Chapter 14

The stars begin to fade for the coming dawn when Rose slowly wakes up to find herself still being cuddled by not only Luffy but also Chopper, Zoro and Usopp which brings back the blush on her freckles at full force. She growls at the embarrassing situations and starts squirming her way to freedom while she speaks under her breath. "Dammit, motherfucker, why the crap does this keep happening?!"

She doesn't care that she's making the boys stir, because as soon as she's finally out of the huddle, they quickly fall back asleep. She quietly sighs in relief as she dusts herself off, then looks to see Nami and Vivi sleeping under her sheet, but doesn't see Sanji and Ace outside.

Assuming that they're sleeping in the tents, she doesn't bother to search for them. Instead, she puts this time to good use by going to her backpack, and opening it up to grab a journal with a hard, golden colored, cover and a blue pen. She takes a seat in front of the fire pit, while she faces her sleeping friends, then begins writing down everything she knows about the Timore Comet.

It's still hard for her to believe that it's been over a week since she saw the the main piece of her research, but just seeing it was just the tip of the iceberg from what she's learned. From being able to arrive in this world, she knows that it's possible to travel to a desired place if they have a destination in mind. And a new theory is born in that the traveler needs to possess an item that can harness the comet's energy to leave. If there was no item involved, then hundreds, maybe thousands, of people would've disappeared from seeing it, and created an uproar. If she was the only one that left though, then her theory about her crystal would be spot on. Too bad she can't go back to see...

She quietly sighs at her incomplete research then looks down at the red and black crystal hanging from her neck. She's annoyed with herself in that she didn't pay more attention to her necklace after seeing the comet, so she doesn't know if anything changed, because right now it looks the same. If her theory is right though, then she could've just had enough energy for a one way trip. Not that she'd mind staying in this world.

She shakes her head to get back to her task, and gets back to scribbling down her notes, and theories, on how she came to this world.

As soon as she's done, she sees a pair of pale, muscular, legs standing in front of her. She looks up, and grows nervous when she sees Ace scowling down at her. "You got a minute?"

She nods as she closes her journal, and puts away her supplies. "What's the matter?"

"You still want a training session?"

Her purple eyes begin to widen at the question before stars occupy them. "Absolutely!"

The others start stirring from the noise, so she quickly covers her mouth.

When they fall back asleep, Ace chuckles at her excitement. "Good, let's go someplace where we can't wake them up."

"Ok." She leaves her bag behind, and follows him away from the campsite, with an eager smile on her face for the opportunity to talk to Ace about Blackbeard.

When the two of them are far enough from the campsite for it to barely be seen, the wind girl faces her fellow logia user with pure excitement in her eyes. "Ok, how are we doing this?!"

He smirks at her enthusiasm while he crosses his arms over his chest. "First things first, tell me what you've been able to do with your wind."

She blinks at the instructions before she counts the things she's done with her fingers. "I've been able to fly, and make others fly, I've created gusts out of my hands and mouth, and I've changed the temperatures of the winds coming out of me, but not the air itself. Recently, I've learned that I can manipulate clouds, and as you saw on the ship, I turned my arm into wind, but that was the first time."

Ace nods at this, and unfolds his arms. "Good, now I know how much fire I should use for our sparring match."

She widens her eyes at the statement, and sees that he's completely serious. "Wait, what?! Shouldn't we be going over basics first?!"

"Who's the teacher here?"

She twitches an eyebrow at his arrogant attitude before she answers him. "You are..."

"Then I decide how we do this. You can learn faster in a real fight. If you want, we can make this more interesting too."

She calms down from the suggestion and grows curious. "Interesting how?"

"If I win, you answer every question I have for you honestly."

She pauses at the demand, and to her she only thinks that this is still about the restaurant incident and not about his brother.

She keeps on a poker face to hide her worries while she responds with a small scowl. "And if I win?"

"Whatever you want it to be, just tell me what it is now so I know what I'm getting into."

She blinks at the response before she thinks over her choices. She knows that if she asked him to stop going after Blackbeard it could save him, but it would ruin the story line by Blackbeard going after Luffy. Even so, she can't in clear conscious say nothing and let the pirate walk off to his death either.

When she figures out something in between the two possibilities, her bangs cover her eyes as she gives him her request. "What I want is for you to listen..."

He tilts his head at the request. "To listen?"

She slowly nods before she lifts her head up to look the taller man in the eye. "I want you to listen to everything I have to say wholeheartedly, and without any questions. Whatever you do after hearing me out is up to you. Can you agree to that?"

He's surprised by the explanation, but it seems like a fair deal, so he smirks while he gets in a stance. "You got a deal. Ladies first."

"Gladly." She starts the fight by creating a gust of wind to lift him up, and low sweep him so that he falls on his face!

He growls in irritation when he feels her lifting him up again, but before she can do anything, he starts throwing fire balls at her. She tries to blow them away, but she only creates a small gust that strengthens the flames instead!

Rose widens her eyes at the large fireballs before she jumps out of the way, and releases her hold on Ace, while he keeps throwing them at her. She grows annoyed while she dodges the last fireball, and blows the sand under them up to create a smoke screen around the area!

Ace hacks from getting sand in his mouth, and wipes the sand off his dark eyes, while he tries to find his opponent! However, he can't find her anywhere until the sand clears up enough for Rose to fly up to him from the side and punches him in the face, but her fist goes through him!

"That's not going to work this time!" He throws an uppercut to her stomach to send her flying up before he throws another fireball at her.

She quickly flies to the side to dodge the fire, then quickly lifts Ace up while she tries to turn her arm into wind, but settles with creating a strong wind blast to throw him down.

Before he hits the ground through, he turns himself into a large ball of flames that consumes the wind that's holding him!

Rose drops her jaw at how he escaped, and stares in admiration of his power. "Whoa!"

Even though she wants to keeps staring, she knows that she's still in a fight, so she sets up another attack, but Ace quickly re-materializes, except for his arms that are still flames, and launches two fire fists at her!

Rose flies to the right to dodge the flames, but they were redirected towards her!

"Oh, crap!" She tries to push the pursuing flames away, but Ace manipulates the fire fists to avoid her wind.

She widens her eyes at the approaching flames when a whirlwind, that's a little taller than she is, circles around her to form a barrier. As soon as the flames collided with the whirlwind, they join into the cyclone to create a firestorm surrounding her!

"HOLY SHIT!" She quickly stops her wind while Ace stops the flames before she could get hurt.

As soon as the flames were gone, Rose quickly lands on her feet while Ace runs over to her.

He may have been testing her, but he didn't want to hurt her too bad if Luffy was interested in her. That's why when he reached the shocked girl, he checks her body to see that there aren't any burns since she didn't touch the fire. "You ok?!"

She slowly nods, as she finishes processing what just happened, she brightly smiles at him. "That was fucking awesome! I never made a barrier before! Did you see how your flames morphed with the barrier too?! That was so cool!"

Ace sweat drops at the freckled girl's excitement, because she doesn't seem scared at all that she almost got burned to a crisp. The weirdest thing though, is that she almost sounded exactly like how Luffy would've reacted to this scenario.

He softly chuckles before he starts smirking at the shorter girl. "You do realize we're not done here, right?"

She pauses when Ace punches her, but his fist goes through her. She throws a punch at his direction to blast wind at him, but he manages to grab her hand, and flip her over his shoulder! She rolls to the side to dodge his kick, then stands up while he throws a few fireballs at her.

After she maneuvers out of the way, she sees Ace right in front of her and starts throwing punches at her while she continues to dodge. She throws a punch in his direction to throw him off guard with a wind blast by her other fist. However, the arm she was using to fake him out accidentally turns into a strong blast of wind, that collides with his punch, and sends them both flying backwards!

Both of them land on their backs roughly, with Ace quickly able to get up, while Rose struggles to get on her feet. He sees that the fight's over, so he walks up to her while she slowly stands up, and lightly pants from exhaustion. She tries to create another blast of wind with her fist, but nothing happens with her wind as she punches through him. He quickly retaliates, and pays her back for what happened in Nanohana, by punching her in the face to knock her down. "That's enough."

"Not yet!" She tries to use her wind but fails again, so she low sweeps him with her leg while he was off guard, and tackles him! Before she could pin him, he flips her over and pins her arms down while she struggles. She tries to create some wind to blast him off her, but the only thing she can create in her tired state is a small breeze...

"It's over; you can barely use your wind anymore when you're this exhausted." Ace says as he keeps her arms pinned down with both hands.

She growls in frustration, but can't see a way to keep going, so she stops struggling, and sighs in defeat. "Alright, you win. Get off."

He does as he's told, and gets up with his opponent slowly following.

Rose quietly groans from her aching muscles, as she dusts the sand off her, and then chuckles at how the fight went. "Ok, I'm not gonna lie. That fight was a lot of fun. Still, all that was because of what happened at the restaurant?"

"At first, but what you said before the fight got me interested. So, what is it that you want to say to me that I shouldn't question?"

She quietly sighs before she puts a scowl on her face to get down to business. "What do you know about Blackbeard's power?"

He quirks an eyebrow at the returned question. "His power?"

She slowly nods before she answers him. "I doubt he had this power when he was with your crew, or else he would've been more famous. Blackbeard ate a devil fruit called the dark dark fruit. It's a logia devil fruit that allows him to control darkness, and gravity, at will. His fruit also lets him nullify a devil fruit user's ability, including logia users, so we can get hit by him just as how we can get hit by someone with armament haki."

He widens his eyes at this as he remembers the devil fruit Blackbeard stole from his crew mate. However, her knowing all of this just makes her more suspicious, so he keeps a scowl on his face, and narrows his eyes. "And how do you know this?"

"I've seen him fight with it. I don't know where the bastard is now though."

"Why are you telling me this now?"

She shrugs at him. "Didn't have any good opportunities to tell you before. It's one of the reasons why I wanted to train with you. I know you're going after him no matter what, but I want to at least help you fight with him on equal terms. Since he knows how your powers work from fighting alongside you, I can give you everything I know about his devil fruit. That is, if you want it."

He could only blink at her answer, but this is a great way to get some help against Blackbeard, so he nods. "Go ahead."

She feels relieved in that he's accepting her help, so she lists off everything she knows about the dark fruit. "Even though Blackbeard can nullify a person's devil fruit ability, and can hit us, he's able to get hit himself. His fruit don't let his enemy's attacks pass through him like ours can. If his darkness doesn't absorb an attack, his body takes the blow. He can also nullify a person's devil fruit power only by touching his enemy. Once he loses contact, they can use their powers again. The last bit that I can give you, is that he can pull you towards him with the gravitation power of his darkness. If you can somehow avoid his gravitational pull, or use it against him, then you have a chance."

He blinks at the detailed explanation of his powers, and has to take a second to process it, before he speaks up. "You caught all that from just watching him in a fight?"

She nods while she looks at him with softness in her purple eyes. "I saw enough to know how dangerous he can be. Listen; just be careful when you're facing him. If you can get some sea stone before the fight, then I recommend using that against him. And just... Just don't get yourself killed..."

He widens his eyes at the concern in her voice at the last sentence. "Why do you care so much about this?"

"I have plenty of reasons, but if it'll make you feel better I'll give you three of them. First, you obviously care a lot about the people close to you, since you're going after Blackbeard to avenge your crew mate, and I respect that. Second, if my information can help you stop Blackbeard from hurting anymore people then I'm happy. And third..."

She walks up to him, and looks him in the eye with a serious look on her face. "Now this the most important reason to help you, so listen very carefully."

He swallows a lump in his throat, from how determined she is, then slowly nods before Rose's lips curl up to a smile. "Freckled logia users like us gotta stick together! We're rare enough as it is!"

Ace completely froze from the reason, before he looks at her like she just said the stupidest thing in the world. "Did you really just say that?"

She blinks at his reaction, then strokes her chin with a contemplative look on her face. "You're right, 'freckled logia users' is too long of a name. How about 'freckled elements'?"

Ace scowls at the smart remark and goes to whack her. "Don't be stupid! That's not a reason at all!"

Rose quickly takes a step back from his annoyed form, to avoid the hit, before she laughs at his reaction to her joke. "Hahaha, I'm sorry, I had to do it. The tension was getting too high for me."

She sees that he's still not amused, and quietly sighs before she gives him a small frown. "As for the real third reason. It's that losing you would break Luffy's heart, and that's the last thing we both want."

He calms down at the real third reason, and sees that she's just been looking out for Luffy, before he sighs in defeat. "I see, I'll be careful then."

When she hears his answer, she grins in satisfaction. "Thank you."

She looks up at the sky, to see that the sun's already begun to come up, and looks to the direction of the campsite. "We should get back."

She starts walking away, but Ace blocks her off. "Hold it, I still have questions for you."

Rose grows confused by the declaration before she shrugs. "Sure, what do you want to know?"

"Why did you keep trying to make me move at the restaurant?"

She knits her eyebrows at the forgotten question. "You're still mad about that?"

"I'm more curious than mad now."

She sees that he won't let it go, so rubs the back of her head, and gives him a line of half truths. "Well, call me over cautious, but we haven't eaten for days, so I knew Luffy would come bull rushing into the first restaurant in sight. Luffy told me that he had a brother in the Whitebeard pirates, and I figured it was you. I wanted to keep you away from the doorway, so if Luffy did run into the restaurant then you wouldn't get sent flying, and you two could catch up."

Ace was completely dumbfounded by the explanation she gave him, because of how elaborate it is. "You did all that for the slight chance that Luffy was going to send me flying?"

"I was right wasn't I? Of course, I knew you wouldn't believe me if I told you, so I did what I did. Not that it worked though." She snorts from holding back her laughter as she remembers how Ace flew out of the restaurant.

Ace scowls at how she's holding back from laughing at the memory, and grows annoyed. "It's not funny!"

"You're right, It's hilarious!" She says, while ignoring the angry look she's getting, and takes a deep breath to calm herself down. Once she's sure that she won't laugh, she gives him an apologetic smile. "I really am sorry about what happened. Can we call a truce?"

He looks down at her for a moment, but seeing how she truly cares about Luffy enough to go through all that trouble for him, he can't say no to accepting her now. He grows grateful that his brother has someone like her by his side, and shows it by giving her a small smile. "Sure, and you know, I'm pretty impressed with how well you know your captain. Not a lot of crew members would think that far ahead for them."

She pauses at the statement then looks at him in confusion. "Nobody told you?"

He quirks an eyebrow at the question. "Told me what?"

She looks at him in shock, because she realizes that he thinks that she's in Luffy's crew, so she decides to awkwardly break the news to him. "Well, the truth is I'm not really a member of Luffy's crew. Actually, I'm not even a pirate."

Ace looks at her in complete shock at the explanation. "Wait, what?!"

Rose giggles at the pyro's shock. "I take it that means we're not leaving anytime soon?"

Ace scowls at the question, because he needs to get to the bottom of this. "You got that right! What the hell is going on with you and my brother's crew?!"

She settles down to chuckling at his reaction, and decides to get him up to speed with everything, but how she came to this world. "Relax, I'll tell you what's going on. I guess the best place to start is at Little Garden where I met them."

He silently agrees as he listens intently to her story, on how she found her devil fruit, and first met the Straw Hats on Little Garden.

As the sun began to rise in the campsite, Luffy began to groggily wake up to see that he's huddled with only Usopp, Zoro and Chopper.

He grows confused because he remembers dragging Rose into the pile, but he doesn't see her anywhere, so he shrugs it off to her getting some food.

The captain pulls out of the huddle, stretches, then looks inside the openings of both the tents to see that his brother missing as well.

He looks around for Ace, but sees no sign of him on the campsite as well. "Weird..."

He lets it go before he looks around the camp, to see if he can grab some food from one of the bags, but the ones that he looked through so far didn't have anything. He sees Sanji's bag being held tightly by the blonde chef, and quickly turns away from the tent.

When he spots Rose's bag, he goes inside to see a few apples inside. "Awesome!"

He takes a bite into one of the fruits when he sees her journal in the bag. He looks at it curiously before he reaches in to grab it.

"What the hell do you think you're doing Luffy?"

Luffy stops himself from grabbing the book, when he hears Sanji's voice, then slowly turns to see his chef awake, and walking up to him furiously. "Don't snoop into Rose-chan's things!"

He kicks Luffy away from Rose's bag, then looks around curiously. "Speaking of which, where is Rose-chan?"

Luffy rubs his aching head, from where Sanji kicked him, then shrugs. "I don't know, Rose and Ace weren't here when I woke up."

Sanji widens his eyes at this. "What?! I'll go look for them!"

He goes to leave the camp when Luffy stops him. "Hang on Sanji, you gotta make breakfast. I'll go look for them."

He reluctantly agrees, and gets breakfast ready for the others, while the rubber man goes off to find them.

Luffy wander away for what seems like miles, until he hears his brother's laughter. "Hahaha, are you serious?!"

"Shut up, it's not funny!"

Luffy widens his eyes at Rose's voice, and quickly runs in their direction. He goes up a hill to see Rose talking to his brother with an irritated scowl, while Ace holds an amused smirk on his face from hearing how Luffy recruited her when he was drunk.

He grows confused by their meeting, and hides behind a nearby rock to see what they're talking about.

Neither logia users notice Luffy's presence, when Ace asks her another question. "And he really doesn't remember a thing?"

She softly sighs before she shakes her head. "Nope, you'd better not say anything either!"

She points an accusing finger at him, which makes him laugh even more.

"Hahaha, relax, I won't. Still, I'm kind of surprised. With the way you act around Luffy I thought things were different between you two."

Both Rose and Luffy look at Ace in confusion, before Rose speaks up. "What are you talking about?"

"I mean like yesterday, your face turned red when you were being held by Luffy after you two crashed into my tent."

She widens her eyes at the statement, when she realizes Ace had the same assumption about them being romantic as Nami did, and covers her face with her hand. "Not again, it's not what you think..."

Ace see that she's looking tired, and grows confused. "Oh really? Then what's up with you?"

She groans at the question about her blush while she avoids his gaze. "You try suddenly getting hugged so much, when you're not used to it. It's too fucking embarrassing..."

Ace blinks at the explanation, in that she's shy enough to just blush from a guy's hug, and goes to test it out.

When he walks up to her, Rose grows curious about his plan. "What are you-?"

He pulls her into a slightly tight hug before she can say anything else!

Luffy widens his eyes at the sudden hug, and sees the freckled girl's face heat up from his brother's embrace. When he sees the cute blush on her face, all he could do is scowl at the sight, and grow more irritated by the second.

He doesn't know why he's so pissed off, but doesn't care when goes to get out of his hiding spot.

Ace however, still doesn't notice his brother, when he looks at the brunette in his arms to see that she's really blushing from just his hug. "Wow, you really are-!"

Both Luffy and Ace freeze when Rose flies Ace, and herself, up with her bangs covering her angry eyes.

Ace looks down to see that they're five feet in the air, then when she turns herself around in his arms, he starts to get nervous. "Um, Rose, what are you-?! Whoa!"

Rose quickly grabs his arms, then flips over to throw him off her and watch him land head first into the sand!

Her face is still beet red when she lands, with a small cloud of sand rising to her feet, and glares at the collapsed pirate. "Don't hug me for some weird experiment dammit!"

Ace groans from the pain as he pulls his head out of the sand. Before he can complain though, both logia users flinch to Luffy's laughter, and see him laughing wholeheartedly from seeing Rose throw down his brother.

Rose widens her eyes at his laughter, and realizes that he was eavesdropping. All she hopes for is that he didn't hear about the recruitment.

Ace however, twitches an eyebrow at his brother's laughter, before he gets up, walks up to him, and stretches his rubber cheeks out. "What the hell's so funny?"

"Rose flipping you-! Hey, cut it out!" Luffy whines from the pain of Ace stretching his cheeks further, so he tries to punch him, but his fists go through him.

Rose giggles at the brotherly spat, as she watches Ace release his brother's cheeks, then she walks up to him. "How long were you hiding here?"

"A little while before you threw him. What were you guys doing out here anyway?"

"Ace and I had a sparring match."

Ace snickers at the explanation. "More like a one-sided fight."

Rose glares at the cocky pirate. "Don't lie, I threw a few good hits back there!"

Ace chuckles at her complaint. "For your level, yes. How about later I give you a proper training session?"

Rose freezes at the offer before she beams a large smile at him. "Yea, that'll be great!"

Ace nods while neither of them notice how Luffy's frowning at the way she's smiling at him.

He's never felt this annoyed unless a crew mate is threatened, but no one is in danger. Why the hell does he feel-?

"Hey Luffy!"

He snaps out of it from Rose's voice, to see both her and Ace looking at him with concern.

"You alright Lu?" Ace asks when Luffy's stomach starts growling.

"I'm hungry. Ready to go back?"

Both of them nod as the three of them walk back to the camp with Luffy unconsciously making sure that he's walking in between them.

Ace quirks an eyebrow at Luffy's assertiveness to walking in between him and Rose. He has no idea why his brother could be acting like this, unless...

He realizes that Luffy saw him hugging Rose, then looks from Rose to Luffy for a second. If Luffy is annoyed by him and Rose getting close, and is the one that keeps hugging her, then he has feelings for her! When he comes to this conclusion, a shadow of a smirk forms on his face. This day just turned into a whole lot of fun for him...

He chuckles to himself, and comes up with a plan to tease his brother, as the three of them make their way back to camp where the others are beginning to start the new day.

Hours after everyone continued their journey, the heat started getting to a few of the crew members again.

"Hey Sanji, can we have lunch yet?" Luffy asks for the third time in the past hour.

The chef groans at the repeated question, as he smokes his cigarette. "For the last time no. Not until Vivi-chan says it's ok to take a break."

Luffy turns to her with a smile. "What do you say Vivi?"

She quietly sighs at his stubbornness, but when she sees how tired some of the others are getting, she can't help but agree. "How about we take a break at the next rocks we find?"

Luffy happily agrees to it while he turns to the others. "Alright, to the next rock! Whoever wins rock-paper-scissors has to carry everyone's stuff!"

Zoro quirks an eyebrow at the idea. "Shouldn't the loser carry the stuff?"

Luffy ignores the question as he gets his fist ready. "Alright, let's go!"

Everyone, but Rose and Ace, got themselves ready for the game by huddling together, while the two of them stay back.

Luffy glances over at Ace and Rose while playing, to see Ace smiling at her and joking around soft enough for only her to hear.

Rose widens her eyes, at the quiet joke he just made, before she giggles, but doesn't realize that the captain's been watching them the whole time.

The captain couldn't stop himself from getting irritated when Usopp taps his shoulder. "Hey Luffy, what are you doing? You won."

Luffy turns to his crew, and looks to see that his hand's in a tight fist while the others were showing scissors. "Eh?!"

"That's right, which means you gotta carry our stuff." Nami says as she, Vivi and the rest of the Straw Hats place their things on a makeshift sled.

The winner reluctantly takes the sled, and starts walking while the others casually walk ahead of him.

Rose looks back to see Luffy tiredly dragging his crew's things at the back of the herd, and looks around to see nobody else paying attention to him. She starts slowly walking to get in the back of the group, just in front of Luffy, then uses her wind to lift the sled up a foot in the air.

The sled driver pauses at the lack of weight, then turns around to see that he's pulling a flying sled.

"I won't tell if you won't." Luffy turns to Rose's soft voice, to see her walking backwards, to face him with a small smile.

Luffy quickly nods with a large smile. "Yea, thanks. Hey, can you make some cold air too?"

She pauses at the request before she rubs the back of her head and turns around to walk forward again. "Sorry, but I haven't perfected it yet. Maybe some other-!"

"Hey guys, I see some rocks up ahead!" Everyone stops at Usopp's voice and looks ahead to see a group of large rocks up ahead.

Luffy immediately brightens up at this and gets ready to run. "Alright! Break time!"

He head offs as fast as he can to the rocks, and accidentally bull rushes Rose to send her flying until she lands on the back of the sled!

"What the hell?!" Rose groans at the rough landing as she sits up on the luggage then widens her eyes when the flying sled starts falling from her lack of focus. She quickly gets the back of the sled flying again, before it hits the ground, while Luffy continues pulling it to the rocks.

The crew can only watch in shock, as they watch their captain run off with the wind girl on the back of the sled.

Ace couldn't help but chuckle at their departure, while he walks ahead. "Let's get going before Luffy eats all the food."

The others couldn't agree more as they catch up to him to get to the shady spot.

As they keep walking, Nami walks next to Ace in the back of the crowd. When they're out of earshot, she starts talking to him with a smirk. "I saw Luffy's reaction to you whispering to Rose during rock, paper, scissors. Did you do that on purpose?"

Ace nods before he returns the smirk. "Just thought I'd give my little brother a couple of pushes to recruit her, if he really does like her. I'll stop if you want."

"Please, don't stop on my account. I want to see where this goes."

He snickers at the request as they begin to catch up to the others. "You got it."

Not another word was spoken about the mischievous plan, as they rejoin the group, and continue on their trek to the next resting point.

As soon as he makes it to the rock, Luffy laughs in excitement as he let's go of the sled. "Finally, some shade!"

He lays down to relax in the cool shade, while Rose releases her wind on the sled, to gently set it down.

She jumps off the luggage pile, and chuckles at the crazy ride Luffy dragged her into. "There's never a quiet moment around you is there?"

Luffy shakes his head with a large smile while he relaxes. "Nope, but where's the fun in that?"

She chuckles at his carefree answer. "You got a point there."

She looks back at the path they took while thinking over what comes next. She knows that the separation filler is coming, but she can't exactly remember how Vivi and Nami separated. Maybe it was from a sandstorm or-!

"Hey, speak to me!"

Rose snaps out of her thoughts from Luffy's yelling, then turns around to see him hunched over a group of five collapsed cranes. She immediately recognized the birds and grows annoyed. "Crap..."

Luffy doesn't notice her anger, as he quickly turns around, and runs back to the path where he left the others. "Rose, stay here and watch the birds! I'm gonna get Chopper!"

"Luffy, wait!" Her calls were ignored when he ran off on own.

She quickly turns around, to see that the birds have already begun to grab some of the crew's stuff. She twitches an eyebrow at their bold move, before she walks up to them menacingly while she gives them her father's death glare. "You got five seconds to drop their shit and run away before I send you flying, you damn con artists!"

The birds pale at her frightening look in her eyes, but they didn't drop the two bags they grabbed when they make a run for it! "HEY!"

She uses her wind to lift them up, and fly them toward her, but they flap their wings to fly away! "GET THE FUCK BACK HERE!"

She flies after them, above the rocks, and chases the two birds that are each holding a bag. When she caught up to them, she began to have a scuffle with them in mid air with the birds pecking at her, while she punches them, and tries to grab the bags. While Rose was distracted with the two thieves, the other three birds swooped down for the rest of the luggage. They manage to grab a bag just before Luffy, and the rest of the crew, show up.

"Those are warusugi birds!" Vivi calls out while the birds make a run for it.

"COME BACK HERE!" Luffy yells as he chases after them, and leaves the others in the dust.

The others sweat drop at how fast he's running, before Sanji looks around for Rose. "Hey, what happened to-?!"

He cuts himself off when the two birds Rose was fighting were knocked out, and slammed to the ground right in front of them!

The others step back from the birds, before they look up at the scratched up girl, as she lands in front of them with a grin. "What's up?"

Nami blinks at her casual attitude, before she looks down at the unconscious birds holding their bags. "What the hell happened?"

Rose takes the bags from her two opponents, and gives each of them one more kick to the gut out of spite, before glares down at them. "These little scam artists tried to steal the bags when Luffy left!"

Vivi snaps out of her surprise then looks at everyone apologetically. "I'm sorry, I should've told you guys. Warusugi birds like to steal from travelers by playing dead."

Mostly everyone was shocked by the explanation, when Sanji takes a drag from his cigarette, before he smiles at Vivi. "There's no need for you to apologize Vivi. If anyone should apologize, it's Luffy for letting himself get tricked and leaving Rose alone with them."

Rose quietly sighs at the comment while she places the bags back on the sled. "It's not a big deal. I can at least take on a couple of birds. Speaking of Luffy, where did he go?"

"He went after the birds after they stole another bag. He's been gone for a while though." Chopper says as he points to the path he took.

Nami quietly sighs before she takes a seat in the shade. "He'll be back when he's hungry. While we're waiting for him let's just enjoy the peace."

The others nod as they start relaxing, except for Rose who's looking out at the path Luffy took.

She looks out at the desert in thought and is taken aback when she remembers the pervy camel about to come into the picture.

Since she remembers him helping everyone out, she shrugs off the thought before she relaxes with others, while they wait for Luffy to come back.

Which didn't take long, because in a manner of minutes, everyone starts to feel a tremor!

When they hear Luffy screaming, they look in shock to see him riding a camel towards them with the giant lizard coming after them.

Usopp and Chopper scream in fright of the gigantic lizard, and hug each other for comfort. "What the hell is that?!"

Vivi widens her eyes she realizes what the animal is, and looks to the others. "It's a sandora dragon! They're the largest reptiles living in the desert."

Ace snaps out of his surprise then chuckles. "Luffy's gift for attracting trouble never fails."

Zoro groans in frustration, as he gets ready to unsheathe his swords. "What kind of crap star was he born under to get a gift like that?"

"The hell if I know!" Sanji says as he and Zoro run towards the incoming chase.

Luffy keeps hanging onto the camel while trying to slow him down when he sees his friends. "Wait, camel! Stop!"

The camel doesn't listen when Zoro and Sanji get close.

"Hey, Luffy need some help?" Zoro asks when Luffy nods with a smile.

"Sure, thanks!" Luffy jumps off the camel and punches the lizard, while Zoro began slicing him, and Sanji kicked him on the head.

Everyone else, but Rose and Ace, watched in horror of the sight of the three of them taking down such a large lizard so brutally.

"When you watch them fight, you can almost pity the monsters..." Nami says.

Usopp slowly nods in agreement. "You got that right..."

Rose holds back a chuckle from their distress then turns to the princess. "Hey Vivi, do those lizards normally hunt alone?"

Vivi becomes horrified by the question, before she looks around for something. "They don't! They hunt in pairs!"

The others look at her in shock when the sand starts to rise behind them. They quickly turn around to see another sandora lizard being uncovered from the sand.

Ace looks at the lizard casually, for a moment before he smirks. "You wanna fight? Then, let's go."

The others could only stare as they watch the sandora dragon get him in his mouth, only for Ace to burn him to a crisp from the inside. When Ace emerged out of his charred mouth unharmed, everyone, but Rose, stared at him slack jawed, while the freckled girl applauded him.

Luffy, Sanji and Zoro drag their prey towards the rock, with the camel walking beside them, before they see the second lizard.

"Awesome, we have as much meat as we need for lunch now!" Luffy says while Sanji gets to work on cooking the lizards they caught.

Zoro takes a seat on the rock, then looks at the camel curiously. "Hey Luffy, what's with the camel?"

Luffy takes the first piece of cooked meat before he shrugs. "I dunno, I found him getting eaten by a mystery plant, when I was chasing the birds."

Usopp looks at the large, two person, saddle on the camels back curiously. "With a saddle like this, it's definitely not a wild camel."

"Think we can ride it?" Sanji asks.

Vivi looks over the camel curiously. "That would be great if we could. With his saddle, it looks like two people can go on at a time."

Luffy quickly finishes his meat, before he tries to get on the camels back, but the camel bites his head to stop him.

"Ow!" He steps away from the camel while he rubs his head from the bite.

The camel starts grumbling, so Chopper begins to translate for him. "He says 'I'm a freedom loving, and compassionate, camel. Thank you for rescuing me. To show you my appreciation, I'll allow your crew to ride me, but no men allowed.'"

Usopp, Luffy and Sanji immediate go up to the camel, and start thrashing him. "What the hell?!"

Once the guys are finished pounding him, Nami walks up to him, and caresses his chin with a smile. "I'm so sorry, my crew mates can be so mean sometimes. Now then, what should we call you?"

Luffy raises his hand for a suggestion. "Idiot."

Sanji follows suit with his vote. "Moron."

Usopp gives them his final suggestion. "Dumb ass."

Nami ignores their ideas, as she gets on the camel's back, and pets his head. "Eyelashes it is."

Zoro sweat drops at the name after he finishes his lunch. "That's the weirdest one out of all of them."

Nami continues to ignore the boys, as she rides Eyelashes towards the other girls. "Which one of you wants to go on first?"

Rose gives her answer by taking a step back. "Sorry, but I'm not interested in riding a pervy camel. Besides, I can always fly if I decide not to walk. You can go with her Vivi."

Vivi looks at her in shock, before she gives Nami an apologetic smile. "It's ok, I can still walk."

"Come on Vivi, it's fine." Nami pushes, so the princess climbs on while half of guys are booing at the camel.

Once Vivi's secured on the second seat, Nami takes the reins. "This is perfect! We can get to Yuba much faster now! Let's go Eyelashes!"

She snaps the reins, so Eyelashes runs away from the group at the speed of lightning!

The others just stare in shock as the girls leave them behind. "HEY, WAIT FOR US!"

The camel ignores their call, as he keeps running away with the girls. The group quickly gets their stuff, and starts running in hopes of catching up to the girls.

Nami looks back to see that they're already far away from them, so she calls out to them. "YOU BETTER HURRY GUYS! IF YOU GET SEPARATED, THEN YOU'LL NEVER LEAVE THE DESERT ALIVE!"

Rose growls in frustration, when she realizes that this is how they got separated in the anime! She hurriedly flies up to see where they went, but she already lost sight of them! "Shit, how fucking fast is this camel?!"

She flies down next to the guys, and points them in the right direction. "I didn't see them, but they should be going straight!"

The others widen their eyes at this, before they focus on running as fast as they can to hopelessly try to catch up. "WAIT FOR US!"

TO BE CONTINUED