Cat on Water

Chapter 27

As Yoruichi fell from the window, she twisted around to face the now increasingly growing genie made of blue mist.

It had dark blue skin, and was completely naked from the waist up, showcasing its ripped muscles it had on a white cloth headpiece wrapped around its head, with a ruby holding it together on the center of his forehead. There was some sort of feather tucked into the cloth, but Yoruichi did not recognize it.

It had golden bracelets with designs carved into it, along with similar small hoop earrings. Lastly, it had cotton candy pink hair pulled back into a ponytail with a golden bangle holding it back. It had an equally long pink beard, which was flapping in the wind as the Genie dove quickly to attack the target its master had designated.

Yoruichi quickly condensed some Reiryoku beneath her feet to stand on, and grinned challengingly up at the genie. It raised its glaive like weapon, with two wavy blades coming out of the polearm like a rooster’s comb. With a woosh, the blade came striking down on top of Yoruichi, with a wordless grunt coming from the smokey apparition.

Yoruichi quickly responded with a lightning quick right hook, more of a palm strike really, as she struck the flat side of the genie’s weapon, pushing it aside enough for it to swing right by her, and allow for her to continue in her spinning motion, bringing up the back of her left heel to deliver a strike to the side of the genie’s face, sending it flying off into another building.

Yoruichi turned back to face up toward the building she had just come out of, with Daifuku standing in the hole in the side glaring down at her, all the while rubbing his belly.

“You know,” Yoruichi called out, “For someone with something that big attached to them, you’d think you’d actually know how to use it.”

She grinned slightly as Daifuku faltered in his ‘rubbing’. She had to stop laughing at him internally as she could feel the Genie getting up out of the rubble and had to backflip his swing that intended to cut her in half.

She flipped up and over the Genie’s head and smashed her knee into the back of its head, sending it tumbling down into the ground.

“Oi Oi” Yoruichi said, “Although I acknowledge its big, I don’t want it. Stop trying to give it to me, it’ll hurt going in me.”

Daifuku’s eye twitched so badly Yoruichi could see it fifty feet away. He then jumped down from the balcony, still rubbing his belly. Yoruichi thought he was going to attack her, but he just ignored her and kept falling until he handed on the ground with spiderweb cracks spreading out around him.

The genie followed Daifuku down, floating to sit behind the man who was, at this point, probably not going to stop jerkin- I mean rubbing his belly. (a/n Im sorry I couldn’t help myself; I was trying to get this in here for hours.)

“Do you know where you are?” Daifuku called out, the genie behind him slowly growing in size as he spoke and rubbed his hands faster. “Do you know who I am? What attacking this island means?”

Yoruichi just raised an eyebrow down at the man, crossing her arms underneath her breasts. “Uhh, well, I don’t exactly know where I am right now, to be honest with you.” You said, a little bit hesitantly.  “I just got scared when you barged into that room back there, ya know?” Yoruichi adopted the face of a klepto teenage girl who was just caught trying to steal makeup from Walmart.

Daifuku faltered in his rubbing, causing the slowly growing crew member coming out of him to shrink slightly. He then quickly regained his ‘stride’ and kept rubbing, his adrenaline rising with each pass of his hands. He shouted up at Yoruichi, “You are in Totto Land, the territory of Big Mom. Turn yourself in now and you might have enough limbs left to walk yourself to your punishment from Mama.”

Yoruichi just scoffed at the large man, her incredulous face showed exactly what she thought of his ‘request’. “How about no? You couldn’t bring me in by yourself. Besides. Who still calls their mother ‘Mama’ at your age?” Yoruichi said callously.

That statement caused Daifuku’s face to crack, even as the Genie started growing bigger. “How dare you. Do you think you are better than a Yonko?” he said, his voice freezing cold.

Yoruichi scoffed again and let herself fall, her knees bending slightly as she silently hit the ground.

“Better than a fat old hag that does nothing all day but throw tea parties and make her entire family attempt to feed her?” Yoruichi smirked as her eyes narrowed at the man who was easily three times her height.

“You-“ Daifuku growled, before he shouted, “Genie, get her!”

The genie nodded, and with a silent roar, lunged at her. It was not bigger than the building she and Daifuku had come out of and was knocking over buildings to the side of them as it flew by, causing what was left of the pedestrians to run screaming.

It went for another overhead chop, this time from far enough away that Yoruichi was outside of its reach.

‘Does it intend to crumble the ground, so I don’t have footing anymore’ Yoruichi pondered lightly as she watched the blade reach its crescendo.

She was quickly disabused of her thoughts when the genie said, “Majin Seidan” and a flying slash came soaring at her.

Her slight surprise at the action was not enough for the genie to score a hit, as Yoruichi quickly flash-stepped on top of the blade that had been indented into the ground. She shook slightly as the shockwave from the flying slash rebounded into her back, and she glanced over her shoulder to see the entire street in ruins.

“Oh wow.” She drawled, balancing on the back of the genie’s blade before hopping to perch on what was now the remains of a building. “Big guy can really explode.” She paused; her face scrunched up in thought. “Though, isn’t it a bit counter productive to destroy your own town?” she asked rhetorically, pointing with her thumb over her shoulder at the devastation.

Daifuku gave a wordless growl, and the genie turned it’s head to look at him. It, surprisingly, asked, “Master, can I Attack?”

Daifuku looked to consider it, if only for a moment before he gave a harsh nod. The Genie turned to Yoruichi who was about level with its waist and immediately swung its glaive down at her again. Yoruichi just raised another eyebrow and was about to sidestep the downward cut when she saw the upper chest and arms, including the weapon turn metallic black.

‘Aw shit, he’s got armament Haki. This is gonna hurt.’ Yoruichi thought despairingly. One thing she had learned from Garp in their frequent spars was that Armament Haki tended to be slightly explosive if used a certain way. It was only until later she found out that the technique was called Ryuo from Shimotsuki Koushirou.

She was correct, as when she slipped to the side the Glaive impacted the ground in a way that caused much the same destruction as it did before, but instead of a line it was more of a circular impact.

The resulting explosion of rock and building pieces sent Yoruichi rolling a bit backward until she was able to stop herself by grabbing onto the ground in a crouch like position.

“Ok, that’s it.” Yoruichi muttered, her eyes narrowing in concentration as she reached behind her to grab her Zanpakuto.

“Iai. Kazeyoke.” She said, before flash-stepping forward fast enough to leave an after image of herself behind. She immediately appeared in front of the Genie’s head and with a deft flick of her hand, drew the weapon across the genie’s throat.

At this point however, Yoruichi really should be expecting annoying things to happen, as right as she was about to slash the Genie’s head off, the entire thing just turned to smoke.

She was caught off guard enough to get caught with a backhand from the Genie’s left hand which had fingers bigger than her entire body, and got thrown into what Yoruichi thought was the office building she had originally came out of. Not like she could tell any more, it was only one more section of rubble in an entire town full of rubble.

She landed with a dull bang and a dust cloud being kicked up, blocking her and everyone else’s view. Yoruichi spat out some dirt with a disgusted snarl on her face.

‘Tch. Why does everything turn intangible when I fight it??’ she complained to Rain, who was currently silent but watching the fight go on.

She pushed some slabs of rubble off her from where she had fallen and glanced around for her opponent, her mind running at light speed.

‘The Genie can turn intangible…’ Yoruichi pondered, her thoughts going back to the earliest interactions. ‘But I hit the thing before, so does that mean it doesn’t act like a Logia?’

She then caught sight of the genie floating above the ruins, slowly waving its arms to push the smoke and dust out of the way.

She heard a loud “To your left, fool!” and she saw the genie turn immediately and attempt to slam down its glaive with another “Majin Seidan” leaving its mouth.

Yoruichi just rolled her eyes in annoyance, and simply vanished into the dusty air, the blind attack not even coming close to hitting her.

She quickly crept her way over to where Daifuku was standing, rubbing his belly at a very fast pace.

She took in the armor he had on, looking for any weaknesses he might have. Now that she got a closer look, it looked much more like a very decorated and furred heavy gambeson made of some sort of hide or leather. The only real ‘armor’ the man had on was his absurdly large pauldrons which were honestly about as big as Yoruichi herself. He also had utterly no protection for anything above his collarbone, which in her opinion was kind of stupid since his neck and shoulders stuck out of his clothes looking like a blond phallic object.

She then thought about her options here. Obviously, the pirate before her is a member of the Big Mom pirates, Charlotte Daifuku. One of the few things actually productive that Yoruichi was able to do was get her hands on a boatload of bounty posters and memorize as much of them as possible, focusing on abilities and powers. She honestly couldn’t care less about what they ‘did’, she knew better than anyone that propaganda in an organization the size of the world government was key.

That was the only reason she knew roughly how large the Big Mom pirates were, and their rough strength. Going off bounty amounts, Daifuku was a fairly powerful person, at 300 million. However, in the grand scheme of things, Daifuku was pretty much a stronger cannon fodder compared to the Yonko and their commanders.

She could tell that the man had Armament and Observation Haki, with Armament most likely at what Garp called an ‘advanced’ level, and he probably wasn’t that good at observation, considering he couldn’t find her right now and she was barely bothering to hide her own presence.

That, plus his devil fruit, which looked to be more of an inconvenience than anything else, did not make Yoruichi particularly afraid of him.

‘Information gathering it is….’ Yoruichi sighed. It was these types of things she usually made Kisuke do. He was much more suited and successful for it.

She swiftly flash-stepped behind the man and tapped him on the shoulder. With a wordless Geki, Daifuku found himself frozen in place. As his arms suddenly stopped, the Genie who was still searching for Yoruichi in the now almost settled dust cloud whirled around with a face of pure fury. “There you Are!..... oh no….” The genie shouted, with its voice fading off into a faint whisper halfway through talking. It then got sucked back into Daifuku’s belt hole before it had a chance to do anything else.

To Daifuku, Yoruichi simply emerged into existence. One moment she wasn’t there, the next she was, tapping him on the shoulder, freezing him in place.

Yoruichi grinned slightly watching the man vibrate in place as he tried to break out of the paralysis. She stepped to the side so the man could see her out of the corner of his eye and commented blithely, “So, that was fun.” She then glanced around at the desolation and people scurrying away in fear, “At least for me.”

She then walked fully in front of him to stare up at his admittedly massive size. ‘He is definitely more than 3 times my size.’ Yoruichi thought a bit disgruntled. ‘What the hell is in the water that makes these people grow so tall?’

She let herself out of her annoyed thoughts and jumped up a bit and stood on an air platform to look the still vibrating man in the eyes.

“Now… I have some questions, and I sincerely hope you can answer them” Yoruichi said with a deadpan smile. She got no response, but that didn’t deter her.

“So” she continued, clasping her hands together like she was going to ask him a heartfelt question, “What’s up with those talking room decorations? Homies, was it?”

Daifuku did not respond verbally, but he did vibrate even harder. She could actually see his pauldrons shaking as he tried to talk to her. How nice of him.

Yoruichi reached out and tapped him on the nose. “Come on now, big guy. I know you want to answer. Why don’t you just open your mouth and spit it out instead of vibrating like a fleshlight?” she said with a mischievous glint in her eye.

When the man did not move after that, she frowned for a moment. It only took her a single moment after that to think of something else to get him to talk. “Ah! I know. You really didn’t like me talking about your mother, did you?” Her eyes narrowed when Daifuku started vibrating even harder, his pauldrons actually rattling now, but he still did not talk.

‘hmm, what to do, what to do….’ Yoruichi pondered, before she got an idea she remembered from watching some 10 year olds saying to each other at a park one time.

“Your mom’s so fat she needs an entire fleet to feed her.” Yoruichi said with a shit eating grin on her face.

The vibrating stopped.

Daifuku lost a few shades of color with one sentence, but his eyes could have started fires from how heated he was looking at her.

“Your mom’s so fat she needs a whole cake island.” She said again, the grin still there. The vibrating had not started again, and Daifuku was not pale anymore. He was a rather interesting shade of red now, his eyes starting to go bloodshot.

“Yor mom’s so big she gets picked up by the world government’s radar.” She said again, starting to get disappointed at the last reaction from the pirate in front of her.

‘Though, he is turning purple now. Wonder if that means anything…..’ Yoruichi idly thought, before her eyes narrowed again.

“Your mom’s so fat she had to use herself as a flotation device.” she said, pausing for a moment to watch for a reaction. All she got was Daifuku turning a very dark shade of blue, as the vibrating started again, this time even more violent than before.

She sighed despondently, shaking her head in disappointment. “Guess you mom was so fat she blocked herself from seeing her children.” she said morosely, looking down at the ground. “Heyyy… is that why you seem to want her attention all the time? You did in the short time I knew you.”

Daifuku said nothing, though he looked like he was going to pass out, so he was certainly trying.

Yoruichi pouted, disappointed that the man didn’t want to answer he question. “Oh well, guess ill have to go find another pirate to annoy.” She turned around and was about to jump off her platform when she heard something from behind her.

Looking over her shoulder at the man who definitely should not be that color she asked politely, “Oh? Did you want to say something?”

“I-Heguh -I- Wi-grkh-Will- KILL YOUUUUU” Daifuku roared, his arms bursting out at breakneck speeds from where they had been frozen at his sides, intent on grabbing the petite woman in front of him and choking her to death.

‘Oh yeah. I Paralyzed him. Forgot about that.’ Yoruichi realized just before she had to duck under hands that would probably crush her skull if they got hold of her.

Daifuku had currently embroiled his both of the entirety of his arms in Armament Haki as he reached out. As soon as Yoruichi ducked, she immediately responded with an uppercut to the man’s chin, pushing off the platform as she did so to backflip off it as soon as she did.

When she did hit him, it felt like she was punching a solid rock, and as she backflipped to dodge the man’s follow up as his hands clasped together and smashed down at her forehead, she saw that the man’s lower face was also covered in armament haki.

‘Damn haki users.  Good enough to know where im gonna hit him but not fast enough to dodge.’ Yoruichi grumbled as she put space between them.

‘Oh well, guess it’s time for some good old-fashioned brawling.’ Yoruichi shrugged as she activated her Shunko.

There was a burst of air as Yoruichi broke the sound barrier and implanted the top of her foot into the side of Daifuku’s head. The man went flying, bouncing off the already destroyed ground a few times until he slowed down enough to carve a large furrow in the ground. She flash-stepped after him stopping short of being in reach. She held out her right arm and braced it with her left, and said, “Hado #58, Tenran.”  A massive jet of air moving at speeds fast enough to cut grooves into stone whirled out of her palm in attempt to force Daifuku back into the ground where he had started getting up.

Yoruichi quickly cut off her Kido and flash-stepped closer to the large man, and silently cast Bakudo #30, Shitotsu Sansen, and pushed the three triangles formed of her Kido at the man who had stumbled from the pressure shock of the Tenran tornado.

All three bindings landed in their intended places, piercing the man’s arms and stomach and binding him to the small wall of dirt, cobblestone, and other miscellaneous pieces that were pushed up when he landed on the ground.

Daifuku spat out some blood and looked around with bleary eyes. “What the hell is this?!” he cried when he tried to move his arms but found them, and the entirety of his torso pierced by glowing pale golden triangles.

He jerked suddenly when Yoruichi appeared beside his head on top of the dirt mound he had created, a calm little smile on her face. “Now, are we going to answer my question?” she said in a voice that sounded like she was talking to a 4-year-old who she had put in timeout.

“Arhhgh Let me out of here and Ill crush your skull!” Daifuku roared, his mind still roiling from the insults Yoruichi gave to his precious mother.

Yoruichi sat down behind his head on the mound behind him and patted him on the head.

“Now now, we shouldn’t get that angry.” She chided, “It’s bad for your blood pressure.”

That only made Daifuku struggle even harder, but he wasn’t able to break out of his bindings. Yoruichi got a bit nervous for a moment when he tried Haki enhanced strength, as the triangles trembled a bit but in the end, Daifuku was stuck.

“Urgh. Haah… Haah…. What is it…. You want?” Daifuku ground out tiredly, having spent several moments struggling as much as possible trying to break out.

Yoruichi smiled, and thought idly, ‘Wow, that went way easier than I thought. Who knew acting like he was a petulant child would work so well.’

She looked down at the man who was collapsed against the mound of dirt and hopped down so she could look up at the man face to face.

“I just want to know two things….” Yoruichi said cheerfully, holding up two fingers like she was asking for two ice creams at a stand and not interrogating one of the members of a fearsome criminal group.

Daifuku growled in annoyance and resignation, and growled, “What…”

Yoruichi held up her hands in a peaceful gesture, tapping them forward slightly in a calming motion. “Ok, ok, I just want to know what’s up with those homie things, and if you have heard anything about ‘Golden Lion’ Shiki being in the area.”

Daifuku snorted in contempt and said, “Everyone knows about homies. They come from mama taking pieces of her citizens souls as tax for living here. As for Shiki, why should I tell you anything about that conniving two-timing bastard?”

The petite Shinigami’s lips quirked a little at that statement. ‘Oho, looks like there is a story there… Wonder if it has anything to do with the Rocks pirates?’ she thought gleefully.

“Hmm, why do you not want to talk about Shiki?” she asked, innocent curiosity coloring her voice.

Daifuku glared at her in disdain. “I ain’t fallin for that. You are not gonna get anything out of me about Mama and Shiki.”

Yoruichi’s eyes gained a slightly victorious glint. “Sooo, Big Mom and Skiki had some sort of interaction, one that led them into having a falling out and now you all hate him?” she questioned innocently.

“The bastard didn’t even bother to talk; he just stole it from her!” Daifuku roared, not realizing his mistake as his binds rumbled from his shaking.

‘Heh, that was too easy.’ Yoruichi thought, eyeing the Kido binding the large man in front of her.

It was quite simple. Most people who are not familiar with how to avoid questioning from people who know how to goad things out of them are very easily tricked into revealing things. Especially people who like to be right, which Yoruichi thought would fit Daifuku to a tee.

And she was right, he was led into revealing the most likely reason that Shiki was in this area, to steal something from Big Mom, his former comrade. What it is, Yoruichi doesn’t know, but she thought she really should find out.

As Daifuku stopped struggling and started paling considerably as he thought over what he had just said. Yoruichi cracked a smile at him, and stood up.

Then the man started shaking again, and Yoruichi looked at him like he was crazy. “What do you think Im gonna do, kill you?” she asked Rhetorically.

She was slightly surprised when she was completely ignored, as the man stared in fear behind her at something.

She turned around, got one glance of what the man was shivering about, and just sighed.

“Aw hell. Couldn’t you have gotten here faster? I sensed you get on the island like 20 minutes ago. Seriously, how long does it take you to get an army and drag your ass over here?” she said, and she crossed her arms in annoyance.

The massive group gathered around her looked collectively bewildered.

“I don’t believe we have had the pleasure of meeting before, miss. But, given the circumstances, If you would step away from my brother, I wont have to Lickity lick you up.”

Said a tall man, almost 11 feet tall (333 cm), who wore a bright yellow coat with candies acting as buttons. It had a very high collar, almost covering the man’s mouth. He also wore a very wide red and orange spiral striped hat, with lollipops coming out of the brim. It also had a feather in it, which was almost down to his mid back with how large it was. However, his most defining feature was his extremely large tongue, which was about the size of his face, and didn’t seem to want to stay in his mouth.

Yoruichi eyed the man and his compatriots, many of whom her senses recognized as pirates that manned Daifuku’s fleet.

‘The rest must be this guy. Plus that….. thing…..’ she thought, eyeing the black humanoid shape that was standing behind the tall suspicious candy man.

It felt weird to Yoruichi, quite similar to how Shinigami and souls feel, but not quite. Like there was something else in there holding it all together.

‘Mah, whatever. Deal with the creepy shadow thing later, creepy ped-*mghm* person now.’ Yoruichi thought.

While she was examining the new entrants, the man decided to be somewhat polite. “I don’t believe I have introduced myself. I am Charlotte Perospero, eldest child of Mama. I originally came here to liaison with my brother behind you about the food stores he was going to be bringing in, but we ran into this unfortunate circumstance.” Perospero introduced, as he gave her a slight bow at the waist.

The rest of the crew behind him were shivering in fear, either from the state Daifuku was in or going up against someone who could put him in that position.

Yoruichi gave the man an unimpressed look, but eventually shrugged. “Eh, well, he didn’t want to answer my questions, so let’s see if someone farther up the totem pole will indulge me.” she said with a challenging grin.

Perospero frowned slightly, and said despondently, “Ah, well, it was worth a try.” He turned to the black thing behind him and said, “Go get your, ah, payment.”

Said thing nodded, and walked forward, causing Yoruichi to look slightly upward at it.

‘Well, looks like Im gonna be finding out what this thing is first. At least it’s not fucking massive.’ She thought, preparing herself for what would be round two, and probably rounds 3-10 as well.