Day 42: Twin Pines [Evening]
Luffy was in good spirits by the time evening rolled around. There was nothing like some music to liven up the day! Then again, who'd ever heard of a pirate who didn't like music? It was the main reason he'd been hoping for a musician ever since he'd managed to get a ship of his own. If his musician position hadn't already been filled, Luffy
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He leaned forward, a gleam in his eye. "Unless you can pull off a heist, anyway," he added excitedly.
Luffy thought that was probably the crowning moment of all the Doyleton trips he'd taken. It wasn't even so much the fact they'd taken useful things (which seemed to disappear along with his other nakama, weirdly enough), but the thrill he'd gotten from being sneaky and doing what a pirate does best. He wished Nami were still here so they could go on another round. Maybe he'd arrange something with his other nakama next week if no one had wandered off or whatever it was they'd done.
"Too bad the Cat Ladies search everyone before we go home," he added, and he sat back in his seat again. "I can't hide stuff in my shirt like Nami can..."
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Well, nothing on the menu looked appeasing to Chise, so she decided to order a steak. That way, she can easily give some of her dinner to Luffy. Sorry Kagura, but it's Luffy's turn today.
Her curiosity perked up when Luffy mentioned another person. "Is Nami another friend of yours?"
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"Yeah, you'd get punished for sure," the pirate answered, and he couldn't help but laugh a little. "But that's why you don't let anybody see you! You gotta be sneaky about it." Otherwise, there was too big a chance you'd just run for your life -- not that that couldn't be a lot of fun, too, but then there was the possibility of getting caught and losing all the good stuff you took. That always sucked.
"Yeah, she's part of my crew!" he answered enthusiastically. "Nami's a great navigator -- the best!" And she was really awesome at coming up with good ideas, like with that heist.
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So Nami was a navigator and part of his crew. Luffy had told her when they first met that he was a rubberman, but what did he actually do in his world? "She sounds very smart. I heard that navigators have to be knowledgeable about the weather and the ocean. Do you and your crew sail across the ocean in your world?" She was curious. Was it part of his nature to be bustling with positive energy, or was it his world that made him who he is today?
Then she noticed that he didn't order his dinner yet. "What are you having Luffy? I ordered a steak for myself in case you're still hungry."
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While Nami was great at stealing things, she was just as awesome, if not better, at navigating. Good thing, too, since the Grand Line's weather could change at the drop of a hat. Sometimes it was like she could read the sky's mind or something!
"Yep, we sail on a ship and everything!" he said. "We're pirates!"
When she brought up food, Luffy immediately decided that a steak sounded really good, too. He called over a waitress and promptly gave her his order. Once she walked off, he turned his attention back to Chise. "I came here just so I could get some meat," he explained brightly.
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When he mentioned pirates, the first thing that came to Chise's mind was dirty man with scars, an eye-patch, a wooden leg, a parrot on his shoulder; shouting 'ARRRRRRR MATEYS! WALK THE PLANK!'. Luffy did have a scar under his eye, but that was it. "You don't look like a pirate to me. I heard that pirates have eye-patches, parrots, wooden legs and all..." She trailed off before she realized that she might've offended him. "I-I'm terribly sorry if that sounds stereotypical of me. I've never met a pirate before so I only know gist of it. Could it be that you're a special type of pirate with a really big crew?"
Luffy didn't specified what type of meat he preferred, and thus Chise concluded he liked meat in general. "Is meat your favorite type of food? I, uh, drew a picture of you shouting for food on the board, if that's alright, since a simple meal isn't enough for you."
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Luffy wasn't the least bit offended at these "stereotypes" or whatever. "Well, sure, some pirates are like that." There were pirates of all shapes and sizes, some with peg legs, or eye-patches, or...well, he hadn't seen anyone with a parrot yet, but there was bound to be someone out there. They had a reindeer in their own crew, after all! "That's not all a pirate is, though!" he added. "The most important thing is to have the dreams of a pirate! My crew's actually kind of small compared to some others out there, but we're all pirates on the inside, which makes us pirates on the outside, too."
This talk about meat was making him more excited for his food to come. What better way to pass the time while they waited than to talk about meat some more? "Yeah, it's the best!" he said brightly. "And I saw that picture!" The pirate laughed. "It was so funny! I was totally going to draw something, too, but then I got hungry and walked into the grocery store." He didn't sound the least bit sorry about it, either.
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She was listening with great interest when he started explaining about pirates, and continued to fire questions at him. "Is that all it takes to be a pirate? What kinds of dreams are the pirate-y type? What's your dream? How many members are in your crew? Are they friendly, nice, or mean? Have you met them here--Oh!" She tried to stop herself, but the words were already out. That last question had been a slip of the tongue. She didn't mean to ask Luffy a sensitive topic. "I'm sorry if that last question was too personal."
Chise giggled when Luffy complimented on her drawing. "I'm glad you liked it. I'm not exactly the best artist around, but it turned out okay in the end. The next time I draw another bear on the bulletin board, you can draw something next to it too!" Then she remembered all the drawings that Kurogane tore down. "Hopefully when I do that again, nobody will tear it down. Some people don't appreciate cute art. Today a really mean person tore down all the pictures my friend drew of him, for no reason! We're friends with him even though he has a scary face and denies having friends. He's so confusing, that Mr. Kuro!" She crossed her arms and pouted...slightly. Chise rarely pouted in her entire life, therefore this incident was very important.
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"It's different for everybody," he replied. "If you have something you really wanna do, and you're willing to work hard, and you wanna be a pirate, then you just wind up doing whatever it takes to go where you need to go." Hard work was the key. Stuff didn't just fall in a guy's lap, after all. Plus, not only would the crew get mad at you if you just lazed around, but it'd be easy to wind up as a dead pirate, which meant no more adventures on the ocean.
"My dream's to become the Pirate King!" Luffy smiled as he said this, and he pushed the brim of his hat back a little bit as he spoke. "But I can't do it alone, so I started looking for a crew. Right now I think I've got eight, plus me -- it was less than that when I got here, but some guys wound up joining in the future!" That might have bothered some people, but Luffy thought it was pretty cool. "Some of my crew are here, but some aren't."
He listened as Chise talked about her bulletin art some more. "Okay!" he answered brightly. "I'll be checking the board for bears, then!"
When Chise talked about her friend, he couldn't help but tilt his head with curiosity. "Mr. Kuro?"
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"What exactly is a Pirate King?" she asked. "Is it a royalty position that needed to be fought over, or was it a rank of honor?" Chise imagined Luffy standing over a mountain of treasure, wearing a crown. "And eight seems like a small number for a crew to sail on the ocean, how did you manage to survive? Do they all have similar dreams like yours?"
So he did have a couple of friends here from his world. At least he wasn't completely alone in this place. "I hope they're alright and not horribly injured, otherwise you would be worried all the time." If Luffy and his friends were hurt, she'll definitely protect them to the best of her abilities.
"His actual name is Kurogane, but I call him Mr. Kuro since it's easier to remember and he's older than me. He has a scary face and doesn't like to talk; he sometimes grunts instead. What's weird about him is that he insists that he doesn't have any friends, and yet he takes good care of them. If his friends aren't friends in his eyes, then what does he seem them as? Comrades? Companions? It's confusing..."
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It was still weird to run into people who didn't know anything about pirates, much less the Pirate King and what all that meant, but he wasn't bothered by it. "The Pirate King is someone who has everything!" Luffy excitedly explained, his mouth full of steak. "Gold Roger, the Pirate King from before, left all his treasure in one place, and whoever finds it -- finds One Piece -- gets to be the new one."
There was so much more to it -- all the legends and stories surrounding that man, how so many crews had perished while trying to brave the Grand Line in search for it. But that was the simple explanation, which suited Luffy just fine right then.
"Well, I want a crew of about ten, but what we've got now's been working good so far," he said. "My crew's the greatest, and they've all got their own dreams, too, so it's not a surprise!" The pirate smiled, taking a gulp of some complimentary water the waitress had brought them earlier. "I'm not too worried about them yet! They're really good at taking care of themselves. I just want to see them again soon!"
With all this talk about Mr. Kuro, Luffy had actually wondered if Captain Kuro had managed to wind up here, but it sounded like this was a different person. "Kind of sounds like a couple guys that are part of my crew," he said with an amused gleam in his eye. "They argue and fight, and I'll bet they'd get mad if someone said they were friends, but they still watch out for each other because they're nakama. Maybe it's like that for Kuro."
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The steak was actually tasty and was nothing like the beef they served at the army. She could feel her stomach filling up at a fast rate. "You can have the rest of mine if you're still hungry," she offered. "I haven't touched it and I'm quite full right now."
Ten may be a bigger number than eight, but it still was a small amount. It was possible that they had special powers that made them super strong if Luffy only wanted ten people. "They must be really tough if they're able to take care of themselves. Do they have special powers like yours?" It'd be amazing if they were ninjas or magicians like Kurogane and Fai.
Chise was excited to hear that there were other people who were friends but denied having friends. "I'd like to meet them someday and ask them why they don't think of each other as friends. With that information I'll be able to understand Mr. Kuro's thoughts about friends. Um...would they be mad if I asked them about it? And what exactly is 'nakama'? I don't think I've heard it before."
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Luffy had been just about finished with his own steak when Chise offered the rest of her food. The pirate's eyes brightened as he leaned forward, wiggling his fingers in anticipation. "Woah, really?!" he exclaimed. "That's awesome! Thanks!" With how nice Chise was, Luffy didn't understand why she had hang-ups with making friends the other day -- but it sounded like she was getting along fine now, so that was good!
"Some do!" he replied when Chise asked about the rest of his crew. "Robin can sprout body parts wherever she sees, and Chopper is a cool reindeer with seven transformations! I met my musician Brook here, too, he's from the future -- and he used to be a talking skeleton!"
But just because someone was a devil fruit-user didn't necessarily mean they were stronger than someone who wasn't. Zoro and Sanji were amazing fighters, and Usopp and Nami weren't people to mess with, either.
"They're all really tough, though," he added, a measure of pride in his voice.
The idea of Chise asking Sanji and Zoro to explain what they were to each other made him chuckle. It'd probably involve Sanji digging his heel into the back of Zoro's head and calling him Marimo, and Zoro snarling and grabbing his collar and yelling, What'd you say, you damn cook?!
Luffy really missed having those guys around when he thought about them.
"Nakama's...well, nakama!" he said, scratching his cheek with confusion. No one had ever asked him to explain something like that before -- at least, not that he remembered. It just always went without saying, like it carried some deeper, unspoken meaning that everyone just got. "My nakama and I...we're always together, playing together, or eating together, or sleeping together, or fighting together -- but even if we're apart, we're still nakama. It's kind of like how your brother's still your brother no matter where you are, but even more than that."
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