Punk Hazard. The Eclipse, lower deck.
The once-spacious storage bay had been transformed into a sterile medical suite straight out of science fiction. Indicator lights from precision instruments blinked in the dim chamber, and at its center stood a massive cylindrical stem cell culture tank, glowing with pale blue fluorescence.
"No, no! Caesar, you idiot! That red IV line is backwards! You'll trigger a cellular rejection response!"
Chopper, goggles strapped to his face, stood on a small stool and waved his hooves furiously.
"Shurorororo! I am the world's greatest scientist. There is no way I would mix up a simple tube connection!"
Caesar Clown, draped in a lab coat, grumbled his protests. But his pale fingers moved fast, yanking the tube free and snapping it into the correct slot.
"Hey, Jeno! That thermostat valve needs to come down another two degrees!"
"On it, little reindeer."
Jeno had shifted into his multi-armed mechanical form. Sparks flew from his welding torch as he made precise adjustments to the valve on the bulkhead.
"Dr. Chopper! I've prepared the anticoagulant ratio exactly to Dr. Vegapunk's formula! Fosfosfos!" Dr. Indigo scurried over, holding up a vial of medicine like a trophy.
The bizarre research unit, a ship's doctor, a mechanic, and two "high-value prisoners of war," was a whirlwind of chaotic productivity.
"Hello? Can you hear me, Dr. Chopper?"
Vegapunk's steady voice came through the mental channel. "The centrifuge speed for the stem cell extraction must hold at exactly eight thousand RPM. Not one revolution more. That is critical for isolating the Sapphire Scales pathogenic gene."
"Loud and clear, Doctor!" Chopper leaned into the control panel, eyes fixed on the gauges. "RPMs are stable at eight thousand!"
"Well done." Vegapunk's voice carried a smile through the link. "With Carina's communication network, remote surgical guidance is proceeding far more smoothly than I anticipated."
In the rest area nearby.
Buggy had slipped in at some point. No wine glass this time. He sat cross-legged on a metal crate, one leg bouncing, flipping a dark purple capsule between his fingers.
"Hey. You two old lunatics."
He glanced sidelong at Caesar and Indigo, his big red nose twitching.
"One of you does poison gas. The other does monster enhancement drugs. Ever think about mashing those two things together?"
"What do you mean?" Caesar pushed up his glasses.
Buggy tossed the capsule into the air and caught it clean.
"Say, for example, this nerve gas capsule of mine. Jeno built it for me. Crush it, and everything within fifteen feet, elephants included, hits the floor."
He paused. His red nose tilted up. A true profiteer's grin spread across his face.
"But what if there was more in this thing than just gas?"
Caesar's eyes narrowed.
"Are you suggesting..."
"Shurorororo! You red-nosed fool might actually be onto something!"
Caesar snatched the capsule from Buggy's hand, turning it over and over. A mad scientist's fire ignited behind his eyes.
"I still have many, many varieties of poison gas. Making multiple gas capsule weapons with different payloads would be fascinating. Shurorororo!"
"Fosfosfos! And what if we add my SIQ enhancement hormone?" Indigo crowded in, fingers tracing shapes in the air. "Picture it. The enemy inhales the gas and falls into hallucinations. At the same time, the enhancement hormone floods their system, and they go berserk, attacking their own allies!"
"The gas dispersion radius could be tripled." Caesar stroked his chin. "Reverse-apply the principles of No Air World. Make the gas actively track living targets after release..."
"Tracking poison gas?" Buggy's eyes went wide. But his instincts screamed big business. "Wait, wait, wait. This stuff you're talking about... how much can we sell it for?"
"Money?" Caesar snorted. "This is art! The art of mass destruction!"
"Can you eat art?!" Buggy sprang to his feet. "You lunatic. Can't you think of something profitable for once? Like reducing the dosage and marketing it as self-defense. Sell it to paranoid nobles and rich merchants! One capsule, five minutes of guaranteed survival, price tag five million Berries. I've already got the slogan worked out!"
"Self-defense?" Caesar blinked.
"Yeah! Think about it. What are rich people most afraid of? Assassination! You give them one of these. Assassin shows up, they crush the capsule and run. Assassin drops. They escape. Tell me that doesn't beat any bodyguard on the market!"
Caesar and Indigo exchanged a look.
"...That actually makes some sense."
"Some sense?! This brain right here is the single most valuable asset in the entire Eclipse Pirates!"
And so the three of them, a portrait of pure chaos, huddled in the corner of the medical bay and dove deep into the business logistics of nerve gas, hallucinogenic enhancers, and tracking poison shells. Fragments drifted across the room. "Dispersion radius." "Hallucinogenic dosage." "Wholesale pricing."
Chopper, calibrating equipment nearby, felt a chill run down his spine.
"What are those guys even talking about..."
"Ignore them." Jeno didn't look up from his work. "Whatever they build, the captain gets final say. Besides, we're not short on money. Though if we combine it with Carina's abilities, it could be useful. Let them pay for their own surveillance bugs."
At the center of the medical bay, the massive stem cell culture chamber had been fully installed but not yet activated.
Bonney sat beside the tank. Her face was still a little pale, but her eyes were bright.
She turned to Kuma, who had stood silent and watchful at her side the entire time.
"Daddy, when do we start the treatment?"
Kuma's broad, thick hand settled gently on her pink hair.
"Soon. Once Captain Ace finds a place that is absolutely quiet. Somewhere no one can disturb us. Then we begin."
Chopper walked over, carrying a tube of nutrient solution.
"Bonney, the ship is still in flight right now. Dr. Vegapunk said the initial stem cell cloning and gene isolation require extreme environmental stability. No vibrations. No magnetic interference. Once we reach our new base, I'll perform your surgery right away!"
"Okay! I'm not scared!" Bonney nodded hard, a brilliant smile breaking across her face.
Kuma pulled a chair beside the life support tank.
He took out his Bible and opened it quietly, the same as always. The treatment hadn't started yet, but in the heart of the man the world called a tyrant, a steady lighthouse already burned.
The next morning.
All equipment and supplies had been loaded.
"Little Eclipse. Disengage silent mode. Prepare for ascent."
Ace's voice rang through the ship-wide broadcast.
The Eclipse's colossal black hull gave a subtle shudder. Long ago, Leona had touched every inch of the ship's armor with the Float-Float Fruit. Now, the thousands of tons of warship lifted as if weightless. No roar of engines. No hurricane winds. Just a sky-blotting black feather, rising gracefully from the open plaza.
"Vector thrusters. Ignite."
At Ace's second command, streams of pale blue plasma propulsion flame erupted from the thrust channels along the Eclipse's underbelly. The warship surged under the immense force, a black lightning bolt tearing silently through the cloud layer above Punk Hazard, vanishing into the stacked white expanse.
At the edge of the plaza.
Saint Saturn leaned on his black cane and watched the Eclipse depart.
His suit was immaculate. His face had settled back into its eternal, unreadable cold. The burns the Vermilion Bird's divine fire had carved into him during the battle were gone without a trace, as if the brutal clash had been nothing more than a minor disturbance.
But his fingers around the cane's handle were bone-white at the knuckles.
Kizaru stood behind Saint Saturn. He nudged his brown sunglasses and watched the white contrail dissolving in the sky.
"Ara ara... they really just left."
He dragged the words out. Whether it was regret or relief was impossible to tell.
Saint Saturn said nothing. He turned and walked into the research facility's depths, his stride as steady as ever.
His footsteps echoed down the empty corridor.
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