Chapter 2: Chapter 2
It took two and a half days to reach Orange Town. Their provisions were a sack of apples and a couple of loaves of bread that Luffy had hastily purchased on their way to the dock when they'd left Shell Town. When Zoro asked why Luffy couldn't just command a few fish to jump onto the deck, his captain countered "Are either of us, sushi chefs? No. Is it safe to light a fire on a rowboat? No. Will either of us be eating meat before we dock? No." Luffy proved to get even pricklier than Zoro when he went two or more meals without protein in a row. Zoro kept his complaints to a minimum under the vague fear of being brainwashed into a mindless drone should he irk his psychic captain too much. When they weren't grumbling about the lack of good food to eat, they passed the time chatting. Luffy already knew everything about Zoro, and he saw nothing wrong with returning the favor. Luffy told his swordsman about the Red-Hair Pirates, his grandfather, his foster brothers, Dadan's gang, and the Goa Kingdom. Luffy also casually dropped that he was the son of Dragon, the most wanted man on the planet. Zoro didn't really care, but he saw how some would freak out at the fact. Who cared about your parentage? What mattered was what you were made of, not who made you. On the third day, Luffy perked up and adjusted the tiller. "Good. We're catching up with her. Damn, she's a good navigator to work the wind and currents to beat us there." "Care to explain?" Zoro prompted, wondering what had perked his captain's interest. "Nami stole a boat from a few of Buggy's minions. I don't feel like letting them drown so we're going to pick them up. Then we'll continue on to Orange Town and convince her to be our navigator. Might say hi to Buggy, see if he recognizes my hat." Luffy used his physical voice, even though telepathy was faster because he didn't want to weird out his Nakama. Plus, it didn't really save that much time. Zoro nodded and returned to his meditation. While he knew how to access his Haki thanks to the memory dump from Luffy, his body seemed to still be catching up with the program. He'd needed an extreme amount of focus just to hear Luffy's voice with Observation when he was just a couple feet away. Apparently, like every other muscle, Zoro had to train his spirit to access his weaponized ambition. Soon enough, the breeze carried the two on their tiny boat to were three colorfully dressed pirates were treading water. "Please! Help! We'll drown!" they called out desperately. Luffy squinted slightly. A second later, the men stopped talking and silently swam over to their boat. The three hauled themselves aboard, sat down next to each other at the aft of the boat, and stayed quiet with blank eyes. Zoro shivered. "No offense, Luffy, but your powers can be downright creepy." "Now you see why I try to not use them that often. But I just didn't feel like it was worth the effort to beat them into submission and decided to cheat using my handy mind control. Now, we should be at Orange Town within the hour. Let's hope Nami hasn't gotten into any trouble." True to his word, Luffy docked them at Orange Town about 45 minutes later. Zoro stretched as he stood on solid ground again while Luffy guided the three nameless peons to go to their hammocks in their ship and have a nice nap. Luffy joined Zoro and closed his eyes and brought a finger up to his temple in a gesture of focus. "The town's deserted. Buggy must have chased them out when he set up base here. The only minds in my range are us and our passengers." "So how are we going to find this navigator woman?" Zoro asked. "The traditional way, look." Luffy crouched and then jumped over a hundred feet into the air. He surveyed the town from his bird's-eye view, and then landed right where he'd leaped smooth as silk. "I saw a big commotion on a rooftop near the middle of town. Let's start there and see what we find." Zoro nodded, a slight frown on his face. "If only I knew a few years ago what you taught me. I could have trained so much better, so much more efficiently. I'm nowhere near your level physically." "You'll get there. Fast, if the Grand Line is anything like how I 'remember' it," Luffy assured him. They wandered through the town, and Luffy paused when they got in sight of the tavern where Buggy's crew had set up base. "Nami's being chased, she already stole the map. Let's make sure she doesn't get roughed up and dragged before Buggy." With that, Luffy took off at a pace that Zoro could just barely keep up with at his best sprint. They came across the redhead thief with three of Buggy's mooks hot on her heels. Luffy rushed past her and knocked out all three with one punch per man. Zoro just caught his breath and regarded the woman that had caught his captain's interest. In a purely male part of his brain, he acknowledged she was conventionally pretty, but the rest was unimpressed. She seemed like a weakling, and Zoro despised weakness. Nami blinked as she adjusted to this turn of fortune. Then she recognized Luffy and her face settled into an annoyed frown. "Oh. You again."
"Nami, been so long. We really must catch up," Luffy said jokingly as he wiped the blood off his knuckles. "I've got nothing to say to you," she said, turning her face away with a 'hmph'. Luffy sighed. "Come now, I just saved you from a beating, possibly a gang-rape. And that's before they brought you back to Buggy. You can at least show me a drop of gratitude." Nami tensed, well aware of what would have happened had those ruffians caught up with her. "Fine. Thanks. Since you're a pirate, you obviously want something in return. What is it?" Luffy got a serious look on his face. "I know who you work for, Nami. And I know why. I propose a deal. I beat the crap out of him and free your island. In return, you sail with me on my crew. And I promise, so long as you help me become Pirate King, I'll help you draw your map of the world." Nami gaped at him. "How… how do you know all that? Have you been spying on me?" Zoro chuckled. "He ate a Devil Fruit. He can read minds. He knows all there is to know about everyone he meets. You get used to it." Nami turned to regard the former bounty hunter. "Okay, you are new. You this idiot's crewmate?" "As of three days ago, I am. And it's already proven to be well worth it." Zoro shrugged. "I don't know your situation, and frankly I don't really care. But I can say I've had a lot more fun and excitement since I met Luffy than I've had in my life so far. And he's promised to help me achieve my dream. I consider it my honor to return the favor." "Ah, thank you Zoro," Luffy said with a grin. Nami's jaw dropped. "Zoro? Like, the Zoro?" "That's my name, don't wear it out," Zoro said deadpan. Before Nami could respond, Luffy had a premonition from his Observation, which he always tried to keep passively active. "HIT THE DECK!" He grabbed Nami and dove for the ground. Zoro did likewise, trusting his captain. Not far from them, a massive cannon blast devastated a large swathe of the town. In a straight line from Buggy's lair to the edge of town, there was nothing but wreckage. When their ears stopped ringing, the three teens got back on their feet and marveled at the carnage. "I heard he was a little trigger-happy from Shanks but this is something else," Luffy said to himself as he regarded the destruction. Nami distanced herself from the pirate captain. "This is what pirates are. Forget your Morganeer and Peace Main bullshit. They're the scum of the earth, all of them." "Then what does that make you, Nami?" Luffy asked pointedly. She hung her head. "A girl forced to play the hand the world dealt her." "You never answered me. I take out Arlong, you be my navigator. Interested?" Nami threw back her head and laughed. "You're delusional if you think you can take on Arlong. He's unbeatable." Luffy sighed. "Okay, clearly I need to work a different angle here. Don't join my crew. I'll hire you instead. How does… 10 million Beri for the first month sound?" Nami whipped her head to look at Luffy incredulously. "Show me the money or no deal," she said immediately, all compunctions against piracy forgotten at the promise of Beri. Luffy reached into his pocket and pulled out a simple black-and-gold checkbook. The clasp that held it close was of a stylized 'Z'. Nami gasped. "Is that…" "A Zenith checkbook, yes," Luffy finished for her. Zoro turned from looking at the debris of so many houses. "What's a Zenith checkbook?" Since Nami seemed to be too busy drooling, Luffy elected to answer. "Zenith checkbooks are only issued to Zenith account holders. The minimum amount to open a Zenith account is 100 million Beri." Zoro whistled. "Geez. How'd you end up with that kind of money?" "My home island has one of the richest cities in East Blue. Whenever an old nobleman or noblewoman died, I may or may not have used my powers to convince them to send some of their inheritance into a numbered account. Once I reached a billion, I figured it would be safer to bank with Zenith, they're neutral and anonymous, even the World Nobles use them." Nami seemed to snap out of her daze. "You're… you're a billionaire?" "On paper. It's all numbers in ink, I don't have any cash on me. But take one of these checks to any bank in the world and they'll cash it for you. So, what do you say? 10 mil for a month of your navigational services?" Luffy tilted his head. "Combined with your haul from Alvida and what you can fleece from Buggy, this would put you over the required amount, wouldn't it?" Nami's eyes turned to Beri signs. "What would you have me do, captain?"
Luffy took out a pen tucked into the checkbook and calmly signed away 10 of his millions. He cut the check and handed it to Nami, who clutched it like it was made of pure gold, which it might as well have been. "No offense to her, but you sure she's worth it?" Zoro muttered under his breath. "You don't know her as I do. This is a bargain at twice the price. She's one-in-a-million at navigation and meteorology. Hopefully, once I beat up her old boss anyway, she'll agree to the original offer and sail with me for free. I really don't want to have to pay one of my Nakama to be my Nakama any longer than I have to," Luffy whispered back. "And not to sound spoiled, but I can afford it. I'm a billionaire, remember?" Zoro shrugged. "You're the captain, you know best." Luffy cleared his throat to get Nami's attention. "Right. I and Zoro are going to go pay Buggy a visit. You can steal his treasure while we're dealing with the crew. Once that's done, we can head back to the dock and be on our way." Nami carefully tucked the check into her bosom and nodded. "Got it. Luffy, wasn't it?" She'd do whatever this rich bastard said so long as it didn't involve grievous bodily harm or anything perverted. The trio of teens walked through the carnage of once-proud houses and buildings back towards the bar at the center of town. The party up on the roof still seemed to be in full swing. Luffy waded through the hubbub mentally to find Buggy's mind. A quick inspection left Luffy sorely disappointed. For all that he'd sailed with Gol D. Roger and Shanks, Buggy was a bully and a braggart with an inferiority complex the size of a Celestial Dragon's ego. He was a petty, mean, small man, and Luffy found he had no desire to get to know him personally. So he decided he might as well burn that bridge from the start. "OI! BIG RED NOSE!" Nami gaped. "Are you suicidal? That's his berserk button!" "Exactly. So now he'll be entirely focused on me, allowing you to sneak in undetected. Well, what are you waiting for?" Luffy prompted. Nami shook her head and vanished into the nearby warehouse, on the hunt for shiny things and green paper. "Who dares to flashily talk about my nose?" came a shrieking voice from the roof. Buggy the Clown came to the railing on the roof and looked down. He was dressed… uniquely, let's just leave it at that. "Oh, I dare," Luffy called out, confident that this weakling who'd somehow sailed with titans was no threat to him or Zoro. "Men! Prepare the Buggy Ball flashily!" His crew moved a cannon and loaded an orange cannonball with Buggy's Jolly Roger emblazoned on it. "Any last words?" "Shanks is a hundred times the man you'll ever be," Luffy said with a taunting smirk. Zoro remained stoic at his captain's side, taking confidence from his utter lack of fear. "FIRE!" Buggy roared. The fuse was lit, the powder ignited, the destructive Buggy Ball sent flying towards Luffy… who caught it like it was nothing more than an oversized baseball. The Buggy Pirates dislocated their jaws as they gaped at a lanky young man actually catching a massive cannonball with one hand. Luffy lobbed the ball up and down a couple of times before reaffirming his grip. "Your turn! Catch!" With that, Luffy returned the Buggy Ball to its creator at triple the speed the cannon had sent it. There was a tremendous boom and the entire tavern was reduced to rubble. Luffy cricked his neck. "He and his lieutenants used the underlings as shields. You take Cabaji, the unicyclist swordsman, and Mohji, the beast tamer. I'll handle Buggy myself." "Whatever you say, Luffy," Zoro said, tying his bandana in anticipation of a good fight. As Luffy had sensed, three of the Buggy Pirates, including the captain himself, had blocked the blast of the Buggy Ball by using their own Nakama as human shields. They dropped the singed, unconscious unfortunates and walked out of the ruins of their temporary base onto the street. The man on the right brandished a sword and balanced atop a unicycle. The man on the left was perched on the back of a green lion with a purple mane, coiling a whip around his hand. Buggy himself had his arms crossed with a pissed expression on his clownish face. "This embarrassment shall not stand! To avenge the honor of the Buggy Pirates, I will end you!" Cabaji said, slashing at the air. "Look, Richie, dinner," the beast tamer crooned into his pet's ear. Buggy glared into Luffy's eyes. "That hat… that comment… you know Shanks, don't you?" "Yep. Told me all about you. And how he did the one thing you could never forgive him for: he saved your life," Luffy grinned ferally. "So he saved me from drowning one time! It's his fault I'm a Hammer in the first place! Now, because of him, all the treasure under the ocean is lost to me! But I'll settle for all the treasure on land!" Luffy sensed Nami about to emerge from the warehouse and mentally warned her 'Stay inside, it's about to get messy out here.' Ignoring the audible squeak as she reacted to his telepathic voice, Luffy focused on Buggy. "Not all treasure is silver and gold, mate. Now, shall the butt-whupping commence?" With a roar of "Chop-Chop Cannon!", Buggy sent his fist laden with knives at Luffy's face. On cue, Cabaji and Mohji both charged forward as well. Zoro swiftly drew his swords as Luffy casually dodged Buggy's launched limb.
Leaving his swordsman to what should be an easy fight, even two-on-one, Luffy gave a solid punch to Buggy's solar plexus before he could split. Spittle sprayed from the clown's mouth as he folded around the blow. Hardly done, Luffy grabbed Buggy by the pigtails and brought his face down on his knee. Letting go as Buggy straightened reflexively, Luffy gave a roundhouse kick to the rival captain's side sending him crashing into a nearby tree. The tree fell over at the force of the impact. While Buggy tried to process the last ten seconds through the mind-numbing pain, Luffy sighed. "You know, I really expected more from a member of Roger's crew." Buggy flinched and glared through the haze at his opponent. "You shut your mouth. That information gets out and I'm a dead man. The World Government would hound me to the ends of the world. Why do you think I settled down in this backwater Blue?" "Because you're a coward who's never worked a day in his life with any real effort at bettering yourself, and this is the weakest ocean in the world so you figured you'd fit right in." Buggy spat out some blood. "So how do you explain yourself, you freak? You hit like a Supernova, yet you're a local. How'd that happen?" Luffy shrugged. "Shanks taught me a thing or two. So did my Gramps, Garp the Fist. Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to kick your ass all the way to the moon." With that, Luffy rushed over and indeed kicked Buggy so hard he went shooting off into the sky, creating a nice twinkly light as he vanished from view. Luffy turned from his disappointing fight to find Zoro putting the finishing touches on his own bout. Cabaji was unconscious, probably from the three big cuts on his torso from one of Zoro's Oni Giri attacks. Mohji was down too, and Richie the lion seemed to be playing dead quite convincingly. "That was hardly worth the effort. We need to have a spar sometime so we can really stretch our muscles. I need to work out the kinks from what you 'taught' me somehow," Zoro said as he sheathed his swords. "Agreed." Turning to the warehouse where the Buggy Pirates had stored their valuables, Luffy called out "Nami! All clear!" The pirate thief emerged, clutching a big bag of treasure. "It's over already? Those guys seemed pretty tough. And that was really freaky, captain, when I heard your voice in my head." "Sorry. Couldn't let them know you were there by warning you vocally. I'll avoid telepathy in the future if it bothers you," Luffy promised. "And we fought, we won because we were stronger. Simple math. Now, what to do now? Find the townsfolk and let them know the pirate menace has been dealt with or just leave and let them discover it for themselves?" Nami shrugged. "We ain't Marines, no need to play the hero. I say we just ditch and get to where we're going as soon as possible." "Seconded," Zoro said as he tied his bandana back around his bicep. Luffy nodded. "Majority rules. Let's hightail it out of here." Unaware of Mayor Boodle cautiously coming over to scout out the pirate base to see what all the ruckus was about or the noble vigil of a dog named Chou-Chou, the Straw Hat Pirates returned to the dock and settled into their respective rafts. "You sure we can't try to find another sail for your boat? It's got Buggy's symbol on it," Luffy griped. "It's just painted on a canvass, no big deal. And do you want to go searching blindly around this dock for some spare cloth? Didn't think so!" Nami countered. "Now tell me where you want to go so I can earn that check." Luffy grinned nostalgically as he reviewed his mental file filled with the memories he'd absorbed from a marksman named Yasopp. "Gecko Island. Our sniper is waiting to be recruited. If he's half the talent his father is, that is." Reviewing her mental atlas of the East Blue, which she'd memorized in its entirety by the time she was 13, Nami pulled out a compass and calculated their heading. "Got it. Just follow me." Nami sailed with utter confidence out into the open ocean, obediently followed by Luffy and Zoro. When they'd been sailing for about half an hour and the island was lost to the horizon behind them, Nami turned to her employer. "So. Just how exactly does your whole psychic Devil Fruit thing work?" Luffy shrugged. "I can read minds so long as they're in my range. I can also control minds if I want to, but I don't often want to. The stronger the mind, the more resistance I have to work through as my will challenges theirs, but for your average joe I barely even feel the effort." "Control them how, exactly?" Nami asked, curious, and concerned in equal measure. Luffy blinked. Then the next thing Nami knew, the azure ocean waves had turned lime green. "I can fool the senses, make people see things that aren't there, or not see things that are there." Nami suddenly found herself patting her head and rubbing her tummy at the same time. "I can make people do things, with or without realizing they're even doing them." Out of nowhere, the taste of Bell-mere's tangerine chicken flooded Nami's mouth. The flavor almost made her break out in tears, the powerful reminder of her childhood affecting her deeply. "I can make people remember, or make them forget." Nami blinked and all the false impressions had vanished, while Luffy had a contrite expression. "I can do a lot. Sorry for doing that to you but I felt the best way for you to realize it was to experience it yourself."
Nami felt a kind of very real fear slither down her spine as she realized the pure, reality-warping power locked away inside the ordinary-looking boy with the straw hat. "On the way to Shell Town, when you said you could do worse than kill me…" "I could have you bent over and begging for my baby with a thought, either fully aware but helplessly trapped in your own head or honestly thinking that's what you wanted. I'm not sure which would be crueler, to be honest. I could make you forget how to breathe and watch you suffocate. I could wipe out every thought and memory in your head and leave you a vegetable. My power is terrifying, Nami, make no mistake. There are times I wish I'd never eaten that Fruit. But then I remind myself that better me than some sociopath bent on world domination." Nami nodded slowly, processing these revelations. "If Arlong had eaten your Fruit or Nezumi…" "Then East Blue, maybe even the world, would be in really bad trouble. Luckily, I was the one to eat it. So I'm the one who gets to play with people's minds like toys." There was a troubled look on the pirate captain's face. Zoro nudged him with his boot. "Cheer up, Luffy. It's got to be fun, being essentially a god over us lowly mortals. Besides, your gift can be damn useful. You taught me all that stuff the first day, remember?" "What stuff?" Nami asked. "I made a decision that I would transfer all relevantly useful memories about combat to each member of my crew. Zoro essentially had a multi-year apprenticeship to some of the best swordsmen in the world in the space of a breath. I also taught him about Haki, which is this special energy every person can unlock and use. Speaking of, you're part of the crew, even if you're on retainer. Here you go." A beat later, Nami felt a pounding headache as the secrets of Observation and Armament flooded her memory banks. Weathering the discomfort, she blinked. "Wow. That's… that's actually pretty cool! Little old me could punch through a concrete wall with enough Armament!" Nami reassessed her provisional captain. "You… Luffy, are you really strong enough to beat Arlong?" "I've spent ten years training for the New World, the second half of the Grand Line. An average Fishman, even an above-average Fishman, would be a walk in the park for me even without cheating with any Mind-Mind interference. Jinbe, on the other hand… well, I might use a couple of tricks to help out." Nami felt hope bloom in her chest, but years of conditioning and building Arlong on a dark pedestal in her mind could not be undone in a day. "Well… if you ever happen to cross paths with him, I'll wish you luck. I'll even say something at your funeral." Luffy threw back his head and laughed. They sailed for the rest of the day, just chatting like young people were wont to do. When the sunset, they had a cold dinner from the stores they'd snagged on the way out of Orange Town. Luffy decided he might as well pass the time somehow and joined them as they settled down to sleep. It had been a week, after all, he was overdue for some good old-fashioned slumber.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
NarutoSO
NarutoSO Copy from FF. Il update when the original Author Updates
Original author DuncanIdaho2014
https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13562243/
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone