Chapter 168: Recovering

Dialogue "sample"

Thoughts 'sample'

Author notes -sample-

Disclaimer: One Piece and all of its characters belong to Eiichiro Oda.

Chapter 168: Recovering

When she opened her eyes, Vivi found herself in an unfamiliar room.

She made a move to stand up and felt an intense headache.

"Take it easy, you pushed your body beyond its limits for too long."

The voice of Chopper came from the other side of the room.

Her last memories flashed before her eyes. She forced her unstable awakening while trying to save Ace and get rid of that Admiral.

"Right…I remember…since this does not look like a cell, I guess we managed to escape. Did we get Ace back?" She asked.

Chopper approached her bed in order to examine her.

She let him do his thing for a while until he stopped and looked at her with a surprised expression.

"This healing ability of yours is amazing…your body was internally damaged when you collapsed. But now it's perfectly fine. The pain is probably from the mental exhaustion, it should pass soon." The doctor explained.

"Right…" She held her head since that seemed to ease the pain a bit.

"You didn't answer my questions thought."

"We rescued Ace and escaped, using Smoker's ship. You have been unconscious for the last twelve hours. We are currently on the calm sea. Nami thinks that we still have a few more hours before being able to leave it and change course to the Shabondy Archipelago." Chopper explained.

Vivi breathed in relief.

'We made it…'

"Then. What happened to-"

The door opened and Nami entered in a rush.

"Vivi!, you are awake!"

She rushed to her side and gave her a tight hug.

"You had me so worried…"

Vivi did not know what to say and just hugged the other girl back.

"Sorry…I had to do it."

"She is fine. Just need some rest and not to use her abilities for at least 24 hours and no haki either. I have seen Luffy reach this level of exhaustion a few times, the best is just to wait and let her natural healing work." Said Chopper.

"There are still some things I want to know. What happened to Smoker and Zoro's girl? What about Kid, is he behaving?."

Nami released Vivi and sat down at her side.

"Well… let's see. Smoker and Tashigi are currently locked inside one of the bedrooms. We had to put some seastone cuffs on him to make sure he won't try to fight us again."

"As for Eustass Kid…we had to put him in cuffs too…" Nami made a complicated face.

Vivi rose an eyebrow.

"Why?...what let me guess…he tried to kill the marines."

Nami nodded.

'It no wonder…his hatred for anything marine relate seems to know no bounds after what happened to his crew…what are we going to do with him?.' She wondered.

<><><><><><><><><>

After resting for a few more minutes, her headache diminished and she wanted to see the rest of her friends.

In the main living area, she found most of them. Luffy, Bon Clay, Marco, and Ace were chatting while drinking something.

Ace was wearing some casual clothing that probably belonged to one of the Marines. He looked very much recovered and was not wearing the seastone cuffs, which made Vivi wondered how did they manage to remove them since the keys must have been in Kizaru's possession.

"Everyone is looking better, I see." Commented Vivi as she entered the room.

"Vivi!" Luffy exclaimed with a smile.

They made some room for her and Nami and they sat down.

She looked at Ace, who was giving her a beaming smile.

"I have been told that I owe my life to you, Vivi. Thank you!" He gave her a bow.

"No need for that…You are my Captain beloved brother. And we all worked hard to rescue you, it wasn't just me. Im glad to see you free, make sure they don't get you again."

Ace frowned at remembering how he was captured.

"If it wasn't for that damn Blackbeard!"

"Yeah…he got us good, that bastard." Commented Marco with a disgruntled expression.

"What happened?" Asked Nami, who wanted to know more. And she wasn't the only one.

"Did you guys got beat up by that Blackbeard?" Asked Luffy.

"Not exactly." Started Marco. "After Ace came back with new information about him and his devil fruit ability. Our father decided that Ace should not go alone and sent me and a few others with him."

"Faher died shortly after that…" Said Ace with bitterness in his voice.

"Yeah…I think he knew and didn't want us to see him die like that. He probably wanted to die in some big battle instead of laying on a bed." Said Marco.

"We spend a long time tracking Teach back. We then got a tip about his location and foolishly went to his encounter…that was a trap."

Ace clenched his fist.

"It wasn't just that bastard and his crew waiting for us but a whole army of marines, and two Admirals…we had no chance."

"We made some time for our brothers to escape but Ace and I got captured…and you know the rest" Said Marco.

"So, Blackbeard is still working with the Marines?" Asked Vivi.

"No, he is not." Inazuma entered the room.

"Sorry, I overheard part of your conversation."

"That's okay. " Said, Marco. "So, what happened to Teach."

"Shortly after you were captured, Blackbeard raided one of the most secure secret laboratories belonging to the Marines, took something from there, and disappeared. The Marines are looking for him like crazy, so whatever he took must have been very important. His title as Shichibukai has obviously been revoked but it hasn't been made public yet." Inazuma explained.

"A laboratory?" Muttered Ace. "What the heck is that bastard planning?"

"They have already lost a lot of Shichibukais in a short period of time. They don't want to seem weak." Commented Nami.

Vivi was thinking about this new information. She knew that the Marines had been doing all sorts of mess-up experiments and wondered what could Blackbeard had taken from there.

'What is he planning now?...things are happening very differently than how they were supposed, so I truly have no idea what is going to happen and that scares me a bit…but it also makes it more exciting.' She could not help but let out a smile.

A.N: - Remember to comment, vote and/or leave a review if you have the time. Those things help me a lot and I would really appreciate it.

You can Support me on P@treon if you like and get 10 advanced chapters.

-patreon.com/Kriogenix