UPDATED A/N: I'm "re-writing" this fic. Technically, just cleaning it up. That way, you readers can read it better. I can write properly; I'm just a little slap post happy. I'm a disgusting shame, I know. I tend to throw my ideas down and post. POST. No looking! Knowing it's messy and wrong. JUST POST...post. I'm now realizing, "post", is a funny word.
post
ORIGINAL A/N: Making sure your eyes read the title as "Scatter Island" not "Shutter Island". What you are about to read is placing the characters into series of horror events (and it won't just be about zombies and ghosts) so it's probably going to end up bouncing you all over the place. Hence the title I clarified one sentence ago. *sigh* It's probably going to give you a headache more than anyth-and you just hit the back button. Well you know what!?...It is a sexy button.
WARNINGS: For language, violence, gore, sexual themes (giggity)...*cough*, crappiness, spur of the moment bulldonkey plot writing, and it's a fan fiction. (Need I say more?)
NO PAIRINGS. Well sort of...maybe...shut up...I'm indecisive.
CHAPTER ONE: All Who Enter
Dead Mortis Part One
It was dark now. Dark and quiet. A dramatic difference from the unusual but usual climate change that occurs on this odd sea. The sky went from bright to gloomy with low hanging dark clouds and a mist that slightly obscured one's vision.
The air itself changed from crisp to clammy, due to the humidity that seemed to tighten the breath of anyone breathing.
This dramatic change occurred fast and unexpectedly, just barely a moment ago.
It at first seemed like a cataclysm erupted upon the world, but it just as fast went silent and eerie.
The Thousand Sunny was at a dead stop with the crew-members sprawled out on deck. The navigator began to raise herself up now.
"What was that?" she asked, still shook up from the earlier eruption.
"I...I don't know," Luffy replied shaking the dizziness off. He gazed ahead of the ship and his eyes began to widen.
"Whoa," he gasped,"That is spooky."
The other crew members stood and gazed ahead as well.
Just as Luffy, their eyes widen, and the majority of them dropped their jaws.
In front of them, and the ship, was a large dark island.
The appearance of it could be described as foreboding and depressing.
It practically screamed horror.
"Another Thriller Bark?" Luffy wondered.
"No," his skeletal comrade replied,"I might just be scared, but this feels much more formidable in frightfulness than Thriller Bark. I can feel it in my bones..."
Before Brook could make a skull joke of that, Nami interrupted.
"Luffy, I agree," she said, as she held her hands near her chest in fear. "I don't like this feeling either. Let's just pretend we didn't see this island and turn around."
Now it was her turn to be interrupted by Usopp's scared gasp.
"Th-tha-that no-not possible," he stuttered. He was leaning over a side rail, eyes gazing behind the ship.
The crew's attention was drawn to what Usopp was stuttering about.
Their mouths dropped even more than they did upon seeing the island.
The cyborg was the first to voice the shock.
"WHAT IN THE HELL?!" he yelled.
Behind the ship was a wall of nothingness.
The ocean they were just sailing on was gone. Instead there was a drop off that the ship was dangerously near.
The Thousand Sunny didn't move, for the water was absolutely still.
It appeared like it was gushing a waterfall down the drop off into the abyss, but it all was petrified in place.
Nobody could say a word now. They too were frozen.
Eventually Chopper's fearful chattering was heard.
"What's going on?" he tearfully asked. "I''m scared! What's going on?!" he continued to cry.
"Calm down, Chopper," Zoro sighed as he tried to get the reindeer to stop getting over emotional. "Going into panic isn't going to help the situation."
"How are we going to leave?!" Chopper's cries continued more.
"Well, we can jump off the ledge and see where that takes us," Zoro calmly explained.
"THAT'S SUICIDE!" the doctor cried even louder,"It's all gone! It looks like a bottomless pit!"
"Then how is that suicide?" Zoro questioned. "If nothings really there, then we got nothing to splat against."
"Just shut up, Zoro!" Nami scowled.
"Okay,...then we can go on the island," the swordsman chuckled, as if he was enjoying this.
"Will you stop it?!" the navigator shouted. She was getting more frustrated and scared.
"Stop scaring Nami, asshole!" Sanji defended the girl.
"Then you tell her where to go," Zoro spat. He waved a hand, signally he was done with this conversation. Sanji, however, looked ready to debate on this with him. Physically.
The cyborg pounded his large fist on the railing and he shouted at them.
"Knock it off!" he demanded,"Fighting is no better than panicking! I'm in no mood this week!"
"How do you explain this?" Usopp stared at this phenomenon and trembled.
He looked to the always leveled headed and always smart archeologist.
"Robin, you're smart. Have you ever studied something like this?"
"No," she stated flatly,"I've never seen nor heard about anything like this. It's quite intriguing."
Luffy, meanwhile, had been switching his gaze from the nothingness to the island. His expression giving him the look of someone in deep thought.
"Well, we definitely only have one way to go," he finally spoke,"...but we are too far from the island to dock ,and we're not moving."
It was an obvious statement, but at least obviously right.
"Luffy-san's right," Brook finally chimed in. "Sunny-chan looks petrified in place, like the water."
Franky took a look over the railing at the water.
"Well at this rate, if we're going to the island, then it looks like we'd have to swim it," he explained. He then looked harder at the water.
"Or...wait a minute."
He suddenly bounded over the railing and landed on the water like it was solid ground.
"Whoa! Awesome!" Luffy exclaimed. "How did you do that?!"
Franky tapped his foot on the water and walked a little farther out. "I don't know. It's just like this," he replied.
"Is it ice?" the captain questioned.
"No, it's freaky is what it is," the cyborg replied back again.
Luffy now jumped off the ship and landed on the water, joining his cyborg companion.
"Wow! This is cool!" he cheered. He jumped up and down on the ocean. "We've got to see what else this island has!"
His navigator slapped her hand on the railing of the ship.
"Luffy look behind us! Aren't you the least bit concerned about all this?!" Nami asked.
"Are you looking behind us?" he mocked. "There's literally nothing there, so maybe there's something on the island that makes it all normal again."
The remaining crew on the ship took another moment to look at their surroundings again.
Robin placed her hand on Nami's shoulder.
"Sorry, but either way you look at this, we don't have much of a choice," she explained.
Nami simply sighed.
"Come on, guys! Let's get going!" Luffy ordered, as he was already starting to walk towards the island.
"W-wait!" Nami called after,"At least let us get some supplies packed! Just in case, okay?!"
"Fine!" Luffy slouched.
Nami, Robin, and Chopper packed up their backpacks with basic supplies, before disembarking with the rest of the crew towards the eeire island.
They walked, some of them cautiously, on the odd water for about five minutes before reaching the shore.
"It's definitely more scary up close," Chopper whimpered.
"Doesn't it remind you of Thriller Bark?" Luffy asked like it was a memory of a picnic.
"That's my point," the doctor whined.
"If you ask me," Robin added,"I say there's something darker about this one."
"M-more evil?!" Chopper shrieked in response.
"Shut up, Chopper! She's only joking," Zoro again tried to get the reindeer to stop spazzing out.
They walked a little further to what looked like a path, though it was quite covered in dead tree branches and fog.
There was; however, a sign greeting them at the path's start.
It was made out of metal and supported underneath by a small, stone wall-like stand.
"Welcome to Hope's Hollow," Nami read it aloud almost apathetically.
"That sounds promising," Usopp sarcastically mumbled.
"At least we know there is life here," Sanji added a positive view.
"Well down the path then!" Luffy urged on.
They started the walk, stepping over the dead limbs and straining to see up ahead.
"Nami! I'll carry you so you don't have to exhaust yourself stepping over these!" Sanji offered.
"No thanks, I'll manage," she replied, not at all interested.
His offer failed with Robin as well, so they continued to walk down the path. It seemed to stretch on forever and grow more intimadating as they went.
A sudden foul smell hit like a wave.
"Ergh! That smell! It's horrible!" Chopper complained as he stumbled back and covered his nose.
"Yeah, I smell it too," Nami agreed. Even Luffy crinkled his nose.
"Gross!" the captain sniffed,"It smelled like something died!...Oh, no offense, Brook. For the record, you don't smell dead at all." He stated, apologized, and complimented all in one.
"Yohoho," Brook laughed,"no offense taken...,and thank you?" The skeleton took the compliment for the best.
Again they pushed forward, trying their best to ignore the smell.
But then came the noise.
At first it was faint, but started to grow loud.
It was very similar to how the cries of cicadas sound, but soon grew to a much more frightening screech.
It now sounded like a mix of cicadas and the horrid screams of children, as it grew to the thousands.
The Straw Hats covered their ears-Brook included- and started to huddle closer together.
"Aaah! What is that?!" Nami cried, and she started to visibly tear up. "This is too scary! I want to go back!"
They frantically searched the tree line for what was causing the noise. The misty fog was hindering their sight, and the noise only seemed to close in on them.
"I can't stand this!" Usopp snapped,"It's horrible! What should we do?!"
"There's something up ahead!" Luffy pointed, but quickly put his hands back over his ears.
He motioned with his elbow for his crew to follow and so they did, sprinting closely behind him.
Though the destination was very close, it seemed like it was taking forever to get to it. The noise chasing right on their heels.
The shadowy shapes ahead began to surface from the misty fog and revealed itself to be a town, surrounded by a moss covered stone wall.
Luffy slowed himself to a stop at the entrance; His crew right by him. As they stopped, so did the noise.
It died down to silence, excluding the panting from the crew.
Chopper put a hoof to his heart and exhaled heavily.
"I'm going to throw up," he heaved,"I don't like this at all."
"No argument here," Nami agreed. She shifted her eyes to the arc sign over the stone wall's entrance.
It consisted of two words with the first word hovering over the other.
"Mortis Dead."
She read it like she had read the sign at the start of the path.
They stared at the sign and then at the obviously creepy town.
"Hmm," Usopp hummed. "Welp, I'm going back."
He turned to leave, but Zoro grabbed his arm and yanked him back.
"I don't want to hear that annoying sound again," he growled.
And so they stepped into the town trying to find any sign of life that wasn't as foreboding as the signs, or any clue as to how to change this phenomenon.
"There's somebody," Robin spoke up. She had seen a battered woman digging around at a food stand.
"She's right," Luffy nodded. He also saw her. "HEY, LADY! Can you help us?!"
The woman jerked around with an arm load of food cans. She looked terrified at the sight of them ,but then turned angry at Luffy's shouting.
"Sh-shut up!" she quietly yelled back as she threw a can at him.
"We just want to ask a question," Luffy explained, but the woman wouldn't have it.
"Shut up! Get away from here ,you idiots, and stop making noise to attract them!" she warned.
Luffy stepped a little closer to her. "But...what?" he was confused.
The woman seemed a bit confused herself. "No! These are my supplies!" she now turned frantic and ran off, without elaborating them.
"Things are not getting any less disturbing," Sanji commented.
"I wonder what she meant by attract," Usopp worried.
"Maybe some huge flesh eating monster," Robin bluntly answered.
"Robin!" Usopp whined at her morbid thoughts.
"Shouting like that,...you might attract it," she now seemed to be somewhat teasing. Usopp now took up shelter near Luffy.
"Hey don't attract it to me," the captain laughed, but he quickly snapped his attention to the sound of something crashing.
"What was that?" the sniper asked in his scared squeaky voice.
"It came from that alleyway over there," Brook pointed. They stared at it for a second before Luffy decided to see what was in there.
"Stay behind me guys. I'll check it out," he said.
"Be careful, Luffy," Usopp warned, still somewhat squeaking.
"I'll be fine," Luffy replied confidently.
He peeked around the corner to see a man leaned up against a garbage dumpster holding his bloody and torn arm.
"Are you alright?!" Luffy asked. He was about to try and help the man, but was abruptly stopped.
"STAY AWAY FROM ME!" the man yelled.
"I was going to help you!" Luffy defended.
"I know that!" the man replied,"That's why you need to get away from me! Go! Now!"
"But..," Luffy was interrupted by a scream in the distance.
"Now it sounds like that lady!" Sanji listened. "Luffy, I'm going to go see if she's okay."
The cook ran off towards the screams, as Luffy took one more moment to decide that the guy would probably be alright, albiet with a torn arm.
He and the rest of the crew caught up to Sanji. All of them trying to find the woman.
Her screams grew more intense, as if something was tearing her apart, and the crew was having a hard time tracking where she was. It was because of the maze of buildings.
When they thought they were close to her, the screams stopped.
"Now what?" Luffy panted,"How are we-" He stopped when he heard now another new noise replacing her screams.
It was an odd noise. Almost like someone was chewing on something squishy ,but crunchy, at the same time. It followed by soft mulitple grunts.
"It's around that corner," Luffy whispered. He pointed down at the end of the side walk that wrapped around a general store.
They spun around the corner, without really thinking, and froze in their places. Their eyes suddenly locked on a horrible sight.
A select few of them trying to hold the vomit down at the very sight of this disgust.
In front of them were what appeared to be five people, bloody and torn, huddled up on one target.
It was the lady they had ran into earlier.
They were feasting on her.
Luffy and the others were stunned, like poor defenseless animals caught by a ray of light.
Nami finally found enough emotion to gasp, which undoubtedly alerted the attackers.
Their attention snapped-along with some of their own bones-to the crew.
Their empty eyes, blank as they may be, sized up their new targets.
It was decided, with the one dropping the lady in favor of the next meal, that they would attack immediately.
The disgusting people sprang towards them. They made horrible hissing and gurgling noises.
Luffy didn't falter and sprang towards them as well. He shot a fist at them, which they hungrily grabbed.
"Don't let them bite you!" Nami yelled, causing Luffy yanked his arm back.
"Wait," he said,"I'm rubber..I don't have to worry about that. Their teeth aren't sharp enough."
An attacker had now got in Luffy's face and hissed, showing it's razor sharp pointed teeth.
It was like it was there just for that sort of occasion.
"Ok, I'm kicking your ass for the timing," the teen snarled.
He was able to knock that one back, but was now distracted by his own crew.
"Luffy! Behind us!" Sanji called.
Luffy turned around and saw numerous others trying to surround them.
As he was distracted, he got tackled by the ones he turned his back on.
The cook quickly kicked them off of his captain, but only to have one of them refuse to let go of his leg.
It was Franky's turn to now lend a helping hand, as he punched the stubborn creature off Sanji.
"Stand back guys," Franky recommended. He took a deep breath and spit out a wall of fire.
It seemed effective, at first, until the attackers proved more invulnerable than they thought.
They emerged from the wall of fire, and even though they were covered in flames, they still lunged foward.
"We're too out numbered, and I left my Clima-tact on the ship!" Nami yelled. "I'm too scared! We should just run for cover!"
Which she attempted. Zoro just missing grabbing her.
"Wait! Nami! Don't just run off yet!" he warned.
It was too late.
She let her fear sink in, and she bailed.
"Nami wait!" Sanji called after her, and then ran after her.
The attackers began to swarm in.
"Damn it!" Zoro yelled. "Screw it! Come on guys!"
The rest of them began to flee, but didn't realize that Usopp and Chopper were too terrified to move.
"Usopp! Chopper!" Luffy called, but they didn't respond, even as they were getting dangerously close to being tackled by the creatures.
Robin used her powers to sprout hands near Chopper, and shoved him back. She then rolled him close enough to her to pick him up and run, whereas Luffy stretched his arm and grabbed Usopp to drag him along.
They ran fast to where ever they thought they were going. They darted through alleyways, trying to lose their pursuers. When they finally came upon the start of the town again, it seemed clear of danger.
They surely thought they had lost the attackers by now, but then they suddenly heard distorted breathing.
It was the man that Luffy wanted to help earlier.
He was standing a few feet away with his body dead still.
He was staring very intently in their direction, and his eyes looked like one of them.
That's when he made a very strange but loud gurgling noise, and within a few seconds, it was realized that he had alerted the others.
Within just a few more seconds, the creatures disgusting noises could be heard heading for them.
The Straw Hats weren't quite near the entrance of the town to run out, so they instead ran inside a building. This particular one looked like it could be a good barricade.
Once all of them were inside, Luffy and Zoro slammed the large doors shut.
It almost seemed like doors shut themselves.
The stranger part of it; The doors didn't have any sort of lock on them, nor did they have time to block it.
However, when the attackers slammed into it, it didn't budge.
The doors had stained glass in them that the attackers couldn't, very surprisingly, seem to break.
Once Luffy's crew realized this, they took the moment to catch their breaths.
Even with the attackers outside it seemed quiet again.
The quietness was short lived, as Zoro decided to voice his anger.
"What the hell was that, Nami?!" he yelled. "Why the hell did we run?!"
"I...I don't know!" she defended herself,"Everything is happening too fast! I was scared!"
She pointed defiantly at him."You didn't have to listen!"
"Yeah, and if you ran alone, they would have caught you! " he roared,"And why did you leave your weapon on the ship, when you of all people should of felt the need to protect yourself. Especially on an island like this!"
"Stop yelling at Nami! She was scared!" Sanji protected her.
"Of what?!" Zoro fumed,"They look like zombies. We dealt with zombies at Thriller Bark. Not that scary!"
"This isn't Thriller Bark!" Nami now seemed angrier than he. "Those are the real zombies!" she exclaimed. "The ones that don't reason or have salt as a weakness!"
"I'm sure my swords can work just as effective!" Zoro retaliated.
As the argument continued, Robin seemed to notice something.
There was a table near by with a few empty cups and plates on it.
She thought she saw one of the cups slide a bit on its own.
At the same moment, Brook was looking over at a line of cabinets on the nearby wall. He swore he just saw one of the cabinet's doors swing open a bit.
Luffy was concentrated on the argument and decided to stop it.
"Guys! Shut up already!" he ordered. "Let's just not freak out this time and kick their asses, alright?."
"Uh, Luffy, I don't think that's a great idea at the moment," Usopp chimed in,"If we open the doors now, then they'll just swarm in."
"You can blame Nami for that," Zoro smirked,"but don't worry. We can knock them back and have them down in no time. Just like Nami said, they are not Thriller Bark zombies. Nothing special about them. Just normal zombies."
"Then you guys ready?" Luffy asked as Zoro, Franky, Sanji, and Robin stood near the door with him.
Even Brook seemed ready to fight, though he stood a bit back, out of fear. Usopp hid behind him.
The sniper was nervously getting his weapons ready.
Nami and Chopper were just huddled in the very back.
"Alright," Luffy grinned,"Let's do this."
The door didn't budge.
They didn't expect it,even though the door already had proven to be strange.
"What the?" the captain seemed baffled,"Um...guys...are we locked in?"
He even kicked it and still nothing, so he turned around towards his crew.
"Is it possible for the zombies to lock it from the outside?" he asked, pouting at his defeat from a door.
"I don't think so," Zoro replied.
Luffy crossed his arms. "Then this door is freakishly stro-Hey...That cup just moved."
He had apparently seen it move like Robin thought it did.
"I thought I saw it do that a moment ago," she explained.
"Then I must not be crazy when I saw that cabinet door move," Brook added.
"Huh? On it's own?" Usopp asked,"You mean like a gh-."
He didn't get to finish the sentence before every dish on the table flew off.
Every cabinet door opening and slamming shut as loud as possible.
They all jumped from the sudden commotion.
"No! No! No! I don't want to be right!" Usopp screamed, as he now ran towards the front to get away from the back.
"That was kind of cool!" Luffy exclaimed.
Robin also seemed a bit intrigued by it. "Might this be an actual ghost?" she pondered.
Their attention was now drawing back to the door, when they heard scratching noises coming from it.
Their eyes widen when they saw it was being scratched from the inside, by what must be the 'ghost'.
The scratches were writing something that stretched across the door, even the windows.
"This can't be good," Franky sighed, as the scratching stopped.
It seemed that they were stuck in here for a reason. A twisted reason.
The scratches on the door read: "Tour the house. Your deaths will be more beautiful in here."
ORIGINAL A/N: I know this chapter moved too fast, but this story is just something I'm doing for my own entertainment, really.
I know I said it at the start, but no, this is not just going to be a zombie/ghost story. Not all the way through, anyway. I did at least plan something else to add in here.
(UPDATED A/N: .. ... post.)