Serious; Salty and Johnny's travels; Chapter 4: Blue Stripe (Open to Max and myself.)

At the top of the prison, and right atop some of the tall, net-like bars enclosing the open field's edges from the sheer drop down the coast, the figure from before, that weirdo Orior seemingly easily took the upper hand against, those name seemed so miniscule and pointless it must have been forgotten already, sitting atop said bar, and looking at the open seas. Right below him, a pair of bags, dangling around slightly, and alongside the air flowing. On these 2 bags, one could stop what seemed to be hair popping out. "Hehehehehe, everything went according to the plan ... now, guess it's high time I dumb these 2 bodies ..!"

Salty was running... and running... and running... moving through the different passages that the prison of Blue Stripe had to offer. He seemed to have moved for quite a while and he was probably very far away, compared to the place he was put under a sleeping condition before. "I will soon find them, that's for sure!" he thought, while moving. Salty was moving "blindly", searching for the two people that caused the mess inside the prison!

"Take this!"
"Resilient, aren't we?"
A pair of fists are seemingly clashing. Seemingly, as one of these fists grazes off the impact spot, and, by moving forward at a high speed and velocity, smashes onto Zack's flat and bluff face, almost giving the impression that said mug was flattened and dis-formed even further, before the criminal was might-fully pushed and thrown away, smashing over and over on the ground, and eventually on the steep hard walls. Johnny was obviously having the upper hand as far as pure hand-to-hand combat was concerned, but it seemed that Zack was at the very least extremely durable, getting up just a few seconds later, apparently unharmed, outside the face area which was squished backwards and bruised blue.


((OOC: Oh I wished I had that particular ost I was lookin for now, it fits xD))

Right below the net on, Salty could watch at the mysterious man who was speaking about dumping "two bodies" and carried two bags with him. Although he could not listen to him, he could look at him and that brought suspicions to the Commodore. Apparently, no people inside the prison except members of the Photography Department and the enemies were standing... And that man was not a member of the photography department. As a result, the photographer immediately realized that the man was behind something, he was up to something... With a serious look on his face, he raised his right hand and pointed at the man with his index finger, so that he would draw his attention while speaking and emphasize the moment to give it more impact. "Hero" Salty was about to face an enemy!

"Hey, you! What are you doing there?! Get down here!" were the words of the marine, at the mysterious man.

"Hm?" The mysterious man slowly looks downwards, and, from a small balcony, a marine figure is seen pointing upwards towards their direction. A strike of bad luck? Should be, how could anyone just happen to see him all the way up there, especially coming off a balcony several stores below him. The man slowly and slightly tilts his head, inspecting the small dot-sized man, he could still see the marine cape draping on his back, so, this meant that he must have been a newcomer. "Oh well, it doesn't matter ... catch them if you can." he speaks to himself, and, nonchalantly lets go of the ropes, the two bags hovering for an instant, before they begin to plummet at an increasingly high speed, towards the spiky and rocky littered shore below. A murder attempt?!

Meanwhile, on the gate's level, on the massive hollow hall-like area with the large elevator's tube in the middle, the fight is taking a slower pace, as the enemy now pulls off what seems to be a massive amount of a puffy-like substance. "Is this the manifestation of his power to alter memories and beliefs?" Johnny talks to himself, Bobby clenched on his shoulder. "GET HIM! That's a cool cloud, tho ... GET HIM!" he screeches in the poor marine's ear, a deafening experience to say the least, but, it seems that Johnny was focused on something. *Something is not right here...*

"What the...?!" said Salty with a surprised look on his face as he looked at what the mysterious figure just did. Salty didn't happen to know who was inside those bags but he could realize that something bad was about to happen. What annoyed him the most, though, was the fact that the distance between himself and the enemy was so great, that he couldn't do anything, even if he wanted to. "What to do... What to do..." thought the Commodore anxiously, as he did not really have something in his mind about what he should do if he wanted to stop the man. Salty's mind was blocked. No thoughts about any possible actions came in his mind...

"I guess I could give it one chance..." he commented. "If... If I succeed in doing it, I will not be that useless compared to Johnny... If I do it, I might reach that guy... I have to use the Geppou!!!" he spoke some words and he jumped high on the air, before falling down. Of course he couldn't use it, he wasn't trained in it. FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIL!!!

"... Did he just felt so mortified he decided to commit suicide? .. Whatever .. this is fun, and it things went the way I planned, then in a few minutes, a massacre beyond limits will go off .. how delightful." The mysterious man, now being significantly more serious than when he fought against Orior, comments to himself, before he gives off a hollow, cruel, stare towards the sunset. "This place will pay for what happened 12 years ago. Mark my words, for a Maractus always keeps his word." he adds up, now the stare changing to a distant, solemn gaze upon the light from the sun, fading away. Maractus?

"What is this... ability? This isn't what it was supposed to be...!" Johnny comments, and is seen seemingly floating inside the material, which has apparently captured him. He also seems incapable of actually pulling himself out. But, at the same time, Zack seems a bit weird, he just vacantly stares at the large quantities of the foamy substance that has engulfed most of the room.
"Oooooh, my memories! My memories faaade into obscurity! WHY ME?!" Bobby meanwhile screams, holding his head. "Your memories are fine... this isn't the ability he thinks he has ... which means, he's not our guy...!" Johnny explains, while Bobby blinks, realizing that he's just fine, merely unable to escape this material either.

Salty immediately got up and looked at the man. That man... He was standing there, watching at the sunset... Salty did not know who that man was, but he pretty sure that he was insane enough to stay there and watch at the sunset while all those things were going on. He had to find him and stop him, before it was too late. That man was definitely an enemy, after all... He started thinking "If I follow the stairs and run, it will take me around two minutes to get there... Who knows whether he will be there... But I still have to give it a try.". Then, he started running, moving through the stairs that would lead to the position where the man was...

((OOC: The poor people in the bags  xD))

[OOC: Salty can't help them, they were dropped away, weren't they? xD]

"With this, my powers shall....aaah...?" Zack begins to speak, but his facial expression suggests that he gets more and more confused with each words he says. What was going on? This ability, it didn't seemed to be what it was supposed to be, as Johnny had spotted. The man's face contracts from confusion to a hint of pain and stress, then back into confusion but a spike of determination to finish what he was trying to do. "This is ... you too have been fooled." Johnny calmly, despite the tight situation he was seemingly into, says to the man, maintaining a constant, serious, glare towards him. "This ... no ... I am .. what? No ..." the confused man is starting to lose his cool, but then he extends his arm towards their direction, eyes wide and restless looking at them. "MY POWER IS ABSOLUTE! DIE!" He yells, and seems to be about to do something, but then a flash, which turns out to be a fast kick, makes him lose balance and get blown away a couple of meters away.

A man with a scorched, trimmed brown cape slowly moves his leg, which was vertically raised, after the kick, downwards, while simultaneously the foamy substance is bubbling away. "Sir ... go upwards and find the real criminal, let me handle this." the man glares at Johnny, his face seemingly burned, freshly burned.

Salty kept running and running and he eventually reached the roof, where the mysterious man was standing. By the time he reached the roof, he stared at the enemy with a serious look on his eyes and he raised his hand, pointing at the enemy with his middle finger. "Hey, you!!!" he said, while pointing at the enemy, who turned his head towards Salty's direction. "Take this!!!" he continued speaking and he moved his hand, showing the middle finger to the enemy so that he would start annoying him. Salty was setting up the basis for the usage of his Troll Combat: He was trying to get in the nerves of the enemy so that he could battle him more easily.

"How did you came up so fast? .... Eh, no matter." The man speaks, nonchalantly while still focused and at the same time abstracted from looking over the blazing horizon, as the final rays of sun were giving off a final veil of light, before the dusk begins to set in. Slowly, accordingly to the slow descent of the light, the man turns and watches at Salty, only to realize that the marine is actually flipping the finger at him. "Guess it's better for you to be up here; down there it's going to be a hell, pretty soon. If you wish, I shall ignore you and won't end your life. What do you say?" he calmly, coldly but politely, asks the Commodore. Seemingly unfazed by the man's weird antics!

"To think that you would speak such words... Such words that you would speak, to think... This piques my curiosity... My curiosity this piques, indeed. I don't know who you are, but I guess I'll have to find out soon... Who you are... I guess I'll have to find out soon... I don't know." spoke the commodore his words with the weird way he used to speak words whenever he used his Troll Combat style and then he disappeared from his position, moving with great speed towards the direction of the mysterious man. Salty's speed had definitely increased by the time he met Johnny and developed his battling style... All the battles he got involved in since Anubis' attack in Arabasta made him a capable fighter who was now having the power to fight with speeds that other marines dreamed of having the chance to do so. "Here I come!!! I COME, THERE!!! TROLL KICK!!!" he yelled as he attempted to perform his signature attack at the enemy.

"You are too slow." A fading image is dispersed as Salty's kick goes through the dust-like entity. Which, was actually really bad. Because after that tall fence that the marine had just jumped through to kick his opponent to his dearest parts, there was .. nothing. Just a massive fall was awaiting anyone unlucky or foolish to fall off from here. Admittedly, foolish was more befitting, as it was unlikely that someone would just happen to climb up 12 meters of fence to drop off.

This seemed like it would be the end for the marine, however, a small blast sound is heard, before what seemed to be a pair of long, slim, lines of cable are fired off towards Salty. To grab him, obviously. Only that these things were pointed, with dangerous hooks!

"Shit, shit, shit!!! Shit, shit, shit... I am falling down... Down I am falling!!!" were the words of the commodore as he realized that he was about to fall. While he was about to fall, he turned his head, staring at the man who was launching the dangerous hooks that were about to pierce through his body... Oh, not again... Salty was in big trouble once more. He should have expected that the enemy wouldn't fall for a trick like that... After all, his attack was not successful all the times, there were chances that his foot would be avoided. He should have thought that he should probably use the attack while his enemy was standing on a safer place, so that he would avoid situations like these. However, it was too late. The Commodore was in big trouble!!!

"What to do, what to do..." he thought as he looked at the hooks and moves his body, hoping to avoid them. However, when he realized that this was something impossible to do, he only closed his eyes and moved his hands in such a way that it looked like he was praying. He was praying... But why was he praying? "Please, please, save me again!!! Save me again, please, please!!!" he whispered while praying...

[Flashback]

Before, as Salty was jumping off the window, he realizes that he is falling without a safe way to land on the ground. Apparently, the Commodore was not a member of the marines' spec-ops or something. He was a simple fighter who turned out to be a Commodore just because of his well trained subordinate, Johnny Cool, and his witness that turned out to be quite handy whenever he needed it. He was not the ultimate fighter who could move by himself on the air, nor the kind of guy who would pull out a stunt and act as if nothing happened before. "OH SHIT!!! WHAT DID I JUST DO?! I AM ABOUT TO VOMIT... Vomit? Hm... I should keep that for later... OH SHIT, OH SHIT, I AM ABOUT TO DIE!!! SOMEBODY, HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELP!!!" he screamed in agony as he was falling. He closed his eyes and gulped. The more he felt the pressure of the air while he was falling, tears were coming out of his eyes, tears of fear and despair. Fear towards death and despair because of his inability to overcome his fear and find out a way to save his well-being.

"I AM SORRY, EVERYONE... I AM REALLY, REALLY SORRY..." he yelled as he reached the ground more and more with greater speed. Johnny? He was nowhere... Neither was Fino. Neither was Douche. Neither was Bobby. "Johnny... Douche... Fino... And even Bobby... I am sorry. I failed you." was one of his quick thoughts as he felt a weird hand grabbing him from the back of his cape and stopping him from falling. The air's pressure stopped. Salty was not falling anymore. He was just saved. What had just happened?

Salty saw himself moving upwards. His body was moving along with the person that was carrying him. Salty was so shocked that he did not even have the courage to move his head to see the face of his savior. Was he a man or was she a woman? He did not know... Then, he turned his head in such a way that he only saw the hand of the person that was carrying him... That hand... It was a peculiar hand. The savior had a red hand with long-inch claws... And then, he found the courage. He slowly turned his head upwards and finally took a glimpse of the person who gave him a second chance to live.

His eyes twitched. He did not know what was going on. He could not understand what was going on. He did not really want to believe in his eyes. Salty's savior was not a man nor a woman... Salty's savior came from another world. The face looked inhuman. "HUH?! A DEMON?!" yelled out loud Salty, before fainting out of a second shock. It was finally revealed! The mysterious demon was the one to save Salty! But why would the demon save Salty?!

[Flashback ends]

"It looks like you are not here... You are not here, it looks like..." were the last words that Salty commented just when the hooks passed through his chest. The hooks pierced through his flesh and came out from his back, ultimately damaging the Commodore who could not do anything at all... "No... *COUGH* No..." he coughed some blood. "I... lost? Lost... I..." he finished speaking as his eyes turned white! Salty did not fall, but he was hit by the hooks! Was this the end of Salty?!

"Tsk!" The man makes a sudden movement, his arms moving towards the opposite direction, which forcefully, and with quite some power and speed too, pulls Salty upwards and back inside the vast open area of the last "floor". Then, while the marine was still in midair, he jerks his arms towards the left, sending Salty down crashing onto a tree nearby, with enough force to topple it down in the process, all the while, his movements leading him to land at the exact spot he was standing when Salty reached him some moments ago! He even carries on watching towards the sea, ignoring the man's fate and condition completely. "I saved your life, so make it count. Go around after this and speak of the greatness that is Maractus Zack." is the only thing he says, still focused elsewhere.
He then removes a trimmed, dirty piece of paper, and lets it slip, for the air to take away. On it there's a face that resembles his alot. It's a bounty poster. Writting ...

"Maractus Zack the "Grand Mentality" "Bounty: 200,000,000."

"Fools ... won't even remember my face .. let alone what my true battle rank was ...!"

Salty was way too low after he was dropped down to the nearby tree by Zack. However, the way he was dropped was good enough to save him from the sure death he would end up having if the hooks did not really reach him. Salty could not move at all. His eyes were looking upwards at the spot where Zack was standing, surprised. Blood was coming out of his mouth and the Commodore could not actually do anything to stop that. The only thing he could do was to raise his eyes and look at the man at the top of the roof, who seemed to be speaking a few words. While at first he could not realize what the man said, two words echoed that made him realize what was really going on. "Maractus Zack." were the words he heard and his eyes twitched by the time he realized that this was the real Maractus Zack, the man behind the whole mess in the prison of Blue Stripe.

"Bo-chan, we have to reach Level 3 as fast as possible, correct?.." Johnny is conversing with Bobby, while the pair are going up the hidden passages revealed by the supposed to be Zack while he was descending down. The little dwarf nods his head, while being clenched onto the captain, but he seems a bit skeptical, something that Johnny notices in advance. "The man that arrived .. does he ring a bell?" he asks the little new comrade of his, who in return looks over the marine's cheek and nods. "I remember everything, now. This man was in a cell, but he's not a bad guy. Must have been something this Zack person has done to confuse us even more. This guy was .. a marine."

Meanwhile, on the gates floor, the two individuals are ducking it out, with a series of sharp claws slashing through the puffing masses of clouds fired towards the clawed man's direction.

"There, this was the passage-way, we will see him right ...?!!" Bobby stops talking and his jaw drops, while Johnny stops moving. Some men are in front of the trapped Danny's body, who is half-submerged in debris, and barely still conscious. "We were sent here in case you change your mind .. Boss Zack asked his to kill you. We own him a lot, sorry champ." It was the troll pirates, all of them, released, and apparently under Zack's influence too! "Oh? ... an enemy .. let's handle him like we handled the other ones left here asleep...!" the Troll pirate's captain, brutally says, while Bobby squeals. "The guys...!" he shutters, thinking about Fino & Orior. Johnny's expression grows surprised and mortified, thinking the worst. "What did you do ... Troll pirates?!"

Salty was about to fall asleep. However, he could not do so. After all, he had just realized what was going on. Everything taking place around Blue Stripe was something that was organized by that man... Only one man managed to cause such a big mess that would never be forgotten. That reminded him of a story he had heard about Impel Down, regarding two yonko, the former yonko Seshomaru and the current Yonko Maximillion... Both of them had managed to break out of the underwater prison. But, there was a big difference. All those people had somebody to back them up. They had crews and allies who were capable of helping them. Zack's case was the exact opposite. Unlike all those powerful men, Zack was causing a mess, all by himself... And that was what Salty could not really accept.

"Maractus Zack... Maractus Zack... Maractus Zack..." he spoke the man's name and he slowly moved his right hand at his pockets, grabbing a Den Den Mushi. Salty was attempting to call Johnny and inform him about what he just found out.

"Takedama!" A swift, straight, extremely fast punch is fired right onto someone's face, with more than enough force to sent the individual smashing through a number of think walls up ahead. "Hiko!!" Niko, one of the pair of these odd, apparently relatives, Troll pirates members, shoots, as the man is seemingly knocked out cold with a single shot, smokes dusting around his motionless body, his white eyes and gaping mouth implying of his defeated status. However, Johnny then focuses on an incoming attack, his leg connecting with Achoo's kick, neutering the blow.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZMOGlXXNlA

"You are .. Achoo, with a bounty of 80,000,000.. a martial artist." Immediately the duo begin to exchange blows. Meanwhile, Bobby was fighting against the pair of clowns, Zorn and Thorn.
"Is he so tiny?"
"So tiny, is he?"
"Oh, were you taught the troll style from Master Salty? So cool!!"
No one was paying attention to the Den Den Mushi calling, left right on the secret passageway's start!

[OOC: What did they do to Orior and Fino? Cause I want Orior to wake up soon ]

Salty was desperately trying to call Johnny in order to inform him about the news but from the looks of it, he could not do anything at all. Johnny was not responding and Salty could not reveal the valuable information he learned right before his defeat. "I'm such an idiot... He might be facing the enemies." he thought while trying to move his body. At least now, he was better than before. He was bleeding but now he felt that he could start moving his body, but in a slow pace. As a result, the commodore would get up and slowly climb down the tree he was thrown on in order to enter in the prison of Blue Stripe and start climbing to the upper levels, hoping to find Johnny and the rest of the co. And while moving, he would keep trying to call Johnny, hoping that he would find him and inform him.

((OOC: They are supposedly beaten and thrown away, but you are free to bring them up any time, you can even add them in your previous post if you wish~)

[ΟΟC: I will make Orior appear in the next post, I guess]

"Did I said that you are free to wander around?" The man's cold voice would surely remind Salty of his situation. Before him was a criminal, a pirate, anything he may have been, he was the bad guy. And he was strong. And, also, he was really erratic and weird during the whole time these two "conversed". It was obvious that the man, while apparently not interested into directly attempting to actually kill Salty, was not intending on letting the Commodore walk away as he never met up with the man. "Sit down, or I will kill you." he calmly, again, nonchalantly says, like threatening someone to kill them if they wouldn't listen to your "orders" was really not that huge and unsettling to someone's ear. So, it was confirmed. He really wasn't intending to just let Salty walk away, at all.