One Piece (Love Story) [Part One]

Chapter Ninety Seven [Rewritten]

-Chapter Ninety-Seven-

"Wait, hold on—listen to me! Sure, we threw him off our boat, but I bet he's still alive!" Luffy tried to explain as the orangutan continued to rant and rave, clearly not bothering to listen to a single word the rubber man had to say.

"I don't think he cares, captain" I said.

"Havoc Shooter!" sucking in a large amount of air, the primate started to sing into the mic he was now holding...well, singing was a nice way to put it.

"The ship!" Luffy gasped as the boards to the other ship started to moan and creak until they eventually started to pull back and break.

"So what are they doing?" Sanji questioned.

"Destroying their own ship, it seems" I sweat dropped.

"Who cares? It looks amazing!" Luffy shined in awe. "He's destroying his own ship with his voice!" he laughed.

"Get to work, everyone! Let's use this to our advantage and put some distance between us and them!" Nami ordered.

"Great idea!" Sanji swooned with hearts all around him.

"Look, Nami's not a demon anymore" Luffy smiled.

"Better not let her hear you say that" I snorted, shaking my head.

"Really?" Chopper perked up upon hearing what Luffy said, seemingly pleased that the ginger was no longer in the mood to bite someone's head off.

"Well, I hope she'd be calmer after letting off all that steam from earlier..." Usopp grumbled before suddenly stopping in his tracks when he noticed that some of our boards were now starting to tremble. "Luffy, we got trouble! This isn't good!" he wailed, moving to hold one of the planks down.

"Yeah, seems like it" I hummed as I jumped on top of another board that was getting ready to spring up.

"Waves are moving faster than I thought—oh great, the ship's starting to break apart right when I just repaired it today!" Usopp groaned as more boards were beginning to be ripped up from the ship. "Ahh! She's beaten up enough already, if we stay here any longer we'll start taking up water!" he screamed.

"Full speed ahead! We need to get out of his voice's range!" Nami shouted.

-Later-

"I can't believe our luck..." Usopp heavily sighed, hammering away at one of the boards that had been ripped up as he tried to slot it back into place. "Seriously, that orangutan almost sunk us and now it's up to me to fix it all and keep this thing afloat!" he irritably huffed as Chopper happily stood next to him—handing him a new board whenever he needed it.

"I'm just glad we don't have to listen to that guy's singing anymore—if we stuck around just a bit longer, I'm sure my eardrums would have busted..." I grumbled, hands holding the metal that was wrapped around the mast in place as Zoro hammered down the nails that had been ripped up.

"Seems to me that this busted-up old ship is on her last leg" Zoro remarked. "We need a new one."

"How dare you even consider replacing this boat!" Usopp snapped.

"Yeah, how dare you!" Chopper echoed.

"You are all aware of the origins of this ship, aren't you?" Usopp asked as he desperately looked around.

"Yeah, don't you?" Chopper frowned, causing the corners of my lips to twitch.

"Yeah, we all know the story, Usopp—try not to be so defensive" Luffy smiled from across the ship where he worked. "The Going Merry is an important part of our crew and we all know we have to take care of her, you shouldn't take everything so personally" he reminded the sharpshooter.