Disclaimer: I do not own One Piece. I only play with its characters.


Fears

It was the most frightening place I've ever been in. This creepy castle really scared the hell out of me, and I knew it was the same with Usopp and Chopper.

But what happened now just right in front of our eyes was beyond any explanation. Beyond any things I've seen so long.

It was Luffy, our stupid hyperactive captain, usually grinning and jumping around all the time, and he lay on the ground like dead, with a layer of thick white strings entangling him. Those were spider webs, I noticed with disgust, but that was secondary.

He lay there like dead, his ever so wide black eyes closed and his ruffled hair framing his pale face incredibly soft. I've never seen him so pale, never. It didn't only frighten me to no end – it was something different, some strange pain I've never felt before.

"Is he … dead?", I muttered lowly but didn't know what I just said. All I could think of was him laying there so lifeless, his head on the side and his mouth wide open. As if he slept. It gave him a strange aura, like he wasn't the boy we all liked … loved … but a stranger, an oddly grown stranger.

"Luffy …!", I heard Usopp say, his voice shivering from the shock. I forced myself to say something, I needed to know after all … "What was that? Just now … did you see?", I asked my fellow crewmates with which I was squashed in that weird ugly mockery of a teddy bear.

"It's a shadow … he's taken his shadow …", Chopper said incredulously.

His shadow …

"This is … just like the story that skeleton Brook told us …", Usopp mused.

I gulped. Now everything was clear … but why did Luffy lie here just like dead, and that stupid skeleton hopped around as if nothing ever happened to him? Was he … did something go wrong? I only remembered that large scissors, what if he did him any other harm? Something even more severe?

I was pulled out of my pondering when my two crewmates looked at me like they were expecting me to say something. I cleared my throat, "He said his shadow had been stolen. Then it was this ratbag who did this …", I said, my voice still strong and betraying my actual mood. I felt like breaking down here and now, just why did he look so damn dead … This was Luffy, after all, he needed to be alive …

Chopper nodded. "I just can't believe it. To cut off a shadow, that's impossible …"

We flinched when that candy-pink-haired girl looked in our direction. The stupid bear tried to say something, but as he had a piece of cloth stitched on his mouth, it was impossible. Besides, his pink-haired owner seemed not to like it when he spoke – lucky us.

But then, the bear tried to show her what was going on by bumping us around from one side to the other. I clenched my teeth so as not to cry out in anger as I fell upon Usopp and one of Chopper's antlers jabbed my side. Damn, that bear was clever. He did that several times until we found a way to keep still inside him, and fortunately, we soon heard the girl shout at the zombie to stop jumping around so stupidly.

When we were sure that no one looked in our direction, I peeked out of a small slit in the bear's zipper. The shitty shadow cutter and the zombie doctor talked about a "number 900" and that they wanted to plant Luffy's shadow in it. The huge fat violet-haired onion-head said he would get his most capable subordinate now who would finally make him Pirate King – ha, in your dreams, idiot! Luffy would never do such a thing! We all know what he is able to do, but you don't, and you soon will learn, and then he'll become Pirate King and not you, stupid idiot …

But then my glance fell upon the lifeless body on the floor, and everything seemed so hopeless now … if he was dead … what should we do? How could we live on? How could I live on? He was the reason for us all to be here, it would never be the same again without him, I couldn't even imagine …

The onion-head said something to the spider-mice, but I didn't hear it because I didn't care. I was so deep in my thoughts and worries that I only realised what they were about to do when they already had him lifted up and began carrying him out. They brought him elsewhere and we would never find him again!

"Luffy!", I screamed and wanted to jump out of this stinking zombie teddy bear and run after him, wanted it so badly at this moment that I didn't even care about revealing our hiding place. It didn't matter anymore, it all didn't matter when he was dead …

A hand was put upon my mouth and held me back from jumping out of our smelly hideout on the spot.

"Idiot! Stay inside!", Usopp hissed. "It doesn't seem like having your shadow stolen is fatal. It wasn't for Brook."

I heard the conviction in his words. And really, I wanted to believe that. It was reasonable, it made sense. It couldn't be that he was dead. It just couldn't be, he was the future Pirate King, he was Monkey D. Luffy, and now we would go and save him.


"Yes!", she said firmly, as if to persuade herself of something. I looked at her searchingly, what was the matter with her? Usually she wasn't that rash and imprudent, so strangely out of control. At least she wasn't if no money was involved. She could have revealed us, and then we'd been sunk.

"We can't go out yet!", I impressed on her, and she nodded. "We'll wait for our chance …"

She looked at the zip as if she wanted to undo it again and jump out straight away. Really, this wasn't the Nami we all knew, and I seriously wondered what all this was about. Was she so shocked and scared that she just wanted to run away? Luffy wasn't here to help us, this time we needed to help him.

Yes, that could be it. She was frightened and feared that odd lion's jaws guy who wanted to kidnap her. But she couldn't run away just now.

I wanted to tell her that right then, but the look on her face kept me from doing so. Nami was strange sometimes …


Author's note: I wanted to point that moment out again. It was one of the cutest. We all know Nami is not the kind of person who acts thoughtlessly and imprudently, and yet Luffy's capture evokes such a reaction in her. Isn't that damn cute?

Hehe, in the process of writing this I watched the episode again and was laughing so hard at some moments in it … Hogback and Cindry are just so funny. And Luffy biting the iron bars of his cage … with his knight's armour … xD

Ah, and just in case you didn't notice, the line marked the switching viewpoint from Nami's to Usopp's. I just hate to write "blah's POV" and "bluh's POV" above the stuff. I don't think it was that difficult ;-)