Chapter 6
The roof where the cats meow
Bell-mère had always enjoyed telling her daughters bedtime stories. She would lie on the bed, her legs buried between the sheets, her back against the headboard, and her eyes would travel miles away, immersed in the depths of the stories, as if words could navigate as easily as ships. From beneath the covers, Nami had sailed with the Marines to islands full of dangers and adventures, with evil kings and heroes disguised as villains.
Bell-mère had told a thousand and one stories that allowed her daugthers to fly beyond the tangerine trees and hunger.
Once her mother was killed, Nami stopped hearing stories or reading fantasy books. Only maps and coordinates. Numbers, plateaus and coves.
Nami avoided wandering around imagination and dreams. Soaring over cities was only possible by reading maps.
All her life, she blamed her far-off dreams on the Grand Line, not on ordinary citizens of East Blue. That was until Luffy took her to soar above the Kingdom of Goa.
Nami had a theory that drawing maps from rooftops would make the work easier, but the fear of falling and leaving her sister and the village of Cocoyashi behind haunted her.
Luffy made it look easy. He knew the alleys of the city, the squares and the stairs. And most importantly, he knew how to sail through the sky. Instead of sandals, it seemed like he was traveling on clouds. The strides he took across the tiles were fluid and full of life. He played with the idea of touching the sun. For him, there didn't seem to be any danger, only fun. Even though it was clear that of the two, he was the one most likely to hit the ground headfirst—he had almost slipped into the chimneys a couple of times.
She had seen him play on the shore, atop cliffs, a step away from the wide sea. And now she knew he had eaten one of the Devil Fruits, she began to wonder if that boy was capable of feeling fear when he never feels it near the sea. But watching him dance across the rooftops, an eternity away from the ground, she knew terror was foreign to him.
After hours of playing on rooftops and drawing straight lines, Nami, exhausted, asked Luffy for a break. He, with boundless energy, kept coming up with acountless challenges on the tiles—each of them a potential way to die. He agreed, on the condition that they climb to the highest rooftop in the city. Despite her reluctance, Nami eventually agreed, because Ace was right—it was very difficult to get an idea out of Luffy's head.
Luffy's stomach growled as soon as they sat together on the edge of the bell tower, their feet just a step away from walking on the wind. And for the first time in years, her imagination flew.
"The first member of your crew should be a cook," Nami remarked, with the sound of music and laughter from the square floating up to their careless ears.
Luffy laughed, thrilled by the idea.
"Or a musician, or a swordsman, or a sniper, or…"
"A doctor would be best. You live a step closer to death than anyone else. You love taking risks too much."
"But it's so much fun!"
She glanced at him, trying to figure out what was behind all that energy.
"What is? The danger?"
Luffy gave her that expression he was getting better at, one that made her realize how odd her questions were, even if they were the most mundane in the universe.
"Adventure, Nami. There are no adventures without risks!"
Bell-mère's stories invaded Nami's mind, seeking out the dangers. Hadn't stealing food from giants to feed hungry towns been dangerous? Hadn't brave Oden's fight against the tyrant dragon been life and death?
Maybe Luffy had a better eye for understanding adventures. Maybe being a dreamer had more advantages than she could see.
From the highest rooftop in the city of Goa, her mother's laughter filled Nami's mind, as if mocking her daughter's wounded pride as she became aware of how small and confined her thinking was, trapped under Arlong's claws.
"Your dream would be nice, if it weren't for the pirates. That idea of setting sail and never looking back sounds good. No burdens, no chains. Just sailing the sea, like seagulls, flying."
"Or like beetles."
She laughed at the comparison, so typical of Luffy and so strange. Maybe one day she would also see the beauty in those bugs.
"It would be wonderful to have their shells. They're protected from everything with armor."
He looked at her, with his hair tousled by the wind and his hat flapping behind his back. The sun danced with the soft strands of his black hair, as if embracing it.
"Armor doesn't protect you from the world, Nami. They fight a lot. That's what the horns are for. I told you they're really cool. And besides, they fly with suuuuuper thin wings, and even though they're scared, they still fly. You're still a caterpillar," he declared, puffing out his chest and raising his chin.
She sighed.
"They're called worms."
"And what's the difference between worms and caterpillars?"
"The same as between horns and noses."
Luffy's face lit up, proud that Nami was talking about horns.
"You'll see, when you're a big, strong orange beetle, you'll be the best navigator in the world. Everyone will know the name of the Pirate King's navigator."
Nami shook her head, annoyed.
"I'll be the best navigator, but I'm not going to be a pirate, Luffy. You'll have to find another job if you want me to work on your ship. And a lot of money, because I charge high for my services," she added at the end. Her financial ethics always came first.
"Naaaaamiiiii!"
She ignored his complaints, stood up, and brushed off her skirt with a flick of her hand.
"Come on, I'm hungry too, and I need to heat up the food for dinner."
Luffy forgot the argument, his eyes hungry and his mouth wide open.
"What's for dinner?!"
Nami eyed the boy suspiciously.
"I don't know what you're going to eat, Luffy. I'm having lentils."
He frowned but nodded thoughtfully.
"Well, Ace must have hunted something, so don't worry. Lentils with meat are tasty."
"I'm not eating with you. I have my own food and my own place to sleep."
"Don't you want to have a sleepover? You're so boring, Nami. Come sleep at our place."
"No, I already told you…"
The birds took flight seconds before the ground shook beneath their feet. The tiles rattled as they clashed against each other, and suddenly, the wall of the building in front of the bell tower, an immense golden and white palace, exploded.
The explosion sent plaster and stone flying in all directions, and the tremor heightened the sense of danger.
Nami tried to regain her balance, and when she looked ahead, toward the edge of the roof, she saw Luffy was trying to do the same. The difference was that a piece of plaster struck beneath the boy's sandals, and his heel slipped, searching for support that ended up being air.
When her mother died, Nami felt as if the bullet's path to her head had taken an eternity. The light in her eyes took years to fade. The corners of her mouth took eons to return to their place. Her body fought against gravity for centuries before finally hitting the ground.
When Luffy slipped and fell into the void, time stretched again. His knee bent at an odd, too-elastic angle. His annoyance turned to surprise, and his mouth opened, unable to process the fall. The tiles flew before his body did.
The difference between her mother's death and Luffy's fall was the lack of movement.
When they pulled the trigger, Nami turned to stone. But before the first tile touched the edge, her arm had shot out to grab her friend's red vest.
Bell-mère left alone, but Luffy dragged Nami with him as soon as her fingers latched onto his clothing.
"Na..." Luffy's voice was drowned out by the loud sound of the explosion.
The moment Nami's fingers intertwined with the red threads of his vest, time returned to its course, and the void swallowed them both.
Nami's thighs, ribs, and chin crashed into the tiles as Luffy continued falling. For a moment, she remembered that just minutes ago, her body had still been aching from Arlong's beating, and yet she felt no pain when she hit the ground. Adrenaline had already wrapped around her.
Both of them screamed as Luffy dangled from the roof, held up only by his friend's thin arms. Despite the Devil Fruit, the fall would have been fatal.
The tiles slid under Nami's body, and fear screamed for her as she found half her body hanging off.
Their eyes met amid the terror, and Luffy quickly stretched his arms to grab onto the weathervane of the bell tower, pulling both of them up as his rubber limbs snapped back.
As soon as she felt solid ground beneath her feet, Nami vomited what little she'd eaten all day, trembling and sweaty, with adrenaline still buzzing under her skin.
Luffy laughed next to her, panting. She gave him a look that promised a slow and painful death.
"Now you have to come eat with us."
Nami wanted to say something, but a second explosion rocked the city, and her desire to speak evaporated with it.
She didn't know what was wrong with this island, but she cursed the moment she thought it would be a quiet and simple place to map.
Notes at the end of the chapter:
Well, bbys, I usually comment on AO3 because here, since they don't give me the option of notes, it's hard for me to touch the texts. This chapter is this fast upload thanks to the holidays about the constitucion of my country and the fact that I'm introducing some cool new plots that occurred to me the other day (that's why in the previous chapter there was that strange conversation) and I'm excited. Maybe I'll upload another one soon or next week.
I have cut times with my job. I hope you are liking it as much as I do!
And sorry for the grammar mistakes, I'm spanish and English is hard for me. You can tell me any mistake, I will correct it in no time and I can learn too.
bye, see you soon 3
Note 2
I'm editing and correcting the story little by little, I hope you like it, I'm also working on the next chapter! :)