chapter 111

"Did Laffite get the Dials I told him about?" I asked Wilson as Doc Q came down from the ship and began working on Urouge's wounds. "Oh, you mean those sea shell thingies?" Wilson asked as he turned to look at me.

"He's getting the last of them with Byron as we speak," he added, pointing towards three barrels neatly placed on top of each other. "Good, we can put those to good use in the future," I remarked as I made my way towards one of the barrels, opening it and smiling in satisfaction at its contents.

"Who is this guy, by the way?" Wilson asked as he turned to look at Urouge, who Doc Q was treating. "Another weirdo?" he asked again after looking at the mad monk's grin.

"He has a bone to pick with the guy who attacked us too," I replied with a smirk. "So he'll be fighting with us, for the meantime," I added with a shrug.

"So, what happened to him?" Wilson asked again, eyeing the exhausted and tattered monk curiously. "That monster you're talking to happened to me," Urouge replied himself, snorting through his grin, causing Wilson to chuckle.

"You're making a habit out of beating up people and befriending them," Wilson said in an amused tone, shaking his head. "Hey, it worked on you, didn't it?" I asked with a shit-eating grin.

"Are you implying that you managed to beat me up?" Wilson asked with a raised eyebrow. "I'm not implying anything, gorilla brain," I replied with a smile.

"I beat you up, and that's a fact that doesn't need implying," I added with a shrug, quickly stepping to the side to dodge one of Wilson's fists.

"You wanna go at it, you bastard?" Wilson asked with a scowl, retracting his sleeves. "If you want to get beaten up again, then by all means," I replied with a smirk, moving forward fist first in Wilson's direction.

"Are they going to be okay?" Urouge asked with a raised eyebrow as he watched Wilson and me punch the shit out of each other. "Wilson is Johnny's first mate, and they're always at each other's throats," Bob said from the side while watching the fight as well.

"But they have each other's backs when it matters," he added in a casual tone, looking away from the fight as he retrieved a mirror and began grooming his mustache.

Urouge merely shrugged his shoulders and lost interest in the fight at Bob's comment and closed his eyes to get some rest as Doc Q kept working on him.

It wasn't long after that Laffite and byron showed up with the rest of the Dials, stuffed inside barrels that the latter carried in his Crow form while Laffite rode on his back, causing Wilson and me to stop fighting.

"Oh, captain, you're already back," Laffite remarked as he jumped off Byron's back as the latter dropped the barrels, transforming back to his human form and following behind my navigator.

"Who is this person?" Laffite asked in a curious tone as he noticed Urouge. "Another weirdo that Johnny beat up," Wilson murmured from the side, causing Laffite and Byron to chuckle while the mad monk merely sighed, not bothering to say anything.

"His name is Urouge. He'll be fighting with us, but I'll properly introduce him when everyone gets back," I said with a smile, and Laffite nodded.

"By the way, captain, what are those seashells? Dials, I think you called them," Laffite asked again while pointing at the barrels. "They are seashells with special properties," I said as I opened one of the barrels, retrieving a dial with the words tone written on it.

"This one, for example, is a tone dial that records sounds. Look," I said as I pressed the top of the shell, bringing it close to my mouth. "Wilson is an idiot," I said, causing Wilson's eyes to twitch as I let go of the button.

"Wilson is an idiot," my voice came out of the shell as I pressed the button again, causing everyone to look at it with wide eyes. "This one is a simple day-to-day use Dial," I explained as I put it back into the barrel, rummaging through and searching for another type of dial.

"Aha," I exclaimed as I found what I was looking for in the barrel. "This one is a flame dial," I said as I took out the dial with a smile on my face.

"As the name implies, it absorbs flame," I said as I pressed the button and activated my flame thrower, releasing fire into the shell, and it absorbed the flame-like it was nothing.

"It can also release it," I added as I pointed the shell towards the sky and pressed the button again, causing the seashell to release a ball of flame that exploded in the air.

"There are many types of Dials with different uses, but you get the idea," I concluded as I threw the flame dial back into the barrel.

"But these things seem awfully convenient. How come we didn't hear about them before?" Byron asked in a curious tone as he began rummaging through the dials.

"They only seem to exist in sky islands for some reason," I replied with a smile. "What little of them that end on the blue sea below are mostly harmless and barely useful like the tone dials," I added with a shrug.

"So people never took notice of them," I concluded while shaking my head. "I want to ask how you know this, but I know better by now," Laffite jokingly said from the side while shaking his head with a smile, causing me to chuckle.

Everyone else returned from the area they were investigating soon after, and I let everyone rest for an hour before calling a meeting, so we can discuss how we'll go about kicking Lokni's ass or murdering it in this case.

Why am I so set on murdering him, you might ask? Because he has a powerful devil fruit and ambition, which makes him a threat, so I might as well take care of the guy early on, but I digress.

We all gathered on the black pearl's deck as soon as everyone had enough rest.

"Alright, everybody, listen up," I said while loudly clapping my hand once to get everyone's attention. "I found out who attacked us, and now it's only a matter of finding the guy and putting him down," I exclaimed, causing everyone to nod.

"His name is Lokni, a pirate from North Blue, who ate the Logia cloud-cloud fruit," I explained, causing Law to frown.

"I have heard of a pirate called Lokni in North blue, but he's been missing for a while now," Law said with a thoughtful expression. "And I don't recall anything about him having a devil fruit," he added in a confused tone.

"He is indeed a pirate from North Blue, and he ate his devil fruit here in the sky," I replied while nodding my head. "My new friend, Urouge, will explain how that happened," I said, calling out to the mad monk to repeat what he told me to my crew.

-0-

"Believing in human kindness? What a joke," Wilson said after hearing Urouge's story, spitting on the ground in contempt. "We're hardly the worst pirate crew out there, and such a devil fruit would have tempted even us," he reasoned with a disdainful snort.

"No offense," Wilson added as he turned to look at Urouge. "None taken. I'm of the same mind as well," Urouge replied with his usual grin, seemingly not offended at all.

"Still, it will be difficult to deal with a guy who controls clouds in the sky," Law said commented with a frown. "Do we have a plan, captain-YA? he asked as he turned to look at me.

"Do you know what kind of numbers and weapons they have, Urouge?" I asked as I turned to look at the mad monk.