-Chapter One Hundred and Fifty-Two-
"Didn't we also realize that they'd send warships after us...?" Usopp weakly questioned when he took note of the warships that were now following us.
"Looks like they went all out" I whistled.
"Look—there's our exit! The sea gate!" Nami pointed the second she spotted the gate that we needed to pass through to ensure our escape. "Usopp, prepare the bow cannon! Chopper, make extra sure you follow my orders!" she instructed.
"No problem" Chopper nodded from his place beside the steering.
"This is the base's only way out—we have to break through that gate" Nami explained. "The shore markings can't be right...the water's just way too shallow, so why put a port here? It's wrong, something doesn't make sense..." she mumbled to herself after taking a closer look at the map in her hands. "Are you kidding me? We don't have a single cannonball!" she scowled when Usopp suddenly came back and informed her that there were no cannonballs onboard the ship for him to load into the cannons.
"Not a one" Usopp shook his head. "No explosives of any kind—not even the boxes they came in" he said.
"Well, that's hardly surprising, given that they confiscated the Going Merry" Robin said.
"She's right" I nodded. "When a ship is normally confiscated, so is everything it carries—since this place's budget was cut, I bet they're making good use of the cannonballs they took from our ship..." I mumbled.
"What do we do? We can't burst through that gate without some serious firepower" Usopp frowned.
"We can, but we have to be smart about it" Zoro said as I jolted the minute I felt the bottom of the dress suddenly flutter a bit from behind, causing me to quickly turn to him with a glare.
"Excuse you?" I quietly hissed, frowning at the innocent look he gave me as he turned with a hum.
"Is something the matter?" he asked, grinning as he watched my mouth open and close like a fish out of water. "You know, you should wear dresses more often—they really compliment your legs" he suddenly complimented, grin widening as my cheeks flushed.
"Oh yeah? Well, my foot up your ass will probably compliment them real well as well..." I eventually grumbled, causing him to laugh as I crossed my arms and turned my head with a pout. Although...I couldn't stop the small smile that tugged at my lips when I felt him lightly bump me with his shoulder, causing me to look back at him from the corner of my eye and see that stupid grin of his. "You're such a dumbass, you know that?" I quietly snorted, shaking my head.
"Hm, and yet you still hang around me" he teasingly hummed.
"It can't be helped, you'd be so lonely without me" I dramatically sighed, leaning back toward him as he chuckled.
"All we have to do is gain control of that gatehouse" Sanji shrugged, he and the others clearly ignorant of the exchange between the swordsman and me.
"Don't talk like it's going to be easy!" Usopp snapped.
"It is because I have an idea" Luffy suddenly grinned. "Gum Gum Balloon!" inflating his stomach, he caught a few cannonballs coming straight for us and sent them flying back towards the sea gate. Strong was the force of the explosions as waves were created in the water that harshly rocked the ship. Coughing and waving her hands, we were pleased to see a decently sized hole in the gate once the smoke finally cleared a little and started to spread out.
"It worked!" Usopp cheered.
"That's one way to do it..." Nami muttered.
"A very creative way, that's for sure" I chuckled.
"Good job, Luffy! Now let's sail out of here!" Nami grinned before her eyes slowly started to widen at a sudden realization. "Wait...if they took all the cannonballs..." she quickly scrambled down the stairs and into the storeroom where I recalled we had placed the gold earlier for safekeeping before landing.
"Oh...that doesn't sound good" I winced at the loud scream that pierced through the air.
"What's wrong, Nami?" Usopp worriedly asked.
"We've been had! My treasure!" the ginger despairingly wailed.
"The open sea! Keep her on a straight course, guys!" Luffy shouted as we finally started to near the sea gate and the hole we had made in it.
"No! Turn around!" Nami quickly demanded. "We can't leave just yet, full reverse! Don't just stand there—those lousy Marines stole all our gold, turn us around!" she angrily ordered. "We have to go back to the fortress right now!" she stomped her foot, making it clear that she wasn't going to stop throwing this tantrum of hers until we turned around and did as she demanded.
"Are you nuts?" Zoro asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Nami, I know it's frustrating that we lost all our gold, but we're so close to escaping" I frowned.
"Yeah" Usopp nodded. "Maybe you didn't notice, Nami, but we almost got killed breaking out of that place—Zoro's right, you're completely nuts" he huffed.
"I'm quite sane right now, thank you!" Nami glared. "Look, what's the point in escaping if it's without all our hard-earned gold?" she asked as if trying to reason with us like we were the unreasonable ones.
"Wow! Whenever money's involved, Nami gets really serious" Chopper remarked.
"You can say that again" I nodded.
"I love that side of Nami too!" Sanji cooed.
"You love every side of her" I sweat dropped.
"But we're so close to that big hole we made! All we have to do is just sail through it, you know!" Luffy argued.
"Hey, aren't we supposed to be pirates?" Nami frowned as the captain slowly nodded. "Well, have you ever heard of pirates leaving gold behind? Wouldn't that be the worst thing a pirate can do?" she asked.
"Yeah, I guess" Luffy agreed after a moment's thought.
"So, I guess it's decided then, let's get our treasure! Crew, let's make a U-turn and go back to the fortress—double!" Nami ordered.
"Got it!" Chopper nodded.
"Aye, aye! Anything for you, Captain Nami!" Sanji swooned.
"Hold on, you guys!" Usopp shouted as the ship was turned around.
"What are they doing?" Zoro asked before grunting as I smashed into his chest after losing my balance due to the harsh and sudden turn.
"Going to go get Nami's gold, I suppose" I shrugged, grabbing hold of his shirt in an attempt to steady myself.
"Hey, be careful!" Luffy snapped when he almost lost his balance.
"That's it, just keep it up" Nami smiled before frowning as bells suddenly started to ring.
"You hear that?" Luffy questioned.
"Please be quiet, Luffy" Nami requested.
"Sounds like windchimes" he remarked, ignoring the ginger.
"What kind of windchimes are you listening to?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.
"They're alarm bells—you use them to signal your location to other ships when you're in fog" Nami explained. "And those sound like they're coming straight towards us" she frowned.
"How was that, Nami? Should we keep her on a rightward course?" Sanji asked.
"No, left rudder full! If we don't, we're going to crash into that big ship heading toward us!" Nami hurriedly shouted as the ship made another sharp turn and sent us all tumbling over once more. "We're going to crash!" she wailed when she saw just how close we were to the Marine ships that were passing by, but by some miracle, we just barely scraped by them all without any incidents. "That sure was close, to think we almost died without ever laying eyes on our gold again..." she heavily sighed the minute the danger had passed.
"Yeah, that was the worst part about all that..." I sarcastically grumbled from my spot sprawled out on the ground.
"Uh-oh" Nami's face fell the minute she heard more bells starting to ring.
"Sounds like a lot more than last time" Luffy remarked.
"I see one, two—oh no! There's a whole fleet of ships bearing down on us!" Nami cried.
"We're dead meat!" Usopp fearfully screamed.
"So, Nami, what will it be my sweet? Left rudder or right rudder?" Sanji asked.
"Left, quickly! If we don't, we're going to be smashed to pieces!" Nami shouted. "I don't think we're going to make it!" she cried as we sailed past the other ships—the air around us thick with tension with each close call we had. "We...we made it? Keep her heading straight, guys!" she ordered once she realized we weren't in any danger. "We can't keep sailing blind like this, it's too dangerous here—we got to get out of this smoke" she eventually huffed in realization.
"Wouldn't they spot us if we do?" Zoro asked.
"Yeah, we'll be sitting ducks once we leave this smoke! Those ships will take aim and then boom!" Usopp fearfully cried. "They'll blast us to the bottom of the ocean and we'll be fish food—I can't die yet!" he wailed.
"Either way, it seems we just might be screwed" I shrugged.
"Do you have any better ideas?!" Nami angrily snapped at the three of us.
"Miss Navigator" Robin suddenly spoke up. "I was able to do a little bit of research, it turns out that this fortress used to station quite a lot more troops and warships than it currently does" she revealed as I slowly nodded, already understanding what it was she was implying.
"Well thank you for sharing! But this is not the time for a stupid history lesson, Robin!" Usopp snapped.
"It seems that this fortress has become a victim of military downsizing, as a result, many of its areas were shut down and there are plenty of unused docks around the base" Robin continued, ignoring the sharpshooter as she held up the map that Nami had been using earlier.
"Plenty of unused docks, huh? That's great!" Nami gasped in realization. "Wow! Thanks, Robin—you're a lifesaver!" she grinned. "Okay, guys, here's the plan—we're going to hide the Merry in one of those old docks" she informed us.
"Uh...how do we even know where to find one?" Usopp asked.
"Obviously we use the map" I said, motioning toward the piece of paper Nami was now holding. "You know, the same one we've been using this entire time to find a way out of here."
"That's right, just follow my orders and the map" Nami nodded.
"Well, what do we do now, guys?" Usopp asked once the ship was finally safely docked and out of sight of the Marines. Currently, we were gathered inside the kitchen—quietly discussing what our next move should be now that we were out of harm's way.
"If you ask me, I think we should head back to the gate and make a break for it while we still can" Zoro huffed.
"You got a point there, the Marines mean business" Usopp quickly agreed.