#i love getting to do more experimental stuff yaay
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Yaay I get to ask you stuff!
2. Most hated character?
3. Favorite romantic ship with Shachi? And with Bonney?
16. If you could change one thing in One Piece (the story or the world), what would it be?
ask away sensei~ I am prepared to answer all.
BUT BEWARE ALL WHO ENTER!!
This will end up long winded and preachy just like my tags and fic comments.
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!
2. Most hated character?
believe it or not it’s not Blackbeard lol. I’m actually kind glad he exists and while I wish we had seen more of Thatch (it’s crazy he literally has like TWO panels in the manga and he’s super duper popular throughout the fandom, it’s so great). I hate quite a few characters, mostly because they suck or they pissed me off, but my top two are Nami and Bartholomew Kuma.
Why Nami? She’s kinda.... meh to me. Don’t get me wrong, I like that there are some normies in the plot that aren’t just naturally superhuman like Zoro and Sanji (but then we learn it’s haki and biological experimentation). Usopp’s a normie (his ammo is not), Tashigi and Kuina seem pretty normal to me (just very skilled with swords). Bartolomeo is pretty normal (he just has a janky devil fruit). I’m not really sure what it is, I had already disliked her before I discovered them diehard Nami haters (are they even still around, I never followed any of that). She was cool at first but I think the timeskip ruined her for me. Hard to explain. Hatred for Nami 7/10.
Bartholomew Kuma........ Kuma Kuma Kuma. Where the fuck do I start with this? I’ve had blow ups with Cyriusli about this a few times whenever his ass popped back up in the story line or in rando memes. I didn’t mind him in Thriller Bark, thought he was a good add-in to the whole ‘fuck around and find out’ bits. I love the memes of Zoro figuring out that his sacrifice was pointless because Kuma wasn’t really going to kill his boss’ son. Those are hilarious! It was during the time skip when we learned about Kuma, about him being a Revolutionary, when Ivankov got mad in the flashback, when we saw him guarding the Sunny, when he was a slave to the Celestials. It actually took me a couple of years and some talks with Cyriusli until I realized that Kuma planned all of this. How I didn’t notice before I have no clue, but everything he did, he did just full intention. He made deals with Vegapunk to experiment on him (consent), he sent the Straw Hats to islands that were perfect for their growth (you think he knew Sanji hated okama or was he just thinking “oh this boy is a cook, Iva-chan has all these amazing recipes he made for us before, this young cook will benefit from this” and just sent Sanji’s homophobic ass off to Twirling Heart Island. I also think he knew full well about Zoro’s plans to fight Mihawk so that must have been a last attempt at being a troll before becoming a mindless drone). And his last wish before losing all control was to protect the Sunny. What the serious fuck Kuma? How are you benefiting from this?? This is where I get mad. Why didn’t you tell Ivankov and Inazuma (oh btw I ship KumaZuma)? Why the lies? Why the deceit? Who are you trying to protect? I asked all these questions and thought of something.
NEW THEORY: He sent Franky to one of Vegapunk’s abandoned labs... He sent Franky to learn ALL ABOUT Vegapunk’s experiments. Bastard is banking on Franky being able to turn him back. That’s what it is. At first maybe he didn’t see a way out, but then he saw Franky and the Sunny at Thriller Bark, and of course he follows the news and learned about the new crewmate, he knows what Franky’s capable of. He finally agreed to Vegapunk’s terms and gave up, hoping the Straw Hats might save him. Now that’s a huge gamble but we all know Franky is a man of honor and might volunteer to do it. My hatred for Kuma went from 10/10 to 8/10, but I still don’t like him.
3. Favorite romantic ship with Shachi, or Bonney?
ho ho ho, before I got into KilGuin I was shipping Penguin with Shachi, and Killer with Bonney. I think the whole KilBon came from some old fanart when we were first introduced to the Supernova and also the fact that his fave food is pasta, and her fave food is pizza. I just imagined them owning an Italian resto together and said that’s the ship, done. Not the case anymore because I see Bonney as more of a lesbian or bisexual, but cares more about food than sex so it is was it is with her. I shipped Penchi because I liked the idea of them being childhood friends and they share a room in the sub and while they might not be exclusive to one another, they do often do dirty stuff together as a mutual “I scratch your back you scratch mine” kinda thing but they’re too close and too stupid to admit any real romantic feelings to the other. But they’re fine, they go to brothels together and dabble in the occasion threesome. [These are very old ideas, not sure if I’ll continue this when I write my monster fic.]
16. If you could change one thing in One Piece (the story or the world), what would it be?
As mentioned earlier I would have liked to see more of Thatch and who he was as a person. It’s confirmed that he’s a chef but I think we all deserve to see his talents showcased. Also how he interacted with the crew. Lot’s of fics and art depict him being super childish and playing pranks with Ace, making fun of Marco (aka Whitebeard’s parrot lol), and dancing with Izou. I love how the fandom made him into a real person but I crave to see him in official work.
I’d also like to see passed villains come back to the main plot. We see Foxy come back twice in fillers and in some movies, Crocodile came back in Impel down, Buggy is always around the lovable idiot. But I want to know more about Morgan and Klahadore, where did they go? What about Don Krieg? Did Mihawk chop him up and dump his body? What about Gin? We see Gin so much in fanfic, even in new released fics but he’s not been back since in the manga. What will happen if Morgan and Helmeppo meet again? Jango became a marine and I bet Morgan became a pirate lol.
SPOILERS: I think Eneru should make an appearance again with the happenings in the latest chapters.
In the world? Not sure... I theorize gravity is lower on OP Earth than ours, just by a little bit. Just enough to make us jump higher and fall slower but not affect our health too much, as the atmosphere will thin out a bit and it will be more difficult to breathe. (I imagine someone from our world would die if they go to Skypiea). (I was really excited to see this visualized in the new film Bubble, it’s on Netflix if you want to watch it~) so if this isn’t the case then i would change it to this.
My SO theorizes that the Void Century is like the missing history here in the Philippines. When the Spaniards came, they stayed for 333 years and they destroyed a lot of indigenous landmarks, tribes and nearly erased our mythology. There’s a lot that has been lost but luckily the Spanish didn’t go everywhere (we got over 7000 islands). It’d be cool if this was the inspiration (also Gray Terminal’s pollution is based on Manila).
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The Hopefully Limited Ron
But, God, ya know... The ending is us sitting at his kitchen table, listening to the rain, talking about dogs he’s trained. About the lives he’s lived. The things we’ve both done or want to do. And it’s calm and almost good, so I can’t really entirely fault him for all the other stuff.
Except, Jesus... The beginning is such a goddamn mess. The beginning is the fact that I had been traveling for twenty-three hours straight when I met Ron. When Ron was speeding me around Santa Barbara faster than light, talking nonstop, letting the ticker on his cab crank mercilessly towards thirty bucks, and all I caught out of the blur was, “when we go out for dinner or something”. It took my three-hours-of-sleep mind to fully work that all out and really realize what was happening. And by then, Ron was already on to the next thing: “So I’m going for a dog walk today if you want to join.” All I could manage was a high-pitched, voice-cracking, “Uhnn… I was gonna…sleep? Maybe shower?”
“Okay, okay. You like ribs?”
“I guess.” Did I? I honestly couldn’t remember. What was happening? How long had it been since I brushed my teeth? Who was I?
“This place has the best fuckin’ ribs,” he said, pointing out the window towards a dilapidated building with one word on its front window: Rib. Not even plural ribs. Just one rib.
“Oh,” I said. “Nice?”
“Best onion rings, too. They’re on fuckin’ steroids, man. These fuckin’ onion rings.”
That one was easy. I remembered onion rings. “Oh, I do like—”
“What kind of phone you have? Android?”
This is how it went. This was the beginning of Ron.
***
Actually, Ron started a week before that, when I booked a room at his place on AirBnB. He had it listed for seventy-five a night, but then contacted me saying he needed an extra fifty. When I scoffed and asked, “Uh... Why?” he cited some bogus excuse about a glitch on the AirBnB site. Something about how his room had been a hundred a night all along, but just didn’t say it online, sorry.
Fine, whatever. I didn’t want to make a fuss. I didn’t know Ron. Didn’t want to upset a man whose house I was staying in until I had a bead on him. You know?
Ron proceeded to message me and ask me what time I was getting in to Santa Barbara. I told him I thought it might be about one o’clock.
“Cool,” he wrote. “I run taxi service and am pick up if would.”
I don’t know how he did it, especially because it turned out that he spoke perfect English, but all of Ron’s messages were borderline illiterate.
Anyway, I told him I’d take him up on his offer for a pick-up. Why not, right?
A few days later, I told him my plans had changed and that I might need an extra night. He agreed, “Okay”, and then went silent. The day before I was supposed to arrive, he wrote me: “Check in at 3.”
“Great!” I said, because I’m a wuss. “Hey, is there any way I could just drop my bags off and come back after check-in? I’ll actually get in at twelve-thirty now.”
“I can pick up in taxi run a taxi service and would if pick up want then secure bags until 3.”
“Okay, awesome! But I’ll have been travelling for like a full day at that point, and I would so appreciate just being able to change my clothes, take a quick shower... Is someone else staying there tonight? If not, would it be possible at all to get in before 3? Again, I would be so appreciative.”
“House not open until 3 sorry.”
“Okay, that’s fine! And just a reminder that I’m staying an extra night.”
“We discuss upon you arrival here. See you at 12:30.”
“Sounds good!”
Fucking wuss.
And then Ron hit me again: “I run a taxi cab service and if you would me to pick you up at 12:30 and secure bags and drop off you somewhere do that.”
Him and his taxi service.
“Yeah, that would be great!” I said, kicking myself for not being more assertive.
***
As I was getting on the train in El Paso, I saw a familiar form leaning out of the window of the cafe car. A tall, regal looking man. Pristine in his blue uniform. It took me a moment to recognize him.
It was motherfucking John. He was back. The man with the bad sandwiches and even worse jokes. Beautiful, glorious John.
As soon as I was seated, his to-die-for voice came on over the PA. “Ladies and gentlemens, it’s John here, from John’s Place. Are you hungry? Are you thirsty? Are you both?”
Wow, I almost cried. I was so happy to hear from him again.
“Come on down to John’s Place,” he and I said in unison. I giggled like a child.
“We’ve got some folks down here already,” John went on. “They’re not causing too much ruckus, though. Are ya?”
A general cheer went up in the background. A guy cried out, “We love you, John!”
That son of a bitch. Who did he think he was.
John laughed with the power of a drunken, mirthful Viking king. “Alrighty then. We’ve got room for everybody down here in John’s Place.”
I went down after dinner to get a drink or two to settle in with for the long night ahead. I was so nervous. I couldn’t tell if he recognized me or if I should tell him I admired his work or what. I just ordered the drinks.
“Can I get two little things of gin and a can of tonic?” I asked.
“Sure,” he said amiably. “You got it.”
“I’m not going to drink them all at once,” I explained. “I’m gonna spread them out.”
“However you want to do it,” he said.
“I just thought I’d get cozy. You know.”
He shrugged. “Sure.”
“Long night,” I added, sweating.
He rang me up and I gave him a big tip, which he gave me copious amounts of thanks for. I managed to leave without blurting out, “I love you” and I listened eagerly for all his announcements the rest of the way.
At around nine at night, he asked us, “What did the man say when he walked into the bar?”
God, it could have been anything!
“Ouch!” turned out to be the answer.
John. So clever.
“Yaay,” I cheered, drunk. The woman sitting next to me leaned her head back and closed her eyes. She sighed, “Oohh.” Not angry. Just disappointed. Which I totally get.
***
At about noon the next day, Ron messaged me again, asking me to message please when am half hour away.
I told him I was half an hour away right then, since I expected to get in at about twelve-thirty. As discussed.
He sent me four messages in a row:
WHAT I thought got in 1 o clokk
Give me a call
When get in??
Call me..
Typically, when you ask someone to call you and then you get a call seconds later, you assume it’s that person. Right? I’m asking because when I called Ron immediately after his messages, he picked up and, in the voice of an angry grizzly, said, “This is Ron, who is this, how can I help you?”
“Hi, Ron, it’s Sam.”
“Hey, man, how’s it going?” He explained that he ran a taxi cab service and that he could pick me up soon.
Right, so. I expected the ride to be free. But as soon as I got into the car, he flipped the meter on. Instantly, four-fifty vanished from my wallet. And another fifty cents each minute, until I owed the man nearly twenty-eight unanticipated dollars for the experience.
Meanwhile, Ron, a beer-swollen, neckless, bald man with big, lobomotized eyes, talked at me without pause as we zoomed through the streets. I was numb with travel and lack of sleep, and it was all a dream.
“Here’s a nice cafe,” he said. “You like coffee?”
“Sure,” I said. Coffee who?
“Sixty-four,” he said.
I just stared at him.
“See, that’s cold for us.”
“Ah, the temperature. Sure is chilly, yes.”
“And you can just pay up front for the extra night,” he told me.
This one really took me by surprise. “I...don’t have cash,” I said, a little annoyed.
“What do you need to do to get the cash?” He gave me a wary look in the rearview mirror and I suddenly felt dirty. Like I was buying drugs off him. Like experimental drugs that the army field tested and then banned.
I peered up at him through the mirror. Without guarding my annoyance, I said, “I’d need to go to an ATM. You know.”
“There’s one in this coffee shop, man,” he said, pointing to a place. “I can buy you a cup, too. I work here.”
“You do?” I was surprised because his profile on AirBnB said he was a professional dog trainer, and he had also mentioned something about a taxi, I think. But nothing about a coffee shop.
When we pulled into the parking lot, he pointed to a little white sign tacked to a palm tree. It had the same logo on it as his taxi company. A line or two of text explained that any vehicles in violation of the parking lot rules would be towed by him.
“Ah, I see,” I said, nodding at the sign. “Ron’s Towing. That’s cool, dude.”
“What’s that sign say?” he asked me, pride eating at the edges of his voice.
“Um. Ron’s Towing.”
“What’s my car say?”
I had heard this routine before. From a lot of men, all around his age. Men too over-zealous and proud and ego-driven. Pointing out things and challenging when they really didn’t need to. Knowing the easiest way out was through, I just said, “Ron’s Taxi.”
“See the number?” he challenged me.
“Yeah, it’s the same.”
“That’s me.”
“Golly.”
He bought me a massive cup of coffee, which was chill of him. I think he just got it for free, so it wasn’t a huge deal. And as soon as we got back in the car and the meter began running again, I felt much less chill about Ron.
He started taking little detours to point things out.
“You like Indian?” he’d ask.
“Sure.”
Did I like Indian? How long had I had my contacts in? Were they just part of me now?
“You should check this place out,” he’d say, pointing. “I service their lot, too. See the sign?”
“Sure. Ron’s Towing.”
“Yeah. Oh, they have good food, too.” As an afterthought.
He did this two or three times.
He dropped me off at a bookstore, where I hid among the stacks until he came back for me. He kept saying he needed to do some errands, and he’d pick me up later. When he returned, he drove us to his house for free-- “Won’t charge you a dime”-- which I guess he considered chill, too. When I opened the trunk, though, to get my secured bags, they were gone.
“I brought them inside already,” he explained, like it was obvious.
I closed the trunk, grumbling.
That my bags were inside was obvious. What wasn’t obvious was why he insisted I couldn’t enter his home until 3, dropped me at a bookstore, dropped my bags at the house, ran some errands, came back for me, dropped me at the house, ran more errands, and then whatever the fuck else he did. And all before 3:15.
Think it through, Ron. It’s so easy to save time and not be a douchebag. So simple.
The room itself was fine. It was just a spare room in this guy’s kind of small home. And the home itself... I think something very telling about it is the fact that Ron keeps his toothbrush in the shower. He’s clearly the kind of man who brushes his teeth in the shower. And you just stand in there with the greenish showerhead and the cracked tile and think about who Ron is and it strikes you that, yes, this is a shower that’s been pissed in. Regularly. I’ve never had that sensation anywhere else. But it just smacked me in the face standing there, head throbbing, rocking a bit on my heels, checking out the dirty shower curtain and the mold. Yep. There’s been piss here.
That’s pretty much all you need to know to get a sense of Ron’s place.
When we first walked in, I scanned the house as quickly as I could, desperately searching for something we could easily connect over. There was a dirty sewing table in one corner, a fireplace that had vomited ash onto the carpet in a wide arc, a massive cluttered desk in another corner covered with papers and sticky notes (I also noted later that his computer there has a live feed of hidden cameras around the outside of the house, and one suspiciously blank image that made me briefly search my room for another camera), a large brass dog sculpture and two smaller matching ones that always always make me jump when I leave my room, and a Himalayan salt lamp on the island in the kitchen.
“Oh, nice salt lamp,” I said, relieved. “My mom has one of tho—”
“What?” he said.
“The sal—”
“What’d you say?”
“Cool salt lam—”
“Oh, the salt lamp! Yeah, an old girlfriend gave that to me. And I’m glad she did.”
“Yeah, they’re supposed to be healthy for you.”
“What?”
“They’re supposed to be—”
“Oh, yeah.” He frowned. “Well, it’s Himalayan.” Like I was missing the obvious.
“For sure,” I said, wanting to burrow through the carpet and dig a tunnel to literally anywhere else.
All this with his gruff, loud voice. His blank eyes. His mouth that never, ever smiled.
***
But then the mountains in the distance sucked up the sun and it became night. With the night came the rain. I had washed myself off and downed my free coffee, so I felt better. Ron came back from running more errands and sat out in the living room, watching TV loudly. I hid for a while, but guilt wormed its way up my spine, so I sighed and went out to join him. He had the salt lamp on. He sat by its orange glow, watching some show about fishing. When I came in, he turned the volume down.
“Yeah, I just got back,” he said, without introduction. “I was working with this dog who needed help adjusting to play.”
I sat next to him. He pulled up a video on his phone of two dogs playing. Bouncing and jumping and running back and forth.
“He looks like he’s doing really well,” I said.
“Yeah,” he said. “He’s so fuckin’ happy.”
Ron showed me more videos of his successes. A violent stray named Buzz, who was found wearing a collar made of bottle caps, with a bottle opener attached, the words, “Get Buzzed” etched into its surface. Buzz couldn’t go near other people or dogs without attacking them. But after an evening with Ron, he was cured. Complacent.
“How do you do that?” I asked. I was really impressed, and kind of annoyed that I was impressed by something Ron could do.
“I...just work with them,” he said vaguely. “Look at this guy.”
Another video. A before and after of a dog named Dixon who had maybe been trained for dog fights. Before, Dixon would attack anyone who stretched their hand towards him. After, Dixon would lay his ears flat against his skull and lick timidly at their fingers.
I frowned, because I didn’t quite know about that one.
“See?” Ron insisted. “Does he look aggressive? Is he acting inappropriately?”
“No...” I said, unsure. He looked scared. He looked like he had flipped too much in the other direction. What had Ron done with him?
I asked this out loud, and again, Ron gave me a vague answer. “Nobody works with dogs like I do.”
I decided I didn’t want to know any more.
But the point is that we actually sat there by the salt lamp for some time, listening to the rain and the background noise of the fishing show and talking about what it was like to be living. Where we had been. What we had done. A surprising range of things. Most of it doesn’t matter, which is the best kind of talk. But at one point, Ron looked away and he said, “Santa Barbara is filled with two kinds of people. Those who do nothing and have money. And those who don’t have money but work. I work twenty-four-seven. I do everything. Around here, it’s go go go. But I’m doing alright.”
He was quiet. For Ron, the silence was deafening.
I just nodded.
I would never, ever go out of my way to spend time with Ron again. No way. No matter how good our conversation was. But it’s important to remember that there are moments like that hidden all over the place with people like him. Moments where they stare into the dim, calm light of an old girlfriend’s gift and feel, just for a second, actually okay. Like they don’t have to scrape and claw or point out their towing business signs to prove a point. Moments where there is just the rain, the company, the talk and the memories. And the distinct sensation that, hey, you are still breathing and the roof isn’t leaking. You ate today, and you maybe helped a dog or two.
And that’s pretty damn good for now.
I think that ending is important to remember. Especially when cruising around town, listening to the chatter of a man who you could so easily write off as a class-A prick. And maybe you still should. But that moment would give you pause. A double-take. For just a second.
That is the important part.
And holy shit, John still can not making a fucking sandwich.
(Santa Barbara, CA)
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