A/n: So for not updating for so long!
AND YAY FOR COMPLETING TWENTY CHAPTERS!
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Chapter 20
Nami tapped a finger against her knee, chewing on her lip as she eyed the activity around her. Freddy had come up to her some time ago and suggested that they leave the storehouse and move to another location. But with Zoro's injuries and the unconscious Sanji, Nami didn't want to risk being seen - or worse, getting caught – by the enemy. She couldn't just leave them there alone either. Zoro may definitely be able to protect the two of them, but Nami didn't want to risk it. She absolutely refused to leave them, again. Her frown deepened and she began chewing her thumbnail as she focused on the two men in the back of the large room.
The entire space had been cleared out and put back to how it originally had been. They had taken away all the medical equipment as well, save for a thick futon Sanji was now lying on, a couple of first aid items and the two I.V bags in Zoro's lap. Nami sighed, the warm breath tickling the sensitive tip of her thumb, and made her way towards the two.
"Zoro—"
"Go."
"Eh? What—"
"Nami, you staying here is of absolutely no use. I can take care of both of us. Besides, I'm sure you have other things you have to do."
"Zoro, I am not leaving you and Sanji-kun again."
"What about Luffy?"
Nami frowned down at Zoro's spiky green hair, wondering whether it was better that she was talking to his head than to his face, considering how terrifying she was sure it looked at the moment.
"What about him—"
"Where is he?"
Zoro's voice was sharp and cold, like the blade of his katana, and Nami felt herself shrink from the rumbling sound of his rage, that seems to surround him, like angry, black thunderclouds.
"I-I don't know," Nami stammered, involuntarily taking a small step back, one hand unconsciously reaching to the Clima Tact tucked in her waistband. When Zoro half turned his head, just enough so she could see his three earrings, Nami flinched so hard, she almost fell backwards.
Zoro seemed to pause, as if he'd seen her stumble, and sighed, a low, forlorn sound that made Nami's stomach sink even lower.
"Then why are you hesitating? If you don't find him, who will?"
The way Zoro said it, it could've almost been accusing, but from his strained voice to the way he refused to look at her, Nami knew he was doing all he could to stop himself from grabbing her and physically throwing her out.
"Yeah… but—"
"Nami—"
Zoro was cut off by a sudden shockwave that passed through the storehouse, rattling the broken shutters and causing dust to come off the boarded walls. Everyone straightened up immediately, body and mind on high alert, ready for something to attack them.
Zoro's eyes slowly scanned the ceiling, like he was expecting something to crash through a huge gaping hole and swallow them up. Nami instinctively reached out towards the swordsman, wanting to make sure a sudden rift in the earth wouldn't separate them.
The rumbling mellowed down after a moment, the dust still hanging off the walls and the ground, everyone still frozen in place, all senses alert for danger. Nami slowly relaxed her shoulders, letting out a low, shaky breath. She was just about to chuckle and make an offhand comment to Zoro, when there was a high, ringing sound in her ear. Nami clamped her palms against her ears and winced, the sound was so sharp, it was making her teeth chatter. From the corner of her eyes she noticed several people screaming and groaning and most of them began to panicking and ran out.
Another shockwave passed through the ground, causing the earth to shake.
"What the hell…" Nami spun around, her keen senses picking up the imminent danger she knew was coming.
"Zoro…" she breathed, her voice barely a cracked whisper. She opened her mouth, willing her voice to come out louder, but he had heard her.
Zoro grabbed Nami by the waist and pulled her down, twisting her around and draping her upper body across Sanji.
"Stay down!"
The humongous explosion that followed, swallowed Zoro's loud booming voice and everything else around them.
Nami forced her eyes shut and wrapped her arms around Sanji's head just as the entire storehouse was swept off its foundation. She felt the pieces of wood and metal bounce off the ground around them. Some crashed against Zoro who was hunching over them, forming a protective wall and small pieces struck her arms and other parts of her body that weren't covered by the swordsman. She clutched Sanji tightly against her, whispering calming thoughts to herself and him, praying that they would be okay.
After a time, when there seemed to be nothing else left of the warehouse to come crashing against them, a thick cloud of dust settled on them. Nami raised her head slightly and immediately began to choke. She couldn't breathe from the amount of dust swirling around them. Her head snapped to Sanji and she bent low, trying to make out if he was still breathing. Unable to tell from all the fine particles that clouded her senses, she threw out her hand and groped the air.
When her palm rested against what seemed like Zoro's warm, sculpted cheek, she immediately pulled herself towards him, using his neck as a hold. She gasped into his chest and trembled against him, shuddering from her ragged breaths.
"We need—we need to.. get out.."
Zoro didn't respond, but leaned towards her, reaching out behind her, and realizing what he was doing, Nami wriggled under his arm and tried to push herself up. A sharp pain shot through her and she collapsed against the swordsman's side, clutching her leg and gritting her teeth. Her eyes watered as she squinted at the rather large piece of wood that had impaled her calf and she swore loudly, a lump forming in her throat.
Zoro looked up from hooking his arms under Sanji so he could carry the cook bridal-style and eyed Nami, searching her body for the source of her pain. His already furrowed eyebrows knitted some more, and he thrust out his elbow to Nami, sitting back on his haunches and lifting the cook off the ground in the process.
Nami groaned and shifted all her weight on her other leg and arms, dragging herself up onto Zoro's back and winding her arms tightly around his neck. He grunted once and heaved himself to his feet, carrying all of both Nami's and Sanji's weight by himself. Zoro turned and shifted, as if debating where the exit was. Nami tapped his shoulder and propped her chin against his throat.
"Walk straight all the way to the front. Make sure to keep your eyes on the ground so you don't stumble."
Zoro nodded once and followed her instructions, taking careful steps through the dust and debris. Nami's shoulders hunched together and she bent her head as another spasm of choking coughs wracked her body. Zoro coughed every now and then, but from the occasional hissing sound he made, Nami could tell he was mostly holding his breath.
She shifted slightly so she could crane her neck and look down at Sanji. She wasn't sure if he was breathing, and from the peaceful expression on his face, neither could she tell if he was in pain. Zoro suddenly stopped short and groaned, bending to one side and pulling back his left elbow. Nami immediately pulled the leg wrapped around his waist free and propped it on the ground, shifting her weight off Zoro and onto her own foot.
That seemed to bring instant relief to him and he hissed slowly, bringing Sanji closer to him, like he was trying to use the cook as a barrier against the pain. Nami tried to hop on her one good leg, but almost fell face first into a huge chunk of what used to be the storeroom's wall, when her ankle got caught in a tangle of bent metal. She could feel the way Zoro tensed under her arm and sighing, pulled herself up onto his back before he forced her to.
The slow winding path to the exit through all the fallen and broken pieces of the once-storeroom seemed to take hours, what with their injuries and all the smoke, dust and debris holding them back. Finally, Nami saw the faint glow of the afternoon sun and let out a sigh of relief. She stretched her arms out in front, to make sure Zoro didn't blindly crack his head against something, and her palms rested against broken wood and bent metal. She opened her mouth and let out a string of curses, even as her palms moved back and forth, looking for a crack or dent or some small space that they could make it out through.
Finally, Zoro grunted and sat down abruptly, laying Sanji on the ground and allowing Nami off his back. The carrot-haired woman hopped over to the large wall of debris that blocked their path and pulled out her Clima Tact. She had been afraid to use her weapon in case she trampled the people that were still inside the storeroom, but considering the fact that the entire right wall of the storeroom had collapsed and there was no way anyone underneath could have survived, she decided it was now or never.
Fixing the cyan rod to its full length, she pulled back, so one end of the tube faced the corner where the fallen wall had doubled over on itself, creating a large, perpendicular, whose only weak point seemed to be the frayed edges where it had collapsed. Drawing in as much of the murky air she could without collapsing in a fit of coughing, she yelled hoarsely, "Gust Sword!"
The hurricane of wind shot out from the Tact and blew outwards, creating a large, gaping hole in the thick wood and bent steel. Nami was thrown back due to the force of the blast and her poor footing, causing her to crash directly into Zoro and send them crashing to a stop a few feet away.
Both groaned, as they got to their feet and Zoro cussed, rubbing his head where it had hit whatever it was behind him. Nami smiled sheepishly at him and sighed in relief at the slowly clearing air. They sat there a moment, breathing in and out deeply and filling their lungs with much needed oxygen, before they hobbled across the room, grabbed the unconscious cook and made their way out the hole Nami had made.
They squinted in the afternoon sun and collapsed to the ground, gasping. Zoro lay Sanji down gently and examined him, to make sure his wounds hadn't opened or he hadn't acquired any new ones. Nami sat back and eyed the damage, her eyes going as big as saucers when she saw how the huge storehouse had been completely destroyed. She snapped her head in the direction the explosion should have come from and noticed that it wasn't very far at all, barely sixty or so metres away from where they were.
There was nothing left of the source of the explosion, but a large black circle with stray debris scattered out in a huge circumference. Some of the warehouses and buildings nearby had sustained quite a lot of damage, but it seemed like theirs had been hit by the full blast of the explosion, as there were no other buildings between the source and where they were.
"Oi!"
Nami glanced back to see Zoro hunched over Sanji, ear to his nose and palm against his chest. From the way the swordsman's frown was deepening, Nami knew it couldn't be anything good. She went up to them and sat on the other side of Sanji head, nudging for Zoro to move back so she could take a look.
Once she'd confirmed that Sanji was breathing - although very shallowly - she helped shift him into a better position and sat back and watched his chest slowly rise and fall, the adrenaline rush finally settling down to give in to fatigue and exhaustion. She could feel her eyes slipping shut even as she tried to keep herself awake.
"It won't do much good if you give in now, would it?"
Nami and Zoro jumped back and grabbed their weapons, Zoro growling and Nami hissing, when they recognized the voice and then saw the silver-haired girl standing in front of them.
Diara tilted her head like she always did, and gave them both a wide-eyed look, before glancing down at Sanji. She squatted by his head and looked at him for a moment. Then she reached out and brushed a strand of his hair from his face.
"He doesn't look very good. I would say, the best for him would be to get off this island as soon as possible."
She looked up and glanced between Nami and Zoro once, before standing up and patting her dress into place.
"Well Nami-san, Freddy-San and the others have already started to make their move, I think you should join them?"
Nami looked at Diara once and then at her leg, which was torn and bloody and hastily wrapped, and then at Diara again. The girl eyed Nami's leg with somewhat of a disappointed expression and then sighed – which seemed to shock the two more than her usual sudden appearances – and nodded.
"Alright then, I shall help you with that."
She came over, put down her back pack, rummaged through it for a moment, looked around, picked up two pieces of metal that were miraculously unbent and straight as a rod, placed it against Nami's leg and bound them tightly so Nami could barely feel the pain beyond the pressure of the metal plates. She stood up slowly, leaning heavily against Zoro, and gingerly shifted her weight onto her injured leg. She winced at the jolt of pain, but otherwise it was manageable. She let out a shaky laugh and nodded, as though comforting and encouraging herself more than either of them.
"Yeah.. I think I can manage. Though if we were to get caught…"
"We won't."
Nami eyed Diara wearily and finally nodded, sighing in resignation. She turned to Zoro and tilted her chin up, as if challenging him to say something. Zoro let out a huff of breath and scratched the back of his head. He then knelt down, picked Sanji up and thrust his chin out toward the opposite direction.
"I'll you see you later, then."
And so saying, he hobbled off, a stray bandage trailing behind him and snagging on a piece of wood, causing his ankle to snap back and him to teeter dangerously. He hopped backwards and after some drastically evasive maneuvers, successfully ripped the undone bit of bandage and shuffled off. He widened his shoulders more, but from how the tips of his ears were red, Nami could tell he was embarrassed.
She chuckled lightly and turned toward Diara, intent on getting away from that place before she changed her mind. Zoro's words echoed in her head as she followed the girl,
"What about Luffy? Where is he?"
A/n: And, she's off to find her captain!
The situation right now: All of the crew are on the island, bust separated. Chopper, Brook and Usopp are most likely on Sunny, Robin and Franky are still in the destroyed factory, Zoro and unconscious Sanji are in one of the warehouses, Nami and Diara are headed toward Zeher's mansion with Freddy and the others, Amoret is most likely still in the red-light district and Luffy is god knows where. Yup, that's about it. The identities of the three mysterious hooded figures from the previous chapter and Zeher's whereabouts will be revealed soon enough.
Stay tuned for more!
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