#woopslap

(Luffy will sometimes call her Mama)

It is for the best that outsiders are few and far between – she doesn’t think she could stand it otherwise, the constant misgivings about herself. The islanders have a notion of her nature, but very few of them like to say it or notice it. Woopslap and the Witch are among the few who will.

(Luffy will sometimes call her Guardian.)

Makino is kind, despite the fangs in her mouth. She cleans up the scrapes of young boys whose horns are far too small for their future crowns, and wipes sake off of laughing handsome pirates. She listens to old men’s worries, and gives shell necklaces to women too fragile to walk to shore.

(Luffy will always call her the best, so kind, isn’t Makino great?)

She is kind, to those who walk her shores without ill intent.

But not always.

(Makino has been here a long time, has been here since Folk started to tread these shores. She has been there since she was first Needed, and she will be here till the last soul flees from this place. She is old and young, but loves her people ever so kindly.

Except she has seen much. She is old. She has seen battle and blood and massacre. She sees the filthy city that rests on the shores, and would wail at tragedy if she felt sympathy for those who chose to burn and hurt and kill without cause.

She knows what is beyond kindness)

Not always, because sometimes bandits try to steal hers away. Sometimes, she must retract her proverbial shielding wing over those who call these shores homeand allow nature to take its course.

Because, sometimes Luffy screams in pain, and Makino is no longer kindbut more bloodthirsty than even flesh-hungry Luffy has ever been.

So she becomes less kind – lets the flesh covering her skin rot away until all that is left is hardened scales and moss, horns that halo around her floating hair and forceful power that cutsher body in half so it can rage free.

Makino is not a monster, witch or goddess.She is not even a demon like all of the east are.

She is a spirit, the guardian soul of this island, a Sentinel, of Dawn, of Goa, of little boys who look to her as a mother and care taker. She is not kindbut mercifuland only to those she loves.

And she no longer loves this banditthough he was once one of hers.

Before she can attack, a pirate comes instead, taking one look at her and the bandit, trembling but still holding Luffy before her, and intervenes, (Is he scared of her or does he recognize her?) stopping her from tearing this man limb from trembling limb.

But her adversary escapes.

(And she rages.

People say the ocean holds terrors far beyond man’s imagination. They are not wrong (do they see the shadows beneath the waves?) but often they are too worried looking at the dark depths to recognize the forceful, horrifying power in the earth beneath their feet.)

Shanks rescues her child – but Makino is not always kind (though from the beginning she has been). She waves her hand, and the Lord of the Coast (part of her realm, though it merges with the Ocean and is not entirely of the Shore)surges to being and takes the bandit and Shank’s arm with it. (It would not have taken Luffy, even if Shanks had not been there. Luffy is her child after all, and Shanks must pay for the danger he put him in)

Later, after soothing Luffy’s nightmares away, none of Shanks crew will remember how she looked (how she was her, notMakino, the soul the founding Folks found waiting on the beach as they first tread on these shores, but her, the guardian,scaled and many eyed and glowing and dangerous) but only that she ran for their help when Luffy was captured. They will remember Makino, the barmaid of the Party Bar, and that she was young and scared. They won’t remember the source of the nightmares that draw them from sleep with images of things that belong only in shadowed places.

She’s is kind, but not always, for there are those who do not deserve her mercy.

(Hmm, the witch of the mountain speaks to her, though she goes not by witch but boss now, the storms said you threw him out, spirit.

He was not of ours anymore. The Lord of the Coast appreciated his snack.

And the red-bastards arm?

He interrupted my duties. He caused Luffy to fear. Of course he must suffer – though he knew very well that he didn’t have to lose that arm.

He sailed with Roger. He knows what is due≥

Very well, witch.

Its Bandit, Spirit.

Very Well, Bandit-Witch.

Ugh. I need a smoke.

Sesesese!)