I don't know if this is any good. Ho hum. Bold Italics are fighting techniques!
"'Dark Luffy?'" Luffy repeated. "What's that? Who are you, and why do you look like me?"
That last one was the real question, thought Nami, as she gaped down at the shadowy figure blocking their path. He had the same face, but that was about it: his posture, his expression, his clothes, and the way he spoke were all very different to those of the Luffy to which they were accustomed. He even lacked the straw hat. Still, if he was anywhere near as strong as Luffy…
She shuddered. They could really do without meeting someone like that.
Meanwhile, Dark Luffy - as he seemed to want to be known - was eyeing Luffy ponderously. "Look like you, you say?" He smiled, completely without mirth. "I don't see it."
"What?" The volume of Luffy's voice rose a little. "You look exactly like me, and you say your name is the same as mine!"
"Our names are the same, true," Dark Luffy replied, "but I don't think we'd look the same to anyone." As quickly as it had appeared, the smile faded from Dark Luffy's face. "Besides, if anything, you look like me, not the other way round. Don't get things backwards."
"What are you talking about? It's no different," said Luffy, bewildered.
Dark Luffy's face - appropriately - darkened. "It's very different. You see, you are something that you see every day; someone who has not achieved their true potential. I, on the other hand," he continued, "am someone you do not see every day. I am everything that I could have been."
So he had been going somewhere with that 'dissimilar' charge. He was trying to make a point. Worried, Nami kept her eyes on Luffy. There was something very odd about Dark Luffy, something besides the obvious fact that he looked exactly the same as Luffy himself. It was in the way that he carried himself, but she could not quite place what it was.
In any case, the accusation had left Luffy perplexed. "What'd you say?"
Dark Luffy glared at him, and then, slowly, drew himself up to his full height.
"I'm saying," He began quietly, then roared: "WHY DID YOU TAKE SO LONG TO GET HERE?"
The shout shook the forest, loud as an earthquake and forceful as a landslide. Even though she was standing a fair distance away, safe upon the Thousand Sunny, Nami took an involuntary step backwards. A moment passed, as the bellow pealed into the distance, leaving behind a silence weighty with significance.
"Why did I take so long?" Luffy still sounded confused. "You don't make any sense."
Dark Luffy took a deep breath. He looked to be holding in his temper. "I'm talking about the time you have wasted helping these…" He glanced at the Thousand Sunny, wrinkling his nose dismissively. "Misfits. You didn't need them to get here; you don't need them now. You can achieve all you want to achieve on your own. But instead of doing all that you could to reach this island, you've gone on all your wild adventures with this hapless crew of yours. You don't deserve this island's secrets."
Luffy scratched his head, and then glanced back at the Thousand Sunny. He looked bemused. "So… what are you supposed to be?" he asked eventually.
"I'm your potential - the perfect version of you. I am you as you could have been by now."
Once more, Luffy scratched his head. And then, he said, flatly: "I don't see it."
"See what?"
"I don't think you're me or my potential or anything like that. It doesn't fit."
Dark Luffy ground his teeth together so ferociously that it was visible from the ship. "What?" he snarled.
"You're way weaker than I am, so it doesn't make sense."
A thrill shot through Nami's chest. Obviously Luffy must have seen some vulnerability that he could exploit, otherwise he would not have said something like that.
Ah, wait. Her heart sunk. He absolutely would have said something like that, even if the other person was hideously powerful.
"Weaker than you?" Dark Luffy repeated. His voice had changed, and was now laced with danger. A chill ran down Nami's spine. "Well, I somehow seem to have underestimated your stupidity." The shadows in his eyes were unfathomable; forbidding. "Perhaps I will show you how wrong you are, right now. You see, you ate the Gum-Gum fruit, didn't you?"
"Yup," Luffy replied, altogether too cheerfully.
"Well, since I am your true potential, I never did. Would you like to guess what that means?"
Nami leant forward. She had just realised what it was; the strangeness surrounding Dark Luffy. The way that he carried himself was different, and, as her horror mounted, she understood why.
He was used to fighting with a different Devil Fruit.
"Black Meridian!" cried Dark Luffy, lifting his hands aloft.
The effect was immediate, and terrifying. Dark clouds surged out of nowhere, sweeping the sun out of the sky in a matter of moments and plunging the island into sudden darkness. Churning ferociously, with lightning sparking in their midst, they reminded Nami of the Maelstrom's geysers, only far more obviously malevolent. Taking a step back, she stared up at the sky, feeling dizzy. Was it weather magic, like the Clima-Tact, only on a far greater scale? Either way, the change had been so quick and so categorical that only one conclusion could safely be drawn.
"Luffy," she yelled, "be careful, this guy is seriously strong! I think he is using weather magic!"
Luffy glanced at her, nodding quickly to show he understood. His expression had changed - sobered, perhaps, at the display of raw power - but he still looked confident. Dark Luffy had looked at her as well, and he had not looked away. There was a musing look to his gaze that woke a sense of sickness in her gut. She was not sure what he was thinking, but it was nothing good.
"Pretty," he commented, somehow managing to make just that single word sound like a terrible threat. Nami heard the crew shuffle, could feel them edging protectively closer. Luffy's hands clenched into fists.
"Don't talk about them," he said simply, sounding angry for the first time since Dark Luffy had arrived. "This is me and you." He paused, reconsidering. "Me and... Me?"
Dark Luffy, finally, turned his attention back to Luffy, leaving Nami feeling as if she had just been released from prison. "Oh, it is? Yes, I suppose it is." Still, however, he did not attack, instead folding his arms casually across his chest. "Tell me, why do you even keep these people around? They're just holding you back. Think about it..." Dark Luffy smiled coldly. "I have your memories, so I will think about it too. Remember when you ate the Gum-Gum fruit? That was Shanks's fault, and really, when you think about it, it set the precedent for what was to come."
"Shut up. I don't care what you have to say."
"Just consider for a moment how much further you might have come by now if you had always been alone." Dark Luffy shook his head, regret in his eyes. Most worrying was the assured, confident tone. "You could have accomplished so much more than you have! Cocoyashi village, Enies Lobby, Sky Island: all these are places you would never have visited if you had pursued your dream. All you have done is delay, delay and delay, and you expect me to let you through this gate? When you yourself didn't even care enough about your own dream? Ridiculous." Dark Luffy sneered, and then his eyes turned to the boat again. He looked too calm, too collected; horribly confident. "Let me tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to rip your whole crew apart. Would you like that?" Dark Luffy smirked. "It will be entertaining, watching them suffer…"
"Gum Gum pistol!" Luffy bellowed, and Nami could hear his fury. He threw a punch that whistled past Dark Luffy's face, missing by little more than an inch. But miss it did, and Dark Luffy straightened up quickly. Slowly, almost lazily, he extended a finger, pointing at Luffy.
"Black Meridian..." he said again. The ground began to rumble, even the river and the trees thundering with the vibrations. Overhead, the clouds began to spin, drawn by some unseen force to rotate so fast that Nami could not even keep track of the movement.
"What the…" she whispered. This was not just power - this was impossible power. Then, she remembered. "Luffy," she screamed, desperately. "Run!"
"Radiant Wave!"
The band of energy that swept down from the heavens could have hit at the speed of light, so intense was the explosion that bloomed with blinding intensity in front of Nami's eyes. The force of the impact was meteoric, the shockwave lifting her from her feet and sending her soaring backwards to crash down onto the deck, even the Sunny itself almost lifted out of the water by the blast. For a few moments, she lay groggy on her back, but as the rumble of Dark Luffy's first attack pealed away into the distance, she managed to roll over, pushing herself up with her trembling arms. Despite feeling as if she had been hit by a cannonball, only one thing was running through her mind. If that was the power of just the shockwave, what damage had the actual attack done?
"Nami, are you ok?!"
Chopper was hurrying towards her, medical kit at the ready, but she waved him away. Sanji and Zoro were staggering, dazzled. She had been standing closest to the bulwark, so she had felt the impact most heavily, but nobody had escaped unscathed. Even Franky's mechanical body was sparking in places.
"I'm alright," she gasped breathlessly. "Let's... Let's hope that's the only time he can use that, or we're in a lot of trouble. Luffy," Staggering back to the bulwark, she leant over it again. "Is Luffy...?"
She froze.
"Well, that was all too easy."
It couldn't be true.
"I expected a little more fight, I have to say. Then again, that attack could have split the island in half, so I suppose this outcome isn't entirely unexpected."
Even from a distance, she could see a figure lying on the floor, a deep slash gouged into the Haki-augmented skin that he had used to mitigate the force of the blow. A ravine - a deep, narrow gorge - had been cut into the ground, bisecting the arena as if someone had struck Raftel with a gigantic axe. The fissure did not extend into the treeline, but Nami barely registered this fact. She was more concerned with the figure, whose straw hat had toppled from his head. Luffy was not moving.
"Luffy!" she screamed.
Dark Luffy, who was standing over his body, glanced at her lazily. "Be patient, girl. I'll be with you all shortly. I'll just finish with this weakling first."
"Get away from him!" she shrieked, beginning to lift herself over the ship's rail.
There was no way she was going to just stand by and watch, not when she was still able to fight. She was not helpless anymore - she did not have to stand by and witness the people she loved get killed. Even if Dark Luffy was an opponent she could never hope to beat, she would try. It was better than doing nothing.
Hands seized her, though, holding her back.
"Wait, Nami!" Sanji's voice was in her ear. He was the one stopping her from moving. "Look. It isn't over yet."
He was right, she realised, after she had had time to take a few deep breaths and refocus. All was not yet lost. In her panic, she had not noticed, but Luffy was still moving; albeit slowly.
"Tell me," Luffy rasped, struggling for breath. "Tell me who you... Are."
Dark Luffy's expression turned ugly. "Didn't you listen? I'm your potential, I'm who you-"
"No," Luffy snapped forcefully, making Nami jump. He was glaring up at Dark Luffy now. "I didn't see it at first, but I do now. You were right before, we aren't alike."
Dark Luffy smirked. "Well, I see you finally understand..."
"We're nothing alike," Luffy continued, interrupting him again. "You talk about my dream, as if becoming King of the... Pirates is just... Something I could do on my own. You talk about my dream as if..." He coughed, bowing his head briefly. "As if it's just one thing. So you can't be me. You can't even be close to me."
"What are you talking about?"
"My dream isn't just one thing anymore. None of us have just... One dream." With difficulty, Luffy clambered to his feet, the great slash down his back dripping blood onto the floor. Despite his wounds, however, he was speaking with strength. Once upright, he stared levelly at Dark Luffy. "We have each other's dreams now, too. If you don't have them, you can't be me."
"I'm NOT you! Why would I want to be you?" Dark Luffy bellowed, appearing incensed by Luffy's words and his calmness. "A weakling like you could never conquer this island! You don't have a hope! Where is your strength?! I am a thousand times more powerful than you have ever been, and my Chaos-Chaos fruit is far superior to your useless paramecia!" He took a deep breath, shaking with rage. "You don't have the power! Where is your iron WILL?"
Somehow, Nami knew what was coming. As Dark Luffy straightened up, righteous fury in his eyes, she could see the beginnings of that monstrous power that Luffy had brought with him back to Saboady: the same force that had sent 50,000 fishmen crashing to the ground.
Conqueror's Haki.
"My will?"
Luffy's voice was quiet; untroubled. He had to know what was happening, but he did not seem to mind. Nami's hands gripped the Sunny's rail as she braced herself, waiting for the inevitable blast of power that would send them all to the floor...
"Not only mine," Luffy said.
She saw the moment their gazes met. Dark Luffy's eyes had time to widen, but that was all.
The explosion of Haki shook the trees, bursting forth from Luffy and rippling through the air like a tsunami of pure energy. The ground shook, the air surged with power, and the hairs on Nami's neck stood on end. Above, the clouds that had gathered for Dark Luffy's Black Meridian burst apart, scattered to the winds by the sheer force of Luffy's will, sunlight blazing suddenly down once more upon a renewed Raftel. If Dark Luffy had himself tried to use Conqueror's Haki, it had been quelled so swiftly and so completely that no trace of it remained.
Staggering backwards a few paces, Dark Luffy bowed his head, and then sank down to his knees, breathing heavily.
As he knelt there, the fear that Nami had been feeling gradually dissipated, until she wondered why she had ever felt it at all. Under the blue sky and the sun, she realised something: this person, whoever he was and however much he looked like Luffy, was simply outclassed. No matter how extraordinary his powers might be; no matter how monstrous his attacks; he could never defeat Luffy. In fact, as he remained hunched over, winded by the power that had been unleashed upon him, she almost felt sorry for him. They were on completely different levels, and she could see that now. Alongside her, the rest of the crew watched silently, all knowing that the threat - for now - had gone. Luffy watched his counterpart silently, appearing utterly unfazed.
The sun glimmered on the back of Dark Luffy's head as he looked up. A thrill of shock passed through Nami as she saw that he was smiling.
"I suppose… I should have expected as much. Just remember," Dark Luffy snickered, seeming, for the first time, a little like his mirror image. "You won't get far on just your own power here. This was the first test. No one of you alone can reach the heart of this island. Still…" His form was losing integrity, Nami noticed suddenly; he looked to be fading away. "I'm defeated, at least for now."
With that, he was gone, his body vanishing into the sunbeams. His smile was last to go, drifting away like a wisp of smoke caught in a gust of wind.
Another low rumble shook the ground, and then the earth began to part, the arena splitting in two to allow the river to rush unimpeded through the place where the gates had once stood. Perhaps they would be able to travel farther on the Sunny after all. This time, though, the route was straight; an obviously artificial channel leading deeper into Raftel. The river was still flowing the wrong way, but after witnessing Luffy fighting his own reflection, the fact that water was travelling inland seemed like little more than an interesting side-note.
After a moment spent gathering herself, Nami took a deep breath. "Alright Franky, raise the anchor. Let's see where this takes us. Luffy!" Nobody responded. "Where is he?" she asked, exasperatedly.
"Glub glub glub…"
The sound emanating from below brought a stony expression to Nami's face.
"Our captain appears to have fallen into the river," Robin observed. "Possibly when the ground parted."
"Glub glub glub…"
"Will someone please fish him out?" Nami said exasperatedly.
"Going," replied Zoro, taking the time to casually place his weapons on the deck of the ship before leaping into the water. Nami sighed.
"Is it really too much to ask for him to take care of himself every now and again? Did he really need to let that guy hit him before beating him?"
"I think it may well be, unfortunately," Robin replied, smiling. "Besides, isn't that one of the reasons we are all here?"
Nami chuckled softly. "I suppose so."
As Zoro leapt back onto the ship, a bedraggled and dazed-looking Luffy under one arm, she shook her head ruefully. He really could be his own worst enemy sometimes.
She blinked. Had she really just come up with that dreadful pun completely by accident?
It was definitely time to move on.
"Get us out of here, Franky," she called, and the ship turned slowly about, carrying them onward down the river.