Taki's Story

'Wow. I decided to use a name that a lot of people called Buggy in my last life. Guess I will have to use the D. name to it's best advantage.' I was still laying down when I heard Taki say this: "Buggy the Clown? Your name is 'the Clown'?"

"Yeees, my name is Buggy D. Clown, why?" My eyes closed a little.

She stood up on the blankets and pointed at me "No! Your name is Bugs! It's way easier to say that than to say 'Buggy the Clown'!"

I felt my veins in my forehead bulge. I said in as much of a menacing voice as possible "There is no way... YOU are going to call me 'Bugs'. If you want to call me something, call me Buggy."

And she reacted to that by moving back and curling her tail a little, and lowering her ears while having a petrified look on her face. And then tears started to form in the corners of her eyes.

'Okay, seriously, is Buggy's personality affecting me somehow? I shouldn't be able to make someone cry multiple times. I guess the name isn't horrible, but I can't just have her call me that out in front of the whole world.'

Still laying down, I gave a proposition: "I got an idea. If you want to call me 'Bugs', *Sigh*, then you can only do it when we talk alone. I don't want the image of me to be un-... uh... Not menacing or stoic. That's it. So you can call me 'Bugs', but not in front of other people. Does that sound good to you?"

Her ears perked up at that and the petrified look disappeared. "I-if you're okay with me calling you Bugs."

"Yeah. I guess it's fine."

'WAIT. Didn't I learn that Taki here has a devil fruit ability a couple minutes ago? She can make stone with it, right? Maybe I should confirm wether or not she actually ATE a devil fruit.'

"Hey Taki. I got a question for you." I sat up, slightly startling the calming down fox child.

"Um, yes?"

'How do I ask this question. There are multiple things that could identify a devil fruit, especially the inability to swim, but I don't really remember seeing any of the Mink tribe swim, at least in memory. Maybe I should ask about a horrible tasting fruit, that might make sense.' I turned to her and asked "So, do you remember eating a horrible tasting fruit at all?"

She curled a little into a ball, holding her legs near her chest, and her ears folding back down into her hair.

'Seems like it had some effect on her, or whatever happened had some effect on her. I bet it's gonna be a long story. And a sad one. Better get comfy for the potentially long tale of Taki.' So I sat with my legs crossed, took off my cloak and folded it quickly, tossed it to the side, and turned towards her.

"Three years ago, I think, I remember falling to the ocean, and I don't remember anything before that except for my name and how old I am. I remember being four when I fell, but I don't know why I fell. When I hit the water, it was freezing, and I never learned to swim, so I splashed around to try and find anything to float with."

'Already sad. Amnesia I think, but I don't remember much about my own life before like 8, so I can't say much.'

"I ended up splashing around for a while and almost thought that I couldn't do anything, until I found myself grabbing a hold of some wood, where I pulled myself up onto it to find a ship burning down. I barely was able to grab a hold of anything from it except some rope and what was left of the burnt sail, and I ended up seeing something really tall move past, which sent me floating away from anything else I could grab. And for a while, I just had a sail as a place to sleep during the night and the rope to hold it together. The wood that I was floating on was big enough to carry the sail if I wrapped it up, and enough for me to walk on."

'Weird. Wonder why and what ship was destroyed by Zunesha moving around. It's probably not important though.'

"But there was one problem, food. I didn't have any, so when I got hungry, I tried to ignore it because I couldn't eat anything and didn't grab anything. And once I got hungry enough, I decided to eat the sail, because I wanted to eat something, anything, and a sail is something. So, I ate the sail. It didn't taste good since it soaked in the water, so I needed water, but couldn't do anything. I ended up eating almost half that sail just to stay alive before I found something caught in the sail itself. A treasure chest was in the sail, and when I opened it, I found a weird fruit that was just shaped like a ball, with a stone-y outside covered in star shaped swirls, but I was too hungry to think about it and just ate the whole thing because of how hungry I was. And it tasted horrible when I think back to it, I didn't really pay attention since I was so hungry and thirsty that I didn't realize how bad the taste was until I was done eating it."

'Definitely a devil fruit. No other fruit would taste bad if you ate it other than a rotten one, but with a stone texture and swirls, weird swirls nonetheless, but that is a description of a devil fruit. What devil fruit? No idea. I don't remember so I just have to see what it is later.'

"I wanted to drink some water to get rid of that taste afterwards, so I tried to drink from the ocean, and as soon as I touched it, I felt really tired, and then pulled my hand out of the water, which was more work that I had thought. I tried more times to get water, but it didn't work, and I kept becoming tired over and over again, until I fell asleep on what was left of the sail. But when I woke up, I found myself near this place, I didn't know how I got near here, but I found a bag full of food and a barrel of water on my piece of floating broken boat alongside these blankets we are on right now. I ate all of the food that was on that boat, and drank all of that water before I drifted onto the beach. So when I got here, I decided to run onto the land and dragged everything I could along, and still didn't know what happened, so after dragging everything to off the beach, I decided to run and see if anyone was there, until I ran to that town to ask people where I was."

'What? A barrel of water and a bag of food just appeared? And these blankets too? It sounds like someone helped her and secretly did it. I could find out more, but she's not done. and wasn't Zunesha on the other side of the Red Line? How did she even end up on this side? It can't be a coincidence, but I don't know what would have happened to cause it.'

"When I first walked into town, everyone saw me as a monster and ran me out, trying to hurt me. But when I got to my stuff, everyone had stopped chasing me. And I tried again, over and over until I just gave up on it. So I snuck around town to find stuff out, learning that gold was important, and it could be sold for money, and money was important to travel, to buy food, and to buy anything. So I dug this hole out and dragged everything in here to keep it safe, since I didn't have it before and didn't know if I could find it if I lost it. That all happened over two years ago, and I have been getting gold ever since to see if I could find my homeland. But since you're here, I don't need that money anymore." Her spirit lifted a little at the thought of finding her homeland, with her ears perking slightly.

'That was a lot.' I decided to talk about it. "So, in summary, you fell of Zou, ended up living and eating a part of a ship you ended up with, ate the sail you kept until you found a box with a horrible tasting fruit in it and ate that, then tried to drink sea water to get rid of the taste, only to fall asleep and wake up to a bunch of blankets, food, and water. Then find out you are near here, and learn stuff only to start living here in hopes of getting enough money to find your home? That is definitely a lot to go through at the age of... four? That's some trauma if I've ever heard. But circumstances just weren't in your favor, and that's all. I can't help with your past, but I can help your future. Since I already agreed to help you, actually taking money from people doesn't matter anymore. Just count on me to get you there." And I ruffled her hair a little.