me who kicked my mother's face in. And I'm warning you now." She snapped her finger over her shoulder to point at where both Robins were watching over the KO'd Marine. "You might be my friend, but that is my mother. So! If I wind up being unhappy with the answer…" Her grip on the metal tube tightened to the point where her knuckles popped.

Nope, not saying anything. I'm not a snitch. Biting my lip, I did my best to avoid Nami's gaze. Hopefully she'd get whatever punishment she had in mind over with quickly and we could move past—!

"It was Jones!"

WHAT.

"MRPH?!" Cross squawked just as incredulously.

"YOU HEARD ME!" Soundbite cackled madly, his eyestalks jabbing in my direction. "SCARFACE HERE decided to punt the Marine dead center! Quite viciously too, I might add!"

Oh, that little… "YOU FOUL, SCHEMING LITTLE TURD OF POND SCUM!" I spat at the slimy shit, straining at him as much as physically possible. "I SHOULD BAKE YOU IN GARLIC BUTTER AND SERVE YOU WITH FRENCH BREAD! AND I HOPE THAT WHEN YOU GET REINCARNATED, IT'S INTO A FUCKING SALT-SHAKER!"

"Bring it the hell on, you two-faced, TWO-MINDED, HALF-BAKED Impact Dial!" the slimy git leered. "I ain't goin' down for the shit YOU'VE DONE!"

Half-baked? Half-baked? Oh, we'd see who was half-baked. "When I get out of here, I'm going to shove my 'half-baked' Newton's Second down your—GAH!"

"GYRK!"

"Oh, will you both just SHUT UP?!" The clouds tightened even further, also extending to wrap around Soundbite. If my Nami wasn't livid before, she was now. Oops. "I don't care who, but someone better give me a straight answer, or—!"

"Well, I'm no doctor," Lee cut in from where he had moved to examine Bellemere. "But besides the boot to the face, from the bruising and her pupils she took a nasty fall onto her side, and also a bright light in her face. Which of those two does that sound like?"

The Namis looked at each other. "Bright light sounds like Cross' Gastro-Flash," TB!Nami offered. My Nami's expression darkened.

"And Jones tends to blow up and throw people across the battlefield. So it was both of them. Thank you."

"You're welcome!" Lee cheerfully replied. "So, what're you gonna do—?"

Suddenly, crackling noises filled the air and the atmosphere reeked of ozone.

TB!Nami's eyes shot wide as she shot her hand to her suddenly lighter hip. "Shit! Nonono, wait—!"

Lee, too, looked rather panicked. "Shit!" The Catalyst sprang to life. "Stop!"

Tabarnak. This wasn't gonna be pretty. Sparks began to dance around the iron clouds, blue and white and gold. Tiny zaps of static- like you get from a wool carpet- preceded the incoming storm. I grit my teeth and closed my eyes, bracing myself for pain.

"OKAY, HAPPY-HAPPY-FUNTIME STOPS HERE! SUCK IT!"

No- no pain? "Eh?" I cracked an eye open. Nami- my Nami- was kneeling on the ground, her hands over her ears, looking like she was about to vomit. TB!Nami stood over her, clutching two thirds of a Clima-Tact. The iron clouds receded, dropping me and Cross to the deck with a thud. Not far away, I heard a groan in a vaguely familiar voice. Oh, good, Bellemere was waking up.

Both Namis froze at that sound. They turned in slow unison to look at the red-headed Marine. Cross and I were forgotten in a clatter of heels as the navigators raced across the deck to check on their mother. I let out a sigh of relief at the lack of lightning treatment.

"Bellemere!" The Marine was engulfed in hugs as soon as she made to sit up. Both Namis looked like they might start crying at any moment; Bellemere, for her part, was totally confused.

"N-Nami?" Glancing at the two women hugging her didn't help the Marine's confusion. She reached up to wipe blood from her face, wincing as she touched her nose. "This- This is a dream, right? Because last time I checked, you were three years old, and I'm pretty sure I didn't have twins."

"If it is a dream, I'm not sure I want to wake up." My Nami glanced back at me out of the corner of my eye. "It's almost good enough for me to forgive those idiots for what they did."

"Really?" I couldn't quite keep the eagerness out of my voice. Beside me, Cross sagged in relief. Half a second later, a thrown bottle bounced off my head. Nami smiled.

"Okay, now I can forgive them."

"Ow…" I grumbled, rubbing the spot where the bottle had hit me. Thankfully, both Namis were now focused entirely on their tearful reunion with their mother, leaving only TB!Vivi, who was looking thoughtfully at me, and her mother Titi, who seemed content to just watch with an amused smile on her face.

Actually, Vivi was outright staring at me. And then she was staring at Lee. And then back at me. Creepy…

"So, which one of you is Cross's?" she asked.

Lee shot a confused glance my way, to which I could only shrug. Cross's what? Who knows? Denied an answer from me, he turned back to Vivi, raising a finger. "Uh, Cross's what?"

"Oh, his loved one," she clarified, looking a little sheepish. "Sorry, it's just… everyone else ran off to who knows where because after my…" There was a slight hitch to her voice that was rife with both disbelief and joy. "My mother and Serra - Conis' mother," she clarified at our confused looks. "After they came out of the mist, we all figured out that our loved ones were somehow coming out of the Mists. I was just wondering which of you was Cross's."

"That would probably be me," Lee answered, raising his hand. "I was one of his best friends back, uh… home."

When TB!Vivi looked askance at me, I rolled my eyes with a heavy sigh. "I'm with the other Straw Hats. You know, the crew a dimension to the left and a few months behind?"

The princess opened her mouth, closed it, and frowned. "…I cannot, for the life of me, believe that I'm not questioning that sentence. Now, if you'll excuse me…" A dreamy look came over Vivi's face as she turned towards where her mother was happily helping keep a visibly shellshocked Bellemere stable. "I have to get back to a long overdue reunion."

And with that, she left.

I wanted to question that sentence as I looked out over our two ships, which were slowly starting to fill with recently returned members of separate Straw Hat crews and their often deceased loved ones. But… weird as it was, this still had nothing on -All You Zombies-, so if I could accept that… I sighed and shook my head.

"So… Lee, was it?" I looked over at the by-far-oldest of the three of us. "When did you leave Mother Earth to descend into a realm of madness?"

"Tail end of 2016," he answered, leaning back onto a nearby railing. "Right before I was set to leave on a family New Years' vacation to Los Angeles, if I remember correctly. You?"

"November of the same year."

Lee grinned. "Hey, Xom!" he called out. "D'you want us to- *snrk*"

I frowned in confusion as Lee hastily clamped his hand over his mouth to dampen the amused snort I'd heard. Whatever it was that had provoked that, it had to do with Cross, so I turned around and—

Okay, I have to admit: Cross' comically angry face, accompanied by fingers jabbing at his cloud gag and a lot of angry "Mrph!"s, was definitely something to laugh at.

Still grinning like a loon, Lee said, "Ladies, I don't know how you made those clouds last, and while I think it's hilarious… would you remind removing Cross' gag for him? I want him speaking for this."

"AGREED!" Soundbite chimed in. "He can't appreciate my genius LIKE THIS!"

"Mmph mm—GAH!" Cross yelped as a tendril of Iron Cloud literally slapped the gag off of him. "Oh, thank God! Finally!" The anarchy-lover shot a scathing glare at his crew's navigator. "I want two digits off my debt for that, you… damn…" he trailed off into a smirk as he eyed Bellemere nearby.

TB!Nami, for her part, waved her hand dismissively. "Yeeeah, that's not happening in a million—eh?" She interrupted herself when a hand landed on her shoulder and then paled when she trailed it back to the very twitchy face of her visibly displeased mother.

"What was that…" Bellemere intoned darkly. "About a 'debt'?"

"Meep," TB!Nami squeaked unintelligibly, sounding for all the world like a kid whose hand had been caught in the cookie jar.

"Hehehehe, sucker," Cross chuckled sadistically as he watched a suddenly-lively Bellemere browbeat our navigators before refocusing on our conversation. "Aaaaaanyways, CV, you were saying?"

"How would you like to hear how 2016 went?" he said, grin stretching ear-to-ear.

I blinked in confusion as Cross perked up intently. Why would he be looking forward to that? I mean, sure, it was a crazy year, but- wait a minute. This Bites! was published in 2015. Cross doesn't know anything about that year, and Soundbite most likely wouldn't have cared enough to share with him.

Oh, this was going to be fun.

"And I'll make sure this guy stays accurate and doesn't embellish," I added, a grin of my own spreading over my face.

Cross glanced back and forth between us before heaving a sigh. "I know I'm going to regret this, but… fire away. It can't have been that crazy."

"Oh, very poor choice of words," Lee chided. "Hey, does anyone have any booze handy?"

From the Merry, docked next to the Sunny we were currently on, a bottle came sailing up. From the way Lee hastily crossed his arms over his face, he hadn't been expecting tha- Tabarnak! That… Stand keeps surprising me. In fact, it seems almost automatic. In any case, Lee took the bottle, popped it open, and took a deep gulp from it.

"Terrible," he grumbled, his face a mask of disgust. "Alright. 2016. It all started with this fucking gorilla…"

-o-

Steel clashed against steel, forming a strange, ringing battle music. Anyone not bearing a sword had the good sense to stay well away- even if they were a person usually lacking in good sense. This wasn't a spar; this was a curbstomp, this was a massacre, this was—

This was, Yosaku reflected as he was thrown into the air by a miniature tornado, going very poorly.

He didn't blame Big Bro, really. As a swordsman, he understood what an amazing opportunity it was: a chance to spar with your older self, to learn things from him. But really, was the appropriate reaction to having your opening salvo blocked so effortlessly that you couldn't even tell if your opponent had woken up really to grab two friends who were just minding their own business in the galley and declare it an exercise in teamwork? And then that little girl had charged in, momentarily shocking both Zoros before the battle heated up more than ever.

…Okay, maybe he did blame Big Bro. Just a little.

Further philosophizing was cut short by the imminent impact with the nearest bulkhead. The green hunter wheezed as he landed hard; Johnny came down on his back a second later.

"Is it just me, or are we getting our asses kicked?" he groaned.

"Rhino Cycle!"

Yosaku looked up just in time to see the older Zoro flick two blades up in a quick spinning maneuver that tore lines across the younger Zoro's chest and sent him staggering backward into a rail. "Nope, it's not just you, Bro. It's you, me, Big Bro, and that weird Li'l Sis with the shinai. We're all getting our asses kicked."

"Well, technically, she's not getting her ass kicked," Johnny pointed out as said shinai-wielding young girl tried to land a thrust on the older Zoro's leg. "He's just letting her flail at him without getting hit." Sure enough, the swordsman sidestepped the blow with almost criminal ease, his focus rooted entirely on his younger counterpart. "Honestly? I know he's trying to be kind, and I get why, but that's pretty insulting as a swordsman."

True enough, the young girl was livid. Her face was red as a tomato as she continued to swing futilely at the man who was ignoring her. The girl's attacks became sloppier and sloppier as her anger took control, until she finally snapped and started screaming as she fought.

"TAKE ME SERIOUSLY, DAMN IT!" Tears welled up at the corners of her eyes, but she didn't let them fall. "YOU MEN- YOU THINK YOU'RE SO TOUGH! THINK GIRLS ARE DELICATE, CAN'T TAKE ANY PAIN! NEWS FLASH! WE HAVE TO GIVE BIRTH TO YOU NUMBSKULLS! THAT HURTS A HELL OF A LOT!"

She paused, panting, before launching back into both her attack and her rant with renewed vigour. And this time, a disproportionately large number of her strikes seemed to be targeting Zoro's groin. "I CAN DO ANYTHING A BOY CAN DO, AND I'LL PROVE IT! YOU THINK YOU'RE SO GREAT BECAUSE YOU'RE TALLER THAN US AND YOU HAVE TESTICLES—LET'S SEE HOW YOU FUNCTION WITHOUT THOSE DELICATE BITS OF ANATOMY! AND WHILE YOU'RE ON THE GROUND WHIMPERING IN PAIN, I'LL GO ON AND BECOME THE WORLD'S GREATEST SWORD-FIGHTER! TAKE THAT, YOU MISOGYNISTIC MOSS—!"

"Kuina, will you SHUT UP ALREADY?!" the elder Zoro roared, his swords flashing out—!

"Yosaku!" Johnny yelped, shooting to his feet, sword in hand.

"Right behind you!" Yosaku replied, doing the same.

Their urgency came from the fact that, after pushing away his younger counterpart (read: knocking him into a wall hard enough to rock the ship), Zoro had turned his blades—his very sharp blades—on the young girl. As they watched, both swords… hooked their blunt edges under her armpits? And lifted her? And—

"Oh, shit!" both swordsmen yelped as the hilt of Wado Ichimonji flashed up and slammed into Kuina's temple, launching her at them at a pretty respectable clip. And with their own forward momentum, they had no chance to dodge.

As such, Kuina slammed sideways into Johnny, the sudden reverse in momentum carrying both of them into Yosaku behind, and from there into the wall and then a groaning heap on the deck.

"It's not because you're a girl that I'm going easy on you," the insensate swordsmen heard the elder Zoro grind out. "It's because—" Silence, stretching for several seconds. "Because it's really hard to step on ants without killing them."

Johnny and Yosaku gaped, and Kuina looked murderous. It was his younger self, however, who responded, his voice livid.

"You can't even be a year older than I am. How did you get strong enough to earn the right to start talking like Mihawk?!" he snapped.

"I'm still nowhere close to beating him," the older Zoro scoffed, refocusing his attention. "But I doubt that you're too far off from where I am. What's the last island you left?"

"Drum," Yosaku and Johnny groaned in unison.

The older Zoro nodded. "Just a few more months, then. The Grand Line has a tendency to push you past your limits. Over, and over, and over again," he added with the barest hint of exasperation. He considered for a moment, and shrugged. "Then again, I had some help. It's amazing what beating up on another swordsman all the time reveals about your own fighting style."

Johnny and Yosaku had already fainted before their Zoro turned back towards them.

Kuina forced herself to her feet, a teary smile on her face. "I guess… Congratulations, Zoro. You finally got good enough to beat me. But I won't give up! If you've gotten this good, then I just have to get even better! I will prove that girls can be master swordsmen!"

There was more steel in her words than any child that age should be capable of. It made both Zoros flinch. They glanced at each other, questioning. Then, through the sort of mental rapport only possible for identical twins and clones, they came to a decision. The elder Zoro sighed.

"I'm gonna tell her."

"Don't you dare!" the younger Zoro hissed.

"Tell me what?" Kuina asked innocently.

The two Zoros exchanged a stricken look, and came to some sort of agreement. "Nothing," they said in unison and more than a little haste.

Kuina frowned and folded her arms. "You may have improved with your swords, but you're still a terrible liar. Both of you."

-o-

"—but the year went by, and none of the king's wives had a child!" The younger Usopp paused dramatically before rushing on with his story. His elder counterpart and their mother shot him amused looks.

"Yet when the king came in the next day, the eldest of his wives informed him that he now had a beautiful daughter. He was delighted. But when he asked to see the child, his wives wouldn't let him. It was not a human child that had been born in the nursery that morning, but a small, white kitten. When pressed, his wives told the king that he couldn't see his daughter because it had been foretold that if any man should look upon her before her wedding day, the princess would die a terrible death."

"Many years passed. The feline princess grew up into a beautiful cat under the care of the king's wives. Soon the time came for the wives to seek a husband for their precious daughter. But where would they find a prince willing to wed a cat? It took a year and a day of scouring the land, but finally they found a lad who would do as they asked."

"The prince married the cat, and continued to find excuses to look after her in secret as the wives had done. By this point the king was anxious and restless, having had a daughter for fifteen years without laying eyes on her. He demanded to see the girl, but the prince continued to deny him."

"One day, a watching goddess saw the white cat crying in her room. Full of pity and confusion, the goddess descended to ask what was wrong. The cat princess lamented that she was forever trapped in that room, and could do nothing to help the increasingly harried prince. She loved him, as much as a cat could love a human, and wished she could in some way lessen his burdens."

"Touched by the cat's story, the goddess brought her a magical fruit. One bite, she told the princess, would be enough to turn her into a human girl- albeit one with animal traits, that her prince might still recognize her. The cat princess didn't need to think; she thanked the goddess and immediately took that fateful bite. Seconds later footsteps came stomping down the hall. The goddess vanished as the door opened."

"Imagine the prince's surprise when he opened the door to find not the cat he'd married, but a lovely girl wrapped in white cloth. At first he was enraged, demanding to know what had happened to his precious feline. But the princess wept and told him of what had occurred, pointing out patches of white fur on her shoulders and back that showed what she had been."

"Once over his shock, the prince was delighted. He and the princess spent many days together, getting to know one another in truth and falling in love as humans do. Eventually, the prince brought his beloved to meet her supposed father- and thus, even the king got his happily ever after."

"That was great." The elder Usopp applauded briefly before puffing out his chest. "But wait til you hear mine!"

-o-

[So… this is the Chopper we were supposed to get before Cross showed up,] Leo remarked.

[I'm… honestly kinda disappointed. Is anyone else disappointed?] Raphey said.

"Sorry…" the tiny reindeer hugged the strange stick he was carrying, his ears drooping.

[No, no, don't apologize!] Mikey said, waving his flippers in apology. [We'd have been perfectly fine with you if you'd been on our crew!] That said, he shot a glare at his fellow ship's guards. [Right, guys?]

[Changing the subject away from Mikey's rather sad attempt at intimidation—]

[Hey!]

[What is that outfit you're wearing?] Donny finished.

"This?" Chopper plucked at the sleeve of his very odd shirt. "This is my jersey. I play hockey—well, usually I'm the mascot, but I got to be a defenseman one time. It was a lot of fun!" He turned to proudly display the number on his back. "Look! I was number 17!"

Two completely blank stares met the reindeer's nervous gaze. The other two dugongs' faces lit up, each coming to their own conclusion about what the tiny doctor meant. Their voices competed as they simultaneously blurted out their conclusions.

[Cool!] Mikey beamed. [Too bad you weren't a goalie though; those masks are freaky awesome!]

[You already know Haki?] Raphey asked, impressed. [How does that work? I thought your crew just left Drum Kingdom.]

"No,no, no! Not Haki, hockey!" The tiny reindeer waved his stick around and pulled a small, heavy black object from beneath his jersey to show them. "It's the national sport of Drum Kingdom, almost everyone plays or watches every chance they get. You need two teams of between eleven and sixteen players, some good ice, and a puck—like this one! And they all have sticks. Now, the point is…" Chopper's voice became gradually higher and higher as he began to explain the rules of this game, his stick swinging ever more erratically as he used it to emphasize his words. More than one of these swings forced passersby to jump or duck, lest they be brained by sturdy wood.

Mikey's eyes followed the stick as if hypnotized. [I am both extremely disappointed and extremely happy with this development.]

"—And because Larry couldn't skate with a scalpel lodged in his sciatic nerve, I got to play defense for a Leafs-Seas game!" Chopper's expression turned into a dark, angry pout. "But we lost… Stupid Seas and their stupid Rocket brothers. They always steal all the glory! The Leafs haven't won the Bighorn Cup in almost fifty years!" This final exclamation was accompanied by a particularly violent swing, which the dugongs were forced to duck.

[…I am no longer disappointed,] Donny whimpered dumbly.

Chopper didn't appear to hear him. In fact,the little reindeer appeared to be searching for something, his eyes lit up with a manic light. "I'm sure we'll win next time though! We have to! Maybe it'll help if I—!"

THWACK!

"Ow!" Chopper yelped, clutching a rising goose egg on his skull. He turned his gaze on the culprit, Donny, who was lowering his bo staff and staring at it in bewilderment. "Why did you do that?!"

Shaking his head, Donny said, [Sorry, force of habit. We have to do this to our Chopper all the time, and you were starting to sound like him.]

Chopper stared in something akin to horror at Donny, then slowly creaked his gaze around to a disappointed Mikey putting his nunchucks away. He thought of the lather he was working himself into, how angry he got whenever the thought of the Seas and their thrice-damned Rocket Brothers either beat his Leafs or won another championship. Really, that left him only one possible response.

"…what kind of person did I become!?" he demanded.

"Salutations, colleagues!"

The poor reindeer nearly shifted into Jump Point from sheer surprise at the voice coming from behind him.

[That kind,] the four Dugongs sighed.

It was easy to tell the difference between the two reindeer; the Dugongs' crewmate's hat and pants were identical, but the senior Zoan was topless and hefting a notably larger backpack. The face, though, was the main difference: after all, the younger reindeer certainly didn't go around with a smile that belonged in a Lewis Carroll novel and a look in his eyes that screamed 'I'm going to do violent, bloody SCIENCE to you!'

The hockey-obsessed reindeer clutched his stick to his chest in an attempt to slow his rapidly beating heart. "He-Hello!" Glancing around, the sight of two Zoros scowling at a little girl reminded Chopper of what he'd been doing before he ran into the dugongs. The little doctor smiled nervously at his older self. "I don't suppose you'd be willing to help me look and see if Doctor Hiriluk is around here somewhere?"

"Eh? Oh, I already found him, he's somewhere over that way, but more importantly—!"

THWACK! THUD!

Everyone stared in varying levels of shock and bemusement as Hockey Chopper slammed his hockey stick on his doppelgänger so hard that he knocked him down, a look of fury in his eyes.

"'More importantly'? 'MORE IMPORTANTLY'? WHAT'S MORE IMPORTANT THAN OUR FATHER?!"

"Geh…" Doc Chop's eyes spun blearily for a moment before they blinked back into focus… and then he slapped a hoof to his face with a miserable groan. "When I'm normal, nothing short of my skills being necessary to save someone's life. But when I'm 'sparking out,' as Cross calls it?" The mad-reindeer withdrew a notebook from his backpack and flipped through it for a second before grimacing regretfully. "Apparently the longevity-inducing properties of the Mists. Ergh…" He pinched the bridge of his nose between his hooves. "I should have waited to start getting excited about this place's application to the Panacea Project until after I was back in my lab…"

"WHAT ABOUT UNTIL AFTER WE FOU—wait, you have your own lab?" Hockey Chopper's face lit up, his fear and anger evaporating like non-eldritch mist. "Lucky! I wish I had my own lab; I have to share the galley with Sanji. He keeps getting lettuce in my Petri dishes!"

"Oh, I hate when that happens!" Doc Chopper winced sympathetically. "Oh, or what about whenever Luffy eats our nascent protozoa cultures? I have no idea how he can keep mistaking them for bacon!"

"I've found that dying the cultures blue helps prevent that- although all my streptococcus pneumoniae samples still manage to get contaminated with his saliva somehow, but Jones helps me clean things, so with two of us it's easy enough to remove that from the—" Hockey Chopper stopped and shook his head. "Gah, getting sidetracked, not important, sorry for jumping on your back earlier. Now, quick, before we get sidetracked again! Where did you say you saw Doctor Hiriluk?"

"Ah! Come on! Go in the vial, you stupid—!"

Both Choppers turned to see the very familiar backside of Dr. Hiriluk as he dashed along the side of the ship, desperately trying and failing to waft some of the rainbow mist into a test tube.

"Right here, apparently," Doc Chopper deadpanned.

Hooves clattered across the deck. Tears in his eyes, Hockey Chopper launched himself at the lovable quack, wrapping his little arms around Hiriluk's leg. "Doctor! I'm so happy I get to see you again- I missed you so much!" He glanced up at his father's face with a watery smile. "I haven't been this happy in forever, not even when the Leafs got to the playoffs!"

"Er, ah, th-thank you?" Hiriluk stammered. Hockey Chopper visibly wilted.

"Did I do something wrong? I'm sorry…" He released his hold on the quack's leg, dropping to the deck and backing off. The little reindeer clutched his stick for comfort.

"No, no, little fellow, it's alright. I was just surprised; I never expected to see a little reindeer person out here." Hiriluk bent down to pat Hockey Chopper on the head. "Let alone two. You know, you and your brother remind me of a little reindeer person I know back home. You two should come to visit sometime; I'm sure Tony Tony Chopper would love to meet you."

The two Choppers looked at each other. "But… I'm Tony Tony Chopper."

"So am I."

Doctor Hiriluk stared at them numbly for a moment. "That… That's not possible. There can't be two of the same person- two of the same Devil Fruit. And neither of you are anything like Cho-pper…" The quack's voice trailed off as he caught sight of the identical hats the reindeer were wearing- hats identical to the one he had given Tony Tony Chopper just recently.