The Puppet Master [One Piece]

Funesto pt. 4

~Shanks’ POV~

                The faint smell of coconut and citrus lingered in the air even after she’d vanished and I was still completely mesmerized by what had just happened. I could still feel her soft delicate kiss upon my lips. She’d looked so mortified when she’d pulled away from me but I was too stunned by her actions to say anything coherent. Once the initial shock and awe wore off I sprinted after her. She was remarkably fast when she wanted to be and had completely vanished from sight in a matter of seconds.

                “ECHO!” I called after her as I attempted to follow her footprints in the dirt path. They were almost too faint to see she was running so fast her feet barely hit the ground.

                “Captain, what’s wrong?” One of the rookies in Echo’s fan club pondered as he and a small group of others scoured the streets to drag the remaining bodies to rest by the graves.

                “Have you seen, Echo?” I gasped not realizing how breathless her kiss had left me.

                “Is something wrong with Echo-chan?” Travis, a young rookie in his early twenties with unruly sandy blonde hair and a spattering of boyish freckles across his face, panicked.

                I shook my head in response and ran toward the forest. Of course they wouldn’t have seen her; she was almost too fast to be seen at all. Yassop stepped out of the forest scratching his head and looking thoroughly confused about something.

                “Have you seen, Echo?” I asked him curiously.

                “She about ran me over. And when I tried to stop her she went berserk and took off. What’s her problem now?” He sighed as he raked his fingers through his blond dreadlocks, “Her mood swings are exhausting, I never know which side of her I’m going to get-.”

                “Which way did she go?” I interrupted him.

                He pointed to the west portion of the forest, “She took off that way-.”

                I turned and sprinted in the direction he pointed.

                “Is something going on we should know about?!” He called after me as I ducked under the cover of the forest.

                A small opening in the forest broke into a clearing a little ways ahead and I spotted a flash of white and jade as Echo stopped running. She placed one hand against a tree to steady herself as she doubled over gasping for air with her other hand resting on her side.

                “Echo?” I called out to her as I stepped into the small clearing.

                She straightened up and looked ready to flee, but thought better of it when she saw me tense readying to race after her again. Her usually pallid cheeks were flushed crimson with embarrassment and she quickly cast her murky sea green eyes downward.

                “I’m so sorry.” She repeated meekly as I drew nearer.

                Warm gentle rays of sunlight broke through our secluded clearing and soaked the trembling girl in waning light causing her hair and lightly glistening skin to shimmer. She was the very picture of innocence and beauty.

                “I don’t know what came over me.” She continued, her voice beginning to quiver.

                I cleared the space between us in a few short strides, “Echo.” I breathed her name softly.