Chapter 2: Escape from Goat Island 1/2

A Good Ship

Xipholynx

Summary: Reincarnation doesn't always land you in the same type of body as your previous one. Luffy sets sail from his home in a living ship and goes on a journey to "to gather a crew, find the greatest treasures, have the greatest adventures, and to become King of the Pirates." AU

Disclaimer: All recognizable characters, settings, etc. of One Piece are the property of Oda Eiichiro. No copyright infringement is intended.

Chapter Two: Escape from Goat Island

The secret to happiness is freedom... And the secret to freedom is courage. - Thucydides

Koby was fifteen years old and miserable.

Not because he was fifteen but because for the past two years he had been the unwilling cabin boy and even more unwilling personal occasional punching bag for the worst pirate he had ever met: Captain "Iron Mace" Alvida. She was cruel, brutish, vain, and also completely delusional. Even worse was on top of everything else she had a standard of cleanliness that was somehow even stricter than the Official Marine Guidebook Standards. Koby knew this because he had memorized said guidebook a few years ago when his dreams had still seemed only difficult instead of actually impossible.

It seemed the only reason Alvida seemed to tolerate his presence on the crew (even though he was as spineless as a starfish) was because Koby could clean up nearly anything better than anyone else on the entire crew. The fact that he had basic navigational skills seemed marginally useful after that. Alvida had made the base of her pirate operations on the northeast side of Goat Island, which was a fairly small island where rocks instead of sand covered the shoreline and a small but densely packed forest grew in the middle that was too difficult to pass through easily. Koby knew that there was a tiny town filled with fishermen and sailmakers on the far southwest end of the island whose residents feigned blindness and deafness over the fact that pirates were around as long as they were left alone.

(The old-timers knew it was only a matter of time before a certain Monkey returned to the area and kicked around the unsuspecting pirate captain. They were right in a sense - just not about which Monkey it would be.)

Koby had completed his duties for the day, having scrubbed the deck of Alvida's ship to be spotless and following that had cleaned the main washroom that Alvida used at their island base. Since he was done with his duties for the day he decided to walk two kilometers down the shore over to where he had been building his 'escape boat' with whatever driftwood and supplies he could manage to scrounge up for the past two years. He doubted he'd ever actually use it since it looked more like a coffin rather than a watertight seaworthy vessel. Some pirates drank, fought, or gambled in their free time but Koby messed around in his boat and imagined his never-to-come escape.

He had only been fiddling with his boat for about an hour or so when he noticed a rather unusual sight. The constant flocks of gulls and other seabirds like sandpipers and albatross were very common for anyone living near the sea to see. As were the much more useful News Coos who delivered papers to everyone and anyone. The unusual sight he spotted though was flying further above. Wheeling on the thermals was a bird with a shape he wasn't able to recognize right away. It looked to be some type of black and white bird of prey like an eagle, or perhaps some sort of pelican based on the shape of its beak, Koby decided. He squinted upward, his hand above his brow, but still, he couldn't make out enough for identification from so far above.

Then it transitioned smoothly from gliding upon the sea thermals into a sudden dive. That was interesting, the bird almost looked like it was heading right towards him.

It was diving right towards him.

"Yiiiieee!" Koby ducked his head into his arms and tensed, expecting to be snatched up like a tasty shrew would be taken by a hawk and stayed that way for at least a minute.

"Do you think that fellow's alive, did he faint, or do you think he's playing dead, Ann?"

The question had been asked with the soft voice of a lady who wasn't Captain Alvida. Koby uncurled from his protective position and peeked up to immediately spot a black and white giant bird that had a person sitting on its back. She had short hair that was blue like the sea on a sunny day and gentle looking velvety black eyes that peered down at him with some curiosity. The girl dismounted smoothly from the bird in order to get a closer look at Koby.

He lastly noticed a green bird perched on her shoulder only when it spoke in the same voice that he had heard before. "Well, it seems he was just playing dead. Go ask him if there are any goats here."

"You could just ask him yourself." The blue-haired girl, apparently named Ann, argued back to the green bird before turning her attention back over to him and said, "Well? You heard her right? Are there any goats here?"

"N-no, I haven't seen any goats - just fish and- Woah, wait a minute! Why are you asking me about goats!? You should get out of here quickly." Koby warned them. "This island is the home base of the pirate "Iron Mace" Alvida and she'll completely flatten you if she finds you here."

"I'm just scouting ahead for my captain since he wanted to visit here. He thought there might be goats. He won't care that a pirate has a base here, right Dawn?"

"You've got that right. The only thing that scares Luffy is his grandpa. A pirate base wouldn't worry him a bit." the talking bird, apparently named Dawn, concurred with Ann's statement before saying something bizarre. "We'll be there in a little while, I can see the shore already."

Ann turned to look to the horizon and brightened up in excitement before waving her arm enthusiastically to apparently signal to her captain. Koby was eager to see what the approaching ship would look like and though he was worried over getting this girl and her captain tied up in his own issues hoped he might be able to finally escape from Alvida's service and truthfully was a bit disappointed that it was only a boat, only large enough to carry about four people, even though it was a cool looking boat.

It had a design Koby had never seen before and was painted a rich forest green color. It was a bit odd that a small boat would have a carved figurehead even if it was shaped like the head of a dragon. He briefly wondered what kind of captain lead Ann and manned such an interesting boat before he finally spotted the figure at the helm. It was a teen who looked to be approximately sixteen or so in age. He wore a sleeveless red vest, blue denim trousers cuffed at the knees, and a pair of straw sandals that matched the yellow straw hat perched on top of his head. Even from a distance, Koby could make out a crescent moon shaped scar underneath his left eye but his smile was much more distinctive. He seemed to be friendly looking so Koby marginally relaxed even if it seemed to feel a bit underwhelming to meet him like this.

The teen gave a fond pat on the top part of the dragon figurehead (Koby decided he only imagined the figurehead lean into the teen's touch and smile a little wider) and in a loud, confident voice that carried all the way over to Koby said, "You did a great job again, Dawn! Stay safe while I go ashore!"

Koby wondered why the little bird and the boat had the same name but decided it didn't matter too much to worry about it. Even with the boat so close to shore Koby still gaped at the sight of Luffy disembarking from the boat by taking a standing leap off of it and landing only three feet away from where Ann and her giant bird stood.

"This is my captain, Monkey D Luffy." Ann introduced as she gestured towards the scruffy but friendly-looking teenager, who smiled widely at Koby and waved his hand towards the timid teen in an enthusiastically friendly gesture that Koby timidly returned.

"The "D" stands for Delightful." Ann's little green bird spoke up in a merry tone of voice.

"No, it doesn't." Ann denied as the green swallow fluttered over to Luffy and perched up on his yellow straw hat and settled contentedly onto the top of it.

"Where's the meat?" Luffy asked with excitement as he whipped his head back and forth to look across the tree line as though he expected a line of goats to emerge at any moment.

Ann shook her head and said, "Sorry but there aren't any goats here. From the air, I spotted a fishing town on one end of the island, there is a big forest in the middle, and some pirates on this side of the island that this guy warned me about."

"Pirates!?" Luffy's eyes seemed to sparkle with excitement, "Do you think these ones will be friends and share their food with us?"

"I doubt it. The pink-haired kid said that Alvida would 'completely flatten' me if she found me here apparently." Ann responded not looking especially concerned. "I figure it won't be anything to worry about since you were coming along anyway. I'm not up to date on many pirates but I do know about the ones around this region like Spiel and Alvida. From what I last heard Alvida's bounty is 5,000,000 beris only because she sticks around the Goa Region. It's considered pretty brave for a pirate since it's the region where the Marine Hero Garp is from. Pirates like us should really leave the region quickly or else we'll be nothing but paste after a very short career."

While Luffy shivered and felt what was surely the shadow of death passing briefly over his soul Koby realized that the two older teens were actually rookie pirates and internally sulked over the realization. It was just his luck that the first pretty girl around his age that he'd met after years of servitude had to have been a pirate on top of being completely out of his league.

"I'm Koby. I'm actually a cabin boy on Alvida's ship." He introduced himself and admitted his shame while averting his eyes in order not to see their reaction to his confession but the result of his reveal was very anticlimactic.

"Oh, I see. Actually, that's not important." Luffy said before he continued. "The important thing is for you to answer this. Do you know where I can get some food? I ate on the mayfly's ship but my leftovers vanished when he sunk his ship."

"Y-you were on a sinking ship?" Koby looked up in astonishment at Luffy, astonished over his admittance. It was certainly a farfetched statement considering the excellent state of his boat. "A normal person will die on a sinking ship."

"I almost did but Ann saved me," Luffy admitted in a tone that seemed a bit too cheerful to be speaking of a near-death experience. "So food? Where can we get some?"

"Not at Alvida's base, she'll catch us for sure. I think there might be some small animals in the Middle Forest that you could hunt and I think there's a pub over in the little town across the island (though I've never been there). The other pirates told me the forest is filled with restless soul-sucking ghosts though so maybe we should try to fish on the shore here instead of going somewhere."

"Let's get food at the pub then! Pub food is pretty tasty. I had it a lot growing up. Let's go across this forest!" Luffy ordered, ignoring Koby's suggestion as he pointed at the forest and then whipped his hand to point at Ann who had already started to climb up on top of Balloon. "This is crew bonding time so no flying unless Balloon can carry you, me, and Cody."

Balloon squawked at Luffy, puffed his chest out, and flexed his wings as though he wanted to show how strong he was but crooned in disappointment when Ann hopped off from his back.

Ann nodded and in an agreeable tone of voice said, "Yes, that sounds fine. This island isn't very big anyway. I could see the whole area from not too far up in the air. It'll be dark soon though, should we really go into an unknown forest this late?"

Luffy threw his a fist into the air energetically and gleefully said, "It'll be fine! Let's go have food and an adventure! Show us the way, Cody."

As Koby turned to lead the two pirates and birds to where they wanted to go (He sure was used to taking orders from pirates, wasn't he? His miserable inner wanna-be marine scolded ineffectively) he struck up a conversation to distract himself. "I actually don't want to be on this island anymore ya' know. I was thinking about running away but I just don't have the guts to do it...I'm gonna end up being a cabin boy for Alvida for the rest of my life even though I want to do something else."

"If you want to leave, then leave," Luffy said easily as he took the lead of the group since he felt they were moving too slowly.

"No! No way! I can't, it'll never work! Whenever I think about Alvida finding out I want to leave my legs turn all mushy...I get too scared!" Koby denied frantically remembering that dark day so many years ago. "It was all too fast, I remember it like it was yesterday! I only wanted to go out fishing but I accidentally got onto Alvida's ship! I had to be a cabin boy for Alvida for these last two years just to stay alive!"

"Wow Cody, you're pretty stupid and useless and you seem kinda wimpy too. I don't like you." Luffy said honestly causing Koby's shoulders to wilt a bit.

"Gee, thanks for your honesty," Koby mumbled morosely.

"Aw, you don't need to be so mean to Cody, Luffy. Not everyone in this world is meant to be smart, useful or brave but even those types of people deserve freedom just as much as anyone else." Ann felt some empathy for the younger teen but not much since she at least had at least tried to escape her pirate captor with Balloon within a few hours of being captured.

"Actually my name is Koby." It didn't seem to Koby that either of them heard him since Ann seemed more interested in debating with her captain over listening to his comment even as the trio of humans and duo of birds soon came up to the densely packed inner forest where none of Alvida's crew ventured very far into.

The trees were too thick and too old with roots that twisted entwined together. The canopy of the forest was so dense that Koby couldn't even see the light from the setting sun. On the shore, it had been late evening but within the forest, it was already dark and getting darker. Luffy traversed through it as easily as though it were an open meadow. Ann seemed to be following Luffy's lead and even though she stumbled a few times the big panda bird Balloon was always near enough to steady her so she wouldn't fall. Koby felt like he tripped over every single root they crossed and his hands were already getting tender from breaking his falls on the rough bark of each tree.

"So why did you two set sail anyway? You're both pirates right?" Koby asked as he moved to walk closer to the duo, trying to distract himself again. Wasn't he supposed to be leading them anyway? Not that it mattered much since he hadn't ever been this far into the forest.

"There's freedom on the ocean, you know," Ann answered easily with a bright and excited smile. "Even though I only became a pirate today I've never felt this lighthearted before. It's honestly very addictive."

Koby nodded at her explanation and when he turned to Luffy he watched transfixed at the blinding wide smile that Luffy produced as he loudly declared. "I came out and will gather a crew, have adventures, collect awesome treasures, and become the Pirate King!"

Koby really did trip on one of the tangled roots in shock and looked up at Luffy in baffled incomprehension. "Eh? Wha-? What!? Pirate King is the title of the one person who has everything in the world. Are you telling me that you're looking for the world's greatest treasure, the One Piece!?"

"I sure am," Luffy said with a confident grin as he continued to march fearlessly forward.

"Do you want to die or something!?" Koby shouted in disbelief over what he was hearing. "All the pirates in the world are looking for that treasure!"

"Well so am I," Luffy said with a firm expression. "And I won't let them beat me."

"I-impossible! Impossible! Utterly, utterly impossible!" Koby refuted as he descended further into frenetic denials over Luffy's declaration. "To become Pirate King in these times, the Great Pirate Era!? There's no chance! It's utterly impossible! You'll die trying!"

Whap!

"Ow, w-why'd you hit me?" Koby whined as he rubbed the lump on his head that was beginning to form from of Luffy's punch to his head.

"Because I can't stand whining like that," Luffy replied unconcerned over Koby's whimpers.

"...oh well... I guess I'm used to it anyway..." Koby admitted even as the lump seemed to be disappearing. Pirates certainly were a violent bunch, weren't they?

"I'm not afraid of dying," Luffy said firmly causing Koby to halt his negative self-reflection.

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"Because it's my dream. My dream and treasure are tied together." Luffy continued sharing a smile with Ann and the two birds. "And that's why I don't mind dying for it."

"...you wouldn't even mind death?" Koby asked feeling amazed over Luffy's bold declaration.

"Besides I know I can do it. Even though it might get kind of tough." Luffy admitted.

Koby felt a bit hesitant but he had to ask the question welling up in his mind, "...Will I also...be able to accomplish my dream...? If...I'm willing to die that is...?"

"Hm? What?" Luffy asked since Koby's voice had been barely above a whisper.

"Will I be able... to become a marine?"

"A marine?"

"Luffy. Ann. I know it means that we'll be enemies! But joining the marines and catching bad guys has always been my dream! Do you think I can do it?"

"I wouldn't know."

"I have to at least try! I'd rather die trying to get out of here and join the marines that stay here and be Alvida's cabin boy for the rest of my life! Then I'll be able to arrest awful pirates - like Alvida!"

"Ufufufufu!" The sound of somewhat menacing laughter suddenly filled the air from behind him after Koby's declaration, to which he flinched and yelped in fright. Instead of the whale of a pirate appearing, however, the laughter stopped only for identical laughter to start up from in front of the group, the ufufufufuing echoing back as an answer. Eerie glowing golden eyes seemed to be peering at them from every angle through the trees staring unblinkingly at them causing Koby to shiver in fear. There had to be over fifteen pairs of eyes shining in the dark. He stopped himself from fleeing though when he spotted Luffy's disappointed pout while Ann seemed to be trembling from excitement rather than fear considering the big smile that had suddenly stretched across her face, making her even prettier.

"Aww, these aren't ghosts. They're just birds." Luffy complained as he pouted even further.

"These are laughing owls," Ann added with an excited tone of voice - her eyes seemingly glittering with excitement. "I've never seen a flock so large. They must live across all the islands in the Goa region if they live here, on Goaf Island, and on Dawn Island too. They're nocturnal birds that usually live in pairs in heavily forested areas and they like to eat bats. There sure are a lot of them here for such a small island though. I wonder how there can be so many bats here to cause a flock this big to gather."

Koby tried to ignore the birds and accidentally shuffled his feet into a large pile of fallen leaves that suddenly swarmed to life. He then had the rather obvious realization that it was currently spring (not autumn) and what he had stepped in wasn't a satisfying crunchy pile of leaves but instead a swarm of an impressively large amount of fluttering moths of some kind.

The frantically flying insects attracted the attention of a colony of bats, which began to swoop around to catch the moths, which in turn caught the attention of the parliament of owls who joined the mess as well. So there were frantically beating pairs of wings everywhere except from the two pirate birds. Koby desperately ducked away from the flying mess that he caused mostly because Luffy and Ann were already walking away. He felt fortunate now that he was in the back of the group so he wouldn't be the first to encounter another situation like that again.

Luffy, however, seemed to be blessed by Lady Luck since he seemed to constantly miss walking into the large colonies of spiders that had spun thick webs that ended up in Koby's hair, several impressive pitfalls that he almost stepped in that resulted in him needing rescue from Ann, a loud colony of frogs scared the soul out of him by screaming at him when he passed by them and lastly and most disgusting of all, Luffy avoided disturbing a rotted out tree that burst open when Koby walked by it which ended up showering him with over a thousand tiny flying hissing cockroaches.

In much less time than Koby thought it was going to take the thick forest finally began to thin out again giving the group enough space to move more easily.

If Koby never had to see another roach for the rest of his life it would be too soon. It was no wonder Captain Alvida had a near-obsession with cleanliness with insects like those in the forest.

The fishing town they found on the other side of the forest was rather strange. Only a few buildings were built on the land but there were several small buildings built on the docks instead where it seemed that most of the villagers seemed to live on boats. Of the buildings on land probably the largest one was a pub with the effigy of some kind of mermaid goat with pink horns, fishtail and beard, black hair and eerie yellow and black goat eyes standing proudly on the top of the building with a green shining lantern in its mouth. Koby realized the mermaid goat was staring back at him.

The mermaid goat was probably alive.

Koby averted his gaze and resolutely decided that there were no mermaid goats on goat island. Just impressively lifelike effigies of mermaid goats crafted by an obviously skilled artisan.

Ann whispered to Balloon. "Wait for us here at the edge of the forest but be sure to call out if anything dangerous approaches."

Balloon crooned unhappily but calmed down with a pat to the back of his head and settled in as the lookout for the group.

Luffy had picked up his pace significantly when the pub was sighted and Ann seemed to be matching his stride now that Balloon was left safely as a lookout. By the time Koby caught up to the door of the pub Luffy was already seated at the bar counter with Ann seated next to him (Dawn the bird was still perched on top of his hat) right in front of a burly bartender who was likely his own bouncer seeing that he looked like he ate pirates for breakfast every morning and gargled iron and glass shavings every night before going to bed.

"Food!" Luffy cheered as he hit his fists enthusiastically on the bar counter which had a few locals look up in surprise, though the barkeeper seemed to be unphased by Luffy's bombastic entrance.

"So some of you pirate lot from across the island finally got the stones to finally cross the forest, eh?" The old barkeeper asked with a voice that was as old and leathered as his face.

Koby sputtered as he sat on Luffy's other side at the accurate accusation though Ann and Luffy didn't seem to care.

Luffy actually shrugged and said, "I'm actually a pirate from another island. The forest was alright, though it wasn't as fun as the one from home. The ghosts were just owls and there weren't even any regular tigers or bears, let alone giant ones."

"You a Dawn Islander then, eh? That's the only place with tigers in this area. You do seem a bit too scruffy to supposedly be from the cleanest and most beautiful land in the East Blue though." The old barkeeper commented suspiciously as the locals made their way to leave the pub. This caused Koby to break out into a cold sweat. He hoped the old villagers wouldn't try to form an angry mob over this visit or Captain Alvida really would kill him.

"He's from Fuusha Village and grew up on Mt Colubo - not the city." Dawn piped from where she perched up on Luffy's hat. "Besides that, we've got money and came here for the food anyway. So are you really going to try to shoo us away?"

"We have money?" Luffy seemed mystified by the concept.

"Yes. Remember the pirate fund? You got a full third of it remember? I used a lure earlier to stuff a couple 1000 beri notes under the ribbon of the hat for your allowance earlier today. The rest is with me." The bird rather calmly replied.