Author's Note: THANKS SO MUCH for the kind reviews! Still deciding on the pairing, I've got mixed stuff here...
Disclaimer: Don't own One Piece, get off my back and don't sue me…
Chapter Three: The Gate of Heaven
Nami glanced over at Hoshi. "Hoshi, could you scout a route for us?" the carrot-topped navigator asked. Hoshi grinned.
"No problem," she said, pulling out her wings. She jumped straight into the air, clipping the deck with her first downward flap, before she gained altitude and she flew about twenty meters and circled.
Zoro watched her, seeing her trim black figure outlined by her snow-white wings. His face was guarded as usual, but there was a tenderness in his eyes as he watched her fly. She looked so free…
His train of thought was interrupted by a lively little melody drifting down from the sky. Hoshi had taken out her silver flute, and was piping a song as she led the ship. It was a happy tune that made his heart lift. Luffy started square-dancing with Usopp and the both of them were laughing like crazy. Chopper was sitting on the banister and crying 'cause he was laughing so hard at the silly pair. Zoro glanced at his nakama, then looked skyward and grinned.
Suddenly, the tune stopped. "Everyone! We're almost there!" Hoshi called down. The crew looked, but all they could see was a giant cloud in front of them.
"Are you sure?" Luffy yelled. "We can't see past this big cloud!"
"You can't, but I can!" Hoshi called from ten meters above the ship's mast. "If we get around this cloud, we'll be there!"
"Can you see a way around this cloud Hoshi?" Nami shouted.
"Give me a minute!" Hoshi flew up and up… and up… and up…, then came back with a big negative. "The cloud stretches as far as I can see… It might even go to the end of the cumulorgalis cloud!"
"Should I just cut it out of the way?" Zoro asked.
The orange-haired navigator sighed. "We might have to do that…"
"Why?" Hoshi asked, touching down and pulling in her wings.
Nami got a stress mark on her head. "We can't just sail right through it Hoshi, we saw know that already!"
"Why?" Hoshi asked again. "It's a cloud."
"Did you forget about the solid clouds already?" Nami raged.
"No…"
"THEN WHY ARE YOU ASKING 'WHY'?!"
"'Cause those clouds aren't solid."
"THAT IS ONE OF THE STUPIDEST REASONS I'VE HEARD ALL DA- huh? The cloud isn't solid?!"
"No."
The crew started stifling laughter at the sight of Nami's face, though once her eye turned on them, they miraculously put on straight faces. Nami turned back to Hoshi and pointed an accusing finger at raven-haired hybrid. "You're lying!"
"No I'm not!" Hoshi said indignantly. "Look! I'll show you!"
With this, Hoshi pulled out her wings and jumped off the deck. Once she had gained enough altitude, she turned her course on the cloud…
And flew straight into it.
Luffy's eyes bugged out as Hoshi flew back out, soaking wet but grinning. She landed on the deck and shook herself off, wings and all, spraying water everywhere.
"Told you so," Hoshi said. "We can sail right through it!"
"How'd you figure that?" Zoro asked in disbelief. "It looks just like all the other clouds?"
Hoshi shrugged. "Er… I don't know really… Instinct?" she asked, cocking one eyebrow at him.
He grinned at her. "Good enough."
Luffy wasn't paying any attention. "YOSH! Make a course straight through the cloud!"
"… wait a second, if it's a cloud, can we breathe inside it?" Sanji asked, taking a puff on his cigarette.
A pause… then everyone turned to look at Hoshi, as she was the only one who had actually been inside the cloud. She shook her head, wet locks of hair flopping over her eyes. Pushing them back, she said, "You can't breathe inside clouds… not without bringing your own air. And the cloud is about seventy meters thick. There's no way we could hold our breaths for as long as it would take for the ship to get through."
"Oh…" A disappointed air rose from the crew as they pondered what to do. Hoshi lasted a moment before bursting into laugher. "Did you guys already forget that we can bring our own air with us?"
"How the hell are we going to do that?" Usopp demanded. Hoshi laughed harder.
When she got herself under control, she grinned at them all. "I can control air!"
Nami slapped herself in the head. "That's right!"
Zoro frowned. "But remember? When you defended the ship from that Shojo monkey's sound waves, you were exhausted afterwards."
Hoshi waggled her finger at Zoro. "That was different. I was trying to hold the air still, because sound waves are vibrations in the air. Now is different. It takes less energy for me to make a bubble because the volume of air that I actually need to control is less."
Zoro continued to look disbelieving, but Nami clapped a hand on Hoshi's shoulder. "Don't mind him, his brain couldn't get something like that," she said forlornly. Hoshi snickered.
A stress mark appeared on Zoro's head. "I understood," he said in an annoyed tone. "I just don't want Ho-"
A glint appeared in Nami's eye. "You don't want Hoshi to what?" she asked in an evil tone.
Zoro flushed, but tried to hide it by being playing dumb. "What the hell are you getting at?"
Nami's evil grin became even wider. "C'mon Zoro, you know what I'm talking about. Do you not want dear Hoshi to tire herself out?"
"What the hell…" Zoro muttered, turning his back on Nami, who grinned more evilly than ever.
"Do you LOVE Hoshi, Zoro?" she asked in a stage whisper. The others began to giggle as the green-haired swordsman turned redder than ever… except for Luffy, who didn't have any expression on his face, and Hoshi, who was confused by the sudden change in conversation.
"So… do you guys want to get through the cloud?" Hoshi asked, though she was unheard over the giggles. She was completely lost, because in calculating how much energy it would take to make a big bubble around the ship, she had missed the last part of the conversation.
"C'mon Zoro, spill it or I'll charge you," Nami warned.
"… charge Zoro for what? Spill what?" Hoshi asked, completely flummoxed.
"Yes, are we going through the cloud or what?!" Zoro demanded, glad to get away from this subject.
"AFTER you answer the question!" Nami smirked. Usopp and Chopper were barely containing their laughter, Robin was looking placidly amused, Sanji looked murderous and Luffy just had an expressionless look on his face.
Zoro made a choked sound and leaned back, waving both hands in the air in front of him and blushing furiously. "What the hell!" he shouted. "We're supposed to go to Sky Island!"
"Answer the question!"
Usopp was falling over himself with laughter. "Look at… how red he is!" he gasped.
"What the hell… is going on?" Hoshi asked, her eyebrow twitching.
"I think," Usopp gasped, "Zoro really likes y-"
"We need to get to the weird gate thing, remember!?" Zoro yelled before Usopp could finish.
"I like Zoro," Hoshi said, confused. Everyone stopped laughing to stare at her in astonishment, though at her next words, they all relaxed. "I like everyone on the ship. That's not really a funny thing, is it? And are we going through the cloud or not?" she demanded.
Nami poked Zoro in the chest. "You're not off the hook yet… just lettin' you know."
"Damn woman, can't you just leave a guy alone?" Zoro demanded.
"Oi you shitty Marimo head! Who do you think you are talking to Nami-san like that!" Sanji growled.
"Whatever." Zoro sulked off and settled down for a brief nap for their trip through the cloud.
"Okay, everyone, pull us into the cloud! Hoshi, make your bubble around the ship!" Nami said, barking out orders as usual.
"AYE!" everyone responded.
Hoshi sat down and closed her eyes. A power hummed the air for a second, then disappeared. She opened her eyes and grinned at the crew. "All set!"
"Yosh, everyone straight ahead!" Nami shouted. The ship moved forward… and everyone gaped as the clouds bulged inwardly and enveloped them inside a bubble.
"Wow Hoshi, you're amazing!" Luffy yelled, running around the ship.
Hoshi grinned. Hearing that she was amazing was a nice change from the laboratory responses…
"Oh my gosh, its heart rate only increased by thirteen percent…"
"Look at how it controls the wind! Spectacular!"
"How in the world did it do that? It got out of the maze in only four minutes!"
She grimaced and shook her head to get rid of the echoes. That was the past now, and she was never, ever, going to go back. To get her mind off it, she walked up to Zoro's sleeping form and poked him. "Zoro? Neh, Zoro, are you alive?"
Zoro sleepily opened one eye. "Oh it's you. What do you want?" he asked grumpily.
"Nothing… just wanted to have something fun to do."
"Poking me awake is your idea of fun?"
"Yup!"
"… do you have anything better to do?" he asked irritably. A nap would have been very stress-relieving, but it looked like that wasn't going to happen.
"Nope, not till we get through this cloud," Hoshi said brightly… a little too brightly.
"What's on your mind?" he asked, opening both eyes. "You're sounding obnoxiously happy, even for you."
Hoshi shrugged. "Nothin'."
"Yeah right."
Hoshi didn't respond, but perched herself onto the banister and bounced her heels off the railing. "I am in the craziest crew known to mankind," she muttered, looking around at the cloud they were inside.
Zoro raised his eyebrow at the subject change, but didn't comment on it. "We do some crazy stuff," he agreed. "But that's what you get for following Luffy."
They grinned at each other, and Hoshi groaned. "I sure picked one hell of a ship to drop in on." Zoro chuckled.
At that moment, they cleared the cloud, and everyone shielded their eyes against the sudden burst of light. Hoshi released the bubble, and a little wave of cool air washed over the ship.
When everyone's eyes had cleared, in front of them was the huge gate Hoshi had mentioned. Nami read the enscribed on the overhead arch. "The sign says… 'Heaven's Gate'…a gate to Heaven!?"
Usopp started freaking out. "OI, is this a joke?! It's like we're all going to die!! D-d-does this mean we're all dead?!"
Sanji lit is cigarette and shrugged. "Who knows?"
Zoro smirked evilly. "Maybe we're all dead already!"
Usopp collapsed on the deck in a sobbing heap.
Hoshi prodded him with her foot. "Moron, we're not dead," she muttered. "I'd know if we were."
Luffy had stars in his eyes. "Heaven huh? Sounds like fun! Finally goin' there!"
Nami punched him in the head the same time Hoshi did. "Idiot," said Nami.
"I already said, 'we're not dead yet', how many times do I have to say it?!"
"Hey, someone's coming out," Sanji interrupted. Everyone looked in the direction he was pointing.
A little door opened on the side, and a wrinkled old lady with her grey hair tucked into bun. She had two strange antennae looking to be part of her hair perched on her head. But almost strangest of all… there were two strange wings on her back. Hoshi raised one eyebrow at the sight of the strange wings. They were much too small to carry an infant into the air, much less a …er… half-sized adult. She came out clicking away on a strange, pink, flash camera.
Hoshi narrowed her eyes and stared coldly at the old lady.
"On her back!! Wings!" Chopper yelled in astonishment.
"It's an angel!" Luffy said, stars in his eyes.
"Are angels supposed to look like prunes?" asked Sanji.
Merry stopped under the arch, and there was a rather awkward silence. Finally, Nami spoke up. "E-excuse me…"
"I am the appointed lookout of Heaven's Gate, Amazon. Are you here to sightsee or fight?" asked the old pruney-angel person.
Nami was taken aback. "Fighting? We're sightseeing then, I guess…"
"We want to go to Sky Island!" Luffy cut in. "It's on the other side of this gate, right?"
"What do you mean 'fighting'?" Zoro asked.
Amazon was silent, then answered, "It doesn't matter which."
Hoshi felt her hackles rising.
"Just pay the immigration fee of 1,000,000,000 Extols and be on your way," Amazon finished.
"There's that 'Extol' thing again," Sanji muttered.
Usopp was counting on his fingers. "There're eight of us… so that would be … 8,000,000,000 Extols! Holy crap, whatever an Extol is that's got to be a lot of money!"
"Why the hell do we need to pay so much? We're only going in," Hoshi muttered. "The old granny must've had her wires cr-" Nami slapped her hand over Hoshi's mouth.
"Excuse me," the carrot-top called down sweetly. "About the money…if by some chance, we didn't have enough…"
"You can pass."
Usopp fell down.
"Or you can also not pass. I'm not here to stop you from doing anything. I only listen to your will."
"Okay… then old lady! We're not going to pay, but we're going through!" Luffy called.
"I see! Seven of you, yes?"
"No, there's eight of us," Hoshi said. The old lady didn't seem to hear her.
"So how do we get up to Sky Island?" Luffy asked.
As if to answer that question, two giant red claws came and grabbed the remains of what had been Merry's wings. Panic broke out on board.
"WHAT IS IT!?" Chopper yelled, crying.
"Inhabitant of the White Sea: the Speedy Shrimp," Amazon answered.
Suddenly, the ship zoomed off.
"WHOA!! IT'S A HUGE SHRIMP!" Zoro yelled.
"Oh, Sanji! Let's eat it!" Luffy shouted.
"It's moving up the waterfall!" Hoshi murmured, still suspicious about the old woman. She didn't know what to think… why were they allowed to go through without paying the fee? The phoenix let out a confused sound, echoing Hoshi's own confusion. She felt uneasy as they zoomed up the spiral falls. What was going to happen next? Something told Hoshi that their day had only just begun. She grinned. Whatever was coming, it was going to be one hell of an adventure.
And that's where I'll stop for today! You know the drill! Not postin' the next chapter till FOUR of you this time press the little button! This method of making people review seems to work, so I'm going to keep on doing it!