One Piece: Grand Endeavours

Chapter Forty-Six: Origin of Nightmares

Kuro
As soon as I wake up I, like most mornings, take a few moments to force myself to realise I am not there. I'm somewhere safe. I'm not in the place of constant...everything. Everything I want to forget but can't. I huff, gnawing on my lip, the nightmare still having a bit of a hold on my mind. I decide to get some fresh air, heading out of my room, hoping I don't zone out as much as I did before. I don't really need to elbow someone again given I have pretty sharp elbows. People don't need bruises because of my crap issues or unimportant qualms. I head to the railing then notice Luffy is also there, looking both down and dejected.
"You okay?" I ask, heading over. He jumps slightly, glancing at me with a confused expression.
"What are you doing up this early?" he asks me.
"I'm always up around this time," I say with a shrug. "Why are you up?"
"Bad dream," he murmurs. "I don't get them very often but after what happened to Ace they happen at least sometimes..." His expression falls and I find myself trying to figure out what I can do to cheer him up but I'm at a loss. "Did you have a bad dream too?"
"Yeah," I admit, reluctantly, glancing out at the horizon again.

I feel relief when he doesn't push it further and we just stand in silence but I don't think it is an awkward one. It is more of a calming quiet despite how on edge I still am.
"So what do you normally do when you have nightmares?" he asks me, breaking the silence.
"Uh...get some fresh air and have some tea," I say with a shrug. "Or I just stare blankly at a wall and try to pretend it didn't happen." Not the healthiest approach, I know, but it is what I'm used to doing.
"What did you do when you had a friend? When you were little?" he asks. "Did ya tell her?"
"No," I say. "Honestly, the nightmares were barely a thing then and even if they were I wouldn't want to be a burden."
"Yeah but if you told her she could've given you a hug! Hugs help you feel better!" he says happily. I am unconvinced. What will a damn hug do? "You've had hugs before...right?"
"Maybe two not genuine ones?" I guess. "I don't know..."
"That's just depressing..." he murmurs, glancing at me. "Do you want a hug?"
"Uh...I don't know? Are they really worthwhile?" I ask.

He considers for a moment then wraps his arms around me in a tight hug. For a moment I'm confused and hesitate then hug back. Or try to because I don't know anything about hugs. Hugs always looked pointless and impractical to me but to my surprise the hug is nice. Calming even. Okay, yeah, I know that theoretically in psychology hugs are good but it was a vague concept to me until now.
"So are hugs worthwhile then, Kuro?" Luffy asks with a grin, pulling away.
"More than I thought they would be," I admit, feeling better than I did before. His grin widens and yet again I'm left wondering how I don't find him annoying. Anyone else this cheerful and such really annoys me but not Luffy.

Eventually we arrive at an island.
"Hopefully there's a sweet shop!" Nova says.
"Nah, hopefully there's nice meat!" Luffy replies. I agree with Luffy far above Nova. Sweets are gross and overly sweet. "Although knowing Kuro he'll want there to be a teashop and that'll make him happy..."
"Yeah, probably." I agree. "You can never have enough tea."
"Hot chocolate is better," Nova counters.
"Hot chocolate is gross..." I mutter. How the heck do I keep getting into arguments about sweet vs. not with Nova...?

I end up walking around with Luffy and Nova, not entirely sure how I ended up agreeing but I did. Oh well. Nova's cheerfulness may get a tad annoying at times but it could easily be worse.
"Hey Kuro, you know you said you left your home island when you were 13 and started your crew when you were fifteen? What did you do for the year and a bit between those times?" Nova asks me. I feel myself blanche at the question.
"Nothing," I say, shortly.
"Did something happen?" he asks me.
"Nope," I lie. Then suppress a sigh of relief at the way to get him to drop it. "Nova, look. The sweet shop has a sale." Nova grins and runs off towards it. Phew...
"Something did happen..." Luffy says. I glance at him and shake my head. "Well it obviously did! What is it?" I shake my head. No one needs to know what the origin of my nightmares is. No one needs to know how pathetic I really am.
"Luffy, they're giving away meat over there..." I murmur, hoping that distracts him enough.
"Meat!" he cheers. "Okay, I'm going to get it, we'll talk later!" He runs off and I hope he forgets about this.