Coming out of the storeroom, Law, Bepo, Sachi, and Penguin headed toward the Polar Tang. The sun had long set since they had cleared all the paperwork from the strange room, liberating its only occupant. She was currently slumped against Bepo's back, oblivious to the world around her.

"What happened with the surviving marines?" Law asks as they move through the small marine base.

"You didn't give an order, but Ikkaku put them on the Tang since they had been helpful." Penguin says.

"Alright, keep them isolated from her." He orders.

Penguin starts to reply when all four of them tense. Immediately their backs are to one another and they're all looking into the darkness. It doesn't take long for the source of their tension to make itself known.

"Law." The deep voice preceded the steady steps of the severe man walking toward them. His hair was short, and his attire was that of a Marine Vice Admiral.

Four sets of eyes fall onto the figure, and Law growls. "Vergo."

Gripping his sword, he doesn't take his eyes off the man in front of him. "Bepo, Penguin."

The two respond with a single, "Aye!" before running off toward the Polar Tang. Sachi takes up a position behind his captain, gun already in his hand and leveled at Vergo.

"How fortuitous that I was already on my way here when I received a concerning distress call." He says, gripping the bamboo stick in his hand tightly. "If I had reacted any slower, you would've left before I could get here."

"Even if you geppo'd at top speed, that's impossible." Sachi says in an even tone despite his disbelief.

"If the distress signal had been from your reckless decision to free her, then yes." Vergo states, stepping toward the two of them. "Entry without an entry code into that room sends its own signal."

"... Sorry, captain." Sachi grumbles.

"It's alright." Law says, drawing his sword completely. "What's so important about her?"

Vergo regards the two in front of him in silence for a moment. "She controls the Heart of Gold," he says finally, his tone and aura shifting as he pulls his coat off and tosses it aside. "But what it does, or doesn't do, isn't any of your concern."

"Something to warrant his attention, at least." Law affirms, eyes narrowing.

The action was over as swiftly as it had started. Sachi pulled the trigger as the Room expanded from Law. Vergo moved as the trigger was pulled, dodging the projectile easily. Law disappeared as another shot was fired, and his sword clashed with Vergo's reinforced bamboo staff as Sachi reloaded his firearm while on the move, adjusting his position as Law and Vergo exchanged blows.

Two more shots. Vergo and Law shift left, but Law shifts again immediately, barely flickering before Vergo's sight.

The sword cuts the horizon, at least from Sachi's point of view. Sheering the marine base's walls and cutting the island's topography smooth. If Vergo is surprised by the power of the move, or by his own split state, it doesn't show on his face, but his understanding of the situation is quickly made apparent when he makes no move to block Law's follow up attacks.

Vergo lays in pieces on the island, alive only by the power of Law's devil fruit. Alive, only because the brat had willed it.

Law's room expands far enough to reach the Polar Tang, effort flashing across his face for a moment before a small item appears in his hand. He sets it down in front of Vergo, just out of reach of his severed pieces.

Vergo knows what it is. Proof of his true identity.

"If they don't decide on a Buster Call for this island, maybe you'll be able to talk your way out of execution, Vergo-san." Law offers, as he and Sachi walk away.

"... We're really going to bare our fangs, huh Captain?" Sachi asks after a few moments.

"Yeah." Law answers, looking down at the calmly beating heart in his hand. Tucking it away he pulls out a den den mushi, devilishly angled red glasses on its face and a mass of pink feathers around the receiver.

Setting it down by the shoreline, he and Sachi board the Polar Tang. It would take the transponder snail days to reach Vergo, and by then the Marines would have arrived – either the ones accompanying Vergo before he had split off from them, or the ones who came to provide supplies for the guards. If fate saw fit to spare him, then so be it, but Law liked his odds.

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The Polar Tang moved through the depths of the sea at a steady pace. Law sat surrounded by papers and files, and four sleeping bodies. Sachi, Penguin and Bepo had fallen asleep an hour ago, but for the last few hours they had been helping Law organize and categorize all the files they had removed from the cold room.

The fourth sleeping body had been sleeping since they had brought her aboard. The steady beep of a resting heartbeat was the only sound in the room to accompany the soft shuffling of paper. Law wanted to be able to monitor her, but he also needed to get through the files as quickly as possible, and that's why there were four extra bodies and a heart monitor crowded into his office.

Most of the paperwork wasn't important to Law. Years of logs of vitals and system checks. The details hardly mattered, she was alive, and the system hadn't failed, but the sheer volume of these reports was important.

She'd been in stasis for decades at least.

So far there was nothing that pin pointed the exact date she had been sealed away, and aside from half a dozen files about her supposed crimes and the fate of her family, there wasn't much else about her. Law would have to ask her directly once she was done resting.

They'd provided her intravenous supplements and Law had been monitoring her vitals with the occasional scan. Things he had expected to find, like dehydration or severe muscle atrophy, weren't present. If there had been any stress on her organs, it was undetectable. Despite decades in suspended animation, she was healthy. The heart monitor was just there to alert him if something happened while he was focused on the files.

"A new ceiling." A voice says calmly, but so unexpectedly that Law nearly has his sword in hand before he realizes that his guest is awake.

The steady, resting beep of the heart monitor has not changed.

Law's sudden movement was enough to rouse the other three sleepers in the room. He took a steady deep breath and let it slowly, calming his own heart before he stood up. Her gaze shifts to him, and watches silently as he scans her again.

"A familiar face." She states. Her voice is as calm and steady as the heart monitor's beeps. It's almost like there's a facsimile of life within her. "That is a positive."

"You expected different?" Law prompts.

"Based on historic precedence and my own experiences, yes." She replies flatly. "One time I closed my eyes and when I opened them, I was in a cell with my family. Then I closed my eyes and when I opened them I was on a platform, and my family had become corpses. Every time I closed my eyes time passed. The ceiling changed. The people changed."

Law can feel the discomfort emanating from the three behind him. There's not a hint of emotion in her voice, despite the story she's relaying. If Law hadn't read her personal files, he would have thought she was simply repeating something that happened to someone else.

"This time, I saw golden eyes, and when my eyes closed and the ceiling changed, I still see golden eyes." She looks from Law to the others, no change in her expression as each one of them flinches. He understands why. She's so devoid of emotion that it's impossible to read her. Even looking right at her, your brain expects her to disappear like some apparition.

Even the pacifistas have more emotional presence.

"Am I permitted to sit up." It's a question, Law's sure of it, but the lack of fluctuation in her voice makes it feel like an odd statement.

"If you feel dizzy, or nauseous you need to tell me." Law says. "But you can sit up if you want."

"I believe I do." She states, sitting up. The motion of her body is the first truly human thing about her. It seems odd to consider such a simple movement graceful, but Law can't shake the connection. "Am I permitted to know the day's date."

Law's silent for a moment before responding. "It's year 1523, of the Kaienreki Calendar."

"... Ah."

"What's the last date you remember?" Sachi asks.

"I... do not." She begins, pausing for a long moment, the unnervingly blank look on her face wavering so subtly that Law wasn't sure if he was projecting or not. "Want to say."

"Then don't." Law says, sitting down at the foot of the bed, and doing his best to look at the expressionless face looking back at him. "We have a lot of questions for you, but you don't have to answer any of them that you don't want to. We won't force you, or punish you."

"I decided to trust you arbitrarily, but it appears luck is on my side." She looks around the room for a moment, eyes settling on the golden heart sitting on his desk, before turning back to Law. "I can provide little more than self-preserving obedience in exchange for continued trust."

Law's quiet for a moment. "We won't force you to do anything. The more questions you can answer, the better, but I won't demand you answer anything. The only thing I do ask is that you let us protect you."

"Protect." The word comes out flat, but something about it sounds questioning to Law. "But why."

"There are people who want you." He explains, pointing to the golden heart on the desk. "And that."

"That... is useless to anyone but me."

"May I ask what it is?"

She nods. "A container, and a gift. Two dear friends gave their lives to protect my convictions. There is no great power contained within, but I can see how time would have caused a misunderstanding."

She stares at the golden heart with no more emotion than she's shown up to this point, but there's something in her eyes that almost looks like sadness. With what she says next, however, Law dismisses the flicker of emotion as a trick of the light.

"My emotions are sealed within it."