I just remembered, it's been a few days since I finished this, and I haven't
sent it to the ML yet. We don't seem to get very many One Piece fanfics around
here. This is the prologue to my rather bizarre take on the pirate saga. I
hope you enjoy it.
--
________ Shay Caron (E-mail address: shay@protection-comic.com) -=- MST #95880
__/ ___/ Protection: a web comic strip (on hiatus) about the one hero standing
_(___ ) --- between San City and chaos: gadgeteer Justin Forrester, also known
/____/ ---- as the Protector. -=- See it at http://www.protection-comic.com/ !
------------------
It grabbed the attention. It was designed with that in mind,
after all. The rare newcomer to the city inevitably noticed it before
anything else.
The skyscraper towered over those that surrounded it. Where
other buildings were broken down and dilapidated, this one was
perpetually kept unsoiled. The billboard at the top of the building,
which reached almost to the clouds of soot and smog that constantly
hung above the landscape, announced the company's name.
AkumaTech.
You'd be hard-pressed to find a single person in this city --
"Red Line", population approximately 2,500,000 -- who hadn't heard at
least _some_ rumors about the experiments within those walls. Based on
its press releases and products, AkumaTech was merely a massive
bioengineering firm, experimenting with organ transplants, genetic
modification, and the like. Security was incredibly tight, though, and
wherever there have been secrets, mindless speculation has inevitably
followed.
One rumor suggested that AT-hired thugs wandered the streets,
looking for young men and women (and sometimes even stray animals!) to
kidnap and take back to the laboratories. There, in what was known
only as the "M.I." division of AkumaTech, they would be experimented
upon and mutated in tests of the scientists' latest theories. Most of
them died. Many of them wished they _could_. But a very lucky few not
only survived the surgery and manipulation but came out of it with
their bodies... improved. Strange abilities granted to them.
At least, that's what the rumors say. But seriously, how much
of that can you really trust?
More than you might think.
------------------
Project O.N.E.
A One Piece Alternate Universe Fanfic by Shay Caron
One Piece and all characters therein belong to Eiichiro Oda
Prologue: Setting the Stage! The Past and Present of AkumaTech
------------------
18 Years Ago
There were some moments when Roger D. Aureus wished he'd just
stayed on that assembly line. All he wanted to do tonight was go home
to be with his lovely wife and adorable daughter -- he'd hardly
managed to clear any time off from work since she was born two weeks
ago. But the prospective merger with Doppler Imaging Labs had been
having diplomatic troubles, and several investors wanted to see more
results from the organ cloning research, so he'd had to pacify them,
and in the middle of that a containment tank had ruptured on the
twenty-fifth floor... AkumaTech was an incredibly difficult company to
run, especially when you were as much of a control freak as Roger was.
The work might soon be proven fruitful, however. Roger had a
prototype unit running overnight to see if it would create a usable
lung for transplantation purposes. If it worked, AkumaTech would be
able to start supplying cloning units to hospitals within the month.
The human genome project was coming along very nicely as well.
'And then there's my secret project... Ah, but I shouldn't
even _think_ about that too loudly.'
It was past midnight; the moon was out and streetlights
gleamed for miles in every direction. Roger stepped out onto the
street, leaving the AkumaTech building behind. As well as his company
was doing, he was thrilled to be able to get away and get home. He
looked forward, specifically, to a really long hot shower. Hmm...
Perhaps Hitomi would be willing to join him? This particular line of
thought distracted Roger so much that he forgot to watch where he
walked.
A hand gripped his shoulder, and the world spun around him
until he found himself in an alley, arms pinned behind his back by a
package of sausages masquerading as hands. "Who's there?" he shouted
-- and winced as he realized how stupid that had sounded. Well, it
wasn't as if he'd ever claimed to be eloquent... not without a few
nights to prepare his speech beforehand, at least.
'Funny how the mind works,' he thought, lightheaded. 'I'm
almost certainly about to be killed, and I can't seem to wrap my brain
around the idea.'
A massive figure stepped forward, half-obscured by the
shadows. "Good evening, Roger. I expect you're just heading home?"
"I might have known it would be you," Roger said. "I always
did think you were a shifty reptile." 'Should have hired bodyguards,
should have carried a weapon, stupid, stupid, stupid...' ran through
his mind.
"How right you were," the figure laughed. "I'll be blunt. If
you cooperate, I'll happily allow you to continue living. Otherwise...
Well, as far as my plans go, sadly, you _are_ expendable."
Roger's dry response was, "I'm hurt. What cooperation did you
have in mind?"
The man stepped forward, brushed his thugs aside, and glared
at Roger. "That secret experiment of yours. Your notes and data. I
want them." A stray beam of moonlight glinted off his left hand.
Roger laughed mockingly. "My secret project? If you want it,
you're free to take it. You'll just have to find it first." 'Yes, that
was my death-warrant,' he thought, seeing the man's face twist into a
snarl, 'but I can _not_ allow _him_ to get at Project O.N.E. under
_any_ circumstances. I've got insurance. Hitomi and Vivi will be able
to take care of themselves. I just wish I could see them one more
time.'
"Really funny, bastard," a thug spat. At the figure's nod, he
continued, "Let's see ya laugh at _this_!"
Roger grinned even as the gun fired.
'No regrets.'
------
10 Years Ago
What surprised Shanks was how powerful the detonation was.
After all, it was one thing to be told, "I can make my body explode."
It was another thing entirely to feel the floor shake under your feet
as the promised explosion went off. Still, he hadn't survived this
long in Red Line by standing around with a confused expression on his
scarred face. The instant the tremors died down enough that he felt
safe moving, he ran down the AkumaTech hallway (2nd basement level,
northeast section), hiding a limp 7-year-old child -- a child, in
fact, who redefined the word "limp" -- underneath his black cape. Ben
followed behind him, carrying -- of all things -- a crying baby
reindeer.
Three guards turned the corner and stopped before the two
groups collided. A punch from Shanks and two shots from Ben's gun and
the trio went down without a struggle.
After a minute spent running (with intermittent hiding), a
voice in their earpieces crackled to life. "It's not going too well,
Straw Hat. They caught about half of us so far. They got some sort of
neural disruptor that can knock people unconscious."
"Great. What about the escapees?" asked Ben.
"Lemme think... Goro and his girlfriend Valerie are still
tearin' up the guards. Me an' Lucky are gonna catch up with you two;
I'm carryin' a two-years-old girl. A-Tech still has the fat lady and
the guy with the gray hair. As far as I know, that weirdo with the
face paint imitated a guard and ran. Oh, yeah, no sign of your
red-nosed buddy or the kid's brother."
Shanks cursed under his breath. "Look, just make sure everyone
remembers the plan. No getting yourself killed or captured, right?
Free the prisoners and run."
"Oh, of course. The gang's going for everybody who got caught.
We'll be there to join you and Ben in a minute. Watch out for the
security robot. I hear tell it's nasty. Yasopp out."
As they finally caught sight of the tunnel they'd dug to enter
the building, the child in Shanks's arms let out a small sob. "Hey,
there, Luffy," Shanks whispered. "We're almost out. How ya holding
up?"
Luffy sniffled and wriggled around a bit. "I'll be okay," he
said, in a soft voice totally unlike him.
"Hurts, doesn't it? Don't worry, Luffy, we'll getcha back to
normal." Not for the first time that night, Shanks wondered what kind
of mental disorders a person had to have to do to a child what had
evidently been done to Luffy. He reminded Shanks of a boneless
chicken; his bones had either been removed or given the consistency of
-- there was no avoiding it -- rubber. Rubber was the operative word.
Luffy drooped loosely over Shanks's arms, and somehow Shanks just
_knew_ that if he were to take Luffy's hands and pull, the poor boy
would stretch like newly-made taffy. The worst part was that Luffy
appeared to be in constant pain because of all this -- which wasn't
particularly _surprising_, given what he'd been through, but...
Ben mused, "Why do you suppose we haven't seen any guards in
this area?"
A voice from behind them suggested, "Probably Because I Am
Sufficient."
A flash of gold was Shanks's only other warning before a fist
put him through a wall.
'Dammit... The security robot. This is gonna hurt...'
------
One Week Ago
Clad in her customary tight black jumpsuit (after all, for a
thief, it was _traditional_!), Choushou Nami crept carefully along the
wall, balancing precariously on a minuscule outcropping. A hand-drawn
map pulled together from downloaded schematics rested in her left
hand; one particular window was circled with red ink. As she
approached the destined pane of glass, she paused to review her
infiltration plan.
'TenmaCom, a division of AkumaTech. Boy, that Aureus had a
weird naming scheme for his creations. So I cut through this
seventh-floor window, slip through where the security is weakest, and
all I have to do is knock a couple of guards out to get my hands on
those files.' Nami grinned -- in fact, she very nearly drooled -- at
the thought of how much money those files would bring once she found
the right buyer.
The steel-toed boot that smashed through the glass changed
that plan somewhat.
Nami scrambled backward as a lanky boy about her age stepped
through the shattered window, carefully carrying dozens of manila file
folders. He wore a yellow straw hat over his messy black hair, but
other than that, he was clad all in black. The boy glanced over at her
and grinned childishly before stepping off the outcropping.
"Hey!! What're you _doing_?!" 'This is the seventh freaking
_floor_!' Nami watched in horror as the boy plummeted to the alley
below, hit the ground with much more force than those skinny legs
should be able to withstand, throwing up a huge circle of dust around
him --
-- and stood up and ran, as if the drop were nothing at all.
She caught a glimpse of clumsily-scrawled white kanji on the back of
his vest before he and the folders vanished.
Nami stared at the spot where he'd touched down. 'He cracked
the cement when he hit! What the heck _is_ he?!'
The sound of glass breaking beneath a shoe (thieves need to
have _very_ good hearing) caught her attention again. She heard a
guard from inside say something along the lines of, "He came outta
nowhere! He had like twenty fists or something!"
She sighed. Tonight's work was wasted, to put it lightly.
There was nothing for her to do but head home, plan a new heist, and
wonder... Who was that strange boy with the straw hat?
Nami was one of the first people in Red Line to ask that
question. It wouldn't be long before every person in the city wondered
precisely the same thing.
------------------
To see author's notes for the story, travel to my personal fanfic web
page -- http://www.protection-comic.com/writing/fanfics.php -- and
scroll down until you see the cute One Piece sprites.
------------------
Project O.N.E., Prologue
6/15/2003 -- First draft completed, sent to proofreaders (thanks, Nik
and Memphis!)
6/20/2003 -- Second draft completed
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