Chapter Text
It takes an embarrassing 3 years for her to figure out that the small coastal town, on the secluded island, in the middle of nowhere, is, in fact, not of her world.
So when she finds a very not common-looking apple in the orchard three years later, she does what anyone with foreknowledge and definitely some childish impulsiveness does: she eats it.
It tastes worse than it looked. All red with black and gold swirls, with a bumpy texture more like dried skin. But she ate it anyway.
Perhaps she should've searched it up in the Devil Fruit encyclopedia beforehand; perhaps if she had waited, she could've found a different one–one better and more useful. But she doesn't. She eats the fruit in her small hands and chokes it down, forcing it inside her.
This world is not made for normal people. A world once fiction, littered with beings with powers that make them near gods and monsters all at once. Humans with strong wills are the closest who can compete in a place like this, and, in truth, she doesn't believe her own will can match.
In the end, she eats the first devil fruit she can get her hands on.
She needs it if she plans to survive this world and live long enough to make a difference. She needs power, for this is a world that runs on it.
When the apple is eaten and nothing but the core remains, she stands. Nothing is different. Everything feels the same. Yet it doesn't either. She isn't sure if something is meant to happen or if she should try to activate it. She does the latter, and fails to do so, quite embarrassingly, screaming and running around in circles for anything. But nothing comes.
So she trots back home. Her mother is out, likely still at work being a nurse hand in the village, so in the meantime, she heads to her mother's bookshelves where the old Devil Fruit Encyclopedia sits.
Flipping through the worn and faded yellow pages, she comes across a picture similar to the fruit she ate:
Tsukuru-Tsukuru no Mi
The Create-Create fruit
She gets a vague idea of what it could do, reading the description, which is mostly blank other than the fruit’s appearance:
Can create things
Very useful description indeed. Super duper helpful. There's nothing else on the page. Fantastic.
With a sigh, she shuts the book and puts it back where she found it, sliding the desk chair back into place too. She takes one of the other books, one her mother has had since before she was born, back when she was a doctor and scientist with the Marines.
It's on Haki, a skill she's been trying to learn since she figured out where she is now. Hasn't worked well, not at all. Neither armament Haki nor observation Haki has come naturally, if at all, for her. And she's tried both, on multiple, if not more embarrassing occasions that she'd rather not admit to. Still, despite three years' worth of trying, nothing has come of it. She doesn't even consider conqueror's Haki. She knows that one is not only rare but inherited.
Her mother, of this world, strong in her own ways, has never used Haki, or at least has shown no interest in the skill when she's been asked before. Likewise, her father, whoever he may be, is not in the picture. It makes her conclude he is likely dead or a pirate, or possibly someone back at the Marines. But again, her mother is tight-lipped on the whole thing, referring to her father when necessary as ‘the other half of DNA”. It's strange to say the least, but in this sort of world, who is she to judge?
Create-Create fruit? She mulls over the words. To create things, is it simply out of thin air? Or an existing thing which turns into something else? Maybe it's like an instruction manual, like some sort of IKEA book where she needed the pieces of things but could create it? She isn't sure, so she decides the best case scenario is to experiment, after all, as her mother would say, “if at first you don't succeed, try again or fudge the results until it does.” Which is also, maybe, related to why she isn't still working in the Marine Science department.
First, she tries drawing. She recalls a different boy from a different anime who could draw animals, and they came to life.
It ends with ink splotches everywhere and nothing coming to life. Oh, and her drawing skills didn't magically improve either, which in hindsight is likely good, as she'd rather not have very fucked up looking birds flying around.
Second, she tries eating a ton of sugar and pulling on her skin where it's softest to see if something forms. There'd been a girl from a hero anime with a similar ability–quirk–as it were called there. But nothing comes from it other than a full stomach, tingly teeth, and a small bruise on her arm.
Lastly, she decides to sit on the ground with her legs crossed and close her eyes. She thinks of another hero, this time dressed in scarlet, and flicks her wrists in the air like the woman would do.
Create a pencil, she thinks as she waves her hands. Create a pencil.
She feels something then, in her hand, pulling together. She cracks open her eyes and sees….
Yeah, not exactly a pencil, but it's close enough. It's yellow, like the old pencils from her past life, with a pink nub. But that's about as far as the comparisons go. The lead is all janky and far too thick. The writing on it, which she figures is meant to read ‘#2’, comes out as squiggles. The metal, which wraps around it, covers nearly half of the pencil. Oh, and it's not a pencil shape, oh no, it's triangular.
Nevertheless, it's something tangible, and she can work with that. So she tries again. It comes out as a sphere. She thinks harder, focusing on the shape, and this time it's the correct shape, but not the color. Again, she tries for an hour, and she has a perfectly normal-looking yellow pencil. Well, she also has 14 misshapen ones, too, but who's counting, really?
Then she promptly passes out.
When she wakes up, her mother greets her with a knowing look and the pile of pencils on the nightstand beside her.
Her mother sits with her arms crossed and a calculating look on her face. “Something tells me you had an interesting lunch?”
“What gave it away?” She replies, earning a glare. “Yes, in the apple orchard. I didn't think,” she had, sort of, “and ate it.”
Her mother nods. “You aren't sorry?”
She isn't. Apologizing for something she doesn't feel any remorse over is useless. “No, I am not.”
Her mother regards her, assessing her like a project that needs to be completed, an experiment teetering on failure or success. Then she says, “Alright. You know what it does, then? And the consequences?”
“I do.”
“Then you will deal with it then. You've made your bed,” her mother rubs her cheek near where her right eye is, “you are very much like that man after all.”
That's all she says on the matter, both the devil fruit and her father, before getting to her feet and leaving, taking the pile of pencils with her.