The Anatomy of Cross-Dimensional Pirates (One-shot Collection)

Look, Listen, Learn

"Geez, it's been years since I've really gone through this stuff." Lexi said in a sigh, blowing at the dust that covered the old newspapers and trunks sitting in their basement. The cloud of dust scattered in the air, and the brunette coughed to get rid of the contaminants in her windpipe. "Needs a good cleaning too."

"What is all this stuff, Lexi-chan?" Shachi asked as he stepped past her to head further into the archive of boxes and random piles of stuff that surrounded them. Only a few lightbulbs with strings dangling from them illuminated the large, unfinished space. As Lexi had explained, the basement had no walls, simply the bare-bones wooden structure of them, and a concrete floor.

With spring right around the corner, plus a few days vacation from university had Lexi encouraged to do a bit of housecleaning. Nana, in a moment of clarity, recalled that they never had touched her husband's treasures from downstairs in over a dozen years, practically laying untouched since his death years before. The boys were just as curious to see a little bit of the history of this world, and had followed her down. Nana stayed upstairs, her back not what it used to be.

In response to Shachi's question, Lexi took the first newspaper from the pile and shook off the rest of the dust, unfolding it to look at the first page. "These are all the things my grandpa collected over the years. Most of them are from World War II, but there is some from afterwards too. From what I've heard, he liked to hold on to pretty much anything he ever received."

The sheer size of the horde of items was also a testament to that claim. The Roe family was known for being sentimental, and perhaps Lexi had found the origin.

"Wow, look at these." Penguin pointed to a gun case, displaying four rifles inside. They looked a little worn, but otherwise in good condition. "How old are they?"

"Hmm..." Wandering over, Lexi looked at the weapons more closely. "Well, I'm pretty sure that one," she pointed to the right-most rifle, "is one of the standard issue rifles from the army during the war. Don't really know how he managed that, though. Nana likes to say that he stuffed it straight down the back of his pants and somehow made it home that way, heh. If the rest are the same age, they're over 50 years old." She chuckled at the memory, only imagining the grandpa she'd never met doing ridiculous things to sneak the military-issue rifle back home with him.

"Quite a collection he has." Law commented, opening a dust-covered trunk that sat on the floor in front of a stack of magazines that were not suitable for children. Lexi sighed, hoping that the two engineers perusing the opposite end of the old junk wouldn't notice them. Who knew what could happen.

"When I was little I sort of got to look down here sometimes, but I've never really thought about most of it until now. Wonder what sorts of things grandpa's got laying around here..." She drifted off, spotting a pole leaning against the wall, and walked towards what she assumed was a flag of some sort.

The others continued searching the other items at their leisure, and Lexi lifted the corner of the flag to inspect it's design. Her eyebrows shot up upon seeing the famous red, white, and black Nazi insignia. The colors had faded with time, and other than a few frayed edges of the fabric and a few holes that looked suspiciously like they'd been made by bullets, it looked to be in fairly decent condition.

"Wow..." She muttered, fascinated by the history she had in her hands. How crazy it was to think that this could have been stationed at a major Nazi outpost or building, right in the middle of the action, the violence, and the bloodshed that had occurred over 50 years ago. Gently feeling the fabric, she couldn't help but wonder at the hands of the men who had held the flag.

The sound of paper knocking over brought her attention back to reality, and she turned to see what had been a pile of neatly-stacked newspapers now scattered about the floor. Penguin looked on sheepishly, unable to hide what he'd done, and Lexi just sighed.