I'll be honest, writing a fic where Luffy isn't aiming to be Pirate King is hard and definitely OC-ish of Luffy. It also doesn't help that I can't quite grasp the other characters either. But I won't stop this fic. If only to set the record for the worst fanfiction ever created. ;3
Chapter 7 - Mystery Feelings
"Zoro."
"Yes?"
"Do you know where we are?"
"In the stomach of a whale."
"Yes, and do you know why we're inside the stomach of a whale?"
"Just our usual luck."
"I'm raising your debt."
"Shit."
Flashback
"You're kidding… right?"
Luffy's dream to become Pirate King was the whole reason the Straw Hat Crew existed. Without it, Luffy probably would have never been able to get anyone to join the crew the way they did.
That ridiculously impossible but somehow believable dream of his was the sole reason the crew was able to go so far in achieving their own individual dreams. They'd be nowhere without Luffy and that dream.
But now they were in a world where Luffy didn't have that dream. Though, that was better than him dead.
"If he doesn't want to be Pirate King, then what is his dream?" Nami asked.
"Nothing, sis. He doesn't have a dream," Franky crossed his arms, clearly conflicted.
"Better than suddenly wanting to become a Marine Admiral, I suppose," Zoro sighed with a mix of relief and hidden concern.
"Is he still a pirate?" Nami hoped that at least that part didn't change about the rubber captain.
"Not yet. He said something about going back to the beginning before becoming a pirate."
"Beginning? When was Luffy ever the type of person to give vague answers?" Zoro crossed his arms in concern. "But at least we have a pretty good guess on where this 'beginning' is."
"Dawn Island..." Nami lightly fingered her lips, in deep thought.
"That being said, I think you guys should go after them now," Franky knocked the two out of their thoughts. "They left almost half an hour ago. But with your super navigator abilities, you guys should be able to catch up in no time."
"That's only if we choose the same sea route as them," Nami bit her lip, still frustrated that they missed each other by less than an hour. Was this just fate messing with them?
"We'll manage to find him," Zoro said.
"Doesn't sound too reassuring when someone as directionally challenged as you says it," Franky chuckled.
"What's that supposed to mean?!"
"Nothing. Just get going and find and fix the captain for me, will ya?"
And so they ran off to go back to their sailboat, with Zoro occasionally running to the wrong direction— Something the Nami could never stop getting irritated about despite traveling with this guy for more than three years.
Once they set sail, they shouted their brief goodbyes to the Cyborg who watched them leave his home island.
They let the wind guide the sails through the sea, Nami only made sure the boat faced the direction where the East Blue was.
After two minutes, the swordsman fell asleep, which resulted in him getting heavily beat up. He had to admit, it was hell not getting some damn rest when he wanted to damn sleep.
After twenty minutes, a pirate ship started attacking them.
One minute later, the pirate ship was sliced into thirds and sank. None of the pirates noticed that no treasure sank with the ship.
After a total of sixty minutes of sailing, Nami spotted another ship sailing ahead of them. It was smaller than any other ship that was brave enough to sail through Paradise, excluding their own. Upon closer look, Nami realized that there were only two people visible on that ship.
"So how should we introduce ourselves?" Nami suddenly grew anxious at the thought of meeting their captain. A captain that didn't know them and could possibly express disinterest.
"Since when did we ever have plans?" Zoro shrugged. "It'll be fine if we be ourselves… I think."
Nami was still very nervous, until she realized that she didn't make the greatest first impression in the previous timeline, so anything she did now should be fine.
When their boat was close enough that Sabo and Luffy took notice of their presences, a gigantic shadow appeared from beneath the surface of the water. In an instant, a gigantic whale emerged from the sea.
The whale bore gigantic scars on its head, resembling a certain whale that was waiting for a certain skeleton back at the Red Line. The resemblance forced Zoro to restrain himself from slicing the poor whale all apart.
And that was how Nami and Zoro ended up in the stomach of a whale. They were sitting on their boat that was floating on top of a mix of water and stomach acid. Similar to how they got swallowed by Laboon in the previous timeline. Only difference was that there was no Crocus or a sky painted on the walls of the stomach.
It was rather bland for the inside of a whale's stomach, if Zoro had to be honest.
"The one time in our life you should've sliced something, you don't?"
"It looked like Laboon," Zoro mumbled, grumpily.
"Laboon's all the way at the Red Line! As if he would suddenly pop up an away away from Waters 7!" Nami hissed at the swordsman's idiocy as she stated what she was most frustrated about. "We missed our shot at meeting him!"
"I can cut us out of this whale."
"PUT DOWN THOSE SWORDS! THIS WHALE MIGHT BE UNDERWATER!"
Once Zoro was sporting some new bumps on his head, a loud scream echoed through the chambers of the stomach.
"WOOOOOOOOOAAAAH!"
It was oddly familiar.
Quickly, they realized that a boat was entering the stomach. Meaning, the whale just ate another boat. Knowing that there was only one other boat near them when the whale ate them, the two had a good guess who else was just eaten by the whale.
Once the boat that they were previously trying to chase crashed onto the water and possible stomach acid mix, splashing the liquid all over Zoro and Nami.
Shivers crawled up their skin as their eyes widened at the newcomers. In an instant, the three years of the strange loneliness vanished.
They were somehow surprised and not surprised when they heard a childish, enthusiastic laugh.
It was stunning, nonetheless, to see him alive again and to have no care in the world. It was as if a ghost was dancing before their eyes.
"So this is what the inside of a whale looks like!"
"Luffy… I see you haven't left your habit of getting eaten by gigantic creatures..."
While the boy was enjoying the view of a whale stomach, his eyes caught the figure of the other ship occupying this stomach. "Hey!" He grinned and waved at them. "I saw you guys get eaten by this whale!"
It was a surprise that he only now just noticed them. After all, their boats were literally five feet away from each other.
"Uh… Hi," Nami was nearly speechless as she forced herself to awkwardly wave back at the boy.
For a moment, she felt like she had been dreaming for three years. After all, the boy she once called her captain was enthusiastically bouncing around the ship in front of her. He was all animated and not dead at all. For a moment, she felt like nothing happened at all and the Straw Hats were just on another crazy adventure inside another whale's stomach. But her senses snapped her back into reality. They' were all three years younger than they're supposed to be. She is a stranger to this boy. The Straw Hat Crew did not exist. She could feel her eyes water, but she willed herself to not cry.
Meanwhile, Zoro crossed his arms as he analyzed the boy. He did look the same. He did act the same. But those eyes…
The boy caught his gaze and held it for long while. He could have been imagining things, especially since he was now covered in the liquid that resided in the whale's stomach, but he thought he saw a hint of recognition in the boy's eyes when they caught each other's eyes. Or maybe it was just his imagination since he was so used to understanding those eyes. Now staring at those eyes, he found nothing but the eyes that were looking at strangers. It was very unsettling to see these eyes from him. This only reminded him of what was lost and what should not be lost again.
But what really set them both off was the lack of a straw hat resting on the boy's head or shoulders.
But at least he's alive...
"Erm… But if you saw us get eaten, why didn't you immediately try to escape?" Nami masked her trembling voice as she wiped her eyes, even though she knew that she would get a simple and dumb answer.
"Cause it looked fun," the boy replied. A noise of a palm smacking a head echoed throughout the whole whale stomach.
"Treasure meeting you here! My name's Monkey D. Luffy, and this is my brother, Sabo."
The blonde shook his head, then sighed in defeat. "How many times have I told you not to reveal your name out so quickly."
"Shishishi… At least I remembered my manners! I said treasure meeting you!"
"It's pleasure meeting you," Sabo softly corrected.
"That's what I said!" Luffy pouted at his brother, not understanding his mistake.
"I suppose that's the most progress you've ever made," his brother responded, while failing to suppress his chuckle.
Zoro smirked. Classic Luffy.
"Anyway…" Sabo turned his attention to Zoro and Nami. His eyes were narrow and full of caution. "What's your business? It looked like you guys were trying to get into contact with us."
"Just a coincidence!" Nami answered before the swordsman could say something stupid. "We're just sailing to a destination and you guys just happened to be in our path."
"May I ask where your destination is?" Sabo's tone was laced with suspicion. Not that he was one to criticize, but sailing the Grand Line on a mere sailboat could only mean one of two things. The passengers were either idiots or extremely skilled and powerful. If the aura and confident appearances were anything to go by, these two seemed like they belonged in the latter.
"East Blue."
Luffy's head perked up due to the revelation of that information. "Hey, that's where we're going too!"
"Yeah, what a coincidence," Nami nervously chuckled. Zoro gave her a disapproving nudge, as if to say that she would sound suspicious to any other person.
If Sabo thought anything of the like, he didn't show it. But internally, he was wondering what business people of this caliber had in the East Blue of all places. "A coincidence indeed."
"Since we're going to the same way…" Luffy spoke, bringing everyone's attention back to him. "How about we sail to the East Blue together!"
"Luffy—" Sabo was about to protest, but he knew that there was no changing his brother's mind now. The most he could do now was keep a close eye on these strange people.
"You'd want two strangers like us to travel with you?" Zoro voiced Sabo's concerns, even though he didn't find Luffy's request all that strange. After all, he immediately wanted Brook to join the crew just cause he was a skeleton.
"Yeah! You guys seem like fun! Look," he pointed to Zoro. "You have green hair."
Zoro felt quite annoyed. The only thing that was interesting about him was his green hair? He suddenly imagined the Luffy of the previous timeline recruiting him solely because of his 'unnatural' hair color.
"And you—" Luffy pointed at Nami. "You have blue wands."
He was clearly referring to Nami's Clima Tact.
"Careful, that just shows that she's a witch," Zoro shrugged.
"Call me that again, and I'll raise your debt."
The swordsman begrudgingly kept his mouth shut.
Luffy had a different reaction. "A witch and a swordsman? So cool~"
Sabo, too, temporarily threw away his suspicion to curiously examine the novelty of the pair.
"We'll take you up on your offer," Zoro finally replied, to Luffy's excitement and Nami's annoyance since he didn't even bother to check with her— even though she had the same answer. "But don't you think we should get out of this whale first?"
Luffy looked at Sabo, who then rubbed the back of his neck. "Good thing I prepared for the extremely rare chance that I allow us to get swallowed up by a giant monster," the gentleman sighed as he took out a small back from his pocket. "This things can only happen with Luffy…"
As he emptied out the content into the liquid of the whale's stomach, Sabo warned, "Better hold on tight."
Moments later, the whole stomach shook and the liquid their boats rested upon started to bubble. Riding the boats that erupted with the liquid, the group escaped the whale through its mouth.
As the two brothers and the two "pirates" sailed together and day turned into night, faced the full extent of the differences between this Luffy and the Luffy they knew in their previous timeline.
At first, he seemed normal. He was playful and energetic. He still said dumb things and acted like an idiot. He couldn't stop complaining about how bored or hungry he was. He couldn't sit still.
They were also pleasantly surprised that there wasn't much of a gap between theirs' and and his strength. Nami remembered how they crew worried about the big possibility of Luffy being extremely weak compared to the rest of the crew when their journey would eventually start again. This all brought the relief they sorely needed after the Dawn Island incident.
Unfortunately, the Dawn Island incident didn't allow Luffy to keep all his traits.
The first sign of 'there's something wrong with Luffy' became evident when Sabo cooked and prepared food. On instinct, Zoro and Nami grabbed their plates and were ready to guard it from the thieving rubber hand that would usually come their way when they ate with Luffy.
That… didn't happen. Luffy didn't even try. He just grabbed the food that was reserved for him and ate it slowly… well, slower than his usual pace. Nami thought that Sabo finally beat some manners into him, but then she realized that Luffy was still sloppily eating his food… so it couldn't have been a manners thing.
The looks of shock and confusion on their faces— mainly Nami's since Zoro usually masked his emotions well— were unmissed by Sabo, who had been carefully examining them since they left the whale. He noticed how the two wouldn't even bat an eye— mainly Zoro— when some pirates would initiate an attack on their small sailboats or when a Sea Monster would pop out of nowhere and immediately get destroyed by one of the men. They were experienced fighters, Sabo noted the obvious. But what really intrigued him was that their stoic expressions would suddenly come to life when Luffy did something… Or when he didn't do something.
Of course Sabo would recognize that look, because he would always carry that look when Luffy did something un-Luffy-like back when he was residing with the Revolutionaries. It was disturbing, but by now, he got used to it. Nonetheless, it was disturbing to see these people have that look when the should barely know his younger brother. It urged him more to wonder who exactly these people were.
Zoro did notice that Sabo might be onto something, given how closely the protective brother had been keeping an eye on them. But he shrugged it off, knowing there wasn't much he could do about it. Though, he couldn't say that it was not uncomfortable to have the once friendly brother constantly look at him in suspicion.
Nami purposely didn't finish her meal as she pushed her plate closer to Luffy. To test something. "Want the rest?"
Luffy paused and looked at her with curiosity. "You sure?"
Once Nami nodded, Luffy immediately gulped down the rest of the contents on the plate. "Thanks!" he licked his lips and patted his belly, satisfied with what he ate.
Nami stared at him, dumbfounded.
Luffy waited for permission to eat other people's food.
She had mixed feelings about this issue, and she knew that Zoro did too. In fact, if the whole crew learned about this, they'll be surprised and bothered by a myriad of not so colorful thoughts.
If this was just a Luffy that learned some manners, Nami wouldn't worry so much. However, she feared that the boy's actions were not because he learned some manners. This had to be something deeper. And anything like this had to relate to the only thing that drastically changed their timeline.
The second sign, though a bit debatable as of now, was that Luffy had yet to get himself in trouble. Zoro expected him to somehow get caught in the mouth of a bird's mouth like before while Nami predicted that he'd slip and fall into the ocean— of which in the event that it occurred, the two would be well prepared to save him in order to avoid what happened in the last timeline from happening again. He did none of that, and they didn't know whether to be proud or concerned. Zoro theorized that because they weren't a crew and therefore Luffy had little reason to trust them with his life, that Luffy was more careful with his life. They both shut down the idea for the fact that Sabo was present and that Luffy couldn't be careful to save his life.
The third and most obvious sign was the missing straw hat. They checked the ship, and indeed, a straw hat did not exist anywhere on the brothers' sailboat. This led to the final difference they found in their captain (that had been brought up by Franky and the mere thought of it was nagging them ever since).
While Nami was chatting to Sabo about how she could tell the subtle difference in direction, atmosphere and other stuff Zoro didn't care to understand, Zoro decided to confirm whether his dream was really gone or not.
"What's your dream?" The swordsman was clearly not one to beat around the bush.
"Huh?" Luffy looked back at him with the blank and unreadable eyes that Zoro hated.
"No one sails these seas without some sort of dream. At least, not people like you."
For once, and for only one moment, Zoro could read something from those eyes. He could sense the boy struggle with an inner conflict.
"For now... " The boy said slowly as he stared directly back into the swordsman's sudden calm and soft eyes. "I just want to get stronger have a great adventure!"
It wasn't the answer he was hoping for, but at least he knew all hope wasn't lost. A 'great' adventure could eventually translate into becoming Pirate King. The road to becoming Pirate King is a great adventure, if the progress they made in the previous timeline was anything to go by.
Zoro did note that having a great adventure was vague and could mean literally anything other than striving to become Pirate King. It wasn't nearly as ambitious. Heck, if Zoro lost his memories of the previous timeline and met Luffy like he was now, he would have never allowed himself to follow a man with an ambition worth less than his own.
But somewhere deep inside, Zoro still believed that this boy in front of him will become the Pirate King. Even though Luffy was now different and didn't proclaim that he will become Pirate King with every breath, Zoro just knew that he will become Pirate King. If anything, that was the universal truth of the whole world. If it wasn't, then Zoro was prepared to make it happen, no matter how messed up he turned out to be.
Plus… Zoro turned away from the boy to hide his smirk.
The conflict in those eyes revealed that somewhere deep inside, that despite what he says, Luffy still desires to become Pirate King.
It was just that there was a horrible something that was stopping him from wanting to dream that dream again.
But at least... this was still Luffy.
Zoro the swordsman. Nami the navigator.
They had addressed themselves as such. Nothing more and nothing less.
He quickly learned that Zoro held the third sword with his mouth and Nami's magic wands shot bubbles and did weird stuff with the weather. Zoro liked training, sleeping, and slicing. Nami liked yelling, navigating, and money. What mysteries.
Yet, Luffy felt some sort of connection with these strangers. He felt comfortable to be with them. He felt right to rely on them. To trust in them.
To say Sabo shared the same thoughts was a lie, but Luffy knew that his brother no longer suspected these two people of anything bad. That was good. He didn't know why, but he wanted Sabo to accept Zoro and Nami… even though he barely knew them either— which felt wrong to say. He felt like he knew them somehow, and that they knew him. If Luffy believed such things, he would say that they must have known these people from another lifetime.
He quickly deemed this a mystery feeling.
A couple days later, when they were all planning to restock at a near island, Luffy accidentally broke the sail of one of the ships. He didn't know exactly how, but he was playing with some aggressive birds and things turned sour quickly.
He could sense an aura of ferocity emanate from Nami as she berated him for doing something so stupid. Suddenly she raised her hand like she was about to smack him on instinct as if she had done it many times, and Luffy could feel it coming. He expected it to happen.
But she didn't, to his surprise. She stopped herself and she lowered her hand. Then she started shaking and tears streamed down her face.
"Nami? You're crying," Luffy was confused. He didn't know what was going on, but seeing the Nami react this way made him feel angry. His mystery feeling flared as they reminded him of some forgotten and non-existent promise to make sure this girl never cried again.
The girl clenched the front of his vest tightly, like she was making a knot. She suddenly seemed to be very angry.
"Eh? What's wrong?" Luffy gaped, but felt compelled to just tell her that everything was going to be okay, Even though he didn't know exactly what was going on. He glanced at Sabo, who only looked at the scene with equal confusion. Luffy then caught Zoro's gaze. It was neutral and untelling as usual, but he had a feeling that the swordsman understood Nami's sudden outburst.
"...Everything's okay," he finally said. This only caused the navigator to shake even more.
"I- I know," she forced the words through her gritted teeth. Eventually, her sobs faded and she let go of the raven haired teen. She quickly apologized and shut herself in the cabin.
Subconsciously, Luffy looked to Zoro as if he expected some sort of insight. The man just continued on with his business, like nothing happened.
Everything's okay, his mind repeated.
He didn't have time to process those words as he felt a hand on his shoulder. Luffy looked up at Sabo gave him a reassuring smile.
"It isn't polite to make women cry," Sabo lightly advised.
"But I didn't do anything!" Luffy defended himself. "But…"
"What?" Sabo eyed his younger brother carefully.
"I don't know," Luffy placed his fist against his chest. "When she was crying, I felt really sad too. Even though I didn't know what for. And… Back when I first saw them, I felt really happy. I'm still really happy seeing them.
"It's just… It feels nice, being by their side. It feels… right to be together. Like the same feeling I have when I'm with you. They make me feel… at peace," Luffy looked up to his brother, expecting some sort of explanation for what he was experiencing. Though if there was an explanation, Luffy was sure he'd understand none of it.
"Strange," Sabo whispered into the wind as he tried to rack his brain for any clue as to what Luffy was experiencing.
When Sabo didn't give an answer, Luffy grinned and just accepted that this mystery feeling he had with those two was really just a mystery feeling.
Just like most things he found in this world.
A mystery.
Nothing more and nothing less.
Look at that. Another chapter already.
I know you guys are quiet, but should I do a mini arc with these four and explore more of their thoughts? Or should I just dive into meeting Sanji and Usopp next?
Thanks for reading ~ November 3, 2018
