Cat on Water

Chapter 32 – Cat Gets Detained In World’s Worst Party



Hey All! Sorry for not posting for a while, I recently moved back to school for my final year and am getting so much stuff shoved down my throat I don't have all that much time to myself, and when I do its spent staring at my phone trying to turn my brain off instead of writing. Either way, I got like half the chapters edited to fit more of my vision I have come up with in the last 10 or so chapters, and will probably spend a bit more doing the rest. Bit of a shorter one, hope you like regardless :D

Chapter 32

Benn Beckman POV

Benn Beckman sighed as he relit his cigarette, looking up at the crow’s nest where he just witnessed their attacker try and curb stomp Yassop.

After a few moments, they could see and hear nothing, except the whispers of occasional words that made their way down to the deck. The rest of the crew just glanced awkwardly around at their first mate, who was leaning calmly against the side of the cabin entrance.

All of a sudden, they could hear a rhythmic thumping sound coming from the crow’s nest.

*Bang* *Bang* *Bang* *Bang* *Bang* *Bang*

Beckman just let loose a puff of smoke as he glanced expressionlessly upward at what he was sure was some dumb shit his captain was getting into.

He looked around at the rest of his crew, who were all just awkwardly glancing between him and the crow’s nest.

“Urgh, fine. You idiots are too scared of the captain anyway.” Beckman grouched.

He pushed himself up the wall, and quickly made his way over to the ladder that led up to the crow’s nest. After a silent climb, save for the banging which stopped halfway through and the lull of voices floating up from the desk, Beckman pushed open the hatch to the crow’s nest and climbed up onto the deck, only to find his Captain in a, well, very, compromising condition.

Beckman just raised an eyebrow at the man he has been following for years now. “Uh, Captain, if you were going to hire a prostitute, why did you make Yassop shoot her?” the first mate said bluntly.

He watched both Shanks and the woman freeze, in probably the most compromising position he had caught his captain in in probably the last 5 or so years.

He was currently behind her with his hands on her hips, while she stood bent over holding onto the railing near the wall of the crow’s nest. When Beckman showed up, he was trying to pry her off the wall, probably to stop her from hitting things, but it created a very, suggestive scene that looked like they were having sex standing up.

After a moment of shocked pikachu face from the both of them, the woman proceeded to donkey kick Shanks in the nuts.

She stood up, and dusted her hands off as she gave Shanks a disdainful glare. “As if I would ever let this, idiot touch me.” She spoke.

Said idiot remarked, from his place on the floor, “you already did….” Which earned him another kick, this time in the side.

Beckman just raised an eyebrow at the woman, who for all intents and purposes was rather small. ‘Eh’ he shrugged. ‘Shanks has bagged worse, I guess.’

He then examined her more thoroughly. Now that he thought about it, he couldn’t sense her at all with his Observation Haki. ‘Odd. I’ve only ever seen Shanks do that with his Conqueror’s, but that stops other people form using future sight, not hiding their entire presence.’

Shrugging off the, well, weirdness of their newest acquaintance, Beckman addressed the woman. “I am Benn Beckman, first mate to the crew. You are?”

The woman just stared blankly at him for a moment, before saying blandly, “Yoruichi. If you can give me directions, I would like to get off this godforsaken ship as soon as possible.” 

Beckman raised an eyebrow. ‘Is she not…?’ he thought absentmindedly. He then glanced between his captain and the petite woman, who was still just looking at him dully.

“Are you not, uh, with the captain?” Beckman asked hesitantly.

Yoruichi went utterly still, and her eyes sharpened to a Franky absurd degree. After a moment, she burst out laughing. “Bahahahahahaha. Ohhhh, hahahah! That idiot?” she said, pointing her thumb over her shoulder. “Nah, he’s WAYYYY too young for me.” She gave his captain, who was finally getting up off the floor, a disdainful sneer.

Beckman was slightly confused now. ‘Is she not fucking Shanks?’ he thought. ‘What the hell is she doing here then?’

After a moment of contemplation, he just gave up. ‘Eh, we will just let Shanks sort out his own messes.

 

 

 

Yoruichi POV

For some reason, the pirates she had found were not that wary of her. Yeah, they were a Yonko crew, but you’d think that when she came in hot swinging like the badass she was, the pirates would be a little more mad at her. Not trying to get her drunk as all hell.

She was currently sitting with her back up against a smaller mast in the front, facing the starboard side.

“Hey, Yoruichi!” said a talking monkey of all things, as he came stumbling over to her with a giant ass red bowl full of what was probably another vat of sake, “Here’s a drink! Your cups ermpty.” he stumbled a bit at the end, his obvious intoxication starting to affect the, man?

Yoruichi just stared with dead eyes at the third ‘cup’ of sake that was handed to her in the past 30 minutes.

Said ‘cup’ was more akin to a birdbath than an actual cup. The thing was as big as her torso and head combined.

She gingerly took the massive sake cup from her new monkey friend and put it down next to the other two ‘cups’ she had been given and looked around at the utter chaos that was happening on a ship that was definitely not floating through the most dangerous waters in the world.

Yassop and one of the fatter men she had seen in a while were over by the starboard rail juggling guns while trying not to get shot when they inevitably dropped them because of either drunken stumbling or massive wave stumbling, the monkey that had given her booze had returned to what he was previously doing, which was giving booze to what she assumed were rookies, as they looked young and very nervous to be on the ship, while being given alcohol they probably  weren’t allowed to drink.

Beckman and Shanks were sitting in chairs in the center of the ship, laughing uproariously at something some other pirate who she didn’t know said, all the while playing darts with a board that was held up by some newbie who definitely did not want to be anywhere near the position he was in.

Going by the amount of times Shanks missed his throws, Yoruichi could assume the man had probably missed enough times to injure the unlucky idiot who got themselves stuck holding the dartboard prior.

Yoruichi honestly had no idea how she went from ‘Im gonna interrogate a bunch of pirates’ to ‘Pirates are forcing me to drink out of bowls the size of my table’.

All of a sudden, a shadow came over her and Yoruichi looked up. In front of her stood a brown-haired man with wild hair down to his shoulder blades. He stood at a similar height to Garp, around 9 feet tall, and was extremely muscular. He had on what would not be amiss in a woodcutter’s lodge, with green pants and a brown, wide-necked T-shirt that was cut close to his massive arms. He came over with two plates of food, and had a kind smile on his gruff face, and held one out for her.

“Here.” he said. “Figured you already have enough booze.” Both of them glanced at the giant cups of sake involuntarily, but then back at each other. Yoruichi smiled lightly at the man and accepted the plate with thanks.

It was a somewhat simple plate, filled with ‘party food’ of various snacks, dried meats, and fruits. Popping a slice of pineapple into her mouth, Yoruichi turned to look at the man who had sat down next to her.

Said man has plopped himself on her right side and was basically shoveling his food into his mouth. “So, uh, what are you doing here?” the man asked between handfuls of chips. “Oh, I am Gab.” He said again after a second of munching.

“Doing here?” Yoruichi responded, popping a dried banana slice into her mouth. She then gave an indifferent shrug. “Well, I originally came from Toto Land, and was looking for directions, so I decided to ‘ask’ the nearest pirate ship. Which happened to be you all.” She popped another dried fruit in her mouth, slightly surprised that it actually tastes pretty good. She gave her plate an appreciative glance.

Gab stopped shoveling food into his mouth and looked at her in surprise. “Toto Land? Seriously? We were just going to head there ourselves. Heheh, with the amount of sake we go through, we gotta raid them once a month, sometimes more.”

Yoruichi just shook her head at that. “I really wouldn’t go over there right now; Big Mom wouldn’t take it too well. When I left, she was pretty mad.”

Gab’s head cocked back like he was just slapped. “Haah? Wha-what do you mean, she was mad?” the man said, his voice now taking on a timid tone, eyes shooting over to his captain.

This got a mirthless chuckle out of Yoruichi. “Yeah. Apparently, she did not like me ‘stealing’ something of hers. Not that it was hers in the first place.” She replied flippantly.

“Ohohoo~ you stole something from that old hag?” came a drawling voice from behind both Gab and Yoruichi. Glancing up, she saw that Shanks had made his way over, a large smile on his slightly red-tinted face as he ambled his way over.

The petite Shinigami glowered at the red-haired pirate captain. She was still annoyed with him for trying to shoot her then the whole issue afterwards.

Shanks continued talking, his curiosity getting the better of him. He leaned town to get his face closer to where Yoruichi was sitting, “SOooo whatcha taaaakkkee~” he asked clumsily.

Yoruichi reached up and shoved his face away. “Get your unusually nosey face out of my way.” She said dryly, the force of the shove sending the drunk man stumbling over until he tripped over one of the sake cups next to her and landed in it with a splash.

He came up sputtering, hands wiping his eyes. After a moment, he looked down at where he was and just went. “Ooh, more Sake! I thought we were out!” and reached over to a cup next to him, picked it up and started chugging.

Yoruichi sweatdropped a little at the man’s antics. ‘Wasn’t this idiot supposed to be a Yonko? One of the four most powerful pirates on the planet? Why does he seem to be more like Shunsui than anything else?’ she thought.

She just put the apparent lack of decorum into the back of her mind, and asked Shanks, “Why do you want to know what, if anything, I took?”

Shanks kept chugging for a few more moments, completely ignoring the purple haired Shinigami. After a bit, he said, “Ahh. That was nice. Thought we were all out of this.” He then looked over at Yoruichi and said, “Heyyy~ you hit hard. Wanna spar?” with a lecherous grin on his face.

Yoruichi raised a single eyebrow at the man, then gave him a smile of her own. “Hmm, how about we go somewhere more, private?” She almost purred, “I can get quite destructive….”

Shanks perked up like someone had just given him water in a desert. “Really?” he asked, sparkles in his eyes?

“No.” she deadpanned.

Laughter coursed over the waves as the red-haired pirates laughed at their captain’s crestfallen look.

Yoruichi put her plate down, and hopped to her feet, quickly making her way over to Shanks. When she got close enough, she patted the man on his shoulder and said, “Sorry, kiddo, bit too young for my tastes.”

 

She only got a childish pout in return, but the man quickly perked up again. “How bout an actual spar?” he asked, for some reason getting very excited. Yoruichi just sighed in exasperation. “No. I barely want to be here in the first place, and the only reason I’ve stayed here is because I don’t know where I am, and you idiots won’t tell me!” she grumbled.

Shanks got up, wobbling a bit as he made his way over to Yoruichi. “Aww, don’t be like that! I’m sure you’ll love it here.” He said drunkenly, swinging his hands wildly around as he articulated.

Yoruichi just gave him a deadpan look. “Just tell me how to get to Pirate Island you lazy drunk.” She said, her irritation already apparent. At her words, Shanks stopped and gave her a weird look. In fact, so did most of the other pirates on board.

‘Why are they all looking at me like I just grew 3 heads?’ Yoruichi thought. Her eyes flickered between every single man on board, and everyone in ear shot was just staring at her.

After a moment of silence, she got fed up. “Oi, what’s with all of you looking at me like that?” she snarked as she leaned back onto the mast and crossed her arms.

“If-If I may, Yoruichi?” came a timid, questioning voice from her right. She turned her head and saw Gab looking at her like she was going to step on his puppy. Or his balls. Yoruichi rolled her eyes slightly and replied with sufficient enough annoyance to get her point across, “I’m not going to eat you like you did that plate. What, do you want to say?”

Gab gulped a bit at seeing her expression, his face a mess of cold sweat. He lifted a hand to wipe his brow as he replied with a still noticeable stutter, “Ah, well, uh…. You see…. Pirateislandisaterribleplacewhydoyouwanttogothere?”

Yoruichi blinked as everyone’s gazes shifted from her to Gab, who blushed in embarrassment and cowed his head at the subsequent teasing of his crew mates.

Beckman came over and gave the man a pat on the shoulder, which caused him to blush even harder, as Beckman gave Yoruichi a concerned look. He said gently, albeit gruffly, “What do you need there? Somone of your strength could find anything they wanted on this sea, anywhere. Pirate Island is for chumps who can’t stand on their own two feet out here.”

Yoruichi was done with this. Starting to get up from her seat, she threw her hands in the air and yelled, “Why the hell do you guys’ even care? If I had known this boat was a fucking Yonko’s, I would have avoided you like the plague, but now that I’m on the damn thing, you won’t let me go? What does it even matter to you why I want to go to Pirate Island?”

The large man who was constantly chowing down on a stick of meat piped up quickly from the corner, “Well, you fuckin the boss, aintcha? That’s good nuff for me.” He punctuated his statement with a bite of his meat.

“FOR THE LAST TIME I AM NOT FUCKING YOUR CAPTAIN!!” Yoruichi screamed. She whirled on Beckman again and stepped up real close to his face. With a finger pointed right at his nose, she growled, “I blame you for this. I’d keep a real good eye behind you or the only thing you’ll be fucking is a steel rod I shove up your ass.”

She then whirled around again, with a scream of “I AM FUCKING LEAVING!” She didn’t make it very far as a hand whipped out and grabbed her on the upper arm. As soon as she felt the hand’s presence hear her, she whipped around, her breathing labored as she prepared to yell at whoever it was, only to find a dark redwood-like container with a glass ball inside of it shoved into her face. On the tip of the container was “PIRATE ISLAND” scratched on with what looked like a knife.

“Here.” said Shanks, who had stepped from his drunken induced fantasies and shoved the thing closer to Yoruichi’s nose as he insisted, she take it. “Eternal Pose to Pirate Island.” The Yonko said, a goofy grin on his face. “You’re right, we shouldn’t really care. But we do anyway, because you’re a new friend.”

Yoruichi took the eternal pose from the man dumbly, her mind just blank from the built-up stress that was finally boiling over. She eventually mumbled a “Thanks” to the man as she looked between Shanks and the compass.

Shanks then turned around with his hand’s raised, getting a cheer from his men. Before he left again, to go back to his party he turned around and winked at Yoruichi. “Maybe we can actually get to fucking once you get back, hehe~” the man called over his shoulder, then turned back to his men singing a truly horrible song. “Fucking fucking fucking, fucking fucking fucking~ the only thing I find more fun is getting drunk and then more fucking fucking fucking!~”

His jaunty song was cut off by Yoruichi’s boot finding itself implanted right in his ass, sending one of the four most powerful people in this ocean shooting forward toward the portside rail, and almost instantly smashing into the side of the rail and flipping over and into the open ocean.

There was a stunned silence for a moment before the entire crew just cheered “AYYYYYY!” and went back to partying.

 

Ahh, the insanity of the Red-haired pirates. Truly wonderful stuff, except for normal people witnessing it, then it's like the Great Old Ones frying their brains.

Of course, this chapter is kinda 'filler', but is slightly important to Yoruichi's character development. In Shinigami years, she is like mid 20s at most, if we go by Shunsui and Ukitake being the elder uncles and Yamamoto being the old bastard that just wont die. In that timespan, she was put on a pedestal, pulled off it, forcefully dragged herself back on it, got booted off again, sat in exile for almost a quarter of her life, then got sent to another dimension where she got hit with whammy after whammy of shit she really doesn't know how to deal with. So she finally cracks in this chapter, especially after recent events. I definitely see her as someone who can push personal issues off until later to get the job done, so after dealing with Big Mom, who, after Kizaru, she isn't entirely certain she can face them, as she is aware Yonko are generally stronger than Admirals, she gets forcefully 'adopted' by Shanks and his crew and is given enough time to start coming to terms with what exactly she is finding out.

Anyways, that's my analysis of her character, and what I tried to aim for in the last little bit. It all works out and up to one big sledgehammer blow that I haven't entirely figured out how is going to be delivered yet, but its coming along. Kudos to yall for your patience. See you in the next one!


Tip: You can use left, right, A and D keyboard keys to browse between chapters.