The Vanguard sailed calmly, being warmed by the morning sun, and gently rocked by waves.
The group was having breakfast at the table, on the deck.
Robin was reading a medical book with her glasses on, Nojiko was drawing a map of the island they just left, Buggy groggily sipped his coffee and Aden was deep in thought.
"What has gotten you in such a pensive mood, captain?" Robin asked, barely looking up from her book.
"...Just considering visiting Luffy. I did promise to stop by afterall." Aden said, with a distant look.
"You miss him,huh?" asked Nojiko, with an understanding look. She missed Nami.
"Obviously."
"But, how would you even find him? They could be anywhere." Buggy asked, barely waking up.
"Well i have this." said Aden, pulling out a folded paper from behind his belt.
"Hang on! Is that a....?" Buggy perked up.
"Vivre Card? Yep. Asked Shanks to make it for me years ago. And i weaved a piece of it into Luffy's hat when it got damaged one day.
"That is amazing, so that means you can always find him." smiled Nojiko, after getting an explenation of what a Vivre Card was
"Exactly. So...If you want to tell Nami something, just write it in a letter and i'll deliver it for you." Aden suggested, causing Nojiko to jump to her feet and run to her room, leaving behind a chuckling group.
A bit later, Nojiko returned with her letter.
"Alright. I'll be off. I left a piece of my Vivre Card with Buggy, and i'll be taking a Snail with me, so if anything happens that you can't handle, call me." Aden said, putting on his coat, stashing the snail in his pocket and walked towards the starboard side ladder.
"Be careful, captain." said Robin.
"I would say 'Stay out of trouble' but it's you, so why bother." said Nojiko with a grin.
"Just don't die. Or do. Then i'd be captain." Buggy said, seemingly without any care, but everyone saw he didn't mean it.
As Aden got ready to leave after confirming the direction in which to go, everyone expected him to fly away, but he subverted those expectations by jumping into the sea and shooting away, only leaving behind a trail of disturbed water.
"*sigh* He always has to be extra, doesnt't he?" sighed Nojiko.
Aden was doing his best impression of a torpedo, occasionaly flying into the air to check his heading, before diving back in the sea with a fresh layer of air around him.
"Even this has gotten a lot easier. I feel like i could stay in water for a while, even without the air layer. But enough of that, i better get in the air, this is not fast enough. And even then it'll take me who knows how long to reach Luffy." Aden thoughtfully considered as he broke the water surface and took to the skies.
As he flew above the clouds, he felt that he could go faster. So that's exactly what he did.
He sped up so much, he had to semi-transform into air, but still more or less held his shape. His speed increases to the point that he felt like he was trying to break through concrete, but he still pushed his speed further.
And that's when it happened,
*SHHH-BOOOOOMMM!*
a loud explosion of sound, accompanied by the moisture in the air around him condensing into a cone shape.
"Did i just...Brake the sound barrier?! What the hell? How does that even work?" Aden shouted in his mind in confusion. He is air, so how could he be going faster than sound? This was all going through his mind as he continued to fly a bit beyond the speed of sound.
It would take him hours, if not days to find his brother so he had a lot of time to think.
Especially about his Devil Fruit. He has long suspected it was not a wind element fruit, but something completely different.
He looked back at his life in this world, all the training he did and considered every angle he could. And then an idea struck him. What if he could do all those things, because his Fruit was not a Logia, but a Special Paramecia.
Looking back at everything he can do now, he thought that maybe, his fruit allows him to manipulate physics in some way. But that didn't account for his ability to turn into air, at least by his current understanding.
A second idea he came up with, was that he may be able to somehow absorb and channel different elements? That made even less sense, but these ideas were the only ones he came up with, that would explain his abilities.
After hours and hours of brainstorming, he simply filed it away for later again and kept flying. After a while he stopped to check the Vivre Card. It seemed to be trying to go slightly downwards so that meant he was close.
As he began his descent he spotted a huge city with water channels all over. There were different ships everywhere and he soon saw the reason. A huge shipyard was taking a part of the city and he could see a bunch of ships being built currently.
"Water 7? I heard about this place. Best shipwrights around if the stories are to be believed." Aden thought, slowing down as he got closer.
He flew for almost two days to reach here, so the sun was just rising. He was a bit tired, but nothing major, he could stay awake for another day or two.
Aden found what seemed to be a scrapyard and landed there. Looking around he spotted a house built from scrap not too far away, but decided to ignore it. He had a straw-hat wearing rubber man to find.
He checked the Vivre Card again and walked in the direction it wanted to go.
.
The Straw-Hat crew was sitting around a big room they were given by Iceburg for saving his and Franky's life. The cyborg was nowhere to be found after Luffy's offer to join his crew.
"Luffy! I am telling you, it's a bad idea!" shouted Zoro at his captain.
"Why!? We need a new ship! Merry was a great friend to us, but she's gone!" he shouted back.
"Still hurts though." said Usopp sadly from the side.
"But stealing a ship from here is such a moronic idea! We can just buy one. We have the money now." Zoro said, getting really tired of this.
"No." came a single word from Nami.
"Oh don't you start. What is the point of having it if you are not gonna spend it?" Zoro turned to her angrily, recieving a kick in the face right after.
"Don't you dare talk to Nami-swan that way, you moss-headed bastard!" Sanji shouted, his foot still stuck to Zoro's face.
" Again with the moss insults?! I swear the next time i see Aden i will give him a piece of my mind! He started with those, the bastard." Zoro complained as he unstuck his face from Sanji's shoe, more upset with the insult than with getting his face kicked in. This resulted in the rest of the crew laughing.
"Come on guys. Don't fight! You especially Zoro. You will tear your stitches again." said a small raccoon ("REINDEER!")..sorry. Said a small reindeer.
"Chopper's right you guys. Stop it. You really should listed to your doctor." said a gruff voice from near the open window.
"Whatever." said Zoro and went to sit on his bench to presumably take a nap.
"Right... So... Is nobody gonna talk about the cat in the room?" Sanji asked, lighting a cigarette.
"What is there to talk about? I already told you my story. And when Luffy offered me to join your crew after learning of my situation, i accepted." the gruff voice replied, his figure blocked by the sun coming in through the window.
"Right... Because that made a lot of sense..." Sanji said sarcastically.
"Sanji, that is enough. I trust him. He had a perfect chance to kill me, but he didn't. Frankly, the only reason we got out of Enies Lobby is because Lucci carried me out of there." Luffy defended his new crewmate, in a rare show of seriousness.
"Okay, okay. Geez. I'm just being cautious."
"It's alright. I wouldn't trust me either if i were in your shoes. That mind-controlling, flying rat ruined my life. I joined them thinking i would serve justice and order. But when i saw the truth, they had the pidgeon bend my will to their own goals." now identified Rob Lucci explained a bit further.
"I am forever thankful to you Captain, for killing the pest." he said, turning towards Luffy.
"Though i am a bit worried where that thing's Devil Fruit ended ul, it should be okay. The mind-control had a very short range, that's why the bird stayed near me all the time." Lucci said with barely contained rage.
(flashback time)
As a young man he joined the marines, thinking he would make a difference, but after realizing the World Government was indeed NOT the shining example of good they portrayed themselves to be, he was mindwashed by a bird with a Devil Fruit for years. It wasn't until he nearly killed Luffy, that he woke up to his own mind again, simply because the bird was too far away. Remembering all the heinous things he was forced to do under the birds control, he decided right then and there to help these pirates escape and hopefully they would not hate him for this. He was a good man at heart, but he could understand if they wanted him dead. He would not fight back. It would be deserved.
So he threw Luffy over his shoulder and jumped out of the tower towards their ship, where he crew was waiting. Seeing him approach, they got defensive, but after seeing him carry their captain, and approaching them seemingly not wanting to fight, they waited.
After putting him down, Lucci immediately raised his hands in surrender, and gave them a short version of his story. That was when Luffy woke up, only to see Lucci talking to his crew. He was confused, but if they were okay he didn't really care. But then he spotted a white pidgeon fly closer to them, and at the same time Lucci froze in the middle of a sentence. In a moment of brilliance, he put two and two together, figuring out the bird was doing something to Lucci, and punched it out of the sky with as much force as he could muster at that moment. The bird flew backwards, and if the punch didn't kill it, the sea would. The moment the bird was gone, Lucci relaxed again and turned to look at Luffy with gratitude written all over his face.
(flashback over)
Everyone recalled the moment Lucci agreed to join them. And after explaining things to Iceburg, Lucci was forgiven for his attempt at the mayor's life.
As the crew got to talking again, a knock sounded at the door.
As Sanji was the closest, went to open the door. And when he did, his cigarette dropped from his mouth.
"Aden? How did you get here?" Sanji asked in shock.
"Wait..Aden!!?" everyone besides Lucci and Chopper shouted.
"Sup."
(And there we go again. Took a bit longer than id like, but hey what can you do. What a twist eh? Anyway ill see yall next time.)
(A/N. So, Aden presented two ideas as to what his power might really be. So i would like to have your opinions. That means i would like to wait until i get some votes on which itll be, before continuing. This sucks i know, but i want to take your thoughts into consideration as well.
So here is the choices:
1. Still just Air, but extremely creative with it.
2. Physics manipulation on a yet to be determined scale.
3. Elemental conduit, similar to the inFamous games. (which i realized only after i wrote the thought down)
or 4. Give me some of your ideas?
Thank you for reading.)