The Moby Dick buzzed with the usual chaos—barrels of rum rolling, Thatch juggling knives while arguing with Vista over sword polish, and Ace napping in a hammock strung between the masts. It was Haruta who stumbled onto the treasure, his voice shrill with excitement as he burst onto the deck, clutching a wooden box.
"I FOUND IT!" he hollered, lifting the lid to reveal a spiraled fruit, its skin a kaleidoscope of cobalt and gold. "Devil Fruit! Looks like a Paramecia, maybe a Zoan! Who wants to—"
Before he could finish, a flash of iridescent feathers streaked across the deck. The crew's resident peacock—Kirin, as Gunnar had begrudgingly named it—swooped down, talons snatching the fruit from Haruta's hands.
"HEY!" Haruta lunged, but Kirin hopped just out of reach, tilting its head with avian smugness.
Thatch cracked one eye open from his hammock. "That bird's got better reflexes than you, Haruta."
Kirin pecked the fruit once, twice, and swallowed it whole.
Silence.
Then chaos.
"DID IT JUST—"
"THAT WAS MY TURN!"
"MARCO, CAN BIRDS EAT DEVIL FRUITS?!"
Marco, mid-sip of coffee, sighed. "Apparently."
Gunnar emerged from below deck, shirtless and scowling, a fresh scar across his ribs. "What's the damn noise—" He froze, spotting Kirin. The peacock glowed faintly, its feathers crackling with static.
Thatch rolled out of his hammock, grinning. "Your pet just stole Haruta's Devil Fruit."
"Not my pet," Gunnar growled, though his eyes narrowed as Kirin fluttered onto his shoulder, preening.
Haruta threw his hands up. "That was a Mythical Zoan! I felt it!"
"Bullshit," Thatch called. "You couldn't 'feel' a hangover."
Whitebeard's laughter boomed from the throne. "Gurarara! Let the bird keep it. Fits the crew's… flavor"
Jozu sidled up to Gunnar, poking Kirin's now-glowing tail. "Where'd you even find this thing?"
Gunnar swatted his hand away. "Father gave it to me. After my Coma."
The deck went quiet.
"Whitebeard… gave you a peacock?" Vista asked, incredulous.
"No," Gunnar snapped. "The fruit. A Mythical Zoan. For… recovery."
Ace whistled. "Recovery, huh? Looks like Kirin's your nurse."
Kirin pecked Ace's finger, sparks flying.
"AGH!" Ace shook his hand, glaring. "Okay, definitely* Mythical Zoan."
Smoothie stormed over, her both eye twitching. "Why does your bird get a Devil Fruit? It's already insufferable!"
Gunnar smirked. "Jealous, Princess?"
"I HATE YOU!"
Kirin flapped its wings, and a thunderclap echoed across the ship. Crewmates ducked as plates rattled and rigging swayed.
Marco pinched the bridge of his nose. "Pop… Is it alright?"
Whitebeard grinned. "Entertainment."
***
The sun beat down on the sand, each grain a tiny, searing coal against Ace's already aching back. He groaned, tasting salt, blood, and the bitter tang of defeat. Beside him, Gunnar coughed, a harsh, racking sound that ended in a gob of sandy spit.
"And that," Gunnar rasped, voice like gravel grinding gravel, staring blankly at the mercilessly blue sky, "is how Kirin got his Devil Fruit. Stole it right from under the nose of my Brothers. Birdy always been lucky."
Ace winced, not just from the throbbing in his ribs. "Are you really telling stories right now, Gunnar? We just got our asses handed to us."
"What, you got a better suggestion, pretty boy?" Gunnar shot back, turning his head just enough to glare. His face was a mess of bruises, one eye swollen near-shut. "A sing-along, perhaps?"
Further down the beach, scattered like driftwood, lay the other survivors of their small, independent Whitebeard-affiliated crew. Maybe a dozen of them, all in similar states of disrepair.
"Fighting Zephyr…" one of them, a wiry man named Pip, moaned. "What were we thinking? The Black Arm… he's a monster."
"Almost died," another, a burly woman called Martha, wheezed. "Every single one of us. If it wasn't for Kirin…"
"Yeah, yeah, Kirin the magnificent," Ace muttered, pushing himself up on an elbow. The world spun for a dizzying moment. "He pulled us out of the fire, sure. Doesn't change the fact we got roasted."
"Oh, boo hoo, Fire Fist got his flames doused," Gunnar sneered, attempting to sit up and succeeding with a pained grunt. "At least I landed a few good hits before that oversized mechanical arm caved my chest in."
Ace scoffed. "Landed hits? You mean you flailed wildly while he used you as a punching bag? I saw you, 'Alpha Dog'. More like a kicked puppy."
Gunnar's good eye narrowed. "You wanna say that again, sparky? I'll show you who the puppy is, even like this." He flexed a battered hand, knuckles raw and split. His entire demeanor was that of a cornered wolf, all bristling aggression and wounded pride. The loss clearly ate at him, a raw, festering wound to his ego.
Before Ace could retort with something equally cutting, a sudden, heavy THUD shook the sand. They both flinched, instinctively reaching for weapons that weren't there or were too damaged to use.
A colossal, tusked boar, easily the size of a small carriage, lay dead in a freshly made crater not twenty feet away. Perched atop its bristly back, radiating an almost regal disdain, was Kirin.
The peacock was magnificent, even by peacock standards. His train feathers, currently fanned out, shimmered with iridescent blues, greens, and golds. But what truly set him apart were the faint crackles of electricity that danced along the edges of his plumage, an occasional spark jumping from one feather tip to another. He preened, letting out another, more self-satisfied squawk, as if to say, 'Dinner is served, incompetents.'
Ace, despite himself, felt a reluctant admiration. He got to his feet, his body aching. "Well, don't just stare at it. I'll cook." He extended a finger, and a small, controlled flame ignited. The smell of roasting pork soon began to mingle with the salty air, a welcome change from the scent of blood and burnt cloth.
Gunnar grumbled, "Always gotta show off, don't you, Ace?" but he, too, was eyeing the boar with a primal glint.
Pip, gnawing on a cooked rib, finally voiced the question hanging in the air. "So… what now? Do we try to find one of Pops' main ships? Report in?"
The suggestion hung heavy. Returning defeated.
Gunnar, tearing into a chunk of meat with his teeth, snarled around it. "Report what? That we got our teeth kicked in by an old man with a grudge? That we ran with our tails between our legs?" He spat a piece of gristle onto the sand. "No. I'm not going back like this. Not until I've proven I'm not some damn failure. I need to wash this shame off. With blood. Preferably Zephyr's." His voice was low, intense and like a gun about to shoot.
Ace, found himself nodding slowly, the fatty meat surprisingly soothing to his bruised insides. "He's right," Ace said, the words tasting like ash despite the savory pork. "Losing is one thing. Losing this badly… I can't face Whitebeard, I need to defeat your Old man. But I can't until we've redeemed ourselves. Until I've redeemed myself." He punched a fist into his palm, wincing as the impact jarred his injuries. "That old bastard made us look like amateurs."
"Redemption," Martha mused, looking from Gunnar to Ace. "Sounds like more fighting."
"What else is there?" Gunnar retorted, grabbing another piece of meat. "We're pirates, aren't we? We fight, we win, or we die trying. This… this was just a stumble. Next time, we break his other arm."
Kirin, who had been eating silently, and one of them spoke. "Zephyr is strong. And he has followers. Many."
"So What!" Gunnar slammed his fist on the sand. "We hunt him, Whoever gets in our way. This time, we won't just survive. We'll win. I will win."
"And what if we lose again?" Skip asked quietly, voicing the fear they all felt.
Gunnar rounded on him. "Then we fight harder! Kirin!" The peacock, who had been delicately pecking at a charred piece of fat, looked up, its intelligent eyes fixing on its master. "You got more thunder in you, boy?"
Kirin let out an affirmative, crackling shriek, its feathers flaring with a brief, brilliant burst of blue lightning.