-x-
Pinwheel
pouring out
-x-
How the marine manages to get ahold of him is a mystery to Nami.
Maybe, in the midst of a light-hearted retreat from an army of weak-but-persistent marines, Luffy was careless. Maybe the cadet just got lucky. Either way, Nami is close enough to hear the snap of the sea prism stone cuffs closing around Luffy's wrist, to see it out of the corner of her eye. Luffy goes face-down in the dirt with a grunt of surprise, his left arm twisted behind his back, the stone pole jamming between his shoulder blades. Nami snaps her staff into threes and flips the resulting batons into their proper formation.
She swings her Clima-Tact, a chains of dark thunderheads lancing out. The surrounding marines yelp in surprise because they haven't seen this technique yet - only wind blasts and obstructive clouds that they can't push through. Those were merely inconveniences, hemming them in to aid the pirates' escape.
Now, Nami is angry.
Every marine within twenty feet of her drops in a charred heap, writhing as the lightning's current pulses through her bodies. She hears Usopp ("Hey, watch what you're doin' with that thing…!") and Sanji ("That was electric, Nami-swan~!") as she hastens to where Luffy is still pinned down. The lightning didn't hurt him, of course, but the hefty marine that caught him also collapsed on top of him. Luffy has his free arm outstretched in front of him, his chin resting on the ground - the picture of misery.
"Thanks, Nami," he groans, the words pushing out like he can't quite get his breath.
Under all that weight and sea-stone, he probably can't. Nami heaves the marine off of him, huffing, "Be more careful next time, you idiot!"
A slender hand blooms at her waist when she kneels beside Luffy, presenting the keys. By the time Nami unlocks the cuffs and Luffy leaps to his feet, Zoro is running past, only bearing one sword to fend off enemy attacks, about fifty vengeful marines in his wake.
"You got him?" he calls to Nami.
"I got him!"
She throws the pole and handcuffs aside, scowling as they clatter on the ground. The nerve of someone, cuffing him. Nami thinks, suddenly, if she ever has to see him in chains she wouldn't know what to do with all the rage shaking out of her body. She turns on Luffy, then, to jab a finger in his chest.
Quit screwing around, she wants to say, in the same heavy way that Zoro has. (Stop making me worry!)
Luffy is righting his hat, fingers tugging at the straw rim to draw it down across his forehead. When he lifts his head, he turns to her and grins, love and gratitude pouring out of him like water from an overturned basin. He doesn't even have to say anything.
Nami huffs out a sigh through her nose, plants her hands on her hips.
"A rescue is 1,000 berries, you know!"
Luffy laughs, "Alright~"
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(A/n) LuffyxNami Week 2015! Day 2. Protect!
-BobTAC
