Disclaimer: See disclaimer from Chapter 4.

~ Witch on the Waves ~

Chapter 5: Monkey D. Luffy

For the next year, Nami and Nojiko refined their Haki, continued their physical training, and decided to branch out into the other Blues for pirate targets. They had by no means cleaned up the East Blue – there were still hundreds of pirate ships sailing the waters.

For one thing, there was a minority of pirates who didn't actually kill noncombatants; whether they were truly innocent adventurers or whether they were simply thieves, the two sisters didn't go after them. And for another, their method of finding pirates was opportunistic; they watched and listened for news of pirate attacks and then tried to track them down based on known information. It was somewhat hit-or-miss, and a lot of pirate-related events simply didn't make the news.

They had also avoided attacking Don Krieg's armada. While they were getting to the point where they might be able to take on the Krieg fleet in a straight-up battle, it would require that they use at least Armament and Observation Haki to the max, destroying ships wholesale, revealing the full extent of their abilities, and killing a considerable amount of people. And it would be difficult to prevent the ships from scattering and escaping. They just didn't see the need to do that when there were so many other pirates around who equally needed stopping.

So they held off on that for now, and went after mid-level bounties in the other three Blues. They decided that, with the Fidelius protecting their home village and with Haki as a backup, they could afford to let people conclude that they had some method of teleportation or high-speed travel. Most people would put it down to a Devil Fruit.

It was another bright, sunny day with a constant breeze, as was common in the East Blue, and the two girls were doing speed drills on the water while wearing weights, as their boat sailed along a trade route towards an island. Therefore, it was no surprise when they saw a sail on the horizon, approaching them along the trade route in the opposite direction. They quickly went back to their boat and packed up their training equipment in case they needed to fight.

As the ship got closer, they soon decided that it must be a luxury cruise ship of some kind, as the babbling of voices and violin music gave it away.

"You know," mused Nami, "Before I turned 14, I would have snuck aboard and robbed everyone on this ship. I almost feel like they deserve it for being so stupid. The lookout is slacking off, the cannons don't look like they've been unlimbered in ages, and there's some kind of highball party going on in there. This is just asking for trouble."

"Wanna hop aboard and take a look? Maybe we can nab some fancy food."

"Sure. Let's hide our weapons first."

After a bit of casual spying, they both ducked into the women's bathroom, pulled dresses out of their expanded bags, and dressed up to fit in at the party.

As they hovered around the table munching hors d'oeuvres, they overheard the captain chatting with a lady.

"Oh, no, our ship has never been attacked by pirates. We're just too large and strong for that."

"Oh my god," said Nojiko. "Did he really just say that?"

"I think he did," said Nami, equally dumbfounded. "Well, if we want to see some action, this is the place to be. Hey, do you feel that aura up on deck?"

Nojiko nodded. "It's strong, but it's… asleep? Not as strong as us or Crocus, but way above anyone else on board."

"Yeah, but usually the strongest person aboard is the captain. Maybe a passenger?" Nami focused and tried to find out something else with Observation.

A young man approached the two of them, and said to Nami, "Hello, would you like to dance?"

Nami ignored him completely and said to Nojiko, "Extend your range."

Nojiko did so, then grinned, "Aaaand there are the pirates."

"Excuse me? Pirates?" said the young man, wondering why he was being ignored.

"Yup. There's our fun for the day," said Nami.

"Fun? What are you talking about?" He was starting to get annoyed.

In unison, the two sisters counted down. "Three. Two. One. And–"

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! Cannons went off in the distance, and seconds later there were three crashing thumps as the cannonballs hit the water around the luxury cruiser, rocking it in the water.

The young man froze in fear. "P-p-pirates?!"

"Oh, man up a bit," said Nami, finally addressing him. "Pirate attacks happen every day. It's not like this is anything unusual." And before his eyes, Nami and Nojiko vanished so fast he didn't even see them move.

When they reached the deck, now in their normal fighting outfits of T-shirts and capris, wearing their weapons openly, Nami stopped and said, "What the heck?"

Nojiko had noticed it too. They both walked over to the barrel that was rolling across the deck. "That aura. Why is someone sleeping in a barrel?"

"And it's wet. Maybe he got fished up from overboard?"

Nojiko flipped the barrel upright, punched her fingers in, and yanked off the lid. Inside the barrel was a boy wearing a straw hat, sleeping away.

"Oi! Wake up! What the heck are you doing sleeping in a barrel?"

She had to dodge back suddenly as the boy suddenly stood up, stretching his fists in the air.

"THAT. WAS. THE. BEST. SLEEP. EVERRRR!" he shouted.

Nojiko's face showed her annoyance, and Nami raised an eyebrow.

"Eh?" said the boy. "What's up with you two?"

"Oh, nothing much," said Nojiko. "But you might want to duck, because there's a cannonball aimed for your head."

"YAH!" he ducked, and a cannonball flew through where his head had been and smashed into the base of the ship's mizzenmast.

"Huh? Oh, pirate attack," said the boy nonchalantly as he looked around.

"Yes, pirate attack. What were you doing sleeping in a barrel anyway?" asked Nami.

"My boat got caught in a whirlpool so I climbed in a barrel and closed the lid." For some reason he didn't seem to think this was anything unusual.

"Alright," said Nojiko after another cannonball hit the wheelhouse. "Reckon that's close enough?"

"Sure, why not?" said Nami.

And they both dashed off, launching off the gunwale towards the pirate ship.

They each released a flying sword slash just before they landed, slicing through the masts and rigging. The pirates aboard actually panicked before the two girls even reached the ship, shouting, "Lady Alvida! Lady Alvida! Monsters!"

"Hey Nami."

"Yes Nojiko?"

"Why are so many pirates…"

"So. Damn. Ugly." they finished in unison.

"No clue, Nojiko. Not even a theory. Hey you, fat lady, don't you know putting on that much makeup makes you even uglier?"

"And that big fat mace. If you're gonna accessorize, choose something that doesn't emphasize your worst features."

Alvida was now officially and totally apoplectic with fury. Her underlings cowered away.

"I'LL KILL YOU! KILL!" She raised her giant mace like it weighed nothing at all and swung it from side to side, aiming at Nami and Nojiko, when…

"GUM-GUM ROCKET!" The boy from earlier slammed shoulder-first into Alvida, sending her flying off the ship.

"Hey, you guys looked like you were having fun," he said as he nimbly landed on his feet.

"We were, past tense," said Nojiko. "You just sent the only interesting thing flying."

Nami groaned. "I forgot how boring it was dealing with weak mooks like this. Makes me just want to blast them with that, you know?"

Nojiko nodded, understanding that Nami referred to Conqueror's Haki. "So what's your name anyway, Straw Hat?"

"My name is Monkey D. Luffy! Hey, do you know where I can get some food?"

"They probably have some food below-decks somewhere. I mean, Alvida had to get fat somehow. Hey you!" said Nojiko, pointing at a pink-haired cabin boy who was cowering with everyone else. "Do you know where the food is on this ship?"

"U-um, yes ma'am!"

"Then take Luffy here to get some food."

One of the cowering men appeared to be slightly braver than the others. "C-Coby! You shouldn't… ERK!"

The "ERK!" was because Nami grabbed Alvida's spiked iron mace and started swinging it around to test its weight. Given that the weapon was twice the size she was, this looked even more intimidating than when Alvida used it.

"Eh, badly balanced and not my style. Nojiko?"

"Pass."

"Okay. Let's go find their treasure!" And she chucked the giant mace over her shoulder into the sea.

When the sisters had finished raiding Alvida's cabin, they went to the kitchen to find Luffy happily stuffing his face with meat, and the cabin-boy in better spirits for some reason.

"Ogh, mrgle mrph!" said Luffy, his mouth too stuffed to understand.

Nami rolled her eyes. "Swallow your food before talking, Luffy, or no one will be able to understand you."

Luffy gulped comically, his neck expanding to let the huge bolus of food go down.

"Hey guys, this is Coby! He wants to be a Marine!"

"Hmm. Nice to meet you Coby. I'm Nami and this is Nojiko."

Coby, it turns out, had manners. "It's nice to meet you as well."

"So, you must have been a forced conscript?" asked Nojiko.

"Yes. I was trying to take a boat out fishing one day and it turned out that was the one Alvida was taking."

"Bad luck then. Anyway, we came to tell you we're getting off this ship. There are three Marine ships on the horizon."

"Ahhh, we better get out of here!" panicked Coby. "If the Marines see me they'll think I'm one of Alvida's pirates and I'll never be a Marine!"

Luffy's reaction was different. He jumped up from the table and started gobbling down meat with both hands at record pace. It was all gone in about five seconds.

When they got up to the deck, it was deserted. They soon saw the reason: the pirates had jumped in all their lifeboats and deserted their disabled ship, realizing they had no chance in a ship with two of its three masts cut down and the rigging completely mangled.

"Let's jump back over to the cruiser," said Nami after sharing a look with Nojiko. "You guys can come with us on our boat."

"Okay!" said Luffy. He grabbed Coby under his arm and jumped the distance to the luxury cruiser, which the pirate ship had drifted closer to under its own momentum. This of course produced a "WAAAAH!" from Coby.

Despite it being almost ten minutes since the three had stopped the pirate attack, the sailors of the cruiser were still in chaos, their officers not having managed to get them in order. Obviously their emergency training was lacking. This made it easy for Nami, Nojiko, Luffy and Coby to dash across the ship and drop into the girls' boat where it was tied near the bow, cast off and sail away before the Marines got close.

~ Witch on the Waves ~

"So Luffy, you have Devil Fruit powers?" asked Nojiko as they sailed away in the boat.

"Yup!" said Luffy, grabbing his cheek and stretching it. "I ate the Gum-Gum Fruit. And now I'm made of rubber!"

"Interesting. What does that let you do?" prodded Nojiko.

"Well, I'm stretchy. And when I get hit, I don't get hurt."

"Useful. But I suppose you can still get cut by swords and things, just like regular rubber?"

"Uh-huh."

"What about bullets?"

"They bounce off."

"Very useful. So what were you doing in a boat by yourself? Going anywhere?"

"Oh, I'm a pirate! I'm the man who's going to be King of the Pirates!" said Luffy with utter confidence and resolve. "Hey, you two are strong. You should join my crew!" And he grinned.

"Hmm…" said Nami. "Do you have a ship?"

"Nope!"

"Who are the other crewmates?"

"It's just me so far!"

Coby decided to pipe up here. "Luffy told me that you should follow your dream with everything you have, even if it means risking your life!"

"Hm!" Luffy nodded, still smiling.

"And that's why I'm gonna be a Marine! It's my dream to catch badguys like Alvida!"

"That's nice. But do you realize that's not all Marines do?" asked Nami.

"What do you mean? Isn't that what Marines are for, catching badguys?"

"See, there's a reason why Nojiko and I will never join the Marines. A lot of what they do is dedicated to catching 'badguys'. But the Marines are actually just the military arm of the World Government. Their mission isn't just to catch pirates, they have to follow the orders given to them from above. Does that make sense?"

"Uh-huh. But that sounds like a technicality, why is that a problem?"

"The problem is that the World Government is led by the World Nobles, the Celestial Dragons."

At this, Luffy instantly lost his smile and gritted his teeth.

"I see that Luffy knows what I'm talking about. The problem is, the World Nobles own slaves. They kill whoever they want, whenever they want. And they are so arrogant that they think it's their right to do so, and that they are somehow inherently 'above' the rest of humanity. They even claim that they are the descendants of gods who created this world, and that this gives them the right to treat the rest of us like animals.

"And if anyone tries to disobey them, or defy them, they send the Marines after them."

Coby looked horrified, but he asked "A-are you sure that's true? Are you sure whoever told you this wasn't lying?"

Luffy interjected grimly, "It's true. Ten years ago Saint Jalmack visited Goa Kingdom. They burned down Gray Terminal and killed most of the people inside before he arrived just so he wouldn't see something ugly. When he came, he brought slaves with him, and he took more people as slaves before he left. And he killed my brother."

Nami nodded. "Sorry to bring that up Luffy. Coby, I won't hold it against you if you still want to join the Marines. There are a lot of Marines who are good people, mostly people who join because they want to do good like you. But you should know everything before you commit to something like that."

"I'll think about it," said Coby sadly. "Hey, Nami, Nojiko, if you don't want to be Marines, what are you? Are you pirates too, like Luffy?"

Nojiko and Nami laughed. "No, no," said Nojiko. "We're bounty hunters."

"B-bounty hunters?"

Nojiko nodded, grinning.

"But, but, but… AAAAAAAAHHH!" And Coby was back to being terrified. "You're the Fighting Sea Sprites!"

"That's us!" "That's us!"

"The Fighting what?" asked Luffy.

"The Fighting Sea Sprites!" repeated Coby. "It's said that they can walk on water, that they have never been touched in a fight, that they can defeat even the strongest pirates in the East Blue! They're even scarier than Pirate Hunter Zoro!"

"You can walk on water?" said Luffy.

Nojiko smirked, locked the tiller in place, and hopped out of the boat. She used Armament Haki to harden the water, walking calmly on it and keeping pace with the boat.

"SO COOOOL!" shouted Luffy. "I gotta try!" And he immediately stood up and hopped out of the other side of the boat.

With the immediate result, of course, of sinking like a stone.

Nami facepalmed. "Devil Fruit," she said. "Gonna have to fish him out." And she dived over the side to rescue him. Fortunately, Luffy really did sink only as fast as a stone, so by kicking hard on the water, she was able to catch up and grab him before he went too far.

As Luffy, spat up water over the side of the boat, Nami teased, "Hey sis, he's totally your type. He's cute, he's a pirate, and he's an idiot."

"He is not!" denied Nojiko. "Just because I said that one guy was cute doesn't mean that's my type!"

~ Witch on the Waves ~

"So Luffy, Coby," said Nami a little later after a silent conference with Nojiko. "Where do you want to go? We were sort of just wandering when we ran into that luxury cruiser earlier, so we can pretty much go where you want."

"I wanna find that Zoro guy and ask him to join our crew!" Coby had told Luffy about Zoro.

"Well we've met Roronoa Zoro, he seemed like a good guy, so he'd be a good choice. If you can convince him to join your crew."

Luffy caught the emphasized 'your'. "It's OUR crew, because you're joining, right? Right?"

Nami almost answered with a negative, but then looked at Nojiko. Something about her sister's emotions made her say, "We'll… think about it."

Nojiko nodded. "We'll talk later. But for now, where is Zoro anyway?"

Coby repeated his explanation about the Marines having Zoro.

"But who's holding him? Do you know what base?"

"I think it's the 153rd Branch, the nearest one from here."

"Oh. That's convenient. Okay, to the 153rd we go." And in a show of unified action, Nami adjusted the sail while Nojiko turned the rudder, both of them watching the sky until the boat and the sail were angled just so.

"Wow," said Coby. "you guys must be really good navigators."

"The best you'll ever meet!" declared Nojiko, and it wasn't much of an exaggeration.

"Shishishishi!" laughed Luffy. "That's why I want you on my crew!"

"You didn't even know about it a moment ago!"

"Shishishishishi!"

"Idiot."

~ Witch on the Waves ~

"Now the 153rd is led by a Marine Captain named Morgan," explained Nami the next morning as they came within sight of the base. "And Morgan, also known as 'Axe-Hand Morgan', lost his right hand at some point and had an axe-head attached there in its place. He is a corrupt, abusive tyrant of an officer. We've avoided his base so far because we didn't want to deal with him when turning in bounties.

"If you want to get Zoro out of their clutches, you'll have several options. First is to suck up to him and manipulate him by pandering to his massive ego. It should work, but it's not really your style, is it?"

"Nnnnope," said Luffy.

"Second is to use stealth, sneak in and get him out in the middle of the night. But since you don't know if he wants to join you, you'd have to deal with communicating with him beforehand. And I sense that's not really your style either."

"Meh."

"And since you're a pirate, the third option is what you'll probably do, smash in, fight the Marines, and take him in broad daylight. After asking him to join your crew, of course."

"Now you're talking."

"That being the case, since Nojiko and I don't want to get on the wrong side of the Marines quite yet, you'll have to do it yourself. Since you're bulletproof, I don't think there's anyone in the base who can really hurt you. Just stay away from any seastone and you'll be fine."

"What's seastone?"

Nami sighed, realizing that despite his earlier display of knowledge regarding World Nobles, Luffy was still largely an ignoramus. "It's a greenish-gray stone that somehow negates Devil Fruit powers, same as being dropped in the sea. The Marines have a lot of the stuff, though there's not much in the East Blue because there are so few Devil Fruit users here. Just avoid touching the stuff, and you'll be fine."

When they reached port, Luffy and Coby separated from Nami and Nojiko as they went to look for Zoro. As the two girls wandered the town, Nami raised a Muffliato and turned to Nojiko.

"You're thinking about joining," she stated.

"Sheesh. Can't hide anything from you anymore."

"Observation Haki. And I can say the same."

"Yeah," said Nojiko. "You're somewhat interested too. But you have reservations?"

Nami sighed. "I've been drawing maps and charts ever since we started on this jaunt four years ago. It's still my dream to make maps of the entire world. And you know that I have a much more efficient way of getting around than tying myself to a single ship. But you, you just want to go on adventures, right?"

Nojiko smiled. "Right. And that's not the only issue for you, is it?"

"Yeah," said Nami. "There's also a small matter of pride. Luffy is strong, and I sense an incredibly strong will under that idiocy, which will only make him stronger in future. But while he will eventually grow to be at least your equal in future with the right training, I will always be stronger than him. That makes it hard to accept him as my captain."

"That and there's some leftover male pride from your previous life."

"Hey! That's not… dammit, that's true."

"Hnnn, and you were talking like a wise old man earlier when explaining things to Coby."

"I do not sound like a wise old man." And Nami blew a raspberry to emphasize the point.

"Second childhood."

"When did your tongue get so sharp?"

"Years of keeping up with you."

"Hmph. I'll take the compliment. Anyway, I'm thinking of some kind of conditional basis for joining myself. As you said, it does sound like fun. And we were always going to go into the Grand Line. Having a crew makes it a lot less dangerous."

Nojiko smiled and hugged Nami.

"But!" said Nami. "I want to ask Luffy a few questions before we agree to anything. Just making sure he's the right kind of pirate."

"Fair enough. Now can you cast your stealth spells? I wanna go spy on the action!"

"Are you sure it isn't just Luffy you want to spy on?"

"It's not like that!"

~ Witch on the Waves ~

Later, as Nami and Nojiko were tracking Luffy's rampage through the base, Nami took an opportunity to use Legilimency on Captain Morgan.

"No bribery, but he's been using his position to levy an illegal 'tax' on Shells town," she reported under a silencing spell. "He's spent a lot of it but there's still a bunch in his personal safe."

"Great, let's take it," said Nojiko.

"You keep following Luffy, I'll go grab it."

When the fighting was over, they followed Luffy's aura to a little restaurant near the Marine base, where Zoro had apparently made friends with the owner's daughter, a little girl named Rika. Coby was there too, just kind of… fading into the background.

Zoro was eating like a man who had starved for a month. Which he was.

Luffy was eating even faster.

"Nami! Nojiko! Zoro joined our crew!"

"Our crew? We haven't agreed to anything yet!" objected Nami.

"The Sea Sprites?" asked Zoro, while stuffing his face with food.

"Hey Zoro, nice to see you again," said Nojiko.

"Like I said before, it's the Fighting Sea Sprites," said Nami.

"So your names are Nami and Nojiko?"

"I'm Nami and my sister here is Nojiko."

"Captain," said Zoro, "are you sure you're a pirate? It seems like you're recruiting a bunch of bounty hunters and you're friends with a boy who wants to join the Marines."

Luffy laughed. "That's me! I'm going to find the One Piece and be King of the Pirates!"

"So why do you want to be King of the Pirates anyway?" asked Nami.

Always happy to talk about his dream, Luffy explained, "The King of the Pirates is the strongest and freest person in the world!"

"So it's not just about finding the One Piece?"

"Whaddya mean? If I find the One Piece, I'll be King of the Pirates."

"I think what Nami's getting at," said Nojiko, "is that finding the One Piece isn't enough to be King of the Pirates. If you found the One Piece today, the only thing that would happen is every other pirate in the world would attack you and try to take it from you."

Nami nodded. "I think if you want to be King, you first have to face all of the strongest pirates in the world and either conquer them or get them to acknowledge you as their leader. I'm not sure what's in the One Piece itself, but I doubt the treasure itself will make you that much more powerful."

Luffy laughed. "Sounds like fun," he said, and he meant it. "So are you gonna join my crew?"

"We'll talk about it on our way to our next destination," said Nami. "And speaking of our next destination, look what I found in Morgan's personal safe."

She pulled out a piece of paper that said:

"I.O.U.: One map of the Grand Line. –Buggy"

There was a little drawing of a clown face in the corner next to Buggy's signature.

"Ooooh," said Nojiko. "Now this sounds interesting."

"A map of the Grand Line!" said Luffy. "We have to go find it!"

"Eh," said Nami, "It's just a standard Marine map of the Grand Line, not all that accurate and missing a lot of details. We've already got a couple of those."

"The interesting part," said Nojiko, "is that Buggy the Clown is supposed to have Devil Fruit powers. And we haven't fought a lot of Devil Fruit users before, so this could be a fun fight."

Luffy laughed, pounding a fist into his palm. "Sounds good!"

"And he's also got a 15 million Beri bounty," added Nami. "Which we should collect while we still can. Speaking of which, there are some Marines on their way here, and if Nojiko and I don't want to be recognized we have to go. When you leave, grab our boat and get out to sea, we'll find you and join once you're out of sight."

Zoro and Luffy nodded their understanding, and the two girls vanished.