Chapter Text
I know pirates like to tell stories but god damn
Shanks has been talking basically nonstop since I came up and asked him about some of the things he’s experienced. The only times he stopped talking was to drink or let one of his crewmate's add onto his story. He has been telling story after story for so long now that the sun is right smack dab in the middle of the sky now and Marco, who has continued to refuse to drink is looking even more annoyed with Shanks than earlier. Anytime he brought up us leaving to continue on our way Shanks would brush him off with a laugh and say something along the lines of “just one more story then we’ll leave you be birdy” before proceeding to tell another five.
Right now he was going on and on about a kid he met in the east blue. Luffy was the kids name and apparently he was a little menace if what Shanks is saying is anywhere near the truth. He had stolen and eaten the devil fruit they had just found which is hard for me to wrap my head around because why the hell would you leave a devil fruit near a kid who you know at that point will eat absolutely anything he thinks is edible? Honestly with that level of stupidity I have no clue how he has lived this long let alone become a Yonko.
But I am impressed with the kid, he left such an impression on Shanks that he gave him the hat he has been wearing his entire pirating career. I was wondering where it went when Shanks got a new wanted poster last year that was missing it and i thought he just wasn't wearing it when the photo was taken but I guess that explains it.
If Suminari knew that Shanks had given his hat to some random seven year old in the east blue he would loses his shit. He went on so many rant about how cool Shanks' hat was and how he wanted one just like that,, which he did get when Juniper made it for him for his fourteenth birthday but he would have still been so disappointed that there could have been a chance if he ever did meet Shanks that he could have been gifted the hat if he met whatever criteria Shanks had.
This kid sound absolutely insane though so i really doubt if he did ever meet Shanks that he would even a a fraction of a chance compared to this kid. Even so Sumi always had a blind hope for those types of things and it was so annoying at the time but now its just another thing that makes me miss how life used to be.
“And the damn kid stabbed himself right under his eye! Almost took it right out! Can you believe that?!” he said boisterously through slurred words as he laughed and smacked my back roughly to accentuate how funny he found it almost causing me to fall forward and off the barrel I was sitting on.
“Given what you’ve told me about him I definitely can” I say laughing awkwardly not really knowing how to reply anymore. It's not that I'm not interested in hearing more stories from him but this is the most social interaction i have had in four years and its been overwhelming for a while.
I want to just slide onto the floor and disappear into the void so I can be alone for a bit.
Shanks doesn't seem to notice as he continues rattling on about the things Luffy did while he was there. primarily about how Luffy stole that devil fruit from him which Shanks has already told me about. I guess hes to fucked up to remember that or he does and just doesn't care. I'm not surprised that he favors a kid like that given the type of person he seems to be.
I'm not sure if I mean that in a bad or a good way yet.
"Captain I think we should be heading out" Beckman who had moved back up onto the Red Force calls down suddenly finally making Shanks stop for more than two seconds.
Looking up at him i notice he looks even more annoyed then Marco does which is definitely a feat.
"What? Why?" Seeing a grown man like Shanks pout like a child will never not be weird to me.
"You know why" Beckman says and his tone sounds almost strained and that seems to sober Shanks up a bit if him sanding up so quickly says anything.
Alright that's weird and kinda ominousness.
"Ah well that's to bad" He says before turning to me with a massive smile "it was nice meeting you Finch! If you ever want anymore stories just ask birdy to give me a call"
"Will do" I am never gonna do that shit. As much as I loved the stories he talks way to much and that is not something I can handle right now or any time soon.
"Fucking finally" Marco sighs from behind me where he was leaning against the railing and I'm peeved that I have to agree with him.
If Marco had it his way we would have been out of here as soon as I had finished eating a few hours ago but Shanks had it so the Red Force was blocking our way preventing us from going anywhere till they moved.
Total ass move honestly but it worked so i gotta give him props for that i guess.
As much as it seamed like he wanted to Marco was not going to try and fight them he was eyeing the ores but those are conveniently a multiple person job and even though I am not enjoying myself as much anymore my annoyance with him outweighed my want to be alone by quite a bit.
The entirety of Shanks crew that was on our small ship quickly pick up all the mugs of beer and barrels that they brought on and move back to their ship. With how drunk most of them seemed just moments ago I'm surprised some of them can even walk let alone carry stuff back up a latter onto their ship.
"Tell the old man I said hi Marco" calls down from over the railing as his ship begins to move.
"No"
"Aw come on!"
"Use your den den mushi and do it yourself"
"Your no fun!" Shanks says pouting before turning and going further onto his ship.
Both me and Marco are silently staring at the Red Force as it moves away until its far enough that I'm sure no one on it could hear us talking.
"Please tell me its not a common occurrence for him to show up on Whitebeard's ship. I can not handle that long of a conversation for a while" I ask truing to look at Marco.
"It's not don't worry yoi" he says reaching over and giving me a small pat on the shoulder.
I brush off his hand and turn away from him with a nod making my way over to the railing of the ship to gaze out at the quickly shrinking Red Force
I've had no time to really just look at the ocean and appreciate it. Seeing the different seas was the only thing I liked about the constant moving I was forced to do over the last few years. It was the only consistent thing i had, it was always gonna be there with its same blue color no matter how much changed around me. It may be unpredictable and dangerous but at least you know that's what it is, the sea doesn't try to hide what it is or pretend its something different.
People do though, Marco probably is hiding more then one thing about why he is taking me in but with most secrets they will probably stay hidden from me till something bad happens because of the festering secrets. I don't know if that's what will happen, I can't tell the future but I can guess and that seems like the most likely thing to happen since life just loves to fuck me over.
God that sounded so angsty what the hell is wrong with me.
Glancing back over my should I notice that Marco is no where to be seen and the sails are now down again. I didn't even notice he did that.
Well that just means I'm actually alone now and I'm not breaking down crying so that's better than before.
So in the span of three days I met the first division commander of the Whitebeard pirates, had him defend me against Mr. Zuno, got kidnapped by him, had a breakdown in the room he let me stay in because he reminds me so much of my sister, and met another Yonko.
Right.
I let out a deep sigh and run my hands over my face and through my hair ruffling it more then it already was.
Why can't my life be normal for once?
But if it was normal then it wouldn't be my life would it?
Deciding to drop that thought for now I stare out at the water trying to make out the shapes of the fish swimming around just beneath the surface of the water. I'm sick of fish, I've been eating way to many of them when I was on Honeysuckle island since i couldn't really go into the town to get any other type of food. Fish where never my favorite but now that I've eaten other foods the thought of having to eat anymore makes me queasy.
I do like the thought of fishing though that's fun. Well fun probably isn't the right word but still. Its something I can do to keep me occupied and not overthinking stuff. Juniper is the one who taught me to fish on my sixth birthday. She couldn't get her hands on an actual birthday present for me so she did that instead and it was more fun then any gift she could have given me. After that at least once a week I would beg her to go down to the river with me so we can fish together and no matter how much she protested or said no she always ended up down there with me.
I wanna fish now god dammit. Since I wont be eating any of those fish I can throw the one I do catch to the seagulls and other birds that are flying through the sky and landing on the ship to take breaks from flying. But I don't even know if there are any fishing rods on the ship, it really wouldn't make cense if there wasn't but still there is a chance there arnt.
Pushing off the railing i make my way to the door to the lower deck and make my way down. obviously there are no fishing rods in the bedroom and I really don't wanna go digging in the creates for one so…
I have to ask Marco.
Yay.
I can hear his loud sighing from the room that I haven't gone in yet. I don't hesitate to walk up to the door and open it. Its a small kitchen and Marco sits at a chair he pulled up to the counter and he was scribbling on some paper.
"What are you doing?" I ask walking up behind him and peering over his shoulder.
"Paper work for you, I was actually about to call you so I can get the details right" he reply's sitting up straight and looking over at me.
"Aw what? I don't wanna do that I wanna fish" I say it a lot more whiny then I wanted to making me cringe at myself.
"Either we do it now and get it done with or we do it when we get to the Moby your choice yoi." He says placing the pencil down before crossing his arms over his chest and raising his eye brow at me.
Oh god hes giving me the same look Juniper did when me or Suminari didn't wanna do our chores.
"Fiiiiine, might as well get it done with" I grumble as i hoist myself up to sit on the counter.
"Thank you Finch, I'll grab you a fishing rod once we're done" He turns back to the stack of papers and picks back up the pencil. "A majority of this I can already answer but there are a few I'll need your input on"
"Alright" I mumble as i watch him write away and lean forward to rest my chin on my hand. "do you do this with everyone?"
"Yes we do, its important that we know all of a persons medical history so if they have any conditions or require any medication or have any allergies we can handle it appropriately and since you already said you have never been to the doctor it make filling this out a lot easier sadly."
"Sadly? why is it a bad thing it means there's less work for you." I say confused tilting my head at him.
"Yes and it also means we don't know if you have any underlying medical Issus that might not be obvious to the naked eye or even to the person that has them" He says while letting out a exasperated sigh and flipping over to the next page
Yeah I guess that makes cense, still don't like it though.
"Do you know if you have any allergies yoi?"
"I get stuffed up when there's a bunch of pollen but that's it" he writes something down before going to the next page
"Broken or sprained anything?"
"Sprained my ankle a few times and broke my right arm once" he side eyes my arm at that examining it. "it happened seven years ago and my arms fine now stop looking at me like that"
"Hm…" Is all he says in reply.
This goes on for a around ten minutes with Marco asking me question and me answering yes or no to them. They were all super basic questions that i really didn't see the point in him asking but he's the doctor not me so I can't really say much.
Well I can and I did but that's not the point.
"Alright that's all I need you for so you can go now" Marco says as he once again places the pencil down on the counter.
"Fishing rod" I say flatly as I stare at him with a blank expression.
He looks at me for a second before remembering "Right sorry, I'm a little out of it right now" he says with a small laugh as he stands up and out of the room with me following closely behind him. He takes off the lid of one of the crates and inside are a bunch of fishing rods of different sizes "we had to get new ones because Trace was being stupid and ended up destroying the ones we had. I still don't get how he manged that" he says while opening a smaller crate.
"Thanks" I say as i reach in and grab out one of the rods
As I pull away from the crate with the rod in my hand Marco passes me a small black rectangle container "There bait and lures in there yoi"
I nod and pick that up as well and start walking towards the stairs.
"You know how to put the bait and lure on the rod right?" I turn back to give him a annoyed look as i furrow my brow
"I'm not six Marco of course i know how" I snap, I'm offended that he genuinely thought i wouldn't know how to do something so simple.
Marco raises his hand up in defence as he chuckles "sorry, sorry, i was just making sure"
I give him one more long glare before continuing up the stairs and onto the deck. It takes less then a minute for me to get all set up and to start fishing.
The next few hours fly by with me only catching a few things but that's really to be expected while fishing off the side of a quickly moving ship. Paying attention to my rod making sure I don't miss even the smallest tug has really helped keep my mind off things, Marco leaving me alone during that time was also helping with that.
Though it was starting to get dark and my stomach was starting to growl so I think its about time I stop and go annoy Marco for food.
Reeling my line back in I stand my rod against the railing before going to bother the weird bird stalker. He was still siting in the kitchen where i last left him but now instead of doing paperwork he was reading a book.
"Make me food" I say as I jump back onto the counter I was sitting on earlier.
He looked up at me with a amused look "wow not even a hello?" he asked with mock offense as he lowers his book down.
"You kidnapped me, why would I be nice to you"
"I didn't- you came here willingly Finch, you haven't even complained about it until now"
"Yeah because you said yourself that you would force me to go no matter what so what choice did i really have in this situation?" I say as i watch him stand and move over to the fridge. "I could have tried to stay and be carried to your dumb ship or I could walk and keep my ego from breaking" I continue making Marco snort as he pulls out sliced cheese and bread from the fridge.
"You have an ego? I couldn't tell" He laughs out and I squint at the back of his head as he leans down to open one of the cupboards to pull out a frying pan.
"Whats that supposed to mean?"
"what do you think it means yoi?"
"I don't know that's why I'm asking you dipshit"
"You'll figure it out"
"Why do I even talk to you"
"Because you like me"
"In your dreams maybe" I huff out crossing my arms and looking away from him in annoyance.
With that silents falls over us and I'm left to mope in my annoyance as he finishes making me food. What is he making anyway? I wasn't really paying attention to that. Looking over at him from the corner of my eye and I see hes just making me two grill cheese sandwiches.
Basic ass food but its still better then what I was eating before.
The next day I only do four things fish, feed the birds the fish, draw the birds as they eat, and do my best to ignore Marco's attempts at getting to know me better. I've already told him to much in such a short amount of time that I'm worried that I'll spill everything before we even reach Whitebeards ship.
I was sitting against the wall next to the door down to the lower deck drawing when Marco finally came over to me after standing on the other side of the deck acting like he wasn't watching me for the past twenty minutes.
And he gets annoyed when I call him a creep.
"What are you drawing Finch yoi?" he asks crouching down to be at my level and try and look at my sketchbook.
I look up at him for a second before looking back down at my drawing to continue it. I honestly didn't want to talk to him at all nor did i want to show him my perfect drawing of a seagull. I'm drained from the last few days they were so eventful that I really just need to be left alone.
But obviously I'm not gonna out right say that no, that will just lead to more issues then is worth it.
"A bird" I say flatly as I close my sketchbook and stand moving to the other side of the ship leaving Marco there.
"Alright then…"
"Where are you from Finch?" Marco suddenly asks as he walks up beside me as I so some more fishing for the new horde of birds that have decided to stay on the ship now that I've been feeding them.
"Why?" I give him a confused look from the corner of my eye.
"Just curious that's all yoi" he says as he leans against the railing.
If I tell him he might try to contact someone there to ask about me, even the thought of that my stomach turn.
"It doesn't matter" I say keeping my eyes trained on the bobber of my rod.
"Oh?" holy shit can't he just drop it?
I quickly reel my line back in placing my rod against the railing before turning to leave.
"Finch-"
"Fuck off" I say slamming the door to the lower deck behind me and locking myself into the bedroom.
Its the middle of the night when I shoot awake form yet another nightmare. Those have become more and more common these past few days but I can never seem to remember what actually happens in any of them only that they always involve Mom in someway.
I reach my hand to my neck griping my necklace tightly in my hand and rubbing it between my fingers. A few moments latter there's a small knock on the door and Marcos voice calls out to me.
"You okay Finch?" he asks softly
I don't reply right away instead focusing on calming my breathing.
"Finch?" he calls again
I take one last long deep breath before answering "Yeah I'm fine just… go away" I say as i flop back down and stare at the ceiling.
"Okay just come get me if you need anything"
"Yeah whatever" I say back while listening his footsteps move away.
There's no way I'm gonna be able to fall back to sleep.