A fierce explosion ripped Nami from sleep and she jumped out of her desk chair before her mind even registered that she was awake. She ran to her door and threw it open. Her searching eyes quickly located their night watch. "What's going on?" she called as the rest of the crew rushed onto the deck. Zoro, who stood in the crow's nest, pointed forward and slightly to the right. Only then did she realize that there was an island. It's already been a few weeks since Alabasta and we've somehow managed to avoid trouble for this long… so why is this happening now?
"An island?" Luffy asked, a grin spreading across his face. "Awesome! Let's go!"
"No, not 'awesome'!" Usopp shouted at him. "There was just an explosion! Who knows what kind of crazy people are there!"
"Well, if they're pirates, they'll probably come after us as we pass, anyway," Sanji said.
"That island is supposed to be uninhabited."
Nami turned slightly to face the newest addition to their crew, a stowaway who had revealed herself only once they were at sea. For the most part, everyone had accepted her. Even Usopp and Chopper, as afraid of her as they had been, no longer had any quarrels with her. "How do you know?"
Robin smiled a bit as she turned toward the navigator. "I read it in a geography book."
Nami nodded, deciding to trust in the other woman's judgment, and looked back to the island. "In that case, any people there are almost certainly pirates."
"Well, Luffy?" Sanji asked. "What do you want to do?"
"I want to go!" Luffy exclaimed excitedly.
"We should leave someone to guard the ship," Robin advised.
Nami murmured her agreement and glanced at Usopp, who stood beside her with knocking knees. "Usopp, you'll stay."
"O-O-Okay," he stammered. Then, feigning bravery, he said, "A-A-Alth-though you m-m-may reg-g-gret n-not having the g-g-great C-C-C-Captain Us-s-sopp by your side-"
She tuned him out after that, dismissing his words as his usual brand of cowardly ramblings, and turned to Chopper. The young reindeer stood leaning with his cheek pressed into her open door, sound asleep. The sight was undeniably adorable, though she would never admit that out loud. "Chopper's staying, too."
"I will stay as well." At the puzzled looks she received, Robin merely shrugged. "I have a book I want to finish reading."
With the arrangements made, they docked the ship near where the explosion had occurred and yet, hopefully, far enough away that no one on board would be in immediate danger. The four land-goers jumped off the ship. Almost immediately, Luffy ran to the trees near the shore. The jungle was thick and dark, with the barest hints of bright orange flowers in the darkness. Ferns dotted the outer edges of the jungle at irregular intervals, sometimes in clusters, sometimes alone. "Look!" What the captain had seen would forever remain a mystery, it seemed, as he stretched his arms out, grabbed something, and launched himself into the wilderness.
"L-Luffy!" Nami called out, but it was too late. The straw-hat wearing captain vanished into the darkness seconds later.
Sanji glared in the direction Luffy had gone. "Idiot."
"Now what?" Nami muttered. "He's the reason we came here."
"We may as well check it out," Sanji sighed, gesturing vaguely to the fire a couple miles away. Nami shrugged, neither agreeing nor disagreeing, and they began walking. Sanji stopped after a moment. "Oi, Marimo. Let's go."
Nami watched as Zoro, who had been gazing out into the sea, turned and silently began to follow them. Though she looked away, Nami glanced at him one last time before turning her attention fully forward. He's still acting weird. She knew it wasn't abnormal for him to not talk sometimes, but him not talking all the time was abnormal. His recent habit of spacing out was also not normal behavior for him.
Chopper had been running himself ragged trying to figure out what in the world had happened to their crewmate, but it was to no avail. It's no wonder the poor thing is so tired. It didn't help that Zoro consistently refused let Chopper examine him. The odd part was the fact that he grew even more uncooperative when the reindeer tried to touch him. He'd never been opposed to touch before. Even if he'd never really touched people or let others touch him much before, he'd never really avoided touch like he had been doing recently. However, further contemplation on the subject was halted by an unfamiliar woman's voice.
"Well, well, well, look who it is. A little girl and her adorable little lovers."
Nami's face flushed in anger. "I'm not little!" she snapped, completely ignoring the last part of the sentence she was replying to, refusing to acknowledge those words. Of course we're not lovers!
Two people walked out of the shadows of the trees, their backs illuminated by the blaze at their backs. They stopped side-by-side, facing Nami and the others. The man smirked at her. "This one has a fiery temper," he drawled. "I like it."
The woman smirked as well and Sanji took a step forward. "You two do this?" he asked, glancing to the fire.
"Obviously," the woman replied smoothly.
Nami looked around unobtrusively. She expected to see the remains of barrels of gunpowder or something of the sort in the flames, but only the smoldering carcasses of the trees that had been consumed by the flames were visible. Immediately, she grew suspicious. Especially considering the fact that we're in the Grand Line…
Meanwhile, Sanji was still speaking with the two strangers. "What reason could you have for attacking an uninhabited island?"
"It's simple, really," the woman replied with an uncaring shrug. "There was a man here we wanted dead."
Nami was horrified to think that there was a corpse inside that burning wall of light, so she spoke to both distract herself and to get information. "You're Devil Fruit users, aren't you?"
The woman's smirk widened, revealing her perfectly white teeth. "Oh, you are an observant one, aren't you?" she sneered. "Yes, we have Devil Fruit powers. Care for a demonstration?" She didn't wait for a reply, nor did she give them time to react. In a split second, she had lifted a large gun, aimed it at them, and fired three times. Two mouths stretched wide with laughter as three sets of thick metal restraints slammed into Nami, Sanji, and Zoro, pinning arms to sides and crushing legs together so that they couldn't move them without a great deal of pain. They were trapped. "Since these are steel," the woman said, "you'll have to melt them in the fire to get free. And by the time it melts… you'll be dead." She and her partner laughed again.
The man approached Nami and her struggling crewmates. "If you want…" he said slowly, "I'll make things a bit easier for you." He stomped on the ground hard and immediately a ring of fire exploded around them, hot and far too close for comfort. He stood in the flames, clearly unaffected. "Now all you have to do is fall," he told them. "Any direction's fine."
"Kota here can create flames through stomping," the woman explained unnecessarily. "Meanwhile, my power is both fixed and forever changing."
"What do you mean?" Sanji demanded.
"Depending on the season, I get a different set of abilities." She shouldered her gun. "Tell me, do you know what season it is?"
Nami frowned in thought. Summer. Which means heat, rain, droughts, thunder, lighting… oh no.
"It's such a shame you're wearing steel…" The woman raised her hand. Lightning raced through them and their restraints. Searing pain like nothing Nami had ever felt before caused her to cry out and fall heavily to her knees, trembling in agony. Sanji's knees weakened visibly as well, though he didn't fall. She couldn't see Zoro, who stood on Sanji's other side. The woman tutted at them. "Such poor fashion choices… Oh well. It's your own fault for getting involved in things that weren't any of your business." Her gaze flicked to Sanji's left. "Hey, Koto. He has weapons."
Koto nodded and stepped out of the flames to retrieve them, but Zoro dodged neatly to the side. Koto tried again, his hands making a swiping motion through the air, but Zoro just dodged again, returning to where he had originally been. Koto stomped in a fiery display of anger, forcing Zoro to jerk his leg away, lest he get burned. "Stop moving!" Koto commanded hotly.
"Don't touch my sword," Zoro replied with unfailing calm.
Nami grew puzzled by his response. Why did he say "sword" when he has more than one? This Koto guy is trying to take them all, isn't he?
Zoro stared calmly, his expression never changing, at Koto, whose eyes blazed with growing with growing anger. The fire-user signaled for his partner to subdue the swordsman but, though the other two were soundly electrocuted, he seemed… unaffected. It shouldn't have been possible. Currents of electricity ran through him and the metal that had him trapped, but he showed no signs of pain. In fact, he didn't even seem to notice that he was being attacked. Koto glared hard, barely holding onto reason as his temper reached peak levels. "How are you immune?! Are you a Devil Fruit user as well?!"
"No."
Sanji stared at Zoro, a frown marring his otherwise relatively calm expression. Immune? Impossible. He's human.
Nami fought not to let agonized tear fall from her watery eyes. She bit her lower lip tightly. She had never been in more in ever in her entire life. Every nerve was raked raw, her limbs trembled, the metal burned where it touched her skin… If Zoro could only get one of his swords…! He had learned how to cut steel, right?
The woman looked to Koto, suddenly looking concerned for the first time. "Hey, Koto… could he be the one Crocodile was talking about?"
Koto glanced back at her over his shoulder. "Perhaps."
"Oi," Sanji called, pulling their attention back to him. "What the hell are you talking about?" He cut a glance to Zoro and something unspoken passed between them. His gaze returned forward.
"Crocodile spoke briefly of a swordsman whom he suspected had the potential to destroy all of Baroque Works, himself included, single-handedly," the woman replied.
"No way!" Nami exclaimed. "That can't be possible!"
"But it is. Not that it matters to you, since you're about to die."
Muttering crossly to himself, Sanji glared at Koto and the woman. Hurry up, you bastard…! Then, as if in response to his thought, there was a loud slashing sound, closely followed by a second and a third, and, suddenly, three sets of restraints fell heavily t the ground with easily audible thuds. Sanji didn't take to time to wonder how Zoro had been able to move in his restraints, opting instead to merely be thankful for it for now. He'd get back at the stupid swordsman for taking so goddamn long later.
Zoro stood by with a sword in hand as Nami stood and Sanji tapped the toes of shoe on the grassy earth. They seemed eager to fight, perhaps out of revenge for being captured and tormented, but Zoro didn't share their feelings. He simply didn't care. He was only here because he'd been chosen to come. That was it. The island may have held a passing interest for him, and perhaps even the explosion, but not these people, and not this fight. These people, whoever they were, could barely even be considered a threat. So, with all the excitement of a child who had just been given a full day chores, he cut them down.
"I'm seriously fine, Chopper. Worry about Sanji instead, okay?"
"Nami, your burns are worse than his."
"But we were both electrocuted!"
"You were right by the fire, though."
Nami huffed but stopped arguing. She knew he was right, anyway. Besides, the medicine he was rubbing on her burns felt so good… She sat on the main deck of the Going Merry, a crate acting as her chair while Chopper rubbed more medicine on one of her legs. The coolness of both the medicine and the late night breeze was a welcome relief to her hot and abused skin. The smack of a hand on the railing of the ship drew her attention to the side just as Luffy pulled himself on deck. "Oh, Sanji! Zoro! Nami! Where were you guys?" He grinned.
"Where were we?!" Sanji snapped, his expression of comical anger causing Luffy to laugh. "Where the hell were you?!"
"I found this cool lake-"
"We were trapped and you were out looking at a stupid lake?!"
Nami smiled to herself at their antics. Those two, I swear…
"Hey, Nami?" Chopper asked.
"Yes, Chopper?" she replied, looking down at him.
"Were the three of you all restrained in the same way?" he asked her, not looking up from his task.
She blinked in surprise. "Yes. Why?"
"Because, if that's true, then… somehow, Zoro isn't burned."
Doing her level best to remain calm, Nami lifted her gaze to look at Zoro, who was watching Sanji and Luffy quarrel with an impassive gaze. Could what that man was saying be true? Could Zoro really be somehow immune to lightning…?
Posted 04-22-15.