One Piece (Love Story) [Part One]

Chapter One Hundred and Fifty Seven [Rewritten]

-Chapter One Hundred and Fifty-Seven-

"Hey, all set up here!" Chopper shouted up to us from below the deck as Nami, Robin, and I got the octopus ready.

"Roger! Everything's ready—it's all up to you guys now!" Nami nodded as she peered down below deck where all the men were gathered in an attempt to help Usopp in setting off the Impact Dial.

"I feel sorry for Usopp—you sure it was the right thing to force him to be the one to use the Impact Dial?" I worriedly asked, starting to second guess if it was right to force him to do something so dangerous despite knowing that Luffy or Zoro could handle the force of the blast a lot better.

"Ah, he'll be fine—it'll help build character" Nami dismissively waved, not a hint of guilt in her body over what we were making the sharpshooter do. "Just stay focused, we can't mess this up" she said as the ship suddenly and violently shot up into the air.

"Robin! Hurry, now!" Chopper squealed from below the deck.

"Well, let's do it" Nami sighed. Robin used her Devil Fruit powers to stretch out the octopus' tentacles around the ship as Nami and I pointed two Breath Dials upward toward the octopus—attempting to blow air into it and inflate its head once more.

"We're still falling!" Luffy shouted when he saw that the ship was slowly starting to fall back down.

"Luffy, the Flame Dial!" Nami called over to him.

"Your time to shine, captain!" I shouted.

"Gotcha!" he nodded, positioning himself right underneath the octopus as he used the Flame Dial to help inflate it as quickly as possible like a hot air balloon.

"Come on..." Robin quietly urged as she joined in on blowing air into the sea creature, silently praying along with the rest of us that this bizarre plan of ours would work.

"Please fly! Please fly! Please fly!" Nami desperately chanted.

"I rather like living at the moment, so please fly" I begged, sounding almost genuinely in my desire to live at this very moment.

"I said fly, so do it now!" Luffy scowled as he continued to blow flames into the octopus, his jaw clenched as he tightened his hold on the Flame Dial in his hand.

"You can do it, come on!" Chopper encouraged the octopus just as the ship started to get a bit too close for comfort near the water. "Now, fly!" he shouted.

"Come on..." Robin urged.

"Please—fly!" Nami pleaded.

"You can do it" I softly encouraged.

"You can fly!" Luffy shouted before grinning as the octopus finally inflated all the way and began to carry the ship upwards into the sky and away from the water. "Yeah, we did it!" he happily cheered just as the Marines started to open fire...only to miss each time until finally, we passed over the mountains and began to float away from the Marine base altogether. "Whoa! Look at the size of that place!" the captain gaped as he peered back at the fortress we were now leaving behind.

"It thought it looked big on the inside" Chopper awed.

"Strange that a place so big was getting so many budget cuts..." I muttered as I peered back.

"Well, so long, old fortress guy!" Luffy waved with a laugh.

"Love you, Jessica!" Sanji cooed, causing me to raise an eyebrow as I now wondered what he had been doing the entire time he was inside the base and separated from us all.

"Um...guys? Not to complain or anything, but why aren't they shooting at us?" Usopp curiously asked when he noticed that the Marines were no longer firing at us.