The sun was at its zenith. The vast ocean was as flat and still as a giant mirror, reflecting a blue so intense it hurt the eyes. Not a single cloud. Not a single bird.
And not a single bite of food.
On a small boat drifting aimlessly, two figures lay listlessly.
Luffy was on his back, his stomach letting out mournful groans louder than the lapping of the waves. He was gaunt, his eyes sunken, the mouth that was always grinning now only capable of whispering desperate words.
"Meat... Water..."
Zoro sat in meditation, trying to calm his mind to forget the hunger and thirst that were gnawing at his insides. But even his iron will was shaken by the constant rumbling from his captain's stomach.
"Can you please shut up?" Zoro growled, his eyes still closed. "Your stomach is breaking my concentration."
"But I'm hungry..." Luffy whined. "Zoro, you're the navigator, right? Why did we drift to a place with nothing to eat?"
Zoro's eyes snapped open, veins pulsing on his forehead. "I'M A SWORDSMAN! NOT A NAVIGATOR! You're the captain! Finding food and a navigator is your responsibility!"
"Huh? Really?" Luffy asked, looking genuinely clueless.
"Of course, you idiot!"
"Well, that's too bad," Luffy sighed. "I don't know anything about navigating. I just follow the wind."
Zoro let out a long, weary sigh. He had joined a crew run by a true moron. "Normally, I survive at sea by hunting other pirates for their bounties to buy food. But there's no one out here in the middle of nowhere."
Luffy looked at him. "That's weird. A bounty hunter who can't find his way."
"I'm not a bounty hunter!" Zoro snapped. "That was never my intention!"
He looked out at the sea, his gaze distant. "When I first set out, my only goal was to find a certain man."
"A certain man?"
"That's right," Zoro said, his voice lowering. "The man I have to defeat to fulfill my promise. But... I couldn't find him. Worse, I couldn't find my way back to my own village. I was completely and utterly lost."
He sighed, a rare frustration on his face. "So, I had no choice. I had to hunt bounties to get by."
Luffy listened, and then his face lit up as if he had just discovered a great truth.
"Ah! I get it!"
"Get what?"
"It means," Luffy said with utmost seriousness, "you're just bad with directions!"
WHACK!
A large lump instantly appeared on Luffy's head from Zoro's punch.
"SHUT UP! THAT'S NOT IT!" Zoro roared, his face bright red.
Just then, a massive shadow passed over their boat.
They both looked up. An abnormally large bird with colorful plumage was circling above them.
In his hunger-induced haze, Luffy didn't see a bird. He saw a giant, flying roast chicken.
"MEAT!"
Without a second thought, Luffy stretched his arms out.
"Gomu Gomu no..."
His arms shot upwards, grabbing onto the bird's legs.
But he had miscalculated. The bird was too strong. Instead of pulling it down, he was lifted up into the air.
"Whoa! Help!"
To make matters worse, as he was pulled up, his head got stuck right inside the bird's beak.
The startled bird flapped its wings frantically, flying away with the screaming captain of the Straw Hat Pirates.
Zoro could only stand and watch, his jaw on the floor.
"...THAT COMPLETE IDIOT!"
He scrambled for the oars and began to row with all his might, trying to chase down the bird and his moronic captain.
After rowing at a furious pace for some time, Zoro spotted three men clinging to a piece of driftwood in the middle of the ocean.
"HELP! PLEASE!"
Zoro glanced at them, then in the direction the bird was flying. He didn't have time to stop.
"GRAB ON!" he yelled as he rowed past them.
The three men hastily grabbed onto the side of the boat and were pulled aboard. They were panting, looking completely exhausted.
"Th-thank you so much," one of them said. "You saved our lives."
Zoro didn't reply, still focused on rowing.
The three men looked at each other, a sinister grin spreading across their faces. They stood up, pulling out rusty swords.
"Thanks for the lift," the leader said. "Now this boat belongs to us!"
Zoro stopped rowing. He slowly turned around, one hand on the hilt of his sword.
"What did you just say?"
"We're pirates of the great Captain Buggy! Hand over the boat!"
Zoro stood up. "Oh. Pirates?"
A few seconds later.
The three pirates were lying in a bruised, swollen heap on the floor of the boat.
"Now then," Zoro said, his voice as cold as ice, while the three trembled and began rowing in the direction he pointed. "Tell me, why were you three adrift out here?"
The leader, his face still full of fear, began to explain.
"We were tricked by a girl! A little witch with orange hair!"
He recounted how they had met a beautiful girl on a small boat. She had used her looks to charm them, got them drunk, and when they weren't looking, she had made off with their treasure and their map of the Grand Line, leaving them on a leaky raft just before a storm hit.
"She even knew the storm was coming! She's like a demon!" another one added.
Zoro listened. A girl who could predict the weather? Such a talented navigator...
"Our captain, the great Buggy, will not let her get away with this!" the third one growled. "He's a Devil Fruit user! No one can stand against Buggy the Red-Nosed!"
Meanwhile, in a nearby port town, a girl with vibrant orange hair was running for her life through the narrow alleyways.
She was Nami.
In her hand was a rolled-up, old parchment. The very map of the Grand Line she had just "borrowed" from the Buggy Pirates.
"GET BACK HERE WITH THE MAP, YOU BRAT!"
Three of Buggy's pirates were hot on her heels.
Nami glanced back, a confident smile on her face. "Idiots! Catch me if you can!"
She turned into a dead-end alley. "Damn it!"
The three pirates blocked the entrance, sneering. "Nowhere left to run, little lady."
At the same time, in a nearby clearing, Captain Buggy sat on a chair, looking annoyed at his subordinates.
"You still haven't found that girl and the map?!"
"Captain, we've spotted a very strange bird flying towards town!" one of his men reported.
Buggy glanced at the sky. "It's an eyesore. Shoot it down."
"Yes, sir!"
A cannon was aimed at the sky.
BOOM!
Back in the alley, Nami was looking for a way out.
Suddenly, a massive black shadow fell over her.
CRASH!
An object fell from the sky at a terrifying speed, slamming into the ground right in front of Nami and the three pirates, creating a small crater and sending dust everywhere.
Everyone froze.
As the dust settled, they saw a young man in a straw hat getting up from the crater, dusting off his pants as if nothing had happened.
"Whew, that was a rough landing," Luffy said.
The three Buggy pirates, led by a large man named Superhuman Domingo, stared in utter disbelief. To fall from that height and be completely fine?
Nami, after a second of shock, immediately saw an opportunity.
She pointed at Luffy. "There! That's my boss! You'll have to deal with him!"
With that, she bolted, leaving a confused Luffy to face three angry pirates.
"Huh? Boss?" Luffy asked.
"You're her boss?" Domingo growled. "You don't look like much."
He swung his hand, intending to slap Luffy. Luffy easily dodged, but the slap knocked his precious straw hat to the ground.
The cheerful look on Luffy's face vanished.
The air turned cold.
He slowly bent down, picked up his straw hat, and carefully dusted it off. He placed it back on his head, the brim shadowing his eyes.
"What..." a low, cold voice said. "...did you just do to my hat?"
"It's just an old straw hat! What's the big—"
POW!
Luffy had moved. His punch was a blur, smashing straight into Domingo's face.
The other two, horrified, charged at him.
"Gomu Gomu no Pistol!"
Luffy took them both out with ease.
After the fight was over in a matter of seconds, Nami peeked out from around a corner, her face a mask of surprise and admiration.
"Hey!" Luffy turned to her, slightly annoyed. "Why did you run off and leave me to deal with them?"
Nami stepped out, a charming and sly smile on her face.
"Because that's what I do," she said.
"My name is Nami. I'm a thief who steals from pirates."
"And you, my rubbery friend, just saved me a whole lot of trouble."