One Piece (Love Story) [Part One]

Chapter Sixty Nine [Rewritten]

-Chapter Sixty-Nine-

"Uh-oh, this is bad, you guys! We're surrounded by Marines—aren't we?!" Usopp frantically cried once he realized that there were multiple Marine ships surrounding us on all sides. Each ship clearly far bigger than our own to the point that they felt comically massive...or more like our ship felt comically smaller than it really was.

"Awesome!" Luffy laughed.

"Exactly how is that awesome?" I sweat dropped.

"Think about it though, the Marines are having just as much of a hard time with this fog as we are" Nami suddenly remarked, reminding us of the thick fog that had settled around us and now currently provided us cover just the same as it hindered our vision.

"Exactly, it's probably best for us to escape under the cover of the fog" Robin agreed.

"Yeah, you're right—we'll just keep heading forward" Nami nodded. "Everyone, keep quiet—especially you Luffy" she instructed, quick to zero in on the captain who widely smiled back at her.

"Right" he nodded, acting as if he understood what she had said.

"Hey, Nami, is that a kid standing up there?" Sanji suddenly asked.

"A kid?" I echoed, gaze flicking in the direction the blond was pointing as I squinted my eyes in an attempt to see through the density of the fog.

"A little kid? What is he doing up there?" Nami frowned upon spotting the young redhead aboard one of the nearby Marine ships. He was dressed in a standard uniform you'd expect any of the cooking staff to wear aboard such a massive vessel and was currently dumping the contents of a cooking pot out into the sea.

"Well, it's not that uncommon for children—especially young boys—to be found on Marine ships" I said in response to Nami's question. "Some start out pretty early in their training no matter what it is they plan on doing abroad the ship—from the looks of it, I'd say that he's probably an apprentice of some sorts" I explained, watching as the boy lifted his head and jolt the second he spotted us not that far away. Clearly taken aback at the sight of us, he ended up accidentally knocking the cooking pot he had been holding overboard. Sloppily trying to grab the pot and stop it from falling...

He instead succeeded in flinging himself right over the railing along with it.

"Hold on" Sanji jolted, already getting ready to dive overboard and jump in after the kid.

"Please, allow me" Robin softly spoke, halting the blond in his movements as she used her Devil Fruit powers to instead catch the child and safely bring him aboard our ship. Moving him into the kitchen, we allowed ourselves to fall behind the Marines as Chopper watched over and tended to the child while we patiently sat around and waited for him to wake up.

"He's coming around, the smelling salt seems to be working" Chopper brightened once he noticed the boy was starting to stir.

"Where am I?" he jolted the moment he awoke, eyes now frantically flickering about in search of something familiar.

"Well, kid, you've ended up on board the ship of the Straw Hat Pirates" Usopp truthfully answered.

"You sure we should have told him that right away?" I asked, raising an eyebrow at the sharpshooter's decision to be straightforward. On one hand, it was good to not beat around the bush and strength the boy's panic...but, on the other hand, such a revelation that he was now aboard a pirate ship would only make him start to panic more. It's one thing to know that you'd encounter pirates while out at sea with the Marines and another to wake and find yourself aboard of pirate ship.