After the hearing the crash that shook the island, several of Arlong's crew were gathered around the demolished boat that they saw sailing through and falling from the sky.
"That's really strange, I've never seen a ship fall out of the sky before." One of the fishmen questioned.
"Yeah, me neither. It would seen that we have some unusual visitors. The question is, why are they here?" Another one asked.
"Hey, you guys, look! He's not from this island!" Hatching called out. The three saw Luffy walking down the path across the field. The straw hat captain looked up seeing the fishmen pirates in front of him as he approached them.
"Oh, wow! Could this be fishmen?" Luffy asked himself. Luffy ignored them as he walked past them, continuing down the pathway.
"Hey, you there, wait!" Hatchi shouted to Luffy.
"Huh? You mean me?" Luffy asked, pointing to himself.
"Who are you and what are you you doing on this island?!" The octopus fishman demanded.
"Why, what does it matter to you?" Luffy said.
"Well, it's just that we don't get many visitors." One of Arlong's commanders replied.
"Oh, my name is Luffy. I'm just passing through." Luffy told them.
"Passing through? Well, have a nice time!" Hatching smiled and waved.
"Hey, smart ass, where are you going?" One of Arlong's commanders asked Luffy.
"Heck if I know?" Luffy shrugged as he walked off.
"He seems like he be a fun guy to have around!" Hatchi said.
"Yeah, sure. But, who the hell is he?" One of the fishman questioned.
"He walked right by us and wasn't even intimidated. I've never seen that before." Another one questioned.
"From the beginning, huh? It all goes back to eight years ago. Up until that day when we were still little children. She lived here in the village. Nami and I will never forget her as long as we live. Her name is Bellemere." Nojiko told the group as she started to explain Nami's and her story to them.
"Bellemere? So you're saying that she raised both you and Nami?" Usopp asked.
Nojiko nodded. "That's right, she did. I guess I should start at the beginning."
Back at the house, Nami woke up and noticed that Nojiko had left. "I fell asleep. Oh, no Nojiko. What wonder where she went off to?" She asked herself. She looked down at the map in front of her on the table.
Just a little more, Bellemere... Just a little more and everything will be like it was again. Cocoyashi village, your tangerine farm, everything. It's taken eight years. Nami thought to herself as she remembered.
A young Nami was sitting down, drawing a map in a library. She smiled as she looked down at her finished work.
"It's done! It's done! Yay!" she exclaimed happily. "Now, if I could just get that book." She got a ladder and climbed up it and a book off from the high shelf. She climbed back down, looking down at it, smiling. It was a book about Navigation.
"Hey, is that you, Nami? Do you need any help there?" A older woman asked Nami.
Nami smiled nervously, as she quickly hid the book behind her, underneath of her dress. "No! I'm just looking! I'll be going now!" She told her as she backed away. However, just as she reached the door, Nami bumped into someone behind her, startling her. She accidentally dropped the book as it fell to floor with a thud. Nami cringed, knowing that she was caught. She slowly turned around and saw that it was Genso, who was, frowning, looking down at her.
"Damn it, Nami! Not again!" He shouted angrily before he whacked Nami on the top of her head. He picked her up by the collar of her dress and she dangled while he walked away with her.
"Let me go! I'm not a cat!" Nami shouted at him.
"You little urchin! How many times do I have to tell you that stealing is wrong?" He berated her.
"How else am I going to get what I need? I don't have any money! Cheapskate!" Nami shouted at him, ticking her tongue at him.
"Bellemere! Bellemere! I caught her stealing again. Now, open up this door!" Genso shouted as he pounded on the door. A woman, who appeared to be in her middle age, came out, standing in front of the two. She had fuchsia red hair, shaven along the sides and tied up in a long ponytail, gray eyes, wearing a green checkered shirt with the word "MACE" on it, indigo trousers and brown sandals.
"What do you want now?" Bellemere asked. She noticed Nami dangling in front of her. "You're back? That was a quick trip!"
"I got a ride!" Nami laughed.
"Listen, you better get control of her before she winds up in a jail cell!" Genso warned her.
"Thanks for the advice. Haven't you ever seen something that you wanted and just taken it?" Bellemere asked.
"You're the reason she acts this way!" Genso shouted at her.
"Relax, I'm just kidding. I hope that you were kind enough to pay for her." Bellemere smiled as she stepped up to him.
"Uh, Bellemere?" Genso questioned, nervously.
"Thanks so much! I don't have the money right now," Bellemere smirked. "I'll pay you somehow, maybe I'll show it to you later."
"You can't say things like that!" Genso exclaimed as his face turned completely red. Bellemere and Nami laughed as they watched him leave.
"Look he's red as a beet!" Bellemere smiled then she bent down to Nami. "Now then, laugh it up while you still can, Nami." Bellemere raised her fist as she whacked it across Nami's head. "Do that one more time and you won't be able to sit for a week!" She warned Nam I as the two were in the back yard from the house. There was a large vineyard covered with tangerines. Bellemere was sitting down in the chair near a table. Nami pouted as she rubbed her head.
"I'm sorry! It's just...that I really need that book, Bellemere." She told her.
"Then why didn't you ask me if I would buy it for you?" Bellemere asked.
"Because I know you can't afford it." Nami said. Bellemere frowned in confusion.
"Of course I can, there's money left over from the last harvest."
"But, I heard them in the village. They said that the weather's been so good lately, everyone's tangerines will sell, which means we can't raise our price and we may not be able to sell at all!" Nami explained to her.
"They don't know what they're talking about!" Bellemere reassured her.
"Way to go, Nami." The two saw Nojiko standing by the backdoor to the house. She walked over to them. "If it was me stealing, there was no way that I would've been caught!" Bellemere leaned down to the two girls with a smirk. She popped Nojiko on her head as well as Nami's again.
"No more stealing, right?" She smiled.
"I was just joking that's all!" Nojiko told her.
"I'm really sorry!" Nami replied.
"I'm sorry, but one thing's for sure, the maps you draw are so amazing, Nami!" Bellemere told her as she held up Nami's drawing of Cocoyashi island. "I see you can draw land mass now as well as sea charts."
"That's the map of our island, isn't it?" Nikki asked her.
"Nobody will believe that such a little girl drew this all by herself." Bellemere agreed.
"I wanted the book so I'll be able to start studying navigation." Nami told them.
"Navigation as well?" Nojiko asked.
"You're going to be a navigator?" Bellemere asked as well. Nami nodded.
"That's right! I'm going to guide ships around all the oceans of the world! It'll be great! And I'll be able to make maps from all the far off places that I go!"
"So, this island map is a first step to realizing your dream, is that it?" Bellemere smiled and held up Nami's map towards the sun, the three looking at it. "A world map, huh? Nami, your dream is going to come true. I have no doubt!"
Later on that day, Bellemere, Nojiko and Nami were eating at the dinner table. There were several plates of food for the two girls in front of them. Nami noticed that Bellemere barely had much seeing a tangerine.
"Hey, uh, Bellemere, why haven't you been eating dinner with us, lately?" She asked her, while Bellemere was sewing a shirt for Nami.
"I've been eating tangerines. I've just been on a diet, that's all." She told her.
Nojiko scooted her plate away from her. "Then I don't want to eat, either."
"What's with all of the drama? You need to eat because you are a growing girl." Bellemere told her. Nojiko looked up at her.
"Why do you keep lying to us! You're not eating because we don't have enough money to buy food, that's why!" She shouted.
"Really?!" Nami exclaimed in surprise.
"You're starving yourself so we won't go hungry!" Nojiko pointed out.
"Tangerines replenish my skin with the power of liquid sunlight. And they are the only reason that I'm such a ravishing even though I am in my extreme late twenties." Bellemere tried to assure them.
"Your hands are all yellow!" Nami replied.
"Would you shut up and eat your food already!" Bellemere shouted at her.
As they were finished with their meal, Bellemere had finished up Nami's shirt and she held it up in front of her. It was lion's face sewn on top of a sunflower. "And here you go, Nami, all done! A Bellemere one of a kind original!"
"Oh great, a hand me down." Nami frowned disappointed.
"Now, that's true, but it suits you. See, look!" Bellemere told her, giving her the dress.
"But, the lion used to be a sunflower!" Nami argued.
"Quit complaining! You have to take my hand-me-downs or you won't get any new clothes!" Nojiko shouted at Nami.
"But, it's not fair! You get new clothes all the time and mine are all used!" Nami shouted at her.
"I get old clothes too, you know! So just suck it up, Nami! Take what you get, understand?" Nojiko yelled back at her.
"We didn't come from the same parents anyway! We're not real sisters so who cares!" Nami cried out. Bellemere froze in shock. She turned around and smacked NamI across her cheek.
"NAMI!"
"Bellemere, please!" Nojiko pleaded to get her to stop.
"So what if you don't have the same parents," Bellemere said, angrily. "I DON'T EVER WANT TO HEAR YOU SAY ANYTHING LIKE THAT AGAIN!"
"I don't care! You're not even our real mom! You're just some lady who's taking care of us! You wish that we've never came here so you have all the food and clothes for yourself! You'd be better of without us isn't it!? That way you can do whatever you want! I wish...I wish that one of the rich adopted us instead of stinky loser like you!" Nami cried as she shouted at her. Bellemere stared down at Nami completely stunned and hurt. She looked away from her.
"Fine, if you hate it here so much you can find someplace else to live if you want. I didn't sign up for this." Bellemere told her.
"Stop fighting! Please, just stop!" Nojiko cried out. Nami got up and ran out the front door and into the pouring rain outside.
"I'M NEVER COMING BACK!"
"Nami, stop! Nami!" Nojiko called out to her begging for her to come back.
Bellemere sat down in the chair at the table.
"Bellemere, the three of us are a family, that's the truth! And you know Nami feels the same, no matter what she said." Nojiko said to her. Bellemere turned to her and chuckled and smiled.
"Look who's being the adult here. I blew up and you're the level headed one." She replied as she petted Nojiko on her head. "Why don't you go and find Nami? I'll make something special for dinner and we all can make up, okay?"
"So you've run away from home and come to the village, now what's the plan?" Genso asked as he cleaned Nami up with a towel drying her off. He hand her a cup with "Drink it before it gets cold."
"Bellemere, would be so much happier if she didn't have us around." Nami replied, sadly.
"And why would you say that?" Genso asked her.
"Well, you need a lot of money to take care of two kids. And because of me, the whole village hates her, right now." Nami pointed out.
Genso made a reassuring smile. "That's progress. At least you're considering it, that is. But, don't worry, when Bellemere was your age, she was a complete nightmare terrorizing the entire village."
"Is that true?" Nami asked him surprised. Genso nodded.
"Sure, even now the villagers look at her as some kind of a screw up. So, you can imagine how surprise everyone in the village was when she joined up with the Marines." He explained.
"Marines? You mean, Bellemere was in the Marines?" Nami asked.
"That's right." Genso said.
"She said that she couldn't stand by and do nothing while pirates killed innocent people then she left the village. She was teetering on the verge of death, that is, until she saw two children. A little girl and a baby. Bellemere was surprised to find anyone alive in a ghost town of a village in ruins caused by the battle she was in, trying to defend it against pirates. Despite of everything, the baby laughed when she first saw her. That innocent child was you, Nami." Nami's eyes widened in shock and Genso continued his story.
"And seeing how precious you were, gave Bellemere the right reasons to live again."
There was a fierce storm late at night, a small bat crashed against the waves struggling to fight against the currents.
"A ship?" One of the villagers questioned.
"Who on earth would be out here in such a terrible storm!?" Another one asked. Bellemere stepped off from it, cradling Nojiko and Nami in her arms wrapped in blankets. She had her Marine uniform draped over them to shield themselves from the pouring rain.
"Doctor! I need a doctor!" She cried out.
"What's going on? What happened to you, Bellemere?" the of the villagers asked, shocked to see her, as well as seeing the two children in her arms.
"Bellemere!?" Genso exclaimed as he ran up to help.
"Did somebody call for a doctor?!"
"Who are these children?" The doctor questioned her.
"Doctor! They're burning up! I'm afraid they might be really sick! Please, help them!" Bellemere pleaded with him. He took the two girls in his arms before looking at Bellemere. "Alright, and we better mend up those nasty wounds of yours as well, young lady!" Bellemere shook her head in refusal, crying.
"Never mind that! Please just don't let them die! You have to save them!" She cried out. "I'm begging you, doctor!"
Eventually, the three were in the village hospital. Bellemere was sitting in the bed holding Nam I to her chest while Nojiko was to the left of her. Genso and the doctor were there was well.
"I don't believe you, say that whole thing again." Genso replied, confused.
Bellemere smiled as she pulled Nojiko closer to her. "I said that I'm going to try to be the mother of these two girls. It's that simple!" Genso and the doctor's eyes widen in shock.
"No way!" Genso exclaimed.
"That's insane! You are far too immature to handle this much responsibility!" The doctor agreed with him.
"You can't handle them by yourself! Just hand them over to me-" Genso tried to persuade her.
"I'VE MADE MY MIND!" Bellemere snapped, angrily, scaring the two men. "You can't deny that I am an adult and what I've lived through as a Marine, has given me the right to be treated with more respect. I'm perfectly capable of taking care of these two girls. And nothing can stop me from raising them to be wonderful girls. So, we're going to be a family together, Nami and Nojiko, all three of us." She told the two girls as she hugged them closer, all three smiling.
"The bond between the three of you girls goes far beyond than any normal family." Genso finished as he told Nami his story.
"Nami! I thought I'd find you here!" The two heard Nojiko by the front door and saw her standing there.
"Nojiko?" Nami questioned.
"Come on! Bellemere's waiting for us! She's making us a special supper!" Nojiko smiled.
"Sure!" Nam I smiled back and nodded.
"I think she's making your favorite, omelets and tangerine sauce!" Nojiko told her as the two girl ran through the village. The villagers were watching them as they left.
"I love omelets!" Nami exclaimed.
"Time sure flies. It seems like it was only yesterday that they were fighting for their very lives." The doctor commented.
"I think it makes everyone in the village happy to see those grow up so full of life." Genso agreed.
"That's true! Their families had suffered so much over the years. It's good to know that they managed to overcome it, right?" A villager chimed in.
"Pirates are coming! Everybody run!" A villager shouted as he, frantically ran into the village. Everyone's eyes widened in shock. "The pirates are coming!"
"It's the Arlong Pirates!" They saw a ship with Arlong's jolly roger pulling in by the docks. The fishmen were now advancing their way towards the village.
"Why would fishmen from the Grand Line come here?!" A villager exclaimed fearfully.
"Nami! Nojiko!" Genso shouted as he ran over to the two girls.
"Genso!" Nojiko said, scared.
"It's too dangerous to be here. Go hide in the woods." He told them. Nami looked at him worried.
"But, what about-"
"You must go, now!" Genso urged them. The two girls hid between several houses in the the bushes and watched as the Arlong Pirates arrived into the town stopping in front of the villagers.
"Greetings and salutations, you pathetic little humans. From this moment on, this entire island and it's inhabitants are a part of my domain!" Arlong shouted and smirked evilly. "Listen closely, from now on the first , or every month, you will buy your lives from me. 100,000 belis for adults, 50,000 for children, those who can not pay will die!"
"What should we do, Nojiko?!" Nami asked her worried. "We don't have that much money!"
"Maybe, the fishmen won't be able to find our house! You can't see it from here!" Nojiko assured.
"Is that it? So what's the haul?" Arlong asked one of his commanders as they finished collecting the money from the villagers.
"About 25 million give or take," he replied.
"You all shall live!" Arlong smirked as he got up to leave, his crew following behind him. "It's time to leave, come brothers!"
"Arlong, there's smoke coming from outside the village!" One of his crew members pointed out into the mountains. Nami and Nojiko froze.
"Okay, let's see. Delicious! There isn't anything quite as tasty as my special tangerine sauce!" Bellemere smiled while she was cooking. "Nami and Nojiko are going to love it!"
"It looks like chimney smoke coming from somebody's house." One of the pirates said.
"Oh, we almost missed that one." Arlong said. His crew and him started to head over in the direction where the smoke was coming from, that was coming from Bellemere's house.
"Bellemere!" Nami and Nojiko exclaimed and ran to warn her.
"Alright, let's go, guys!"
"This is bad! The pirates are going to Bellemere's house!" Genso murmured.
"Genso, Nojiko and Nami are gone!" The doctor called out to him seeing Nami and Nojiko were gone.
"I think the dumplings needs another ten minutes and the stew is almost ready." Bellemere said to herself before opening a cabinet and pulled out a wine bottle, that was made from her tangerines. "This is definitely going to blow my budget but sometimes you got to live a little."
Nami and Nojiko ran as fast as they could hoping to get to the house before Arlong and his crew do.
"Bellemere! Bellemere!" Nami cried out. "Bellemere is going to be killed!"
