Ch 54 - I am with Family.
A long time ago, and what now felt like another lifetime for Emmy, she had seen a shooting star. It had streaked across the sky and faded in and out of her existence within a heartbeat. It was just a brief moment yet it was enough to make a lasting impression on her. She never forgot it and could only wonder if she'd ever see it again.
She couldn't help but get the same feeling around Ace. He was a ball of blazing light that went from one place to the next. Even though she wished he could stay for as long as possible, she knew that it was not up to her to decide. All she could do was look at him wondrously and hope that he would be nearby for just a bit longer.
Emmy was so preoccupied with Ace's presence that it completely eclipsed the grueling trek through the harsh desert. They had been walking for hours and the sun was not letting up. The usually rambunctious pirate group could hardly make conversation. Their sole focus was to take one step in front of the other without inhaling whatever water was left. There was no idle conversation, no chatter, and the only sounds were that of heavy breathing. Well, one of the only sounds.
"Gehhhhhhhhhh...Gehhhhhhhh," Luffy moaned. He held a walking stick in both hands and he used it to stab into the sand in front of him with every step, "Gehhhhh."
"Stop moaning so much, Luffy," Nami said, "You'll only tire yourself out."
"Gehhhhhh!"
"He's not listening," Zoro grunted while pulling Chopper behind him on a makeshift sled.
"I don't even think he's talking...Those aren't words," Sanji said, who despite the circumstances still managed to be up for a cigarette.
"I can't go on...I can't take hot weather…" Chopper gasped with his tongue rolling out the side of his mouth.
"Vivi-sama, you seem to be doing fairly well," Emmy commented.
"I was born and raised here, so it doesn't bother me much," Vivi said.
"But what's with all these hills?" Usopp complained, "I figured a desert would be more flat."
"Gehhhhhh!"
"This is a very old desert, so some sand dunes here are over 300 meters high," Vivi explained.
"Oh god, it's like climbing a mountain!" Usopp gasped.
"Gehhhhhhhmmmmy," Luffy gasped, "Can I drink my water now?"
"It has been a while since you had your first sip," Emmy said, "I guess it's alright if you take another-"
"Waaaater," Luffy moaned as he adjusted the water barrel strapped to his back and stuck the straw into his mouth.
"Remember, Luffy, you have to conserve it! Remember to keep your sip small," Nami advised.
"Eh?" Luffy asked as his cheeks expanded into giant balloons.
"Don't drink so much!" Nami and Usopp shouted as they both punched Luffy hard in the back of the head.
"Let me have some too!" Usopp seethed, "That was 13 mouthfuls just now!"
"Hold on!" Sanji leapt into the action and pointed a finger right in Usopp's face, "You just had some. I'm next!'
The three boys started to duke it out and they tumbled right down the side of the sand dune.
"Stop fighting! You'll only waste strength!" Vivi cried.
Emmy blinked and she looked at Ace, who didn't even have a sign of sweat on him. "It must be nice having the Flare-Flare Fruit...This heat must not affect you at all."
His eyes met hers and they crinkled up into a smile. "How about you, Emmy? Do you need some water?"
Emmy shook her head. "I'm okay. I can go a bit longer without it."
"You're a lot tougher than you appear...but then again, I guess you'd have to be if you lived with Luffy on Mt. Colubo."
Emmy smiled sheepishly. "Luffy and Gramps took care of me a lot during that time."
"Eh?," Ace asked as he raised his eyebrow, "I wouldn't call Gramps' training any form of 'care'."
"Gramps never trained me. If anything, he thought of me as too delicate...not tough."
"Really?! The old geezer actually shows mercy?"
"OY! EMMY!" Luffy roared and came racing towards his sister with eyes narrowed and fists high up in the air, "Let me have your water."
"You moron!" Sanji seethed as he held Luffy's confiscated water barrel in his hands, "We just said that you lost all your water privileges for the day since you drank your fill. Don't go stealing it from Emmy-chan!"
"Emmy doesn't need it," Luffy whined. He reached over towards Emmy but just when he was about touch her smaller barrel, she gently pushed his hands away.
"No," she said simply.
"WHAT?!" Luffy gasped.
"No," Emmy said again and she smiled patiently at her brother, "Are you thirsty now?"
"Of course! It's hot and-"
"Luffy," Emmy warned, "Don't lie to me. Are you feeling thirsty or are you just hot?"
Luffy opened his mouth but then after a second, he clamped it down into a pout. "...I'm hot..."
"So do you need water?"
"...No…"
"Can I keep mine then?"
"...Yeah…"
"Thank you," Emmy said and she looked up at the sky, "You know...the sun seems to be going down. Once it's night time, that means we can set up camp, make a fire, and-"
"FOOD!" Luffy cheered as he found a new motivation in life. He raced to the front of the group, down the sand dune, and continued on into the horizon. The only trace of him left behind were the footprints and the sand he kicked up.
"Where is he going?!" Zoro asked, "It's not like we're heading towards a restaurant and it's not about distance. It's a matter of when the sun sets!"
"Just be glad he left all the water in our possession," Nami sighed.
Emmy noticed that Ace was looking around the group with a blank expression. He didn't look amused, angry, or even indifferent about his brother's actions. It was a complete poker face. Inside though, Emmy was close enough to feel it. He wasn't happy in one or another. Nor was he upset or worried. He was just at peace, content to just be a witness to the group's antics.
By the time night fell and the group had set up camp, everyone besides Vivi, Chopper, and Ace were surprised to find themselves shivering with cold.
"It was so hot during the day! What's going on?!" Nami asked as she sat as close to the campfire as she could while huddled up next to Vivi.
"With nothing to block out the temperature, the desert scorches during the day and goes below freezing during the night. The desert is fraught with unpredictable dangers," the Alabasta native explained.
"Wow, look at those stars!" Chopper said brightly as he laid on his back and enjoyed the chilly air that he was born to withstand.
"Aren't there stars on winter islands too?" Usopp asked.
"Winter island skies are always covered with thick snow clouds," Chopper sighed, "So I've never seen so many stars before."
"Ah, you're so warm and fluffy!" Usopp said as he flung his arms around Chopper.
"Quit it! Get off of me! I'm trying to watch the stars!" Chopper seethed as he morphed into his human transformation.
"Chopper," Zoro growled from his seated position next to the reindeer, "Don't turn big. We need your warmth."
"Yahoo!" Luffy yelled as he leapt onto Chopper and causing a mix of limbs between him, Chopper, and Usopp, "Ah so warm. Isn't this nice?"
"I...I guess?" Chopper asked weakly.
Emmy giggled as she sat next to Ace under a pitched tent. They both watched their mutual sibling. "Luffy was probably like that with you and Sabo-san too, huh?"
Ace's face cracked into a smile and he leaned forward against his knees, "Ah. He hasn't changed at all since he was a kid. Despite how he selfish and unreasonable he seems at times, people are still naturally drawn to him. He's always got this mysterious charm."
Emmy smiled wistfully at the Straw Hat. "Must be nice...to know Luffy so well and for so long...I wish I had met all of you sooner…"
"Me too. Especially since Luffy and I were more rough around the edges than Sabo so if you had grown up with him around, it might've made your time on Mt. Colubo a bit less stressful," Ace sighed, "I wonder how different it would be having a little sister around."
Emmy fell back on her hands and her fingers sunk into the cold sand. "What? Little sister.. I...I didn't mean to...I'm not trying to say that I am your sister...I didn't mean to overstep my bounds."
Suddenly, she saw two hands stretch out and grabbed onto Ace's shoulders before Luffy pulled himself to sit right in front of his siblings. "Shishishishishi. Emmy, why are you so surprised? If you're my sister and he's my brother, then of course you're his sister too."
"But...sake cups...Sabo-san...and...and..." Emmy couldn't even sit up let alone form a complete sentence.
"Chopper, do you think Emmy is having a stroke?" Usopp whispered to Chopper, "Because she's just saying stuff that makes no sense to me."
"Some signs are there but not concrete enough for me to make a diagnosis…" Chopper murmured back with utmost sincerity.
Ace held out a hand and pulled Emmy back up to a seated position so that they were eye to eye. "You do make a good point."
Emmy smiled with relief. "Please don't feel obligated to think of me as your sister just because Gramps-"
Ace clapped his hands and rubbed them together. "No. I mean you made a good point about Sabo and the sake cups. I mean, there has to be some sort of ceremony for us to become siblings, right?"
"Yeah! Sanji! Go get some sake!" Luffy cried.
"Idiot! We're in the middle of the desert!" Sanji shot back.
"No need for sake," Ace said and he rubbed his chin, "Besides, sake wouldn't be fitting for an older brother to exchange with his younger sister."
Emmy's mouth fell open but no words came out. The only thing she could do was just blink dazedly at Ace. A smile stretched across his face when he got an idea. He reached up to his hat and pulled off the string off the beads that lined the rim of his it. He then held it up between him and Emmy, letting the two blue beads with face painted on them dangle in front of Emmy's face. "A fitting present for an empath, don't you think?"
"For...me?" Emmy gasped as Ace draped the beads over her head. They felt heavy around her shoulders but it was oddly comforting to her.
"Yep," Ace said and then held out the palm of his hand, "Now what do you got for me?"
"Me?...I...I don't have anything," Emmy said and then she held up her wrist to show him the bangles on her arm, "Do you want one of these?"
Ace laughed and held up his arm next to hers so she could see that his wrist was three times the size as hers. "I don't think it'll fit."
"Oh dear…" Emmy said as she nervously smoothed her apron. She let out a little gasp when her finger hit a bump in her pocket and she hurriedly pulled out her deck of cards, "How about this? It's my weapon!"
"Your weapon?" Ace asked with a raised eyebrow, "You want me to take your weapon?"
"I can get more! And...and you're Ace so…you should have cards!" Emmy said with a firm nod.
Ace laughed again and he took the deck out of her hands. He shuffled through it and took out the Ace of Spades. "Here. I'll just take this one. That's enough for me."
He handed Emmy back her deck and then patted her on the head. "There! Now the ceremony of is complete, we are officially brother and sister. Although..."
"Although?" Emmy and Luffy asked.
Ace smirked when he saw how the two sat with each other, with a knee touching the other's and both leaning slightly toward one another. "Although, I wonder if I should consider you a sister or a sister-in-law…"
"Eh?" Both Emmy and Luffy stared at Ace in confusion.
"Law? What does the law have to do with it?" Luffy asked.
"Is there an official document that we need to sign?" Emmy asked and then bit her lip, "Oh dear. We didn't sign anything either, Luffy. Does this mean we're breaking a law?"
"We're pirates! What do laws have to do with us?!" Luffy huffed.
"That's true," Emmy said and then her shoulders relaxed.
Ace doubled over and he laughed until he was out of breath, which confused his younger siblings even more. When he had finally gotten a hold of himself, he threw an arm around Emmy's shoulder and pulled her closer to him while directing a mischievous smile to his younger brother.
"Well then, it's time for us to go to bed. Say good night, Emmy!"
"Good...Good night?" Emmy repeated breathlessly, unsure of what was happening anymore.
"What?!" Luffy raged, "What are you talking about?"
"What? I'm a Flare-Flare Fruit user so my body is naturally warm and it is very cold right now," Ace said as he flicked Luffy right in between the eyes, "What can you do for our little sister? Inflate into a hot air balloon and bounce around her? Idiot."
"I can do lots!" Luffy fumed and he wound his arms around both Ace and Emmy. He slammed himself into them and created a makeshift Emmy sandwich, "There! Now Emmy can be warm on both sides!"
"What in the world are you guys doing?!" Nami asked.
Zzzzzzz!
"THE TWO BROTHERS FELL ASLEEP ALREADY?!" Nami, Usopp, and Chopper shrieked.
"You idiots. Look at what you're doing to Emmy-chan!" Sanji seethed as he pushed up his sleeves and began to stomp over towards the siblings but was stopped short by a firm hand in front of him.
"Leave them," Zoro grunted, "It's their family business."
"Family…" Emmy murmured to herself as she felt Ace's chin resting against the top of her head while Luffy's hold around her loosened but still remained right around her waist, "Family…"
Sanji sat at the edge of his shared tent with Usopp, Chopper, and Zoro as he enjoyed a quiet, late night cigarette while the camp slept. Well, somewhat quiet. His highly tuned ear and romantic heart could not miss the sounds of a lady crying, no matter how muffled and faint it was.
Yes. He had spent enough time with this crew to know that the first mate had some crying fits every now and that all she needed was the captain at her side. However, these recent times...Something about it was different that kept the cook up at night.
It wasn't the frequency of her fits that was disturbing. After they left Arlong Park, she had maybe two or three episodes up until they reached the Grand Line. Then, after they left Whiskey Peak, she was practically crying every night.
It was the way she was crying that made it hard for Sanji to sleep at times. Before, they got on the Grand Line, her cries would be more of horror or panic. Much more breathing that would quiet down and go back to a normal steady rhythm after some coaxing from Luffy. Now...her cries were just that. Cries.
Full of tears and sorrow. So much sadness that seemed couldn't be resolved.
Sanji puffed on his cigarette as he looked over at the first mate's tent.
"She okay?" he heard Ace ask the captain.
"She'll be fine," the captain answered back, "Leave it to me."
"Ah. I will."
"Whoa! I found a shrimp! Emmy! Wake up! I found a sand shrimp!"
Emmy's eyes flew open and she let out a strangled gasp when she remembered her sleeping arrangement. It wasn't like her to sleep so deeply and comfortably and yet somehow she had managed to do so while sleeping next to a person she had just met less than a day ago. Given that this was person was now her brother helped her not go straight into a panic attack. Still, Emmy sat up from her place with her heart racing and her face bright red while her other brother waved something above his head a few feet away with Usopp and Chopper next to him.
"I didn't know shrimps lived in the desert!" Chopper gasped wondrously.
"They don't," Usopp said as he leaned in to take a closer look, "But this sure does look like a shrimp."
"Could this be a 'desert shrimp'?" Chopper asked.
"It looks yummy!" Luffy shouted.
"Stop! Luffy-san! Throw that away!" cried Vivi as she scrambled out of her shared tent with Nami.
"No! That'd be a waste!" Luffy replied.
"That's a scorpion! It's small but it's very poisonous! You'll die if it stings you!"
Chopper and Usopp immediately backed away from the small creature with frightened looks plastered on their faces while Luffy just sighed and tossed it over his shoulder. "Oh. It's not edible? How boring…"
Vivi bowed her head. "I'm so sorry. I should've mentioned it earlier."
Emmy slowly crawled out of her tent, leaving the snoring Ace behind, and when she got out, she saw that Chopper's ears had perked up and his nose was sniffing diligently.
"Dr. Chopper? What is it?" Emmy asked.
Luffy blinked. "Eh? Is something wrong?"
Chopper spun around and climbed to the top of a nearby boulder so he could look out further into the horizon. "Something is coming," he stated.
"Something? What?" Usopp asked.
Emmy heard the sounds of fabric flap behind her and then Ace strolled past her as he stretched his arms up into the air. "Morning," he yawned and then tilted his head up towards his hands, "Huh. Seems like the wind is picking up."
Vivi gasped at those words and she turned frantically to yell towards the camp. "Everyone! Get behind the rocks, quickly!"
"Huh?"
"A storm! A sandstorm is coming!" she warned.
"Oh?" Ace asked with a grin and a hand over the brim of his hat, "This should be interesting."
"Oh dear," Emmy said as she bit her lip and ran around collecting all the loose items that were strewn about.
"Oy, Emmy," Zoro growled, crawling out of his own tent and not missing the opportunity to "accidentally" kick the cook awake on his way out, "Stop cleaning up and get the hell behind a rock."
"But we need-"
"We need to stay alive. Those things aren't that important," Zoro said. He grabbed her by the collar dragged her behind a rock where Nami was already crouched.
"Oy! What was that for, you jerk?" Sanji grunted.
"Ugh! No time for that, Sanji-kun! A storm is coming," Nami lectured.
"She's right. There's no time! The sandstorm is going to hit us at any minute!" Vivi warned, seeking sanctuary behind another boulder with Luffy, Usopp, and Chopper.
Just as she finished the words, a violent wind swept through the camp and whipping every inch of exposed skin with sand.
Sanji leapt clear over the rock to cover Nami's body with his own. "I'll protect you, Nami-swannnn!"
Emmy was about half a foot away from the rock and the wind was so strong, she didn't think she had the strength to push forward so all she could do was grab unto the next sturdy object, which was the swordsman.
"God, Ace, you lied!" Emmy heard Luffy complain through the howling winds, "This isn't interesting at all! Deserts are nothing but storms."
This was followed by the distinct sounds of wood snapping and then a tent flew right over their heads, tumbling off into the distance.
"The tent!" Emmy gasped.
"Don't worry about it! We'll just use Chopper next time," Zoro grunted.
"I am not a rug!" Chopper screeched.
"I'm sorry, you guys! I forgot to mention that sandstorms are one of the many dangers in the desert!" Vivi apologized as if that would ease up the winds.
"Mention it sooner!" Usopp lectured.
"Hahahahah."
"How can you laugh at a time like this, Ace?!" Nami screamed.
"You guys are funny."
