Anxiety | ZoLu 𔘓𓂃 ִֶָ

1

It's been 2 years since one fortunate Captain was reunited with his crewmates in a bright and colorful Island, floating with inhumanely large bubbles, called Sabaody Park.

2 years since Luffy last saw his friends before their lives changed, with their Captain having one of the most drastic changes.

Changes that no one has ever noticed since they've been reunited with the young man.

Apart from a large reddened "X" mark that was permanently scarred at the very center of his chest, or his observation haki and various advanced methods he uses to fight now, nothing else had changed about the young man.

But as a month went by, Luffy himself noticed that something was different about his personality.

It all started when a stork dropped a rolled up newspaper onto his hands.

During this time, a smile was drawn across his lips as his friends were cracking lighthearted jokes and making him laugh.

"I now present to you... Usopp's imitation of: Karoo! Ahem... WUAAAAAAAAACK!!! QUAAAACK! QUAACK! QUAAAAAAA!!"

His eyes were squinted shut as his smiley face kept his bright orbs covered up after his Sniper started to make comedic duck noises.

"NISHISHISHI!! OI, USOPP!! YOU SHOULD DO.... A... Ace..."

The tight grip Luffy had against the newspaper began to loosen up when an article with the picture of a freckled man with light beige skin, a red beaded necklace and a tangerine tinted cowboy hat, popped up without a single warning.

"HUH?? WHO?" Shortly afterwards, Usopp's voice was left unheard by the young man as he brought the picture closely to his eyes.

He kept his nose buried deeply inside of the piece of paper for awhile, remaining completely speechless.

His voice was tempted to respond to the voices his subconscious was able to capture in a near distance, but even so, his friends were left without a response.

Their Captain couldn't speak at all.

Someone tried taking the paper off of Luffy's hands, out of curiosity, and by the time they tried to do so, the Captain was brought back to reality and squeezed the pages in his hands tighter than before, in a protective manner.

Ever since that day, he refused to let anyone else see the newspaper he held in his hands every night afterwards, going to sleep with that picture buried into his chest.

The following day, he woke up with an unsuspecting smile on his face he used to greet his friends with.

"Ooooh!! Fooooood!! Gimmie gimmie!!"

"Hey, slow it down! You're gonna asphyxiate yourself one of these days, Luffy. I'm calling it." Sanji warned, poking at Luffy's overstuffed cheeks with a fork.

"MMHNM 'AS NUFFIN' I CAN FIT MORE FOOD THAN THIS!" He insisted, feeling small particles of food slipping out of his mouth.

"Oiii, Luffy!!! You never told me who I should have imitated yesterday! I thought I heard you say a name before, but it must've been my imagination." Usopp's question made the boy raise an eyebrow at him.

"Hmm? Name?" He asked.

"Don't cha remember?"

Shutting his eyes for a moment to clear his mind, Luffy shrugged his shoulders, unable to remember anything.

"Tch. What's he gonna remember? He had his nose buried into that newspaper all day. I'm surprised you showed so much interest in reading, Luffy."

Zoro spoke, clicking his tongue.

Upon mentioning the certain piece of paper he had been holding onto since yesterday, all the way to this morning, Luffy's chewing subsided for a moment.

He let his fork rest beside his plate, gathering a set of unwanted thoughts that were breaching his peaceful mind.

His vision drifted off into the distance, his surroundings no longer made sense to him, the boy was completely lost, despite sitting right where he always does, every morning.

"Zoro's right! What'd you see yesterday, Luffy? It must've been something serious in order to earn your full attention." Franky chimed in, waving his hands in the air at the young man.

"It was just..." The world began to spin around Luffy, while everything remained still for everyone else.

He began to wonder if he had eaten his food too fast when his stomach muscles clenched tightly.

"It's true! You shoulda seen his face, he was totally all over the pages!"

The longer his friends opinionated on the Captain's reaction to the flyer, the longer it took Luffy to let out his own opinion.

"That's because-"

"It was probably a piece of meat or something related to food, wasn't it?"

The lively glow in the young man's eyes had dimmed down to an opaque darkness that surrounded his pupils, making him stare straight at the scenery in front of him, being unable to pay attention to what it even looked like.

Nothing made sense to the boy anymore, he was completely spaced out from the world around him.

"Oi, Luffy!"

One man's voice that had called out to him from afar had finally managed to awaken Luffy's mind and bring him back to reality when he realized he was chewing on a napkin.

"What the--?!" Spitting out the thin piece of paper from his mouth, Luffy shook his head and smiled.

"My bad! Shishishi!!"

"Are you alright?" The same voice responded.

As Luffy's eyes lightened up and followed who the sound was coming from, he found his Swordsman staring at him.

"YUP! I'm okay!!"

The boy insisted, readjusting his straw hat so that it could hang a bit lower than usual, casting a shadow upon his eyes.

But this wouldn't be the end of the Captain's unexplainable habits that he developed ever since that article landed in his arms.

A week afterwards, he would continue to grow distant towards his close friends, and bestow little to no time or interest in adventuring to a new island, any time soon.

And the most inexplicable part of it all, was that Luffy himself didn't understand why he felt so distracted lately.

Let alone why his heartbeat felt so abnormal and unsteady.

These were the first signs that the young man would start to experience, before his body was taken over by an uninvited mental disturbance called: "Anxiety".

~~~