Chapter Text
Sabaody was a disaster. As a member of the Strawhat pirates, Erica expected things to get messy. With Luffy as her captain, there were no plans, just go with the flow and think fast to stay alive. But nothing prepared her for the events at Sabaody.
It started fine. They kicked some asses and got good guides. They also gained some strange allies on the way to the archipelago. The island was as beautiful and colorful as she remembered. And just as dangerous. They had been off the Sunny for less than forty minutes and had already been ambushed three times by bounty hunters.
Eri decided to go for a walk by herself while the others went to meet the coating guy. The streets she wandered into were chaotic, to say the least. The air was filled with the sounds of fights breaking out, people shouting, and the smell of smoke and sweat. Suspicious figures lurked in every corner, their eyes following her every move. She was by no means weak, despite her appearance being deceptive in that regard. Some guys tried to steal from her a few times, unfortunately for them, which were left with some good injuries as a result.
The vibrant chaos of the environment captivated her momentarily, but her interest faded quickly. She decided to enter a nearby restaurant, but the sensation of a piercing gaze cut through her thoughts. She could feel eyes on her, making the hairs, that were left from her braid, on the back of her neck stand up.
She searched the street, her golden eyes scanning the crowd. Suddenly, she locked eyes with a stern yellow stare from a stranger across the road. He quickly looked away. Erica's suspicion grew. Upon closer inspection, she realized he was the captain of another pirate crew she had seen in the newspaper: Ta-Taflaguar Law or something? His dark circles and intense gaze contrasted with his tired expression, giving him a unique, almost brooding charm. He walked around with a polar bear and people wearing white boiler-suits with what looked like the jolly roger of the bunch.
That look unsettled her. She couldn't deny it, he was kind of attractive. The dark circles under his eyes matched his tired expression and his tall, thin shape but contrasted with the intensity of his gaze. Honestly he seemed like a weird emo guy, but he had his charm. She just found it a bit strange that he made his crew wear those clothes while he dressed normally. It seemed a bit narcissistic.
He looked at her again and quickly looked away. Again. When she thought about confronting him there was an explosion in the distance and a fight breaking out in the street near them.
Both of them stopped to watch the fight, but Erica's heart raced when she saw a familiar face, or rather, a familiar masked face. A tall guy with a scar on his chin broke up the fight. Another rising captain, though his name escaped her. Desperate to avoid a reunion with her masked acquaintance, she slipped into an alley, still feeling the intense gaze of the emo guy on her back.
Eri's mind raced with the possibility that he might be on the island. The bustling streets of Sabaody, helped her get away unnoticed. She didn't want to run away, but she had no idea how to handle the situation either.
It was a blur from there. Usopp found her heading towards the amusement park. Camie had been captured to be sold into slavery. Erica, Brook, Robin and Usopp arrived at Grove 1 and broke into the auction house after the chaos had already started. They helped defeat the guards of the Celestial Dragons. Amidst the chaos, Erica caught sight of that guy, Talf-tafla-tra… whatever, Law talking to Luffy.
“What are you two talking about, so calmly, at a time like this?” Erica threw an enemy that approached her captain away.
“This guy was saying something about the Marines being close or something.” The boy responded nonchalantly, wiping boogers from his nose.
“This guy is Law, Luffy… a captain of another pirate crew.” Erica explained, keeping her eyes on the approaching enemies.
“Oh… Are we on a first-name basis now, Birdy-ya?” Law's voice dripped with arrogance, a smirk playing on his lips.
Luffy jumped to conclusions, as usual. “Ah! You know each other then! Is he the one you talked about that day at the drinking game? What about the bear?”
"What? No! I only saw him in the newspaper!" Erica snapped, her frustration evident. And what did he call her? What the fuck. She delivered a heavy blow to an approaching enemy, catching a glimpse of Law's satisfied look out of the corner of her eye. Before she could react, she felt a blow to her rib and ended up taking out her frustration on her attacker. Why does he have to be so infuriatingly handsome? ugh…
“His name is Trafalgar Law, captain of the Heart Pirates. And I believe the bear is a mink, Luffy.” Robin intervened.
While Eri was still fighting she felt a piercing gaze again. This is getting annoying… She decided to ignore it.
They heard a gunshot and realized that Camie was still in danger. A Celestial Dragon girl pointed a gun at her. The Strawhats prepared to attack, when she suddenly fainted.
Weird… she thought. An old man came out from behind the stage. Apparently, by Hachi’s reaction, he was his friend, the coating guy. While the rest interacted with him Erica realized that the look wasn't coming from Law. She looked around and found the look coming from none other than Eustass Kid, the guy she was avoiding. He was clearly angry, but that was normal from what she had experienced. Killer tried to calm his captain while the others looked at her in surprise. She had already been spotted. With nothing to do about it, she simply smiled and waved to her old acquaintances and turned away just in time to feel a great energy coming from the old man.
The guards, like their boss before, collapsed in a faint. Erica knew that feeling. She had already felt it on her travels before joining her current crew and had once felt it, on a smaller scale, from Luffy himself. She vaguely remembered her father commenting on something similar, but she was very young at the time making the memory blurry.
The old man somehow ripped off Camie's slave collar. Franky got the keys to the necklaces and gave them to the other slaves, who were very grateful to the entire crew. Apparently the old man was actually the infamous “Dark King” Silvers Rayleigh.
The three captains entertained themselves by teasing each other. The bickering between Luffy and Kid was plausible based on what she knew of the two, but Trafy, as she decided to call him, showed a side she didn't expect in this interaction. At first he appeared to be more composed and mature than he was letting on, apparently he was as stubborn and competitive as her crew leader.
The three of them went to the front line in battle against the marines outside the auction house and their crews joined shortly after. While Eri was fighting, Eustass saved her from some projectiles that were heading towards her. He smirked and approached the girl, towering over her small frame.
“You still have a long way to go, kitten.” He growled, pleased with the girl's reaction.
Erica pushed him away angrily. Kid thought, triumphantly, that he had affected her with his comment. She threw the dart of her weapon towards a cannonball and shattered it into pieces. He blinked and it took him half a second to realize that the enemy attack would hit him directly if it weren't for her. “I can tell you the same, Kiddo.” She said playfully, winking at him and leaving before witnessing his rage. Except he seemed more captivated than angry with her wily attitude as he watched her run away.
As she escaped from the marines with the Strawhats, she looked back one last time, meeting Law's eyes again. This time, they were filled with something more than displeasure. A shiver ran down her spine, but she turned and ran, the sound of explosions echoing in the distance.
If any of the Strawhats noticed the interaction between Eri and the other crew's captain, no one remarked on it. The crew went to take care of Hachi at Rayleigh's coating shop, discussing his past and planning their next steps. Erica, however, couldn't shake off the memory of Law's intense gaze. It lingered in her mind.
They decided to split up and hide until the coating was ready for them to leave and meet again in three days. As they left Rayleigh's house, their usual funny banter filled the air, masking the underlying tension.
Eri decided to split up first to look for a place to stay. And out of nowhere, she felt a tremor in her soul, as if shadows were gathering on the horizon. She dismissed the feeling, trying to remain optimistic, and was already relatively far away when she heard an explosion in the direction where her friends were.
She turned to go help them, but felt something behind her. She barely managed to dodge the laser blast enough to survive. It was Kuma, the Warlord they faced on Thriller Bark. He looked strange, but he still had his abilities and she was alone… She was alone, against an enemy who defeated her entire crew.
Eri tried unsuccessfully to escape, to fight, but it was all in vain. She began to think about the possibility of her life ending there. She was almost losing consciousness when she heard screams and a commotion. There were more people fighting. She tried to get back up to help, but it was impossible, she was very injured and had lost a lot of blood. Her vision blurred, limbs growing heavy and unresponsive. In her fading consciousness, she glimpsed the familiar form of the polar bear rushing towards her, its shouts muffled and distant. Darkness closed in, swallowing her senses whole.