[Week 22] [P] Kin G. Doom <Chapter 4: A Nasty Surprise>

As he sat bolt upright on the beach, Kin looked around fervently to try see if he could see any of his crew mates. After failing to see either of them, it finally dawned on him that he had no idea what island he had washed up on after that tsunami. Kin got up and had a better look around, out to sea there was nothing apart from the blue sea stretching into the distance meeting the blue sky, the sky was clear apart from a couple of white cloud sprinkled around. He then turned to look at the island, the beach stretched towards an untamed jungle which surrounded the cove he had washed up in and from the sound of it was full of activity.

Realising the only way he could go was through the jungle, he shrugged and walked into the jungle muttering "What's the worst that could happen?" As he walked into the forest, he could feel the sun disappear as the trees hid it from view and as a result, it got a lot darker. Due to the change in light levels his eyes hadn't grew accustomed to the change, he kept almost losing his footing due to not seeing the roots of trees. After almost falling over so many times he started to pride himself on his footwork and apparent inability to fall down, however at that moment he managed to get his foot tangled in jungle vines and before he realised what was happening he fell down face first into the jungle floor.

He wiped his face clear of mud and turned round to see how he could get his foot free, after struggling and worming around he managed to free his foot. He stood back up and wiped himself down, he looked around and saw some light a little distance away. Looking around he saw that the jungle just seemed to stretch out as far as he could see in every other direction. He set off towards the light to find out what exactly it was.

As he walked into the light he had to shield his eyes from the bright light and had to let them adjust so he could actually see. Once he was able to see, he immediately regretted walking towards the light. What was in front of him was a watering hole, but that wasn't what worried him, the fact that it was surrounded by gorillas was the thing that worried him. They all simultaneously turned their heads to look at him, after they stared at him for a minute they then all turned to look at one of the gorillas among the pack as if looking for instruction on how to act to the intruder in their territory. The gorilla they were looking at stood up tall and beat his chest and roared, Kin realised this one must be the alpha male of the group and also realised that the reason that he hadn't moved from where he stood was due to the fact that he was petrified with fear.

The gorilla noticed that Kin hadn't moved from where he was and came to the conclusion that this intruder was a threat, it charged at full speed, bounding over the moss and vines in the direction of Kin. As the gorilla charged at him, Kin realised there was only one thing that he could do, which was to face this beast in a fight. Clenching his hand into a fist and preparing himself as he knew this would hurt him due to the fact that the force of the gorilla would be something he had never felt before. As the gorilla closed in on him Kin mentally and physically prepared himself for what about to happen.

As the gorilla got to him and started swinging it's large muscular arm, Kin jumped to the left and delivered a punch with his left hand into the side of the gorilla that caused it to bend over and spin around to face him. Once it had done this, Kin knew he had won the fight and delivered the final blow, an upper cut to the gorilla's chin. This sent the gorilla falling over backwards, upon seeing this the other gorillas around looked at each other, and all ran off into the jungle. Kin was now alone, he walked over to the watering hole, being careful not to trip over any vines again. Crouching down he rinsed his face and his hands, he knew that his hands would hurt once the adrenaline had worn off. He stood up and stretched, even though it was against a gorilla, he knew that he had enjoyed that thrill of the fight. Looking around for the path he would walk next, he noticed something glinting like on the floor, so he went to investigate.

It was a puddle of some kind of liquid, he crouched down and put his fingers in it, upon inspecting his fingers he saw that it was red, and smelled familiar but he couldn't quite put his finger on what was so familiar about that smell. It then clicked in his mind, he knew what it was, it was blood. He stood up and looked around at the jungle floor, trying to see if he could see a trail. He knew that the blood could belong to either another person who was out in this jungle severely injured or it could just belong to some jungle animal that had got injured in a fight. He knew he had to find out, he couldn't just leave if there was a chance that there was an injured person out in this jungle alone. He spotted a few more drops on blood and then saw some more, so he followed the trail.

He then rushed through the jungle following the trail, he knew he couldn't yell out or it might attract some unwanted company from some of the more fierce local inhabitants. He started thinking about how much blood this possible person had lost, how far they had travelled while injured and how badly injured there were. The blood drops in the trail were getting closer together, realising this meant that the person or animal had slowed down. The trail went round a corner, Kin was about to run round it, but he stopped as he heard some noises from the direction of the blood. He slowly peered round the corner to see what was there, it was then he saw the cause of the blood trail, it was a man that was sat upright against a tree and looked like he had passed out, but the bigger problem was that he was surrounded by a pack of five tigers. Kin knew that he had to do something, so swallowed down the worry he had and stepped round the corner.

As he stepped round the corner he cleared his throat in an attempt to get the attention of the tigers. His plan worked and all five of the tigers were now facing him, he realised he hadn't planned anything after that, so he prepared to face then and took stance. The first tiger leapt at him, he only just managed to dodge to the left, as a counter he punched the tiger in the stomach sending it flying into the air. Then another tiger attacked, this one ran at him baring its teeth, Kin stepped to the right and kicked it in the stomach so that it was airborne just in front of him, he then punched it with his right hand sending it flying into a tree. Now there were only three tigers left, another one ran towards him, this time shortly followed by another one. As the first reached him he knelt forward and elbowed it on the top of its head, knocking it out and sending it to the floor sliding forwards, he then grabbed the tail of the tiger with both hands and used all his strength to swing the surprisingly heavy tiger around and he struck the other tiger with it sending that one into another tree and quickly before this one woke up he swung it over his head into the ground. There was now only one tiger left, Kin started walking towards it, it leapt at him, this time Kin used both his fists and put his arms outstretched in front of him in the path of the tiger, the tiger smashed into his fists and just dropped as if it had just hit a brick wall.

Kin rushed to the injured mans side and checked for a pulse, he let go a sigh of relief as he realised the man was still alive. Kin started trying to remember his basic first aid training he had learnt back at his home town. Realising he would have to clean the wound, he then started thinking of a plan to take the man back to the watering hole that he met the gorillas at. There was only one way he would be able to carry this man back, so Kin picked him up and gave the unconscious man a piggy back all the way to the watering hole. Upon arriving at the water's edge he almost collapsed with exhaustion, he set the man down by the side of the water and sat down to gain his breath back. After locating the wound, which turned out to be on the man's left, around his ribs. Tearing a part of his shirt off he put it into the water and then proceeded to dab the man's wound with it to start the cleaning process. After he decided it was sufficiently dabbed, he then started wiping up the rest of the dirt from the wound, constantly cleaning the piece of shirt in the water. Once it looked clean enough to him he then tore a longer piece of shirt and tied it round the man's ribs to apply pressure to prevent further bleeding, it was then that the man gained consciousness.

Blinking, the man tried to sit up apparently noticed the pain. "Stay laid down, you have a wound on your left, around your ribs. I treated it the best I could but I'm no doctor." Said Kin calmly. The man looked around seemingly considering his options, it was then he noticed the gorilla still on the floor out cold.

Motioning over to the gorilla the man asked, "Was it that thing that did this to me? And what the hell happened to it?"

"Huh? Oh, the gorilla? No it wasn't that, at least I don't think it was. I found you surrounded by a pack of tigers. You mean why is the gorilla on the floor passed out? Oh, ummm I may have knocked it out." Said Kin sheepishly.

"You?! You knocked out that gorilla?" The man asked, "Wait, tigers?! What happened to those?"

"Yeah, the gorilla came at me, what was I supposed to do?!" Said Kin almost shouting, "I got the tigers as well, it looked as though they were about to finish you off, so of course I had to help you!"

"Oh, well...thanks for that, you don't even know me and you fought tigers to save my life..." Mumbled the man in deep thought, "Who are you anyway? You don't seem like you're from around here."

"Me? Oh I'm just a..." Said a puzzled Kin, not wanting to frighten the man by telling him he was a pirate, "I'm just travelling, we ended up on this island and I got lost. What about you? Why were you out here?"

"I'm just a simple travelling merchant, I was told I could find some rare plant roots in this jungle, but obviously someone just wanted rid of me. I appreciate your assistance though, I'm certain you saved my life, everything I do now will be thanks to you." Said the man with a smile.

"It's ok, helping other people is something I enjoy, I do it out of the goodness of my heart." Said Kin smiling and rubbing the back of his head.

"Well, I should get going. I'm sure my business partner is worried about me." Said the man wincing as he was getting up.

"As I said, I'm no doctor but I'm pretty sure you shouldn't be moving that much with that injury." Kin pointed out.

"It's ok, I have had much worse, believe me. But I really should get going." He said as he started walking away, "Don't worry about me! I'm sure I'll be fine and we'll meet again!"

"Ok, be careful then!" Shouted Kin as the man walked away, he started wondering why a travelling merchant would have had much worse injuries, but he didn't think that for long as he heard a grunt from behind him and as he started to turn to see what it was, the arm of the gorilla he had previously knocked out caught him in the side and sent him flying. He passed out as he was flying through the air.

~

Whilst walking away from a trail of dead tigers, wiping down two blood stained scalpels with a couple of leaves he had found, Harper shook his head and sighed. He disliked ending lives prematurely but he had no other option, he was trained to kill, and those tigers had unluckily decided that he would be their dinner. He had been on this jungle island for a few days, yet he still hadn't seen any sign of civilisation, he feared that the island maybe totally uninhabited, which with his luck would be typical, that wasn't the only problem, he had climbed to the top of a tree to gauge an idea on how big the island was, only to find out that it just stretched on and on, he knew it could take weeks to traverse it. He had done many a thing in his life and now he was suffering for them, this was the reason he now tried to help out and frowned on wrong doers. He didn't even know why he had decided to join Kin's crew, surely that went against everything he stood for now...but there was something in that boy's eyes. Something that he hadn't seen in years, eyes full of hope, determination and a sense of adventure, the last time he could remember looking into those eyes was many many moons ago when he himself was a youngster, before he set out on his journey and turned into what he was now. He hoped that he could save this boy from a life of murder, assassination and espionage. If he could do just that then he could rest a bit more peacefully at night. First of all he had to figure out where the hell he was and how to get off this island and somehow regroup with Kin and Roko, which was much easier thought than done, he would have to come up with a plan. So he kept going in the same direction.

He heard some noises while he was walking, quickly checked the direction of the wind and hid upwind of the path so that whatever it was wouldn't be able to know he was there. As the noise got louder he could hear muttering, which could only mean it was a human. Standing up straight dusting himself down and making himself presentable he walked out of the area he was hiding in and announced, "Hello, sorry for the inconvenience but could you point me in the direction of the nearest vill-". He stopped talking as he realised that he knew the person stood in front of him, someone he had hoped NEVER to see again.

The man just stared at him realisation dawning on him, "Slicer? Slicer is that you?! My my it has been a long time hasn't it? I see you have grown your hair since back in the day."

Harper managed a fake smile, "Wow Butcher, I never thought I'd see you again. What are you doing in these parts?" He then noticed that Butcher was injured and pointed at it, "Do you need any help with that?"

"Help? Like I'd need from a help from a drop out Doctor like you!" laughed Butcher.

"Drop out?! Hell! I was the best Doctor in the whole dam place, the only reason I 'dropped out' was because I was so damn good with scalpels they stuck me with you lot!" laughed Harper.

"Best? Like hell you were, Joe from group 4C was a million times better than you."

"Joe from 4C?! How on earth was he a million times better?! He failed everything, hell, over half his patients died!"

"Well...yeah, but they went out happy!"

"Happy?! Only because he gave them alcohol and got them rat arsed before he started so they'd complain less."

"Exactly, at least he gave them alcohol!"

"Just shut up and lay down, I'll take care of that injury."

"Yeah yeah, you always order people around."

"I said shut up!" barked Harper as he got to work on treating the injury, "Who the hell treated you? This first aid is horrible, seems like an amateur did it!"

"Some kid treated me after I was supposedly attacked by tigers. He claimed he took all five tigers out AND knocked out a gorilla. My arse did he do that, it was just a kid, I reckon he found me and tried to take all the glory for himself when someone else did all the hard work."

"You let a kid treat you? Going senile in your old age?" laughed Harper, "Hang on, I know what you're like, is that kid still in the world of the living? And in one piece?"

"Old age?! You're only a couple of years younger than me! Errr, yes, I left him untouched, after all the jungle is a scary place, anything could happen."

"Yeah yeah, keep telling yourself that." Said Harper finishing up, " There now I'm done. So why are you here? And getting yourself injured." They then both stood up and as if by default leant against trees.

"Let's just say I'm...travelling, needed to get out of the area and stay low."

"Oh god, what have you done now?"

"You haven't heard? Oh, well when you hear about the big event that just happened, I was there, in the thick of it doing my fair share." Smirked Butcher, "Oh and you were asking about the nearest town, I'll tell you for old time sake. There's a town about a week's walk away, you should get to it if you follow that path."

"Thanks, it was...an experience meeting you again, we should do it again sometime."

"Oh, indeed we should, I look forward to it." Said Butcher smiling and he started walking away, "Oh, I'll mention to the guys that I saw you, they will be very interested in this."

"Alright, see you around, and maybe the guys as well." Said Harper waving over his shoulder as he walked away. Once Butcher was out of sight he drew his scalpels ready for the first sign of trouble, he knew Butcher and therefore it would not be as easy as he said to get to the town, whether it would be an ambush, traps, whatever it was he would be ready. He then started worrying about the fact that Butcher was in contact with the other guys and how this could only be bad news, not only for him but for everyone...

~

Kin woke up, it took a while for the fact that he had no idea where he was to sink in. It suddenly hit him and he tried to sit up only to suffer a severe shock of pain he let out an involuntary whelp of pain. Hearing this, a woman came through from the other room carrying a bucket of water, a sponge and some dressing.

"Don't move, you're injured we've been taking care of you for the last couple of days." Said the woman kindly.

"Uhhhh, what happened? Where am I?" questioned Kin.

"You were hit by a gorilla, luckily for you some of our foragers were nearby and brought you back here, we've taken care of you since then, you have been out cold for two days. You are in the only town in this part of the island, far away from the other areas."

"Other areas? Just how big is this island?"

"Quite big, I'll explain it to you another time, you look sleepy."

"No, I'm not slee...I'm not...I'm..." murmured Kin as he fell asleep.

~

Kin awoke again, this time the woman was sat on a chair next to him watching him, it crept him out a little but he didn't let it show. He tried to speak, but ended up coughing as he hadn't realised how dry his mouth was. The woman offered him a cup of water and said softly, "Here, drink this. It will help."

Taking a much needed drink Kin then replied "Thank you, by the way I don't think I ever told you my name, I'm Kin and I am extremely grateful to you for everything you have done for me."

"It's really no problem, in this town we look at it as good fortune if we help travellers in need. By the way my name is Lola."

"Still...thank you Lola." Said Kin smiling.

"Have you been around here before? You seem a little familiar, but I just can't place it."

"No, as far as I know, actually I don't even know where here is."

"We're on the Ionian Archipelagos, this is known as the Jungle Island, and there are other islands, depending what you do when you leave, you may encounter them. If you do plan to travel then I'll explain the other islands to you if you wish."

"Ionian Archipelagos..." muttered Kin thoughtfully, "I've definitely not been here before, thank you for the offer, I lost my friends and I can only hope they also ended up on this island."

"You might be lucky then, all the currents around these parts behave peculiarly. They pull in things from nearby towards the island, so your friends could be around somewhere. If you want to go now then I will explain the islands to you, as your injuries seem to be almost healed."

"Thank you, how long have I been here?"

"You have been in that bed for three days now and we have taken care of you the whole time."

"Well... before I leave I must ask one thing of you."

"Oh?" said Lola curiously.

"I'd like to do three days work around the town to repay my thanks for taking care of me. It's the least I could do."

"I told you it bring good fortune on us since we helped you, but if you are insistent then there may be something you could do. I'll be back in a moment, I'll ask around."

"Thank you."

The woman left the room, Kin tried to sit up. He felt the pain still there as it was yesterday, but decided to push through and help out in this town, he swung his legs off the bed and tried to stand up. He promptly fell forwards onto his face, grumbling he managed to pick himself up and sit on the chair the woman was sitting on. He needed to get his legs working again, three days in a bed had taken some toll on him as he had never spent so long without using his legs at all. Putting one hand on the back of the chair and the other on the chest of draws beside the bed he pulled himself up. He managed to successfully stay upright this time, he then started moving forwards towards the door leaning on everything he could whilst ignoring the pain from his ribs. He made it to the door and walked through, he was stood on the landing of the building he was in, he started making his way down the stairs leaning on the banister with one hand and using the wall as support with the other hand. He slowly made his way downstairs and managed to get through the door at the bottom, he was starting to get a feel of his legs again.

Walking through the door he saw a group of people stood around talking, one of them he recognised as Lola. They noticed him and turned to look at him, Lola was the first to speak, "I didn't expect to see you up and around already, I've been talking to these people here about various things you might be able to help us with. By the way, this place here is the town's tavern and I own it. We made a list of things that you could help with, here you go." She passed the list over to him. He took the list smiling and read it, he looked up and said "Sure, I'll help out with this. Is it alright if I start tomorrow morning?"

"Sure, take your time after all, you chose to do this." Lola responded.

Nodding and smiling Kin replied "Thanks, I'm going to walk around the town and get to know people." Kin spent the rest of the day finding out what was where around the town and introducing himself to everyone, the peculiar thing was that everybody said he looked familiar. Luckily for him everyone seemed to greet him with a smile and a friendly attitude. He finished the day going back to the tavern and having some food thanks to Lola, he knew he would have a busy day ahead of him.

Kin woke up the next day raring to go, he barely even noticed his rib pain as he got to work, however it did restrict him lifting heavier objects that he'd normally be able to manage. He spent the day doing jobs ranging from simply sorting out the store houses to carrying supplies around even to helping repair some leaky roofs. Seemingly quite quickly the sun was beginning to set so he called it a day and finished, he had made quite an impact on the list. Lola was surprised and impressed at the amount of work he'd been able to do in one day as she supplied his evening meal again. She said "At this rate you will be finished by tomorrow."

"I know, are there any other jobs that need doing as well?" he asked.

"Actually no there aren't any other jobs. That list we gave you was everything that needed doing around here."

"Oh, here is an idea, how about I finish off the list tomorrow, then go help get some food the day after then leave after that?"

"You'd purposely stay longer to help out even more after you've done all this for us?"

"Well...yeah, you really helped me out and I need to repay the favour to both you and everyone else. Well I better get an early night, another full day of work tomorrow, I can feel all this hard work helping my injury as well." Kin then went to bed ready for another full day of work.

Once again he woke up raring to go, the work was much like the day before, menial tasks that no one else wanted to do. Such as pruning back the vegetation around the town, moving around supplies again and general cleaning of the towns people's houses, such as sweeping and polishing. As Kin finished the last thing on his list the sun started setting, he couldn't help but smile at a job well done, he had accomplished a list expected to take three days to complete in only two. He headed back to the tavern for his last evening meal there and he had another discussion with Lola.

"You know, since you finished everything on the list you can leave now." She told him.

"Yeah, but I want to help a bit more. I'll go gather some food tomorrow and after that I'll leave."

"Alright then, I have an idea. How about you go gather food tomorrow and we have a feast tomorrow evening celebrating the time you have been here? Then after the feast I'll explain everything you need to know about the islands and the best plan to find your friends. Then you can set off the next morning after a full night of rest."

"Ok, that sounds like a plan. I'll head out in the morning with a couple of baskets and forage for food, don't worry I have seen what the others bring back so I won't bring anything poisonous back."

"I didn't think you would, we'll be busy preparing for the feast tomorrow so we probably won't get to talk before you run off foraging so I'll leave the baskets out here for you to pick up."

"Thank you, I should probably head to bed since it will be a busy day of foraging followed by celebrating tomorrow." Said Kin smiling as he got up and started walking back to the room he was staying in.

"I should be the one thanking you, you're the one that brought joy to the town. I'm sure your friends will be glad to see you again once you meet them. Remember, everything you do will effect something else in the world, be it good or bad. Every action has an equal or opposite reaction; choose yours wisely, or what should be positive will turn to negative faster than you have chance to stop it." Kin paused for a moment whilst he was walking out of the room to think about this, then continued on his way to bed.

Kin awoke a little later than he had done the previous two days, but as before he was raring to go. He grabbed the baskets on his way out and started heading out into the jungle to start foraging, as he knew everyone would be busy preparing for the feast.

Kin walked into the jungle along the beaten path that he knew the foragers took. Keeping his eye out for any fruit or vegetables that he had previously seen brought back to the town, as that was his criteria for assessing if it was poisonous. Soon after he had filled up one basket he started struggling to find more fruit or vegetables. That was when he noticed a gorilla wandering around, knowing that gorillas eat vegetation he decided to follow it carefully in the hopes that it would lead him to something worth bringing back.

He started marking the trees as he followed the gorilla so that he wouldn't get lost afterwards, the gorilla lead him to an area full of fruit and vegetable plants. Kin waited hidden until the gorilla left the area until he ventured into it himself, amazed at the amount of fruit and vegetables around him, he very quickly filled up the empty basket and topped up the other basket. As he was about to head back to the town he felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up on end, he knew he was being watched. He slowly lowered the baskets to ground, stood up and turned around slowly to see what it was.

He saw what had caused his hairs to stand on end, it was a tiger poised to pounce at any time. He knew as soon as he made any sudden moves it would leap at him and attack. He also knew that it would not leave, at least not quickly. He decided to hell with it and took up his fighting stance as he knew as soon as he did that then it would attack. Sure enough, as soon as he took stance, the tiger leapt at him with all its might. Kin intended to grab it and throw it over his shoulder but as he grabbed it, he felt the pain from his ribs again and all he could do was drop the tiger, which then took the opportunity to put both its front claws in his left leg and it then bit it.

Yelling out in pain, in one swift movement he dropped down onto his right knee punching the tiger on the top of its head causing it to screech in pain. The force he punched the tiger with caused the tiger's head to hit the floor and bounce back into his fist, these successive blows caused the tiger to lose consciousness. After knocking the tiger out Kin got his leg free from the grasp of the tiger and wrapped his wounds in more fabric ripped from his t-shirt. Picking up the baskets he had put down he started limping on his way back to the town, following the path he had marked while following the gorilla.

As Kin limped back into the town he noticed it was eerily quiet and he started to get curious and put down his baskets and while walking towards the nearest building which happened to be the general store of the town. He called out "Hello?!" to see if anyone would respond however all that responded was a chirping cricket. As he got to the store he saw some blood splatter on the door frame, his face dropped and he rushed into the store, as soon as he did the colour on his face drained away in an instant until it was drip white. He rushed out and to the bushes and promptly threw up because of what he had just seen. The scene he had just laid his eyes on was horrifying, there were multiple bodies beaten almost beyond recognition with something that could only be a set of spiked knuckle dusters, there was blood splattered all over the shop which could only have come from a very savage beating. After Kin had finished throwing up, a realisation hit him and he rushed to each of the buildings in the town, each one containing a similar scene as the store. It was all he could do stop himself throwing up again, there was only one building left that he hadn't checked and that was Lola's tavern. He headed straight there.

As he approached the tavern, he could hear laughter and what sounded like muffled screams, taking a deep breath he walked purposefully to the door and opened it with force. Almost instantly his jaw dropped in surprise at the scene he saw, what he first saw was Lola who was tied down onto a table, wrists tied down to the table legs at one side, and her ankles tied down to the table legs on the other side so that her legs were open. She also had some type of gag in her mouth preventing her from making any loud noises, hence the muffled screams he had heard. Her head was at the far side of the table from Kin, then he noticed the figure of what seemed to be a man stood between him and Lola, the mysterious man was rubbing his hands, almost as he was getting ready to have some fun. Lola raised her head to see what was happening when the door burst open and saw Kin stood there, she frantically tried shouting something to Kin but due to the gag she couldn't get her message across. The mysterious man spoke "Who dares disturb me when I'm about to have such a good time? I thought I had killed everyone in this poor excuse of a town." Kin froze when he realised that he recognised that voice, it was then the mysterious man turned round to see who had disturbed him. "Oh it is you, I didn't think you would be around here, get out now before you regret staying here." As the man turned and showed Kin his face and as Kin feared he knew who it was had a terrible sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach.

The man stood between Kin and Lola was none other than the man that Kin had saved from the tigers and helped in the jungle. "B-b-but why?" stuttered Kin in shock.

"Why? Because this is the kind of thing I like to do" said the man calmly with a smile.

"You're only a merchant though, how could you do such a thing? I saw those bodies back there..." questioned Kin.

"You saw them did you? Yet you still came here, I admire your courage kid. You know, I'm not actually a merchant, I'm a pirate."

"What!?!?! What kind of pirate does all this?!"

"...The normal kind of pirate."

"No pirate would do this, this is barbaric!"

"Hah barbaric? You have a lot to learn kid, this is nothing compared to what me and my crew did back in the day...this one guy, Slicer, he was the definition of brutal...ah, that guy was a true artist with what he did..."

"I don't care what you did back in the day, this is the new day and things like that are barbaric and no normal pirate would ever do such a thing!"

"Hah! What would you know about things that pirates do?"

"Well, I am a pirate."

"Hahaha, you a pirate? Don't make me laugh! Who would be crazy enough to have you on their crew?"

"No one."

"I thought so."

"Actually, I'm the captain of the crew."

"What?! Who would be mad enough to join with you as a captain?"

"I have two others that have joined me so far."

"Hmpf, anyway you don't know what it takes to be a pirate, I bet you didn't take part?"

"Take part in what?"

"In what? You definitely don't know. I was one of the pirates that was in the group that attacked the Marine Headquarters!"

"What? Why would you do such a thing? Marines don't need more excuses to hunt pirates down!"

"Hahaha who needs a reason? The bastards deserved it! What...do you think it was barbaric of us?"

"Barbaric...? No, it was a bloody stupid idea. Now leave this town and never return."

"Why do you want me to leave? Does this town mean something to you?"

"This town saved my life."

"They did, did they? Well, does that mean you like this woman here?" Gesturing to Lola who was still tied to the table.

"Leave this town now." Said Kin firmly ignoring the question.

"Actually, I don't think I will, I'm having too much fun here, but maybe I'll kill this woman here in front of you and then kill you, since you interrupted me as I was about to have some much deserved fun with her."

"Leave now." Said Kin, his jaw clenched.

"No, since you are so insistent, I'll kill her now." He turned round and walked towards the end of the table where Lola's head was, she was struggling to get free and much as she could, her eyes were full of terror. "I was planning on treasuring this...oh well easy come easy go." He slipped out a spiked knuckle duster from his pocket and equipped it onto his right hand, he placed his fist over Lola's head and raised his right arm ready to punch her and split her skull. Then Kin finally found something within himself and charged at the man, however the man had noticed this and was much more experienced waited until Kin was at the right distance away and swung out his left arm, catching Kin in the stomach and sending him flying into a wall, so that he wouldn't be able to move, the man had taken special care to leave him conscious though so he would watch everything.

"Are you paying attention? And remember this, when you saved me, do you remember what I said? I said that everything I do now will be thanks to you. I truly meant this and thank you for this opportunity." Then he brought his arm down with such a tremendous force that there was a sharp crack of Lola's skull breaking and blood spraying everywhere just like a gusher. "You know, I like it when it does that, it's a pretty blood fountain." He turned and looked at Kin, "I would kill you...but I think it will be much more fun to leave you around in the land of the living." He wiped his spiked knuckle duster down clearing the blood and put it back into his pocket. "Well...my work here is done, I'm sure we'll meet again." He saw Kin trying to move, "Oh, don't get up on my account I'll let myself out thanks." With that, the man walked out of the tavern smiling to himself.

It took a few hours for Kin to be able to move properly again and it was almost getting dark, he started going around all the buildings pulling out the bodies of the townspeople and lining them up in the middle of the town so that he would be able to give them a proper funeral. After he had finished he sat at an entrance to the town cross legged and looking down, his mind was miles away. He heard steps and panting but didn't look up. Then the person that had walked towards him suddenly said. "Well, I'll be a monkey's uncle. I finally found you." To which Kin looked up to see who had addressed him. In fact the person that had addressed him turned out to be none other than Harper.

Harper stood there above Kin, noticing something was wrong he crouched down to talk to Kin eye to eye. "Is something wrong?" Kin just looked at him and then motioned over in the direction of the bodies he had lined up. Harper got up and walked in that direction that Kin had motioned and saw the bodies. He crouched down and studied them, sighing he got up and went back to Kin. "So...did you see the person that did this?" Kin just nodded, not particularly wanting to talk. "You met him then, it is a surprise you are still alive, a man like him doesn't usually leave witnesses. Did you happen to hear about why he was here by any chance?"

Still not wanting to talk, Kin just used his finger and wrote out a message in the dirt that spelt out; HE AND OTHERS ATTACKED MARINE HQ. Harper just looked at the message with eyes wide open and said almost to himself "So that is why he was out here, bet they were in on it as well. Alright, we'll talk about it when you want to, now how about we make some tracks, if both of us are here, then Roko should be here as well, come on lets go." Harper started walking off in the direction of the trampled dirt road, then he noticed Kin hadn't moved so he walked back over and spoke softly to him. "Staying here moping won't do any good and won't help these people. Come with me now and I'll give you a chance to get him back for all of them." Kin just looked into his eyes and slowly nodded and got up. "Alright, let's go and see if we can find Roko somewhere." They set off walking down the dirt road together, in hopes of finding their last crew mate. However Harper knew that a critical point would soon appear, this event would decide Kin's future, the meeting of Kin and Butcher. He would have to help Kin in any way he could, but that would first require him speaking again, and the only person that Harper knew how might be able to do that was Roko, he only hoped that they would fine Roko soon.

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