...So, in other words, here's what happened.
The moment Alice received word that I'd been captured by Akainu, she completely ignored my message of "I'm fine, so don't do anything rash, just wait." She'd started moving immediately.
To rescue me, of course.
The pirate Kisack was a fabricated identity that Alice had created by using the Reva-Reva Fruit's Powers to Reverse and fine-tune various attributes: gender, beauty, pigmentation, skin and hair texture, and so on.
She'd deliberately gotten herself arrested in that disguise to be imprisoned in Impel Down, where she'd been waiting for an opportunity to break me out. Or so she said.
What's more, this disguise wasn't something she'd whipped up just for this infiltration. She'd apparently been using it for far longer than that.
All those times Alice had been slipping out of Merveille recently? Turns out she'd been committing acts of piracy in the surrounding seas.
That said, she never laid a hand on honest citizens. She only targeted Slave Traders and crooked merchants.
Oh, and various other illegal activities on top of that. Black market deals and the like.
She'd been using this "Kisack" persona as her cover identity for all of it.
The Marines had already taken notice, and without ever figuring out she was Alice, they'd slapped a Bounty of 50 million Berry on "Kisack" alone. Just how much had she been doing out there? Wait, what? Papa gave her permission? As part of her social education? That person, honestly...
"And so, like this, I finally got to see Mom again."
"Sue, you had a child?"
"Had no idea... Well, I guess considering your age, it's not that strange... Wait, but didn't you say before that you were 'inexperienced'?"
Blume and Beauty chimed in with things like that, but rather than answering them, I was still trying to figure out what to say to the daughter standing right in front of me, my thoughts a tangled, confused mess.
"Alice, you... How reckless can you be?! I told you I was fine and to stay put!"
This time, at least, there was absolutely no way I could just smile and praise her with "Good job, what a clever girl!"
I'd experienced it all firsthand in this Impel Down, from pain to humiliation, and had suffered through it intensely, so I understood exactly how dangerous what she'd done was.
No, dangerous didn't even begin to cover it. Just being inside this place meant she must have already endured terrible suffering.
Starting with the Baptism in Boiling Blood when you first enter the prison, then the various types of torture. Days of unending pain and degradation.
And she'd been on Level 3, so she would have barely been given any water or food.
On top of that, I'd heard the male prisoners included some especially violent types, so there was every chance she'd gotten caught up in brawls. With Seastone shackles on, she wouldn't have been able to put up much resistance either.
"I was fine... Did you forget where I come from? Pain, suffering, humiliation, hunger, thirst... I'm used to all of it, so it was no big deal. More than any of that, all I could think about was whether I'd be able to find you, and how I'd get you out. I'd been preparing a bunch of things, you know."
"None of that is even remotely fine! How could you throw yourself into this hell with so little certainty, practically no plan?! Just because you got yourself thrown in here doesn't mean you'd ever find me, and even if you did, how were you planning to escape? Do you even understand how dangerous what you were doing was?! You could have died!"
"Yeah... the torture really was pretty rough. I was honestly always wondering how much longer I could hold out. But you endured it even longer than me, Mom, and on top of that you had to go through those humiliating tortures they save for female prisoners... You're truly amazing. I'm sorry I couldn't come save you sooner."
"You're apologizing for the wrong thing! First of all, doing something this danger—"
"No, I'm not."
Alice cut me off mid-sentence.
"That part isn't wrong. Sure, I do feel bad about the reckless infiltration and making you worry. And yeah, there were plenty of places where my planning was sloppy. But coming to save you? I don't think that was the wrong thing to do. I don't regret it one bit. Not coming was never an option for me."
"You could have died, you know...?!"
"So what?"
"...?!"
"I was infiltrating enemy territory, the Government and Marines' own stronghold. I went in fully prepared for the danger, fully prepared that I might die. Even so, not saving you was never an option for me. You're the most important person in the world to me. I'd risk my life without a second thought, as many times as it takes. If it meant being separated from you, if it meant being left behind... I'd choose to die together without hesitation."
Her lips were smiling, but her eyes weren't.
With a look more serious than anything I'd seen since making Alice my daughter, staring me straight in the eyes, she said those words with absolute conviction.
What do I do? When your daughter says something like this, as a parent you absolutely have to scold her.
And yet here I am, feeling happy. Feeling proud of this idiot daughter of mine.
"If you think the way I think is stupid, that it's wrong... If you think I'm an ungrateful child who doesn't understand her parent's feelings, then take responsibility and re-educate me properly."
"I know. Don't underestimate your mother. However many years it takes, I'll set you straight."
"Hehe, roger that!"
***
"Reporting, Chief Jailer! The disturbance caused by the abnormal Wolf Units outbreak on Level 5 has been contained! Culling operations to reduce the Wolves to near-normal numbers are also complete! However... the prisoners who were dispatched for the operation... appear to have been wiped out. Including, um... those three..."
"Hmmmm, what did you just sayyy?! That can't... Are you sure?! Did you properly confirm the bodies?!"
"Well, the bodies... All the bodies from this incident had been ravaged by the Wolves, and not a single one retained its original form... It's impossible to tell whose body is whose. Given the circumstances, it should have been impossible for Ability User prisoners weakened by Seastone shackles to escape..."
"N-No... That can't be...! My permission, wasted...! The other side of the 'public display'... My screeaams of despair...!"
***
With the big reveal out of the way, we started walking again, following Alice.
We chatted about various things along the way.
"So Sue, she's not actually your biological daughter then. Now that you mention it, you two don't really look alike."
"You're an Ability User, right? But while you were disguised as Kisack, you couldn't use your original Powers. Or rather, the Seastone made it impossible. How'd you handle interrogations? I'm impressed you managed to bluff your way through."
"I just gritted my teeth and toughed it out. As for being an Ability User who couldn't use Powers... I passed it off as a failed SMILE. That way, it wouldn't be strange for Seastone to drain my strength even though I had no usable ability, right?"
"That's the Artificial Devil Fruit that's been circulating through underground channels, right? If I remember correctly, the odds of actually gaining a Power are about one in ten, and if you fail, you lose all other expressions and can only smile..."
"Yep. So all I had to do was keep a constant smirk on my face and it sold the cover."
"But... that means during torture, you would have been in considerable pain, wouldn't you? And through all of that, you could do nothing but smile? That should be impossible."
"I just kept smiling through it. Powered through on sheer willpower."
"Willpower?! That's absurd..."
"What kind of endurance is that..."
"She's overwhelmingly more of a Monster than the three of us put together... in mental fortitude, acting ability, and facial muscles alike..."
Alice really is incredible...
From the Slums of a Non-Affiliated Nation... well, actually, that's not where she's originally from, is it. Still, among the Three Sisters, she probably does have the highest tolerance for pain and everything else.
Having experienced those brutal tortures firsthand, having cried and sobbed over and over from how painful and agonizing and humiliating they were, I knew exactly how harsh they were. And she endured all of it with a smile on her face through sheer willpower alone?!
"That said... I'll admit my facade cracked a few times, and I thought 'oh crap.' But think about it: the smile-only symptom is the result of a 'failure,' right? So the condition itself is unstable. The Guards just convinced themselves that under extreme enough pain, other emotions might leak through. They actually got more into it, figuring that if they pushed harder, I'd recover more expressions, and cranked up the intensity."
Saying all that so casually, but what she went through was harrowing...
It must have been so hard for her, and yet she talks about it like it's nothing. Honestly, this kid of mine...
"Besides, it wasn't all bad. Every now and then, they'd parade in female prisoners who'd been subjected to humiliation torture, so that was a nice treat for the eyes. When it was you, Mom, I was so frustrated and sad and sorry for you... but even then, my body reacted honestly. Sigh, being a man is really inconvenient. It's immediately obvious when you're turned on."
"Oh yeah, when you were 'Kisack,' your pants were impressively deformed... That's what made the staring feel extra creepy."
"But... wait? Alice-san, you're a woman, aren't you? The Kisack thing was just a disguise... a transformation. So getting aroused by women's bodies... huh?"
"Ah... be careful, Beauty, Blume. This one swings both ways."
""Huh?!""
The two of them recoiled in shock.
Alice, who'd been listening, let out a mischievous laugh. But rather than teasing those two further, she turned to me instead.
"Oh right, Mom? I worked pretty hard this time, didn't I? I think I deserve at least a little reward... Is that okay? Consider it also an apology for that letter you sent that had us all worried."
"A reward...? You, after pulling something this reckless... Well, but you are trying to save me right now... And the letter thing, I'll admit you have a bit of a point there, it couldn't really be helped... Fine, I'll allow it. But what kind of reward do you wa—mmph?!"
The instant I indicated my consent...
Alice grabbed my face firmly with both hands, held it in place, and stole my lips.
""...?!?!""
Smooch, slurp, swirl, squelch, swirl, slurp, lick lick, suck, smooch, smack, slurp, squelch, swirl, suck, slurp!!
What even are those sounds?! I wanted to retort, but the intensity was beyond description. Truly, I had no idea what was happening. Mysterious sounds were emanating primarily from inside my mouth.
Still reeling in confusion, I found Alice's tongue invading my mouth, thoroughly savoring every corner, sucking out my saliva, pouring hers in, an equivalent exchange followed by our tongues intertwining. Wait, wait, seriously wait!
Alice, what are you doing?! Between two women, and parent and child no less!
Slipping tongue in like it's the most natural thing in the world, and it actually feels kind of good...!
That went on for a solid minute or so.
With a gasp, our mouths finally separated.
A string of saliva stretched between us, drooping obscenely. No surprise after that much intensity.
At that instant, my knees buckled and I collapsed.
My legs gave out... From just a kiss... This had never happened to me before...!
Alice was skilled... if that's even the right word. What kind of technique was that? She clearly had experience! Where did she learn this?! From the "work" she used to do?!
...Or wait. Alice mentioned earlier that in her Kisack persona, she'd been doing piracy "and various other things"... Hey. What exactly had she been doing?
While supporting my still-limp body to keep me from falling, Alice licked her lips with a flick of her tongue.
"Hehe... Well, I'll let you off with just this much for now."
...Is this what "letting someone off" looks like?
I could barely breathe. My body was more drained than when I wore Seastone shackles!
Just look at Blume and Beauty! The sheer absurdity of this development had them trembling with terror! They were clinging to each other, staring at us with the eyes of people witnessing something beyond human comprehension!
They'd just realized a Monster far scarier than any Wolf Units had been right beside them all along! They were honestly more terrified of her than they ever were of Kisack!
When did you grow into such a Monster, in every sense of the word...?
I thought I'd been keeping a proper eye on you girls as your parent, but I had no idea about any of this.
This is bad... No, I mean, I'd known for a while she was that kind of kid, but... If I ever give her the okay, even jokingly, she will absolutely come for me. Sexually.
I could see the future: Alice, having switched her sex, dragging me to bed, taking every first I had, making me hers, and ten months later I'd be giving birth. That child would also be my grandchild. What is this cursed sentence?
After that, it took a while before strength returned to my body, so Beauty carried me.
We walked a bit further, and Alice stopped in the middle of a corridor.
At first glance, it looked like an unremarkable section of hallway. But when Alice pulled on one of the pipes running along the wall, the entire section of wall peeled away silently, swinging open toward us.
Amazing. You'd never notice unless you knew. The wall was a door, and the pipe was the doorknob.
We slipped through and Alice carefully closed the door behind us. Everything plunged into near-total Darkness, but far ahead, a faint glow was visible.
Walking toward it, we found another door. Unlike the hidden entrance, this was an ordinary door.
Alice reached for the knob, but instead of opening it immediately, she paused and glanced back at us with a sly grin.
"Now then... Mom, Blume-san, Beauty-san... Welcome to the Paradise that shouldn't exist within this Great Prison... the prisoners' Secret Flower Garden!"
Then she flung the door open with a bang, and in that instant!
Pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-POP!!
"""Welll... KAMA!!"""
Not gunfire, of course. What rang out was the sound of welcome Crackers.
Paper Flakes swirled through the air. Streamers rained down.
How to describe it... Throngs of people in, shall we say, groundbreaking outfits. Countless perverts... er, "Newkama."
The tantalizing aromas of food and drink wafting through the air.
Mirror balls. So many mirror balls crammed onto the ceiling it was frankly excessive.
In the back, a bursting ball split open, and from it unfurled a banner reading "WELKAMA!!"
The scene spread before us was overwhelming in every possible way.
Our three brains were overloading on sheer information. Even I'd had a feeling this was coming. Then, from the stage in the back, a massive silhouette appeared, and...
"Hup!"
With that shout, the figure launched into an enormous jump, landing right in front of us.
It was a man... no, a Newkama of exceptional impact even among this crowd of eccentrics. Nearly half of the figure's towering height was occupied by face alone.
In the One Piece Original Work, this was one of the most pivotal characters in the Impel Down arc.
Known as "The Miracle Worker." Eternal Queen of the Kamabakka Kingdom, and Executive of the Revolutionary Army.
King of Newkama... Emporio Ivankov.
"Nfufufufu... Welcome, three new Candies! This is Impel Down Level 5.5... the prisoners' Secret Flower Garden... IIIIT'S, 'NEWKAMA LAND'!!"
"""HEE-HAAW!!"""
...No good. I knew this was coming, but I can't keep up with this Tension...
But well, I guess we're saved. We really are... saved.
To be continued...