From Ninja to Pirate

31

The help you receive
Should be there, hiding subtly
Not forced upon you,
So that you'd leave abruptly.

But please notice,
That hiding subtle help.
It is there for you,
Not for your strangled yelp.

-noelicoan

She appeared on an island near to where her ship was anchored, to a sight she never wished to see again.

"GO AWAY! LEAVE ME ALONE!" Natsuki jumped, thinking he was yelling at her, sighing in relief when she found it was at Jimbei. She cursed at herself for thinking that way, but she was feeling such a jigsaw of emotions, she had no idea what to feel anymore.

"I can't do that. I won't let you go on hurting yourself."

"IT'S MY BODY! I'LL DO WHAT I WANT WITH IT!" Luffy growled back.

"That's what Ace thought too. He died because he did what he wanted with his body."

"SHUT UP!" Luffy looked up to the sky, glaring hard at it, like Natsuki had done a few hours before. "ONE MORE WORD AND I'LL PUNCH YOU!"

"Go ahead if that's what it takes to calm you down. I'm injured as well, but I won't lose to the likes of you in this state." Jimbei replied with cold sympathy.

Luffy immediately tried to punch Jimbei, key word being 'tried'.

Jimbei, with far more experience and skill, immediately had him on the ground.

Whilst Jimbei was lost in his thoughts of his conversation with Ace at jail, Luffy bit hard on his arm, forcing Jimbei to release Luffy.

"Ow! That hurt you brat!" Jimbei pushed Luffy to a rock, holding him by the neck. "Are you blind to everything now!? Where's your confidence that you can overcome anything!? What happened to that strength you never doubted!?"

"I lost it when I was defeated by a giant wall..." Luffy replied with the seriousness he never showed before.

Something in his voice triggered tears to fall. Natsuki wiped them away from her eyes but looking at her broken brother made them fall more quickly than ever.

She almost stepped in, but he had to solve this himself, and she wasn't the hand he needed to be pulled up. Jimbei would be the one.

"Don't think of what you have lost Luffy. Count them. What do you still have?" Luffy sank to the ground and remembered.

"Luffy!" Zoro, Nami, Usopp, Sanji, Chopper, Robin, Franky and Brook called out. All with smiles on their faces as they yelled for their captain. He counted each one in his memories.

Luffy smiled as they appeared one by one, tears falling and melting into the soil.

"I have my friends. I have my crew!" He finally realised, then remembered the promise he made. "We promised to meet up someplace. I have to go there."

Natsuki then suddenly remembered the time difference their world and her last world had. Years for her was months to them... Then perhaps months for her was weeks, weeks for her was days and days for her were hours... She'd have to test that theory.

...Then that meant that she was gone for a month...

So much had happened within that time frame. She looked back to her brother, who cried out, wanting to meet the family he created from scratch.

Natsuki wanted to run to him so that he could meet him, when she suddenly felt a notorious man enter her minimal sensory field that she kept up at all times.