They were going to arrive at Port Royal in the early morning.
It was already evening on their second day at sea. Rackham was up and about, ready for his night watch, and Ben still thought he was up to something.
What was strange, though, was why he was waiting so long to try something. This close to Port Royal, the chances of running into navy patrols was much higher, so he was soon to miss his opportunity.
"Sleep well, Rackham?" Ben called out to him, trying to get the man's measure.
"Aye," Rackham answered lazily. "I did indeed, boy. Did ye work well?"
"Aye," Ben responded almost automatically. He was used to being asked if he had pulled his weight.
"Good, good," Rackham said, losing interest.
Ben didn't understand. The man was so nervous yesterday, always glancing out at the water like he was expecting to find something there.
Now, though? Now he was almost relaxed. There was still an edge there, but it was like getting closer to a naval base was actually calming him down.
Ben supposed that he might be running from something. His own death, probably, judging by the black spot on his palm.
Surely Rackham was more likely to find that death at the bottom of Port Royal's gallows, though. He was a wanted man, after all.
*thump*
The ship bobbed in the water, as if it struck something.
"We must have hit some rocks or a reef!" called one of the deck hands.
"I can't see anything!" another cried out.
Rackham was frozen solid and sweating profusely.
"I'll take a look," Jinbe offered. Ben imagined he must be a good swimmer with those odd webbed hands.
*THUMP*
The ship lurched upwards and crashed back down, sending little waves radiating out from the hull.
One of the deckhands raced below deck, likely to check for leaks.
"No," Rackham muttered, grasping the sides of his head. "Nonononono! We were so close, too close!"
"What did you do?!" Ben grabbed the man by his ratty coat.
"Get off me, boy!" Rackham' fear turned to anger.
Ben was grabbed in turn and soon found himself flying through the air. He saw the railing of the ship from the outside, then felt himself hit the water.
Ben was a good swimmer. You had to be, if you wanted to make a living on the water. Even with the restless waves caused by the strong wind they'd caught, he would at least be able to find the surface and stay there long enough to be fished out.
He had no thoughts of swimming when he opened his eyes. He was lucky he was able to keep a hold of what breath he'd had before getting tossed overboard.
There beneath the surface of the sea was a monster from legend. It was bigger than their ship by manyfold, more than he could count.
Eight enormous tentacle arms, each massive enough to wrap around their vessel and crush it into tooth picks. A gaping maw from which nothing could ever hope to escape. And worst of all, the eyes…
Something grabbed Ben around the waste and he screamed. It was fortunate that that something turned out to be Jinbe, because they surfaced quickly and allowed him to catch the breath he'd surrendered without a fight.
"Jinbe-!" Ben shouted between watery sputters and gasping intakes of precious air. "That's a-!"
"A kraken, yes." Jinbe spoke as if he were merely observing the weather. How he could be so impossibly calm in the face of that monster, Ben had no idea.
Wait…
"A kraken?" Ben asked. "The kraken, you mean?"
"No, I have seen three krakens in my life, not including that one," Jinbe clambered over the side of the ship and deposited Ben on the deck.
Ben noted that Rackham was tied to the main mast, crying and shouting through a gag like a mad man. The rest of the crew were on edge, occasionally shooting dirty looks at Rackham.
Luffy looked positively furious.
"Luffy, it seems a kraken has taken us for easy prey," Jinbe blurted for the whole crew to hear.
The obvious happened; a panic started. There was nothing that ordinary men could do against a legendary monster.
One started praying, a couple ran around like headless chickens, Rackham pissed himself and writhed around even more desperately. Thankfully a few had decent heads on their shoulders and started loading the cannons, for all the good they would do.
"Oh?" Luffy perked up. A tremendous growl echoed from the depths of his guts. "I could go for octopus."
Before anyone could question Luffy's sanity, the water swelled in several places around the ship. Great pillars of flesh rose from beneath the waves, towering over the ship and making even the crow's nest look short in comparison.
Ben wasn't religious by any means, but in that moment he was willing to follow any god who was willing and able to save them.
Then the drums began.
At first, Ben really believed that a god must have come to their rescue.
The thunderous beats were louder than cannonfire, yet caused no pain to his ears. The pounding vibration in the air seemed to resonate with something deep within him. The flickering candle flame of hope within his heart, which had been on the verge of being snuffed out, was instead bolstered by the song.
A giggling sort of laughter brought him out of his reverence, and he realized that the source was not a god, but Luffy himself.
The older boy's hair had taken on a wispy, cloudlike quality and turned starch white. Even his clothes appeared to have been bleached by a thousand years in the sun.
The kraken's arm came crashing down onto the ship, threatening to wrap around and wring the ship like a wet rag.
And that's exactly what they did, to Ben and the crew's horror.
However, the crunch of splintering wood did not come. Instead, the hull, the mast, the rigging, the sail, all of it began to stretch and bend, but refused to break.
When one of the tentacles caught a deckhand, Patrick was his name, and started to squeeze him between itself and the deck, Ben saw his upper half swell up like a balloon. Ben thought for sure he would pop like one too, spilling his blood and viscera all over the deck. Instead he just flailed his arms and yelped in obvious discomfort, but far from the sort of pain that should accompany a slow squishing death.
"HAAA!" Ben heard Jinbe let out a shout.
One of the massive limbs was severed clean through by a blade of water, which then carried onwards to cut through two more.
A gurgling roar could be heard beneath the ship. The kraken had been hurt, and quite seriously at that!
The rest of the action went by in a blur. Jinbe and Luffy proceeded to cut off the remaining limbs, and then Jinbe jumped into the sea.
Soon after, the great beast was launched into the sky and Luffy followed up with a punch that dwarfed even the kraken itself.
Luffy landed back on the deck, then stumbled as the drums and the white receded. Ben caught him and looked upon his pruney form in wonder.
Perhaps Luffy really was a god.