Steel Heart

Ch 3 - Good Customer Service

Ch 3 - Good Customer Service

"Make way! Make way! Coming through, people!" Nana warned as she surfed down the canals of Water 7, while Pygmy ran alongside her on the walkways. Nana stood on top of her latest transportation creation. It was a flat metal board shaped like a rocket. All along the board were pedals and gears. Underneath was a heavy metal fin, for anchoring, and an array of canisters fitted on each side of the fin.

Nana had her hammer on her back and a large messenger bag hanging off her shoulder. Nana had sewn a thin but strong magnet down the middle of her corset to hold the hammer firmly in place. Her messenger bag was old and well-worn with a large steel buckle at the front, in the shape of a very ornate heart. The bag was newly filled with the best tools she could find at her trusty hardware store.

The shop owner had a soft spot for Nana and always gave her a heads up when there was something new in their inventory. She had a sneaking suspicion it was because the auntie, who ran it, had a crush on Iceburg but Nana was wise enough to keep that to herself.

"Nana's on her waterboard! Get out of the way!" a group of guys called out just as Nana whipped between their two Yagaras.

The water splashed across her grinning face and onto her goggles. "Pygmy," she called as she pushed down on a pedal so that the canister on the farthest right would eject a strong stream of air, "Turning now!"

"Woof!" Pygmy barked as Nana made a hard left. The dog quickly jumped into the canal and doggy paddled across it in order to get to the other side of the street. He was a fast swimmer and caught up to his master in no time.

As Nana rounded the corner, she spotted something that made her hurriedly apply pressure on her back heels to gently brake. She hopped off of her board as Pygmy stopped right at her feet. A crowd had gathered on the street. Nana knew the city like the back of her hand and no one ever stopped here unless something either crazy or bad happened. She hoped it was the first and not the latter.

"This is terrible," someone murmured behind her, "Does anybody know who this guy is?"

Nana pushed herself to the front, using her waterboard to forcefully nudge people out of the way.

"You're..." she gasped when she saw what was the cause of the gathering. In the middle of the group, bleeding right on the street, was the long nose guy from earlier and he looked like he had gone through a grinder. "Usopp?! Wasn't that your name?"

The man was unconscious and lying with his limbs splayed out. Nana dropped her board and knelt down beside his head. Pygmy sniffed his face and then whimpered. She lifted Usopp up by the shoulders and gave him a gentle but firm shake. "Hey! Are you awake? Do you remember me? We met at Galley-La!"

Suddenly, she heard someone else rush over and soon the red head was kneeling down next to her. "Usopp!" she cried, "Are you okay?!" She glared at Nana. "What happened? What did you do to him?!"

Nana balked at the accusation. "Me?! I just got here 10 seconds before you did."

Nami turned towards the sniper. "Usopp! Can you hear me?"

"Er...are you guys pirates by any chance?" someone interrupted from the crowd.

Before Nami could say anything, Nana was already at her feet and holding her hammer. "Whoever is still looking this way in 3 seconds will get some face to face time with ol' faithful here...I have a new heat setting I want to test out and I'll happily use anyone as guinea pigs. Ready? 1!"

Immediately, the whole group turned their backs to them but they started to murmur to each other. "If Nana is with them, does this mean they were beaten up by the Galley-La people? Or do you think they were beaten up by pirates?"