My Class Meets One Piece 10: Let the Game Begin!
About an hour after Jessica told us her plan, we started getting prepared. For the most part, that went off without a hitch That is, until I had to get dressed. What were we wearing? Let's just say to make sure that Sanji's cause of death wasn't due to loss of blood through the nasal passages, he had a blindfold on.
"I'M NOT WEARING IT DAMNIT!" I shouted from my hiding spot behind some bushes. Everyone was getting frustrated with me and my refusal to wear the agreed upon clothing for Operation: Get-a-boat-so-we-can-win-the-race-and-get-lotsa-money. The plan was also known as Operation: Get a boat. With a twitch of her eye, Nami's voice snapped back,
"Zoey, you better wear it or Kami-sama help me, I'll wring your scrawny neck! " Rick-James poked his head into the bushes where I was hiding and said,
"Just wear the damn thing Zoey, 'cause I bet good money on us to win the f!#king race!" A blush spread across my face making me look reader than an overripe tomato (if that's even possible). I covered myself to the best of my ability as I kicked the guy out of my view and into a wall, leaving a footprint on his face.
" HENTAI NO BAKAYARO(1) RICK-JAMES!"
"OK, that's it Zoey!" Ana said as she grabbed my arm from the bushes and jerked me from my hiding spot. The red on my face spread to the rest of my body as Sanji fainted because he took off his blindfold. I felt like I was in "Girls Gone Wild". Side note there, I've never seen that show, but I've heard enough about if from Rick-James to know what it's about. I was wearing a turquoise swim suit, but it was one that I would NEVER wear, even it I was stone drunk. The top barely covered the breasts, making me look flatter than normal and the bottom felt more like a thong. I should probably mention that all of the girls, Nami and Robin included, were wearing this kind of swim suit in different colors.
"I feel like this top is cutting off the circulation in my boobs...and can someone wake up Sanji-hentai before he dies? No, wait, ignore that last statement." I murmured as I kicked Sanji's fallen form and crossed my arms in front of myself to try and keep warm in the cold night. Chopper stuffed lots of tissues up Sanji's nose while we went over the plan just to make sure.
"OK then, everyone got it?" Jessica asked from the huddle. We all nodded, but Luffy asked,
"I don't get it, how're you gonna know the guard out like that?" Randy put a shoulder around Luffy and said,
"All in good time my naïve captain. All in good time..."
"In the mean time," Al said as he pat Luffy's back, "We need to give you a little talk that we know as 'The Birds and The Bees'."
"What do birds and bees hafta do with this?"
" ...please tell me that he knows what we're talkin' 'bout. I was scarred for life hearing about it in middle school; I don't wanna go through it again." Brian said with a sweatdrop forming behind his head.
"Nope."
"Damn..."
"Maybe we should tell Anaguma about it too..."
"Poor kid's gonna be scarred for life." Oh yeah, Anaguma told us that he wanted to go back to his Grandpa on Gasparde's boat, so we're gonna take him there. What? Did you think we were cruel enough to just drop the kid in the ocean and say, 'Good luck finding them'? Well, if you did...to be honest I'm not surprised really.
While the guys told Luffy the wonders of how a baby is born, the rest of us got ready to start Operation: Get a Boat. The boat yard was in our line of eyesight and there was a single guard. He looked like he would rather be anywhere else but here. He appeared middle-aged, maybe old enough to be coming out of his mid-life crisis.
Great. This guy's about the same age as my dad. Oh boy... I'm gonna have to go to a hell of A LOT of confessions at church and shrinks to get this off my mind and conscious...
"Everyone ready?" Ashley asked.
"I'm just gonna say this now so ya'll don't have an excuse for sayin' that you didn't hear me...no good can come from this at all." Maggie said as she shook her head side to side.
"Didn't need to tell me that, I already know it." Gabbie said as she adjusted her top.
"Well, if that's it, the let's go." Bri said. I gulped as I nodded with everyone else.
Oh dear God in heaven please forgive me for what I'm about to do. I didn't want to even do it in the first place, so does that count? Please say that it does.
With that, we came out from our hiding spots and walked over to the guard very seductively.
"Excuse us sir," Nami purred out. We decided that she and Val would do all the talking. After all, Val once argued with a store clerk long enough to get the price on a dress to go from 150 dollars to 90, "We reeeaaallly need your help..." I rolled my eyes when she dragged on the 'really', but managed to stop before he noticed.
The man seemed to sweat just by looking at us. Why not? We were ten teenaged girls in clothes that a hooker would probably wear in the heart of Las Vegas or New York City.
"Shu-shu-sure! Wha-what can I he-help you lovely ladies wi-with?" he asked.
Sounds like someone's been smoking one too many cigarettes lately...
"We're in that big ol' race, but someone sank our only boat! Do you think a smart, strong man like yourself can sell us one?" Val pouted as some of us hugged the man.
Oh boy,no male can resist her pout. Even the gay ones can't. I really gotta find out how she does that!
"Bu-bu-but I'm nuh-not a real kar-carpenter," He started to stutter out before Nami ran a finger under his chin and said,
"That's ok. All we need to see is the biggest boat you have." That was the signal. Summoning the little dignity I had left, I hugged him with everyone else. With all of us in his face, he was knocked out from a nosebleed in no time. With him out of the way, I rubbed some blood off my swimsuit while everyone dropped him.
"I can't believe it worked." Maggie said in disbelief.
"It is official ya'll, I've seen and done everything now." Val said as she shook her head back and forth. Jessica raised an eyebrow and said,
"You really gotta think before you speak Val, that sounded SO wrong."
"Awh! Get the image out of my head!"
"Zoey! Zoey, remember, every time you hit your head you loose a hundred brain cells and a point on your IQ! Zoey...ZOEY!"
"I see flying pie...I like pie... I think I'll sing the pie song! OOOOhhhhh..."
"Does Reader-san do this often Knife-san?"
"You have no idea Robin, you have no idea..."
"ONE, TWO THREE! AND SHE'S DOWN FOLKS!"
"...Ok, for that Rick-James, YOU get to carry her onto the boat."
"F!#K!"
When I woke up, I was on a hard wooden floor that was gently rocking back and forth. I rubbed by eyes and stood up. What did I see? I saw that everyone was trying to figure out how to operate the ship we were on. It was a pretty nice one actually. The entire boat was a rich brown color, indicating that this boat had never sailed before. There were two main masts, which had two rectangular shaped sails hanging down on them. To my right was a door and on each side of the door were stairs leading up to a higher deck. It was the same on my left, only on the floor, there was a door leading somewhere else. At the front of the ship was a figurehead that looked like a panther about to pounce. Luffy was sitting on it, with a big grin on his face.
Nami's voice interrupted my observation of our new boat.
"Guys! A gale is coming, get ready!"
"Hey Zoey!" someone shouted. I looked up to see Val was on the lowest mast, " 'bout time you woke up! C'mon up here, I need help untying something!"
Good thing I'm not afraid of heights.
So I found a very unsteady rope ladder that took me up next to Val. She was struggling to get the last corner of the sail untied.
"Hurry up and get that sail undone ya'll or we're gonna miss that gale thing!" Pete ordered from his position in a crow's nest. Chip was clinging to him like...well, like a monkey to the last banana.
"Ok, from the looks of it, this goes here, and that goes there..." I murmured to Val as we tried to go as fast as we could with that knot.
"Thirty seconds until impact!" Nami announced to us. My left eye twitched as I shouted back,
"You don't need to tell us! We're doing the best we can!"
"Twenty seconds!"
Clearly she doesn't care about us being stressed outta our minds...Damnit, I cave under pressure! Then Val's eyes lit up.
"Zoey, hang on. I'm gonna try and burn this rope. Just make sure that to put it out before it spreads, ok?" Before I could respond, she got a look of concentration on her face. The tip of one of her fingers caught on fire and she smiled. What finger was it? Let's just say Randy saw it and thought Val was flipping him off.
"Ten seconds!" Val put the tip of her finger on the rope, catching it on fire. When it broke through, I made sure to stop it from burning. Here's an interesting tidbit for you guys: putting out a fire by wetting your fingers and pinching the flame DOES indeed hurt.
"Hold on!" Nami shouted. Val and I didn't have enough time to get down on the deck, so we held on to the mast. No sooner than we put our arms around the wood, there was an enormous blast of air that sent the boat forward. Here's the weird thing, the path that we had to sail was going UP a mountain.
"Anyone else wonderin' how the hell we're gonna sail up a f!#king mountain?!" Grant asked as we got closer and closer.
"We'll just do what we did at the Reverse Mountain: sail on!" Nami said while Chopper steadied the boat. He was in his Human form and was at the wheel. After we got used to the wind pressure, we were able to freely walk around and Val and I were able to get off the mast. Well, I stayed up there because it had a really nice view.
"How is this even possible?!" Maggie asked from her position next to Nami.
"Our world is much more different that yours, Ghost-san," Robin stated. Maggie seemed a bit depressed that her new nickname was 'Ghost-san', " The things that occur in the Grand Line defy all logic that one might have known before sailing on it. Sometimes you can't even trust what's in front of your own eyes."
"That almost sounds a bit poetic." I whispered to myself.
"YOSHA! Here we go!" Luffy shouted in excitement as we actually started sailing up the mountain.
"I can't believe that it's working." Bri said in disbelief as she looked over the railings.
"Hey," Ussop said, breaking our amazement, "what are we gonna name the boat? People usually name their boats on their first journey.
"Oi! As captain, I say that we name it Bear Polar Bear Lion!"
"IT DOESN'T EVEN LOOK LIKE ANY OF THOSE THINGS!" we all shouted.
"I say we call it the S.S. Rick-James Bitches!"
"No."
"The Flying Monkey?"
"The figurehead is a panther Pete."
"I have an idea,;" Jessica whispered. We all looked at her, waiting to hear the name, "Well, back home, the Pro football team is the Panthers and they were able to go to the Super Bowl in 2004, despite being the underdogs. And the figurehead looks like a Panther about to attack. So maybe we would call it the 'Crouching Panther'."
I took some thought into consideration. The Carolina Panthers DID go to Super Bowl XXXVIII when everyone said it was impossible, giving us the nickname of the 'Cardiac Cats'. It was also the closest Super Bowl game that almost resulted in an over-time. And not to mention, they broke the record for the longest offensive play in Super Bowl history when Jake Delhomme threw Muhsin Muhammad an 85-yard touchdown pass. It sounded good to me! Ah, that was a good Super Bowl,too bad Justin Timberlake and Janet Jackson had to ruin it. (2)
"I like it."
"Me too."
"I dunno what football it, but it sounds cool!"
"I think I can live with that."
"I think it's a great idea Jessie-chan!"
"So are we all in an agreement?"
"YEAH!"
"OK then! From now on our new nakama is Kouza Kurohyou!(3)" Luffy announced. Our shouts of happiness would have echoed throughout the island, but there it seemed like everyone who lived here came to see all of the ships off.
Now, most people say that the youngest child craves attention in life. Bullshit. I'm the oldest child of two younger sisters and I LOVE having people's attention on me. So when I saw everyone cheering at us (I pretended that the rest of the boats were nonexistent), I just HAD to go to the railing and wave to people.
"Hi everyone! Don't worry, we're gonna win this race!" I heard Ussop shouting to the people. Looking around the boat, it seemed like almost everyone except Zoro, Nami, and Robin were waving to our new audience. That is until we heard what they were saying to us,
"You guys better loose! I pet my life's savings on Gasparde!"
"I bet on the two giants, so don't you do anything to them or I'll hunt you down and rip your lungs out and feed them to ya!"
"If you do anything to make me loose my bet I'll wring your necks with my bare hands!"
Needless to say, this scared the shit out of us.
I really miss the Southern hospitality of home right now! I've heard more death threats now than the day I went to visit one of the public schools back home.
The whiff of a combination of smog and something burning filled my nose. It sort of reminded me of New York City (4). I followed the scent to a large metal ship. It sort of looked like one of our steamboats back home gone wrong. Twin black clouds of smoke were leaking out from two pipes on the ship, making Bri and Ana go on a rant about Global Warming.
"That's Gasparde's ship, The Salamander. It's one of the first ships that doesn't use sails." Robin informed us.
"I don't see what's so special about it really. Back in our world, we have a bunch of ships like that that are even bigger and hold thousands of people." Al said in a bored tone. Maggie elbowed him in the ribs for that comment.
"Uhhh, guys," Chuck said from the crows nest, pulling our attention away from Gasparde's boat, "are you sure this is a mountain?"
"I'm pretty sure, why do you ask?" Nami asked.
"Cause the end of the water just drops right in front of us!" Now our attention was on the front of the boat. Sure enough, the water only continued for another 100 yards and then vanished.
"OH MY F!#KING GOD!"
Author's Notes:
(1) HENTAI NO BAKAYARO RICK-JAMES!- roughly translates to: Rick-James you dumbass pervert!
(2) Sure, it was on the news, TV and newspaper, but I saw it first. (Yes, I was able to go to that Super Bowl. My dad knew someone who knew someone who knew someone who knew the MAN! So he took my sister, his dad, and I too the Super Bowl. Turns out that right before the third quarter, a streaker ran onto the field. He was tackled by Matt Chatham and that was ranked #50 on ESPN's Greatest Super Bowl Moments.)
(3) Kouza Kurohyou- roughly translates to 'Crouching Panther'
(4) I just know I'm gonna be flamed by some New Yorker about this so I'm just gonna clear things up: I've been to New York City hundreds of times and that's the best way I can describe it. To me, it really smells like smog, smoke, roasting chestnuts, and hotdogs.