The Marine

Standing at the prow of the [M.S.S. Showboat], Bill was looking towards a black cloud that wafted across the expanse of the horizon.

By now the riff-raff fleet of commandeered pirate galleons was within several hours of arriving at New Haven and looking forward to finally reaching landfall by that afternoon had caused his expectation to rise.

This expectation wasn’t just his own, thanks to word getting around the Merveillians and even Foxy Pirates were looking forward to seeing the high-tech island of [New Haven].

Electric light, air conditioning, and internal plumbing existed in some places but for the vast majority of people in this world they were complete unknowns.

Of course, Bill knew full well that there would be difficulties in New Haven taking in over 2,000 more residents but as best as he could figure it would be possible. After all, there was an abundance of sea life surrounding the island for food and they had the technical knowledge to make enough housing at least for the Merveillians.

If push came to shove Bill figured he could rip up another part of the seabed to expand the island as he had done before.

Those were the thoughts that had been running through his head over the past several days, only now for there to be completely other ones taking their place.

‘Is that… smog?’ he thought, eyeing the black cloud lofting in front of them.

He could tell that it wasn’t rainclouds – the blackened cloud was too low for that – and so he was instantly filled with hypotheticals.

A fusion reactor provided the island with electricity, so in terms of power generation there were no emissions. However, the same could not be said about the forges, refineries, factories, and the large drydock. Each of which used various materials that needed to be smelted, blasted, welded, and otherwise processed.

In industry everything was a tradeoff.

One of those tradeoffs Bill had made was to reduce the efficiency of his Department’s workshops to increase the standard of living for those engineers and families who had permanent residence on the island.

This was no small tradeoff either. It had to be known that the Procurement Department issued non-standard rifles and kits to each of its Marines.

Even putting aside the toxic method of creating the seastone-metallic compound for the [Iron Wardens], or synthesizing bio-engineering materials for cybernetic limbs, just simply manufacturing enough ammunition for training purposes caused a staggering amount of waste.

And in the grand scheme of things, the ammunition factory was one of the least polluting facilities on the island.

‘Either the island is on fire or Nelson’s been forced to increase production quotas’ was Bill’s final thought on the matter.

If either one of those outcomes were the case, then signified that the situation was more dire than he would have hoped.

But standing there on the prow of the ship Bill made sure that he was being seen. Occasionally talking to the people around him, he was flanked by the former-outlaw Hollandaise and Chore Boy Roule.

The former Foxy Pirates didn’t care one way or another about the smoke, but the Merveillians had questions to which Bill answered as honestly as he could.

He didn’t say he thought the island could be on fire, just mentioned that the factories could have been working at full capacity due to the beasts invading the East Blue.

This seemed to be a good enough excuse, though the expectations of the refugees had diminished somewhat. ‘It can’t be helped’ is all Bill thought about it, after all, he was literally sailing these people into darkness. He couldn’t expect that they would stay completely unconcerned.

Moving forward with the wind and in every other direction with the waves, it wasn’t long until Bill saw New Haven as a tiny spec on the horizon.

Smiling when he focused his eyes, he was glad to see that there were no signs of fire, but instantly that frown was turned upside down when he saw a dozen ‘puffs’ in the far distance and realized.

‘That crazy fool is firing on us!’

Questions could be asked later, jumping into the air Bill sped off in the direction of the shells and deciding the best way to not scare the hell out of the people on the ships he gritted his teeth and muttered: “[Time Warp]!”

Slowing time relative to himself down by more than 50%, Bill reached the shell furthest to the right and altered its course directly downwards. Doing this with the next eleven shells took him over seven seconds in real time which wasn’t enough to tire him mentally but was enough to irritate him.

Steadfast in not drawing any conclusions, he was further annoyed when Yoko practically vaulted her way towards him, and with her [Compliance Tree] in her hands said: “Bill! Did that Nelson actually just shoot at us?!

I told you he was no good and that he’d try to take over everything as soon as you left!”

It was hard to not roll his eyes at this comment, but replying back to her, Bill told Yoko that she had never made such a claim and to go back to the ships and tell everybody there was nothing to worry about.

After all, when the King Cannon shells hit the water, twelve tsunamis were kicked up a hundred feet into the air. Despite being far enough way that they wouldn’t affect either the ships or New Haven, it was a terribly destructive scene.

Seeing her do as she was told, Bill turned and sped towards New Haven, about halfway there he could hear the sirens wailing and see Nelson looking directly at him through electronic binoculars.

Getting closer fast, Bill could see Nelson’s facial expression but could not determine what it was.

The emotions of happiness and relief were battling against fear and the look of someone has when they realize that they had made a really really bad mistake.

Landing in front of the Science Division Commander with a hard ‘thud’, the waves hadn’t subsided behind him, and the entire officer corps left on the island were looking at him awkwardly.

Turning a couple of the men present, both [Ruluka Island] natives who had joined the Department just before the raid on Hannabal Island, Bill said: “Officer Hank, see that those cannon crews stand down immediately and prepare the harbor to dock four medium sized galleons. Officer Lin, order those sirens to cease and see to it that the barracks kitchens prepare a dinner for an additional 2200 people.”

Getting two quick nods, both men fumbled for sleeves on their vests and hurriedly pulled out handheld communication devices shaped like square walkie-talkie’s.

Turning away from the rest of the group, they began quickly speaking to whoever was on the other end and started heading for the corridors that went down from the fortress’s primary overlook. Seeing to the Commodores’ orders personally, they didn’t waste a single breath.

Looking around to take a closer look at the newly built fortification, Bill waited a moment before giving orders to each of the other men present. New Haven could take in and support a couple thousand people, but it wouldn’t be easy and the next couple of hours until the ships docked in port would be crucial.

After sending the others off to do their jobs it was finally only Bill and Nelson standing alone atop a newly built fortress overlook.

With his back to the sea, Bill used his foot to tap the stone underneath his feet and said: “You’ve been busy! It’s only been a couple of months and you’ve constructed all of this, there’s smog in the air and soot spread across the island, and now you’re shooting at me?”

Met with this accusation, no matter how sarcastic Bill had said it, a wave of righteous indignation washed over Nelson and for a brief moment he was the same person that he was growing up as a kingdom noble: “Sh..shooting at you? Well, I say I ought to have shot at you and ought to have hit you!

Unless you do not know this, so-called Commodore, we have a war going on and you’ve been MIA for TWO MONTHS!!

Imagine that! No communication, not a single word from our ‘Commodore’ during that time! The only concrete news any of us had was the signal from that submarine you departed on!

…

…”

Listening to Nelson lay into him, Bill could easily tell that the Commander had lost a significant amount of weight over the last couple of months.

If the first time Nelson laid into him, he had been an enormous whale-person, now, he was a thin and haggard creature whose red circled cheeks were dimmed by the dark bags carried underneath his eyes.

Giving his Commander another few moments to vent out his frustration, Bill put his foot by cutting him off and saying: “Alright, that’s enough. You’ve struggled, and I recognize that, but I also haven’t been having a picnic. I won’t have you diminish those efforts either.

Now answer me, and I don’t want to hear a complaint from you. How were you able to build this fortress in the couple months since my departure?”

If Bill could understand the reason for the smog and soot that was everywhere, he could not understand how Nelson had constructed a Marine-styled fortress at the mouth of New Haven’s harbor in barely six weeks.

Gritting his teeth, Nelson answered Bill’s demand by saying: “The fortress isn’t finished yet, not by a long shot.” As he spoke, he motioned his arms around clearly still wanting to vent his frustrations to his superior, he nonetheless did as Bill ordered him to do.

Continuing, he started to say: “The gun decks are the only actually finished part, which I’m sure you’ve seen-“ but was cut off by Bill who wanted to know how the building itself was actually built.

“Eh? Well, thank Henzo for that. That old coot finally did something besides designing his power suits when we lost contact with you and the others.

He altered the anti-gravity field device you designed for the Pulse Gloves. It takes a lot more power than your original design, but he was able to stabilize the anti-gravity effects and make it constant.

With that we could easily lift the stones and put them into place.

I know what you’re going to ask… Yes, the stone had to be cannibalized from the pile we were going to expand the island with but there was no other option.”

Hearing that Henzo had altered his device wasn’t something that Bill was off put by. Instead, he could only think that was interesting and wondered how it would work. Back when he designed the Pulse Boots and Gloves, the reason they could only work in ‘pulses’ was due to the extreme amounts of power needed to keep a continuous anti-gravity field.

After he was done explaining about the fortress, Bill asked the whereabouts of Sasha and told Nelson what he had seen in the paper concerning Ranse.

Nodding to his questions Nelson told Bill to follow him.

Walking down the ramparts, towards the command center of New Haven, he described the last seven weeks of hell. Silently listening to Nelson speak, the only thing Bill would do was acknowledge the people who saw him back on the island. Despite their wide smiles at seeing him, he couldn’t be happy.

The situation described by Nelson was pure chaos around the world.

Starting from their own responsibilities on New Haven, when Ranse was placed in charge of the East Blue’s response to the Beast Wave it was the island that had been burdened with the truly vast amounts of resources needed to fund the operation.

This was why there were no ships in the harbor, not even the couple small sized Frigates that had been being refurbished.

In explaining this Nelson had answered another question Bill had, because each and every one of their vessels were being used to ferry munitions and gear across the Calm Belt and by the time they returned, more were needed elsewhere.

Their Department currently had 2400 Marine personnel which manned a battlefleet of five Frigates, one large Galleon, one large Battleship, and an additional eight escort Caravels.

These numbers were not small but were nowhere near large enough to cause the state-of-the-art factories to fall behind in production, whether or not Nelson demanded more King Cannon’s to be assembled.

Holding off on this question, Nelson was prompt in explaining the reason he was forced to push production quotas was due to the fact that Ranse had required thousands more Rivet Rifles and a general rearmament of the [East Blue Marine Corps].

“Grenades and shell casings can’t be produced at the same time as rifle barrels, the gunpowder used in cannon shells and 30.06 cartridges aren’t the same so we have to almost daily recalibrate the machines! Doesn’t he know we only have two assembly plants?!

I say, I directly told that damned cattle prodder that he was depleting our resources faster than we could replace them! Then he goes on and on about fighting this or that monster and what can I do from here besides comply with his demands?!”

Walking into the command center of New Haven, tired eyes lit up and whispers started around the building on Bill’s arrival.

A step behind Nelson they entered the high-tech [Situation Room] where there was a holographic table in the center which showed nearly two dozen multicolored pings.

Due to the fact that they had no satellites, Bill hadn’t even considered that type of technology until he unexpectedly saw one back on Merveille, the holographic image did not show a ‘GPS’ layout of a globe but instead on showed the pings distance and direct direction from New Haven itself.

Beside the table were a couple [Logistics] officers who were tracking the pings and seeing Bill they hurriedly saluted.

“At ease.” He told them, and then picking up a stack of dispatch manifests asked Nelson again: “Alright, so Ranse is in the East Blue, what about Sasha?”

Thumbing through a cabinet, Nelson didn’t look at Bill when he answered: “Captain Zima hasn’t taken anything materially from New Haven, besides the fact that she’s in command of the Salamander and a good portion of our most powerful Marines the largest issue with her is that she hasn’t returned to New Haven when I ordered her to.”

Finding the records that he was looking for, Nelson briefed Bill concerning the issues Sasha and Ricky had been facing and handed him the papers with a serious look and brief ‘thought you’d like to see this’ comment.

Looking at the papers, Bill didn’t need to ask but read with a frown on his face.

“That’s just what my contacts could tell me, it’s not much but its more than Egghead was willing to share.” Seeing that Bill looked at him with some confusion, Nelson continued: “Sentomaru has called for you several times but when I said you weren’t here, he promptly ended our communications.”

This was troubling because the report that Bill was reading was labeled.

[Pacifista Program – Prototype Incident Report]

Bill had learned about the [Pacifista Program] from Warden Isaac a couple years before and it had instantly soured his opinion of the Science Division. Being who he was, he didn’t keep them a secret from his commanding staff and was pleased to see that the idea of cloned cybernetic slave soldiers didn’t sit well with them either.

Though they each had different reasons for being opposed to the idea of Pacifista in the Marines, Bill hadn’t gone to demand Vegapunk cease the project until he felt he had something to replace with them.

Thanks to the addition of low purity seastone frames, the Iron Wardens had come far over the last couple of years, but with his responsibilities in expanding their operations across the East Blue and simultaneously training himself as much as he possibly could Bill had never gotten around to going to Egghead Island himself to meet with Dr. Vegapunk.

In fact, Bill lamented as he read the list of actions taken by ‘Bartholomew Kuma’, he hadn’t spoken to [Dr. Vegapunk] directly in several years.

‘Why is Sengoku pushing prototypes into service…’ Bill thought to himself before asking with a huff: “Nelson, how’s the war going against Whitebeard?”

Hearing the question, Nelson answered in a ‘matter of fact’ way: “We’ve lost a lot of good men. Yes, I’d say we’re getting the raw end of the deal so far.” And when Bill asked how that was possible, the Commander answered dutifully: “The Whitebeard Pirates aren’t alone. They have their pirate allies, allied governments, and a host of opportunist scavengers. They strike in force and retreat before any of our major powers can respond.

It isn’t just Whitebeard himself. The Division Commanders Marco ‘the Phoenix’, ‘Diamond’ Jozu, and Vista of the ‘Flower Swords’ can fend off even Admirals for a period of time.

Sengoku doesn’t dare send an Admiral out alone or they could be killed by that trio but nor does he send out a group lest [Marineford] become vulnerable as it was against Shiki…

Hells, I didn’t even ask! Is Shiki still at large Commodore?!”

Nodding his head Bill told Nelson that Shiki remained free and then told him what had happened on Merveille.

“Cowardly bastard!” was the reply that Bill got, but not upset himself after so many weeks, Bill told Nelson that he’d return capture the Flying Pirate as soon as the refugees were settled.

After their last battle, Bill had very little reason to suspect that Shiki could defeat him and everyone who had been there believed the same thing.

Waiting for the ships to come in, Bill continued to be debriefed. He would contact Ranse, Sasha, and a host of other people after the people were dealt with.

The pictures of the ‘Monarch’ beasts attained by New Haven far exceeded what was in the newspapers and Bill was shocked and excited to see that Ranse had grown so powerful.

After all, Bill did abide by the old saying that ‘a friend's triumph is a friend's delight’ and held that true friends genuinely celebrate in each other's accomplishments and victories.

The next few hours passed in an instant, and when the two men were informed of the ships docking Bill and Nelson moved to the docks.

While the process of settling thousands of people started, including training regiments for the former Foxy Pirates, the Logistics officers inside the [Situation Room] began tracking a red ping labeled ‘Amigo-1’ as it began to move closer to base.

Unbeknownst to Bill at this time, he wouldn’t have to go find his target.

Shiki was coming to New Haven with his floating islands in tow.