Now is probably as good a time as any to check in with the only person in their group who wasn't invited to Nami's party; Chopper. He was used to not getting invited to stuff-after all, most of the gang was in college now, and most campuses aren't very welcoming to reindeer. On top of that, a lot of the places they liked to go-bars, restaurants, aquariums-didn't really allow for reindeer either, so he had become accustomed to hanging out with the gang only when they had plans outdoors, or somewhere more accomodating.
So he'd started off his Halloween hanging out by himself in the barn Luffy had set him up in. Luffy had left him a TV that was hooked up to an extension cord, and a bunch of Halloween-themed DVDs to watch-Dawn of the Dead, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Creature From the Black Lagoon-but he'd neglected to turn the TV on, and Chopper wasn't comfortable handling discs with his hooves, so he'd just been wandering around the barn by himself, bored. Besides, what Chopper really wanted to do was go trick-or-treating.
Luffy and Usopp had sat him down a few nights ago and tried to explain what "trick-or-treat" was.
"You go up to people's doors," Luffy had said, "knock on them, and when they open them, you shout 'TRICK OR TREAT'!" He pumped his fists into the air, falling over backwards.
"Really?" Chopper asked, excited, but confused. "Why?"
"So they'll give you candy!" Luffy said.
"What?!" Chopper loved candy. "They just give you candy for no reason?!"
"Well," Usopp said slyly, "if they don't give you a treat, then you get to trick them." He tried to explain that the houses that turn you away get "T. ", but then Chopper needed him to explain that "T.P." stood for "toilet paper", and Chopper didn't know what a "toilet" was...but the main takeaway was that you got free candy. So as Chopper paced around the barn, thinking about candy, he resolved to go out and give this this "trick or treat" thing a shot.
The barn was always left unlocked, so Chopper had no trouble getting out and following the path he remembered from walking with Luffy and the gang that led straight into the suburbs. Looking around, he was delighted to see the bright lights and spooky decorations of Halloween. Ghouls and gremlins hung off porches, vampires and werewolves and witches hung out of windows, plastic graves and rubber hands sprouted from lawns, and every house had a jack-o-lantern or two, or three. Chopper's mind filled with images of Reese's peanut butter cups, and Kit-Kat bars, and Jolly Ranchers, and Milky Ways, and Snickers, and Babe Ruths. His mouth watered as he clopped over to the first house on his path, a small one-story house with a light-up ghost on the stoop, and tapped the door with his hoof.
A second later, a man opened the door. He had to be in his late fifties or early sixties, and was wearing the bowler hat and nailbrush mustache of Charlie Chaplin-not that either of those descriptors meant anything to Chopper. As soon as the door was open, the reindeer bleated "TRICK OR TREAT!" Charlie Chaplin stared at him for a second, mouth agape.
"My God," he said, then his eyes lit up, "that is the finest reindeer costume I have ever seen! You look absolutely fabulous!"
"Aww, shut up! I don't need your stupid compliments!" Chopper said, bobbing his head bashfully and pawing at the stone steps. The old man didn't seem to pay this much mind, though, as he grabbed a bowl of chocolates for Chopper.
"Okay, now, do you have a bag?"
"Huh?" Chopper said. "Why?"
"Well, you need a bag or a bucket or something to carry your candies, of course!"
Oh, crap! Chopper thought. He hadn't even considered that! He looked around frantically for something that might hold candy-preferably a lot of it. "Excuse me!" he shouted as he took off down the stoop.
"Hey-wait!" Charlie Chaplin shouted, but Chopper was long gone. The old man sighed, and he unwrapped a Twix for himself as he shut the door.
Chopper's eyes darted around the street. There were a couple kids wandering around, and now he could see that they all were carrying something-plastic bags, pumpkin-shaped buckets, even pillowcases. He had to get one of his own.
In front of the cemetery, Chopper spotted an orange jack-o-lantern bucket that had been left unattended. Jackpot! he thought, and ran over to grab it.
"Hey!" someone called. "That's mine!"
Chopper looked up to see a little girl in a green dress, a pointed hat, and wearing fake ears, pointing directly at him. I've been had! Chopper darted through the gates and into the cemetery, looking for a hiding spot. He found a large gravestone topped with an angel and hid his face behind it, but failed to hide the rest of his body, and so a second later, someone tapped him on the back.
"I'll be taking that back, sir!" declared a voice confidently. The person speaking was a skinny guy with a brown ponytail and glasses, wearing a fake beard and a red Santa suit. When Chopper turned around to look at him, though, the man's confidence seemed to melt away-after all, Chopper was a full-grown reindeer with a head of full-sized antlers, and pretty intimidating when you looked at him. Realizing this, Chopper lowered his head, aiming to toss Santa aside and continue on his mission to get candy, but the man quickly shouted "Wait, wait, wait!" Chopper paused. "Look, man...my kids are watching," the guy said. "Can you just...y'know...make it look like I beat you?"
Chopper turned his head over to where the little girl was standing, right next to a boy and an older teenage girl, both dressed in green elf costumes as well. He turned back to the dad.
"You want me to pretend to lose to you?" he asked.
"Yes," the father said, unperturbed by the talking reindeer.
"Okay..." Chopper said, "but then I need you to give me one of your buckets so that I can go trick-or-treating, too."
"Hm...I think I can do you something better."
"Is Papa...talking to the reindeer?" the boy asked his sisters, who both shrugged.
"I beat you, you dirty animal!" the father shouted, and he bopped Chopper lightly on the head.
"Ow!" Chopper cried. "I've been beaten, fair and square by this brave man!"
"Stay down, you stinky beast!" Papa bopped him again.
"Ouch! What a humiliating defeat!"
"Now, hand over my daughter's bucket, you foul-smelling monster!"
"(Hey, tone it down with the 'stinky' stuff.)"
"(Sorry.)"
"You can't be serious," said Santa's daughter, glancing up from her phone. "We just watched you whispering-"
"Yay!" the boy and the girl shouted. "Papa beat the monster!"
"Seriously?!" their older sister said. She took the two children aside and told them, making no effort to be quiet, "Don't trust Papa, guys. He's a liar and a coward."
"How can you say that about your beloved father?" whined Santa.
"I say it because it's true," muttered the teenage girl, pulling out her phone once again.
Chopper, who had been quietly watching this go down, cleared his throat.
"Right! I have good news, children!" Papa announced, walking back up to Chopper. "I found a reindeer to complete our costume!"
"Hello," Chopper said shyly.
"Whoa!" said the boy.
"A real-life reindeer!" said the girl.
"He can talk?" said the teenager.
"These are my kids," Papa explained, "my son Rick, my little girl Daisy, and my eldest Rosa."
"You wanna come trick-or-treating with us?" asked Daisy, apparently unperturbed by Chopper having tried to steal her bucket.
Chopper pawed at the ground sheepishly. "Uhm...okay…" he said.
"YAY!" cheered Rick and Daisy. "C'mon, let's go get some candy!"
And so Chopper spent the next hour walking around with the three kids and their father, stopping at houses to knock on the door and get loads of candy. Everyone seemed really excited to see Santa, his elves, and a reindeer, and pretty soon, even Rosa was laughing and having fun.
Luffy, however, was not having nearly as much success. Starting from Nami's neighbors, he'd been ringing doorbells and getting no answer. In a couple windows he saw people peering out and then shutting their blinds, and some houses shut their lights off when they saw him approaching. Only one house had opened its door when he rang the bell.
"Trick or treat!" he shouted, holding out his empty pillowcase.
"What?" said the little old lady with thick, coke-bottle glasses who opened the door.
"I said," Luffy repeated, "trick or-"
"We heard what you said!" called an old man wearing sunglasses from a rocking chair inside the house. "We're not giving you no candy!"
"What?!" Luffy asked angrily. "Why not?!"
"Aren't you a little old to be trick-or-treating?" wheezed a second man with a long white beard.
"Yeah, go get a job and buy your own candy!" agreed a second woman in a bonnet. With that, the old lady closed the door on Luffy's face.
"Hey!" he shouted, and began pounding on the door again. "Open up and give me your candy, you old geezers!" He reared up a punch that might put a hole in their door, but froze when he heard someone call his name.
"Luffy?"
Luffy turned around to see Chopper and the kids, standing at the bottom of the steps. "What are you doing here?" Chopper asked. "I thought you were at Nami's."
"I left to go trick-or-treating," Luffy said. "What are you doing here?"
"Same," Chopper said, then added, "Excuse me," as he walked up the steps with the three kids in tow. They knocked on the door. "Trick or treat!" they shouted.
"Oh my…" said the same old lady from before. "Is...is that real?" She pointed at Chopper.
Luffy was about to yell something at the old lady again, but Papa spoke up.
"Is that your reindeer?" he asked.
"Huh?" Luffy said. "Chopper is his own reindeer."
"He has a kind heart," observed the skinny Santa Claus. "He's really brightened up my kids' Halloween." The man turned to look at Luffy, smiling. "I work a lot, so I don't usually get to see my kids as much as I'd like. Especially Rosa; this is probably the last time she'll go trick-or-treating. I'm very thankful that your friend was able to make tonight special for her."
"Well," Luffy said, "that's just how Chopper is. That's why he's part of my crew!"
"Your crew, eh? Well, you're very lucky, young man," Papa said. "If there's anything I can do to repay you and your 'crew', just let me know." Luffy watched as the kids reunited with their father and they headed back down the street.
"Oh, shit!" Luffy said, smacking his hand. "I should have asked for some of their candy."
Luffy continued to the edge of the suburbs, watching as the lights turned off as he went. "People these days are so stingy," he grumbled to himself as he came up on the last house on the street, a one-story house with a light-up ghost on the stoop. Delighted that the occupants hadn't turned off the lights, the college-aged trick-or-treater knocked on the door.
"TRICK OR TREAT!" he shouted as the door opened, and launched himself into the house, barrelling into the little man who'd opened the door. Unaware of what he'd done, Luffy looked left and right. "Hello? Who opened the door?"
"Down here," wheezed the man. Luffy looked down to see a man in a Charlie Chaplin costume, holding a bowl of candy so that it didn't spill.
"Sorry," Luffy said, stepping off the man. "You're the first person to open the door for me!"
"Is that so?" the little man sat up. "Well, you're the first person I've gotten to give candy to."
"Huh?" Luffy said. "Really?"
"Yes," the man said solemnly. "My house is on the end of the cul-de-sac, so a lot of parents don't even make it this far. By the time the kids get here, they're too tired to go on."
"Well, I guess that means more candy for you, huh?" Luffy said with a grin.
The man chuckled. "Yes, I suppose so," he said. "Won't you come in? It's been a while since I had company."
Luffy followed the man to his living room, which was well-lit, with two big armchairs and walls of photographs. On a big, old-fashioned tube T.V., he was playing The Wolfman. Luffy peered at some of the photographs.
"So, what brought you to my humble home?" the man asked as he sat down in a big loveseat.
Luffy turned to him, then sat down in one of the big armchairs. He sank into it, almost entirely engulfed by the soft cushions. "Every house I went up to shut their lights off!" Luffy complained. "No one even let me knock!"
"Ah, yes," the man nodded. "Back when I was young, I used to have that same problem…" He sighed and looked at the photographs on the wall. Luffy followed his gaze to one large photograph of some eight or nine boys, dressed in identical white shirts, makeup, and bowler hats. If Luffy were more cultured, he would have recognized the uniform of A Clockwork Orange.
"Is that the guy from Panic! at the Disco?"
"My friends and I used to go trick-or-treating well into our college years," the man explained, "Until it got to the point that when people saw us coming down the streets, they'd shut their lights off. At that point in the night, they knew that all the kids had gone home and only teenagers and college kids would be trick-or-treating."
"Yeah," Luffy grumbled, taking a chocolate from the bowl, "It sucks."
"Oh, it didn't bother us at all," the man chortled.
"It didn't?" Luffy asked, his mouth full. "Why not?"
"Well, the real fun was making our costumes and hanging out together," the man said. "We were old enough that if we really wanted candy we could go out and buy it ourselves, so we didn't much care, as long as we got to spend time together." He sighed, looking at the photo again.
"...What happened to them?" Luffy asked.
The man smiled. "Life," he said. "Some of them got married, had kids, moved away for work...a couple of them died." He shrugged. "It happens to all of us, there's no avoiding it. All we can do is enjoy the time we have together while we have it."
Luffy nodded, his lips pursed as he thought. Then he stood up, the couch making a squelching sound as it released its prey.
"I've got to get back to my friends," he declared.
The man chuckled again. "Very well," he said. "It's been a pleasure talking with you, young man." He stood up and led Luffy to the door. "You can take as much candy as you want, by the way," he added.
"Really?!" Luffy said, his eyes shining with excitement.
"Of course," the man said, "I'm probably going to turn in for the night myself. Happy Halloween!"
"Happy Halloween to you too, Mr. Hitler!" Luffy said as he dashed for the door.
"I-I'm not Hitler, I'm-" the man tried to explain, but Luffy was long gone. The man sighed to himself, shut the door, and went back to his movie.
Luffy showed back up at Nami's house and burst through the door to find the sorry scene he had left. Zoro had put on a movie, which he and Usopp were watching absent-mindedly, and Robin had sat down with her laptop, intent on getting some homework done now that the party seemed to be winding down. Sanji was right in front of the door, putting on his coat.
"What are you doing?" Luffy asked.
"It's late, Luffy," Sanji said. "I'm going home."
"You can't go home yet!" Luffy said, slamming the door. "Where's Nami?"
"She's upstairs," Usopp said. "What's the big emergency?"
"Someone go get her," Luffy said. "It's time for me to tell my story."