Crazy In Love | Buggy

n i n e

As we walked towards his ship, I found myself becoming more and more upset. My town, which had always been such a beautiful and vibrant place, now it bore no resemblance to its previous self. The clowns had left it a destroyed mess.

The least of the damage was broken windows, rubbish and trash scattered everywhere. The worse of the damage was entire buildings burnt down, completely to the ground.

It felt alien that spots in our town, which had previously had giant buildings, now just had piles of rubble. Our bank was one of them, multiple houses, a couple of shops.

I could not wrap my mind around the sheer amount of damage that they had caused in such a short space of time. It seemed as if it should have been impossible to reduce an entire town to such a mess.

The most horrifying thing about the entire situation was the lack of reaction from Buggy and his clowns. They seemed unaware, or at least uninterested, in the damage that they had caused. It seemed to not register to them at all.

To me, it felt like that meant they did this frequently. How else would they have caused this much damage?

It seemed like they were experts at chaos. I still couldn't understand how they couldn't feel at least a little guilty. This was our home. This was our livelihood.

I was snapped out of my thoughts by Buggy asking, "Have you ever been on a ship?"

Thus far, we had walked in complete silence so his question took me by surprise. I even jolted slightly from the shock.

I looked up at him. "No, I haven't."

The idea of being on a ship for months was daunting, to say the least. The ocean was beautiful but unfamiliar to me. I knew little of what I was to expect.

He flashed me an amused grin. With those painted red lips, it looked creepy. "Not even a fishing boat?" I shook my head no. He looked even more amused at that. "Well, then you'll have a great time with the sea sickness."

I gulped. I hadn't heard of sea sickness before but it definitely did not sound good.

"Sea sickness?"

"Oh, you don't know? The first little while someone spends on a ship, it can make them incredibly sick. Something to do with the way the ocean moves the boat. Most of my new pirates spend the entire first week with their heads over the sides, vomiting up their guts."

I felt myself pale at that. I found myself hoping that he was simply messing with me, attempting to make me scared. He was clearly amused by my fear, and he had shown that he liked to mess with people.

However, I knew nothing about the ocean, so he could have been telling the truth, for all I knew. My town was not big on the ocean. The waters around our island were turbulent. It took someone very well versed in boats to brave it.

My town lived mostly off the fruit of the trees, the meat from the animals, and nuts that we collected. We were so bad at sailing, that fish were considered a luxury here. Not many people could sail far enough to catch good fish.

I decided that I wanted to keep engaging Buggy in conversation. The more he knew about me, the more that we talked, the more likely he was to feel empathy for me. Empathy could save my life.

I did not imagine us becoming friends, but if we were at least friendly, that could mean the world of difference.

"Did you get sea sickness your first time on a ship?" I questioned, trying to sound genuinely curious.

Buggy's smile dropped from his face. My heart dropped. I was afraid that I had somehow already crossed a line by asking him a personal question. He, however, answered it.