A/N These delays just keep getting longer, don't they...?
Disclaimer: [distant sobbing]
Sanji clicked his lighter open and ignited a flame. The meager light it provided didn't do much to improve their sight, as the cave extended too far in front of them.
"How far do you think it goes?" asked Chopper by his side. Sanji handed him the lighter as he got out his lantern.
"No idea." He took the lighter back, lit his lantern, and then went to do the same for Robin and Brook. The three lanterns fared a bit better, but even so it was too dark to see the far wall.
"Shall we?" Robin took the lead, followed closely by Luffy.
"Let's go! I still wanna find the mystery thing!"
The ground sloped downward, gently at first but slowly getting steeper. They tread carefully, and, for all of two and a half minutes, silently.
"This is boring." Sanji rolled his eyes, and Nami smacked their attention span-deficient captain in the back of the head. Up ahead of them, Robin chuckled without looking back.
"You may have some entertainment soon enough. The tunnel is getting wider, so there may be some kind of chamber up ahead." Sure enough, the tunnel soon widened to the point where they could all walk side by side, but it took another five minutes of walking before it fully opened up. There was indeed a chamber, a few times the size of the Sunny's galley, with a high ceiling. Lifting their lanterns, they could just about make out the whole thing.
"It's... completely empty," Chopper said slowly, looking around.
"Aw, what? What about the mystery thing?" Luffy cried, his voice bouncing back in a disappointed echo.
"There was never any guarantee there would be anything in here at all... although it is rather peculiar."
"Maybe someone's already been here and taken everything?" Brook ventured.
"Perhaps, but that isn't what I meant. Do you notice something about this cave?"
"Apart from it being empty?" Nami asked, unsure of what Robin was getting at. Sanji, for his part, looked around, trying to see whatever it was that had caught Robin's attention. However, no matter how hard he looked, he couldn't see anything. Robin gestured around her.
"Caves like this are usually formed over thousands of years, specifically through erosion by water. The walls in here are certainly smooth enough... but it's entirely too dry."
"Surely the water could just be gone by now?"
"It could, however it would have left some evidence behind. But look around, it's is completely empty; no stalagmites or stalactites, nothing. The ground is unusually even, too."
"So... what does that mean?" Sanji asked, not sure what they were supposed to do with this information.
"It may be man-made, or it was originally eroded by water and then cleared out by someone. Either way, chances are this isn't entirely natural."
"...Which would mean it was probably made for something," Brook added, catching on to Robin's train of thought.
"Exactly."
"But what? There's nothing in here for it to be for!" Nami pointed out.
"That is the question, isn't it?" Robin lifted her lantern and moved further into the chamber. "Have a look around, see if you can find anything... abnormal."
The group scattered, some more skeptical than others. Luffy bounded around the chamber a few times before declaring it boring, while everyone else put a bit more care into their inspection. Finding nothing the middle of the room, they each eventually ventured to the walls, which really were so smooth that they had to either be eroded by water or intentionally carved. Aside from that, however, there didn't seem to be anything of note. Sanji chewed on the end of an unlit cigarette in frustration; the Fish had led him here for a reason, surely. There had to be something down here, although he had no idea what it could be. But what can you hide in an empty room?
At last, the siblings brought forth the charms they had created together, each taking their turn to offer one to the leaders.
The first sibling stepped forward, presenting the unassuming trinket.
"You will travel far in a dangerous world, where the whims of the sky can be your end just as easily as they can be your savior. But now... May the winds be in your favor, and may they take you to where you need to be. This is the blessing of the heavens."
Robin moved carefully along the wall and took in every detail she could. Throughout history, people had been clever. If they really wanted to hide something, they could do it well. She suspected that may be the case here too, unless Brook was right about the chamber already being cleared out before they got there. If so, however, it must have happened long ago; the state of the rocks covering the entrance was a testament to that.
A slight discoloration on the otherwise very uniform ground caught her eye a few paces up ahead. Knowing better than to overlook even the tiniest of peculiarities, she walked over and knelt to examine it closer. A smile tugged at her lips as she realized what she was looking at: it wasn't a discoloration at all, but rather some relatively deep scratches in the floor, as would be caused by pushing something very heavy. They extended a little more than a meter out from the wall, and ended exactly where the wall began. It was too close even for something which had been pushed right up against the wall, the scratches almost appeared to go... under.
Robin stood up and placed a hand on the wall. It was the same type of rock as everywhere else, and it didn't so much as budge when she gave it a push. She stepped a bit to the side, running her hand against the stone. There wasn't so much as a crack... Ah. Right there was something of a slightly different texture. She lifted her lantern higher and peered closer.
Clever indeed. You wouldn't spot it unless you knew to look for it.
She lifted her free hand to the wall again, running her fingers over what she had found. Then, ever so carefully, she scratched at it, and smiled when pieces began to fall off.
It was plaster.
The second sibling stepped forward, trinket in hand. Out of the remaining siblings, he was the one who felt most responsible for his sister's people, and it was he who presented his gift with the greatest of humility.
"You wish to travel the seas in bodies meant for solid ground. It will be hard on you, especially when you head far from land. You will forever be welcome wherever in my domain you set foot, whenever you must return from your journeys. However, out on the ocean, I cannot help you. The best I can do for you now is offer you this: a charm of good health, to keep at bay all but the worst of ailments. Illness was what forced my sister to give up on the very thing she wanted the most; may you never feel that burden. This is the blessing of the land."
Sanji debated the merits of simply kicking at the blank wall he was currently examining, but eventually decided against it. No need to bring the cave down around their ears, after all, no matter how tempting it would be to take out his frustrations. He was sure there had to be something, but with every passing moment his certainty wavered. Why had the Fish brought him here? For that matter, why had they done anything at all? He'd wished for a clue. Had they acted in response to that?
That time with Chopper in the storm, too. He'd wanted to be able to see anything that could lead him to their sinking doctor. Could the Fish really understand that? He hadn't actually thought about it at the time, there had been so many other things to focus on. But if they were responding to his wishes, could he get them to do it again? If he just wished for more help...
A quick glance around the chamber, however, told him it wouldn't work. There were no Fish around, which was odd. As far as he could remember, there had always been at least a couple of them no matter where he went. Or at least, he was pretty sure. In the privacy of his own head, he cursed himself for never paying more attention. The strange out-of-focus feeling he'd had after leaving Water 7 wasn't there either, so chances were that he hadn't relapsed into whatever had been wrong earlier. If he worked with the assumption that the absence of the Fish was abnormal and that it was not caused by him losing the ability to see them again, what did that tell him? The Fish wouldn't come down into the cave. Although perhaps wouldn't wasn't the best word to use, it implied free will and he had no idea if the Fish had that. But regardless of whether it was a matter of choice or simply some weird physics that governed their movement, there were no Fish down in the cave with them. So what was keeping them out?
"I believe I've found something," Robin called from the other side of the chamber, drawing everyone's attention to her and the hands she had bloomed on a section of wall. Luffy cheered and bounded over with renewed enthusiasm, with the others following at a more or less calmer pace. As they got closer, they were able to see part of what Robin had uncovered. There was a crack in the wall which formed an arch. It looked suspiciously like a doorway. Sanji, Brook and Chopper began to help chip away at the plaster, while Nami convinced Luffy that the task required a bit more finesse than simply punching through the rock, there could be something valuable to be found and he might wreck it, could he stop to think about these things for once, thank you very much.
"The crack was concealed with plaster, probably a mix of lime and gypsum. Unfortunately, it has been such a commonly used material for several millennia that it's nearly impossible to say just how old it is simply by looking. But regardless of when it happened, whoever was responsible for it did an excellent job. The plasterwork is nigh impossible to spot, it blends in perfectly with the stone," Robin explained, keeping her eyes on what she was doing. "If I were to take a guess, I'd say behind this wall lies a secondary chamber or tunnel... What is interesting is the amount of effort that went into hiding it. Someone clearly didn't wish for it to be found."
"Do you think it could be some kind of treasure?" Nami asked hopefully, despite realizing the odds were probably against her.
"I don't think so, unless it's cursed."
"Cursed?" Brook asked, voice slightly higher pitched than normal. Robin nodded.
"If it really is fear keeping the islanders away, then that fear will have come from somewhere. And now, we've found something that was obviously never meant to be found. It would be foolish to ignore the possible connection. What we find could be terrible."
"What if it's just some story someone came up with to protect their treasure, and people happened to believe it?"
"It's possible, but if that is the case then it must have been quite the story..."
As the discussion went on, Sanji managed to work away a bigger chunk of plaster. It fell to the floor and shattered, getting dust all over his shoes. However, he barely noticed as he was preoccupied by the sudden but weak stream of air that came through the hole he had created. He must have gotten all the way through. The air was warm, but it smelled stale. The was the scent of something else there too, but he couldn't place it.
By all accounts, it was completely harmless. The plaster must have formed an airtight seal, so of course the air quality would be different from that of the chamber they were in. Yet for some reason, his instincts kicked into high alert. His body tensed, anticipating some danger he couldn't see. But at the same time, he couldn't sense any danger either. All he had was a small but persistent feeling of something not being right.
"I think I broke through!" Chopper exclaimed excitedly. "The air smells really old..."
"Finally! Can I punch through it now?"
"No!"
"The scratches on the floor lead away from the wall. I think we'll have to pull it out."
Luffy immediately took hold of the large stone blocking their path, with Chopper following behind immediately after switching to Heavy Point. Sanji hesitated, still very much uneasy, and glanced at everyone else. Not one of them seemed bothered by anything, and most of them had keen instincts. Maybe he was just letting his imagination get the better of him?
He doubted it, but stuck with the idea anyway and joined Luffy and Chopper. The crack was just wide enough for him to get a comfortable grip on the edge of the rock.
"Ready? One, two, three, pull!" At first the stone didn't move at all, but bit by bit they were able to ease it away from the opening. Once they got it moving, it took significantly less effort to keep pulling. As soon as they'd managed to move the boulder far enough from the opening, everyone crowded around to get a look inside the new chamber. Sanji couldn't see anything from where he stood, still behind the boulder and now behind everyone else. He made to move forward, but froze when he heard Nami's horrified whisper.
"Oh my god..."
The third sibling presented her gift.
"There may come a time when you have done all you can, yet you are powerless. In these moments, all you have is fortune; a school of fish when you've run out of food, a calm during the storm, unobstructed waters during the fog. May your fortunes be kind. This is the first blessing of the seas."
Sanji's unease rose up again, and for a moment he feared taking a look. At the same time, there was no way he could avoid doing so. He took a deep breath and stepped forward, peering cautiously around his crewmates.
Robin had been right. The sight that greeted them was terrible.
The chamber was narrower than the one they had first found, but it was also significantly longer. The lanterns could not cast enough light for them to see to the other end. Frankly, Sanji didn't want to. The walls were lined with desiccated corpses, positioned so that they sat leaning either against the stone or each other. A narrow path had been left clear down the center of the chamber, disappearing into the darkness at the edge of the lantern's range.
Bile rose in Sanji's throat. There were so many of the damned things! He estimated there to be a little less than one hundred in the area he could see alone, and there was no telling how many more there were further down.
"Is this... some kind of mass grave?" Nami spoke quietly, as if she didn't trust her own voice.
"I'd say a tomb," Robin answered calmly, but with a small frown. She was an archaeologist, so she was accustomed to the dead, but Sanji couldn't help but wonder if this managed to disturb her too. If she was, she didn't let it get in her way; she was the first to step further inside while everyone else remained unmoving. She knelt down by the nearest corpse and began to systematically inspect it, taking in details the others wouldn't know to look for.
"Whoever these people were, they must have died long ago. They are not completely decayed, which would suggest a more recent death, but the air down here is dry enough for them to have been naturally mummified." She carefully touched the dried flesh, searching for something which could help narrow down the time of death. Finding little, she turned her attention to the corpse's clothing. "Their style of dress is unique, I've never seen it before. It does bear some passing resemblance to common clothing styles from about six, seven hundred years ago, but there is no guaranteeing the connection without further study."
The others finally ventured inside, walking slowly to where Robin was. Chopper clutched Luffy's leg, and Luffy patted the doctor's head in uncharacteristic silence. Sanji doubted their captain was all that disturbed by the corpses themselves, but perhaps he'd finally registered the feeling of something being off. It was certainly screaming at the back of Sanji's own mind. He rubbed his eyes in frustration.
"This one died a violent death. There's a small hole piercing their head; it was probably an arrow. There's still some blood on the clothes, which means they weren't changed between the time of death and being brought down here." Sanji shuddered, turning his eyes away from Robin but only seeing more of the corpses. They were all in similar states, he realized. Their clothes were stained black, stains which he could easily imagine having once been red... Some of them were missing limbs, now that he looked. That one there didn't have an arm, its clothing torn at the empty sleeve, that one's face was caved in, no longer recognizable as human, and over there... one was missing the entire lower half of its body. Slit throats, blotches of black he realized were proof of stab wounds, cuts too clean to have been caused by anything other than a bladed weapon, collapsed rib cages and skulls from blunt force trauma. Sanji hated how easily he could guess what fate had befallen each of them, but no matter how hard he tried he couldn't drag his mind elsewhere. Robin's analysis offered no comfort, either.
"I doubt any of them died of natural causes. They were all killed. It happened elsewhere, and enough time passed for them to stop bleeding, since the ground is clean. Then they were brought here, and positioned as we see them now."
"What could have caused all this...?" Brook wondered aloud, a clear note of nervousness in his voice.
"A war of some kind is the best guess I can currently make, although 'massacre' may be a better term. None of them are dressed like soldiers, and while I can see some have evidence of defensive wounds, it doesn't seem like they managed to put up much of a fight. Many have wounds on their backs, which means they were probably trying to run away."
That was the only explanation that made any sense, but it didn't sit right with Sanji. A quick glance at Robin's expression told him she was thinking the same thing. They were missing something.
"...Who brought them here?" he asked, trying to place what exactly was bothering him. "There must have been a lot of people involved, this was no small job." Not only would they have had to bring all of the bodies down into the cave, they would have had to position them all, carve the boulder to fit the entrance, and carefully plaster the crack to hide it. Hell, they may even had to clear out the cave of unwanted rock first. It was an awful lot of effort to do something which could have been achieved by digging a hole for a mass grave, or by burning the bodies. That had to mean something, didn't it?
"Perhaps there were survivors, but I can't imagine there having been many. Whoever killed all of these people, they were very efficient." Slowly, they moved deeper into the cave, finding nothing but more of the same. At least two hundred of the dead by now, and they still hadn't reached the end. Robin continued, "There is a chance that the ones responsible for the deaths were also the ones to do this."
"Why would they do that?" Nami asked the question Sanji had been about to ask himself. "Why expend all the time and resources for people they just murdered when there must have been easier ways to get rid of them? Burn them, bury them, dump them in the sea... And if it had to be here, why bother sitting them all up like this?"
The others walked further into the cave, but Sanji stood still. Nami's words echoed through his head, screaming some importance they held but could not convey.
Dump them in the sea...
The fourth sibling stepped forward.
"The ocean is strong. To survive it, you must be strong as well, in body, mind and heart. You must draw it from within, from the people around you... and now, from the water itself. May your strength never falter, may it steady your hands in whatever you choose to do. This is the second blessing of the seas."
"Oi Sanji, you coming?" Luffy called, more relaxed than before. Nothing down here presented a threat to them, so he was letting down his guard down a bit. It was kinda like the zombies at Thriller Bark, only these dead guys moved less. It was honestly getting a little boring, but everyone else was being so serious. It was probably important, at least to Robin, even though she said they died ages ago. Why did it matter anymore? Besides, he wanted to find the mystery thing. Unless this was the mystery thing, in which case he was a bit disappointed.
Something was up with Sanji, though. He'd looked worried for a while now, but he hadn't said much. Still, Luffy trusted him. If there was anything dangerous, Sanji would speak up. In the meanwhile, Luffy busied himself with ideas on how to cheer their cook up. He liked cooking, obviously, and he was the best at it... so then he'd be happy if Luffy asked him to make something, wouldn't he? And if Luffy asked for meat, he'd get something out of it too! Brilliant!
"Sanji, I'm hungry!" As planned, that snapped the cook out of whatever trance he'd been in.
"Are you serious? ...You are. Fine, just eat the lunchbox I packed for you." Ooooh, he'd forgotten about that! Well the plan hadn't gone perfectly, but Sanji wasn't staring into space with a weird expression anymore, and Luffy had food. All was right in the world.
"Are you really going to eat here?" Nami asked, a disgusted expression on her face. Luffy gave her a blank look.
"It's food, Nami. That's what it's for!" Honestly, for someone so smart, she could be pretty stupid sometimes.
Nami shook her head, gave up, and went back to speaking with Robin, only acknowledging the lightened mood in the privacy of her own mind. Luffy had a strange way of keeping them all calm. "What were you saying?"
"If it was whoever killed these people who buried them, they may have been acting according to their own customs. Burial rites play a strong role in several cultures, sometimes extending to their enemies or outsiders. Burying them all like this may have been a sign of respect for the dead."
That wasn't it. Sanji couldn't say why, but he knew that wasn't right. Something was still nagging at the edge of his thoughts, but refused to take shape. Nothing was adding up! By all accounts, Robin's suggestion was reasonable, and she was the history expert. He shouldn't be doubting her without any proof. But still… wounds on their backs, the clearly one-sided outcome, not one dressed in any kind of armor. Civilians, in all likelihood. The corpses varied greatly in size, some of them must only have been children when they were killed. There was no respect in any part of what he was seeing, yet the effort had been made to bring the bodies down and sit them up. It would have taken a long time to do, even with a large group of people doing the work. There was a reason, then. No-one would do all that without a motive.
Dump them in the sea.
His thoughts spun, attempting and failing to form a coherent picture of what they were dealing with. And to top it all off, the air was so dry that it was making his eyes water. He tried to rub away the irritating feeling, but managed only temporary relief. His unease was building again, whatever distraction Luffy had provided was long gone.
Goddammit, what was he not seeing?
"Are you alright, Sanji-san?" Sanji almost jumped, not having noticed Brook come up to him. He glanced around, but no-one else was paying them any attention.
"I'm fine, this place just gives me the creeps." As soon as the words left his mouth, it occurred to him how tactless they could sound. Here he was talking to a skeleton about being set on edge by dead people. At least Brook didn't seem to take offense.
"You and me both. Someone did all of this… to what end?"
"Yeah. Why seal them all down here?"
"That too," Brook said, casting his gaze around the chamber, "although I was wondering why they were all killed in the first place."
"...Oh. Robin did say it could have been a war."
"Indeed, could have been. But what if it wasn't?" Sanji had no answer for that. Surely no-one would attack such a large group of people unprovoked. Maybe they'd wanted something, land, resources? Would that be enough motivation to go through with something like this? And that didn't account for the burial.
"The locals avoid this side of the island," Sanji spoke slowly, constructing his thoughts as he went, "and all of this is probably why, even if they don't actually know about it."
"Anymore," Brook added. "That avoidance began somewhere. Whoever was alive at the time… they must have been the ones who started it, knowing what was here."
"Hang on, would that make the current islanders descendants of the survivors?"
"Or descendants of the ones who committed the deed. We passed the cemetery on the way here, these people do not fear their dead. Regular graves marked with regular tombstones, all clean and cared for."
"So if they were descended from the survivors, there wouldn't be a reason to not come here," Sanji continued, seeing Brook's point.
"Exactly. Of course, this is all mere conjecture..."
"Conjecture is all we can work with right now, unless Robin's found something new."
They both caught up to the rest of the group, but Robin had no new information to give them. Luffy was entertaining himself by bugging Chopper, who in turn was ultimately grateful for the distraction. They kept going further in slowly, as Robin stopped every now and then to examine another body. Everything she found pointed to the same thing as all the others: a violent death. Sanji listened to every analysis she gave, trying to piece things together himself but getting nowhere. The dry air was really getting to him too; his eyes were starting to sting.
"Hey, look over there," Nami said, pointing at a spot a bit further ahead. Robin lifted her lantern a little higher, illuminating an area where several corpses had fallen over. At the same time, Luffy made a particularly animated gesture as he chatted away with Chopper, and lost his grip on his now empty lunchbox. It went flying off to the side, and fell somewhere among the bodies.
"Oops! Sorry, Sanji!"
"Are you kidding me?" He liked that set, dammit. He rolled his eyes (and immediately regretted it, fuck his eyes hurt) and with a resigned sigh, trudged off to go find the damned thing. "Brook, make sure the idiot doesn't toss his chopsticks away too!" Brook responded with a mock salute.
"Aye aye!"
Up ahead, Nami shook her head in mild exasperation and followed Robin to the fallen corpses. There was quite a few of them, but she couldn't see anything which might have caused it. Then again, chances were they hadn't been properly balanced to begin with. Robin, on the other hand, quickly drew her attention to one body which was curled up next to the wall. It didn't look like it had fallen over from a sitting position, but rather as if it had been lying down to begin with. She handed her lantern to Nami and began to inspect the body. It was the first one to be positioned differently.
This one, too, was dressed in the same style as all the others. She suspected they had been male, but the partially rotted, dried skin made discerning features near impossible without starting to remove clothing. There was a splotch of black on the shoulder of his shirt, a stab wound, but it seemed to be the only one he had. It shouldn't have been fatal. She pushed his shirt collar away, revealing what was left of the wound. It looked nasty, even though it had dried out centuries ago. An infection? That could have killed him, but it would have taken longer. She had a sinking feeling; in order for an infection to set in, he would have had to be alive. Following her instincts, she shifted her focus to his hands and saw exactly what she didn't want to see. His fingertips were damaged, skin broken and there was evidence of bleeding. All ten of his fingernails were missing. Unwillingly, but knowing she had to, Robin moved her gaze to the wall. They were faint, but there were scratches there. Snagged in a small crack was something she knew to be a fingernail without having to check. The other nine were probably somewhere on the floor. The bodies hadn't fallen over on their own, then. They'd been knocked over.
"This one wasn't dead." She spoke quietly, but everyone fell silent. There was a moment of confusion at first, but Robin could sense the mounting horror as her words sank in. "He may have been unconscious and injured, but he wasn't killed. I think an infection was what got him in the end… but not before he found himself here."
"Oh god…" Nami looked ready to vomit. "But they would have noticed! Especially if his wound got infected, he would have been running a fever! The other bodies would have been… cold..."
Robin considered her reply carefully, but eventually settled on the truth. "I'm sure they did notice."
A small, strangled noise from Chopper was the only sound to be heard.
Finally, the siblings all came forward together, bearing one last gift.
"In this world we all live in, there will be times when you must see beyond the obvious," said the First.
"You will have to see hidden meaning in words…," said the Second,
"...In actions…," said the Third,
"...In things beyond your control," said the Fourth.
"Implication."
"Consequence."
"Opportunity."
"Truth."
"May you see the world for what it is, may you have the wisdom to understand what you observe."
"This is the final blessing of a loving guardian."
"May your perception serve you well."
Sanji grumbled to himself as he stepped over the bodies, careful not to so much as nudge them if he could help it. There was just enough space for him to make his way through, though he had to watch where he put his feet. He held his lantern high, keeping an eye out for the lost lunchbox. Damn thing had landed somewhere around here… Aha! There it was, a couple meters ahead. He stepped over another body, doing his level best not to think too hard about it. Everything about the situation rubbed him the wrong way, and it was just getting worse.
He was just about to pick up the box when Robin's voice reached his ears. A small, distant part of his mind marveled at how well sound could carry in the cave, but the rest focused on the way her words settled like ice at the pit of his stomach.
"I'm sure they did notice."
His imagination was quick to supply helpful images of being trapped underground in the pitch darkness, surrounded by the silence of the dead. Trapped, probably delirious, no-one around to help, to even hear. He shivered, shoved the thoughts aside, and forced himself to focus on the lunchbox. Nothing ominous there.
Someone was talking again, but the voice seemed to come from far away and he couldn't tell what they were saying. He found he didn't care. Focus on the task at hand, do not think about solid stone walls on all sides. Do not.
He picked up the box, devoting entirely too much attention to the grain and weight of the wood. He stuffed it in his bag mechanically, and started to get up again. As he straightened up, something glinted in the corner of his eye, having caught the light of his lantern. He turned, curious and grateful for the diversion. He made his way over, and slowly crouched to get a better look. In front of him was a body, small enough to have belonged to a child. Age eleven or twelve, at most. Sanji felt nauseous as that occurred to him, but forgot about it almost instantly. The child had a thin leather cord tied around their head, like some kind of headband. What caught Sanji's attention, however, was the stone which hung from it so that it was positioned at the center of the child's forehead, with three beads hanging on either side. Without any direction from himself, his hand lifted and gently wiped away the grime from the stone in the middle. Recognition hit him with all the force of a cannon ball.
There was a faded silver spiral carved in the middle.
The walls suddenly seemed to close in, he couldn't breathe. The feeling he'd had since breaking the seal finally crystallized into an all-consuming sense of wrong, wrong, WRONG. They shouldn't be here, not him and his crew, not any of these people. His own, identical pendant felt heavy around his neck, the stone cold against his chest.
Dump them in the sea.
But they were here, undeniably, had been here for centuries and it wasn't right. They were trapped, like the one poor soul who'd been alive. Dark, alone, unable to go anywhere. Why were they here?
Bury them at sea.
The air was heavy, saturated with anger, with fear, with despair. Trapped. Were these his own emotions? He didn't think so. Whose were they?
Granny said she wanted to be buried at sea. Why aren't you listening to me? She told me.
Down here, under god knew how many tonnes of rock and earth, they'd sat for years, unable to even fully rot away. Trapped, stuck, suffocating even they no longer needed to breathe. And there, tinging everything, a sense of apathy, mixing with the swirling sensations and half-formed images which swam through him and around him.
Why would anyone want to be buried underground?
His eyes burned.
He managed to come back to himself enough to tear his gaze away, only to be met with more. There were the Fish. But they were all wrong, not silver, but a dull, listless gray. They hung dead in the air, unmoving. Most of them occupied the space above their heads, just out of reach, but some remained close to the corpses, silently hovering over their shoulders. Dead, just like these people. Could the Fish die?
He felt delirious, like that man had before he died. The walls were so heavy, so close, he needed to escape, he'd feebly scratched at the walls… Had Robin actually said anything about that? Wearing his precious fingers to the bone as his body got weaker… No, that wasn't Sanji. He hadn't been here when the bodies were still fresh, he wasn't stuck.
His mind didn't feel like his own.
His gaze dropped feebly to his own hand, and he froze (or had he been frozen to begin with?). There, at his fingertips, one of the gray Fish. It was touching him, he hadn't seen it but he must have accidentally hit it. It hadn't moved out of the way. They were supposed to move out of the way.
His thoughts were stuck in a thick fog, but something broke through. He jerked his hand back, and the feelings settled down some and the images faded completely. A headache bloomed in a split second, and, fuck, his eyes hurt. He could still see the Fish, could still feel that things were so very, very wrong.
He may have whimpered, but he wasn't sure. No, he must have done, that was Chopper at his shoulder, asking if he was okay. He wasn't. Or maybe he was. Was he really feeling any of this, or did this pain belong to someone else again?
He didn't know what he said, if anything, but the next thing he knew he was being helped to his feet. The voices were getting clearer now, and he could associate them with the right names. It all still sounded like he was listening through a wad of cotton wool, but his thoughts were making more sense. He took in a shaky breath and only now realized how badly his lungs ached. Had he remembered to breathe at all during whatever the hell that had just been?
The world was slowly coming back into focus around him. It was Luffy who was supporting most of his weight, and Chopper was leading the way back to the exit. The others had crowded behind them, asking questions in worried tones. Fuck, he hadn't meant to worry them. There was no need for that, he was already feeling a bit better. Not good, not by a long shot, but better. He brought a hand to his head, but paused when he realized both his hands were empty. Shit. He blearily wondered if he'd dropped his lantern or if someone had taken it from him. The damn lunchbox was MIA too.
"It's okay," he somehow managed to slur. "Just need some air. You can…," fuck now everything was spinning, "...do whatever you need to… down here." There. A complete, if poorly enunciated sentence.
"Like hell it's okay!" Chopper's angry voice called from up front. "Luffy, come on, we need to get him outside. I can't see well enough down here."
"Got it!" Quicker than Sanji could process (which admittedly wasn't all that impressive right now), he found himself on Luffy's back, being carried out.
"I can walk, dammit!" he complained. Everyone ignored him.
Chopper set a brisk pace, leading them out of the second chamber and then out of the first. The air was getting fresher the further up the tunnel they went, a definite improvement. The others had stayed behind, something Sanji was rather happy about. He was already going to face an interrogation at Chopper's hands, he didn't need any extra audience for that.
"Luffy, seriously. You can put me down now."
"Nah."
"What do mean, 'nah'? I can walk on my own! Let me down, shithead!" Luffy was silent a moment, then laughed. He still didn't let Sanji go, though. And Sanji, for all his protesting, found he didn't mind all that much. He doubted his legs could carry him very well yet.
His head and eyes still hurt like hell, but it was easier to breathe. The chaos in his mind was settling down, leaving room for more rational thoughts. Mostly they comprised of questions, none so prominent as the one ringing on a loop: What the everloving fuck had just happened?
A/N Oh boy, it's been a while... Thank you all for your patience! I've made everyone wait for so long, sorry!
A quick, hopefully spoiler-free note: things seem to be going down soon in the One Piece manga (and we've been promised good things for next year), and depending how it goes I may have to ignore some of those things for the sake of this story. We'll see when we get there, I suppose.
I hope you've all been enjoying the holidays, and wish you all a happy new year. Thank you everyone who has read, followed, reviewed and favorited!