Memoirs of an OC - Story V, Chapter V
Two-Faces West ~Part.1~
So after the Strawhats have packed up everything in their camp, they head back to town, apparently not hiding that they indeed found a fortune in gold as they're described to be walking down the main street ”peacefully - rather boastfully.” Fuu is once again getting lost in her own thoughts, and keeps wondering about how she's going to get the Gold Core now that they've left the mines.
Then we skip through a flashback to a couple of hours earlier.
As the flashback starts, we're in the register office over by the mines, and Nami is making a scene because the rules state that the office needs to keep the gold they found over night. I am not sure why they have to do it, but the Sheriff will keep it in his office... which is in town, isn't it? Several hours on horseback away. Uh-huh. Unless he somehow has two offices, and keeps riding back and forth every single day.
Not to mention that according to the authors, the Strawhats managed to get at least sixteen buckets that contained twenty gold-balls that weigh between one and two kilograms each. That is at least 320 kilograms of gold, which is over 700 lbs. And that's just if they only got sixteen buckets of twenty kilos each. That is a lot of gold to store in an office.
Anyway, what's making Nami annoyed is not only that she'll have to leave the gold out of her sight, but that the office will take 10% in tax.
Then, the Sheriff shows up, sounding like he's slurring drunkenly as he asks what's going on. He also expresses annoyance that he first had to deal with McDuck, and now Nami who doesn't want to pay taxes. He threatens that they'll get in trouble with the ”island lord” if they don't behave. I don't know who the island lord is, so I don't know why that's such a big threat, but okay.
Nami, who is an idiot, is about to keep whining, but is of course stopped by Ace, who somehow has more sense. Ace then proceeds to give Nami a talking-to, and somehow manages to convince her to just follow the damn rules she agreed to when they first got to the mines.
While she takes care of the paperwork, Nami talks about how she's doing this, providing that Ace returns the favor, whatever she means by that. She also makes a comment to the Sheriff that she knows exactly how much gold she's leaving with them. The sheriff replies:
"F'course, little miss…" grinned the Sheriff, "The gold'a safe with me until tomorrow! It gotta be quit' unlucky if som'thing happened though you were really lucky to find that much gold in a day, ya know…"
Gee, I wonder if the gold is going to get stolen. *rolls her eyes* Also, the sheriff must be really drunk if he keeps throwing in apostrophes randomly in his speech like that. I'm not sure what point there is to remove the silent e in “something” instead of writing it as "sumthin'", or what that a is doing at the end of “gold” or what that apostrophe before it is supposed to take away. Anyway, enough about that.
Once they're done at the register office, the pirates head off to get some horses to go back to town. But the moment they get to the ranch near the mines, Fuu spots Scrooge and runs over to him.
Scrooge is obviously not very impressed with Fuu, as she doesn't really explain what she wants to talk to him about. I'm not surprised when he dismisses her as a tavern girl trying to seduce him to get his gold.
Fuu gets really angry and first tries to bully Scrooge into talking about her offer, but when that doesn't work, she panics and gets even more annoyed about being ignored like that. After all, she's the Queen-bee Sue. No one should ignore her when she wants something! But Scrooge is not one to give in to Sues, and he tells her to get lost. Then we're treated to this nice sentence in the narration:
The last statement had definitely infuriated Fuu pass the limit of what her manners would accept, and her nakamas could thus admire from the side-lines one of the rare moments during which she lost her temper.
Yeah, except we're spared this “rare” moment for once. I'm glad to not have to sit through another scene where she throws around “acid comments”. Anyway, the focus is brought over to the Strawhats, who just watch the scene we're not shown. Here, I'll show you:
"Wow…" paused Luffy with a gasping expression, "Fuu can argue with someone, shishishi…"
Yeah, right. We've seen her wonderfully phrased arguments before. They're not very convincing, nor intimidating.
"I agree it's really surprising…" assented Nami with a similar perplexed expression.
"It's true, I've never seen her being angry at someone before…" agreed Chopper while polling his memory.
What? Yes, you have! “Angry” isn't just when you finally snap and explode at someone! She gets angry all the damn time!
"Except with Hiken, heehee…" laughed Franky with a conniving glance for their second guest.
Uh... I don't think she's been that angry with Ace, actually. She's mostly panicking or blushing furiously or a combination of the two when it comes to her interactions with Ace.
"No, for Fuu, Ace is special, so it doesn't count." remarked Luffy in a simple statement, not even realising the chain of reactions caused by his declaration and its innuendo.
What innuendo? I don't see any particular innuendo there. Everyone already knows that they have the hots for each other.
"Regardless of this 'special' case, I agree it is a rare sight to see her argue with people.
Robin, you haven't really been paying attention, have you?
But I just believe it's because it's extremely hard to find a topic on which she would want to fight…"
Shouldn't be that hard. Just pick one, and she'll find a way that it offends her.
smiled Robin while inwardly trying to remember if some fussy memories she had of Fuu defending Ohara scholars against the CP9 were real or the result of a weird dream.
Yeah, that one wasn't very memorable. Even my version of McSinisterpants easily countered it.
"Hum… it's because you've never spoken with her about gallantry or the role of women in society…" remarked Sanji while dragging on his cigarette.
Uh, what are you talking about, Sanji?
"Yeah, she can be quite stubborn on that…" nodded Zoro while crossing his arms at the recollection of the only 'talk' he had had with the hazelnut-haired girl on the topic.
What talk? Have we missed something? What have they been talking about?
SHIN. The fact that Sanji and Zoro were somehow agreeing on something made everyone's focus converge towards them.
"W… wait a minute, Sanji-kun…" interrupted Nami with a bewildered expression, "It means you actually… fought… verbally with Fuu?"
No, it probably means that she ranted at him while he just stood there and took it.
"We can say that… though I would never step as low as to argue with creatures as divine as women…"
Yes, he would, but he'd get distracted occasionally. I'm not sure exactly what they're trying to do to Sanji's character here, but I don't really like it.
smiled Sanji with an expression of adoration, "It's just that Fuu-chan had always been reluctant to accept my offers for making her little cocktails or sweets, so one day we were forced to talk about it…"
What? You had to talk about why she didn't want to have sweets? What if she was diabetic, or just didn't like sweets? Then again, she'd probably treat that as a terrible secret that needs to be kept from her friends at any cost. I don't think Sanji would take offense to something like that.
"She doesn't want the food you're preparing for her?" blinked Luffy in disbelief, "But why? For us, it's so hard to get food, and you gave it to her and she doesn't want it?"
I'm still not sure why her not accepting food is such a weird thing.
"Hum… I remember one day Fuu saying she didn't want privileges and that she could take care of herself…" added Usopp while scratching his head to poll his memory.
… Ohhh. Now I see what we're talking about here.
"Same here…" agreed Franky with a serious nod, "She often says she can do things herself… even when she can't, heehee…"
Yeah, she's kind of stupid that way.
"I don't understand her!" exclaimed Nami in a perplexed tone, "Even if she can indeed do it herself, if the guys are offering to do it for her, she should let them do!"
What? No! Nami wouldn't just let them do it, she'd find a way to extort money from them and still make them do it!
"I think that's precisely the problem…" hinted Robin with a serious yet amused expression.
Yeah, Fuu is an idiot.
"Come on, Robin, that's nothing like being useless in battle, here!" lectured Nami with a still not convinced expression, "Here it's just a nice favour Sanji-kun is doing us because we're girls
And that's the issue we're talking about. *groans*
and he's a gentleman! Usually, women are treated as less important, especially in pirate crews, so what is she complaining about?"
WHAT?! When have there ever been evidence of this? There haven't been that many female pirates shown, but all of them have been in high-standing positions in the crews! What the hell are you talking about?! Are you trying to make this into some kind of feminist statement?
"Well…" paused Robin with a shared smile, "Maybe she doesn't want any privilege for the simple fact of having been born a woman…"
What privileges? When she's playing the innocent, air-headed, dainty lady, it's not really that strange that people want to help her out or think that she's as incapable of doing anything that she keeps whining about herself!
"Weird…" frowned Nami who had been used to deal with both advantages and inconvenient of being a woman ever since she was born,
Uh, except that her foster mother was an amazingly strong woman, and she damn well taught both Nami and Nojiko to stand up for themselves and take care of themselves. Arlong's pirates sure didn't care that she was a woman. All they needed was her map-making skills. I think the only inconvenience that Nami got from just being a woman was her menstrual period! That thing does get in the way...
"Anyone would know you have to make use of everything you have to make your path in life!
Aaah, they're referring to Nami mimicking Bellemere, aren't they? Back when Nami was a kid, she used to steal books about map-making because her foster mother didn't have much money, and when Nami got caught once, Bellemere teased the local cop about paying for the books with her body. Nami then mimicked this behavior, probably because she didn't know what it meant.
Okay, so she found that teasing guys with her body was an effective way to make them lower their defenses so that she could steal their treasures? While it's not the ideal way to go about being a thief, I don't see why it's suddenly cause for some feministic soap-boxing in the middle of this story!
It's not like someone else is going to protect you and create a place for you in the world. Not everyone has the same chances and you have to deal with it! Why would she think she can manage differently?"
Because she's a Sue? Oh, and because she has god-powers?
"Maybe Fuu is coming from a place where people are treated equally…"
Again, what kind of utopia is she from? Women still aren't completely equal to men in everything even in first-world countries!
supposed Robin, her hand resting on her chin in a deep-in-thought pose, "And therefore she has different values than us…"
Yeah, apparently her values mean that she'll get offended if anyone tries to help her.
SHIN. A short silence welcomed the suggestion.
Just what kind of place is she coming from…? wondered with more or less interest the whole of the group, a doubtful drop of sweat appearing on their temple while their minds was running wild to imagine what kind of society Fuu could come from - imagination ranging from a place where citisens were a weird mix of man and woman to a place where the king and the thief were exchanging clothes once a month…
Click to view… I've... got nothing.
"Tsk… I don't know how it is on the island she's from, but it's true she really hates it when you make difference between girl and guy in front of her…"
Zoro doesn't really care about that. He thinks in differences of strength, as seen in his backstory, where he scolded Kuina for thinking that she was doomed to be weaker than her male opponents just because she was a girl. He doesn't think that gender should be an excuse for not being strong enough, that's all.
added Zoro while remembering the only time he had been taken aback by Fuu when she had lectured him hard-core for not making the difference between her being weak - statement with which she agreed too - and her being a girl.
When did that happen? Have I missed something? What does that even mean? Did Zoro somehow say that she was weaker than some guy, and she flipped her shit? Because that's what it sounded like.
"Ooh, so in the end, our komusume is kinda feminist, hum…?" estimated Franky while massaging his chin with an amused and curious smile.
So, in this world, it's apparently normal and pretty much accepted that women aren't treated equal to men, but they're actually aware of the term “feminism” somehow? I'm not sure exactly why you're using your fic as a soapbox, authors, but let me tell you something. Readers don't like to be preached at. Just so you know.
"Then could it be that Fuu-san is refusing to show me her panties for such a reason?" wondered Brook, who had always had trouble befriending the hazelnut-haired girl because of his repeated perverted offers.
Pretty much no one wants to show you their panties, Brook. There's nothing different about Fuu in that department.
"You asked her WHAT?" tilted Ace at suddenly appearing behind the gentleman skeleton with a threatening forced smile and a fist ready to burn.
Yeah, you might want to watch those homicidal tendencies, because they're not very becoming. Besides, he asks all girls that, so why are you surprised?
And while the bystanders were abandoning the feminist matter to try and calm down Ace and in a lesser measure Sanji, the conversation had turned quite frenzied between the usually-calm girl and the anthropomorphic duck.
So... Did time stop while the guys were talking about Fuu's so-called feministic tendencies? Right, that's enough for now.
Right, so Scrooge and Fuu are having a shouting-match in the middle of the ranch, I guess. Scrooge still thinks that Fuu is a tavern wench, and tells her to get a more honest job.
Fuu shouts back that girls can choose what they want to do with their lives, implying that she is a tavern wench. Then, she throws out Goldie's name, and that somehow allows her to win the argument. Wow. Damn, Scrooge. I was rooting for you to stand up to the Sue.
I think that Don Rosa's Scrooge would have been even more suspicious of Fuu after she just mentions Goldie like that, because as far as I know, Scrooge didn't fall in love with Goldie until after they worked together to find gold in Klondike for a while. At first, he just thought that she was a con-artist who scammed miners out of their hard-earned gold in her bar, and to be fair, that's what she was, but that was partly because she didn't realize just how difficult it was to get the gold in the first place.
No, Scrooge would have had his suspicions about Fuu trying to scam him confirmed, and then stomped off.
Fuu finally explains to him that she needs the Gold Core, and Scrooge immediately catches on that it's a valuable item, even though Fuu tells him that it's not worth anything. Of course, Scrooge isn't prepared to just hand it over.
Then, Nami apparently gets bored and tired of waiting, and she calls for Fuu to get going because they're going to rent horses to go back to town. When Fuu turns back to Scrooge, he has walked off, and only tells her that she's not going to get the Gold Core.
In her desperation, Fuu offers five dollars for it. Then there's a pointless haggling scene where Nami shows up to help out until they finally settle on "Nine dollars eighty-seven and a ginger ale!"
It turns out, however, that the sheriff has taken the Gold Core along with the gold Scrooge had dug up. I don't know why he'd take that as well since it's both worthless and it was his personal belonging, but I guess it's supposed to be conflict, so let's just roll with it.
After a long-winded wind-down of the scene, Fuu is suddenly struck by a thought-attack:
He accepted… For such a picky yet cheap price… Wait, does it mean he would have accepted for any price? It's just strange… I mean, it's just nine dollars, now that I think about it… Definitely not much, even though that was the first price which crossed my mind… Well, I'll just pay him the nine something dollars tomorrow, and… dollars, DOLLARS? Oh nooooooooo! How could I say such a stupid thing?
Stupid, stupid, stupid… How could I mention a currency not existing in this world? Did… did the others heard it?
The guys back in town didn't seem to think that the dime was strange, so what the hell are you panicking about?
Also, Fuu? Nine dollars wasn't the first price that crossed your mind. You offered him five dollars. It's right there in plain text.
Nami approaches her to ask just what the hell a dollar is and how much it's worth, and Fuu waffles while trying to come up with an answer, panicking about how she "can't tell them it was - well, still is - the money used in the Far West at the time of gold rushes."
NO ONE SAID YOU HAVE TO SAY THAT, YOU BRAINLESS BINT! You're making this a bigger problem than it already is, just like with everything else! The only thing she really has to say is “Well, it's not a very common currency here, I guess, but a dollar is about a hundred Belli.”
Of course, Fuu doesn't take this easy way out:
"It… it's a currency… not used here… but that can still interest a little number of people…" mumbled Fuu while trying to feel if her numismatic explanation was going to earn her some spoiler slashes or if it was fine, "But it doesn't have any value except for this handful of people…"
Nami is somehow disappointed and walks off, while Fuu frantically thinks to herself how she's supposed to get these dollars, until she figures that she can just create some dollars with her powers. Wow.
Anyway, the others approach her, and Ace asks Fuu if she got the item she needed from Scrooge. Fuu starts to say that they'll get it tomorrow, and then... Ace's face dazzles her. Look! Sorry about the long quote.
TILT. Ace's eyes fell on her, wondering why she had stopped talking, and he couldn't help but smiling faintly in victory at seeing his interlocutor apparently enthralled by him.
Fuu's amber eyes seemed distant but mesmerised.
Her cheeks had the faint glow of a reminiscent blush.
Her face was openly turned towards him, as if still hesitant because of what had happened during their last face-to-face.
"Yes…?" asked he in a seducing tone while bringing his face a bit closer to hers, knowingly reinforcing the spell he knew had bound his interlocutor.
The chime of his whispering voice made Fuu lose focus even more, and she gazed absent-mindedly at Ace's face, at his obsidian eyes which seemed so serious, at his lips which she had nearly felt on hers a mere hour before, in the darkness of this mining shaft.
Ace's smile grew in a satisfied smirk at realising Fuu's defence had started wavering in such an obvious way, and Luffy's words from a bit before made him more confident in trusting that his wishes were turning into reality, in the end.
He actually dazzled her... Ace, you are so damn creepy. As if we needed another similarity to Eddie Cullen.
Anyway, they get interrupted by the neighing of the horses they've rented, and Fuu seems like she's snapping out of a trance before walking away from Ace.
After this, we're brought out of the flashback, and BACK TO PRESENT.
Uh, you know, that flashback could have been moved to the beginning of the chapter without problem. There wasn't really a need for it to be a flashback in the first place.
Fuu moves on from thinking about Scrooge to thinking about Ace, and how she just can't figure out why she's feeling so strange around Ace. She also can't figure out why he's being more of a playboy these days, even though it was just yesterday they were caught in the room above the saloon, and Ace decided to turn the creepiness up to eleven.
She can't figure out that she's in love with him, however shallow that love might be, and I am SO TIRED OF THIS! I don't care about Fuu's sweeping romance, because it's not romantic in the least.
Anyway, once Fuu finally snaps out of her own thoughts, Nami surprises everyone by offering to buy anything they want to eat, and they head off to the Saloon. Of course, Fuu gets all embarrassed and doesn't want to go in, because of the way Ace acted in there the previous day.
The others don't seem to care about her discomfort here, because she can't be bothered to explain anything to them, and it just seems really pointless, so they go inside. All the patrons once again go dramatic prairie-dog and turn around, whispering, wolf-whistling and talking openly about Ace and Fuu and their visit to the saloon the day before.
I'm sorry, but what the hell? I mean, does nothing interesting ever happen in this place, so that people have to talk about two random people (albeit infamous and wanted) who came there to allegedly have sex and then skip out on paying for the room? Wow. El Dorado must really be a boring town.
I'm really not interested in Fuu's waffling about what actually happened in the saloon the day before, so we'll skip to the fact that Marco is there! Yay! More creepy guys to go around! Apparently, Fuu only recognizes him when she spots his hair-do, for some reason. I guess that's why we keep hearing about how awesome Ace is for being able to recognize Fuu's face and voice in a crowd.
They talk to Marco for a while, and Anne appears out of thin air next to him to nod in reply when Fuu asks if the Moby Dick has arrived to the island. Then, she disappears again.
There's some more talking, but nothing interesting really comes up. They simply talk about their practice to send in... Wait, what?
They're... talking about sending in doppelgänger-ships to land, and how they couldn't do it this time, because one of the doubles was damaged at Marineford. I'm sorry, but WHAT? I don't remember anything mentioned about there being doppelgänger-ships, and I can't find any information about this either, And I wonder why they'd do it in the first place, because what good would it do? It's just... I don't understand this.
Apparently, this isn't very interesting to Fuu either, because she skips away from that topic by bringing up why Marco is wearing glasses all of a sudden. Marco explains that Anne (who apparently have been reading way too many old Superman comics) thought that people wouldn't recognize him with the glasses on. He's still wearing his normal clothes aside from the clever addition of putting on a shirt to avoid showing off the tattoo on his chest.
And apparently, the Superman effect actually works, because no one noticed him until he called Ace over to the table. Jeez, authors, it doesn't work like that. Sanji used glasses when he was playing Mr. Prince, but the only reason he could infiltrate Crocodile's casino was because Crocodile and what was left of his minions didn't know what he looked like in the first place!
… Unless this is another stupid paradox-addition, and in that case, it sucks.
Marco tells everyone that even though his cover is blown, he can't possibly get a worse reputation in town than the pair of travelers who came to the saloon all shameful and wanting a room in the middle of the day, and he goes on to let them know that the entire town is gossiping about them having sex. Like I said, it must be a boring town.
They talk a lot more about this, but I don't really give a damn. In the middle of it, the inn-keeper comes out and spots Ace and Fuu, since apparently, they're almost the only ones still standing. He shouts at them that if they plan on getting a room again, they'll have first fork over money to fix the damages they caused earlier. I'd say that it's about time that they had some consequences from their actions, but the inn-keeper is all friendly, and doesn't really force them to pay anything, so fuck those consequences.
I... really don't know how to summarize what happens next, so I'll show you instead:
"Hahaha!" SHRRR. SHIN… In three movements…
"Hahaha!" had laughed the majority of the cow-boys present in the room, awfully joyful to have some official gossip to brighten their evening.
SHRRR. had spurted out Marco, Zoro, Sanji and some other pirates at realising to whom the inn-keeper was talking and what it was implying.
SHIN. had frozen Fuu, shame having drained all colours from her face and her heart being now shared between collapsing in tears and busting into anger.
She breathed in… slowly… deeply… and raised her eyes at a normal level before turning her face towards Robin, Ace, Marco, Anne and the rest of the group.
But the faint semblance of composure she had forced on her face crumbled at seeing that Ace had already walked away to cross the room towards the bar, his expression impossible to see from Fuu's point of view, but his pace calm enough for her to guess that the situation wasn't perturbing him more than that.
So she loses her temper because Ace isn't bothered about it, even though it was his fault in the first place. Well, Fuu. If you had just put some money on the night stand instead of walking over to the bed and looked around for no reason other than to confuse Ace, he probably wouldn't have broken the bed at least.
Marco is very surprised to learn that the travelers who are talked about all over town were Ace and Fuu, and there's more teasing about whether or not they really did sleep together or not and Fuu sulks for a bit. As usual.
However, Marco does assure her that he doesn't believe the gossip, and explains that it's actually great that the island is only gossiping about them, because that means that they're not paying attention to the fact that Whitebeard's division leaders are in town. Because, you know, people can only gossip about one thing at a time, right?
Fuu surprises Marco with her vast knowledge about how the Whitebeard pirates don't want Kaidou - the pirate who has El Dorado as part of his territory - to know that they've arrived there. Marco is amazed that she figured this out on her own, but Fuu denies that, saying:
"We overheard some cow-boys talking about it the last day, and I guess it's his mark on the Jolly Roger floating in the harbour and above the mines… There is also this tax on the gold, and somehow, Ace has been acting strange about it… So it would make sense if it was Kaidou… But it's still a bit confusing for me… I mean, even if all the Yonkous are not as friendly as Shanks, I don't really get why you would want to jump at each other throats when you're on someone else's protectorate…"
First of all, there haven't been a single mention of any pirate flags in the harbor or in the mining area up to this point, so that's something she pulled right out of thin air.
Second of all, why would they fight when they get on each other's turfs? Er. Because they're pirates? Shanks said so in chapter one, damn it! They're not saints, and they don't play fair, so I can definitely see why Kaidou wouldn't want the Whitebeard pirates on his turf without at least someone keeping an eye on them.
Anyway, Marco wants her to go on, amazed that Fuu considers Shanks a friendly guy. Fuu continues:
"I had always thought Yonkous' territories were determined and negotiated based on influences and bluff-based provocations… so it seems weird to me to see you being wary of another Fleet to the point of hiding your presence somewhere…"
Okay, sure… My standards are only up to Mafia Wars in old Italian movies, but come on, I guess Pirates Fleets are somewhat similar… You know, the kind where they glare at each other with handy men behind them to provoke each other but without reaching the point where they actually attack… analysed she while gazing at Marco's enigmatic expression, Did I really say something THAT weird?
GRAH! YOUR. CHARACTER. IS. NOT. WEIRD.
Phew. Sorry about that. She's starting to grate on my nerves a bit too much with that...
Marco laughs, making Fuu sulk even more. … Excuse me.
*bashes head against the wall, then screams into a pillow*
*comes back* Much better. Sorry about that. So, she sulks because she doesn't want to be laughed at, and Marco explains that well, it used to work like she said, but after the Marineford war, things have been a bit tense. While Fuu is "feeling both honoured, melancholic and puzzled at the same time" about finally being told about something like this, Marco thinks about the things that changed during and after the Marineford war:
Like people realising Oyaji was getting old… Like people realising that a rookie like Mugiwara could speak as an equal to him… inwardly screeched Marco at remembering that, even if for the world, WhiteBeard had been a bakemono during that war, for the ones knowing where to look at, it had been obvious he wasn't the all-powerful Emperor he used to be, Times are changing, or should I say times could have changed that day… But we won the War! Oyaji is still there and we're going to make him the Pirate King! This Era is the one of the WhiteBeard's Pirates and that's not going to change anytime soon!
You didn't win the war, Marco. Fuu made you run away using her powers. That's not winning, and I think Whitebeard would have agreed with me.
Also, that Luffy could speak directly to Whitebeard even though he is a rookie pirate does not mean that anyone can do that, damn it! Marco would know this. Whitebeard doesn't bother with small fry, and Luffy did more than prove himself worthy of some respect after what he did at Impel Down and Marineford.
While Marco talks some more about this, he's watching Ace apparently giving love-advice to some pirates and cowboys a few tables away. Then, we're slammed back into Fuu's POV, and she wonders if Marco wants her opinion or something, or if she should just be happy that he's saying anything at all to her.
Then... Marco tells Fuu that it would be great if she joined Ace in talking about how awesome the sex they had in the saloon was, in order to keep the gossip going. For some reason, Fuu seems to think that she has some kind of responsibility to go along with this in order to protect Whitebeard from getting noticed by Kaidou.
I'm sorry, but... I'm not following this messed up train of thought at all. Unless you keep making little scandals now and then, people are going to get bored with this gossip after a while, you know. Besides, I can't see how her talking about what a stud Ace is is her responsibility. Marco is the first division leader, and Whitebeard's right hand man. It's his responsibility to deal with things like that if he's in charge of the group that's in town.
She looks around and notices that people seem to be more relaxed while talking about Ace's 'performance' and figures that it might be better if they stay relaxed and gossip about that instead of treating the pirates with hate. Then she goes into a long spiel in her own head about how she is so awesome, because the pirates she's with aren't afraid of landing on new islands or meeting other pirates or anything at all.
Then Marco tricks her into agreeing to join Ace in feeding the gossip, saying that it's only for this one evening. Fuu is annoyed that she was tricked, but I just think that she needs to listen to what people are saying before showing off how awesome she is. She thinks this:
Oh well… If it's just trying to stop and blush and not making a scene of complete denial respecting to my 'relations' with Ace, I guess I can make an effort… After all, the gossiping part of the room is more than happy to invent the rest, sigh…
Besides playing this role without a care will also show this damn playboy that I can stand next to him without being infatuated by him like any other girl… I guess that's a double-win!
Um, except that you are infatuated by him, you moron. You were dazzled by looking at his face seven pages ago!
So Fuu goes over to the Strawhats to get some food, while Anne magically reappears next to Marco, telling him that he could have told Fuu that he was only joking. Marco claims that he was serious, but we're told a lot of crap about Kaidou having spies there, standing around in a very obvious fashion, and how they're somehow busy and confused now that Ace and Fuu are there. I guess the spies are fooled by Marco's glasses, and their one-track minds can only handle one gossip at a time.
They're actually expecting the rumor about Ace and Fuu sleeping together in the saloon to stay strong and alive for sixty days. Let me go over that again. They're expecting a tiny sex-rumor to shield them from one of the most powerful pirates in the world.
I'm sorry, but am I really supposed to take this seriously? It makes no sense! Even if the townspeople are gossiping about Ace and Fuu, there will come a time pretty damn soon when everyone has heard the rumor, and then there won't be a way for it to keep spreading, and it'll die. Unless this town's population rival that of Tokyo, I don't think it's going to work. Ace and Fuu would have to keep making scandal after scandal in order to keep people's interests up, and to be fucking frank? I don't want to read about that. It's boring.
Marco and Anne talk more about Ace and Fuu, and how they love teasing them, and how they're going to push them together no matter what. Then, Anne gets up and goes over to have a chat with Fuu, thinking: “We should heat things up a bit…”
And there, the chapter finally ends. Are there going to be any likable characters in this story? I'm starting to think that the authors just aren't capable of giving people good traits that can be related to. Keep working, authors, you'll get it someday.
Onward to: Chapter 6
Back to: Chapter 4
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