Betaread by ReadingAtTheSpeedOfLight o/

√ -√v-√ -√v—

At days like those Skull was wondering if she was cursed. As much as she wished that was the end of it, she did not even mean the Arcobaleno Curse. That one she had managed to escape in the end.

That curse had to be from even before that…

Maybe with 'may you live in interesting times'?

First her brother - Cherep and she were kicked out of the orphanage because of their western hair color… In the middle of Russian winter. It's not like either of them asked to be born with purple hair…

Then they got their ray of sunshine - they were allowed by the Maestro to join the Circus… Their life there wasn't maybe the best but it wasn't bad either. Both Skull - then still called Anastasia and Cherep were expected to help around and practice their chosen arts, so that they could be of use when older. But they also were fed, clothed, warm and educated. Other members of the circus made sure they both could read, write and count properly. That wasn't even counting the lessons on how to pickpocket, con others into doing the siblings' bidding, or read the body language of in order to predict humans around them. Using knives and guns and defend themselves hand-to-hand was just as essential as the other people skills that they learned there. Russia… was special even then. The circus let them choose what else did they want to learn, however, so that made up for any nausea their less pleasant lessons put the siblings through. Geography, History, Languages, Mechanics, Biology, Physics… All the things 'normal' children were taught in schools, they were learning on the road.

Of course, nothing good could last. It wasn't really a surprise when after long years of work and learning, when Cherep finally got approval for his stunt-show in the Circus, the other shoe dropped. Apparently, their Circus was involved into smuggling western propaganda into Soviet Block. Anastasia and Cherep barely escaped KGB then.

They did not manage to repeat the feat KGB few months later, after miserable months spent in hiding between the biggest cities of the Block. KBG found the building several suspicious people, including the siblings, were hiding in. No one in there knew when the building was set on fire, everyone was still in it. Those who tried to escape the building were shot by the soldiers standing in cordon around it, those that decided to take their chance with flames were being burned alive…

Cherep himself died trying to protect his sister from the falling beam.

Anastasia survived, hidden under her brother's bleeding out form. She didn't remember most of those hours, but she was certain that she saw the fire around their forms taking on a distinct purple tint…

She couldn't stay in Soviet Block after that… she just couldn't!

To be honest she never remembered how she managed to somehow get out of USSR and into France. She was even less certain about how she got herself a spot in another Circus. This time, she called herself Skull… Skull de Mort… For Cherep.

Skull was just one of many acrobats with aspirations in the Circus. Granted her own aspiration was completely different from the one of her fellow trapeze acrobats but… She wanted to have the stunt-show her brother was denied back in Russia. When she lost control over the machine and slid off the beam she was doing stunts at for a practice, she went straight through the net that was supposed to catch her. In the deathly silence that followed, she stood up again. She saw the same purple fire around her as the last time she should have died.

She was brought straight to the Circus' Maestro then, who explained to her exactly what those flames… well Flames, were and what would it mean for her if certain people found out. And of course, it was nothing good. By then Skull was already resigned to being put in all those crazy situations of bigger or lesser proportions. She remembered that one day that had started with her feeding that scrawny, gypsy brat and ended with her being invited to their camp, getting traditional gypsy garb gifted to her and having to run away before they managed to marry her off to one of their elders. Finding out she was an user of the very rare, very mythical power that was currently used mostly by Underworld and even among all those she managed to be one of the rarest was, in comparison… meh… not actually as impressive as it should have been.

Of course, knowing all that (and guessing that if she knew what to do back then, she could at least try to save Cherep…), she started to experiment with the Propagation. That, in turn, caused smaller or bigger mishaps that got her teased by the rest of the performers relentlessly.

One time she had a dream where she was a Rapunzel and Cherep was still alive and guarding her in a tower where she'd be safe. She woke up to find out entire shared tent covered in her hair, with more than just few acrobats looking like they were on the verge of either laughing their heads off or cursing up a storm. Trying to untangle themselves from between her purple tresses was apparently very trying on their patience. She got her own tent after that.

Another time she forgot herself was when they were setting up a tent in the USA. She was trying to hammer in a tent peg, and might have gotten carried away, splitting the rock under their feet. The circus actually got some additional gold out of her impromptu mine, but she was forbidden from doing that particular job ever again, and delegated to carrying crates around for the rest of the trip. No one wanted to risk her accidentally uncovering water spring or worse – a mercury or oil source.

One time in India when she was volunteered for fakir show with not defanged cobras, she learned that she could get the venom out of her bloodstream by simply bleeding all of it out and Propagating herself more blood. All was well that ended well, but some of the Circus Members were seriously traumatized by the incident. There were no more snakes allowed in the Circus after that.

Throughout these problems with jobs that should have been simple, Skull quickly became the one people sent to get more of the equipment needed for their performances. After she had proved to have enough control in order to keep the Propagated ropes intact and was forgiven for a few times one of the tent supports disappeared, simply making more knives or juggling balls was absolutely no problem for her. Skull still was sure some of the members of the circus still didn't trust her about that, but no one managed to reassign her to do anything safer.

There were also Underground fighting rings the boys liked to visit and the crazy amount of money they won off her. The organizers started calling her 'Immortal Skull de Mort' after they finally connected the crazy slip of a girl at their fights with 'The Woman Spitting Death in the Face' from her posters for stunt-shows.

All in all, the magical Flames proved to be rather useful both for the Circus and herself… Cherep had been a lot better driver than she was. She needed a lot of healing when learning how to adjust her stunt-work on the fly.

But even though her magical purple fire was common knowledge around the Circus no one have ever spilled the beans to an outsider. Even though they took that precaution, the visit from the one who called himself Checkerface was both a surprise… and it really wasn't one.

Being called Strongest Cloud in the World… Meeting others Strongest… That was a fucking quintessence of her bipolar luck. On the one hand - she was among those that she probably wouldn't hurt, too much, if she'd lose the iron control over her Flames, she worked for years to achieve… On the other - she was almost the most inexperienced of them in the dealings with Underworld… Fighting Rings and some Races were nothing on a Hitman, Information Broker, Mad Scientist with propensity of experimenting on other human beings and The Triad fucking Enforcer… Though the lone Soldier with her was in even worse position… Lal was an Army Girl.

It took both of them almost a year to get the more illegal inclined members of that so-called team to stop trying to look at them down (and even that took numerous broken bones, bruised egos and Skull going into Rage in the very headquarters of a Famiglia selling children into slavery).

So of course, soon after the other members of the so called I Prescelti Sette finally acknowledged Lal and her as just as dangerous as they were, they were all cursed into a fucking toddlerhood. By then Skull was already resigned to the fact that almost every good thing in her life would be accompanied by the very bad thing, so she was one of the few that did not immediately Rage at their new forms… No. Skull was calm enough to notice the flash of guilt and absolute lack of surprise on the Luce di Giglio Nero face… She also had the absolute pleasure of pounding that face in the dirt, almost right after the traitorous bitch finally gave birth to her daughter.

After the Curse… things went downhill very fast. Skull, Lal and the last second addition called Colonello (poor Lal had to deal not only with the fact that the idiot wanted to play knight in shining armor, but also the fact that the Curse chose him as a Strongest Rain, hence disfiguring her own Flame and Soul…) were the only ones without a way to get an income in their new toddler-like size. And none of them wanted to owe anything the other Arcobaleno. Few months after the Curse Skull found out that Colonello took over Mafia Land security and Lal landed herself in Vongola's CEDEF.

Skull herself… Just drifted…

With only her new octopus (the consolation prize from fucking Chekerface) who she promptly named Oodako she was traveling the world and learning to live in that new strange reality where something was constantly trying to suck at her Soul, she was 60 cm tall and the unattached Strongest Cloud. Suddenly she was a hot merchandise for all those weak little Skies around the world… She razed down more than a few Groups before they took the fucking hint and stopped trying to coerce her into anything.

40 years of drifting along the air currents and popping up from time to time at the news as the cause of disappearance of another Crime Family or other Syndicate, was both a lot time and not at all. Skull despised few kinds of Underworld dealings and was not shy in letting others know… Usually with no survivors.

Few years in the Curse, Verde created a blimp for her to travel comfortably and installed a virtual fuck-ton of sensors so that he and the others could warn their allies to brace themselves for the signs of the Strongest Cloud's displeasure.

Around the 50th year of the Curse the radiation started. Yuni di Giglio Nero (of course it was a Giglio Nero, it was always a Giglio Nero…) gave Byakuran fucking Gesso key to destroying Arcobaleno… And not even the quick, merciful death. No… They were trying to hunt them down like the bunch of animals… Even with radiation making it harder to use their Flames… to move… to breathe… Gesso brat had to have the glory of killing off the Arcobaleno. Well at least when she finally decided it was enough, it allowed her to finally die and not automatically heal from whatever injuries she got along the way. She took down hundreds of people with her.

In the end Death was not permanent… It never was for her.

Soon there was that awful feeling of flesh knitting back together, but…

She was The Strongest Cloud…

And she did not want to go back to being chained…

She fought the familiar pull to the land of living tooth and nails.

…

She woke up in her old, adult-sized body in this strange new world, fished out of water by her absolute hothead of a Captain… Pirate Captain that is.

They learned about the world together, they sailed together, they found Oodako (her Oodako!), who followed her into this new place, they gathered their crew together, got their bounties together… And somewhere along the ride Skull finally found her Territory. The one she'll protect to her dying breath and a lot longer…

So when her complete idiot of a pack mate announced publicly that they'll be gunning for the Strongest Man in the World… Skull was not happy. Maybe a bit eager to measure her Flame Fuckery as Ace (who was a living, fucking fire and so had no grounds whatsoever to call her out on the Flame bullshit) was somehow aptly calling it, to the power of the Strongest Man… but not in a situation like the one she found herself in.

√ -√v-√ -√v—

Ace, the stupid hothead he was spent last 5 days fighting The Sea Knight Jinbe… A Shichibukai on the Whitebeard's leash. And they barely had the time to bandage the worst bleeding on both fighters for the Doc to be able to tent to them and do no more than start erasing evidence of the fight that took place on that little beach, when she was called back by frantic crew member to see enormous ship with Whitebeard's jolly roger on the mast.

Like… Why?

What has she ever done to have to deal with that specific headache?

Skull cursed a blue fucking streak, cycling through different languages she learned in her long live. By the end of it the crew and Jinbe who still hadn't left, were looking at her with wary awe and Ace… Ace was looking like he was ready to tear strips out of his own skin in a penance, because of course the stupid boy thought that his fault. (Skull really wished for him to… simply slip the name of both island and the people who raised him to her… She'd just pay them a really short visit… Nothing too harmful, she swears…)

Breath…

Okay, what were the options?

Oodako was somehow close to what had to be The Moby Dick sailing towards them, in one of his biggest forms too. So that was one available course of action… After all there were already rumours of Spade Pirates having a Kraken do their bidding. (Her precious, little Oodako proved himself to be adept at sinking even Adam Wood ships thanks to borrowed from her Cloud Flames)

Then there was possible for her to simply knock Ace out and be a good first mate and deal with entire thing in his place… Which would make him all pouty again. And there was no certainty that she would be able to win with Whitebeard… He was probably older than her and had definitely more fighting experience than her… Not a lot of people wanted to spar against a Cloud and later The Cloud to make her even more deadly.

Then there was also… Huh… Well, that could work.

"I'll take this" She muttered quietly towards Ace and immediately stepped aside his try to grab and reel her back, behind him.

"You can't…" He squawked with all the hurt pride of the teenage boy.

"Neither can you." She immediately cut off his protests… There was no time for her to sooth his wounded pride… Whitebeard and people she recognized from Posters as his Commanders were already coming close towards the beach on longboats. (Thank the Seas no one was stupid enough to go close to their Piece of Spadille, still safely sitting in their sights. Forget all the reason, she'd ask Oodako to sink the fuck out of them right away.) "Let me deal with it Ace, make it about First Mates." She even had a plan…

Granted her plan was mostly to hammer on the one weakness all of those titled The Strongest had, their shared arrogance, to get her way… But it was still something. She was always better at simply punching things…

"Phoenix is a Monster!" This time it was Deuce who squawked in protest… Poor, sweet 'Masked Deuce' didn't deserve all the things she shoved onto him while trying to reign Ace in.

"So am I." Skull cracked her neck and started to circulate Flames in her body to warm herself up… For all the magical properties Flames were still fire. "Do it Ace." Then she called up her Haki to start coating her body randomly. Public records said that Marco the Phoenix had been sailing for a long time already and was widely recognized as one of the Terrors of the Seas… Not someone she'd go against without making sure she was in tip top shape. Especially since even if the guy would be nice enough to underestimate her something fierce… Well, she was good at making people take her seriously.

"Al… Alright…" Ace murmured subdued, finally seeing enough of a reason to acknowledge she was in better shape and so had better chance. Then he sat down heavily on a log with a pout, letting their doctor to continue fussing over his injuries. "Skull, I have an order for you - Survive!"

She could get behind that order…

Whitebeard and the others had already landed on the beach and were coming closer… Skull took the deep breath and stepped between her pack and old Yonko. That was what Clouds were after all, Vanguards of the Set… The ones to find the danger and attack to give the rest chance to prepare themselves. That was what she was supposed to be. That was what she had finally a chance to be.

"Didn't you see my bounty poster Honey?" The Cloud asked idly, mussing up her purple hair before announcing with flourish, just quiet enough to not allow any of the Whitebeards to hear her. "I'm The Woman Hated by Death Itself."

It was truly ironic that even after escaping the world, she earned her titles in, they followed after her into this new life. It took only one time to be photographed, standing tall with a blade going through her stomach for the 'Immortal Skull' to land on her Bounty Poster. The longer title soon following…

"So you're the brat that wants to try for my head?!" The tallest of the incoming company, Yonko Whitebeard himself, boomed loudly after coming in the 'talking' distance. His Commanders fanning out behind him and looking at Spades severely. Skull felt her fingers flex in need to grab a weapon and deal with the threat!

"What of it, shitty Old Man?" Ace snarled from somewhere behind her and she didn't need to turn around to see his hackles raised and that snarl he had every time someone dared to threaten their crew. It was such a shame that Flames didn't exist in this world… Ace would make a good Sky. Maybe even he'd be her Sky?

That'd be nice…

"Here's your chance brat!" Whitebeard boomed again and… that was her clue, wasn't it?

"Are all Yonko sending their pet Shichibukai to weaken up Rookies challenging them, or is this situation special?" Skull challenged loudly, putting all the arrogance of The Strongest Cloud in the World simply had to display in public, into her voice. Dredging that feeling up was easier than she thought it would be. Not only had she over 50 years of experience as the 'top dog' or rather 'top bitch' of the world where people were warping reality with their willpower… Before joining that particular part of the World, she was an entertainer, she had to be an excellent actress. It didn't hurt that, that kind of arrogance was definitely in character for the First Mate of said Rookie.

Of course neither the Yonko himself, nor his Commanders could let that go… and so her words were met with some spectacular glares.

"Jinbe's choices are his own, yoi" Commander standing in the place of Whitebeard's right hand spoke up. Her eyes took in The Phoenix's form… And okay, he did look like someone who spend decades on the Sea… Clothes that while not especially fashionable were eye catching enough to allow his mates to reorient themselves in the melee or in the storm among the rigging and easy to move in. Though the open shirt suggested he was mostly fighting, using different kinds of kicks, which made sense with what info about Phoenix's Devil Fruit, she managed to get out of Old Man Rayleigh in Sabaody. Body sculpted by years of training, and working on the ship… Hot damn, what a body that was. Honestly, if not for the fact that Skull had to get her pack away from him and his crew, she'd drool a little. And that was saying something, seeing as she spent more than enough time around Reborn, Fon, and Colonello. Even though she wouldn't tell them that, all three of them were definitely drool worthy in their adult forms.

"Of course they are…" She dismissed indulgently, painted lips taking on nasty smirk "The Sea Knight decided by himself to come swinging at us, promising to not let my Captain attack Yonko Whitebeard… And then also by himself he decided to do his very best to drag the fight up to the day said Yonko was coming against us."

The Commanders visibly bristled at the things she was so freely implying, but before any of them managed to do anything more than shoot her threatening scowls there was a laugh…

"Gurarara! You're a cheeky little brat, aren't you?" Whitebeard put the butt of his giant naginata against the sand under his feet, his reluctantly amused scowl telling her, he knew what she's trying to do… And that he was amused by the 'little rookie's' gall enough to let her have her way.

"Cheekiness is such a broad term" Skull shrugged easily, her smirk taking on less insulting tint… Ace was not fighting New World Veteran in his state if she had any say in it. And she did have it.

"So the brat is already exhausted from clash with one of my sons… And yet, I'm already here" Whitebeard narrowed his eyes at the Spades and Skull felt something hammer against her senses… Something very similar to the Conqueror Haki Rayleigh showed them… Just with no finesse Rayleigh had and with much more power behind it. She felt the way some of her Spades started to sway at the impact and she flared with her Flames (barely keeping them in non-visible range) to keep the worst of the impact off them and to Propagate her pack's mental defenses.

Without conscious thought, her lips pulled back into an inhuman almost snarl and she answered wave of Haki with a deep, warning growl, that thanks to some creative Propagation she learned to use long, long time ago, managed to not only easily reach everyone on the beach but also to hang in the air for a while.

Back there, that sound was making even Reborn back off. Almost as fast as the sound of her patience snapping did.

Here? Here her pack immediately relaxed… Jinbe still behind her but so very in her reach became impossibly still… Ace smiled viciously… Some of the Whitebeard's Commanders took a hasty step back and scowled at that… while those Whitebeards that did in the face of Fight or Flight, she knew she had to cause in them, decide to stand their ground moved into defensive positions. Their eyes suddenly a lot less dismissive when looking at the lone girl standing between them and the Spades.

"First Mate is the one to rule when captain is unavailable. This does hold true for the fights in Paradise. And here?" Ace was simply radiating smug viciousness, all doubts about her ability to survive if not outright win forgotten in the face of that little show. She did tell him that the deeper, more visible the colour of her Flames, the more power she'd use while in fight…

And her Flames never went into visible range yet.

There was a bit of silence, when Whitebeard was processing what just happened, before a grin just as vicious as the one Ace had to have pulled onto his lips.

"First Mate against First Mate" He agreed, finally easing out of his own slight shift into defensive position "Marco, show the brats difference between their little spats in Paradise and the fights in the New World" Old Yonko ordered, the Phoenix already moving towards her with vicious smirk dancing at the corner of his lips.

Skull knew she wore very similar, just a lot less held back expression. With last warm look at her Pack and warning glance at the Shichibukai that still was sitting close to what was hers, she started to move towards him as well. Patting herself down to make sure she had all the little blades she was usually Propagating to use in the fight.

Marco the Phoenix was a pirate for decades and had a bounty of over billion beli to her measly year of pirate career and 300 millions bounty.

He was a Devil Fruit user. She had Cloud Flames.

He was able to use golden and blue fire to heal himself from virtually everything and kept him as young as he looked at some of his old Posters. She wasn't able to damage her body permanently without her purple fire to heal her back up.

He could fly. She could swim.

He had years to practice his Haki. While she accessed them for the first time barely few months ago with the help of that Old Fossil in Avalon.

He was still probably underestimating her… She was going to cheat with Propagation.

He was vulnerable to sea water, Haki and Seastone… She had Oodako move into grabbing distance and was pulling on her gloves with Seastone studs.

…

They stood one against the other in the ideal middle between Whitebeards contingent and Spade Pirates.

Marco the Phoenix… with that infuriating smirk and boredom in his eyes… Posture more or less relaxed, ready to spring into action at the drop of the hat.

Immortal Skull… with vicious snarl pulling on her lips, radiating with readiness for violence, bloodlust and possessive fury. Her body coiled and ready to attack.

Spades were hers.

Spades were in danger.

Spades safety needed Whitebeards down.

They lunged.