A breath, deep and involuntary, hitched in Zephyr's throat, betraying the iron discipline he usually commanded. His hand, calloused from countless hours of training, hovered inches from the Den Den Mushi, as if touching it again would shatter the fragile illusion. *Impossible.* The word echoed in the cavern of his skull, a desperate denial against the impossible reality that had just spoken to him. Six months. Six months he had walked through a fog of grief, each swing of his battle axe a futile attempt to sever the cords of sorrow that bound him to the memories of a burning house and empty cradles. He had buried them, felt the cold earth upon his hands, stared at the gravestones. And now, the voice of the man he’d mourned, his father, resonated from a snail made of living bone and shell.
“Zephyr? My son, are you there? Please, don’t hang up,” the voice pleaded, laced with an urgency that pierced through Zephyr’s shock. It was undeniably his father’s voice, older, perhaps a touch more gravelly, but the inflection, the subtle lilt at the end of a question, was unmistakable. Zephyr’s fingers, trembling despite his best efforts, finally closed around the Den Den Mushi. He lifted it to his ear, the plastic cold against his skin, yet his entire being burned.
“Father?” The word was a rusty cough, scraped from a throat that felt constricted by years of unspoken sorrow. “How… how is this possible? I saw… I saw the bodies. wife. My son.” His voice cracked on the last word, the carefully constructed dam of his composure threatening to burst. The memory, sharp and agonizing, of the charred remains, of the official reports, of the endless, sleepless nights, surged back with a vengeance. He had witnessed the funeral pyres with his own eyes. The World Government had confirmed their deaths, citing a rogue pirate attack, a brutal, indiscriminate act.
There was a sigh from the other end, heavy with a weariness that Zephyr had never associated with his father. “It wasn’t them, son. It never was. The World Government… they want to kill us to teach you a lesson”
Zephyr’s mind reeled. “Kill you? What are you talking about? You were a simple craftsman, retired from the merchant fleet years ago. Why would the World Government target you?” He gripped the Den Den Mushi tighter, his knuckles white. This entire conversation felt like a cruel, elaborate nightmare. Was this a trick? A devil fruit ability? But the emotion in his father’s voice, the genuine pain, felt too real.
“The world government want to teach you a lesson so that you will always obey them or suffer the consequences. If they knew I was alive, if they knew your wife and son were alive… they would come for them again. And this time, there would be no escape.” His father’s words were a cold slap across Zephyr’s face, dousing the flames of his anger with a chilling wave of fear. *Alive?* His wife and son were alive? The sheer magnitude of the revelation threatened to shatter his already fragile grip on reality. It explained the decoy bodies, the secrecy, but not the *why*.
“Alive…” Zephyr whispered, the word a prayer, a curse, a desperate hope. Tears, hot and unexpected, streamed down his weathered cheeks. Six months of agonized mourning, of crushing guilt that he hadn't been there. Six months of hating himself for being alive while they were gone. All a lie. “Why? Why the deception? What did you do that warranted such a cover-up, that put our family in such danger?”
His father’s voice softened, filled with profound sorrow. “Zephyr, I cannot tell you everything over an open line, and certainly not the full story without putting you, and us, at even greater risk. I need to tell you this, your wife and son are currently under the protection of someone named Carl and this person want the marine six body skill in exchange for their safety .”
Zephyr sank onto his cot, the unexpected strength draining from his legs. He sat there, head bowed, the Den Den Mushi pressed to his ear, listening to his father explain a world far more convoluted and dangerous than the one he’d believed he inhabited. His family, alive. But hidden. Hunted. The World Government, not merely an institution of justice, but a predatory force capable of such elaborate deception. It was a betrayal on a cosmic scale, shaking the very foundations of his beliefs.
“Where are they?” Zephyr asked, his voice raw. “ Helena and Elias?”
“They are safe, for now. In a place where even the World Government’s does not know .But their safety is temporary. Zephyr. And that’s where you come in.” The tone in his father’s voice shifted, a subtle hardening that Zephyr recognized from his childhood, a tone that meant business. “ I leave your wife and child to Carl after the incident so that I can move around to contact you. Carl said to contact him back once I have the six body skills to complete the deal. "
“A deal?” Zephyr scoffed, suspicion flaring. “Why do you make such a deal with this Carl ? Those six body skills are top level secret techniques !!” His heart pounded with a mix of relief and rising alarm. His father, a man thought dead, now involved in clandestine dealings, all to protect the family Zephyr had mourned.
“I was desperate at that time Zephyr. I was attacked by a group of assassin wearing cloth like pirates. They are very proficient in haki and each of them have the strength of rear admiral . As I was about to die, this Carl arrived and chopped them all with a single strike. Do you realize how powerful that guys is. I made the best out of the situation at the time"
Carl. The name was unfamiliar, yet it carried an unsettling weight, an undercurrent of something dangerous. A scientist who capable to kill a group of assassin with power level of rear admiral. It sounded less like a benevolent protector and more like a shadowy power broker. Zephyr, a Marine, ingrained with a rigid sense of justice and order, instinctively recoiled.
“Why does he want the six body skills if he is that powerful?” Zephyr asked, his voice tight with apprehension. He could almost hear his father bracing himself.
“he said he want to study them and improvise it where he can.”
The request hung in the air, heavy and suffocating. Zephyr was being asked to betray the very institution he had sworn his life to, to hand over secret Marines technique to an unknown entity, all on the word of a father who had faked his own death for years. The injustice of his six months of grief, the audacity of the request, the sheer enormity of the deception—it was too much.
“No,” Zephyr stated, his voice low and firm, devoid of the earlier tremor. “I will not. Not like this. You want me to abandon my duty, hand over Marine secrets to a shadowy figure named Carl, all based on a story I’m hearing over a Den Den Mushi after believing you dead for half a year? This is insane. If my wife and son are truly alive, if they are truly in danger, then I need to see them. And I need to meet this Carl in person.”
Silence stretched between them, thick and fraught with tension. Zephyr could practically feel his father’s deliberation, the reluctant weighing of options. Finally, a sigh escaped the Den Den Mushi.
“I understand your skepticism, son. It is… reasonable. Very well. I cannot arrange a meeting with your wife and son Carl take both of them into his ship. But I will arrange for you to meet Carl. It will take time, and it will require extreme discretion. I will call you back when the details are set. Until then, not a word of this to anyone. Not a soul, Zephyr. Your family’s lives depend on it.”
The line went dead, leaving Zephyr in the echoing silence of his quarters. The Den Den Mushi stared blankly at him, its eyes closed in mimicry of sleep. His family was alive. His father, a ghost, was embroiled in a dangerous game with the World Government and a mysterious scientist. And Zephyr, the unwavering Marine, was now tethered to a secret that threatened to dismantle his entire world. The path ahead was no longer clear, no longer righteous. It was shrouded in crimson shadows and fraught with impossible choices.