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tsarisfanfiction · 7 months

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Destroyed (Tales From The Heart)

Fandom: One Piece Rating: Teen Warnings: Spoilers for chapter 1081 Characters: Polar Tang, Ikkaku, Hakugan, Heart Pirates My Tales muses woke up again briefly; I've been somewhat dodging them since chapter 1081 because quite frankly, how dare Oda, but while I'm aware I am being supremely hopeful here, I now have a theory... no-one burst my little bubble of denial, okay.

Over the past thirteen years, the Polar Tang had experienced a lot. From her early beginnings, stolen from the marines by three young teenage boys and an equally young mink to instead be a pirate home, through the years of constant hiding from Doflamingo, to the Grand Line, she had been beaten, battered and bruised by the world.

But she had not broken.

The trembles that passed through her weren’t natural. She could feel the Sea herself, roiling in anger, but the source had not passed into her reach even as the quakes passed through the waves, honing in on the Polar Tang as she tried to pull her crew safely through. A creation of Vegapunk she might be, complete with the kairoseki hull that fended away sea kings, but she was not indestructible.

Her crew helped her patch up even as they surfaced, as her captain left her for land and her crew scattered to the waves, and by the time she felt Hakugan’s steady hands at her helm she was watertight again; for a thirteen-year-old ship so beloved by her crew, plugging leaks was child’s play.

She had been repaired from far, far worse than a few leaks.

But the quakes came back, kept coming faster and faster and stronger, and her crew could hold their breaths well, but not indefinitely. Outside, Penguin and Shachi were running out of air, needing to surface despite the fact the other ship hadn’t sunk yet, and the Polar Tang Knew.

Ikkaku was the first one she showed herself to – not the eldest of her nakama, not her boys who had grown up inside her for the last thirteen years, but nakama nonetheless, her beloved engineer who had always worked tirelessly to make sure her engines were in top condition.

“Go,” she said, her voice the echoes of straining engines, and Ikkaku stared at her, eyes filling with tears much like the Tang could feel the water pouring back in at her stern, as far away from the crew still inside her as possible. The weak point she left on purpose, so she could buy them more time at the front.

“No,” the woman, the Tang’s only female nakama, sobbed. Not quite a shipwright, but the next closest thing and one who knew what it meant, to be able to see her ship’s spirit, clad in yellow and proud to match her hull as the black words of her captain ran down her spine.

D E A T H

“No,” Ikkaku protested again. “Polar Tang, you can’t.”

The Polar Tang smiled at her, all teeth. Law’s grin, worn when things were going wrong but he wouldn’t let it stay that way, because her Captain was a D and that meant something.

“None of us are dying today,” she promised, because they weren’t. Not Ikkaku, not Hakugan at her helm, or Penguin and Shachi in the water. Not Bepo, not Law, not anyone.

Not the Polar Tang.

“Go,” she repeated, a strain of her hull echoing the sound behind her. “This will not kill me, and I will not let it kill you.”

It was a good thing that her boys weren’t on board. They would never have gone, no matter how much the Tang pushed them, and it would have killed them all.

Ikkaku gave her engines one last caress, and straightened her back. “Promise,” she said, addressing the physical body of the Tang and not the spirit standing behind her. “Promise this won’t kill you.”

It was an easy promise to make. “I swear,” the Polar Tang said. “On the flag we fly, by the Seas we’ve sailed and have yet to sail, that this won’t kill me.”

Hakugan was the last one, one of her newest nakama but one of the oldest and wisest, for all they kept it locked down beyond the lure of causing havoc wherever he went. The Polar Tang put her hands on her own helm – not the first time, but the first time her nakama could see her do it – and nudged them to step aside.

They moved easily, their mask hiding their thoughts but his motions natural. “Nice hat,” he said, and she grinned, because her hat was nice, fluffy and soft and splodged, just like their captain’s, but where his was white, hers was black, and where his was black, hers was the colour of blood. “The captain told me to take care of you,” they continued after a moment.

“My job is to take care of you,” the Tang countered, and gave them a nudge on his shoulder. They were corporeal enough that Hakugan was pushed back a touch, away from the controls. “This will not kill me,” she assured them, the same way she had assured everyone else currently waiting by the airlock. “And I won’t let it kill you.”

“It will hurt you,” Hakugan pointed out, and she shrugged.

“Not as much as the death of my nakama,” because Hakugan was right; her hull was straining and while it wasn’t yet as painful as the time Mugiwara tore her apart from the inside out yet, it was clear that the monster at the heart of the quakes had his heart set on nothing less than annihilation, and that would hurt. “Go.”

“I’ll see you later,” Hakugan replied, and left. It was the least fuss any of the nakama she had spoken to had made, but Hakugan had always been a little different. The Polar Tang didn’t know all of his secrets, not yet, but she looked forwards to learning them.

That was one reason why they had to live.

She opened the airlock the moment she felt them reach it, ejecting her crew out to the mercy of the Sea. Law was the only one that couldn’t swim, and he was on land; the others were all as home in the water as they were out. They would be fine.

And the Polar Tang could break.

She could hear their despair, her nakama crying out as she surrendered to the forces ripping her to shreds. Even those she’d been able to speak to, sworn oaths of survival for, shrieked, their pain far sharper than the feeling of her hull tearing apart, the feeling of being in more pieces than any ship had any right to be.

She let herself fade back into her body, shattered and broken and sinking, but not without one last, defiant grin crossing her face.

It would take time, and her crew would have to be strong without her for a while, but the monster with his stolen powers had underestimated her, as she’d known he would. He might have torn her apart and left her to sink, but she was a submarine. Sinking was what she did, and as she’d been certain would happen, the moment her hull fractured he stopped, naïve in the way of ships even after all his years at sea.

The Polar Tang was broken, but she was not destroyed. Thirteen years of nakama that called her home and poured love into her constantly were more than a match for something like this.

She would be whole again, and populated by her crew once more.

And when she was, the fool wouldn’t stand a chance.

#one piece #one piece fanfiction #tsari writes fanfiction #polar tang #ikkaku #hakugan #heart pirates #tales from the heart

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eclecticpjf · 1 year

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Got a new shipment of bound comics.

“Midnight, Mass” is a couple of Vertigo min-series about a pair of supernatural investigators.

“Tales from the Heart” is semi-autobiographical stories of a Peace Corps volunteer in Africa.

The third is a collection of Batman & Gotham City related stories written by one of my favorite comics writers, John Ostrander (minus a 5-issue run of “Catwoman” I couldn’t find for a reasonable price).

#midnight mass #tales from the heart #Batman #gotham city #John Rozum #Jesus Saiz #Paul Lee #Cindy Goff #Rafael Nieves #Seitu Hayden #John Ostrander

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tsarinatorment · 1 year

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Chaos (Tales From The Heart)

Fandom: One Piece Rating: Gen Warnings: None Characters: Hakugan, Law, Jean Bart

I got another itch to write some Tales for the first time in quite a while! I’ve not done anything with it since we got Hakugan’s name confirmed, which now means I have another canon character to play with - which first meant headcanon time! I’m still solidifying a load of things with them, but this little chapter showcases what I’ve got so far. Yes, I’ve gone with he/they pronouns for them.

Hakugan is a monster. In the Grand Line – in the New World – that isn’t a distinction worth much of note; any pirate who’s anybody was a monster, and some of the ones that have managed to fly under the radar of the Marines are monsters in their own right, too. Hakugan is – was – both.

They don’t look it, not that that matters when the mask that covers his face is a permanent feature, taken off very rarely even in the safest depths of the ocean, but they’re one of the oldest members of the Heart Pirates – at least, in terms of age. In terms of time proudly bearing the grinning virus that is Trafalgar Law’s jolly roger, they’re one of the more recent additions, picked up during the captain’s time playing at being a Shichibukai.

He still isn’t entirely sure how Law found him, or why the Surgeon of Death went through the trouble of tracking him down – both are as ludicrous propositions as the other; Hakugan simply wasn’t someone to be found, and not even the most unhinged pirates wanted them, either.

Or perhaps it was that Hakugan didn’t want them. They’d put their past behind them, slammed the door shut on who they were, the billion plus beris the World Government had put on their head, and disappeared – convincingly, too, enough that not even the most persistent sniffer-dogs had found them.

Law had guts, and connections that had Hakugan’s eyebrows up to their hairline, a knack for getting information from the most unlikely sources, and…

Jean Bart.

He had never been friends with the captain, but they’d once moved in similar circles, swarming around and around like sharks measuring up their prey and determining if the kill was worth it. Hakugan had heard about the destruction of the crew, although they couldn’t say they mourned.

Mourning was for nakama. They hadn’t even been allies in the loosest sense of the term.

Seeing Jean Bart at Trafalgar Law’s back, as the young man tracked him down to his quiet little retirement in the middle of nowhere even by Grand Line standards – and a mink, young but full of potential, to say nothing of the rest of the crew, whose names and faces had never passed Hakugan’s awareness despite the tabs they’d kept on the bounties (survival and hiding only worked if they knew who to avoid… and which troublemakers they could use as cover when their itch for chaos surfaced) – had piqued their curiosity.

Hakugan still doesn’t know how Law found him, but they know that Law wanted them, and that the Heart Pirates might not be a complete waste of time. Jean Bart’s presence was a convincing factor; the giant of a man (perhaps a giant of some sort, although Hakugan had never pried into that, Davy Jones knew they didn’t share the details of their heritage with anyone) had never given the impression that he would bow to anyone, yet he bore the Heart Pirates flag with pride and shifted his weight in a way that screamed pain and death to anyone who disrespected his captain.

Another compelling factor was the Shichibukai status. Hakugan had had no intentions of revealing their ongoing existence to the World Government, but there was something tempting about knowing that even if it slipped out, their hands were tied on the matter.

Adding them to the crew was a risk to Law; they’re wanted. Over a billion beris aren’t offered for run of the mill pirates, or even renowned ones. They’re offered for threats, and Hakugan is a threat. They’re a threat who knows things, and for the World Government, that’s a crime punishable by obliteration.

Law knows this. Law also wants to know things, is making it a mission to know everything the World Government doesn’t want him to know, and there was something about the spark in golden eyes that had Hakugan’s itch for chaos screaming for release once more.

It was that little itch for chaos that had him agreeing, taking the hand of the younger man – his captain, now, and wasn’t that a term they’d never expected to apply to another – and Hakugan is glad he did, because being a Heart Pirate?

It’s chaos.

Law runs a decent ship – not a tight ship that has his crew chafing at restrictions, but a fair one, where his word is final but he listens, respects, and learns. It’s a good thing he does, because Hakugan is a free spirit of chaos, and they won’t listen to anyone they don’t want to.

They listen to Law, because Law wants to drive everything to its knees, starting with one of his fellow Shichibukai, but Hakugan saw the spark for more when he accepted the captain’s proposal. Taking down one pirate wouldn’t appease the urge for chaos that simmers beneath his skin, but taking down the world?

That is a beautiful piece of chaos that Hakugan wants in on – craves to be in on – and there’s something unhinged enough about the Surgeon of Death that he’s certain their captain can do it.

They can’t wait to be a part of it.

#one piece #one piece fanfiction #hakugan #trafalgar law #jean bart #heart pirates #tsari writes fanfiction #tales from the heart

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absolutedisasterr · 5 months

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hakuwaii · 1 year

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ghibli lockscreens pt. 2

• please don’t repost

• like or reblog if you save

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shummthechumm · 7 months

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OPALINE IS FLURRY HEART TRUTHERS!!!! THIS IS HOW WE CAN STILL WIN!!!! (<--in denial)

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kdramasforever97 · 1 year

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Me, when becoming too invested in a kdrama:

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dominicsorel · 3 months

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Sometimes the shadows of your memory will deceive you, try to lead you astray. You mustn't let illusions distract you from what's truly important.

#kingdom hearts #kh xion #kh sora #kh riku #xion #sora #riku #soriku #sound of waves duo #seashell tale duo #roxas (riku left w/ only his dark memories) > xion (gains riku's pov memories of sora w/ kairi from roxas which was what lead to his fall)#roxas is riku's nobody. he was just harboring a piece of sora's heart bc it got shattered from kairi covering up his true light (riku)

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frootlooppoptarts · 5 months

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I am reduced to a thing that wants

#the fall of the house of usher #tfothou #madeline usher #verna #the raven #carla gugino #willa fitzgerald #the fall of the house of usher s01e5 #the tell-tale heart #madeline usher x death #madeline usher x verna #flptgifs #quote from a letter from virginia woolf to vita sackville-west

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floralcavern · 5 months

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EDIT:

It hurts me to see Whisper of the Heart and The Tale of the Princess Kaguya so underrated :(

EDIT 2:

I’M SORRY FOR NOT PUTTING NAUSICAA GUYS😭😭 I’ve never seen that one!!

EDIT 3:

Guys, stop getting mad at me. I can only put 12 options!

*sighhhhh* We have a winner..

I’m gonna be honest.. I’m not a huge fan of HMC. Like, I respect it animation wise, music wise, and I can tell a lot of passion went into it. But I don’t care for it. It’s a big mess tbh But.. congratulations to Howl’s Moving Castle.

#Studio Ghibli #ghibli #Movies #poll #Spirited Away #My neighbor totoro #ponyo #princess monoke #the tale of the princess kaguya #Kiki’s delivery service #Whisper of the heart #the cat returns #howl’s moving castle #Only yesterday #from up on poppy hill #the secret world of arrietty

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nightmaretherabbitsideblog1 · 2 months

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GGY Week Day 7: Attack

@ggyweek2024

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tsarisfanfiction · 1 year

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Before and After

Fandom: One Piece Rating: Teen Genre: Family Characters: Law, Penguin, Shachi, Heart Pirates

Law’s life was divided into Befores and Afters.

Whew, it's been a while since I last wrote any Heart Pirates (or One Piece at all) but clearly these characters are still embedded in my muses because finding their characters again wasn't any challenge at all (which was a relief). In fact, it's been so long that Hakugan's name hadn't been revealed yet, so I've now got to figure out where to place him in my version of the crew's dynamics...

I joined @stereden's Winter Exchange this year for the first (but hopefully not the last!) time, and my match was Castled_Rook, whose prompt options included some Heart Pirates found family (which is, hopefully obviously, what I went for), which has always been my favourite thing to write in this fandom, so that was a perfect match as far as I was concerned :D Hoping they agree after seeing this fic!

There's a warning for this fic but I'm not entirely sure how to word it, so hopefully this will suffice: a character considering if they would have wanted to live if they'd had the time to think in a life-threatening situation.

Law’s life was divided into Befores and Afters.

Before the Flevance massacre. After the Flevance massacre.

Before Cora-san. After Cora-san.

Aged thirteen, those two Befores and Afters had encompassed everything he was, with the underlying weight of white lead cloying in his body, destroying him from the inside out.

Losing his family had destroyed him. Losing Cora-san had obliterated him from existence.

Law had never thought he’d outlive the clumsy idiot who meant well but screamed incompetence with every blunder. In hindsight, when his thoughts were clear from ever-present fevers and resignation paired with desperation, Law realised he hadn’t wanted to outlive Cora-san, hadn’t wanted to lose and grieve a man that meant so much to him.

He’d already outlived his family once.

Then he outlived his family again.

Law could acknowledge that it was a good thing he hadn’t realised he’d felt that way back on Minion Island. If his mind had been – not clearer, but sharper, more self-aware, he might not have followed Cora-san’s last wishes.

He might not have lived.

Law loved Cora-san, but did he love him enough to live for him when he’d left him without a family again? Evidence pointed to yes, because that was exactly what he’d done, but Law was aware, with the cold, harsh truths of hindsight, that if he’d focused on a different emotion, on losing family rather than destroy the world (destroy Doflamingo)… the answer may not have been yes.

It was a good thing the cards had fallen in the order they did.

Not to say Law was glad Cora-san was dead – that was so far from the truth even a liar like him couldn’t even begin to try and say it; the clumsy idiot had no right to leave him like that, no right to go and die to save him when he should have lived for him – but Law would forever be eternally grateful that he had lived. That Cora-san had saved him.

If he had died, he would never have met his crew. His nakama. His third (and final) family.

Law had no way of knowing if he would outlive this family, too. The pattern in his life suggested that it was a possibility, but also Law was no helpless child any more. He was a Captain, a Supernova, a feared member of the Worst Generation, powerful enough to rub shoulders with some of the greatest on the seas (or go toe to toe with them in battle).

He was a doctor. A surgeon. And he had the Ultimate Devil Fruit to back him up.

He was no god, but he could play at being a god, play with lives and who lives and who died for as long as he drew breath – and his crew? His nakama, his family?

Law refused to outlive them, too.

“You’re brooding again.”

Penguin slid onto the bench next to him, pushing a fresh mug of steaming coffee in front of him and taking a loud drink of his own. “Beri for your thoughts?”

Law ignored him, wrapping his fingers around the mug and watching the letters EATH stand out on his fingers while the D of the thumb opposed them. The metal transmitted the heat straight into his skin, almost hot enough to burn.

“Law?”

“It’s nothing,” he told his nakama. Penguin made a disbelieving noise, but something must have convinced him to drop it because he didn’t push any further – although the next slurp of his own drink was obnoxiously loud in a way that Law was more used to hearing from Shachi.

They’d grown up together. Penguin had been Shachi’s older brother the younger’s entire life – not by blood, but Law had learned twice over that blood wasn’t the rule of family (look at the Donquixote brothers, look at Cora-san and Law, look at his nakama). Shared habits and obnoxious traits were hardly a surprise.

Law didn’t let himself wonder what shared habits he and Lami might have developed, in time. Didn’t let himself remember the ones that had started planting their seeds already, before being suffocated out by white lead and a blaze of fire.

(Didn’t let himself dwell on the fact that her face had long since faded from his mind, and that all he remembered was her big, gap-toothed smile, and I love you, nii-san! echoing in the depths of his ears.)

As if summoned by Law’s stray mental observation, or perhaps Penguin’s mimic of his own drinking habits, Shachi materialised on his other side, throwing himself onto the bench with aplomb and almost spilling his own mug of dark bliss. The smell rising from his own coffee was tinted with something else, and Law knew the news his nakama had for him before he even opened his mouth.

“Bepo says we’re coming up on the island,” the ginger reported, taking a slurp loud enough to rival Penguin’s and smacking his lips together obscenely. “We’ll reach it in a few hours at our current speed.”

It wasn’t an island that held any real significance for them – it was just the next one on the route to Laugh Tale, although the fact that it was on the route at all, the fact that it was a New World island, meant it was one to be approached with caution. Law – and Penguin, Shachi, Bepo, all his nakama – had read up what they could find on the islands of the New World and thought they knew which one they were coming up on (and, more importantly, who it was currently in control, which Yonkou’s territory they were encroaching on this time).

An island on the horizon meant more conflict, and if nothing else, Law could plan for those, at least.

“I want everyone in the infirmary between now and then,” he said, and Shachi hummed, draining his mug and letting it hit the table with more force than strictly necessary.

“Already spread the word,” he said, and once upon a time Law would have hated that Shachi knew and shared his orders before he even alerted Law, but it had been thirteen years since Swallow Island, and two older teenagers with makeshift weapons and a cowering mink cub.

Thirteen years.

He’d had ten years in Flevance. Three with one or other Donquixote brother.

He’d spent those two lengths of time combined with the three of them, and despite his thirteen year old self’s attempts not to let anyone in ever again, that had been a battle he’d lost before it’d even begun, and Law was glad for it.

There was no-one in all four Blues, no-one in the Grand Line, no-one in the world, that knew him better than the trio he’d founded the Heart Pirates with, and once upon a time Law would have recoiled violently at the idea of being known.

Now, as he gave a nod of acknowledgement, it was a fact of life, a safety net to catch him when he needed it.

(And it went both ways; they knew him but he knew them, knew the little tics and habits that lurked beneath the concealing hat, behind the dark shades, beyond the thick white fur. He knew Shachi had spread the order because he, too, worried about their nakama and the fact it only took a stroke of bad luck to take someone away forever. He’d known they were coming up on the island before the ginger had even opened his mouth by the smell of mocha because Shachi only indulged in that particular mix of caffeine and comfort when there was an expectation of conflict in their near future. He knew, already, that Penguin would be the last into the infirmary, letting Law remove his vital organs only once the rest of the crew had undergone the same surgery because he knew his armament was the best in the crew and if they were caught early, he had the best chance of protecting his own body.)

He drained his own mug and stood up, gesturing wordlessly for Shachi to follow him while Penguin gathered up their mugs with a mutter he didn’t mean about it not being his job to clean up after them. Penguin would be last, but Shachi was always first.

(If Law didn’t fear long term consequences of keeping his nakama’s vital organs out of their bodies, Shachi’s would never be in his body, not with his non-existent armament.)

The procedure was quick and painless. Shachi had been through it so many times he didn’t even react when the gelatinous cubes erupted from his body and Law Shambles’d them into their allocated place with the secure vault deep within the Tang, not even taking a moment to readjust before hopping off the bed and pulling his tank top back on – Law didn’t need his nakama to take their tops off to get at their organs, but the less in the way, the less potential there was for something to go awry, and Law was a big fan of minimising risks to his nakama. The shades were next, covering closed eyes, before Shachi threaded his arms back through the sleeves of his boiler suit and yanked the zip up with a familiar zzzhp, snapping the covering flap into place.

“Thanks, Law,” he grinned, clapping him on the shoulder before tugging his hat onto his head.

Law didn’t need thanks, not when the action was always inherently selfish – he wouldn’t outlive his nakama if his nakama didn’t die – but Shachi had taken to thanking him every time and Law had never admitted his selfishness out loud, even though he knew Shachi knew him well enough to understand why he did it.

(There was also the fact that Shachi seemed to lose all self-regard once his organs were removed, revelling in the pseudo-immortality it gave him and taking risks that made Law’s own heart want to leap out of his chest because he knew he could, trusted Law to put him back together whatever befell him. Law didn’t particularly want thanks for enabling that streak of Shachi’s either, but his single-minded ferocity in battle had saved other nakama more than once, so it was something Law just had to live with. Shachi wouldn’t stop anyway, no matter what he ordered, asked, or begged. It wasn’t in the ginger’s nature to hold back when his loved ones were in danger – it was a trait they shared. A trait the whole crew shared, for better or worse.)

“Send Bepo and Hakugan in,” he said instead, because while Bepo was one of the less fragile members of the crew and per breakable hierarchy should be near-last, he needed Bepo on navigation and battle ready as early as possible, and Hakugan had a way with the Tang’s helm that necessitated him there at the first signs of trouble, so he needed to be ready early.

Shachi flicked him a lazy salute, carefree and disrespectful of the origin because Shachi hated pirates the most but he hated marines, too, and disappeared as Ikkaku poked her head around the door, oil streaked through her hair and splattered across her boiler suit.

“Reporting for organ removal duties, Captain!” she chirped, and Law waved her to take a seat. After her came Bepo and Hakugan, as requested, then the rest of the crew filed in, some alone and others in groups, with Jean Bart and then, finally, Penguin rounding off the crew.

This was not a new routine; his crew knew how to work around their organ removals and their island ahead duties with ease of practice, and Law trusted Penguin and Shachi to keep everything running smoothly from the command room as he went through the motions of making each of his nakama, his family, just that little bit harder to kill.

Law’s life had been a series of Befores and Afters.

Before Swallow Island. After Swallow Island.

Before the Heart Pirates.

There would not be an After the Heart Pirates. Jack, and Zou, had come closer than Law ever wanted to come (the only time in years his nakama had faced a battle with their organs in their chests, vulnerable to not just injury but poison) but for as long as Law could do something about it, it would not happen.

There would be no After his family. Not this one.

#one piece #one piece fanfiction #trafalgar law #penguin #shachi #heart pirates #tsari writes fanfiction #tales from the heart

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