Luffy slowly opened his eyes, watching the wall of the men's sleeping quarters rock softly from side to side against the motion of the waves upon the hull.
Shifting around in his hammock, he sat up, scratching his head while he looked about the room.
All the other hammocks were empty, swaying with each wave in a waltz around the room. Also eerily quiet was the blue couch at the other side of the room, blanket strewn across it instead of hiding a snoring swordsman deep within its cushions.
He shrugged, and clambered off the hammock, stretched the kinks out of his shoulders and climbed the ladder to see if he'd missed breakfast.
Opening the door to the deck, he was hit by a very strong wind, nearly blowing the straw hat off his raven black hair. Clamping a hand down firmly over the top he watched lightning light up the sky in front of him just beyond the main sail.
Luffy's line of vision the dark storm clouds left him as it snaked down the mast to rest upon the sight being played out upon the deck. Somehow during his sleep, the Going Merry had been overrun by another band of pirates… or were those marines? Apart from their basic forms, it was hard to tell.
With each crack of lightning, he found his nakama amongst the mass of shadowy figures attempting to take the ship.
Sanji and Nami were back to back at the front of the ship almost right on top of the figurehead where Luffy spent his day watching the open sea welcome his ship, Nami's climatact waiting in earnest for the next move, Sanji's already bloodied foot twitching beneath his weight.
Usopp and Chopper were in the crow's nest, Usopp cracking skulls open with a rapid fire of pachinko while Chopper kept an eye out on the other side, also cracking skulls with his hooves and allowing the bodies to fall to the sea and deck below.
Zoro was at the back of the ship in a similar situation as Sanji, surrounded and slowly backing up, a very scared and confused looking archeologist behind him. He was cursing over the sword between his teeth, not just at why Robin wasn't fighting, but the fact that no matter how many he cut down, more seemed to come from nowhere to fill the space.
Luffy gripped the railing of the upper deck, readying himself for the impact of his body hitting the invading people around Zoro and Robin when he found the same confusion Robin had. Despite his best efforts, his arms would not stretch beyond their normal length; the only thing growing was his eyes wide in disbelief.
What was going on? Why couldn't he stretch and fling himself into the enemy like he normally could? There was no seastone, nothing around that could warrant such a loss of ability, was he sick instead? Placing a hand to his own forehead, he frowned as he felt no change in his temperature that he could notice at least. He felt good, in fact, like the sleep he'd just woken from had given him a new form of energy. But the energy would be wasted if he didn't help out his nakama soon.
So he held onto his straw hat, yelled a shout for attention and acknowledgement that he was there and leapt over the railing to the deck below, landing with a thump that, like everything else he did, went unnoticed.
Nobody saw the captain, heard the captain, nakama nor invading party took any notice of the shouting, stomping and charging of red vest and blue fluffy jeans, throwing a right hook into the back of the closest shadowed figure, hitting the deck hard. What the heck just happened? Luffy should have sent the guy flying into the ocean, the dark abyss which he knew was, at least for him, no return. So why wouldn't the punch connect? Was he a ghost? A specter that couldn't be touched? So many questions started to hurt Luffy's brain, but he did know one thing.
He couldn't do anything.
All he could do was take out all the rage inside of him on passing through all the bodies that he took a swing at, watching his nakama slowly become subdued, losing katana, climatact and oddly enough, a shoe until they fell to the ground or were dragged to the deck from the mast.
Usopp was the first to die; a rope placed over his lie-telling head and down around his neck before a shot rang out into the wind. His body raised to the first cross-beams of the mast, blood starting to drip from the wound in his chest.
Both Chopper and Nami cried out in despair, Sanji turning his head to the side in anguish and Zoro spat his thoughts and blood into the wind, both men trying their strength against the rope and chains forcing them to do nothing but kneel there in front of the faceless foes, bloodied and beaten from the fight.
Grabbing ahold of the small reindeer, much to the protest of the navigator beside him, the dark-outlined men dragged him up the small flight of stairs, right past Luffy as he swung hard at them and into the kitchen. Luffy stumbled at the force of his swing as it passed right through the enemy, stopping after a few steps and turning to the now closed door, the cries for help cutting off suddenly as it was replaced with a sound of metal hitting flesh and wood. His eyes grew wide and he listened carefully, waiting for a sign saying that it wasn't the end of the doctor.
The shadowy masses laughed as they dragged out Robin from somewhere beyond the deck, and strapped her to a cannon. Robin was trying so hard but despite her efforts, she couldn't summon her Hana- Hana powers. Thunder boomed over Luffy's cries out to her, drowning out his attempts to get her to notice him. After a grueling moment of nothing, they started pushing the cannon towards the edge, a shock of realization flashing over Robin's face. They didn't bother watching the wave of water appear after the sound of metal hitting the dark sea below them reached their ears, but just continued their silent cackles of joy and amusement and turned to face the new prey.
He watched as the blood splattered cook was raised high above deck, coming just to the same height as his beloved Nami-san, her flawless skin now blue and puffed from bruises and cold as the front she used in life to hide her pain. They didn't do anything special for her, just a simple beating before hanging her high, but to Sanji, it was the most painful thing in the world. Nami-swan's death should have been much more fitting for his love.
Sanji still struggled against the ropes that bound his arms and legs, making the pressure on his neck even greater until his movements became less and less vigorous, the last of his life expelling from his body in a final cry to the love of his life.
Luffy couldn't move, tears flowed freely down his face as Sanji's lifeless body joined the slow swaying march against the wind; the faceless men preparing a rope for the last of his nakama. He cried, swearing, cursing, pleading with the dark forms to stop, begging that he'd do anything they wanted if they'd just stop…. but they didn't, drawing all three of his swords, face set grimly as he turned his head to look directly at Luffy. He mouthed a few words, thunder booming overhead to drown out his voice as Luffy sank to his knees, trying with all his might to pick out the words his first mate was saying.
"Oi….Oi Luffy…"
The wind whispered to him, causing him to blink the tears from his eyes as he watched the last of his nakama join the others upon the mast, deep lacerations covering his first mate's form as the last of his breath left his body.
"Oi….Luffy…"
He heard it again; the soft whispering upon the wind calling his name, causing him to look about for the direction the voice was coming from, his eyes falling upon his crew once more. He screamed bloody murder as their eyes snapped open, grins forming on their faces as they each said his name….
"OI! Luffy! Wake up!" Zoro growled, shaking his captain awake roughly before leaping back as Luffy fell to the floorboards from sitting up too quickly in his hammock, the raven haired teen panting heavily as he hefted himself up to sit cross-legged.
"What is with all the shouting?" Sanji asked, standing behind the swordsman, just as on edge as Zoro was by the twitching of his foot. Luffy never had nightmares, so the shouting came as a surprise to everyone. "We could hear you at the other end of Merry!"
"Nightmare, ero-cook, or is your vision so bad you can't see that?" Zoro snorted.
"Shut up, marimo."
"Make me, dartboard."
Yet another fight was about to ensue, both poised to strike until Luffy burst out laughing, clutching at his sides and rocking back and forth. A confused look from the cook and the first mate and they both waited for their captain to settle down.
This was his nakama, fighting, shouting, carrying on, but most of all, alive and well. And no stupid dream was going to make him see otherwise. He'd die before that would happen. "It was a bad dream, I'm ok now," Luffy laughed, nodding to show he was just that.
"Yeah well, glad you're awake now, you would have missed out on lunch," Sanji replied, rolling his eyes as Luffy's wailing of him missing breakfast, turning into demands of extra food for lunch, followed him up the ladder and onto the deck, unsure if their supply would make it to the next island to meet the demands. Not that he would give extra anyway.
"Whatever you were dreaming about, it's not going to happen," he muttered, a short grunt of annoyance at the ero-cook and Zoro turned back to the captain still sitting on the floor. "Not before you become pirate king, ne?"
The grin on Luffy's face from laughing grew into one of pure bliss, pure happiness. This was his nakama, caring, willing to fight for each other and their dreams. The good ones.
"I'm soooo hungry~! SANJI! MESHI!" was the answer, Luffy racing up the ladder after the smell of food from the kitchen, leaving Zoro behind to wonder. What they were doing was dangerous, everyone knew that, but for his normally bouncy captain (and not just in the rubbery sense), Zoro knew that this would be the only way he'd allow anyone to see that he was really scared about losing them. He was sure Sanji knew that was what happened, but he wasn't about to state the fact that he shared the same brainwave on the matter with the Ero-cook, smirking softly before following suit.
After all, he didn't want his food to fall victim to the bottomless pit with the straw hat.