Blind
When Brook dreamed of his old crew, of his fellow musicians and even of Captain Yorki, he knew it wasn't real. Because in his dreams, Brook could see.
…
Brook had always loved music. Even in his world of darkness, he could appreciate it on equal footing with everybody else.
So when he came across Calico Yorki, as a blind and broken veteran of the army, with a cane and a violin and only a spark of life left in him, Brook's world opened up again.
He was playing his violin on the side of the street, eyes closed behind dark glasses. He could sense a presence next to him, though, a presence that lingered as Brook played one song, then another, and the air got cooler and the town got quieter.
Finally, he put down his violin. The presence moved, stepped towards him.
"I'm Calico Yorki," he said. "Do you want to join my pirate crew?"
Brook nearly dropped his violin.
"Yes," he answered, his mouth moving before his brain could catch up.
"Great!" Yorki said, reaching up to clap Brook's shoulder. "Come on. I need to find a ship."
"Wait!" Brook shouted, as Yorki began to walk away up the road. "I can't join your crew."
"But you just said yes."
"I can't. I was in the army-"
"So you can fight!" Yorki said happily.
"No. I…" Brook fingered the edge of his glasses. "I can't see anymore."
"But you can play music."
"Well, yes, but-"
"If you want to join my crew, all I ask is that you love music."
And Brook became a Rumbar pirate.
…
The ship Yorki found was tiny, more a rowboat than a ship. Brook and Yorki had to crowd together in the tiny sleeping cabin, bodies pressed together.
On the very first night, Yorki reached out and poked the scar on Brook's forehead. Brook yelped and nearly jumped out of his skin, but only managed to whack his head on the cabin's low ceiling.
"How'd you get that scar?" Yorki asked.
"When I was in the army," Brook said, again answering without thinking. "I was hit in the head. It crack my skull and damaged my brain. It took away my eyesight."
Yorki laughed, and Brook didn't know what to make of that.
"It damaged your brain? No wonder you're crazy enough to grow that massive thing on your head!"
"It's an afro!" Brook protested, as Yorki continued to laugh.
…
When Brook woke up the first time, alone in the Florian Triangle, he'd been dreaming about that first night with Yorki. It was a good dream, and he didn't really want to wake up from it.
When he did wake up, he screamed.
He could see.
The world was grey and foggy, but he could see it, and he nearly died all over again from the shock. And then he saw the skeletons, the bones and skulls of his crewmates, and his own hands, white and skeletal.
He wished- he prayed- that he was still blind.
He tried to skew his eyelids shut, block out the horrible world around him.
But he was a skeleton, and he didn't have eyelids.
Yohohoho. Skull joke.