As The Deep In The Boys

"Okay," the rescuer agreed instantly, swimming closer and staring into Kevin's face. "So, how do I lift you? Can you hold on to me, or should I grab one of your weird fins?" a dolphin asked, nudging The Deep's nose with its snout.

"Thank you! Oh, so you're a dolphin. You can expect the best mackerel, my friend," Kevin said happily, feeling a pang of guilt for his body's past actions. 

"I have enough strength to wrap my arms around your back. Just lie down next to me and wait."

"Got it. Just hurry, please. I don't like being this deep," the dolphin said, settling on the seabed next to him.

Gathering his strength, Kevin began his operation to saddle the dolphin. He immediately discovered a new problem: his limbs, while surprisingly mobile, were incredibly difficult to control. 

He looked like Leonardo DiCaprio in The Wolf of Wall Street on Quaaludes, his limbs flailing uselessly. 

After twenty minutes of titanic effort, he finally managed to climb onto the dolphin and wrap his arms around it.

"Up, but slowly, please," Kevin asked, clinging to his friendly rescuer.

"Got it," the dolphin said, beginning its ascent.

"Do you have a name?" The Deep asked after a few minutes.

"Peter. That's what the strange people who gave me tasty fish and installed some invisible thing called a 'tracker' called me," Peter replied.

"I see. Well, you're definitely going to get a lot of fish soon." Kevin didn't ask any more questions, just focused on not falling off his ride.

Reaching the shallows, the dolphin gave a powerful flick of its tail, launching The Deep's body forward and swimming back to a more comfortable depth. Kevin landed face-first in the sand, still underwater, but he knew his goal was close. 

He spat out the sand that had gotten in his mouth and began to crawl slowly toward the shore. 

An hour later, he finally emerged from the ocean and managed to turn over onto his back, facing the night sky.

"Some training session," The Deep groaned, waiting to dry off. A few minutes later, he felt the tide coming in, and the water washed over his body up to his waist.

"OH, COME ON!" a cry of pure suffering echoed from him, who now understood on a deeply personal level the meaning of the phrase, "I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere." On top of the normal discomfort, Kevin was experiencing a whole new range of sensations from his new organs, which were now almost completely packed with wet, gritty sand.

"Is everything okay?" Peter's concerned voice called from a distance.

"Everything's great!" Kevin shouted back, swallowing the curses that were trying to escape. 

He knew taking his anger out on his rescuer was a dick move, so he clenched his jaw and, fueled by a white-hot rage at his own luck, turned over and continued his journey inland.

After another half hour, he could finally move properly, and ten minutes after that, the power of his Devil Fruit returned. 

Asking the dolphin to come back the next day, Kevin concentrated and jumped. This time, his travel took half the time, and he appeared at the edge of the park. 

Immediately getting his bearings, he sprinted back to his apartment.

Once home, he tore off the green, scaly suit and jumped in the shower. Rinsing the sand from his body was pure bliss. 

Cleaning out his gills was less pleasant, but remembering that he was only alive thanks to these little guys, Kevin gently patted the unfamiliar organs.

After his shower, he pulled his phone out of the discarded suit's pocket and was shocked to see the screen light up. 

A few seconds later, he remembered he had a super-waterproof case, a rare moment of gratitude for Vought's generosity. 

He opened Amazon and ordered several crates of the best mackerel for his personal superhero. 

It cost him almost two thousand dollars, but he didn't care; his life was worth far more. 

He chose express delivery for the first crate and scheduled the rest to arrive one day apart.

Suddenly, Kevin realized he was craving seafood. 

Maybe it was a psychological response to his near-death experience, a way of asserting his dominance over the nightmare he'd just endured. 

Whatever the reason, he wasn't bothered by it. He didn't avoid seafood like the original Deep had. 

The inhabitants of the ocean were constantly eating each other by the billions; a few fish wouldn't hurt his conscience. 

He found the number for a 24-hour sushi restaurant, paid extra for a rush order, and got two large platters of sushi and rolls.

While waiting for his food, The Deep tried to recall everything he knew about Kizaru's techniques from the anime. 

The first thing that came to mind was the sword made of pure light, a formidable weapon. Kevin had no idea how to replicate it, but he was intensely curious about its piercing power and how it was created. 

His first thought was, could it cut through Homelander's skin? 

He pushed that thought aside and considered that the longsword shape probably wasn't a built-in feature of the fruit, which meant a huge potential for creating a variety of weapons and, more importantly, defenses. 

Creations made of light were incredibly durable, at least as long as their creator had direct control over them. 

The biggest problem with being a superhero was that the people you saved were not super. 

What you could survive, they couldn't. A lot of rookies forgot that, which led to casualties on their first missions. 

Kevin didn't want to repeat their mistakes, so the ability to create shields for civilians was invaluable. 

Back when he was a promising newcomer, Vought would have cleaned up any of his messes. Now, one mistake from the disgraced Deep, and his career would be over for good.

His thoughts were interrupted by the doorbell. The delivery guy had arrived with his much-anticipated meal.