With their captain's voice calling their names still ringing in their ears, the Straw Hat Pirates woke up and gasped for air in unison.

In her cabin below the main storage room, Nami sat upright in her bed, her hands frantically grasping at her orange hair and at her face. She stared out in the dimly lit cabin, her eyes darting around as if she expected someone to be there, looming over her like a shadow. But the cabin was empty, and the only sound that was heard was the soft creaking of Merry's hull and a distant call of seagulls gathering somewhere on the ocean near the ship.

"What a nightmare…" Nami muttered to herself as she swung her legs over the edge of her bed and reached for her shoes. She definitely didn't want to go back to sleep with that dream still in her thoughts.

At the same time, in the men's cabin below deck, the four male crewmembers awoke in a small, almost controlled chaos. No one knew exactly who woke up first, but while Sanji accused Zoro of being so noisy that he could raise the dead, Zoro objected and said that he only woke up because Chopper had fallen out of his hammock and landed directly on the swordsman's face again. Chopper on the other hand claimed with tears still streaming from his eyes that he had woken up - and fallen out of his hammock out of pure surprise - because Usopp had screamed, and Usopp said that he woke up because Sanji had been cursing loudly so early in the morning.

For a moment or two, there was a loud cacophony of voices filling the lower cabin, where everyone were either complaining about having their sleep interrupted, cursing out the others for being too damn noisy too damn early in the damn morning, or simply screaming nonsense because their minds had yet to return to a state of actual consciousness.

When no one could come up with anything to say without repeating themselves for a third time, the noise in the cabin faded out into silence, and left the four crewmembers standing there, still rubbing their eyes and yawning widely. Sanji was the first one to break the dazed silence as he fished out a cigarette from the breast pocket of his shirt and lit it casually.

"Whatever," he said coolly, casting one last accusing glare at Zoro before turning to climb the ladder to the upper deck. "I might just as well startmaking breakfast, since you noisy bastards probably woke poor Nami-san from her beauty-sleep."

And with that, he left the cabin, completely ignoring the others telling him that he had been the one who had started shouting in the first place.

Closing the hatch to the lower cabin, Sanji straightened up and stretched. Sitting by the mast all night was murder for the back, and he was thankful that he could find another place to sleep the next night. The joints in his arms, back and legs gave faint popping sounds as they softened up and became easier to move. Yup, he would definitely find another place to sleep at this coming night.

Feeling a bit more refreshed, but still rubbing his lightly aching neck, Sanji walked across the deck and up the stairs towards the galley. Carefully stepping over the sleeping Carue, who lay curled up with his beak tucked under his wing outside the galley door, the cook entered his domain.

In a way, he had already predicted that he would find Luffy in the galley, since the captain hadn't been down in the men's quarters earlier. However, a small part of his mind had been annoyingly optimistic as it had tried to convince him that he would find his captain caught in the giant mousetrap or in one of the snares, and it was that part of him that was deeply disappointed as he stepped into the room.

Even in the dim light from the not yet risen sun, Sanji could see the many empty plates covering the table to his left. And there, between the stacks of plates, the cook could clearly see the outline of a person leaning over the table top.

Walking across the room, a vein swelling mildly in his temple at the thought of all the food that had to have vanished during the few hours he had left the kitchen unguarded. As he reached up to light the lamp hanging from the ceiling, he expected the sleeping captain to stir or at least make some sound in response to the sudden flash of light. However, he was disappointed, as Luffy didn't even move where he sat with his head against the wooden table. Disappointed and a little creeped out.

"Luffy?" he tried, keeping his voice steady and a bit accusing, since he had no intention to let his captain think that stealing food was okay. Still no response.

"Luffy, come on, get up, I have to make breakfast," he tried, a little louder this time, accompanied with a light shake to the captain's shoulder.

The creeped-out feeling only grew stronger when Luffy didn't even twitch by the mentioning of 'breakfast', and it was soon transformed into cold terror, as Sanji leaned over his sleeping captain, only to find that the boy's eyes were wide open and empty. Blinking, the thought 'Who sleeps with their eyes open?' had the time to form in Sanji's mind before he noticed that there wasn't even the slightest rise and/or fall of the boy's narrow chest. Luffy wasn't breathing.

Being forced to deal with something like this in that time in the morning, Sanji couldn't think of anything else than to do something he usually never would do.

He panicked.

– e – e –

Just like any morning aboard the Going Merry, the rest of the Straw Hat crew began to slowly prepare themselves for a new day shortly after Sanji had entered the galley to make breakfast. Diffuse calls of 'Come on, you've been in there forever', 'Don't use up all the warm water', 'What warm water? You used the last drop of warm water last night', 'Oh, I'm so hungry', 'Zoro, get your lazy ass of the couch and pump up some water' and 'Do it yourself!' could be heard all the way up to the crow's nest, where Vivi was just gathering her empty tea mug and a book she had borrowed from Nami and wrapped them in the blanket she had wrapped herself in during her guard shift. With the bundle held tightly in her arms, she started to climb down from the crow's nest.

There was something she had forgotten about - she could feel it poking at the back of her mind, but couldn't seem to remember what it could be.

– e – e –

Since he had been the first one to get up from the cabin below deck, only minutes after Sanji, Usopp was also the first one to emerge from the main storage and the bathroom to greet the new day. Or rather stare grumpily at the all too bright sun for a moment before deciding that it could be ignored until after breakfast. He turned his eyes towards the main mast just as Vivi made her descent from the crow's nest where she had spent the night during her guard-shift.

"Good morning, Usopp-san," she called down to him, leaping down the last few meters onto the deck. "Did you sleep well?"

"Morning," Usopp replied, bending his stiff neck left and right. "Yeah, pretty well. Most of the night, anyway. I had this really creepy dream…"

"You had nightmares as well?"

Usopp and Vivi both turned towards the main storage, from which Nami just walked out onto the main deck, looking a bit more tired than she usually did in the mornings. Usopp nodded and folded his arms across his chest, shivering lightly in the chilly morning air He wished that he had kept his t-shirt on instead of throwing it in the growing pile of dirty clothes down in the cabin.

"Yeah. You too?"

"Oh, I forgot!" Vivi's hands moved to cover her mouth as she looked at the marksman and the navigator with an apologizing look in her eyes. "I meant to tell you… In these waters, there are certain places called Dark Spots. They're places were bloody battles were fought, and where many ships have sunk over the centuries. They say that one can see signs of increased paranormal activity in these places. In short, Dark Spots are places where you can see ghost ships or see ghosts walk around on your own ship."

"G-ghosts?" Usopp stammered, suddenly turning three shades paler. "O-oi, Vivi, you're supposed to tell us these things in advance!"

"I-I'm sorry," Vivi said, bowing apologetically. "Anyway, if we're in the area I think we're in, it would explain the nightmares…"

"Only if the others had nightmares as well," Nami filled in, looking both curious and critical at the same time. "So, what kind of 'ghosts' are there here?"

"Well, it is said that a pirate ship sank here over a hundred years ago," Vivi said, tugging at a few strands of her blue hair. "The ship's name was Pilgrim, and the captain was a well-known man who was nicknamed 'Whitecape', because of the pure white cape he always wore.

"Somehow, they had lost their Log Pose, and were therefore hopelessly lost in the Grand Line. No one knows exactly what led up to it, but they say that Whitecape went insane and slaughtered every single one in his crew, and then the ship mysteriously sank to the bottom of the ocean. He's said to haunt the dreams of anyone who anchors here, and people are said to have died in their sleep in this area. They say that he detests seeing people sailing together, because he feels guilty for what he did to his own crew."

"W-w-what are you saying, Vivi?" Usopp asked, his knees trembling lightly. "You mean that we could have all just died in our sleep, because of some guy who kills us in our dreams or something?"

"Come to think of it," Nami said thoughtfully. "I think I remember someone dressed in white in my dream. I could just see him in the corner of my eye, as if he wanted me to know that he was there…"

"Haa…?" Usopp thought for a moment, his brow knitted together in a deep frown. "I think I saw him as well… In my dream, I was back on that slope outside Syrup Village, trying to defend my home from the pirates. I was all alone against the pirates, and when I realized that I wasn't going to be able to hold them back, I just tried to shoot the leader, but…"

"But?" Nami urged Usopp to continue, clearly eager to hear what happened next.

"But one of the pirates aimed a gun at my head and fired. Just as I thought that I could feel the bullet hit me, I heard Luffy's voice calling my name, and that's when I woke up."

"That's just like my dream," Nami said, a bit less eagerly, but still with a curious tone in her voice. "Only I wasn't shot. But I heard Luffy's voice right before I woke up."

"Chopper had a really bad dream," Usopp nodded towards the little reindeer, who had stumbled out onto the deck while shielding his eyes from the sun with his cloven hooves. "He said something about Wapol eating him alive, and he was really shaken when he woke up. I don't know about the others, though."

"Speaking of others," Nami interrupted, placing her hands on her hips and looking about the main deck. "Has anyone seen Luffy yet?"

"He wasn't downstairs when we woke up," Usopp said simply, shrugging. "I guess he snuck up to the galley to steal food again. Sanji'll probably kick him out at any moment now. I think Zoro fell asleep again when we left the cabin…"

"Jeez…" Nami slapped her hand against her forehead with an annoyed grimace, but she didn't say anything else, since Chopper reached up to them and shyly asked them if they had had bad dreams as well.

– e – e –

There are many ways of waking up. Some are pleasant, while others are not so pleasant. Waking up with the rich smell of a healthy and delicious breakfast tickling your senses is pleasant, while having your face slammed so hard against a table that your skin feels like it is about to fuse with the wood, at the same time the heel of a custom-made shoe is threatening to shatter your skull… is somewhat less pleasant. Unfortunately for everyone aboard the pirate ship Going Merry, the former way of waking has always been shortly followed by the latter, or sometimes even replaced by the latter - at least when it comes to the ship's captain.

When Luffy woke up, he found himself in just that situation, with his face flattened out against the wooden table in the galley of Going Merry and the hard heel of a custom-made shoe pressing him - if possible - even further down. It took a few seconds before he was aware of anything except for that feeling of the stretchable bones of his skull bending in places that shouldn't bend even on him, but then he heard Sanji's voice over the slam that still rang in his head.

"Wake up, damn it!"

When the pressure that Sanji's foot put on Luffy's head was released, the captain flew backwards from the table by the light recoil his face made as it no longer needed to be flattened out against the wood. Gasping for air, almost as if he just had been dragged out of the water, Luffy landed on his back on the floor where he sleepily looked up at Sanji, now feeling a light pain in his head. The look on his cook's face was hard to read; there was both anger and (worry?) something else his eyes that Luffy couldn't see.

"Sanji? Wat izzit?" he mumbled, rubbing his eyes that kept casting his vision out of focus whenever he blinked. He found that a strange burning sensation had located itself in his lungs, and he took a few deep breaths in order to ease it a little.

Sanji sighed deeply and placed one hand on his hip while the other rubbed his forehead lightly.

"Damn it, Luffy. Don't do that, you scared the shit out of me," he said.

"Don't do what?" Luffy asked, his head turning from side to side as he looked around the galley in confusion. Now this was strange. He had been under water only a minute ago, struggling to hold his breath. He knew that, because he had felt (and was almost certain that he still could feel it) every single painful heartbeat that urged him to refill his burning lungs with anything that contained oxygen, even if it meant the water around him.

"Don't do what, you ask?" Sanji said hotly, but he cooled down a bit when he noticed Luffy's disoriented expression. "Never mind, I was just going to wake you up so that I could throw you out and start with the breakfast - if there's any food left on the ship! Now, get out."

The fact that most people wouldn't even think about waking someone up by squashing their head against a table didn't even occur to Luffy. Mostly because he was still a bit drowsy, but also because that was the way his nakama usually woke him up, and he found it rather normal to wake up with a foot, staff or even fist whacking him over the head.

"Sorry, Sanji," Luffy said with a light whine to his voice. He hadn't missed the change in Sanji's tone when he mentioned the stolen food, and he didn't really want to anger his cook any more this early in the morning. "I just had a bad dream, that's all."

"Che." Sanji ran his hand through his hair and began picking up all Luffy's plates from the table. "Yeah, well… That's what you get for eating… fourteen rations of meat after midnight."

While Luffy picked himself off the floor, still with a very sleepy expression on his face, Sanji carried the gravy-glazed plates to the sink where he immediately began washing them.

"Come to think of it, I think I had a really weird dream myself," he said, while scrubbing a particularly greasy plate more intensely. "But I don't remember what it was about."

Luffy bent down to pick up his hat that was lying on the floor next to the bench he had been sitting on. Caressing the three lines of stitches over the top of the hat, he pressed it down over his head. He watched as Sanji slowly but safely made the tall stack of dirty plates shrink at the same time a stack of clean plates was growing next to it.

"Was it about the Baratie?" he finally asked, not able to keep quiet any longer.

Sanji turned around to look at his captain, confusion written all over his face for a second before he gathered himself again.

"Yeah… How did you know that?"

Luffy simply grinned widely as he bounced up to Sanji and gave his cook a tight bear hug. He was really happy that the nightmare had just been a nightmare, and he was even happier to be awake than he had ever been before.

"I don't know," he said simply and turned to walk out through the door. "Tell me when breakfast is ready, Sanji!"

"Don't I always?"

Sanji raised a curled eyebrow as he watched his captain, who bounced out through the door, cheerfully singing a newly composed song of some kind. He gave a light sigh and shrugged before going back to washing the dishes. He'd never be able to figure out how the mind of his captain worked, but he had a feeling that he didn't want to know either. But finding the boy lying over the table with his eyes wide open and without breathing had in all honesty scared the living hell out of him. It had made him think of all the stories he had heard as a kid about people who had just simply died in their sleep without any apparent reason, even though he had trouble imagining Luffy die at all.

No, there was no time to think about that. Now that the dishes were done, he could start with the breakfast. This time, he'd make sure that the old man Zeff couldn't say anything bad about his cooking.

Wait a minute… What? Sanji hesitated in the middle of a step towards the refrigerator. Where the hell had that come from? As far as he knew, the old man was way back in East Blue. Must have been that dream I had…Damn old geezer, if he can't pick on me in person, he haunts my dreams.

– e – e –

The mornings aboard the Going Merry had always been noisy, and this one was no exception, even as the sun had barely risen over the horizon. Down on the main deck, there was a large commotion, apparently caused mainly by Zoro, who didn't seem to appreciate being doused in icy cold water that early in the morning. Nami, on the other hand, was doing quite a good job defending her actions loudly by pointing out that too much sleep would only make him grow weaker. To this, the swordsman didn't seem to have a good answer, but he stubbornly refused to give up.

However, it wasn't the voices of his nakama that kept Luffy occupied. He was lying over the neck of the figurehead with his head propped against his hands and his elbows placed just above Merry's eyes.

"… and then, they shot him, just like that. And those other pirates shot Usopp, too. And Nami was with that stupid Arlong-guy again…"

He grinned as Merry creaked just as he stopped speaking, and he nodded cheerfully.

"I know. It wouldn't have been the same without any of them. I'm really glad I met them, and I'm glad I met you too. You're the best ship ever."

He stretched out his arms and legs to wrap them around the neck of Merry's figurehead in a tight hug. Another rasping creak was heard from the depths of the ship, and Luffy didn't have to use his imagination to understand what Merry had to say. He knew that she loved and depended on them just as much as they loved and depended on her.

An image of Merry lying on her side near the port of Syrup Village, her hull completely shattered and covered in long, even slashes suddenly flashed through Luffy's mind, and he opened his eyes. Peering down towards the water, he thought for a moment that he saw something white just below the surface; something that only rose to the surface and then sank again, as if to check up on him.

"I knew that you were lying…" Luffy said quietly, his eyes still fixed on the glittering water below. "I knew that you weren't the King of Pirates… And I told you that I wouldn't let you touch them…"

Ever since Vivi had told Luffy about the Dark Spot and what was said to have happened there, the captain thought that he understood what had happened during the night, and he wasn't happy about it. However, as he watched the spot where he had seen the piece of the white cloak rise to the surface, he felt that they were out of harm's way, and that he no longer needed to be on his guard to protect his nakama.

Releasing the tight grip around the figurehead, Luffy rolled over to lie on his back and peered up towards the crow's nest, from which Vivi just began climbing down, her foldedblanketheld tightly against her chestin the chilly morning air. He lay still there and watched the clouds go by in the sky above for a moment, before he pushed his hat over his eyes while waiting for Sanji's breakfast call.

While Zoro and Nami continued their bickering, Carue was running around on the deck, quacking loudly and flapping his wings while Chopper did his best to translate what the duck was saying about some dream he had had. It was safe to say that the translation did not make much more sense than the loud quacking. But Luffy grinned under the brim of his hat and tucked his hands behind his head.

The sound of his nakama quarreling had never sounded more wonderful so early in the morning.

/End.