A brief reprieve

Her ears were ringing.

Someone was talking.

What was happening?

Everything was hurting and her ears were ringing. An incessant migraine drummed in her ears. Groggily Nami cupped the side of her head, waiting for the world around her to stop spinning.

"Hamo hamo..." came that annoying laugh. "Good morning, human-scum." A brief glance up saw the long neck Fishman, sitting on top a makeshift throne—its corners hoisted by other human slaves. "The Boss is out right now, so you can rot in there until he comes back."

She opened her mouth to reply, but found it oddly dry. Before long, she was left alone with her thoughts. That was, until some shuffling came from the dark end of her cell.

"Who... who's there?" she edged back, not ready for another confrontation.

As her eyes adjusted, a figure of a man came into view. Then another. And another. There had to be at least 20 men locked away with her. Like herself, each one had a collar as a sign of their enslavement. However, their slouched postures and dead eyes suggested that they had been here for much, much longer.

One of the larger slaves rose to his feet, slowly shambling over to inspect their new inmate. "A new one huh? And a woman?"

Nami instinctively took another step back.

"Oooh!" Another prisoner piped up. "She's quite the looker too!"

The Cat Burglar blushed as she realized she was still topless, her arms quickly moving to cover her exposed chest.

The first man didn't seem to care though, his spirit too broken to do more than stare.

The other one, just as muscular but with spikier hair was a bit more fresh. "Hey, hey! It's been too long since I've had some action. What about you lot?!" He turned to the others, trying to raise their morale with a new prize. "We've been doing nothing but suffer since we got here. Why not let loose while we still can?!"

The other prisoners stirred, silently but surely beginning to consider the thought. If she was going to get out of this, Nami was going to have to act fast.

She could try and take on the loudmouth and establish her dominance within the cell. But without a weapon and considering their difference in size, she would be relying mostly on her wits to win the day.

Alternatively she could try to appeal to the other prisoners' humanity. Perhaps she could win them over as a fellow human?