Here's chapter two! I hope you like it, and please review if you get the chance. Enjoy the chapter ^_^
The clatter of shale and dirt cascading down the Rift's edge echoed and resounded off the tall stone walls, making the sound seem much larger than it was. Zoro kicked another shower of debris down the side of the almost completely vertical rock face and watched solemnly as it fell downwards and out of sight.
After walking a couple miles through the forest that the arrow had pointed him into, Zoro had finally decided that he had either gotten lost, or the arrow had misled him, and wasn't pointing toward the Rift at all. The latter seemed more likely, that is, until he very nearly walked out of the trees and right over the Rift's edge—effectively disproving both theories.
He let out a low whistle and peered into the canyon before him. The ground was a far ways off, but he could see it clearly nonetheless. If he wanted to attempt the climb down into the canyon and then back up the other side, Zoro was confidant that he could do it. The question was whether or not it was worth it.
From where he stood, Zoro could see nothing of the other side of the Rift. The cliff face on the other side was considerably higher than the one he was standing on, which made it impossible for Zoro to see anything of the other side.
Zoro had never been to the Grand Line before, and he didn't know whether it would be a good idea to travel into unknown territory—especially if the rumors of Haven on the other side were false. Again, Zoro sighed, and backed away from the edge a bit. The up side to going to the Grand Line was—of course—the possibility of other survivors taking refuge there. Even if there was no Haven, finding another person, if they were the right person, may clear up the mystery of The Occurrence, and Zoro may be able to find some information to help him decide where he should go from here.
Zoro drew in a long breath and let out a yell as loud as he could manage. It had been quite a while since he'd last spoken to anyone, and the effort of screaming made his throat hurt, but he wanted to try and warrant a response. If there was someone on the other side, and they heard him yelling, wouldn't it make sense for them to yell back, or at least come to see what was making the noise? And if there were people to come and look for him, then he would certainly want to cross the Rift to the other side.
When the last traces of the shout stopped echoing off the canyon walls, Zoro paused, listening. Many long seconds of silence passed, and Zoro drew in another breath to repeat the process, this time yelling something more coherent: "Hey, anyone there?"
Again, the traces of his voice vanished from the air, and the chasm grew incredibly quiet once more. Zoro waited, much longer than he should have, before finally resigning himself to return the way he'd come. Without a response, there was no reason to continue across. Zoro sighed and readjusted the bag on his shoulders. As he did this, a large piece of rock that had been knocked loose by the debris Zoro had kicked into the gorge earlier finally succumbed to gravity and plummeted into the chasm's depths. A faint crack echoed off the Rift's walls.
Zoro paused. That sound—was it the sound of the rocks falling? He was sure he'd heard something else. But then, that could have been his mind playing tricks on him—he hadn't heard anything earlier. If someone were going to respond to his yell, they would have responded to him right away. There was no reason to wait that long.
It must have been the rocks.
And yet…
Zoro hesitated. A year ago, he wouldn't have. Hell, he wouldn't have even come down to the Rift in the first place—he was getting soft. But there was something about not seeing another living person for such a long time that made him really want to see one. Even if it meant climbing across the Rift which was, by every definition, a stupid act, for the sake of chasing down some person who may or may not have responded to his yell, and who may or may not exist.
Despite the fact that he knew it was a bad idea, and he knew he shouldn't have crossed off the beaten path, Zoro still found himself pulling his swords away from his side and securing them to his bag as best he could so that they wouldn't hit against the rock during his decent. Easing over the edge of the Rift, he slowly began making his way down.
This, he was fairly certain, was the definition of insanity.
Either he really had heard someone respond when he yelled across the Rift, or his mind was playing tricks on him. If it was the latter, he would waste an entire day, and risk his life in the process, to chase after a figment of his imagination.
He stepped onto a ledge jutting out of the rocks side and looked down. The ground was still a long way off, but it wasn't near as far as it had appeared to be earlier. Zoro jumped off the ledge he was on, landing on another one directly below. He landed with a thump, swaying slightly. After he regained his balance, he began searching for another ledge to jump to.
It was much faster to jump from ledge to ledge, as long as there was ample room for him to land without falling off. He glanced across the gorge to the other side of the Rift. It was much closer than it was before, and as he looked closer, he noticed that the sides of the cliff were sloping closer together as he neared the bottom.
He jumped to the next ledge, which let out a loud crack upon his landing. The sound sent his heart into over-drive, and before his mind even fully registered the noise he'd grabbed hold of the wall behind him with both hands, just in case the ledge gave way beneath him.
The rock didn't break away, or shift even a little beneath his feet, but he still decided that it would be best if he didn't jump from ledge to ledge anymore. Instead, he grabbed hold of a nicely shaped groove to lower himself off the edge of the platform to begin a slower—but safer—decent. It wasn't that much farther to the bottom anyway, so Zoro was fine with climbing the rest of the way down.
He reached lower to grab another hand hold, placing first some, then all of his weight on his right leg. After readjusting his hold, he shifted to move his other leg further down. This sudden shift caused the rock beneath his feet give way, and as he reached to grab back onto the handhold he'd released to prevent himself from falling entirely. As he did this, the lower half of his body swung to crash painfully against the rock face. The collision knocked two of his katana loose—Sandai Keitetsu and Wadou Ichimonji—and, before he could regain his wits and rescue them, they were sent plummeting downwards to clatter on the rock below.
Zoro cursed, startling himself with the sudden outburst. After he'd regained his footing he paused to rest his forehead against the cool stone. He looked down at the place where his foot had been resting a moment earlier. A number of white shards were wedged into the rock. After examining it further, and climbing down a few feet for a closer look, he was startled to see that what he'd stepped on was actually some poor soul's skull. He bowed his head and mumbled an apology before continuing his decent, careful not to disturb it any further.
There wasn't much of a chance of anyone grabbing his swords, but Zoro couldn't help but feel a little anxious as he consciously increased his pace. Each of his swords was extremely important to him, but most important of all was one of the ones that had fallen—Wadou Ichimonji.
When he was about nine feet from the ground Zoro jumped. Landing in a crouch, he first moved Shuusui, the only of his swords that hadn't fallen, back to his side.
He found his other sword—Sandai Keitetsu—right away. It was sitting on top of a large stone. The blade had slid a couple of inches out of its sheath and was flashing menacingly at its master. Zoro picked it up and replaced it in its sheath, placing it with the other.
Wadou—the most unique and also most important of his swords—was a little harder to locate. When it landed, it had slipped between two rocks, almost completely concealing it from his eyes. A less observant person would have missed it; a less determined one would have given up looking. Zoro grabbed it up, shoving one of the rocks out of the way with his foot to do so. He inspected the blade as well as the sheath for damage.
Satisfied that he'd found none, he placed the third sword with the other two and started walking immediately toward the other side of the rift. It wasn't very far between the two sides, especially from the bottom of the Rift. He carefully stepped over what he assumed was a man who'd been foolish enough to try and jump over the canyon. The body looked disturbingly fresh, however, and Zoro couldn't help but wonder if he'd ever intended to do anything but fall to his death.
Ignoring the thought, Zoro passed by two more corpses—skeletons, really, as they were both much older than the other—without looking at them directly. No matter how much death he saw, he could never see himself getting used to it.
He reached the other wall and paused to consider his swords, leaving the three deceased in his stead. It would probably be better if he kept them at his side, even if that meant allowing them to get in the way of his ascent and hit against the rock as he did so.
He certainly didn't want to risk loosing hold of them again, because then he would be forced to climb down to get whatever had fallen. After making absolutely certain that there would be no repeat of the previous episode, Zoro grabbed hold of the wall and began climbing the other side.
As far as weapons went, swords were the best way to go. Before the Occurance, one might have argued that a gun was a more practical weapon. But with no one to manufacture the ammunition, guns became useless as anything more than a simple bludgeon.
He kicked loose shale away with his foot before allowing the full of his weight on it and continuing his ascent.
People rarely carried guns anymore—hell, most of the people Zoro had met were more satisfied with a large, slightly sharpened stick than a gun.
The only gun he'd seen since the Occurrence, in fact—after everything calmed down and things had lulled into a general peace—was a gun with two bullets, owned by a couple who safeguarded it with their lives. It was either for protection, or for suicide, if need be. Zoro doubted that they'd given the former much thought.
But on top of being functional, practical weapons, Zoro's swords held a certain sentimental value for him as well.
With a grunt, he pulled himself onto a small ledge, and rested one knee on it while he shifted to move his swords out of the way. He considered stopping to rest, but there really wasn't much room for anything but one knee to rest comfortably on the ledge, and he quickly decided to continue onwards.
Two of his swords—Shuusui and Sandai Keitetsu—belonged to him. He practiced three-sword style. Even before the Occurrence he'd been a swordsman. He only owned two swords of his own because the third—Yubashiri—had been destroyed and he had, despite his friends protests, refused to downgrade to a lower quality sword; he would much rather do without a third sword at all. So Zoro had fought with two swords for a while, and though it wasn't a great difference, he had been crippled slightly because of that.
He'd picked up Wadou after the Occurrence. He'd never expected to get his hands on it otherwise, but it had completed his set nonetheless. The sword wasn't his—he hadn't asked for it, nor had it been given to him—but he was borrowing it all the same. Using it for her sake, because she couldn't use it herself.
In a way, it was the one part of his past that he really didn't want to get rid of, even if he could.
He reached up to grab another handhold, shifting his right foot to a higher position. Zoro was nearing the top and was beginning to carefully choose his hand holds to avoid any slip-ups. With a final grunt, he hoisted himself over the edge of the cliff. He stood, rubbing the palms of his hands on his pants as he did so.
The land was generally flat, which explained why the higher elevation made it impossible to see anything of the Grand Line from below, and there were very few landmarks; there was also no one in sight.
He knew he shouldn't have been disappointed—after all, he'd expected that there was no Haven in the Grand Line, but the barren sight before him caused an unfamiliar tightening in his chest all the same.
He ignored it, taking a step away from the edge, and scanned the landscape. There were thickening rows of trees off to his left and, he assumed, if anyone was on this side of the Rift, that's where they'd be. He started off into the trees with determination, ignoring the disappointment of not finding anyone else as it was nagging at the back of his mind.
He could always cross back over the Rift, but it might not be worth the effort, and if it was it wasn't happening today. It would be nightfall soon, and he didn't want to climb in the dark, and he certainly didn't want to camp in the canyon of the Rift, with the dead.
Running his eyes over the trees, Zoro searched for anything he could use to set camp. He would probably keep walking, just to be sure that there was no one over here. It wouldn't take him long to make camp, and he wanted to explore a little further into the trees.
Further ahead of him, a loud crack shook the trees. Zoro froze mid-step, turning toward the noise. That was it. He was sure of it.
That was the sound.
Sorry about all the build-up, I know it's lame, but its necessary (I think). I just hope that I can actually manage to update this semi-regularly :D I don't want to get ahead of myself XD
I'm pretty sure that the entire SH crew will be brought into this story by the end of it, but I'm not sure when (and there's a good chance it will be a long while before some of them are brought in) … So anyway, please review and tell me what you think!
