One Piece : Safety second

Hansen waved his hand in front of him to clear the dust flying around to get a clear look of his surroundings. Looking around, he saw everyone who was in the room earlier getting up. Thankfully, it seemed no one had any serious injury.

"What's going on? Hansen, are you responsible for this?"

"What?! That sounds ridiculous! I had enough opportunities to attack you if I wanted to!"

"Hmmm."

As Hansen looked at Freddy nervously, Tom had climbed up to the room and looked around before locking his gaze onto Hansen.

"Hey you, you're with Spike, right?"

Hansen looked towards where the voice came from and saw the pirate he saw earlier in the day. As he tried to suppress his surprise and talk, Freddy said,

"Spike? So this is because of you, Hansen."

Hansen gritted his teeth and decided to ignore Freddy for the time being and asked Tom,

"What of it?"

"Tell me where he is."

Hansen scoffed when he heard the pirate in front of him demand something from him. Tilting his head, Hansen asked,

"What if I don't?"

As soon as he heard that, Tom's smile grew wide as he pulled out a barrel and placed it in front of him.

"Oh, nothing much. I'll just blow everything up then."

Hansen's smirk vanished as he saw the barrel, which had the letters TNT written on it. Gulping down his nervousness, he looked at Tom as the latter was giving him an evil smile.

Before he could say anything though, Freddy said,

"Any more damages to my castle will mean you will not be going scot-free, Hansen. I am already at the limits of my patience."

As Hansen felt indignant at the situation, Tom looked at Freddy and asked,

"Who are you, old man?"

"..You should introduce yourself first when asking about others."

"Oh, I'm Thomas."

"I am Freddy III, the king of Bedrock Island."

"You're a king? You don't look like one."

As Freddy's eyebrows twitched in annoyance, Hansen zoned out the conversation between Freddy and Tom and concentrated on the smell that was coming from the barrel.

"What are you gonna do if I say where Spike is?"

"Of course, I'll beat you all up and chase after him!"

"...."

Hansen took one look at Tom's triumphant smile and felt his blood boil.

"Why the hell would I tell you anything if you're gonna attack me anyway!?"

"Huh?"

Hearing that, Tom dropped his smile and cupped his chin in thought. After a moment, he let out a sigh and said,

"Alright, if you tell me where he is, I'll just leave."

"..Really?"

"Yes, cross my heart."

Hansen watched Tom make an x over his chest with a serious expression and decided to believe him.

"He already left."

"What?"

"He's en route to Fatare."

"What's Fatare?"

"..It's where we're from."

"Ohh. So how do I get there?"

"Just follow your log pose. You'll get there eventually."

Tom frowned after hearing that. As he thought of how long it would take to reach Spike, he realized something and said,

"Don't you have an eternal pose? Give me that."

"..I don't have it. Spike took the one that we had."

While Hansen and Tom were talking, Freddy was slowly processing the information he was gaining from it.

"You're speaking the truth?"

"Yes."

"Cross your heart?"

"..Cross my heart."

Making a cross on the left side of his chest with a dumb expression, Hansen saw Tom let out a sigh and say,

"Well, can't do anything about that, I guess."

Tom was pretty disgruntled at not finding Spike though, so he ended up kicking the barrel in front of him in frustration. This ended up causing Hansen to exclaim, only to get stunned when he saw the barrel was empty. 

"I-I definitely smelled gunpowder.."

Tom heard Hansen muttering and smirked.

"Keke, you 'just' smelled it."

"You-"

"Nyahahaha!"

Seeing Tom jump outside the castle through the hole, Hansen clicked his tongue. But Hansen thought that it was still fine, as he avoided an unnecessary fight. Spike can handle what comes for him anyway.

Turning towards Freddy, who was frowning at him, Hansen let out an awkward chuckle as he said,

"Why don't we continue what we were talking about before?"

"Unfortunately, this is not the time for that. Please leave, we will discuss it later."

"Haha, Your Majesty, please give me a chance to explain."

As Hansen tried to persuade Freddy to try and continue their deal, one of his subordinates saw a gun peeking out from the hole in the outer wall. It turned around for a while before locking onto Hansen. 

"Hansen!"

As Hansen turned to see who shouted his name, he was pushed away. Before he could understand what was happening, he heard a gunshot.

Getting up right away, Hansen checked his subordinate and was relieved to find that it was only a flesh wound. As Freddy evacuated with his people, Hansen ordered his other subordinates to take the injured person away when he heard someone talk.

"Aw shucks, you've got a pretty loyal guy."

Hansen looked over and saw Tom hanging at the hole in the outer wall, twirling a gun in his hand. Gritting his teeth, Hansen asked,

"Did we not have an agreement?"

"Uh-huh."

"Then why-?"

Tom felt the anger that was coming from Hansen's and said with a smirk,

"Our agreement was me leaving."

"...."

"You never said anything about not coming back, nyahaha."

Hansen had never felt so angry in his life as he did at this moment while he watched Tom laugh maniacally.

"I will end you."

"Nyahahaha! Come on then, tough guy!"

Needing no more invitations, Hansen charged at Tom. As soon as he got closer, Tom used the pistol as a club and swung it at Hansen. Blocking the blow, Hansen caught onto Tom's arm and turned around, throwing the pirate over his shoulder.

Turning his body midair, Tom nimbly landed on his feet and turned around with a mad smile, only to be met with a fist. Ducking under it, Tom sent an uppercut, which was easily dodged by Hansen tilting his head back.

As soon as he dodged the uppercut, Hansen seized an opening and kicked Tom on the side of his body, sending him crashing through the chairs and the table where Hansen and Freddy were discussing matters a few minutes ago.

"Ah man, you're kinda strong. Well, I can have fun now, nyahaha."

Hansen frowned as he saw Tom grow a tail and his hands change into claws.

'A zoan? But what type is it? Is the way he regenerated from Spike's attack a devil fruit ability?'

As Hansen was deep in thought, Tom leaped at him, brandishing his claws. Hansen dove down and rolled away to avoid it but wasn't able to go unscathed as Tom's tail managed to hit him on his back.

Hansen winced in pain as he got up and saw that Tom was sniggering. Hansen clicked his tongue and got into a defensive stance to try and gauge the abilities of Tom before he went all out.

Tom was more than happy to oblige as he ran at Hansen and swiped his claws. When that was dodged, he quickly followed up with a kick and then used his tail. 

The offense quickly got too much for Hansen as he started showing openings, which Tom made full use of. Gasping for breath, Hansen examined the wounds he got while Tom was snickering. Frowning in frustration, Hansen thought,

'This bastard is playing with me. What fruit is it anyway? A small, partial transformation gave him that big of a boost? Looks like I'll have to start using them.'

With the decision made, Hansen ran at Tom while the latter kept snickering. When Hansen had gotten close enough, Tom simply swung his claws at him, wanting to send Hansen rolling and keep laughing at him.

But contrary to what he thought, he saw Hansen smirk and pull out something from a pouch he wore at his waist, turning it towards Tom's claw.

Seeing a cloud come out of it, Tom sneered. After all, what can a cloud do against his claws? Confident over his victory, Tom was thinking whether he should leave the guy alive or finish him when his hand was blocked by the cloud and got stuck in it.

Instantly losing his smile, Tom ripped his hand out of the cloud and jumped back to create some distance. Observing the cloud warily, Tom looked at his hand and tried to shake off the coldness he was feeling in it.

"What the hell is this?"

Tom did not have a lot of time to ponder on the question though, as Hansen took out another device. This one emitted fog, which filled the entire room. As Tom started looking around warily, he heard Hansen say,

"These are called dials, mongrel. You've probably never seen them. Pretty cool, aren't they?"

Tom did not mind Hansen blabbering, as it allowed him to lock onto where Hansen's voice was coming from. Leaping towards it, Tom swung his claws, only to be met with nothing.

"You missed."

Tom looked to the side and saw Hansen was holding another one of those dials. This one was emitting a cloud that was crackling with lightning. Before he could even try to dodge, Tom got hit by a bolt of lightning and blasted through the room and fell in the corridor.

Tom's last memory as he fainted was Hansen walking over and standing over him.