Naruto slipped on the slick rocks. He steadied himself, his mind racing.
The woman in the red dress stood on the skiff, her sword pointed at their boat. Behind her, a dozen or so gunmen crouched in the water, their rifles trained on the shore. Firelight reflected off the water and the dark mouths of their guns. The rescued pirates huddled behind the rocks. Some had already begun to tremble. Though the shackles around their ankles had been removed, their injuries left them unable to run or fight.
"Zoro, Sanji. Left and right." Naruto kept his voice low but steady.
Neither hesitated. Zoro slid a step to the left and vanished into the shadows cast by the rocks. Sanji went right, pushing off silently with his toes to leap onto a large boulder, using the moonlight to study the gunmen's positions in the water.
"Usopp, smoke bombs," Naruto said.
Usopp pulled two round balls from his backpack and gritted his teeth. "Only got two."
"That's enough. Throw them into the water on either side of the skiff."
Usopp drew back his slingshot and took a deep breath. The two smoke bombs flew out one after the other. The first landed in the water three meters to the skiff's left, bursting into a cloud of thick white smoke. The second landed to its right. Smoke spread along the surface, quickly blocking the gunmen's view.
"Now!"
Zoro charged from the left without drawing his swords, sweeping their blunt sides across the gunmen. Two were knocked into the water before they could react. Sanji came flying in from the right, the toe of his shoe striking a gunman's chin. The man fell backward into the water, his rifle flying from his hands. Shots rang out wildly through the smoke, but without clear targets,