The Beginnings of a Future Pirate King

Chapter 13: Stormy Dreams and the Sniffles

The Beginnings of a Future Pirate King
Chapter 13: Stormy Dreams and the Sniffles
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The thunder crashed form above and Lightening flashed through the ship. Of course living in the new world this wasn't uncommon, but this night was very loud and the storm was very close. Luffy woke abruptly in panic that one was louder than the last one. He felt alone in his room all by himself, he wanted his brothers. Grabbing his old bear and putting his hat on his head Luffy quickly got up and waited for the loud boom before opening his door and running as fast as he could. He was getting soaked by the rain but he didn't care he just didn't want to be alone. Reaching the closest of his brother's rooms he opened the door and shuffled inside.

"T-Thatchy.."He sniffled out shivering from being wet. Thatch rolled over at the new noise in his room to see his little Luffy shaking. Panicking he jumped out of bed and check him over.

"You're soaked!" He freaked pulling the wet clothes off of the kid and placing the hat on his dresser before wrapping him in a blanket. Luffy was still cold but pulled the blanket tighter around himself.

"Damn it! All your clothes are in the washing area. You'll have to wear one of my shirts tonight, is that okay Lu?" Luffy shakily nodded his head allowing Thatch to pull on of his larger shirts over his small body. He was still cold though so he climbed back into Thatch's bed to warm up.

"Whatcha doing running out here in a storm?" Thatch asked him sounding a bit angry but really it was worry.

"I had a bad dream and the loud monster outside woke me up." He sniffled starting to remember the reason he woke up in the first place.

"Do you want to tell me about your dream?" Thatch asked softly pulling the kid closer to him to give the boy more heat.

"A monster ate you." Tears started to fill his eyes at the memory. Thatch couldn't help but laugh.

"A monster ate me? What kind of monster?" He knew he should be taking this seriously by the puffing of Luffy's cheeks but he wanted to cheer his brother up.

"It was a big dark monster that had a mean laugh. He hurt you and I was sad." He said Thatch pulled him even closer then already.

"I'm not going anywhere bud. No monster can touch me or you for that matter. We're on the safest ship in the world." He ran his fingers through Luffy's dark hair in soothing motions until the kid smiled and hugged his brother falling asleep.

By the afternoon of that day Luffy was walking around rather tired looking.

"What's up with him-yoi?" Marco said pointing to the kid who had crawled up whitebeards leg to rest on the man's lap.

"He was fine this morning, he ate more than I did, but he always does." Vista said looking towards the clingy child.

"He had a nightmare last night." Thatch said coming up behind them making them look his way.

"He came to my room in the middle of the night and told me about his dream." Marco looked back over to the kid.

"It was raining pretty hard last night! He must have gotten wet-yoi!" Marco was worried whitebeard smiled fondly at the kid who was now sleeping up against him.

"He was soaked I dried him off as best as I could and gave him a shirt to wear. He slept fine once he had someone with him." Thatch smiled at the memory of Luffy cuddling him in the morning.

Luffy slept on whitebeard's lap for the rest of the afternoon the older man didn't mind it he enjoyed the company of his youngest son that's when he sensed it. Looking down at the sleeping boy he began to frown. Luffy's cheeks were red and his breathing had started to come faster.