Background — Pt I: Devil Fruit

In childhood, Giavanna could most be described as curious. Just. Curious.

She was the one that always asked questions and wouldn't stop until whichever adult fell victim of her interrogation near fell asleep on her.

She was the child that was always outside experimenting with the environment to see how certain things would react to different situations and conditions, and at night could be found in the corner of her bedroom, nose buried in a book.

At 12 years old, she had come across a merchant in her village's market whom claimed to have a one of a kind fruit that granted whomever ate it special powers. What powers? You'd have to purchase and eat it to find out! Of course, such a thing sparked all sorts of wonderful questions and curiosity within the young girl. After all, on her small island somewhere in the North Blue, devil fruits we're nearly unheard of expect from frequent sailors.

With more questions than answers, Gia scraped together every single beri she had saved over her short lifespan and used it to pay for this supposed magical fruit.

It came in the shape of a shape most similar to a star fruit, yet was a dark blue color and had strange swirls covering it's exterior. Finding it best to keep her rather extravagant purchase from her parents for the time being, she snuck the fruit back home, grabbed a knife, and locked herself in her bedroom to investigate.

Sitting upon the floor, she set the fruit down. She delved the blade of the knife into one end, beginning to cut it into multiple star shaped slices. What came as a surprise to the young girl was that in contrast to the unnatural blue color on the outside, it was a crimson red on the inside. Without a doubt, this wasn't some magic Bean scam. There was definitely something supernatural about this fruit. Cautiously, she lifted one slice to her nose to smell it. No scent.

With no other ideas of investigation, she chose to go all the way and took a bite of the fruit. Soft, tiny features scrunched in disgust at the taste of the fruit. Maybe it was poisonous after all? But maybe it still was the real deal and this was just a small price to pay for amazing powers? She decided to reluctantly east the rest.

Wanting nothing more than to vomit afterwards, she didn't feel any surge of power or abnormalities that she had assumed she would feel upon gaining superpowers. Off.

Days had gone buy with no signs of any powers. How could she tell if any were even there? Little did she know, all it took was a little bit of subconscious thought, as automatic as a blink or a heartbeat, to witness her slender fingers tips turn from flesh to a red-brown, moldable mess. At first, fear was the immediate reaction. Then, she remembered the fruit. Was this her power? Of course.

Experimental fingers of her fleshy fingers touched that of the brown ones, noting how they bent and moved fluidly without any pain at all. This was just the beginning.

Background — Pt II: It's for SCIENCE

How incredible is it to be able to do something no other human in the world can do? That's how Giavanna felt with her newfound Clay Clay Fruit ability. Over the span of a year, she spent most of her time getting used to this new power. She poked and prodded at herself and even engaged in tests that otherwise would be considered suicide. Sure, not knowing much about her powers, it could be seen as so risky it was idiotic to try, but her curiosity always got the better of her.

She started with simply forming shaped out of her hands. She found that she could alternate between her moldable body being soft and fluid and hard, setting in her chosen shape. Next, she figured that since she could mold herself however she wanted, can she be pierced? Her first attempt was a knife to her gut. She was amazed to have felt no pain, and see no blood. Almost like human instinct, the area around the blade instantaneously turned to clay to avoid the blade from harming her.

Captivated by the sheer impossibility of such a thing existing, she couldn't help but think more about the fruit itself. Where did that merchant get it from? How did he know it was magical? Was it because there were more like it out there that offered different abilities? She needed to know.

The next three years was spent on the sea, having run away from her home for the sake of finding any and every book, person, or story with devil fruits involved. Over these three years, she learned of the three types of devil fruits. She learned of their individual strengths and weaknesses that came with their class. Coming closer to the Grand Line, she learned that those within the infamous path to the end of the world often possessed one of these abilities.

Despite the sea where she was born being considered the most dangerous of the four Blues, she had never really come across pirates. At least, not until she was on her own on the sea. There, they were plentiful. She met many, and fought many more just for the sake of survival. Through this, she learned in which ways her powers could be utilized in battle. It was also found that pirates, more than civilians, possessed devil fruit abilities.

Seeing and facing other powers head on was more exciting than anything to her. It was like seeing color for the first time. She wanted to know more about them all. The only downer was, after her newfound experience with pirates in the open world, she gained a new understanding of the world.

Gia realized that among those with the abilities that she grew to so insistently adore, there were those that shouldn't have them. As much as she loved seeing them, they were dangerous after eating one of those mysterious fruits. Yet, there were also pirates whom we're kind and merely desired freedom.

How could she research these fruits freely and survive the dangers of sailing criminals at the same time? And now, she also had a desire to protect those whom she believed didn't deserve punishment from judgement of the world government. Possibility and possibility again bounced around in her head until, eventually, she came upon a single, sensible solution.

Background — PT III: TheMarines

The now 16 year old young woman guided her way to the nearest Marine base. Had you told her even a week before that she would end up enlisting into the Marines, she would have told you to dry up. Look at her now.

Coming upon their front door, the scientist would find her way to speak to a recruiting officer. With not much more to aid in her initial joining aside from her possession of a devil's ability, she was placed as a common soldier in the Navy. Not that she much minded. She was happy to have taken her first step at all.

From her low ranking position, she was just another pawn in the game of war between the World Government, Pirates, and the Revolutionary Army. Through this, she was run hard, given all sorts of runt work and used in front lines during altercations whenever her home vessel crossed paths with one that flew a black flag over their posts.

Fighting various small crews more than gave the weak soldier a chance to exercise her devil fruit. It made her stronger. Far from that of a high ranking officer, but strong enough to be recognized as standing out from the rest of the crowd. If that in itself weren't enough, the sadistic grin that curled soft, sweet lips whenever a pirate with a devil fruit ability was in her sights certainly did. At times like that, she could either be seen as a loose cannon, or an absolute asset. This was mainly due to her tendency to go off to said ability user and fight them one on one. She seemed completely insane when in a situation such as this, trying her best not only to incapacitate the dangerous foe, but to cut them, injure them, and see absolutely everything they had hidden up their sleeve.

With time, her reputation grew and her captain took notice of her growing strength being something that was severely under ranked.

Without her knowledge, over the next week, her status was being discussed until she eventually heard of a promotion from a Seaman Recruit all the way to a Chief Petty Officer; a seemingly out of the blue promotion to her, yet one that was very much appreciated.

Although her new position still didn't hold much weight in the grand scheme of things, she still had more authority over those whom remained in her previous rank. Even if not much, it was better than nothing.

While in this position, she expressed more of her desire to research the devil fruit abilities that many people held. This was something that was mainly seen as a joke and a hobby by her superiors for a very long time, although she didn't at all let that bother her. Instead, she just worked harder and getting stronger and studying as often as she possibly could.

While a CPO, she found herself with a bit more free time than she did before. In her study time, she often would go to the infirmary to speak with doctors, getting off the record advice and lessons. With this new routine set, she quickly learned more than enough to offer ample emergency medical care in case of there being a lack of any official doctors.

By the end of her 17th year of life, Saichi Givanna became a Master Chief Petty Officer. Not much advancement, but it was still another step towards her minimum goal of Captain.

Once again, her habits didn't change much. She only had a few more eyes on her in a low commanding position. She didn't mind that at all.

With steady progression, both in physical and mental strength, she climbed the ladder from MCOP to Warrant Officer to Lieutenant by the time she was 20 years old.

Finally, she managed an audience with her superiors whom have been offering her the promotions she had obtained thus far. Of course, she brought up her desire to experiment on Devil Fruit abilities. She wanted to learn more about them. Once again, it was laughed off. This was, at least, until she stated the significant advantages such research could give the Marines. She brought up the infamous Doctor Vegapunk and his numerous discoveries that had shifted the tides time and time again, for in favor of Marines and Pirates. She proposed the possibility of finding a power neutralizer more permanent than what contact with sea stone offered. Her ideas were quickly glazed over as being impossible, though she wasn't done with her argument. After all, many things that now were common in the New World an Grand Line such as sea stone and man made devil fruits were seen as impossible not many years before hand. With that final argument, her superiors cracked and asked for a hypothetical plan.

"Give me my own ship and crew. Promote me to Captain and give me all the commanding power that comes with it, and I can capture pirates with these abilities. I can experiment on them. I can find out how they work within their bodies. I can figure some way to shift the tide of war in the Government's favor."

"Experiment? Isn't that incredibly inhumane?"

"Isn't it inhumane to slaughter innocent civilians for the sake of a single beri? To sink countless ships at sea? To kidnap and torture those they don't agree with?"

"We have prisons for this exact purpose. We don't need to torture people that way."

"Think. What is Impel Down? Prisoners there are tortured day after day with no chance of freedom... They're only there to rot. Why not put that hell to use? I will only use those that have a long track record of violence. It's not like the Government hasn't done shady things behind the scenes... Right? What's one more soldier doing the same in order to actually help innocent people?"

". . . . . . . Do you think you can actually accomplish a permanent neutralizer that can completely remove a devil fruit ability?"

"I do."

She won.

She managed to convince her superiors to grant her the title, authority, and resources she needed for her research.

Still, she had her own sick desire to see how such 'magic' truly worked with the biological makeup of the human body, but she was more than happy to put her research into a hopeful breakthrough for the sake of protecting those she herself deemed innocent.

( Made with Carrd )