Steel Heart

Ch 100 - How to Climb to the Top

"Rock, paper, scissors. Shoot!"

"Damn it."

"Yayyy! Thanks, Nana!"

Nana rolled her eyes and kept her arms firmly across the chest. She did a quick side step while the sniper threw his arms out to his sides and leaned back towards her in a complete trust fall. Next to them, Zoro and Law scowled at the scissors they had both chosen.

Wham!

Usopp slammed right onto the deck of the Thousand Sunny and his eyes almost popped out of its' sockets. "Nana!" he barked accusingly, "Why didn't you catch me?!"

"Who said I was going to?" she asked calmly back.

"C'mon! You agreed," Usopp protested, "Winner gets to be carried up to the top of the elephant!"

Nana pretended to inspect her nails. "Who said I had to start now?"

She was able to fix her mechanical wings and it was just in time too. They had arrived on the island of Zou, which was actually an island only by name. To everyone except Law's surprise, Zou turned out to be an actual living, breathing, and moving elephant! It was large enough to fit an entire ecosystem on it's back and tall enough for it to tread through the deep ocean and move across the New World like a camel diligently crossing a desert.

They had found the Thousand Sunny tied to one it's legs and being pulled along the elephant's trek. To everyone's disappointment, none of the ones who fled Dressrosa early were on board. There was no Momonosuke, no Brook, no Chopper, no Nami, no Pygmy, and no Sanji. There was also no Caesar but his existence at this point was a non-factor, at least to Nana.

Now, the only choice was for them to somehow get up to the elephant's back. Nana could fly with her wings but she could only bring one passenger with her. Franky's eyes still needed some mild adjustments so Nana didn't trust him enough to operate the Buzz-7, even if it would just be a straight flight up.

Somewhat fortunately, Kanjuro came up with a solution. He used his powers to draw a large pink dragon, which would everyone could sit on while it climbed up. However, the dragon did not look sturdy at all. It was sweating and looked exhausted just by the act of breathing. His legs were short and thin and it's claws did not look like it had any sort of traction to it. Even the sound that escaped his lips sounded pitiful.

"Ry-ry-ryuuuu..."

One look at Kanjuro's creature had made Usopp, Law, and Zoro all turn to the mechanic almost simultaneously and demanded that she give them a lift. To no one's surprise, the captain and cyborg were too excited about the idea of riding a dragon to even gauge it's distressed state and for some reason, the historian seemed unfazed by it. In fact, she looked charmed by it.

"Okay! Let's go!" Luffy cheered. He was the first to jump on it's back and he scurried right to his ideal spot, right behind the dragon's head.

As everyone else found their spot on the dragon's spot, Nana begrudgingly helped Usopp to his feet and then hooked her arms under his. "Alright. Let's get going."

The dragons started to make it's way up the elephant's leg while Nana and Usopp flew up a little ways ahead of them. She wanted to go at full speed but Usopp, Franky, and even Robin insisted that they stay at the same pace as the dragon. It would be smarter for everyone to arrive at the top together, especially since they didn't know what would be waiting for them. It was frustrating for the mechanic to say the least.

They heard some distant shouting on the Barto's crew ship down below but they were already high enough not to make out the words, at least for the rest of the crew.