DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN ONE PIECE

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Chapter Five

The first few days out at sea were very pleasant...for the most part. I stayed in my room the first day, only leaving if someone came to retrieve me. I had been too scared to venture out because I was with a bunch of pirates and I was a kid. What if they all didn't accept me on the ship? What if someone didn't like me and decided that I should be thrown overboard?! These thoughts circulated in my head the whole first day, and I never told anyone what I was thinking. I lied and said that I had seasickness and needed to get used to the rocking waves. Even when Stafford try to pry the truth out of me, I said that I wasn't lying. Which was a lie.

That was my first week on board the ship, which I had learned as named the Moby Dick.

The second week was when things changed. I think it was on a Wednesday, after I had finished eating lunch with Jade, Heather, and Lynn. I excused myself when finished and headed out of the mess hall and out on deck. Outside, a few men were lounging about, talking to one another or cleaning up the deck. 'Swabbing the deck' was what Stafford called it. Sounded stupid to me. I was ignored for the most part as I made my way to the door that would lead to the hallway where my room was located.

Just as my hand touched the handle of the door, a body came flying from the door beside it. I looked over with wide eyes, honestly terrified as the door slammed back against the wall to my left, and I was even more scared when I saw who it was. A large man, with black hair, gapped teeth, and a stench that clung to him not matter how many times he bathed and washed his clothes, according to what Heather said. A man I hadn't met yet, but had seen around. A man who, from what Jade said, wasn't very friendly with people on the crew and did things more for his own benefit than others. "He's still a brother," Jade pointed out hastily after I sent her a horrified look. "But I mean, he's like that brother that pisses everyone off and will steal your shi-stuff when you're not looking and then deny it later on."

Translation: not a very good person to be around.

Just open the door, Mara. Just open it and go in. Ignore him.

"Well well well, if it ain't the kid!" His booming voice, accompanied by his equally as booming laughter, brought a ton of unwanted attention my way. My face heated up in the afternoon sun and I still thought I had the chance to escape. But when I tried the door, it wouldn't budge. I looked up and saw his hand was holding it closed as he loomed over me. Great. "What, are you tryna run away from me? I ain't scary, am I? We're kin, ain't we?" He laughed again.

Even if he wasn't a pirate, I wouldn't say what I was thinking to him because he seemed like the type that would take offense if I said 'I'm more scared of the smell coming from you pits'. And I definitely wouldn't tell him that he was the last person on the Grand Line that I would recognize as 'kin', whatever the hell that meant. So I held my tongue, released the doorknob, and moved away, heading back to the mess hall to sit and wait it out. Nothing else I could do. Picking a fight with him wouldn't' solve anything, and I was too scared to do that anyway.

Behind me, he laughed again. "Come on, don't run away, kid!" I said nothing, Kept walking. Not looking back. "I just wanted to get to know ya. What's yer name?"

"Mara." I only answered because he had stepped in my way and I couldn't escape. He was quick for his size. I tilted my head up and frowned. But he knew my name. I know because he was around when Whitebeard had introduced me to everyone and had a weird look on his face the moment he heard my name. He was trying to make conversation, I realized. I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but I didn't like him enough to indulge him. "Can I please get through?"

He leaned down and grinned. "Don't you wanna know my name?" Not really. I said nothing, and he took it as a signal to continue and introduce himself. "I'm Marshall D Teach!"

His introduction served two purposes. One, I learned his name, which I hadn't known before, so I would no longer have to refer to him as 'the big smelly one'. Two, I was able to use context clues to figure out that the meaning of the word 'kin' meant that we were family. He had that initial D, and I had the initial. But it didn't make me suddenly like the man and want to be around him more. If anything, I wanted to get away even more now, and I did so by turning my back to him as he looked proud of his introduction stumping me for a moment and heading back to the door that lead to the hallway my room was located in.

Behind me, Teach laughed even louder than before. I noticed that everyone else seemed to ignore him after throwing him some nasty looks, annoyed that he was even there. A small part of me felt bad as I went down the hallway to my room, but another part of me totally understood. He looked annoying at first glance, and was annoying at first meeting.

He was a man that I didn't understand at the moment. It had been said he always separated himself from the rest of the crew, not getting too close in terms of building relationships with the others. However, he went out of his way to make conversation with me for no reason and out of nowhere. It couldn't have just been because of our shared middle initial, could it?

When I got to my room, all thoughts of the large man left my head as I came across another man that was even more difficult to understand lying sprawled on top of my bed, hand covering his face as he snored loudly. The bald had immediately gave away that it was Stafford lying there asleep. I ignored him and went into the room, standing beside the bed and watching him with narrowed eyes as he slept. If he had been someone I knew better, if it had been Josie or Loo, I'd've woke him up so I could lie down myself, which was what I had planned to do when coming in here. However, I didn't know him well at all, and slapping someone's arm when they make fun of you is completely different than waking them up in the middle of their nap. If he got mad, he could kill me easily. Or hit me. He was a pirate, after all.

So I turned my back to the bed, leaving the room and heading back out on deck. A quick glance around let me know that Teach was nowhere to be seen, and that allowed the tension to release from my shoulders some. But I still felt uncomfortable, standing in the middle of the deck with nowhere to go and not wanting to stand there at all. I wanted to hide in my room until dinner came around, but someone ruined that by taking over my bed for himself. There weren't many options for me in terms of killing time and not being around too many people I didn't know. Jade said that she and the girls would be with the captain after lunch, which ruled them out as an option. Thatch was nearly always in the kitchen while on the ship (he had been during my time here at least), figuring out what to make for meals and trying to get all the food done with his kitchen staff before meal time came around.

Besides them, my only other options were Stafford and Marco, the former asleep in my bed and the latter God knows where on the massive ship. It was a rare occurrence to see the blond pineapple head around, as he was always busy doing something be it paperwork in his room or work below deck or anything else that he needed to do.

The remainder of my day now consisted of wandering around the deck, carefully staying out of the way of the men working on the ship. No one paid any mind to me, but I was always conscious of what I was doing. Every step I took had that air of 'if I do this wrong, someone will get mad'. If I bump into someone, I go overboard. If I make eye contact, they kill me.

Stress was eating away at my insides and I felt nauseous for the first time since leaving Scarlet two weeks ago. My stomach twisted and knotted, my palms became sweaty, and my hands constantly moving to twirl into my hair. Bile rose up, but I swallowed it back down, ducking into a cracked door and out of the afternoon sun, believing that the heat had been making me feel more sick. Out of the unbearable sun, I leaned against the wall and lowered my head, palms pressing over my mouth to keep the contents inside and not vomit all over the floor. My vision swam, leading my eyes to squeeze closed for fear that the dizziness would make me faint.

Twenty minutes later, as I sat against the wall and held my head between my knees, I realized that this was the seasickness that Heather had warned me about and there was nothing I could do but bear through it until I was used to the rocking of the ship. Thirty minutes after that, my stomach calmed enough for me to stand up and not wobble around, but I didn't leave the inside of the hallway in which I stood. It was too hot outside, my clothes were sticking to my skin uncomfortably with sweat, and I wanted to cry and vomit.

"What are you doing?" The door that led to the deck was open just enough for Thatch to stick his head in. I shook my head, confused as to why he was looking for me and wasn't in the kitchen like he usually was. He stepped in completely, shutting the door behind him and moving to kneel before me, cocking his head to the side and frowning. "You sick?"

I shook my head, but the motion only served to make me dizzy as I clutched the sides of my head and stumbled to the left. Thatch caught my arm and lifting his hand to feel my forehead. "I think I'm just seasick." I spoke as he hummed in thought.

"That, or you're overheated. And I have just the thing for that!" I lifted my eyes to his face when he pulled away, frowning and raising a brow when he turned his back to me and continued to kneel, looking over his shoulder with a grin and a thumbs-up. "Get on!" Get on...his back? My face heated at the very thought, and I found myself shaking my head and adamantly refusing as I claimed to be able to walk just fine. Thatch rolled his eyes, stood, turned, and grabbed ahold of me under my arms, lifting me so I was held in a way that I was held to his chest, my face beside his with my chin resting on his shoulder, and my legs dangling down in front of his. "Just let me carry you, brat."

The embarrassment I felt as he carried me like an infant across the deck into the mess hall was unprecedented. Halfway through the walk, I hid my face in my hands and cursed at him with every word I had learned during my time around Josie the past year as well as the few days I had been out at sea with the Whitebeards. He only laughed, berating me jokingly for my language as we entered the kitchen.

I was placed on a stool, ordered to stay, and looked around with wide eyes. The kitchen was huge! Silverware and plates and bowls were scattered around everywhere, many were clean, some were dirty. Several stoves lined one wall, with just as many sinks on another wall. Men were scattered around, pulling out ingredients, calling out ingredients that were all gone with one man on the far wall listening for this and writing it on a piece of paper that seemed to be filled to the brim as he struggled to write sideways as someone called out tomatoes. Two people mopped the floors, one person opened one of the ten fridges lining a third wall, and Thatch was coming back with a glass cup filled with ice.

He handed me the cup, pulling up a stool to sit beside me, and leaned back while gesturing for me to help myself. "Ice chips. It's just frozen water, but that shit works wonders when you're overheated." Slowly, I munched on the ice, pretending not to notice that Thatch wouldn't stop staring at me from the corner of his eye. "Were you trying to hide it?"

"Hide what?" I knew what he meant, but acting innocent was always a good route to go.

"You being sick. Were you trying to hide it?" I said nothing, but didn't need to if his noise of understanding was any indication. "You know you don't have to hide those things, right? If you had went to me or any of the girls, we would have helped. Even Stafford, wherever the hell that idiot is."

Somehow, over the course of sitting there with him, I let it slip that Stafford was asleep in my bed. This angered Thatch, as Stafford was supposed to be doing his own chores, which included cleaning up the mess hall before the next meal. He was shirking his duties so that they wouldn't be done, and we went to my room (again being carried despite my protests) and he all but threw Stafford into the hallway by lifting my mattress and tossing. Of course, as it always was with Thatch and Stafford, an argument broke out that was more amusing than anything.

"What the hell do you think you're doing, pompadour asshole?!"

A slap. "Me? What am I doing? I'm doing my job, unlike you!"

"I'm offended that you would say that. I was just taking a nap."

"In Mara's bed?!"

Silence. Then: "It was closer than mine." Another slap. "Oh come on, Thatchy-boy! I was going to clean after my nap!"

"And when did you plan to wake up?" Another silence. A third slap. "Go clean! Let Mara take a nap! She doesn't feel good!"

Now that I was brought into it, I felt awkward standing beside my mattress-less bed watching the two men as one pointed my way and the other sent me a worried look. I quickly waved my hands before my face, shaking my head wildly and pointing to the cup of melting ice I had set on the desk. "No no no, I'm fine."

"Oh my God, the kid's sick!" Stafford wasted no time in rushing across the room, sliding on his knees until he was in front of me and grabbing my face in his hands, turning my head side to side with tears streaming dramatically down his face. "You can't be sick, kiddo! You can't do this to me! We'll be at an island soon and I wanted to show you around! We have to go to the infirmary! I can bring you to Jade and she can give you medicine and you'll be just fine!"

There was no way to refuse as I was lifted and cradled in his arms like a baby and carried out of my room, across the deck once again in the arms of someone, and into the hallway that held the infirmary. Stafford rushed in, ignoring Thatch who was hitting him on the back the entire walk to the infirmary, and thrust me towards a very startled Jade.

"Cure her!"

I was given a physical. My weight was taken, my height was recorded, my throat and ears were peered into, my chest and waist were measured, and my reflexes were tested by tapping a hammer-like tool against a certain part of each of my knees. Thatch did his own test of my reflexes while Jade's back was turned by throwing something towards my face and leaving it to myself to catch it before it made contact. It was a pen. When I caught it before it hit, he gave me a thumbs-up and ignored my glare.

Jade sat in her chair in front of her desk and shook her head with a chuckle. "Mara's not sick, idiot." Stafford breathed out heavily, relieved of this. "Probably just a little seasick. You feeling the symptoms I described earlier in the week?" I gave a nod, and she nodded back. "That's what it is. You can stay in your room if you'd like, and it should pass the longer you're out at sea. Maybe by next week you'll be fine? It's unpredictable, but you'll get over it eventually."

Thatch dragged Stafford from the room to do his chores kicking and screaming, and I was left with Jade as per her request. She wanted to hang out since she wasn't busy, and I was thankful for the company in all honesty.

But she had another motive. "This isn't seasickness." I looked to her with wide eyes. Not seasickness? How? Did that mean I really was sick and I was probably going to die? My fears were twisting in my stomach and I felt my heart beat against my ribcage as she wheeled her chair over to me and rested her elbow on the table beside my leg, meeting my eyes and frowning. "You're just really stressed."

My shoulders sagged in relief and I felt myself calm down slightly. Just stress. Yes. I knew I was stressed. This I could handle. "Yeah..."

"Why are you stressed?" I tensed and looked to Jade's eyes. She was genuinely worried, and I felt like I could trust her well enough, but at the same time, I wasn't sure. She sensed this and patted my hand clenched into a fist. "Don't worry, hun. You can tell me anything and everything. I'm here for you."

So I did. I told her how I had been feeling on the ship the last week and a half. I couldn't relax unless I was alone in my room, and I was too afraid to look at anyone or talk to anyone for fear that I would be in the way and be killed. I explained that, though I was happy I left Scarlet, I was regretting the decision in the back of my mind because I was so scared of everyone here. I was a kid, nothing more. I wasn't a pirate. I wasn't even good enough to catch a fish. So why keep me around? They would leave me at some island because I was taking up space and I was eating food that could be fed to someone who needed it more. Someone who did work around here. And I was scared to eat sometimes, because I thought someone would get mad, but only ate so I wouldn't make Jade, Heather, or Lynn angry by starving myself. Not to mention the wrath I would face at the hands of an angry Thatch for not eating!

By the end of my explanation, Jade was sobbing and clutching me to her chest. When she calmed down and wiped her tears, she assured me that I was just being silly and that nothing bad was going to happen. I wasn't going to be abandoned somewhere unless I wanted to leave. I wasn't going to be killed by anyone on the crew, because then they would face the wrath of Whitebeard, which was something that she assured me none of them wanted. I was allowed to eat without feeling guilt or unworthiness. Nobody expected me to work because I was a kid. If I wanted to help, they wouldn't stop me. If I wanted to stay out of the way, they wouldn't stop me. I was a guest and not a member. I didn't need to do anything.

"Okay?" I nodded, unable to look her in the eyes as I felt embarrassed for feeling guilt or fear over things that looked stupid after Jade explained everything. "Now, go to your room and lie down until dinner. I can come get you, yeah?" I gave another nod, hopping off the table and leaving the room with a backwards wave.

No one bothered me as I moved across the deck. I still couldn't meet anyone's gaze as I made my way to my room, but I felt in the back of my mind that things wouldn't be as tense anymore, and I wouldn't feel like I needed to look over my shoulder every ten minutes to assure that no one was coming at me with rope or a knife.

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