...And he slept all night with the king instead, for this is a fairy story.

[chibi_trillian]

mettathron wanted a One Piece fairy tale to cheer her up after a craptastical day, so I wrote her one.

Title: Smoke and Fire
Series: One Piece.
One Piece: Not mine.
Rating: PG.
Summary: The story of how Devil Fruits came to be (or at least the Logia types, anyway), a la the Brothers Grimm. Yes, I pulled this entirely out of my ass.


Once upon a time, when such things were the norm, all the elements roamed the earth and sea in solid, sentient form. They did many things that people do—they ate, they drank, they argued, they made friends, they fell in love. Mother Sea watched over them all and charged them only to respect each other and provide a good example to her youngest children, the humans.

One day, Smoke and Fire got into an argument. The two of them were lovers, and their occasional spats were nothing new. The other elements shook their heads and either chuckled and ignored them or, in the case of Lightning (who loved mischief), provoked the dispute further.

This time, the debate was over which of them was the elder. Smoke argued that smoke both precedes and follows a fire, while Fire said firmly that smoke could not possibly exist without fire being there first. Neither of them would concede an inch in their positions, both were so utterly confident that they were right.

From such petty seeds grew hatred, and where once they had been closer than any other elemental pair, now they were enemies. When their arguing finally went to the physical level, their fights were terrible to behold, filling the sky with dark clouds and red flame. The humans fled in fear from the strange and terrible lights the warring pair unleashed, and the other elements were at a loss as to what to do.

Eventually, one of the other elements, Water, begged them to take their question before Mother Sea. Water was the most beloved child of Mother Sea, being nearest to her heart and marvelously kind in thought and deed. She knew that under their superficial hostility, the two of them still loved each other very much. She wanted Fire and Smoke to realize that, and go back to the way things were supposed to be.

Though Smoke and Fire both disliked the idea of external mitigation, after much persuasion from Water, they finally gave in. When that day came, the two former lovers went before Mother Sea in an ill temper, for they had fought even more bitterly than usual on the voyage there.

As soon as Water tried to present their problem to Mother Sea, Fire interrupted her. He had never entirely trusted Water, and secretly believed that she favored Smoke in this.

Smoke chastised Fire for his rudeness, and Fire in turn lashed out in a rage. Smoke struck back immediately, and only when the smoke and flame and steam had cleared did they see that their attacks had had an unintended target. Water, thinking only to stop the fight, had flung herself between them. She bled the last of her power and life out on the floor before the two shocked elements.

Mother Sea’s wrath and grief were terrible, and she railed against not only the pettiness and selfishness of Smoke and Fire, but the foolishness of all the other elements who had allowed things to progress to this point. She struck all of the elements with a great and terrible curse, confining them to the fruits of certain strange plants, only to emerge when eaten by a human. The worst part of the curse was this—the elements would never again know the love of Mother Sea. The errant elements did not even have time to cry out before Mother Sea’s curse took effect, and into the darkness of the Fruits of the Devil they were swept.

When Smoke and Fire next met in their new human forms, they discovered that Mother Sea had prepared a special part of the curse for them—they were completely unable to harm each other. Their combat had become truly pointless.

Over the course of centuries and many human hosts, the two former lovers had time and more than time to reflect on the pettiness of their initial argument. Finally, Smoke and Fire grew to see each other’s sides. Alas, though time and experience had brought both of them new understanding, the eddies of Fate—or possibly the still-angered meddling of Mother Sea—kept them from meeting.

It came to pass that Smoke found himself ensconced in the body of a man with a sense of justice as powerful as Mother Sea’s and who planned to spend all his life sailing on her. He felt this was adequate atonement, and helped his human fight for the side of justice and order, even when law and justice were not the same thing.

It also came to pass that many years later Fire became associated with a young man with phenomenal loyalty to those he respected—the same loyalty that Fire wished he had shown to Mother Sea’s wishes. Fire resolved to learn from the man, and helped him fight for what he believed was right.

And one day, Fate finally smiled on the two elements, or perhaps Mother Sea finally began to forgive them. They met on a street in a desert city, and though their humans were on opposite sides, the elements had never been happier to see each other.

As they met in the blazing sky, they spoke as they once had.

I’m sorry. I was petty and quick-tempered.

I’m sorry. I was bullheaded and blind.

Let us be together again.

Yes. As it should be.

And then their very confused humans broke apart, wondering why they could not seem to harm each other. Fire’s human fled with mischief in his eyes, and Smoke’s human vowed to give chase even unto the ends of the earth.

Somewhere Water smiled, for all was as it should be.