A/N: This chapter is FINALLY done! I'm so glad that I got it out in time! I hope everyone who lives in the U.S. had great Thanksgiving's and... I hope those who don't live here had great Thursdays! I can't believe its December already... Enjoy the chapter!
CHAPTER 6: Ailments
With a satisfied huff, Franky sets down the object he had been working on. It wasn't completed just yet, but it was good enough for now.
The large cyborg stands up from his workbench and stretches his legs, careful not to knock anything over as he walked out and away from the workshop.
The whole situation with little Luffy and Ace bro wasn't super at all. With one look, the blue haired cyborg could tell the two boys were scared, even if they didn't like to show it. They didn't even know what was wrong with Luffy yet. Robin had been couped up in the library since breakfast and it roughly an hour before lunch now. (Even then, Chopper, Nami, Brook, and Little Luffy had to coax her down to eat with them.)
Franky passes by a room and he hears a shriek of laughter. Quietly, he peaks through the small opening and smiles.
"Ace! No!" Luffy manages to wheeze out before another loud peal of laughter escapes his lips.
Ace sits on top of the rubber boy, tickling him furiously, a mischievous grin on his face.
"Thought ya could get away with drawin' on my face could ya?"
"NO!" Luffy laughs and squirms.
Franky doesn't even bother holding back his laughter, causing both boys to turn to look at him.
Luffy doesn't hesitant to start screaming and squirming. "SAVE ME!"
Franky only laughs harder. Ace takes this as his cue to start tickling Luffy harder than before.
"What are you three doing?" Brook says, walking next to Zoro.
"TORTURE!" Luffy shrieks in laughter. Zoro peers over and smirks at the sight of the younger Luffy trying and failing to knock Ace off of him.
"Punishment." Ace says with a wide grin still in place.
"Hurry up with that. Robin's figured it out."
Franky, Ace, and Luffy all turn to look at the two swordsmen.
"Really?!" Luffy says excitedly, trying to sit up. Ace rolls off of his younger brother and grabs a rubber hand to pull the slightly breathless pre-teen up.
"Yes! Robin-san did look a bit worried still!"
"Eh? She looked more interested to me."
"Yohoho, perhaps it was both?"
"We are we just standing here! That's not super!" Franky says after a moment of watching Zoro and Brook's exchange. The large cyborg pushes the youngest two in the room forward, more gentle than one would have thought that his large metal hands would have been capable.
Of course, not that the hard metal would have necessarily hurt Ace or Luffy in the first place. At 15 and 12, the boys were considerably strong for their ages.
The two were quick to get the message and scramble out of the room after Brook and Zoro.
Franky hopes whatever Robin has found isn't anything severe. But, after Luffy reaction in the forest yesterday, the cyborg doesn't expect anything less.
With a silent sigh, the flicks the light off behind him and join his crew members.
Robin is silent as the crew gathers around her, only looking from her notes when Luffy and Ace follow after Zoro and Brook. The woman wants to chuckle; Luffy looks like a little duck, following after Ace and the older men with a happy smile on his face.
Robin desperatly hoped this situation would do nothing to harm that carefree and bright smile that had given her freedom two years previous.
She wouldn't let that happen and she didn't need to be told that the crew felt the same.
And Ace is rather interesting too.
But since she had met him after the Marineford incident (never had the Straw Hat crew seen their captain so upset, even if he had succeeded) Robin knew that Ace was interesting.
After all, how many sons of the Pirate King so happened to be living and thriving, not to mention the precious brother of her own beloved captain.
With one look, Robin knew that he had probably had a childhood similar to hers. Seeing him at the age of fifteen thus proved that thought.
He still had shadows in his eyes. But, these shadows lifted instantly whenever he saw or heard Luffy speak.
The obvious devotion and love those brothers held for one a another was almost scary.
To this day, Robin was truly elated that Marineford had been a success for their side.
"Ne, Robin!" Luffy sings, bouncing over to the older woman. "Zoro-ossan said that you know about the thingy?"
Robin allows herself to chuckle when Zoro loudly says "Oi!" And she's not the only one: Nami grins, and the boys all laughs, while Sanji is close to guffaws.
The swordsman glares at Sanji and then karate chops Luffy on the head; not that the twelve year old feels it.
"I'm not an ossan, I'm twenty-one!"
"Are you sure, ossan?" Sanji says with a shit-eating grin, stressing the final word. "I'm pretty sure I can see a gray hair in the grass you call hair. Did grandpa forget to dye it this week?"
Sanji's coo causes Zoro's eye to twitch and for him to draw out Shusui and Sandai Kitetsu and to bark out a string of insults that has Nami inbetween the two in an instant.
"That's enough, you two! We have more important things to talk about right now!" Nami scolds and when Zoro and Sanji sit down, they at least try to look like they're not sulking. "Robin, you said you found out?"
The dark haired woman nods and instinctively reaches for one of her books.
"The symptoms Luffy had in the forest and what he told us sounded familiar to me. I had read something similar in a few books in the past; including this one." she taps the book laying on the table. "I wasn't completely sure, but now I'm almost completely positive."
Robin pauses briefly, as if figuring out how to put what she wants to say next in proper words.
"Luffy... In the forest, I believe that a poltergeist, or rather, a troublesome spirit, has chosen you as its... target, so to speak."
The room is quiet for a few seconds before Usopp, Brook, and Chopper scream in fear over the possible spirit in the room with them. Nami stands up and tells them all to be quiet, visibly worried, if not scared herself.
"Sooo… I'm being haunted by a ghost thingy?" Luffy asks right away.
"Yes, you could say that."
"Oh, okay." Luffy says, nodding before he looks out into space. "OI, GHOST CAN YOU POOP?"
"DON'T ASK IT THAT, YOU IDIOT!" Nami and Usopp yell, nearly jumping over the table to slap the younger boy on the head. They get a hold of themselves before they can actually do it, of course.
Ace has a worried grimace on his face, and he reaches over to grab Luffy's wrist. Luffy turns his head to blink at his older brother, before Robin get his attention again.
"There is a way to get rid of the spirit, of course, but we'll need to go back into the forest to do so."
"But it'll make him feel like that again, won't it?" Ace asks, slowly. He desperately didn't want his little brother to suffer at the hand of a spirit, but he didn't want Luffy to go back into the forest to suffer due to the spirit. There was no real way to win. Ace wished he could beat up the spirit, if it were possible.
"Unfortunately, it probably will give Luffy a similar reaction as yesterday. But, in this situation, it's best if Luffy comes along. It's not certain but we may have found the reason of why the two of you have been made younger."
"Robin, you think the poltergeist has something to do with it?" Usopp says, still looking scared.
"...Possibly. I believe it may have some involvement, but it's still a guess. We won't find out until we venture into the forest once again. Of course, we do know what we're looking for this time."
It's clear to all of the people in the room that Robin is very interested in the subject and wants to find out as much as she possibly can.
Zoro nods and rests his head against the wall. "Got it. Tomorrow morning we're going back into the forest."
Silently the crew nods, while Ace bites his lip.
Tomorrow he'd make sure whatever made Luffy feel that was would never bother his little brother ever again.
Ace, however, isn't the only one whose thinking.
No one notices the small little crease in Luffy's forehead or the determined look in his eye. They probably don't notice it because they're gone almost in a flash when Luffy's stomach growls and he starts begging Sanji for food.
Tomorrow was going to be interesting.
A/N: Oookay, chapter 6 is done! I'm... not to sure about mistakes in this chapter, tbh, but I hope you guys enjoyed it! I enjoyed writing it.
Also, I should probably tell you guys there's going to be about 3-4 chapters left! (including the epilogue)