Part Two:
Accept Yourself
The hospital was much bigger than what Sanji remembered – nestled between rising towers around it, surrounded by a sprawl of smaller buildings that had never been there when he was alive, it still held a large concrete cross atop of it, with the same angels embedded into the north and south sides of the building. It had expanded into two different buildings with a larger parking tower near it – the driveway was small and controlled by valet, with a narrow alley allowing way for emergency vehicles to enter. Across the street from it, he and Zoro gaped up at it with awestruck expressions. It seemed like a bright beacon of light against the shadowy surrounding of the buildings around them – the area unnaturally dark, as if night had suddenly crossed their paths. The air felt cold and stifling, and it was a weird feeling for both of them to understand.
A name, a name, Sanji thought with determination. "The little boy's name…"
Zoro glanced at him from the side of his eye. "Why do you keep saying that?"
"If I don't, I feel like I'll forget," Sanji said.
It occurred to Zoro that this was so – he felt like forgetting was easy to do. "A boy's name," he repeated softly. They then looked at each other, inhaling and exhaling at the same time.
"You smell?" Sanji asked low, unsure why his voice had to be quieted.
Zoro lifted an arm to sniff himself. "I smell good."
Sanji rolled his eyes. "I meant, idiot, do you smell that?"
Zoro lifted his chin to inhale again, wincing. Sanji realized he might not be able to smell anything at all – his nose was missing. But Zoro said, "Yeah…it's like…rot. Like…trash left out in the sun. Fish guts left on the beach."
"Yeah...I guess."
After their initial observation, the pair grew aware that there was more to the building than just the structures – their gazes fell towards the moving mob of people milling in directionless action around the entire building, like a dark cloud of fish in a fluttering course without interruption. The voices that emerged from the horde were loud; wails consistent with mad laughter and shouts that could have been extra city noise – but there was a sense of understanding that not all of these people were the living. The living passed through them without interruption but wore uneasy expressions.
Zoro placed a hand on his gut with a troubled expression, Sanji holding his lips tight as he observed the mob with uncertainty on his features. It felt as if they were looking at a moving wall without a gate in sight. Some of these ghosts walked over each other; some tripped and were trampled harmlessly – Sanji caught sight of a woman pushing against another's wheelchair with her broken body, her own momentum giving the wheels action to move.
Sanji looked for a crosswalk – a habit – while Zoro started forward with his hands in his pockets, eyes locked on a woman that was sobbing noisily up against a fire hydrant. Seeing traffic pass through the Motorcycle Man, Sanji hurried after him with a sheepish expression.
"I forget we don't need to follow laws of physics anymore," he said awkwardly.
"It's because you're wearing pink. Any dork willingly wearing that stuff tends to be less advanced than others," Zoro replied haughtily, looking over the other ghost's clothing. Sanji snarled at him.
"Back in my day, I was a stud!"
"For what, My Little Pony?"
As they approached the crying woman, they were horrified to realize the item she cradled against herself was stained blankets, the shape within clutched hard with equally stained arms. She caught sight of them, her swollen eyes revealing blackened orbs and burst blood vessels around her cheeks.
"Help us," she whispered thickly, clutching the bundle tightly. "Help us! It won't come out! It won't come out!"
"S-sorry," Zoro said hastily, deciding to avoid her while Sanji looked on with horror. "Can't speak the same language as you."
They walked past her hastily, nearing the moving mob with apprehension – some were holding shaking hands and blood stained cloth against holes in their bodies; some stared blankly ahead of them, teetering over some edge with uncontrollable shakes and hacking coughs. Their clothing varied from era to era.
Both of them awkwardly began to enter into the mob, shuffling past those wailing noisily with pain, skirting away from those that were dropping innards and fluids from opened orifices. Zoro pushed through ghostly bodies, some of them startled by their appearance. Sanji found himself losing sight of Zoro, so he reached out and grabbed hold of his flannel.
"Don't you dare leave me behind! You might end up in Canada!" Sanji snapped after him.
"Hold on tight, eighties dance queen," Zoro advised, muscling his way through some burn victims, "because only I can get us through this."
"Why only you?"
"Because I'm younger, and more advanced than you are."
Sanji rolled his eyes mightily, balling his fingers into Zoro's flannel despite himself. "I'm only letting you do all the dirty work for me, moron."
Those the pair interrupted mid-walk were shoved by those behind them. Their startled faces registered the area, the world they were working in. Expressions shifted with alarm, awareness dawning like drawing veils. Shouts began to build as ghosts reacted, unrest causing panicked reaction.
Those reaching out to respond physically to Zoro's rude pushing were shoved from those from behind, interrupting their gesture. Sanji felt fingers scraping against his pink sweater, and he reacted with an alarmed shout as it was eventually pulled from his shoulders. He smacked into Zoro, who was stumbling his way through the thickening center of the mob, climbing over persons in wheelchairs. All of their ghostly shouts of discovery, pain and anger filled the air with a different charge.
"Can't you be a little more polite?" Sanji snapped at him, flapping his flannel.
"I'm not from this country," Zoro tossed over his shoulder, wearing a devilish grin. "I don't know any better."
"Civility is universal, jack ass!"
"I'm sorry, can't understand you! And who says we belong in this universe?" Zoro added, shoving aside an elderly man and knocking aside a policeman, "We might belong to another one!"
The weight of those words affected Sanji. He ended up squeezing his eyes shut, repeating to himself, "Find the boy's name! Find the boy's name!"
As the mob's populace thickened the closer they drew to the hospital, Zoro began shoving those in front of him away to clear a path for them. Sanji half climbed onto his back as people started to move after them with reactive intent. Zoro stumbled under his weight, grabbing hold of a large man in lumberjack clothing and yanking himself back to his feet. The lumberjack looked at Zoro with surprise, half of his mouth missing as his chainsaw ruined arms lifted to push him back. Sanji was hit by bloodied nubs, causing him to shout as Zoro hastily continued forward.
They managed to stumble out from the mob, evading contact with wanderers that had yet to join up with the horde. Looking back once they had space to do so, the pair saw that their interruption had ghosts reacting to their unknown surroundings with horror and pain. But just as fast as it had happened, the mass continued moving in their never-ending flow, swallowing up the interruption without much of a change.
Once Zoro realized Sanji was clinging to him, he reached back and shoved him off his back with irritation. Sanji caught himself then scowled at the horde, his pink sweater gone forever. Zoro used a finger to poke at his shoulder pads, look of disgust crossing over his remaining features. Sanji kicked him in the shin with his Reeboks then looked up at the hospital.
There were people milling around the driveway and entrance, constantly interrupted by the living's valet services. Cars flowed through ghosts without interruption, the living marching resolutely on the sidewalk. Through the landscape was kept beautifully, the sense of darkness in the street seemed to keep everything in shadow around the building. It seemed as if it were permanently twilight here – in the middle of a day change that wouldn't let up.
The entrance to the hospital whispered with each movement of the door, and both of them looked at it with resolve. Zoro looked at Sanji, frowning.
"Just a name, right?" he asked.
"Yeah, that's pretty much it," Sanji said. "If he has a name, it'll make him feel better."
"But he's dead, so…"
"Knowing your name makes you feel better, right?"
"Yeah, but…if it looks like this out here, imagine what it could look like inside," Zoro said, looking up at the concrete overhang of the hospital. He read the name out loud. "'Heart of Peace City Hospital'. Wow. It was like someone couldn't decide on a name, and just threw them all together."
Sanji's mouth fell open, staring at the name emblazoned with stark lettering, unable to even remember the name of his city. He pulled out his wallet to look when Zoro started forward, so he abandoned that intention and followed after him.
They walked in through the lobby doors and were treated to a heavy silence and fog just inside the foyer. The silence was immense, thick and heavy; as if the concept was nothing but a permanent vacuum of emptiness. The living passed by them like gray blurs, their voices muffled. Shadows built and formed over doorways, stairs and elevators – but the lack of sound made the pair distinctively uncomfortable. Signs that should have led them in the right direction were missing – every wall was just a block of darkness without any indication of formation. There was only one doorway visible, pinpointed by a very thin shimmer of red light.
Zoro turned to look out the doors and realized that the fog had covered them. Directionless, he spun in a small circle, feeling panic start to rise up within him. Sanji twisted to look over his shoulder, frowned, and then headed for the red light. He reached back and grabbed Zoro's flannel as the man made to walk in the other direction.
"This way," he said, his voice surprisingly loud, echoing around them. Both of them looked around themselves with a start, positive that this wasn't a good thing. Neither of them could imagine why.
Sanji continued towards the red shimmer of light, focused on reaching it. Something seemed to shift in the distance, causing them both to pause. Neither of them were sure of what sort of sound it was. Hastily, Sanji continued towards the red light.
It turned out to be the control panel for the elevators. He pushed the Up indicator, the elevator doors sliding open with a wisp. The living stood there as grey blurs, outlined as shadowy bulks. It was only their tired, far-off voices that gave the pair the confidence to board with them. One of them leaned forward with an exasperated mutter to close the doors.
"It's always doing that," Zoro heard the man complain. "People need to make up their minds on where they want to go."
When the doors opened to reveal a bright hallway ringing with the comforting noise of a busy hospital corridor, Sanji decided to start here. Zoro followed after them, both of them standing near what looked like a nurses' station. It was vivid, here; the sounds around them, the light – almost exactly as what it was before they'd passed.
Paramedics passed through them with their occupied stretcher. The nurses were working at their computers with a doctor leaning over the counter with a disinterested look, listening to their conversation. Sanji looked around himself for the map of the hospital, sure he'd find something that would take him to the right floor.
"Let's find the right floor from here," he decided.
"What is up with the first floor?" Zoro asked him incredulously. "Did we just ascend from Hell?"
"You believe in that?"
The doctor looked over at them, then strode over with his hands sliding into his pockets. "Look at you. You're dripping your damn foreigner DNA everywhere."
Zoro froze, looking at him with bewilderment then looking around himself as Sanji turned at the sound of the doctor's words. The man was making direct eye contact with both of them, wearing what could only be described as a repulsed expression.
"Yes, I'm talking to you," the doctor told Zoro, eyes running over his injuries. "Gross."
"You – you…see me?" Zoro asked tentatively, Sanji looking at the doctor dumbly.
"I'm looking right at you, sir. What are you doing here? You're dead, you don't need our services here," the doctor said curtly.
Sputtering at a lack of an explanation, Zoro didn't know what to say. Sanji said quickly, "We found a boy. He said he came from here – we're just trying to find his name."
"Good luck with that, Sparkles," the doctor told him, returning his attention to Zoro then down at the puddle left behind. He shook his dark head while Sanji sputtered at the name he was given. "People will be tripping all over that."
As if on command, a nurse with a clipboard slipped between Zoro's legs and crashed to the floor, much to the delight of those standing at the station. Amidst the calls and sputters from the nurse, Zoro self-consciously stepped away from her, patting uselessly at his head.
"So, you came into the hospital to find out a kid's name, and being dead yourselves, what does it even matter?" the doctor asked them.
His features were drawn tight, tired, and there was no indication of how he'd died – his white overcoat hung loosely around a what looked like another jacket, a light yellow shirt and black trousers. His shoes were worn and scuffed, but his stethoscope was shiny. The nametag on his chest read 'Donquixote', tapping ever so slightly against pens and a worn notebook. "Guess you have all eternity to do that, but people normally don't force their way into the hospital."
"He looked like he died of some kinda illness," Sanji said, watching as a cleaning lady appeared, looking in their area with a puzzled expression. She took out the appropriate signs and mop, trying to catch the reflection of the liquid that caused the nurse to slip. With a befuddled shake of her head, she started to mop over the shiny floor anyway. "No hair, hospital gown – "
"Did you look at his ID band?" the doctor asked with irritation.
"He didn't have one," Sanji said, recalling the boy's appearance. "He said he finally found the door out and he didn't want to come back. But I thought once he had his name, he'd feel better."
"If he's one of us, he's dead, there's no point in 'feeling better'," the doctor said crankily. "He's feeling better because he's dead."
Impatiently, Sanji said, "Look, just – where do they keep people like him? He mentioned being taken off a machine, we just need to know what floor, and then we can find our way around if so."
The doctor suddenly turned his head and began walking away from them, but he also started speaking, which prompted Zoro and Sanji to follow after him to hear.
"Well, names are unimportant when you're gone, but he will need to come back if he wants to move on. I don't know how he slipped on by without any of us noticing, but if he died here, then he has a way out. He can move on, he doesn't have to wander like the rest of you mongrels down there in the street."
"Excuse us for dying in the streets like 'mongrels'!" Sanji snapped at him. "We didn't choose our deaths!"
"The weak usually don't," the doctor returned with an eye roll. He gave Sanji a look that reflected his revulsion. "Especially in pink."
He looked at Zoro with the same expression. "Or flannel."
The pair looked at each other with irritation as the doctor continued on.
"As you can see, it's pretty busy here," the doctor said, walking up to a room shut by a curtain. He walked through it, barging in on an older man clutching his chest painfully while his wife fretted over him. Looking him over, the doctor glanced at his vitals on the machine nearby, then looked at Sanji and Zoro. He pinched the oxygen pipes shut with one hand, the other moving over the man's nose. "People can slip by but once they're out those doors, they can't return. Therefore, they can't move on. They think that if they can escape the door they can continue living. But ghosts forget – they fall into a routine without any free thinking – they go for multiple lifetimes without remembering their name."
Sanji and Zoro watched as the man gulped for air, as the machine began to sound. Nurses hurried in as the woman started to sob, the man reaching out to claw at the air, trying his best to breathe. But the doctor continued holding his nose closed, the oxygen piping examined, hurriedly replaced by a nurse. When that was ripped out of his grip, the doctor closed the man's mouth with his hand. Horrified at what was happening before them, Sanji and Zoro were wordless as the dead doctor then grabbed firm hold of the man's shoulders and yanked as the team pushed the bed out, rushing to the surgical unit.
The man left behind blinked owlishly as the dead doctor suddenly reached out, jerking open a door to his left. Without much of an explanation or caring gesture, he kicked the surprised man into the doorway and slammed it shut. The emptiness left behind was thick and heavy, the wife's heavy sobbing filling the hallway moments later.
"He's much too old to waste time and resources here," the doctor then said with disgust, walking out from the room. Sanji and Zoro looked each other with matching expressions of horror, unsure of what happened. Hearing the man speak again, they forced themselves to move after him, watching as he looked over a man confined to a bed, under the influence of something that caused his limbs to jerk violently, his face crazed as his eyes darted about.
"And this stuff," the doctor said with that expression on his face, "anyone willing to inject themselves with a substance that kills shouldn't even have a chance. These ones are the worst. They don't remember how, what, why, and when they died, and forget that they were human in the first place. So they become ghouls. Anyone that met a violent and untimely end with hate to burn turns into a ghoul. Don't forget."
"'Ghoul'?" Sanji repeated vaguely while Zoro formed the word with his own mouth, wearing a frown.
"They're all over the place!" The doctor reached into the man's chest, and while the pair of men watched his hand disappear, the man began to cry out hoarsely. His struggles grew weak as his eyes widened, his face purpled. He started to shriek as the doctor then reached out with a booted foot and caught what looked like a worn, metal handle. Sanji was mystified as to where these doorways appeared from – there was no indication that they were even there in the first place. He watched as the latch caught onto the doctor's foot, and he kicked it open. This led down into a dark, somewhat ominous stairway that disappeared into nothing.
Unable to say a thing, they watched as the doctor yanked the man from the bed as his body began to spasm, machines ringing out noisily. In that moment, the man's body shifted from the living to something dark and spindly, releasing a ghostly howl that made them cringe. Its face turned into a blackened orb of leaking gas, mouth opened to reveal broken, discolored numbs of points that dripped with multi-colored oils. The doctor grunted as he managed to shove the creature into the doorway and slammed the door shut. As the room filled with nurses that didn't show the same eagerness as the earlier patient, the floor rung with heavy pounding.
The doctor caught his breath then left the room.
"They feed off saps like you," the doctor said, examining the clipboard of a sleeping woman, her hands over her lower belly while an exhausted man sat at her side with his smartphone in his lap. "They don't have any recognition as a human, so they attack the dead in a vain effort to gain the form they once had. You'll want to avoid them as best as you can – once they eat you, you either turn into one of them or you'll just cease to exist. Sounds pleasant, right? Ceasing to exist? But you won't have a chance to come back – you'll repeat their life. Seen it too many times in the living that come through here. I remember their faces."
"We've…never seen these guys outside," Sanji stuttered, looking at the woman with worry, watching as the doctor reached into her lower belly – when he removed his hand, there was a small form encased within. The doctor examined it with a frown. The formation was vaguely humanoid but it squeaked a very human sound while the woman reacted with a harsh cry, her fingers tightening over her abdomen. The doctor went ignored as nurses rushed in, calling for assistance. He then pushed his hand down back into the woman and gently redeposited the form. He reached out and patted her head with bloodstained hands and walked on.
"Of course not, because they gravitate back towards areas they once knew, where there's more to feed on. So if you weren't these types of guys when you died, then don't worry about it," the doctor continued on as equipment was rushed to the room they just vacated. Zoro looked behind himself apprehensively while Sanji was deathly pale, hand on his sunken stomach. "I've done my rounds here, we'll go up to the third floor. Either keep up and walk on your own."
"Er, Dr Donquxiote – "
"That's not my name," the doctor snapped at Sanji as he opened a door, revealing a very worn set of stairs – they were falling apart, concrete faded, the sound of some faraway wind touching them.
"That's what your tag says!" Sanji snapped back, hastily following after the doctor's longer stride as Zoro followed after him.
"I know what it says but it's not my name. I won't answer to it."
You child, you just did, Sanji thought shrewdly. His eyes dropped to the doctor's shoes as a force of his own habit, then noticed an important detail.
Sanji reached out and shoved aside his coat, much to the doctor's surprise. His pants were with a high waist with a yellow shirt tucked into them. Much like how men wore their clothes in old Westerns. Sanji then tapped the man's chest, jabbing at his shirt pocket with a snappish action.
"This is your name, isn't it?" he asked.
The doctor pulled his jacket lapel aside to reveal a stitched name on the pocket of his buttoned shirt. The action displayed a set of black suspenders that looked worn and weathered.
"There. It says 'Law'. Does that ring any bells?" Sanji asked, hands on his hips with a satisfied action.
Law wore a puzzled expression, his brow furrowing ever so slightly as he forced the material up so he could look it over for himself. He wore such a mystified expression that Zoro guessed this was how he looked when Sanji found his name, too.
"I'd…forgotten that. I haven't heard my name in…in a long time," Law said vaguely, fingertips smoothing over the tag.
Sanji tapped on his forehead, causing Law to scowl. "Law, see? Names are important, right?"
"I guess they are," Zoro commented, seeing how Law's expression changed as he fiddled with the tag stitched to his shirt. "Changed that attitude right quick."
"I'm always right," Sanji told Zoro smugly. He gave an arm pump. "Cheeuh!"
Zoro laughed noisily. "Hah! What a dork! No one says that!"
"But…it doesn't match this one," Law said faintly, touching the 'Donquxiote' tag on his white jacket. He shook his head, as if to clear his thoughts. "Anyway, it doesn't matter."
"I'm sure once you have your full name, your real name, you'd remember everything!" Sanji said with confidence as Law then opened a heavy wooden door and pushed it out, walking into a children's play room. There were kids playing there, but only one of them looked up to watch them pass by.
Law passed through a wall and headed to the right, emerging into the first room they came to. A teenager sat there, sipping apple juice from a canister while his mother fiddled with her cellphone. A younger child sat on the couch nearby, engrossed in his tablet. The teenager on the bed looked sleepy as Law walked to his bedside.
"What are you doing?" Zoro finally asked, finding his voice. "You just go from room to room – what, taking lives?"
"This is a small hospital, there isn't much room for occupation, so I clean them out," Law told him, reaching out to touch the teen's chest. He withdrew a pulpy mass that caused the teen to slump back into his pillow, struggling for breath. Sanji fretted as the mother didn't react, too engrossed with her phone to notice that her child was under distress.
"Small?" Zoro repeated. "Sanji said this place grew since he was here!"
"Back in the eighties," Sanji said, watching as the teen struggled to breathe. Law seemed to pinch and pull the mass apart until he replaced it back into the teen's chest, the boy sucking in a harsh breath. The mother finally lifted her head and reacted with a start.
"Remind me to come back here," Law told the pair as he crossed through the wall and into another where two other patients were sitting. "The 'eighties'?"
Sanji gave him a bewildered look. "That's when…I…well, I was alive at that time."
Law gave him an impatient look, reaching out to poke on Sanji's padded shoulders. His nose wrinkled with disgust. "I only asked what century, moron. I didn't ask for some shitty backstory – anybody that died wearing what you've got on shouldn't be allowed a backstory."
Aghast that someone would speak to him in this manner, Sanji gaped up at him. Zoro looked at the blond with delight as Law approached the elderly woman lying on the bed. He looked her over with suspicion as Sanji glared at Zoro.
"We're here for a name," Zoro reminded them sternly as Law reached into the woman's chest to clench down heavily. Her body jolted then relaxed onto her bed, the machines sounding off. The doctor then reached out and opened a door, yanking harshly on her arm. Her ghost uttered a surprised noise upon seeing him, then turned to look over her abandoned body. Before she could say anything, Law pushed her confused spirit in and slammed the door shut.
"I hate when they try to act surprised," Law muttered bitterly, wiping his hands together. "Like they didn't know what would happen after how they treated themselves."
"A name, right," Sanji muttered, blinking frantically. "For the boy. We found a boy. We're trying to find his name."
"You can make your way to medical records on level four," Law told them. "Good luck with that."
"There are two towers, so is it on this one or the next?" Sanji then asked, watching Law as he looked over the young male patient across from the elderly woman, who was lowering his magazine with a puzzled look towards his companion.
"I know nothing about that," Law said with irritation, using his hand to pry the other patient's head upon from the top, the man stilling with a sudden jerk upward. He began to seize, his body jolting as Law examined his very visible brain while Sanji and Zoro stood nearby, horrified.
"Not this one! Not this one!" a man cried out, running into the room with an armful of paper held against his chest. Law pulled away from the younger patient to look at him, Sanji and Zoro surprised by the interaction. This new ghost wore outdated clothing – a bowtie in place over a stiffly starched shirt and sharply creased blue pants. "He's got a procedure coming up - !"
"The tumor is growing, why is it taking so long to treat him?" Law asked impatiently. This one wore a penguin shaped hat, shuffling through his papers with a rush before finding the right one to thrust at him. Law examined it, then gave it back. "No insurance."
"Modern times, sir," the other man said wheezily.
"Two days max before I perform my own operation."
"Right!"
After the man's leave, Law crossed through the wall and emerged into the next room, Sanji following after a concerned look at the younger man on the bed. Zoro hastily followed before he could lose sight of either one.
"The name," Sanji repeated stiffly, watching as Law bent over a toddler sleeping in her bed. A sniffling woman laid next to her, combing through her brown curls with trembling fingers. "We just need to find the name."
"Bring him back here," Law told him, observing the pair on the bed. "He needs to move on. If you're cognizant with this task, then you may do that. It seemed easy for you guys to come in, it may be easier just doing that."
"But he doesn't want to come back," Sanji repeated with irritation. "He mentioned how hard it was to get out in the first place."
"Just bring him back," Law snapped at him, reaching down to pick the girl up. The separation was easy, and he opened the door to his right with both Sanji and Zoro looking on with horror as the mother reacted with a panic to her daughter's sudden stillness. The girl in the doctor's arms looked sleepily at them as he then gently handed her off to a pair of ghostly arms that reached for her. After shutting it he continued on, the mother howling for help. Unable to move, the pair of ghosts watched as the room filled with activity.
"If someone doesn't want to be helped, you can't help them!" they heard Law state from the other room.
Forcing themselves to move, the pair shuffled through the wall to find the doctor looking down at a woman with disgust as she patiently fed her husband some broth. He reached inside of her, withdrawing a pulpy mass from her chest. His fingers tightened as the woman hunched over suddenly, dropping the broth over her husband's lap. He looked at her with surprise, sputtering soup from his mouth as she struggled to breathe. Horrified, Sanji watched as Law crushed the mass in his hands and tossed it away, walking out the door.
The sounds of activity followed after them as Law walked down the hall, withdrawing his notebook and a pen.
"What the hell was that? She wasn't a patient!" Sanji growled after him.
"She was deliberately poisoning her husband," Law told him. "Not only can I tell when a patient is at death's door, I can read the souls of others around them. Only here can I render aid."
"'Aid?!" Sanji exclaimed skeptically. "You're tossing people through doors without giving them any chance to know where they're going!"
"You're irritating and I can't concentrate," Law said, scratching a line in his notebook and putting that away. "It's not my job to explain what I do. It's mine to clear room for more."
"So, you're like…an angel?" Zoro asked while Sanji sputtered angrily.
"No," Law snorted. He looked up then perked. "Oh. This is interesting. Look behind us."
Both of them turned, and were startled to see stiff mannequins standing in the hallway. Genderless, they had darkened shadows where their eyes should have been and gaping black holes for their mouths. Sanji and Zoro were so startled at their appearance that they drew together automatically as a sense of fear started to build up from within them. Law frowned at the rigid forms as a spine-tingling howl suddenly rang out from down in the emergency room below. The mannequins suddenly faced that direction.
"Those are monitors," Law said with a light gesture. "If a ghost does something out of line, they appear. I'm taking my rounds elsewhere while they deal with this damned ghoul."
"Monitors? What do they do?" Sanji asked timidly as the inhuman sounds grew with force.
"They look like demons," Zoro muttered uncomfortably. "They make me uncomfortable. And that sound…is that a ghoul?"
"These are not like ghouls. They haven't caught up to me, so I don't know what they do but I don't want to be caught," Law answered, opening another door and revealing the same set of stairs they'd used earlier. "They can follow me all they want."
Because of the sightless way the monitors watched them, Sanji and Zoro hurriedly scurried after the doctor, ghostly hearts pounding with trepidation.
Emerging onto the fourth floor, Law sighed something that sounded like relief. All around him were the sounds of women in distress. Cries of newborns rang out. The atmosphere seemed so much cleaner here, the air surprisingly alive with fresh and pure oxygen. Sanji inhaled deeply. He felt lighter, as if a heavy weight was removed from his form. With the way Zoro breathed in, it was the same for him.
"You'll never find the name of your kid," Law told them, more relaxed as his gait slowed. But as he walked, monitors popped out from the natural shadows of the hall, silently watching him as they passed. Sanji and Zoro pressed closer together as the sound of crackling glass began to build up as they approached two of the creatures pulling away from the shadows of a food cart. "It's too big of a place. You should just ask the living to help you."
"They can't see us," Sanji told him impatiently, keeping his distance from the doctor in case those monitors suddenly reacted. Law watched them cautiously but passed between them without trouble – their heads followed his movement, watching silently. "No one can see us."
"Not everyone can," Law said, suddenly changing direction. "But there are some that do. They come through here, sometimes."
"Then…what? We just…find a living person and ask them for help?"
"Let them find you."
Sputtering with impatience, Sanji snapped, "If no one has seen us so far, then how is that even possible?"
"This is the longest conversation I had with another ghost," Law suddenly said, looking back at them with a curious expression. "Ones that have an active cognizance of their surroundings and limitations."
"You don't give anyone a chance!"
The sound of a nurse hitting the floor with a curse as she slipped caught their attention. Law looked at Zoro with irritation, reaching out and sliding a finger over the gaping wound that dripped continuously over his face. The wound hadn't been healed, but it stopped leaking. Zoro looked relieved.
Law flicked his hand out, muttering, "Gross."
"And you want to spend your afterlife helping other ghosts remember who they are? Why?" Law then asked Sanji with a bewildered expression.
"Just one," Sanji mumbled. "Remembering my name made me feel…not alive, I guess, but remembering who I was made me feel like I had some purpose. This guy, too."
"What about your routine?"
"I follow it, but…"
"What did this ghost mean to you?"
"Nothing. I guess…I don't know him, we're not…related…I just…once I had my name, I realized it was important for others to know theirs, too," Sanji said with some hesitation. "I just think once he has his name, he'll want to complete his task. And don't ask me about some white light! I never saw it!"
"Because you didn't even look. It's always there for those on the outside," Law told him impatiently.
"You died here, right? Why didn't you go?" Zoro asked.
Law shrugged a shoulder, wearing a slightly puzzled expression.
"Then it must've been sudden because it took you awhile to realize you were dead," Zoro said.
"No," Law denied, looking down at his stitched nametag, moving his lapels to do so. With a thoughtful expression, he said, "I died here, yes, but…for some reason, I don't remember how. Details are gone."
"Without your name, you can't think beyond your routine! You think this is it, you're set, why deviate from it?" Sanji insisted. " I don't know how you died, you said that's not your name on your tag – don't you think about leaving here? Who appointed you ghost killer? How do you know all this stuff you're telling us? Did someone talk to you, too?"
"I'm not killing anybody, I'm moving them out of the way so there could be more to take their spot." After a pause, Law then said, "I don't know who taught me this, I just know it."
"Then where do those doors lead?"
"Every soul I take has an arrow on their forehead. One pointing up, one pointing down. Those doors open to those places."
"So…there's a heaven and a hell after all?" Zoro asked with a bewildered expression.
"I don't know," Law said impatiently. "I just open them and toss. I haven't met a god, or an angel or demon – just mutations of a soul. I don't stand around questioning my existence or mourn my death – however I died! I just follow my routine and clean out my route and repeat. I've never had to question it!"
"Because you don't have your name," Sanji insisted. "Once I found mine – "
He trailed off as Law left him, striding into the room they'd been paused outside of. He walked straight to the woman on the bed, reached inside of her, and held the still baby in his arms. He looked the child over, Sanji falling silent from his argument as he watched from the doorway. Zoro waited outside the room, the woman on the bed breathing heavily as her family paced with excited faces and words. The living continued on around them without pause – walking around Law as he examined the baby in his arms. The child shifted to look at him, his tiny mouth forming a smile.
For a brief moment, Law smiled back before he opened the door and handed the child to a set of waiting arms. He closed it and stilled for a few moments as the equipment started to ring out.
The room filled with activity as panic began to rise, and Law looked troubled. He gave a vague nod and let go of the handle, the door disappearing as soon as he did. Leaving the room, he paused again, seemingly unsettled.
"It's important," Sanji insisted quietly. "Our names. You see it now, right? Why are you doing this? You're supposed to move on, but why are you the one making everyone leave? You say you never ran into an angel or demon or met God, but why are you the one doing this? You haven't talked to other ghosts asides from those ones, so do you even know what era you're from?"
Law struggled to think. He looked down at his name tag, then seemed to step aside as family was ushered out from the room. Happy faces turned to dread, and the woman started screaming out painfully before a door was shut. Tapping his name tag, Law looked down the hall at the monitors that were still watching them, closer than before.
Sanji indicated the notepad in Law's pocket. "What's that? Records? Have you really looked at that thing?"
Law fumbled with it as he withdrew it, opening it. On his tiptoes, Sanji could see that the pages were blank, and Law looked startled as he flipped page after page to see this. The monitors shifted, the sound of broken glass growing nearer. Seeing that the forms had moved since they'd looked away from them, the trio hurried on.
Once they were at a safe distance, Law found nothing in the notepad to give him any indication he had even been using it. Sanji snatched it away from him, Zoro looking over his shoulder as pages fluttered by with blank pages. But on the very back was a faint imprint of scratches – something had been written on the page before it – the missing page had left remains in the binding. It was too faint for either of them to make out what it had been.
Law snatched it back, shoved it back into his pocket. "None of this matters. I need to continue."
"We'll find your name, too!" Sanji decided, hands on his hips. Zoro frowned at him for the extra task. "Now - how do we get the attention of the living?"