Cherry was up and awake bright and early in the morning. The sun hadn't quite peaked above the horizon just yet, but its light could be seen warming the eastern sky.
Not that she actually went to sleep in the first place. She only slept when she was feeling especially clingy with Robin.
No, she spent her night like she did most nights; slowly, painstakingly cultivating. Robin did too sometimes, but she wasn't at a high enough realm to completely forgo sleep.
That said, her progress in the Soul Fusion realm was blazing along compared to before, and it could have already been called pretty fast at that point. This was all thanks to her increasing understanding of the concept of fusion. Her study of and experimentation with her devil fruit ability had born fruit.
It was never really wise to rush through cultivation realms, but this was mostly a problem due to poor stability. So far, Cherry has achieved the best foundation she could reasonably manage in every prior realm, and she intended to do the same with this realm before she attacked the next.
None of the other ladies were up yet. Cherry was pretty sure that Pudding was in a food coma and wouldn't be up until noon at the least. That's what eating seven abominations of burger kind will do to you.
Only two of the boys were awake. Sanji always had prep to do for breakfast and Zoro had spent the night making sure no one snuck onto the ship. It was kind of funny how well those two got along when there was nobody else around to hear them bicker. It was like they didn't want anyone thinking they were friends, so they overcorrected in public. Cute.
Speaking of Sanji, he popped out of the kitchen just in time and offered her some coffee.
"Oh, thank you," Cherry accepted it with a grateful hum.
Sanji gave her a smile and went back to his work.
She took a sip. Light roast, dark chocolate melted in, a hint of chili pepper, and hot enough to scald; just how she liked it. Robin had started her on coffee, but it was Sanji that got her to like it. She never liked the cheap stuff that Grandma Angela drank.
Slowly, the docks came to life. Workers brought crates and barrels out from the town and lined them up next to their destined ships. The taxman and his little apprentice were raring to go, ready to squeeze every penny out from the next sucker to roll into Port Royal. Seagulls in the rigging of the vessels eyed them all carefully, not allowing any would-be meals escape their sight.
Cherry turned her attention out to sea. There, just coming around the bend where Port Royal hung its macabre warning to pirates, was a small sail boat and a single sailor aboard it.
It was sinking, and the man was futilely trying to scoop out the incoming water with a bucket. The bucket also had a hole in it.
Cherry watched this scene with a vague sense of curiosity and amusement. She mulled over whether she should help out or not.
"I guess I'll ask if he even wants help, first," Cherry spoke to herself. She'd decide after that.
…
Captain Sparrow Jack was having a bit of a rough go of it today.
The boat he… acquired, had sprung a leak. He supposed that he should be grateful that it had done so now, instead of last night when he was sleeping. At least he had a shot of reaching the docks, instead of drowning.
He really hoped he didn't have to swim, though. The effects of that bottle of rum he had last night hadn't quite left him yet.
Jack hefted another useless bucket of water out of his glorified dinghy.
Feet.
Standing on the water, like it was solid land.
Jack tilted his head left and right, trying to work out what he was looking at, because it certainly couldn't be what it looked like. Then turned back to the inside of his boat and splashed around until his empty bottle.
*sniff sniff sniff*
He gave it a whiff. Smelled like brine and rum.
He looked back at the feet, tossing the bottle behind him into the sea. Deciding that perhaps the answer lay further up the legs that were attached to the feet, he worked his way up to the face of a woman.
She was cleaner than he was accustomed to, but simultaneously looked meaner as well.
She, at least, didn't seem to be angry at him, but he wasn't always the best at judging a woman's emotional state. That Jack did not recognise her in the slightest was either a very good thing, or a very bad thing.
"Looks like ye're in a bit of a pickle, mate," the woman observed the obvious, affecting a familiar accent that he was sure wasn't her real one. Some sort of noble lady, perhaps?
"I don't trade in vinegar or produce, actually," Jack said. She smiled a bit, which should be a good thing, but looked much too predatory for his liking.
"No, I didn't think so," she said, losing the accent. The new one wasn't immediately familiar, which was odd. A stranger, rather than a noble lady, then.
"As you can see, I'm quite busy," Jack said, looking around for his bucket and… saw it floating away several meters from his boat.
"I've got time," the woman smirked at him, clearly insinuating that he didn't have time.
Which he didn't.
"That makes two of us, then!" Jack smiled like nothing was wrong and he had everything under control.
Jack clambered up the single mast of his sail boat and did some rough calculations in his head. He reckoned it would reach the dock in time for him to step off like he planned the whole thing out ahead of time. He was usually lucky like that.
…
He wasn't lucky like that.
He was knee deep in water before he was close enough to hoist himself up onto the dock. He made a point of not looking at the woman who had watched him the entire time and then pranced up to the dock like some kind of fairy. A very unnerving fairy.
Jack popped off his boots and dumped the salty slosh out of them before shimmying his feet back into them.
"No socks?" the woman spoke to him.
"Now, if I had worn socks, then they'd have gotten wet, wouldn't they?" Jack said. Once again, this was all part of the plan that he totally made.
"Very wise," she nodded, a sparkle of… something in her eyes. Something he didn't like one bit.
"Right," Jack turned away and nearly walked straight into another man who he suspected was-
"It's two shillings to tie your… boat, to the docks," the taxman rattled off without hesitation, looking over his shoulder where his boat barely stuck out of the water.
Jack and the woman turned to look at the boat too, then back to him.
"She'll pay for me," Jack said, then marched right past the taxman.
Jack expected some manner of protest, maybe an indignant squawk or two. He heard nothing, and he was too afraid to send a glance behind to find out why. It would make him look guilty, for one; but mainly he was just trying to keep what little of his dignity he had left.