"Ocean blue eyes looking in mine, I feel like I might sink and drown and die."
A simple girl, daughter of a pirate captain, meets the future "King of the Pirates" and begrudgingly decides to join him on his adventure to find the One Piece.
CO...
Refer back to trigger warnings before proceeding any further.
***
Four hours. It had been four hours since they found out what happened to Artemisia. She still had yet to show back up. This worried the others a little. They were surely taking a long time to prepare her for the dinner. Surely it didn't take that long to dress her up and do her makeup. None of them went to look for her, though. They weren't able to. When they asked Maxwell where they were getting Artemisia ready, he told them that they needed space to get her ready. While he seemed genuine, they still wanted to make sure that their friend was okay.
But here they were. Back at the house they stayed in the previous night. The five sat in the chairs in the living room and remained quiet. At first, when they'd gotten back, they tried to carry on like nothing was wrong. They tried to move on from the disappearance of their friend since they'd gotten a good enough answer as to her whereabouts. But now? It'd been four hours! Not a word from her or anyone else with news about her.
There was one thing that caught the interest of a particular person. Nami was recalling the conversation they'd had with Maxwell. Maxwell explained to them about the history of the village before they got there. Specifically, he told them about the children dying from an illness. It was the reason why they were so happy to see Artemisia, he explained. However, there was something about his explanation that confused Nami.
"How is it possible?" Nami found herself asking out loud.
The others turned to her. It was the first time one of them had said anything in a while. Usopp leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees, crossing his arms together, "How is what possible?" He'd asked the question that everyone was now wondering.
A moment of silence passed between them. For a second, Usopp thought that Nami hadn't heard him, or maybe was ignoring him. He was going to repeat the question until Nami finally responded, "The sickness. It's weird, right? How Maxwell explained it? I mean, how could a contagious sickness only affect children?"
And this was the moment when she lost everybody. Luffy looked like he had no clue what she was talking about (though that was normal for him), and neither did Usopp. Sanji seemed curious about what Nami was saying. Meanwhile, Zoro raised an eyebrow at the girl, "People die from illness all the time. Children too. Nothing strange about it."
