What the fuck?
Sitting atop the uppermost mast, a lanky young man with an appearance that screamed youthful robustness had his mouth agape as he peered into his spyglass.
The little thing was quite beautiful. The beautiful, lithe frame tightly wound itself around the lens, and unique golden patterns wrapped around the frame. The lens itself was pristine and clear. Despite its elaborate baroque appearance, the inside was akin to looking through a high-tech super camera.
Looking through the glass, the man's blue eyes beheld a terrifying sight.
On the surface of the endless sea, supreme waves created great mountain ranges, dark blue tides heading in his direction.
Within the depths, the surface tension breaks, a labyrinth of muscly fibres, dense siphons on the surface, their visceral appearance, the scale of them, their depth. It was like an array of barnacles that coated the tentacles, fortunately, the crew wasn't comprised of any members with trypophobia, or else they might instantly pass away from the mere sight of this beast.
The boy steps away from the crow's nest on the topmast of the ship. He yelled out at the top of his lungs:
"Get the message to cap'n, the fucker's closin in!"
The blonde boy then ran straight for a bell on the crow's nest, ringing it like a madman and repeating his words.
"GET OFF YER ASSES!"
At this commotion, dozens of seamen and women scrambled around, some with specialised roles were headed to their stations, whilst others went out to look for their captain.
The ship's deck appeared to be made of a gold-tinted wood, but in actuality, as boots trodded around, metallic thuds could be heard.
From the rear-most deck to the forecastle of the ship, sailors were running around like headless chickens.
Among them, a middle-aged woman yelled out in frustration. "Capn's clearly not on the top deck you fuckin idiots, check their quarters!"
She charged the half deck and ran down a flight of stairs.
"Is the Cap'n here? Someone go to the Capn's quarters!"
The deck was mostly made of members who were manning the artillery, but a few of them, on the other side of the deck, left their posts and went down an alley that led to the captain's quarters.
Knock knock knock knock
"Cap'n, there's urgent news." A bald man knocked urgently on the door.
After a few seconds without a response, the bald man just looked at the middle-aged woman and shrugged.
Clicking her tongue in annoyance, she signalled for the bald man to head down to the lower floor
The bald man let out a sigh but cut it short when he saw the woman glaring daggers at her.
"Hurry yer ass up, this is important! Get her on deck!"
With that, the bald man broke into a sprint and headed down another flight of stairs.
The deck below was much of the same, everyone manning their station.
"Err, has anyone here seen the captain?" The busy crew members looked in the direction of the buff, bald man.
A young woman approached him, she was wearing a white scarf on her head and had a mop in her hand.
"Umm, sir… I saw the captain going into the personal lounge earlier; they've been in there all day."
…
In a confusing and thematically disjointed room, cute action figures were mixed with tactical maps and radars. The walls were pink and adorably decorated, but guns and animal skins were hung there.
A tall woman was lazily spread on a couch, taking a look at the radar while smoking a pipe. She took a long breath and exhaled a gale of smoke as she studied the radar.
Abruptly getting up, she approached a mirror with a black bandana and eyepatch in hand. Her long red hair came into view, with streaks of red. She had a couple of loose hairs that she tied into a braid that hung from the front, and wrapped the bandana around her hair.
The bandana was slanted on her forehead, her hair was styled asymmetrically, it was disjointed but strikingly pretty, and the girl clearly thought so too, as she posed in the mirror.
She even… she even started winking at herself and checking herself out.
In the midst of striking some embarrassing poses at herself, she heard a knock at the door.
"Umm… Mrs Captain… there's some urgent news."
She froze, hearing this, clearing her throat, she announced in her deepest possible voice.
"I see, I'll be right out."
Knocking the door open, the first thing the captain saw was the bald man from earlier. Next to him was a young maid who'd been knocking at her door earlier.
God damn. She thought to herself.
Once again, clearing her throat and regaining her composure to address the dire situation, she looked at the maid and said.
"Hey, you… uh… Are you new on this ship? I don't think I've seen you before, you want me to show you around?" followed by a wink that she'd just been practising in the mirror.
"Um… Miss Captain, I'm um flattered but it seems like everybody's talking about something urgent."
Oh right
The bald man quickly interjected.
"Cap'n the scout sa-"
"Oh, don't worry, I was gonna be heading up soon anyway, I already know." She interrupted the bald man.
…
"What!? You fucking knew!? How?! Why?!"
On the top deck, the blonde boy from earlier was questioning his captain.
"Oh yeah, I've got a radar system installed in my lounge."
"Then why the fuck do I spend all day on the crow's nest looking at the ocean?!"
"Oh, I don't know, it just felt piratey. It's an important job."
"Dogshit!"
The boy's face was flaming at this point, the captain could imagine steam coming out of his ears and almost burst out laughing but held herself back to keep him from exploding in rage.
Clapping her hands, she addressed everyone. "All right, we've wasted enough time."
That was your fault, Captain, the crew all thought.
"We've got a tentacle monster to get away from."
Striding to the quarter deck, she put her hand on the helm. "Alright, everyone!"
In such a situation, most people would look towards their captain, hoping for an inspiring speech that could fire the crew up.
But instead, it seemed like they were bracing themselves for what was about to come out of her mouth.
What would Luffy say in this situation? The captain thought to herself.
Her fingers drummed on the helm for a moment, and she hummed to herself. The wind whipped her blue and red hair around her shoulders. The crew, weapons in hand and eyes full of either panic or long-suffering tolerance, waited.
Then she grinned—wide, teeth bared, eyes gleaming with recklessness.
"I don't know what that thing is," she shouted, voice booming across the deck, "but if it thinks it can swallow my ship, it better be ready to choke!"
A pause. Only the sound of waves could be heard.
"…Because I ain't got time to die before lunch!"
We're gonna fucking die they thought in unison…