The Marine

Seeing a flash of light, Bill instinctively bent his knees, braced his legs, guarded his head and face, and no sooner than he did he was hit with a force that almost took him clear off his feet.

But with Nelson, Ain, and the others behind him blown backwards from the force, Bill’s body turned into stone and instantly covering his body in gun-metal gray Haki from head to toe, he didn’t move backwards an inch.

Everything that happened after that was pure instinct.

Not having [Future Sight], not even having his [Observation Haki] at all, in a tiny fraction of a second, even before his consciousness could react, Bill’s hands shot out from their guarded position and gripped the ankle of his attacker.

Squeezing hard enough to shatter steel, Bill’s first conscious recollection was hearing a groan and then feeling the matter in his hands turn immaterial and slip away.

Seeing the light particles slipping away, his Will almost forced him to pounce forward, but remembering himself, he waited for the Admiral to make his next move.

Already beside him Zephyr was shouting: “What are you thinking, Borsalino?!” and behind him, Ain regained herself and stepped in front of Nelson and the others to protect them.

Of course, Bill would never allow Kizaru to kick in their direction like that now that it had happened once.

Bill didn’t know if he could ‘catch light’ but it wasn’t an exaggeration to say that kick almost knocked him down, and facing that kind of raw power, Nelson and his men would simply die while Ain herself would be seriously injured.

So, facing Kizaru warily, Bill still couldn’t relax even when the Admiral stuck his hands halfway up and attempted to appease Zephyr: “Alright, alright! It was just a text, just a test! Don’t worry Z-sensei, by the book, everything’s going to be by the book…”

If Kizaru’s eyes towards Zephyr had been half open and nonchalant, when he turned to Bill, they were a bit more serious when he said: “We just needed to see what we were dealing with…”

With that half threat hanging in the air Kizaru acted like nothing had happened and started looking around dramatically.

Commenting on how spectacular a sight New Haven made while looking up from the lowest level, Kizaru pointed out that, somehow, he had never known such a land existed so close to Sabaody Archipelago and wondered openly how Akainu would take Dr. Vegapunk and the Science Division spreading its influence.

Naturally Bill did not know Kizaru’s history with Vegapunk or Sentomaru so taking the old Admiral’s words literally he pointed out that he had filled all relevant reports, and that the population of New Haven were either refugees or the family members of recruits who had decided to relocate.

This made Kizaru raise an eyebrow and say slyly that Brannew would get an earful for that.

Shrugging his shoulders lazily as he spoke, Kizaru figured that it was probably the fault of Fleet Admiral Sengoku and then Akainu who had not spared a single ship for anything besides the war effort, but nevertheless thought that it would be Commodore Brannew who took the heat for not sending out any inspectors to survey what had happened so close to Sabaody.

In any case even for Kizaru who had spent a lot of time with Dr. Vegapunk and was accustomed to Futuristic Islands, it was one thing to read about New Haven in a technical report rather than to see it in person and he hoped that Marineford’s Chief Inspector, Tensei, would recognize that.

And naturally the man in question, who had spent his entire career as a Marine Inspector and was now in his early 40s, could recognize many things as his battleship drifted into harbor and was slowly winched up to the dock by massive cables.

Having watched the initial interaction between the Admiral and those on the docks, Tensei thought that Kizaru had struck out at the young Marine officer harder than he intended, but the fact that the young Marine hadn’t even budged after taking the hit was something to take note of.

And if that wasn’t remarkable enough, when Tensei looked up at New Haven and recalled the landmass that they had already passed he couldn’t help but think of the strategic potential of such a place.

Just from what he had seen already it wasn’t an exaggeration to compare New Haven to Marineford!

Thinking this as the lead ship finally docked, Tensei walked down the ramp followed by Vice Admiral Onigumo and a handful of other Marines, and not even glancing in Kizaru’s direction, addressed Bill.

“Commodore William Ox you’re under investigation for the assassination of his Highness Saint Camael and the presumed deaths of his entire retinue. Until we have finished this investigation you are not to leave this Marine Base, and your entire Department will be taken until the authority of Marineford and its representative here, Admiral Kizaru.”

This much was expected, and truly besides a very few numbers of treasures – such as the Map of Mary Geoise or the giant spear Gungnir – Bill didn’t have anything too top secret for him to worry about.

Even the information describing how to produce the Iron Wardens, Minds, and Pulse weapons wasn’t something he could reasonably keep confidential. After all, all the technologies of the Science Division were under the purview of Marineford – and he even planned to see the Iron Wardens implemented on a mass scale!

So, nodding his head that he understood, Bill saluted Tensei and told him that he would fully cooperate and from there Tensei demanded to be brought to the Procurement Departments HQ where his teams of investigators would take an audit of the entire Department.

All of this was the start of Marineford’s Investigation Bureau interrogation of the Procurement Department and after a week of this, Bill began to understand why Dr. Vegapunk had moved his lab from under Marineford to the far reaches of the New World.

True to Kizaru’s word the Marine force had played by the books, but for the first time in his life Bill could feel the subtle power politics at play whenever he met the Admiral or Chief Investigator.

And by ‘power politics’ Bill thought that literally.

Each powerful man, and Vice Admiral Onigumo too, seemed to neverendingly probe him for weakness.

Whether it was Bill recognizing that he was being looked at from far away or a handshake that was a little too strong, a simple slap on the back that was a little too hard, or the fact that besides the Marines who seized Gran Tesoro there were a dozen Battleships stationed right outside his harbor, Bill could not help but be quickly tired of his ‘guests’.

And soon, after only the first week, the investigation moved away from Gran Tesoro and onto New Haven itself as if that had been the location of the Celestial Dragon’s assassination.

As for finding anything incriminating, naturally there was nothing to find.

Bill simply did not embezzle money, cut corners, or abuse his authority.

This was not because he didn’t like money, Bill was a man and not a saint after all, but because in this life he simply cared for something more than ‘wealth’.

What he cared about was exploring the mysteries of this new world he found himself in and building something grander than anything he could have imagined back on Earth.

Those mysteries ranged from his own prowess – turning into a superhuman was something a man from Earth could never pass over if they had a chance – to how the Science Divisions amazing technology actually worked.

Pushing himself physically harder and learning more about the absolute wonders found in Vegapunks laboratory had almost taken up Bill’s entire second adult life. Outside of a few personal concerns and entanglements, he had essentially lived 10 of his 25 years on this new planet as a nigh-on hermit whenever he was able.

This was why he readily allowed Ranse to become the face of his Department inside the East Blue.

This was why he readily allowed Nelson to essentially run the Procurement Department on New Haven.

This was why he gave Sasha the Departments most powerful Battleship and didn’t give her much oversight on how she used it.

It would be wrong to say that Bill ‘merely’ believed his personal strength and knowledge could hold him at the top, or that he didn’t care about his duties in the Marines and used the position for purely personal gain… he was simply not that calculative given the life he had lived.

But it would not be wrong to say that for almost a decade he had been willing to delegate authority away from himself in order to focus on the things he truly enjoyed.

Even the hard things like taking triple duty during a shipwreck, dealing with Clockwork Island’s refugees, arresting old pirates and slaying traitor Marines, or saving the Merveillians from Shiki.

In his heart, Bill enjoyed the hands-on action and hands-on learning. He enjoyed being able to see actual progress. Whether that was watching the amount of weight he could lift go up and up, or watching formerly downtrodden people turn a small backwater island into a technological utopia.

Due to all of this and coupled with his inherent mental abilities which made him a virtual machine when going over expense reports, it wasn’t surprising the Procurement Department really did not have much in the way of waste and had no systemic corruption whatsoever.

In fact, the Department was so clean that it caused problems with Tensei who believed it was too clean!

After all it was just a fact nearly all Base Commanders, given how much executive power was placed in their hands, skimmed a little Beli off the top.

For Marineford, this was a sort of unwritten perk for the responsibilities and dangers associated with being a Marine Base Commander – especially for those Marines stationed on the Grand Line.

And so not seeing anything out of the ordinary made Tensei frown with suspicion, and with his implied consent, teams of Marineford Marines headed by Vice Admirals Onigumo and Dalmatian began to question those in the upper echelons of the Procurement Departments.

While the Vice Admirals started doing their work with more or less zero results, Bill himself was kept occupied nearly night and day with Admiral Kizaru and former Admiral Zephyr.

As much as he liked Zephyr, he disliked Kizaru.

Kizaru was an older man in his mid-50’s and was entirely too frivolous for Bill to ever ‘like’, but what made Bill actively dislike the Admiral was the fact that the older man continued to probe for any sign of weakness.

Kizaru was in every sense of the word ‘elusive’, and thereby, he was untrustworthy.

He wanted to know everything about Bill while revealing as little as possible about himself, and had it not been that he was officially under investigation, Bill would have told the man to shove off.

This went on for another week, and as more and more reports were coming to Bill about the Vice Admiral’s investigative team’s methods, Bill spent more and more time confronting Kizaru and Tensei about it.

For a while it was nothing too unacceptable for Bill to handle.

Vice Admiral Dalmatian spent a long time walking around and sniffing for who-knew-what scent and while Vice Admiral Onigumo was personally aggressive, he never went to the extent of putting his hands on any Marines.

All of this was coming to a head though, because as the Marines had spent weeks with no fruitful findings, besides finding and plundering Gran Tesoro’s vault for billions of Beli, the Vice Admirals were getting more impatient.

Then, finally, on the 15th day of the investigation, with nothing to show for their time – despite Tensei’s suspicions over the Gran Tesoro vault and how it was possible for Bill to not have been able to intervene during the gala – Rapanui and Carrot came running to Bill, telling him that Vice Admiral Onigumo had started to question the younger members.

And, after learning about Yoko, that he had immediately taken a ship to Monkey Island.

Already seeing the trouble that was bound to happen – as the monkey folk on Monkey Island were technically just beasts, and nothing would prevent Onigumo’s hard hands on them besides Yoko – Bill sneered angrily and slightly shook his head back and forth before turning to Kizaru and Zephyr and saying harshly:

“I’ve tried to be calm, and I’ve tried to be cool about this. I gave you my testimony weeks ago, I’ve offered every assistance in searching Gran Tesoro and even offered to tow the city to any port you would like, but you’ve insisted on overturning every applecart on this island…”

By this point Bill still hadn’t given his full presentation on the Iron Wardens, something that bothered him immensely.

So, continuing in a harsh but matter of fact voice he pointed at Kizaru and said: “… if that spider bastard crosses the line, I am going to kick him from Monkey Island back to your ship, and if he – or you for that matter – want to continue after that, I’m going to be here for it.”

With that said, Bill left the room – ignoring Kizaru’s sarcastic laugh and Zephyr shouting at Kizaru to control his men.

Jumping into the air, Bill used Moon Step so naturally it looked like he was flying and headed towards Monkey Island.