Part five - Koby and the "Queen of monsters" 5/6

All four of them involuntarily remembered the first two months - Nami was very persistence - during which the girl tried her best to escape with all their money. And this is when Luffy was acting as her "temporary" captain? Such naivety, then and now, caused only emotion among the guys. The girl herself now too.

- And her constant screams about the fact that she is a navigator and therefore should not fight? - Yosaku snorted cheerfully. - Now you don't even need to say anything, without any orders she will scatter everyone herself and at the same time will not blink an eye.

- How long have you been not like that too? - Zoro chuckled. - I also remember a lot of your shouts, both about battles and about training.

- Do not speak as if you yourself were somehow different from them! - Luffy opened his mouth in a wide grin. - You, in my opinion, were generally the funniest of all. Especially the first month, when you were so helpless that you could not even win back food for yourself.

Zoro blushed visibly, which only fired more curiosity in Johnny and Yosaka.

- Luffy aniki, what do you mean? In what sense could Zoro-aniki not be able to win back his own food? Why win back food at all?

- Because I had to live with goddamn savages - Zoro grumbled, but there wasn't much displeasure in his voice, just the familiar grumbling.

- Where I lived, all the food was added to one cauldron, so if someone didn't have time to grab a piece for himself, he remained hungry, - Luffy explained to Johnny and Yosaku.

- And Zoro-aniki did not have time to snatch a piece for himself? - Yosaku asked incredulously.

- Our Zoro-aniki? - Johnny asked even more incredulously.

- Shi-shi-shi… guys, I've lived with the Mountain Bandits since I was seven. I met Zoro at the age of fourteen, almost fifteen, so the Mountain Bandits had lived with me for more than seven years by the time we met him. Explain further?

Seven years since Luffy-aniki ... Johnny and Yosaku at that moment did not know who they needed to sympathize with more - the guys knew for sure that they needed to sympathize with everyone involved. Zoro, suddenly finding himself right in the center of a pack of bloodthirsty monsters - where Luffy is, there is always blood and monsters - or the Mountain Bandits who had to live with Luffy-aniki - the most primari and bloodthirsty monster of all! - for so many years.

- And yet, what about Nami? - returned to Yosaku's original theme. - She has money, but somehow she is in no hurry to return to her village. And if we really go to the Grand Line soon, we must finally close the issue with Nami.

- Do you really think Luffy doesn't understand this himself? - grinned Zoro, picking up a new bottle of sake

- Don't worry, everything will be fine with Nami, - Luffy waved off lightly, continuing to watch the said girl slowly finish off the pirates. - Her situation will be the last chord to our glory ... or rather your glory, - Luffy replied, turning to them with a satisfied smile, emphasizing the corresponding word.

- I never understood why you're hiding your power so hard, - Johnny said. - What's the point?

- What "what's the point"? - Luffy protested slightly. - Of course, it's more interesting! Why would I even bother otherwise?

- The fact of the matter is, I somehow do not grasp, in what place all this may be interesting.

- Ryu, you disappoint me ...

- I'm Johnny, - the guy objected wearily, already almost resigned to the fact that he is now Ryu.

- … Just imagine, - Luffy continued to say, as always, completely ignoring Johnny's objections, - when you all have your high awards, an even more sinister reputation, and everyone will consider Zoro a strong, cruel and completely merciless captain of Straw Hat Pirates, I go on stage. Terrible captain, turns out to be just first mate, huh? How do you like the plot? Like stories where the brutal psychopathic killer is not the main suspect, but the most harmless, and cowardly looking character. Stories like this are always popular! Shi-shi - shi...

- ...

- ...

- Finally, you recognized yourself as a cruel psychopathic killer. - Unlike Johnny and Yosaku, Zoro had something to say after all he heard.

- I didn't admit anything! - Luffy was deliberately offended. - I just said that by the way!

- Luffy, I lived with you, I lived around people who knew you since your childhood, I was in your home village and I saw your house, I saw what it was made of, and your personal cemetery, which you looked after so lovingly so don't even try to convince me otherwise.

- Hey, stop scaring Johnny and Yosaka with your fictional stories, or they'll think you're telling the truth. Private cemetery? Seriously? You're a joker, Zoro! - Luffy laughed somewhat tightly, which immediately confirmed everything said by the swordsman. - And in general, - the guy hastened to change the subject right there, - in addition to the cool plot, when the most dangerous character is hiding in the shadow of other, it would seem, and so incredibly dangerous characters, there is another reason why I do it. And the fact is that while everyone around you thinks you are the main villains, I can ... hmmm ... how to put it ... In short, I can do a looooot of various junk. And that's cool.

The guys already understood this very well. Doing junk and "having an adventure" - in the words of their captain himself - Luffy loved more than anything else. And money. True, he loved money not because of the money itself, but because it allowed him to more freely do all kinds of junk and "adventure" in an enhanced mode. Not to mention the fact that the very process of stuffing his pockets with money - or the Iron Box, if we talk specifically about their case - Luffy also managed to dilute the doing with various junk and the opportunity to "adventure" or just have fun.

The conversation was interrupted by itself, when, ten minutes after the start of the battle, Nami against Alvida and her team, only some small boy remained on his feet. Koby. When Koby realized this himself, it was only thanks to a miracle - or a curse, given the circumstances, that he did not collapse into a swoon. And it was an even greater miracle that he did not get his pants dirty when the "Queen", having finished with the pirates, went straight to him.

- And who is this we have here? - stretching her lips in a satisfied smile, literally purred "Queen". - A pirate at such a young age? - Ay-ay-ay, how bad, how bad. And what is the name of our bad boy? - The Queen stopped right in front of numb with fear Koby.

- K-koby! - The boy gave out in a trembling voice.

- Captain, what should I do with him? - Turning in the direction of the sun loungers, asked the "Queen" loudly.

- Kill him! - came a joyful answer from the Hat.

Koby sobbed involuntarily in horror.

- Just? - in the girl's voice was clear surprise. - It seems to me that it will be better if we make a visual aid out of it, on the topic: "Why you can't be a pirate at such a young age."

- Then Yosaku will now cut him into pieces and hang it from the trees!

- No no! - The aforementioned Yosaku shook his head sharply. - I want to try a new trick here, when the first thing you do is chop off a person's head, after which he still remains alive long enough to see how I chop the rest of his body into many pieces. Can you imagine what expression on the face of a severed head will be when she sees all this? I think it will be cool and very visual!

Koby felt his vision begin to blur.

- No no! - Johnny shook his head now. - So he will die too quickly! Maybe it's better to fire it first? Count it up, then he will see not just his body being cut into pieces, but his burning body being cut into pieces!

- What? Great idea! - Lightly rubbing her chin with her finger, "Queen" blossomed with a joyful smile - But can I torment him a little first?

- You can, - the Hat said generously, - but only a little! In the meantime, we will collect firewood.

- Thank you, captain!