A/N: This is an ongoing project for 30 kisses.

Not the owner, not making money, not looking for a suit.

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2. news

Delivery on the Grand Line was nearly impossible, which was a terrible shame, as Nami missed being able to take the newspaper on a regular basis. She hated feeling out of the loop, but at least between Robin, any islands they stopped at, and her own collection, she had plenty of reading material.

She supposed, ultimately, it was actually a plus that they couldn't be easily tracked, because it wasn't difficult to do the math--she knew that the combined bounty on Luffy's and Robin's heads was 109,000,000 berries. (Well, actually it was 179,000,000--239,000,000 if you added in Zoro's--but fortunately she, like the rest of them, was blissfully oblivious of this latest development for the time being.)

Still, when they went for any length of time without sighting land, like now, it was always a bit of a torture. What, exactly, was going on in the world? There had been plenty of times when their lack of knowledge on current events was painfully obvious, and it's not like Luffy's disregard for such apparent luxuries as "common sense" wasn't bad enough without the rest of the crew often being left clueless. Lack of knowledge about one's opponent was, to Nami's mind, akin to a kiss of death--though, she reflected, they had done all right so far even with their ill-informed captain.

This was what was on her mind the day the storm hit. It had been completely sunny for the last couple of days, but the oppressive humidity in the air left Nami not entirely surprised when she saw the clouds on the horizon. Not to mention the fact that this was, after all, the Grand Line--it was difficult, but Nami was learning to unlearn what she knew about the natural progression of weather.

Not long after she made the announcement to the rest of the crew, the storm hit.