Origins

I do not own One Piece or any other works that I may have referenced or took inspiration from. They all belong to their respective Authors.

At 22 years old, Carter Reid felt like he had been through the wars. Not the literal wars though, he knew he was never made for that, the senseless violence, and the lack of empathy towards others just didn't sit right with him. His mother was the light of his life, always brightening up the room with her very presence and her constant aura of reassurance and love. She was a nurse who worked odd hours, often sleeping throughout the day and at work each night but she still did her best to be there for her beloved son.

His father worked as a carpenter and had a workshop out the back of their house where he would build furniture as a hobby on the side. Growing up with his father, Carter learned all he could from him. By the age of 13, he was already proficient enough in carpentry to create items good enough to sell and had started doing smaller and cheaper commissions for the people in his neighborhood.

Carter was ecstatic to be able to do these commissions, as it enabled him to start making his own pocket money to save up for his first car, so that he wouldn't have to burden his parents with such a sum.

Before he could fulfill his wish, his life started going downhill. His father was diagnosed with Hodgkin's Lymphoma. Because it was caught quickly, it was possible to treat with chemotherapy, so his father immediately submitted himself for treatment. Living in America, it was almost impossible for them to afford the medical bills, so even with their savings, they had to sell the house they lived in and move to a cramped 2-bedroom apartment.

Although better than being homeless, it was a massive culture shock for Carter to go from an upper-middle class neighborhood to a cheap apartment in a small town. He was forced to change to a different school, as he was no longer in the catchment area for his old school and left all his friends behind.

His father recovered after the chemo, but never recovered his strength and could no longer work as well as he did before. Carter had to take on multiple after school jobs to keep his family going, and his mother had to take on even more graveyard shifts to try to ensure they could keep living as they were.

Unfortunately, Carters father assigned his life's worth with how he contributes to society, and without being able to work as much anymore he started falling into depression. He spent what little money he was making on cheap beer and left all the bills to the mother and son duo, who were struggling to get by. He took his anger out on both his wife and son, but only in verbal abuse.

Shortly after his 16th birthday, Carter came home after work to his mother crying, and his father sitting calmly on the couch, for once sober. The cancer that his father had battled so hard and come out on top of had returned with a vengeance. The cancer had spread from his lymph nodes to his lungs, pancreas, bones, heart, and brain. The doctors gave him only 2 months to live.

The cancer was terminal and chemo would not be able to help with cancer this bad, so his father came home to live out the rest of his life. He has had life insurance taken out since before he was first diagnosed with cancer, and originally believed if he died from it his family would be taken care of.

He underestimated the scummyness of insurance companies, as after he was diagnosed with Hodgkin's the insurance company sneakily changed the contract so that if he passed away from cancer there would be no payout and had him sign it thinking it was for something else.

After finding this out, Carter's father knew there was no way out for him. He could no longer sit around waiting for the inevitable and would instead need to come up with a plan to ensure an "accidental death" so that his family could still get the payout. His morals stopped him from hurting anyone else in his suicide but needed to make it seem as accidental as possible to stop the insurance company from backing out of the life insurance payment.

He decided the best way to do it would be a car crash, as it could easily be seen to be accidental, and he could make sure that he doesn't harm others in the process if he crashes into a tree or a river. He also decided to leave a letter for his wife and son, to ensure they knew he loved them, and was sorry for all his faults after his diagnosis.

The letter Read:

The love of my life and My Dear son.

I do not have much time left, and I can no longer support our family. It will be up to you, Carter, to look after your mother from now on. The insurance does not want to have to pay out my life insurance due to my sickness, so I need to ensure you will be looked after.

I love you both with all my heart, which is filled with regrets for the way I have treated you both. If only I was a better man, perhaps GOD would not have cursed me so.

I will be ending my life today, making sure it appears to be an accident so that the insurance company gives you the full amount you are owed, to look after you both from the other side, even if this ensures I have a one-way journey down The Unwanted Highway.

Please ensure you destroy this letter before anyone else can see it, so that no-one else knows that I committed suicide.

-Love, A broken man trying to repent.

Leaving the letter on the middle of the kitchen island, the man walked out of the front door of his house for the final time, unaware that he had just awakened Carter from his sleep.

Coming out of his room, Carter called out "Dad, are you there?" with no reply he walked towards the kitchen to look for him and found the letter. Before he could read it, he saw his fathers car back out of the drive and start heading down the road.

Looking back at the letter, Carters panic began to rise, as he quickly sped through the rest of the letter. With a heavy heart and tears blurring his eyesight, Carter called out "MOM! Come to the kitchen quickly!" as he ran to grab his mom's car keys.

"What is it dear?" His mom sleepily questioned.

"D-d-dad is trying to kill himself, read the letter on the bench. I-I'm going after him." Carter replied as he rushed out the front door, still in the tee-shirt and track-pants he was sleeping in, with a pair of slip-on converses on his feet.

"Wait, Carter, get back here!" his mother yelled, to no avail, as he jumped in the car and started it. Racing down the road in the same direction he saw his father's car go, he kept mumbling to himself "Please, Dad, don't do it, don't do it, don't do it."

Heading out of town and onto the more sparsely populated roads, Carter rounded a corner at 80mph only to see a red reflection off to the side of the road. Slamming the brakes on, Carters car skidded to a stop over a distance of 35 feet. Putting the car in reverse and slamming on the accelerator, Carter backed up until he was parallel to where he saw the reflection and turned the car, so the high beams were facing it.

His sight was scarred with the image of his father's truck on its roof with parts of the car everywhere, spread out around the car and the front left of the car crushed in from where it impacted something solid and the rear right tires still spinning at a fast speed. Getting out of the car, Carter rushed towards the driver's side of the car screaming "DAD!"

With no response heard, Carter dropped to his knees to peer through the crushed side window. Seeing no sign of anyone inside the truck, he suddenly paused, puzzled. He sat in silence for 10 seconds before hearing a slight wheeze from a bush to his side. Rushing over to the source of the sound he finally found his father, covered in blood with shards of glass sticking out of his chest and obviously broken arms and his left leg.

"D-dad. Please don't leave me." Carter struggled through his sobs. Kneeling next to his father, he held him while crying, as his father looked up at him with his own tears in his eyes.

"Son." He wheezed, "You need to let me go. I – hah – I wouldn't have lasted long anyway" he said with pained gasps.

"Wait, wait, wait, please hold on, I'll call an ambulance." Carter said, pulling out his phone and pressing emergency dial and typing 911.

"Son, it-it's too late. Just promise me you will- you will live well." His dad said.

"No- I won't promise, so you need to hold on." Carter said before saying into his phone, "Yes, I need an ambulance on Clementine Drive near Danica Avenue. Mm- My father, He was in a car crash, please hurry."

But as he sat there, holding his father, and looking at him, he could see the sadness slowly seeping into his father's eyes before they started dimming right there in front of him. "No, Please, Hold on for a bit longer." Carter sobbed, but his father was too far gone. As his fathers body slowly relaxed, and the heat started seeping out Carter could feel his whole mind going numb. Before he collapsed over his father's body sobbing.

The next thing he knew, he was in his mother's arms at his house, with the police that came along with the ambulance having given him a lift home, while the partner drove his mother's car, being in no condition to drive himself. Normally this would never happen in a city, but being a small town, the rules for this situation are a fair bit more relaxed.

Carter stayed in the same fugue state for almost a week before the funeral snuck up on them. With all 4 of his grandparents already deceased, and his parents not having any siblings, it was entirely up to his mother to do the funeral preparations, so the funeral was simple. After the funeral, Carter tried to get back into work, but every time he closed his eyes, he could see his fathers dying face clearly in his mind, so he barely slept anymore. He would use caffeine to continue to stay up as he refused to go through the nightmares, until he would finally collapse and sleep for more than 24 hours. Then restart the cycle.

His fathers' preparations turned out to be enough so that the insurance company could not deny their claim for his life insurance. The payout was 1.2 million dollars, as his father had a very high premium, and continued to pay it all the way through the heavy medical bills he had. It took 2 months for them to pay out the insurance, which was lucky because Carters work had already run out of patience for him and fired him just 2 days before.

Without being able to sleep, Carter fell into his own depression and stopped leaving his house, and often wouldn't leave his room. His mother stayed in her nursing job for only a month after, before retiring to look after Carter full time, as he was no longer eating by himself, or cleaning up after himself.

'What is the point of it all' was a constant thought in Carters mind, but at the same time he refused to harm himself because he knew the pain that that would cause his mother. Using the payout, Carter and his mother bought a small house on the outskirts of the town and moved in there. With the money they had, they no longer had as much worries as they did before, as even after paying off his fathers' debts they still had enough to live for years, if they were frugal.

His mother, in hopes of having him be more social, even if it is not face-to-face, bought him a good computer, and actively encouraged him to play games online and talk to other people in the games he played. He did this for just over a year, playing some games like League of Legends, Counterstrike, Call of Duty, Player Unknown's Battlegrounds, and Battlefield. He mainly enjoyed shooter games as he didn't need to rely on teamwork as much and managed to take out some of his anger on his opponents, but that sadly didn't last long. He soon grew tired of the games, as he no longer found them interesting, and instead transitioned into watching different television shows online.

He torrented anything that he found even slightly interesting, watching many different shows hoping to escape from his boring and unfulfilling life. He watched many random shows, before falling into the superhero genre when he found the show "Smallville". This show chronicles the life of Clark Kent before he became the Man of Steel many know him as. This followed with watching The Arrow, and Finally The Flash, which is where he first fell in love with the idea of speed. After watching these fantastic shows, Carter was no longer interested in comedies or more procedural cop shows, and instead became more and more interested in worlds of power.

His next foray into power was the world of Avatar: The Last Airbender, in which he really enjoyed seeing the flexibility and dodging ability that an Airbender has. After all, what is the point of having the strongest punch if your opponent is just going to dodge it?

His mother, not wanting him to get into any trouble for pirating online movies and TV shows, decided to surprise him with a subscription to Netflix, which is where he found his next great adventure. Called Sword Art Online.

This anime often considered the most normie anime in existence, with a generic plot and abundant in cliches, but it was the anime that got Carter addicted to the worlds offered.

Carter started going through many different anime, from Tokyo ghoul to neon genesis: Evangelion, before starting on his biggest challenge yet, Dragon Ball. It wasn't a challenge because it was hard to watch, or because it was boring, but because it was long. At the time that Carter started watching it, without counting Dragon Ball GT or Dragon Ball Kai, there was almost 500 episodes in the show.

This show once again cemented his belief that speed was supreme in fights, as it was often shown that the faster character would be bound to win. For example, even though they gained a large power boost with the Super Saiyan Muscle Up form, both Goku and Vegeta threw the form away as trash because it would cause them to be slower than their normal form.

After Dragon Ball he moved onto bleach, finding a similar theme shown in bleach as well, with the main character, Ichigo, using speed to his advantage in many fights. In his fight against Byakuya, he condensed his bankai form down to fit within his own body, meaning he had less power of mass destruction as other bankai forms but could move so much quicker that he was able to easily beat Byakuya before he could react. (A.N: no idea If this is correct, I haven't watched it in a long time.)

That fight sent shivers down Carters spine and got him truly excited for the first time in a while. After finishing bleach, Carter once more felt empty, as he no longer had anything to watch. Looking around online he started focusing on anime with characters that focus on speed, watching any that he could find. Watching Assassination classroom, he was awed by how easily Koro-sensei seemed to destroy the moon without any form of superstrength, just moving fast into it to destroy the entire thing.

He next watched Hunter x Hunter, where his favorite character was obviously Killua Zoldyck. When he showed off his Godspeed mode, Carter once again felt that thrill within his spine. Although he could never manage to sit down and watch it all, Carter also enjoyed watching clips of Naruto fights, like the Naruto vs Haku fight, where Haku used his speed to completely outmanoeuvre Naruto's many clones, or the many feats of the 3rd and 4th Raikage.

At 19 years old, Carter finally found what he considered to be the perfect anime, One Piece. This anime has it all, characters with clearly defined goals, who set out to achieve them not letting anyone stop them. Characters with many different powers, who can achieve insane speeds. A sense of adventure that seemed to be missing from Carters mundane life, and anti-hero main characters, who don't recklessly rush in to save everyone but have the righteousness to help those in front of them.

Through the first few arcs of the anime, Carter was intrigued by the sense of adventure and the character development but wasn't too enthusiastic about the fights. The moment he realized the potential in the series was the fight against the black cat pirates, and the advent of Captain Kuro. This showed that even a weak pirate on the weakest sea had the potential to move so fast that no one could see him, and the main character, Luffy, was fast enough to react.

Watching the fight against Enel, Carter realized that even someone who is so much faster than their opponent can be defeated if they act idiotic and underestimate their opponents. The fight against Foxy reinforced this, though it also made him understand that speed means nothing if you can't hit hard enough to put down your opponent. Foxy could slow Luffys speed down exponentially and hit him many times in the time that he is slowed but was not able to do any actual damage to Luffy.

When Luffy was fighting Blueno, and getting destroyed by his superior speed, then managed to come up with the special move "Gear 2", where he pumped blood around his body using his rubber powers to speed up his body, and instantly learned soru from observing Bluenos movements had carter jump out of his seat.

Watching through the rest of the series, Carter was constantly enthralled by the speed shown by many characters, and often dreamed of the fights. Before he knew it, he was no longer having nightmares of his father every night, and instead started dreaming of adventure and the thrill of out speeding opponents and treating them like they are children. His sleep pattern fixed itself, and his mentality started rapidly improving, until after 4 years' time he started wanting to join the world once again. Maybe not to his old boring jobs, but he could now see himself doing something with his life.

Carter decided to follow his new dreams, so the 20-year-old Carter decided to get into amateur fighting. He wasn't stupid however, watching anime will never allow someone to become strong enough to fight people without training, so that is what he decided to do.

He still wanted to live frugally, so he decided to forgo a personal trainer, but after looking around his town he found a small gym that sets up a circuit each day that people can pay a small membership fee to use, and it includes a qualified trainer observing to ensure no one hurts themselves. The circuits focused on boxing, so he could learn how to throw different forms of punches, while also learning bodyweight and equipment exercises in proper form.

Each circuit was only 45 minutes long from start to finish, but after two weeks Carter found himself in the gym going around the circuit at least 4 times every day. At first, he found himself in agony after a workout, but after asking advice from the trainer he was shown many different dynamic and static stretches he could use to improve his preparation, recovery, and performance. After using the circuit for 6 months to learn all he could about proper form, exercises to improve different body parts, and punching, dodging, and blocking techniques, Carter decided to buy the equipment he needed to use at his house, so he no longer needed to pay for the circuit.

Carters mother, after seeing how great her son was doing, decided that he no longer needed her constant care and had gone back to work 3 months prior, as she truly missed her work. She loved her son more than anything and would give up the rest of her life to look after him if he required it, but if he no longer needed her than she was more than happy to return to her prior life.

Carters ambition grew the more he trained, and the more he learned. He studied all he needed to know about nutrition to help him reach his peak potential, while creating a workout regimen that he was sure would put him in league with any other fighter.

Every morning, he would wake up and run 10 kilometers as a warmup. He would then have breakfast and start stretches to prepare himself for his workouts throughout the day. In the mornings he would focus on calisthenics for three hours, working on push and pull bodyweight exercises, and trying to perfect his body control. He would then have his second meal of the day, accompanied by some more stretches before moving on to boxing practice.

He would start using a bag to work on punch power, focusing on using his entire body to add as much power as possible to every single strike, before moving into shadow boxing. Every single day he would start shadow boxing slowly with perfect form before slowly speeding up focusing on maintaining his form as well as possible, until he can no longer hold his form properly. He would then practice as fast as he could, disregarding form for most punches, and leaving them weak, before randomly throwing some punches as powerful as he can with perfect form in the middle of combos.

He would finish this section off with another set of stretches, before having his third meal of the day. He would have two "Rest days" a week, where he would only do a 20km slow bike ride on flat ground to ensure that his body is still moving, on Wednesday and Sunday. On Tuesday and Saturday afternoons, he would add in a weightlifting session, where he would focus on as heavy weights as he could move without hurting himself, focusing on progressive overload for bench press, shoulder press, deadlift, rows, and squats. To ensure that he is working his whole body. Finishing with an ice bath for his muscles, and then another set of stretches before his final meal of the day.

The day after he first did this routine, he was in so much agony that he couldn't move properly, but he didn't want to give up, so he forced himself to his feet and did some dynamic stretches, before going on an extremely slow jog around his block.

Slowly, his body no longer felt so much strain from his workouts, and his recovery speed improved. He had never actually fought anyone, but he had watched many different fights and learned the moves they used, then imagined them fighting him when he shadow boxed, and he believed he was now more than fast enough to dominate the amateur fights he was looking forward to for so long. He found a fight coming up set for the 20th of June 2020, and immediately signed up.

His mother, while scared for him, was also incredibly proud of how far along he had come in following his dream and wanted to see how far he could go. She would always be supportive of him, no matter what he wants to do.

At the end of May, however, his mother came home from work and was incredibly exhausted. She collapsed in the loungeroom, in front of Carter.

"Mom!", Carter yelled in fear, "Are you alright?"

"Mmmh," she mumbled, "just really tired, I'll be fine after a solid night's sleep."

She didn't know how wrong she was. Carter skipped his next days training to stay by his mother's side looking after her, as she developed a bad fever and horrible cough. Believing it to be just the common cold, Carter wasn't too worried as he was caught up on his flu vaccine and had always had a decent immunity to it.

After 4 days of his mother's situation getting worse, Carter started getting symptoms, feeling hot and lightheaded himself. On the 9th day with his mother's situation not improving and him getting worse, he got a call from the local hospital his mother worked for.

"Carter Reid? This is Doctor Emma Lewis from Collinsville Hospital; we have just had our 5th case of COVID 19, come back positive. We think that your mother, Nurse Reid, came in close contact with at least 2 of these cases before she went on sick leave. If you or your mother have symptoms, please come into the hospital so we can ensure that you are not too sick."

Still not worried, Carter decided to comply with their request just in case the situation was worse than he thought it was. On the way down to his car, his mother collapsed once again, and was no longer waking up so Carter Panickily called 911 once more, asking for an ambulance to their address.

The paramedics immediately rushed Mrs. Reid to the hospital with Carter sitting next to her, and they both entered the quarantine unit. His mother immediately was hooked up to a breathing apparatus, as she was taking far too labored breaths. Two days later, his condition also deteriorated to the point where he needed a breathing apparatus just to breathe.

On the 10th of June, Carter was lying in his bed hooked up to all the machines, his depression hitting hard but his optimism, determination, and ambition still guiding him when he heard a sudden alarm. 3 nurses rushed into the room with a crash cart and lead it straight to his mother bed, running through all the protocols they could to try to save her. All Carter could do was stare at the ceiling with tears in his eyes as he prayed to anyone who would lesson to save his mother, unfortunately, his prayers were either not heard, or were ignored.

"Time of death, 17:37, June 10th, 2020."

Those words felt like they broke something in Carter. He remained optimistic about the entire situation, even when hooked up to the machines believing his mother and he would be fine, and yet now he was proven wrong. His mother had just passed away, and he couldn't even hold her hand. She was only a couple of meters away from him, and he could not be there for her as she passed on.

Now here he lay at 4:52pm on June 20th, 8 minutes away from the scheduled time for his first ever fight. Knowing that he would not make it this time and will most likely never get a chance to fulfil his dreams. His heart started hurting as his eyes teared up at the unfairness of the whole situation. All he wanted was his one chance to prove that his work wasn't pointless, and yet he won't be able to fulfill his dreams. Suddenly, the same alarm that had haunted his dreams for the last 10 days started running as his eyes started blurring over and nurses rushed to surround him.

"Time of death, 17:00, June 20th, 2020"