RELÁMPAGO, leo valdez

VI. evil, pretty witch and short, fire boy!

0006. |EVIL, PRETTY WITCH
AND SHORT FIRE BOY!

Nadia was cursing herself. She should've been paying attention!

          Honestly, she blamed Leo. If he wasn't so godsdamn attractive all the time then maybe she'd be able to protect the ship properly. His dark brown curls the same colour as his eyes and his deep, raspy morning voice... gods it drove her crazy! And his white button up shirt that was rolled up to his elbows— see? He got her so distracted!

His hand which held hers, pulling her up the stairs, wasn't helping her either. He hauled her up the stairs on deck, Jason and Frank sprinting up behind them.

Nadia cringed at what she saw, or rather, what she didn't see. Nadia's vision was a blur of running dwarves and Coach Hedge tied up to the mast, Piper beside him like a duct tape burrito, shouting a warning. Nadia frowned, turning around to see Ajax, her dragon, being dragged into a sack.

"Hey!" Nadia cried, pulling her hand free of Leo's. "That's my dragon!" She shouted at the blurry tiny figure. The figure stopped long enough for her catch a glimpse of it, and saw that the it was really a him. The little man was even shorter than Nadia, with bulbous legs dressed in bright green plaid and a striped pink and black blouse, covered almost head to toe in hair. The little dwarf let out a giggle of glee at her before a click sounded behind them.

          She frowned, confused, but Leo's yell in her ear really helped clear things up, as well as deafen her. "Duck!" He shouted.

Leo's hands latched onto her waist, pulling her against him, and in one fluid motion, knocked them to the ground. Nadia grunted as she was practically body slammed to the deck but no sound came out with Leo laying on top of her, his heavy body leaving her without air in her lungs, covering her with his body as an explosion burst through her eardrums.

Grenades—Leo's Archimedes grenades.

          Leo groaned throatily above her, pained. He had taken the brunt of the blast for her but Nadia's ears still thumped agonisingly with the same pattern of her heartbeat, echoing awfully. Her vision was foggy from the blast as well as the grenade smoke. Leo tried to push himself up off of her, but his press-up failed and his skinny biceps shook. Luckily he didn't drop straight down onto her and gathered enough wobbling strength to fall beside her instead.

Nadia blinked harshly. She tried to narrow her vision through the smog but without her glasses she couldn't see further than the end of her nose. She could hear Jason moaning and groaning in her head, clearly in pain from the blast and the distant sound of Coach Hedge bellowing death threats at the dwarves.

"Wha—?" Leo, beside her, stammered groggily.

Nadia managed to loll her head to the side and she saw something—someone—fiddling around near Leo's hips. What the fu—? Leo was being robbed of his tool belt by the dwarf!