Two Dreams, One Adventure

Desperate Times

Caimie shouted at them to get onto the gondola that belonged to the princes to bring Sanji to the place with the most humans. The four got onto the ship, Sanji still bleeding. Luffy wanted Zoro already. The mermaid said she'd donate in a minute if she had the same blood type.

"I'm sorry I can do nothing," she said in shame as the eel took them where they wanted. It didn't seem loyal to the princes much. Luffy stood and looked and listened to the fishmen pirates that were clearly enemies. They were still out cold. Though one of them was moaning in pain. He hadn't pulled his punches. The guys were annoying. As if they would join them!

Luffy didn't care who the hell Hordy Jones was. He didn't care.

"Seeing the whole thing on Sabaody two years, and now here, the racism problem runs deep, huh?"

"I don't get why they took it out on us. We aren't bad!"

"We did take out some of their people. The Arlong guys. Those fishmen had their tattoos, right? They might hold a grudge on us because of that, too," Usopp explained. "Donating blood... well that was annoying." Luffy wished he could donate his blood. "We don't know what that would do to anybody. Your blood burns people, remember?"

"Only enemies. But I won't do that," Luffy replied. Caimie looked surprised. "It's another weird thing," the captain said simply. The mermaid didn't ask again as they headed towards the city, though she was worried about how things would go.

"I don't know if we can find a donor fast enough. Pirates haven't been coming down in the past month or so. You guys are the first for a while," she said in concern. The other three were worried, too.

Luffy said finding humans would be hard for him scent wise because it had been awhile since they came. Some fishmen smelled differently than humans, but he found the mermaids mostly smelled human. "It'll be hard to sniff humans out," Luffy summed it up. Usopp and Chopper looked at Sanji in worry.

"Who knew a nosebleed would cause such a big problem," Usopp muttered.

Chopper was very worried with how much blood he was losing. After Luffy had not fully healed from Marineford, it made him feel less dependent on only blood to heal, and would get actual medical treatment, too. He was still happy it could heal many wounds, but he no longer saw it as a cure to everything like he had before.

He looked down at his arm, absolute proof of that.

"Why has nobody come in awhile?" Luffy wondered.

"We don't know, but there's rumors that somebody or something is stopping new ships from arriving on the island." Luffy wondered if it was Surume. "Who's that?"

"Luffy tamed the kraken," Usopp said, still sounding disbelieving. Luffy told the mermaid he'd gotten better with animals over the last two years.

"That's amazing, Luffy-chin," Caimie praised. Luffy liked not scaring them away automatically. And not making the fishmen and merfolk worried with his presence. "You would be unwelcome if you still gave off that feeling," she commented. Luffy smiled, but it was due to Rayleigh's help the most. He was a great tutor.

The captain said, "I even found somebody like me after the Sabaody mess. She was from Amazon Lily and seemed to be just like me." Chopper tried plugging Sanji's nose, but it was still lightly bleeding, turning the gauze red. He was very worried. Luffy was a bit, but knew Sanji wouldn't die like this. Hopefully.

They found two willing men who were glad to help with just a single question. They both donated quite a bit, since Sanji had lost a lot of blood with that nosebleed. Almost all the blood in his body! Through his nose, how... gross?