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Spring Time (A One Piece Fanfiction)
Chapter 76: Heart of Gold VI

Chapter 76: Heart of Gold VI

– Sarquiss –

Sarquiss was cognizant enough of his own character to admit that there existed a non-zero possibility, that he might not be as completely flawless as he may seem like to others. After all, he was only human and he did have the occasional bad hair day, even if those were few and far in between. While others did call him a vain, prideful narcissist at times, Sarquiss had always been of the opinion that a reasonable amount of adoration towards one's own person was healthy for the psyche.

And why wouldn't he adore himself? If there ever was a tale of rags to riches and power…well, Sarquiss may not be the first example to pop into someone's mind but he'd wager his own name to be quite high on that list regardless.

In a way, apart from the rather humble station in life he'd been born into – as the sixth son of the local butcher – there was no denying that fate had dealt him a rather generous hand to play with. Likewise, most people would likely agree he'd utilized his cards well, rising to a station he'd only been able to dream about in the past. Sure, he owed a large part of his success to Bellamy's friendship. However, Sarquiss had been the one to initiate it all those years ago, all the way back when he'd invited the surly kid sitting alone on a park bench to play a game of pirates.

Of course, life being what it was, things hadn't all been sunshine and roses since that fateful day. There was no greatness without appropriate trials and over the course of his life several incidents had challenged his worldview, most of them concentrated in the short period spanning their arrival on Jaya and the present date. Starting from his helplessness against Satori and his inability to protect his Lily from harm, and culminating in Sarquiss becoming a literal liability in his best friend's desperate battle for survival against Doflamingo… reality had mandated that the naïve country bumpkin grow up into the great pirate he could be.

As a result of the lessons imparted by life itself, Sarquiss' arrogance had been forcefully tempered into justified pride. The key difference between the two being, that pride made it impossible to turn a blind eye to one's own weaknesses nor to accept anything less than one's personal best. Minor flaws were to be excised in their entirety and larger ones hammered into submission, until the individual known as Sarquiss met the strict requirements set by his own pride. All while maintaining a perfect exterior for his adoring fans, of course.

However, there existed a single facet of himself that Sarquiss couldn't fix so easily. His SMILE. That was not to say he disliked his pseudo devil fruit. Quite on the contrary. Despite the rather unfortunate circumstances surrounding its consumption, it had been the boost to his combat prowess Sarquiss had needed at a time, when his sense of self-worth was being challenged by the appearance of people like Laki or Nero.

Nevertheless, as versatile as his SMILE was or as useful it had proven to be, there was no denying that there was a set cap on how powerful it could become when compared to the genuine article. Hence, conventional wisdom would have seen Sarquiss focus on other avenues of growth such as the rokushiki or haki in order to circumvent the issue. Sticking stubbornly to a path which obviously ended in a dead end would have been stupid. And despite his lack of secondary education, the first mate of the Bellamy Pirates wasn't an idiot, no matter what his girlfriend said.

But…well, pride. After all, making that decision would be akin to giving up, wouldn't it?

The Sarquiss who had first set sail would probably have decided to do the smart thing. The Sarquiss, who'd had his world flipped upside down by his captain in the last year or so... well, that Sarquiss had this little voice in his head which plain refused to move on. It had been so persistent that he'd essentially declared "to hell with conventional wisdom" and gotten to work.

The initial trigger had been Bellamy's off-handed comment that force was the change in momentum within a specified interval of time. And momentum was mass multiplied by velocity. Sarquiss wasn't a scientist nor did he have the memories of one, but he'd understood enough to come up with a plan of action. If his SMILE only gave him a third of the boost in raw strength a standard zoan did to others, he could still deliver the same impact by being thrice as fast.

Simple, right?

Honestly, when he'd gone about trying to make his idea a reality, the speed aspect had been by far the simplest aspect of it all. The Crew already had three speed demons in the forms of Nero, Eddy and Bellamy so there had been plenty of ideas to use. Combined with the fact his own powers were geared towards being a speedster, it had taken barely any time at all for Sarquiss to reach and eventually surpass his initial goal. That his insectoid eyes and vibration senses made tunnel vision a non-issue had been an unexpected but very welcome bonus too, such that he hadn't needed observation haki to know where he was going.

The problems arose with the fragility of his own body. According to Bellamy, the conservation of momentum was a universal law. Which unfortunately meant that whatever impact he imparted to his opponent, he'd experience one of the same magnitude. Or had that been the third law of motion of some egghead called Newton? Either way, the first time Sarquiss had rammed his fist into a tree at full speed, the tree had shattered in a beautiful proof of concept. Emboldened by this evident success, he had immediately moved on to tougher targets of the more mineral variety and had promptly broken his own arm.

Chastened by both the experience and their resident doctor, Sarquiss had gone back to the drawing board to figure out what had gone wrong and how he might go about changing that. Identifying the issue had been simple enough…for Nico Robin, who had pointed out that Sarquiss simply lacked the chitin exoskeleton a standard zoan would have obtained. The solution had been equally simplistic in its base idea.

Get tougher.

So Sarquiss had gone about doing just that. He'd bulked up somewhat fierce, going from a slim swimmer's build into something more akin to a professional weightlifter and had quickly seen results with the support of the Crew. For example, Nero and Izou had put their heads together to come up with a training regimen while Hewitt had created a special diet just for him, with Muret maintaining a watchful eye to make sure he didn't hurt himself again. Tekkai had helped a lot too, especially once he had figured out how to limit it to his fist and forearm, so that he wasn't forced to turn into a flying log every time he tried to slam into someone like Superman (whoever that was).

But it hadn't been enough. Not if he wanted to be able to give someone like Doflamingo pause. Spurred on by the success of his friends, Sarquiss had thrown himself into his haki training, unlocking armament a few weeks after the events at Tequila Wolf. The following month had been spent experimenting and figuring out how to turn that into a functional replacement for an exoskeleton by spreading it out over his entire body. He'd succeeded too, even if his new armour was fragile, but he no longer hurt himself by hitting things. Unsurprisingly, Sarquiss had fostered high hopes that with more time, it would turn into something great.

Thus, when after all that effort, he barely got a chance to use any of it in the battle against Mad Treasure's sniper, Sarquiss had been conflicted on how to feel about it. On the one hand, it had been disappointing that Naomi had been taken out before he could really do anything. On the other hand, who knew Rivers had it in him?

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– Rivers –

If one thought about it, Rivers hadn't really won a serious fight on his own. Ever.

He'd played overwatch on St. Poplar, sat on the sidelines against Gasparde, worked as a glorified shuttle service on Sabaody and been a dial dispenser at Marineford while doing little else once that was done. The fight against the Vice Admirals in the mines of Silverstadt had been a group effort as had their victory on Tequila Wolf. And while this was hindsight talking, he'd also been left behind while Hewitt and Muret accompanied the Captain on his little trip to kick Gecko Moria's ass.

Surely, it said something about him that the closest thing to a personal win he'd had in his entire career, was bribing Fuza with sweets while in the midst of an aerial rodeo. Was it any wonder then, that out of everybody on the crew, Rivers felt as if he had arguably played the smallest role in their success so far? Even his supplementary role as a scout had become increasingly irrelevant as Aisa's range and accuracy grew by leaps and bounds.

Maybe that had been why Rivers had swung himself onto Fuza's back and flown ahead of his team as soon as the captain had issued the order. Intent on proving to himself that he wasn't deadweight.

Fuza could be very fast when his lazy partner wanted to be and that went triple with the harness Laki had thrown together for him. Bellamy had called it a poor man's rocket pack, though as Rivers had no idea what a rocket was, it wasn't like he could judge the veracity of that assessment. However, there was no denying that the three-fold combination of flame, breath and jet dials spewing out gallons upon gallons of fiery air made accelerating past a reasonable speed limit a piece of cake. That Fuza could freely control the direction by simply moving the legs the packs were attached to had been the cherry on top.

Swerving out of the way of Naomi's answering volley, Rivers returned her greeting with one of his own, which while not harming the New World sniper, did force her to exit the defensive perimeter her subordinates had formed around her lest she be evaporated like the perimeter was a split second later. With the opening volleys exchanged, the two snipers proceeded engage a furious duel, continual explosions rocking the air as both tried to unsuccessfully sneak a shot past the other.

Mobility became the name of the game, Naomi flitting about on the ground and through the trees, while Rivers and Fuza moved as with one mind, almost dancing between the fiery blasts. Occasionally, the pair would fly off to gain some distance for the sake of better angles of attack, usually followed close behind by Naomi's efforts to imitate an anti-air turret with her bow and arrows. Their subsequent dive would then result in them chasing Naomi around for a bit until a standoff ensued again and the cycle began anew.

Barrel rolls, sudden upward acceleration and headlong nosedives, along with a host of other aerial maneuvers were used liberally as the pair strove stay a step ahead of their opponent's observation haki, just like she tried to do with theirs. And like most sniper duels between observation users tended to do, it soon became a case of predicting that the other would predict they'd predict she'd predict they'd predict she'd predict they'd predict something…in aeternum, which sometimes led to craters being formed in some very out of the way places.

Neither side spared a single thought to how Rivers' friends had cleared the field of Naomi's remaining subordinates and were now watching the show while munching on popcorn. That Psycho P met an inglorious end was worth just as little attention when all three combatants were wholly focused on trying to anticipate the events of the next second from the smallest available signs. Everything that didn't contribute towards this became a luxury neither side could afford when the battle was so finely balanced on a knife's edge.

In the end, it was Fuza who tipped that balance.

Breaking off the current attack run, he began climbing higher and higher into the air until they reached the ceiling of Bonbori's stomach. For a moment, he just floated there with Naomi staring up at them, confused as to why they had broken their usual pattern. Rivers had wondered that himself before Fuza's haki intermixed with his own, allowing a tendril of something to enter his mind. It wasn't quite a thought or even an emotion, holding only the barest hints of a mental picture but it was enough for Rivers to understand. He didn't question why this phenomena had occurred or how it worked, just appreciating that it did.

And with that, the pair dived straight down, the island racing towards them as Rivers flattened himself against Fuza's speeding back, trusting his partner to keep them alive. His trust was repaid, when merely two meters before they'd have coated the ground red, Fuza changed trajectories, funnelling all the gathered kinetic energy into the tightest ninety degree turn one could imagine.

True to form, Naomi reacted to the bird rushing straight towards her by blowing up the space between them, but to no avail. Without even flinching, Fuza barreled on through, opting to open a hole in the explosion by launching a fiery blast of his own from the fire dial in his beak. Sure, they were singed in the process, but it didn't matter when they were nearly on top of their target, flying so close that Fuza's stomach feathers would graze Naomi's hair as he flew past.

Before that happened though, Rivers let go of his grip and slid off Fuza's back.

It didn't take long for him to traverse the distance between himself and the unyielding ground, but that was all the time he needed. Having pursued Fuza with her eyes and her aim, Naomi only belatedly turned around to find herself staring down the barrel of Rivers' rifle, his aerial posture the very textbook definition of a sniper's prone position. Time slowed down for both of them, Naomi's eyes widening in surprise and terror, while Rivers' own narrowed in concentration. Perhaps, to her trained sight, in the split second that decided their fate, Rivers may have looked as if he were suspended horizontally in thin air as he pulled the trigger.

"Gotcha!"

"Hick-"

BANG

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Moria is Alive!

Welcome to Marineford Daily News, your only source of accurate and unbiased truth.

To the collective horror of the world, Gecko Moria has risen from the dead! Once believed to have fallen in the line of duty during the War of the Best, the former Warlord has been sighted on Water Seven where his former ship had been sent for disassembly following it's confiscation by the marines.

The marine spokesman had noted that according to the agreement signed by the relevant parties, all assets of the Seven Royal Warlords were forfeit to the World Government in the event of their timely demise and that the marines had been perfectly justified in the actions taken during the chaotic aftermath of the war.

But Moria obviously didn't see things that way. Rather than going through the proper channels to reclaim his property and filling out the proper forms, the former Warlord decided to expedite the process by breaking into the dockyards by force with a small army of his walking dead before subsequently sailing off on the Thriller Bark.

Once believed to be a hero of the world, Gecko Moria has thus shown himself to be the cowardly, thieving traitor we always suspected him to be and proving that pirates cannot be trusted, regardless of their standing.

In response to this reprehensible robbery of government property, the marine spokesman has revealed that discussions were being held as to the future fate of the Warlord system. We remain confident that whatever is decided, it will be beneficial for the world as a whole.

This was Marineford Daily reporting.

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