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Grand Line – Paradise
Alabasta – Nanohana
Just a few minutes after all the Straw Hats were almost sent flying away by the overwhelming shockwave coming from the three brothers' final exchange of blows and then nearly being deafened by the subsequent crash, with some older buildings in the city that had never received maintenance collapsing amidst all of it, everyone present in Nanohana feels a, I believe primitive fear is the best way to describe what everyone felt, it was raw, as if at that moment everyone was certain they were going to die, and then, as if it had simply never existed, the feeling pass.
It was one in the afternoon, and while the Straw Hats were recovering from the previous moment, Sabo and Ace, carrying Luffy on their backs, appear near the city and walk up to them.
"You all look tired!", Sabo comments as they approach the crew, all of them seeming to have bags under their eyes.
"Whatever that was, this shit worked just as well as a mug of super-strong coffee, I lost my sleep!", recovering enough, Usopp says before turning his attention to Sabo and being surprised by their condition.
"My God, look at the state of you guys!... Get out of this, Chopper, we have patients in need of care!", Kaya exclaims, shocked at the condition Luffy, Sabo, and the unknown man were in. She then turns to Chopper, who was completely paralyzed due to what had happened earlier, and shakes him, bringing him back to his senses, and then he hurriedly follows her upon seeing the state of the three brothers.
"Who's this guy?", Zoro asks suspiciously, his hand resting on the hilts of one of his swords.
"This idiot here is Ace, mine and Luffy's brother, we reunited yesterday after a long time, it was quite emotional, he cried, and somehow that reunion ended up turning into a fight to see which of the brothers is stronger", noticing Zoro's suspicion, Sabo explains while pointing to Ace, who was handing Luffy over to Kaya and Chopper's care.
"Hey, I didn't cry, that's a lie", Ace complains as soon as he hears it, having just laid Luffy on the ground.
"Who won?", Zoro asks curiously, relaxing his posture.
"Seriously, that's the first thing you do?", Nami asks indignantly.
"What? Is there anything else to ask besides that?", Zoro retorts, not understanding why this witch was mad.
"That's not the problem, you Neanderthal! The three of them look like they dove into a tank of blood, and instead of first checking if they were okay, you ask who won a stupid fight?", Nami complains exasperatedly, Zoro irritating her so much that she's stuck between running to Luffy to see if he is okay or beating up this idiot.
"Guys, how about not fighting? Anyway, technically Luffy won", Sabo calms them down before answering Zoro's question.
"Yeah, that terrifying presence from just now was him! And just to be clear, I didn't cry", Ace adds before once again insisting that he didn't cry, which is a lie; he cried as fuck.
"Stop lying, man, you cried the moment you realized I was alive", Sabo turns to his brother and says, not understanding why this idiot was lying.
"No, I didn't cry, at that moment my eyes released a considerable amount of water as a form of body cooling", Ace says, making up a lame excuse.
"Mmhum, keep lying to yourself", upon realizing this would never end if he kept insisting, Sabo says. This idiot probably thinks crying is a sign of weakness or something like that.
"Huff… nothing but idiots here! Well, nice to meet you, I'm Nami, the crew's navigator and also Luffy's girlfriend", after checking with Kaya and Chopper that Luffy is okay, Nami lets out a sigh before standing up and introducing herself to Ace, greeting him.
"Luffy has a girlfriend?", Ace shakes her hand back while asking in surprise.
"Yeah, who would have thought that this idiot would be the first of us to have a well-settled love life", beside them, Sabo says ironically; in the end, the boy everyone thought was asexual was the first to get a girlfriend.
"Speak for yourself!", Ace says, scratching his neck.
"What? You've got a girlfriend too?", Sabo turns his face to Ace at the speed of light, asking in surprise.
"Not exactly, I've got some flings here and there", Ace explains without really explaining.
"Some flings?", Sabo asks with a shitty smile on his face, wanting more details.
"Don't even start, I'm not in the mood to talk about that!", Ace says, not wanting to talk to his brother about the girls he got involved with.
"Come on, man, if you don't vent to your brother, who are you gonna vent to?", Sabo complains, pressing him for more information.
"Just ignore this guy, it's a pleasure to meet you too, thank you for taking care of my little brother!", still holding Nami's hand, Ace turns his gaze to her and greets her, thanking her for taking care of Luffy.
"Well, your little brother is an amazing man, just don't tell him I said that!", Nami says affectionately before asking him not to mention it to Luffy, the idiot would get all full of himself if he knew she said that.
"Hahaha! Don't worry! Well, I guess I should introduce myself formally, it's a pleasure to meet you all, my name is Portgas D. Ace, I'm brother to these two idiots, I know it must have been tough putting up with them, especially Luffy, so thank you all for taking care of my little brother, and this other idiot here too", after letting go of Nami's hand, Ace turns to the rest of Luffy's crew and formally introduces himself, thanking them all for having taken care of his brothers.
And at this moment, after everyone had also introduced themselves to Ace, Luffy, already completely bandaged, wakes up in a flash while shouting, "Meaaat! Give me meat! Give me food!"
"Ahhhhh, you have to rest, Luffy, your wounds are going to reopen!!!", startled by Luffy suddenly sitting up, Kaya realizes in the next instant that all the work she and Chopper just did treating him could be thrown away because he's moving, and then says, trying to make him lie down again.
"Ah, fuck! Scared the hell out of me!", Usopp yells, jumping in fright at Luffy's sudden shout.
"Give me food, I'm hungry!", refusing to lie down again, Luffy keeps shouting.
"Kaya, leave this idiot to me and go help Chopper take care of Sabo and… Ace! And you calm down, or I won't give you any food!", Sanji reassures Kaya before turning to Luffy and threatening him, which works beautifully.
[The part with the three dots before saying Ace's name in Sanji's dialogue is like that because the cook just met the guy and isn't used to using his name.]
The cook then opens a backpack he brought with him from the ship when he came back to see what had happened and takes out one of the pre-made lunch boxes inside, opening it and handing it to Luffy, who devours it at lightning speed, asking for more when he finishes.
And then, after finishing with all the food Sanji had brought with him, Luffy gets up from the ground as if he weren't hurt and quickly looks around, trying to find his brothers.
"So, what happened? I remember being in the process of entering Phase 1 of Ultra Instinct and then nothing", Luffy asks hurriedly upon spotting them, the two of them being under Kaya and Chopper's care.
"Luffy, if you keep moving like that, your wounds will never heal", turning his attention to Luffy, Chopper says worriedly before finishing bandaging one of Ace's arms.
"Relax, I ate a little and I'm already feeling much better, I just need to finish stuffing my belly, drink about five big glasses of milk and then take a two-hour nap, and then I'll be as good as new when I wake up", Luffy says with a smile, stretching dangerously to the complete horror of Chopper and Kaya, who were watching the scene with wide eyes.
"It was a tie!", Sabo says; in truth, not even he knows what the result was. Luffy technically won and lost at the same time; he is without a doubt the strongest among the three, but he was also the first to be knocked out, and he and Ace didn't finish the fight when only the two of them were left.
"Aww, man! Not even using my 'Ultra Instinct – Phase 1' I managed to defeat you guys?", Luffy grumbles, crestfallen.
"Well, both of us had to team up to take you down, so…", Sabo says, not really wanting to lie to his little brother.
"So that means I'm the strongest?", Luffy asks, doubtful.
"No, don't even start, you were the first and only one to be knocked out, so consider yourself lucky that we're including you when we say it was a tie," Ace says, trying to fix what Sabo said, but the damage was already done. To Luffy, that was confirmation that he was the strongest; he just wouldn't insist on the subject because he knew that if he said something about it, his brothers would forever say that he was the weakest among the three, even if that wasn't true.
And then, spotting Nami, Luffy runs up to her and hugs her, asking, "Hey, Tangerine! Did we already get everything we needed in the city?"
"Yes, it's all already stored on the Merry!... this fight between you three was idiotic", hugging him back, Nami replies, expressing her opinion after a few seconds of silence.
"Yeah, but nobody died, so relax, it's all good!", Luffy reassures her before moving away from the hug after a while, turning to the rest of the crew and saying, "Alright, let's head back to the Merry, everyone!"
Everyone then returns to where the Merry was docked, and as soon as the ship with the ram figurehead comes into view, Zoro brings his hand to one of his swords.
"What's that duck doing letting an intruder get inside the Merry?", Zoro complains upon sensing an unfamiliar presence inside the ship with his Observation.
"Relax, just go with the flow and pretend no one's there. You guys remember Nico Robin back at Whisky Peak, right? It's her, it's just a little weird for her to show up here", Luffy says. Vivi, meanwhile, is a little tense with the mention of Nico Robin, but she trusts Luffy, so she decides not to say anything.
=Scene Break=
Crocodile is not stupid; he knows that sending Robin on this mission was basically sending her to her death. Then, if he was willing to do that, it means she is not as valuable as she thought, but is that really the case, or does he have some plan?
And again, Crocodile is not stupid; he knows that Robin is not as loyal as she pretends to be, so knowing that there is a possibility she could betray him if she saw no way out, why would he send her on this suicide mission? Was she his stealthiest agent? Yes, she was, but what if she betrayed him or died? How would he read the Poneglyph of Alabasta without her? What gave him the confidence to make such a risky move? What goes on in his mind?
As soon as Robin arrives at the city port, she feels the terrifying presence of Luffy in his Ultra Instinct for a brief moment before everything goes back to normal.
'...', Robin, sweating cold, leans against the wall of a building while looking at the ground.
A few seconds later, she recovers and starts walking again, quickly spotting the Merry docked at one of the piers and sneaking aboard, the watch duck not even noticing her intrusion, too busy snoring while asleep.
It turns out her conversation with Monkey D. Luffy in Whisky Peak had left her very interested in him and his account of having already found and successfully read a Poneglyph.
So, with that interest in mind, before deciding what to do after betraying Crocodile, she decides to sneak onto the Straw Hats' ship at this opportune moment when no one is on board, to look for information about the Poneglyph that Luffy said he had read, a note, or anything related.
So, while she hurriedly searched through a room full of books and files, mainly used by Nami to draw her maps, voices reach her ears.
"We can't set sail now, the sea is too rough!"
"We'll just wait for it to calm down then!"
"I'm gonna take a nap, I'm dying of sleep!"
"Hey, Sabo! Let's have that talk?"
"Sure! Hey, Ace, come with us!"
"What are you guys talking about? What talk?"
'Great!', Robin thinks depreciatively before then stopping in the middle of the room for a few seconds while questioning herself, 'There's nothing, no note, and this is the only room on the ship with books, could it be that in my hurry I missed something?'
'I'd better get out of here before it's too late', with that thought in mind, Robin stealthily leaves the room she was in, being careful not to end up bumping into the ship's crew.
The Merry is not a big ship, and in comparison, its crew is large; this means that the task of leaving the ship without being seen, at the same time that the crew members keep walking around the place, becomes something time-consuming and difficult to carry out.
So, after a few long minutes going back and forth inside the ship to avoid being caught, yes, the crew members were playing with her while pretending not to know she was there; Robin finds herself inside an empty room, hiding from someone who has suddenly appeared in the hallway.
Then, after waiting for the person to pass, when Robin was about to leave for the hallway again, she hears a muffled conversation coming from the next room, and after a few seconds of hesitation, her curiosity gets the better of her and she uses her powers to create an eye and an ear in a corner of the next room that she supposed was discreet.
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(AN: 2,395 Words)
If you guys decide to give ideas or suggestions about things I should pay attention to in the story, keep in mind that on Patreon, the fic is currently at the Alabasta Arc, more specifically, on Alubarna.
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