-Chapter Nineteen-
"Hold on" Zoro said, one hand held up before suddenly lifting and flinging me over his shoulder. "Okay, let's go" he firmly nodded.
"W-what?" I sputtered out, cheeks flaring up in embarrassment the moment I felt his hand press against my lower back and dangerously close to my bottom. "I can run on my own, you know!" I exclaimed, the flush on my face already beginning to spread the moment I heard his laughter.
"It'll be quicker this way" I couldn't tell if that was a jab at my ability to run—which wasn't that bad—or a lame excuse as I quietly huffed, crossing my arms. Turning my gaze forward ahead of me, I watched how the Marines gave chase as a cloud of smoke weaved its way through them before eventually morphing itself into Smoker.
"Not good, here he comes! Not good!" Luffy loudly whined as he pushed himself to run faster. "Not good" he repeated, getting more frantic and louder each time as the pounding of everyone's feet and his panicked screams now filled the one quiet air before eventually...
Silence.
Within the blink of an eye, everything and everyone grew deathly silent—their voices quickly becoming lodged within their throats due to shock as their feet came to a screeching halt.
"You again!" Smoker grounded out.
"Just give it up" the mystery man from earlier grinned, suddenly appearing between us and the Marines in the blink of an eye much to my and everyone else's startled surprise. "While you may have the power of smoke, mine is fire—a fight between the two of us would be pointless, it would probably go on forever" he said, grin growing cocky now as flames now engulfed the tips of his fingers.
"Alright, looks like mystery man has Devil Fruit powers" Zoro noted
"What? No way—I wonder what gave it away?" I sarcastically asked, mocking surprise before snorting at the swat a received on my lower back.
"Your sarcasm is not needed" he huffed, though the smile in his voice gave away how amused he really was.
"Who is this guy anyway? And why is he helping us?" Usopp asked.
"That you, Ace?" Luffy suddenly inquired, causing my eyes to widen as I hit a balled-up fist against the palm of my hand.
"Oh!" I exclaimed in remembrance, finally recalling the many wanted posters and news articles based around this particular man—Portgas D. Ace was his name and he was a well-known member of the Whitebeard Pirates if I remembered correctly.
"You haven't changed a bit, Luffy" Ace smiled while casting a glance back at our group.
"Is it you, really?" Luffy asked. "Whoa, did you eat a Devil Fruit or something?" he inquired, sounding rather surprised by the other man's fiery display.
"Yeah, the Flame Flame fruit" Ace nodded. "Anyways, now's not the time for chatting," he said, waving his hand as if to shoo us away, "you guys got to get out of here—I'll catch up" he assured us while turning his attention back towards the Marine. "Don't worry about these guys, I got them. Go on."
"Let's go!" Luffy firmly nodded, already starting to run as he gave the order.
"Yeah, coming!" Usopp agreed, quick to follow after the captain.
"But, Luffy" Nami called out as the rest started to follow after as well.
"Who is that guy back there?" Sanji asked, finally voicing the question that was clearly on everyone's mind.
"Hey, when are you planning on putting me down?" I asked—being carried over someone's shoulder like a sack of potatoes wasn't exactly the funniest experience in the world. Already could I feel my stomach starting to ache in protest to the repeated jabbing of the swordsman's shoulder.
"When we get to the ship, now shush" Zoro shushed, currently invested just like the rest in who this "mystery" man was to Luffy.
"Hold up, Luffy! Tell us who that guy is!" Nami demanded, frowning at the lack of an answer being given.
"Do you know him from somewhere?" Vivi inquired.
"Yeah, he's my big brother" Luffy finally answered before tossing his head back in laughter once he spotted the others' reactions.
"Brother?!" everyone shouted in shock.
"I mean...is it really all that surprising when none of us ever bothered to ask him if he had any siblings before now?" I asked, mulling over this new information as I tried my hardest to recall a time were the captain had ever mentioned having a brother before or even a time were any of us had ever talked to him about it before. I couldn't think of any.
"Well, yeah..." Nami slowly nodded. "But still..." she muttered, gaze shifting downwards.
"It's still strange to think he actually had an older sibling this entire time and never once talked about him..." Usopp muttered in defense of his surprise.
"Do any of you go around talking about your siblings? If you have any that is" I raised an eyebrow as I looked back at the group. "That's what I thought..." I muttered when all I got in return was silence. Just then, an explosion sounded out.
"What's going on back there?" Chopper flinched.
"Looks like a fight between smoke and fire" Usopp remarked.
"Neat!" I whistled, admiring the billow of smoke and flames that appeared off in the distance some ways behind us—back where Smoker and Ace were.
"So that's the kind of power you get after eating a Flame Flame Fruit" Sanji noted, earning a quack of agreement from Carue.
"Speaking of Devil Fruits—Luffy, is it true? Is that guy really your brother?" Nami asked as if needing reassurance that we had all indeed heard him correctly.
"Yep, his name's Ace" Luffy nodded.
"Look, I'm not surprised to hear you have a brother, Luffy" Zoro suddenly butted in. "But what's he doing here on the Grand Line?" he asked, shifting a little in an attempt to readjust me atop his shoulder.
"He's a pirate too, just like I am" Luffy unhelpfully answered. "He left home three years before I did to go search for the One Piece" he explained yet at the same time didn't.
"That's great to know, but that also didn't really answer his question" I said. "Also, Zoro, could you maybe set me down? This is starting to get really uncomfortable" I said, pretty sure my stomach was already starting to bruise by this point.
"Wha...hey!" Sanji snapped, practically doing a doubletake as he looked back. "What do you think you're doing handling Skylar like that, bastard?! Put her down!" he angrily growled.
"You're only just now noticing?!" I questioned.
"Shut up!" Zoro snapped right back at the cook.
"Enough you two—we don't have time for one your guys spat!" Nami snapped, clearly not in the mood to deal with those two fighting right now. "Skylar you're just going to have to hold out a little bit longer—thanks to Ace, he's bought us some time that we can't waste. We need to get back to the ship."
"Sure! Nami, dear!" Sanji cooed, his anger quick to dissolve and be replaced with his usual love-struck expression as if just the sound of the navigator's voice was enough to flip a switch in his brain and make him forget about everything else.
"Whoa, I never would have thought I'd run into my big brother in a place like this" Luffy smiled as he twisted around until he was running backward.
"It's a small world, you're bound to run into people you've been away from for years" I piped up,
"Yeah, no kidding..." Zoro grumbled under his breath.
"What was that?" I owlishly blinked.
"Huh? What was what?" he feigned ignorance, a dust of pink now settling across his cheeks as he avoided looking my way.
"Which way do we go?" Usopp frantically cried the moment we started to approach a fork in the road.
"Left, Usopp! Everyone got that?" Nami asked.
"Uh...almost everyone" I sweat dropped, watching as Luffy took the right path instead of left...I'm amazed Zoro hadn't also made the same mistake.
"Yes, Nami! I'll follow you wherever you go!" Sanji cooed.
"Uh...guys..." I said upon realizing that no one else had noticed the captain's mistake.
"You love-sick freak!" Zoro snapped in annoyance, the blonde's gooey behavior finally starting to get on his nerves.
"You know what," I heavily sighed upon realizing they weren't listening, "you guys will figure it out later...hopefully..." I muttered.
-Later-
"Get everything ready, we're taking off right away!" Nami ordered as the men now scurried around the deck of the ship.
"Aye, aye! Set the sails!" Usopp commanded.
"But...it took us so long to finally get here and now we're leaving already? Vivi? Skylar?" Chopper questioned, innocently looking toward the princess and me as we busied ourselves with helping the others in getting everything ready.
"Yes, but remember, we only stopped here to get the supplies we're going to need for the rest of the journey" Vivi softly reminded him. "And now that we have all of that, we're going to head upriver to our next destination—The City of Green, Erumalu" she explained.
"She's right" I nodded in agreement. "Besides, we couldn't stay here even if we wanted to since the Marines now know that we're here" I added.
"Right" Vivi nodded.
"Erumalu?" Chopper tilted his head.
"Hurry!" Zoro snapped, impatiently ushering the others to pick up the pace.
"I am!" Usopp sharply snapped right back.
"Seems they still haven't noticed..." I sighed, catching Vivi's attention.
"Noticed what, Skylar?" she curiously asked.
"Pick up the pace!" Sanji ordered as they finally started to prepare the sails.
"Hm? Haven't you noticed?" I asked with the tilt of my head.
"No? What is it?" she frowned in confusion.
"Ready!" Usopp called out.
"Ready? Set sail!" Nami ordered before halting everything as a look of realization finally dawned across her face.
"That we're missing someone" I said, lips twitching as that same look of realization slowly started appearing on everyone else's faces as well.
"Dammit!" Sanji hissed.
"Uh...guys..." Chopper quietly spoke up.
"You know, I have the strangest feeling that we're forgetting something" Usopp nervously laughed.
"Yeah, so do I" the reindeer agreed.
"It's not something, it's someone" Nami groaned.
"Ugh! That stupid moron!" Zoro growled before snapping his attention toward me the moment I started to laugh. Quickly, I covered my mouth in an attempt to hold back my laughter and hide my smile as more attention was slowly put on me. "You knew, didn't you!" he suddenly accused.
"What?! For how long?!" Nami snapped as she scrambled from her spot towards me and grabbed hold of my shoulders, harshly shaking my body around as I grasped at her wrists in an attempt to get her to stop.
"I've known for a while—I mean, I did try telling you guys earlier!" I defended, nervously looking away from the intense glare the ginger was giving me before she loudly groaned and pushed me away. Tiredly did she pinch the bridge of her nose, lowly grumbling in irritation to herself.
-Later-
"Um...is it okay for a ship to set sail without its captain on board?" Chopper curiously asked.
"I guess, there's really no law against it and it's not like we're just leaving Luffy behind forever" I shrugged.
"The first place the Marines are going to look for us is the harbor, so our top priority is to hide the ship" Nami calmly explained.
"You're not still mad at me, are you?" I asked, giving her an innocent smile the moment she looked at me with a deadpanned expression.
"Yes" was her blunt response.
"Fair enough" I chuckled with a shrug.
"I know of a secret cove that's up ahead, we can anchor the ship there" Vivi offered.
"Alright, so we lay low until things calm down a bit then go back and get Luffy" Sanji suggested as he leaned back against the railing.
"Good grief, that guy attracts trouble like a dead guy attracts vultures..." Usopp muttered from his spot at the steering.
"Yeah, that's the only reliable thing our captain does" Zoro agreed.
"That's not true" I disagreed. "He's also got a pretty good cheery disposition."
"Yeah? And what good does that do?" Zoro asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Don't know, but he's got it" I shrugged. "Unlike some people."
"And what exactly is that supposed to mean?" he glared.
"What do you think it means?" I innocently smiled, propping an arm up on his shoulder and resting my chin within the crook of it as I peered up at him. He only narrowed his eyes further before eventually huffing and flicking my nose, causing me to pull back. "Jerk..." I grumbled with a grin, rubbing my nose as neither of us paid any mind to the slight mumbles of the others around us.