THE FORGOTTEN STORY

(by Shiva Rajah and Claude Neix)

Chapter 3

Yo! I know I'm late, I'm sorry but for once I think I had good reasons. You know, like exams. VERY Important Exams (VIE). ...that I think I've kinda failed. Which leaded to some tantrums, which leaded to some hard words with my family, which leaded to depression, which leaded... No, let's not talk about suicide yet, let's finish translating and updating this amazing story before (one of the only few reasons why the world isn't some shitball! ...yeah I'm not very subtle those days)

I hope you will enjoy it anyway.

I only own the translation. One Piece belongs to Oda. This story belongs to Shiva Rajah.

X_x

"We have to bring him on the Sunny! Right away!" Chopper ordered after examining Arlong, who was gradually drowning on his own blood. "The operation won't be simple because I don't have all the equipment I wish, so it won't happen at best but I can do it. Especially if you assist me."

Aladdin nodded vigorously.

"Of course. You can count on me, Chopper-sensei."

"So let's go! Franky, bring a stretcher! We have to move him the as little as possible. (The giant obeyed straight away.) Aladdin-sensei" The little reindeer added. "Do you have something we can use to place a probe?"

"Yes, of course" The former ship's doctor nodded digging frenetically into his bag.

"In that case, I'm going to inject a sedative in order to facilitate you…"

"Chopper!" Nami shouted, paler than a shroud and her fists so clenched that her nails were digging in her palms.

When she had walked inside the bar and seen the man she was considering as her former torturer, she thought that her blood had just frozen in her veins.

Of course, Franky, Chopper and Robin weren't part of the crew yet when they had defeated Arlong and his gang, but what she had told them about her past should have immediately allowed them to know what kind of bastard was the fishman who was currently bleeding to death. It was just a payback for all the sufferings he'd caused to the people of Cocoyashi!

This was at least how Nami was seeing things, and also how she had expected her nakama to see those facts the way she did… she was wrong.

"I'm sorry, Nami" The little reindeer apologized in a soft but firm voice. "I understand that you consider this man as your enemy but I am a doctor and, for me, he is a patient I have to save above all."

"Your patient, as you say, killed my foster mother by shooting her through the head!" The navigator screamed, tears o rage streaming down her cheeks. "And he…"

"Nami…" Luffy intervened, placing a hand on her shoulder. "Chopper is right. His job is to save those who need his help. No matter who they are."

"But…"

"I know. You hate him and we can understand why. But, while he is your enemy, he is also Hachi's and Jinbei's friend, and madame Shirley's brother. Leave it to Chopper. Do it for them. Okay?"

Jinbei, Shirley and Hachi looked away, horribly ill-at-ease.

Needing a support, the young girl searched for Sanji but even him was biting his tongue. How could he have decently encourage the navigator's murder desire when he had been saved by the beautiful Shirley, Arlong's sister, a year ago?

Despite everything Nami tried to find something to say or to do. She wanted to jump on the sawshark man to snatch the tube from Aladdin and Chopper as they were trying to plunge it into his throat to evacuate the blood obstructing his lungs. She wanted to grab one of Zoro's swords and slice his stomach from bottom to top, gutting him. Oh! She wanted to do so many things… but she knew that, if she acted that way or kept trying to convince her friends to let Arlong die like that stinky freak fish he he was, she would have the bad role.

So she preferred to leave the bar before doing or saying something she would certainly regret.

xox

"I am ready" Robin announced, wearing a blue surgical gown.

She had accepted to assist Aladdin and Chopper, helping them to put their masks and surgical gloves after she did the same.

"Good, here we go. Doctor Aladdin?"

The brotulas merman checked Arlong's reflex and adjusted the sheet over his body.

"Everything is ready, Doctor Chopper, we shall begin."

Robin held the scalpel out to the little reindeer who, before his colleague's bewildered eyes, took it and incised the lavender flesh without the slightest hesitation, his arm never shaking.

xox

At Shakki's bar, empty at this hour, Buggy and Rayleigh were sharing old memories around a glass of rum.

The Big Top crew had been "off duty" until dawn, more because their captain didn't want any indiscreet ear around him than by par real will to give free rein to his men - meeting a cargo of living drunk meat in the morning wasn't enchanting.

"The last time I've seen Shanks, he was speeding toward the Boreal Islands, to the New World north. It was… Oh! It was six or seven months ago."

Buggy the clown let a discouraged groan escape his lips and pressed his glass of rum with crushed ice against his forehead.

Although it wasn't noon yet, the smothering heat was almost unbearable; his light black and white smock was sticking unpleasantly to his body and his long ponytail was burning his neck and his back.

"Great… that means I'm going to have to run after him for weeks!"

"Buggy… Why do you care so much to find Shanks?"

Roger's former ship's boy shrugged.

"So he can smash my face."

Rayleigh chuckled and almost spat the rum he was currently drinking.

"Sorry?"

"You heard me."

"Good lord, what are you saying?"

Buggy sighed deeply and, in one breath, confessed to his former superior how the Marine had forced him to accept an improbable deal.

After all, why hiding it? It was not as if he was on a "top secret" mission, after all! By the way, now that he thought about it, only a complete idiot could have entrusted that kind of mission to someone like him…

Rayleigh listened patiently and nodded.

"Are you serious? Did it really happen that way?"

"Yep!" The pirate nodded and swallowed a long shot of alcohol. "Otherwise, why would they give the Warlord title to someone like me?"

Gol D. Roger former lieutenant smiled.

"I've seen your intervention on the live video from Marineford, three years ago. Impressive!"

"Ah? You think so?"

"Impressively ridiculous, of course."

Buggy didn't take offense, on the contrary he seemed amused.

"Mhh… yeah, it didn't exactly go as well as I was hoping it would but well. It's only postponed. I don't despair because I, the Great Buggy the clown, I…"

"Stop playing with me!" Rayleigh cut angrily, startling Shakki who was cleaning the glasses, pretending not to spy their conversation. "What were you trying to do with your 'I'm a moron who wants to become the king of the world' show?"

"You're not very nice with me, how rude of you."

His former superior sighed, exasperated.

"Buggy, I really need you to explain something to me, something I'm desperately trying to understand since Roger's crew has dispersed to the four corners of the world…"

"Ah?"

Rayleigh grabbed him roughly by his black and white cotton smock and his eyes bored into his, daring him to lie or to try to slip away by the usual clowning around.

"When are you going to stop playing dumb?"

Buggy broke free roughly.

"Maybe I'm not as talented as your dearest Shanks, that's all!"

Roger former lieutenant gritted his teeth.

"Don't play dumb with me, Buggy! You seem to forget that I am the one who trained you and Shanks, and I know perfectly what you're both really made of."

Buggy looked like he was about to explode but, after a discreet glance toward Shakki, who was still pretending not to hear, he answered, barely audible:

"Do you know why a moron has an advantage over Shanks or Mihawk, Rayleigh? It's because no one cares about him, the Marine doesn't even know his flag and, when sun rises, there's no idiot who comes lamenting on his doorstep in hope to get a chance to defy him and prove his value. Well at least it was my case until these fuckers found out that I was part of the Roger Pirates, and now they've appointed me Fartlord."

"Warlord."

"Whatever, it's the same."

"Has someone seen Zoro?" Luffy asked as he entered the bar and cut their conversation. "I'm bored!"

xox

Robin moped Aladdin's sweaty brow as the merman was cauterizing Arlong's blood vessels one by one.

Chopper was rinsing what they had removed from his lung… and it wasn't a broken rib.

"It seems… it seems that this is a piece of calcified metal" He declared, stunned.

The former doctor of the Sun Pirates stopped a moment to look up.

"Metal? Calcified, you're saying?"

"Yes, look. It looks like a point of arrow or rather of a spear. Judging by the thickness of the calcified layer, this thing must have been stuck inside his body for years! Well, let's save that for later; maybe our patient would give us an explanation when he'll be awake. Anyway, now we're sure it wasn't a broken bone. His ribs are intact and we can close without fearing some missed fracture.

Aladdin nodded and, after moping the blood from the wound, he closed it and hold it properly in place to allow Chopper to suture it.

"We should take advantage of the fact he's still asleep to take care of his gills, Doctor Chopper. I'd like to check that no major lesion or foreign body to be sure there wouldn't be a secondary infection.

The Straw Hat doctor was eventually done with the stitches and completely closed the incision they'd carried out on the side of the fishman's torso, and Robin disinfected it meticulously before she bandaged it.

"If you allow me, Doctor" The little reindeer tried "I'd like to observe you to learn the appropriate gestures in this kind of case because I'm still not used to the specifications of the representatives of your race. My tools and myself are however at your service, it goes without saying."

Aladdin bowed gratefully.

"I thank you. The Fishmen gills" He explained as he inserted a retractor between Arlong's with an extreme delicacy "are very fragile and very sensible. The act I am performing right now" He added as he spread the branchial slits with a million of precautions, "would cause an excruciating pain if the patient was conscious."

Chopper observed attentively and nodded.

"I understand. Is this red color normal?"

"Yes. It's this darker area that isn't. See? Just there. The branchial filaments are very inflamed, maybe burned."

"So Jinbei-san was right? They've poured an acid liquid or boiling water into them? How horrible! What shall I do in this case?"

Aladdin fixed some sterile gaze at the end of a long pliers and soak it in tincture of iodine.

"You mustn't do anything other than disinfecting the area and getting rid of the dead fleshes and the possible foreign bodies. The branchial filaments will regenerate themselves. We just have to prevent the infection and apply an anti-inflammatory to the surface of the skin, where the branchial slits open."

Chopper nodded, studious.

"I see."

Aladdin removed the retractor carefully and slip it into the next slit.

"Do you want to try it, Doctor Chopper? Practice is the best way to learn and master the appropriate gestures."

The little reindeer accepted the pliers and drenched another compress, prepared by Robin, into the tincture of iodine.

"I'm counting on you to stop me if it is needed, Doctor Aladdin."

Robin couldn't help but smile when she saw Chopper blushing in pleasure every time his colleague called him "Doctor" and addressed him as an equal despite their substantial difference in age.

Conscientiously, she was passing compresses, bottles and instruments to them, moping their sweat and taking the opportunity to stroke Arlong's face and forehead when she felt him stir uncomfortably.

She couldn't help, by the way, but wonder about the texture of the lavender skin.

He was a shark man, so she had expected the pirate to present a rough and cartilaginous epidermis, like those sea predators, but it wasn't the case. Neither did he look like the "stinky, deformed and enormous monster" Nami had described when she was talking about the years she'd spent at his side – well, 'the years she'd served this foul riffraff' was more appropriate, my bad.

But no matter how long Robin observed him, nothing about this giant well built body or this soft and smooth skin, save for a few scars and obvious marks of torture, could be qualified as 'foul' or 'deformed'.

"Good, I think we did it…" Aladdin sighed, bringing her back to earth.

Chopper nodded and smiled as he used a clean sheet to cover Arlong.

"Yes, he should be out of trouble now."

The former doctor of the Sun Pirates removed his masque, his gloves, and offered his hand to the little reindeer.

"It was a pleasure to operate with you, Doctor Chopper."

The blushing reindeer shook the stretched hand and wriggled in pleasure.

"Oh! What are you talking about, Doctor Aladdin! I only did what I had to do, that's all! It was nothing special. Nothing at all, at all, at all!"

Aladdin raised an eyebrow, amused by his reaction, and Robin turned away to muffle a giggle.

xox

"Hey! Beh! Kid… What's with this gloomy face?" Buggy asked as he sat next to Nami who rested on a root, her feet brushing the surface of the water, and looked in a wreckage. "Did a perfidious little ill-bred thief steal your precious treasure?"

The young navigator sank her head into her shoulders.

"Don't tell me that you're still bearing a grudge against me for this old story…"

The pirate wiped the sweat pearling on his forehead with the back of the hand and leaned toward her until his strange red nose brushed against the young girl's, and his eyes pierced hers acidly.

"Let's not talking about the treasure sweety, but do you have any idea what I have felt when I've found myself without arms, legs and torso in the middle of the ocean, on unknown islands, at the mercy of sea monsters and…"

Without warning, Nami, reaching her breaking point, suddenly burst into tears, totally disconcerting Buggy.

"Oi oi! Wait, it's not such a big deal. Well yes it is, but… Oi oi oi! Look, I…"

The young navigator buried her face into his chest and sobbed even more, gripping his smock tightly.

"Great…" He groaned helplessly.

xox

"Are you alright, Jinbei-san?"

The words started the former Warlord. He hadn't heard Hachi coming, with his smile and relieved expression.

Save for Shirley of course, he was probably the one whose the wait behind the infirmary door of the Sunny had been the most unbearable.

"I was remembering the day we came to get Arlong back at Impel Down."

The octopus man blushed and looked down.

"Arlong-san should have shown more gratitude, I know it, but I think he didn't unders…"

"I'm the one who didn't understand, Hachi. (Hachi's eyes widened and Jinbei sighed.) Why didn't he talk about what happened to him there? Why did that fool keep everything to himself, allowing the resentment to eat him away like a worm?"

Aladdin had shown them the piece of metal they'd extracted from the shark man's body and Jinbei had immediately recognized one of the points of the tridents the guardians of Impel Down used. And then, the dates were tallying perfectly with the time when Arlong had been imprisoned in the submarine fortress.

15 years… he had kept this piece of metal inside his body during 15 years! That was unbelievable.

Hachi shook his head.

"Arlong-san is like this, nyuh. He doesn't like to talk about himself, about his doubts and his problems. This is the way he's found to show continually the image of an invulnerable and indestructible rock."

Jinbei closed his eyes.

"I wonder what he's still hiding from us, that moron. When he was a child, Tai-aniki had to tear the words off his mouth when something was wrong!"

The octopus man chuckled.

"Nyuh! I think that his sister Shirley is the only one who really knows him. However I am sure of one thing, Jinbei-san…"

"What thing, Hachi?"

"Arlong-san has got plenty of faults, nyuh! But he always loved us more than himself. This, Jinbei-san, even you, you can't denied it."

The paladin of the seas smiled despite himself.

"I wouldn't, Hachi" He said as he played with the piece of trident that Aladdin had given him. "No, I wouldn't. No one, on Fishman Island, could…"

x_X

See ya for the next one! I'll try to be faster this time, but right now I can't promise anything (my apologizes to the readers and the author). BUT I won't give up, no sir!

Pleeeeeease review! *0*