The Den Den Mushi's receiver clicked softly in the silence of the Going Merry's galley. Sanji's cigarette had burned down to the filter, a long cylinder of ash trembling at its end. The voice on the other end—smooth, cold, and utterly devoid of mercy—still seemed to hang in the air.
"...a loose end requires trimming. Have Mr. 2 lie in wait between Little Garden and Alabasta. Eliminate Mr. 3. Cleanly."
"Understood, Mr. 0," Sanji had replied, his own voice a stranger's. He'd hung up, the click echoing like a gunshot in his soul.
He stared at the unconscious forms of the Unluckies, the transponder snail and bird slumped on the table. His eyes, sharp and desperate, scanned the clutter. There. Nestled beside a spilled inkwell was a small, glass orb with a single, unwavering needle pointing southeast. The Eternal Pose to Alabasta. The prize. The trap.
His hand closed around it, the glass cool against his skin. What have I just agreed to?
---
"Play it. Now."
On the deck of his marine vessel, Smoker's voice was a low growl, cutting through the salt spray. The white plumes of his Logia body swirled with agitation. A nervous communications officer fumbled with a bulky recorder.
"Sir, the reception is fragmented, mostly static—"
"I don't care. Play. It."
Near the railing, Tashigi was meticulously polishing her sword, her focus absolute, a wall against the world. "Tashigi!" Smoker barked. "Get over here. You need to hear this."
She didn't look up. "I'm busy, Captain. Intercepted pirate chatter is a daily occurrence."
"This isn't chatter." Smoker's fist clenched, smoke tendrils whipping. "It's a king giving orders. Now. Here."
The command brooked no argument. With a sigh, Tashigi sheathed her sword and approached. The officer hit a button.
The speaker crackled to life, vomiting a wave of harsh, digital static. Then, a voice, distorted by distance and interference, but piercing through the noise like a shard of ice:
"...status of… Princess Vivi… confirm… Straw Hat… escort…"
Tashigi's breath hitched. Her hand went to her glasses.
The voice returned, stronger, laced with a terrifying, calm authority.
"...Mr. 0… final orders… Alabasta… will fall…"
The recording ended with a screech of dead air. The silence that followed was heavier than the sea.
"Princess Vivi of Alabasta… and Straw Hat Luffy…" Tashigi whispered, her mind racing. "And that name… Mr. 0. It's connected to the Baroque Works agent we captured. Mr. 11."
Smoker's jagged smile was a dangerous thing. "Exactly." He turned, his greatcoat flaring, and stalked toward the brig. "Let's go ask our 'guest' why a king is whispering about a princess and a pirate in the same breath."
The pieces were scattering across the Grand Line board, and Smoker felt the game turning deadly.
---
Back on Little Garden, the mood was a stark contrast—a roaring, victorious celebration.
"YAHOOO! DINOSAUR MEAT FOR A WEEK!" Luffy cheered, his cheeks stuffed, dancing around the colossal carcass of the Tyrannosaurus.
Nami was practically glowing, surrounded by the recovered treasure. "With this, we can fully repair the Merry and stock up for months!"
Usopp was already weaving a grand tale of their battle to the enraptured giants, Dorry and Brogy, whose laughter shook the very trees.
It was into this cacophony that Sanji and Zoro returned, their silence a sudden, cold eddy in the warm current of joy.
"Sanji! Zoro! You're back!" Vivi called out, her smile bright but fading as she saw their expressions.
Sanji held up the Eternal Pose. The celebration stuttered to a halt.
"I… made contact," Sanji said, his voice flat. "With Crocodile."
The name sucked the air from the clearing. Vivi's hand flew to her mouth.
"He thinks I'm Mr. 3. He gave us this." He tossed the Pose to Nami, who caught it with numb fingers. "And he gave an order. For Mr. 2 to assassinate the real Mr. 3 somewhere between here and Alabasta."
The implications hung there, ugly and sharp. They were sailing into a knife fight in the dark.
Zoro, ever pragmatic, broke the tension with a grunt. "Forget that. Who won? My tyrannosaurus was clearly bigger."
"You idiot! My ingredients were more refined!" Sanji shot back, the familiar rivalry a desperate anchor to normality.
Their bickering—"Swordsman of negligible culinary taste!" "Love-cook of subpar hunting skills!"—did something unexpected. It made the two giants, Dorry and Brogy, go utterly still. They looked at each other, a century of memory passing between them in a single glance.
"A contest… of hunting…" Dorry rumbled, his voice thick with an old, old pain.
"That is how it began for us, too," Brogy finished, the fire in his eyes dimming to embers. "A simple argument. A boast. And then… one hundred years."
The weight of their confession settled over the Straw Hats, a sobering reminder of how grand adventures could curdle into endless tragedy. Vivi's resolve hardened. She would not let that be Alabasta's fate.
As the Going Merry was repaired and prepared for departure, the giants offered their final, solemn advice.
"The Log Pose will point the way," Dorry boomed, pointing a massive finger at the Eternal Pose in Nami's hand.
"But the Grand Line will throw horrors in your path to test your will," Brogy added, hefting his axe. "Remember this: when the impossible rises before you… go straight. No matter what. Your path is forward. Always forward."
The words felt like a prophecy.
---
The sea beyond Little Garden was a placid blue mirror, deceptive in its calm. The Merry cut a clean wake, Alabasta's Pose holding true. For an hour, there was peace.
Then the water ahead began to darken. A shadow, vast and impossible, bloomed beneath the surface.
"What… is that?" Usopp squeaked, his telescope dropping from his hand.
It wasn't an island. It was a mouth. A gaping, cavernous maw lined with teeth the size of masts, rising from the sea on a neck of scaled, leathery hide. An Island-Eater Goldfish. Its single, stupid eye fixed on their ship.
"HARD TO STARBOARD! NOW!" Nami screamed, her navigator's instincts shrieking.
But Luffy, standing at the figurehead, didn't flinch. He remembered the giants' words, felt them in his bones. "No."
"LUFFY!" Nami shrieked.
"The giants said go straight! No matter what!" Usopp yelled, though his body trembled violently. "STRAIGHT!"
"You fools! It's going to eat us!" Nami cried, tears of frustration in her eyes.
Luffy grinned, a wild, fearless thing. "Then we go straight… through it!" He slammed his sandaled foot down. "FULL SPEED AHEAD!"
The Merry surged forward, not away, but directly toward the yawning abyss of the creature's throat. The world turned dark, damp, and reeking of digested fish as they were swallowed whole.
From the shore of Little Garden, two pairs of ancient eyes watched. Dorry and Brogy saw the Merry vanish into the beast and were cast back a hundred years, to another ship, another friend, lost to another monster of the deep.
Without a word, in perfect, battle-forged harmony, they moved. They hefted their weapons—the sword and the axe that had fought for a century.
"Elbaf… SPEAR!"
They roared as one. The weapons spiraled through the air, crossing, combining, becoming a single, titanic projectile of pure force. It crossed the miles in a heartbeat and struck the goldfish's flank.
BOOOOOOM!
The beast shuddered. Its side exploded outward in a geyser of flesh, sea spray, and splintered wood. The Going Merry, miraculously intact, was vomited forth from the rupture, tumbling onto the open sea once more, free.
Back on the beach, the giants retrieved their weapons, their hearts heavy.
"Just like… that day," Dorry murmured.
Brogy nodded, the memory raw. "The little ship. Our friend. We were too late then." He looked at the distant speck of the Merry, sailing away. "We promised to protect the next ones who brought us joy."
They sat, the weight of their shared history pressing down. Dorry spoke into the quiet, his voice the rustle of ancient pages.
"It began with a feast, much like theirs. A hunt. I boasted my catch was greater. Brogy claimed his was more noble…"
The flashback unfolded in their minds—a younger, brighter Elbaf, two proud warriors, a disagreement that sparked a duel, a duel that ignited a war, a war that consumed their lives and their homeland. All because they were too proud to say, "It doesn't matter."
---
On the deck of the Merry, soaked and gasping but alive, the crew stared at the shrinking form of the slain leviathan.
"They… they saved us," Vivi breathed, awe-struck.
Luffy laughed, loud and full. "SEE? GOING STRAIGHT WORKS!"
But Nami wasn't looking at the beast or the island. She was staring at the Eternal Pose in her hand. Its needle, which had held steady for Alabasta, was now… quivering. Flicking erratically for a second before settling again.
A cold dread slithered down her spine. "Sanji," she said, her voice barely a whisper. "The call you made. To Crocodile. He knows we have this Pose. He knows we're coming."
Sanji, lighting a new cigarette with trembling hands, met her gaze. "He knows everything. He knows Vivi is with us. He knows our route."
Zoro rested a hand on his swords. "So the assassin, this Mr. 2… he's not waiting for Mr. 3 anymore, is he?"
The unspoken truth descended upon them like a fog. The order for Mr. 2 had been a lie. A test. A piece of theater.
Crocodile knew. He had always known.
The real trap wasn't between the islands.
It was the destination itself.
And as the Going Merry sailed on toward the burning sands of Alabasta, a single, horrifying question echoed in the minds of every Straw Hat, promising a storm of betrayal and blood upon their arrival:
Who among them had already been replaced by the master of disguise, Mr. 2?
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