(A/N: Feels like forever since I worked on this story or logged on here to work on any stories for that matter. My new job and life in general have been kicking my butt unfortunately. This is probably one of the less exciting chapters, but I hope you all enjoy it, nonetheless. And thank you so much to everyone who's supported this story. I'm always so happy to see new faves, follows, and reviews. I'm not the greatest writer out there, so it really brightens my day seeing you all enjoying Toffee's journey with the Straw Hats. ^_^)
The flight through the clouds had been arduous, and most of the crew was on the ground barely conscious or choking and trying to catch the breath that had been stolen from them.
Zoro was the first to speak, and he slightly wheezed out, "Damn...What happened?! Is everyone here?!"
"L-looks like everyone's okay..." Toffee coughed out. Her lungs still felt like they were on fire. That's why, considering everyone's weakened states, it amazed her Luffy was already up running around. No matter how much energy the teen usually had.
"Hey, guys! Look outside the ship!" Luffy exclaimed with excitement.
"What is this place?!" Sanji cried out, his lips parting. They were surrounded by an endless field of clouds.
"We're on the clouds?! How are we staying on them?!" Nami gasped out, running over to the railing and gripping tightly onto it.
"Of course you can stay on them! They're clouds!" Luffy replied in a matter of fact tone.
"No, you can't!" Zoro, Sanji, and Chopper all shouted out together, looking at their captain as if he had lost his mind.
"It's so beautiful up here! I wonder if this is what heaven must feel like?!" Toffee said with a small squeal, her eyes shining. Though the bright smile she wore grew more sheepish when she noticed Chopper having to perform CPR on Usopp. Seemed the Knock-Up-Stream had taken more out of him than it had the rest of them.
"I suppose it is possible we all died and did indeed ascend to the heavens," Robin chimed in with an easygoing smile.
"NOOOOOO! I'm too young to die! There's still so much I have to do!" Usopp, who had already been freaking out about the situation he had awoken to, began to panic even further, rolling back and forth on the ground.
Nami sighed and gave the sniper a blank expression. "This is obviously the sea of clouds we heard about. Although...the log pose is still pointing upward!"
"It seems we're in the middle section of the cumuloregalis clouds," Robin spoke up, having taken a seat on the side of the ship.
Chopper perched beside the raven-haired woman, looking concerned. "We need to go even higher. How?"
"That I don't know..." Robin confessed with a small shake of her head.
Toffee frowned. Did this mean they were stuck here? Well, she supposed there was no reason to be concerned. The others didn't look to upset. Usopp had even taken off his shirt and looked ready to dive into the clouds while Luffy and Chopper cheered him on.
"Hey, now! Don't be reckless! This ocean is still a mystery!" Sanji cautioned.
"An ocean's an ocean!" Usopp proclaimed, pulling down his goggles and diving right into the sea of white.
"Usopp's so lucky! If only I could swim, too!" Luffy complained when the sniper disappeared from their sight, hanging miserably over the railing.
"I bet it's so fun..." Chopper agreed with his own pout.
A few minutes went by, and Zoro looked around before bringing up, "Hey...He's not coming back up,"
"I was just wondering...Do you think the ocean has a bottom?" Robin voiced, a droplet of sweat trailing down her cheek.
"You don't mean..."
"Did that bastard fall from the clouds?!"
"USOPP?!"
"That moron! I tried to tell him!"
"I don't think you're helping by making a memorial for him already, Heartless-kun!"
Robin turned to a panicked Luffy, who had extended his arm, trying to get a feel for his friend. "Stretch your arm as far as you can!"
"But I can't see down there!" Luffy brought up tearfully.
"It's all right. Leave it to me!" Robin reassured, crossing her arms. "Ojos Fluer!" Closing her eyes, multiple ones sprouted out upon Luffy's arm. Robin soon caught sight of Usopp, who indeed was plummeting out of the clouds, though she quickly created multiple arms that extended and latched onto their reckless crew member.
Struggling to pull Usopp onto the ship, while this confused the other Straw Hats, it soon became clear why when multiple sea kings had latched onto the male for a ride and no doubt what they hoped to be an easy meal.
"It's nothing to be that scared of!" Zoro scoffed out when Nami and Chopper unleashed shrieks of fear, dashing forward and slicing at a giant octopus's tentacle. Sanji had taken down another sea monster, and the two of them were panting heavily where Zoro commented, "But it sure is hard to breathe here..."
"This is one strange creature...I'm not sure if it's a fish," Sanji voiced, placing his shoe on something that resembled more of a sea dragon.
"That octopus was like a balloon!" Luffy mused in awe since the creature had seemed to deflate like one.
"It's definitely an animal. It was moving," Zoro claimed with a shake of his head.
"I can't believe things live in the clouds...!" Nami exclaimed.
"Perhaps we should think of this as an ocean rather than clouds," Robin suggested.
Jumping lightly when Usopp abruptly woke up screaming, Toffee looked at her crew mate in concern. "What's the matter, Usopp?"
"My pants! There was something in 'em!" Usopp wailed out, pulling out a small fish and then falling back on the deck where he proceeded to mumble to himself.
"Ah! Don't hit him with that, Heartless-kun!" Chopper squeaked out. The shadow was clearly annoyed with the long-nosed male's antics and had caused Usopp to loudly yelp when he had slapped him straight in the face with the surprisingly still alive fish.
"These are skyfish. The odd fish described in Noland's logbook," Robin mentioned with a smile, taking the wiggling fish from Toffee's shadow. "They must have evolved to survive in this bottomless sky ocean..."
"So they turned all balloon-like and flat and stuff?" Zoro inquired, crossing his arms over his chest.
"To be even lighter. The buoyancy here is weaker than in the oceans below," Robin replied, chuckling lightly when Luffy took the fish from her and started to run around with it.
"They have scales like feathers and weird carnivore-like mouths!" Nami spoke with a frown. Seeing that Sanji had cooked the fish while Luffy was happily eating away, she growled out, "We're still investigating it! What're you guys thinking?!"
A small bead of sweat trailed down Toffee's head when Nami had snatched a piece of the sauteed fish off Luffy's plate, gushing about how delicious it was, and she shook her head with a tired smile before walking over to Chopper, who was looking through a pair of binoculars.
"See anything interesting, Chopper-kun?"
"I'm looking for Sky Island!" the little reindeer chirped out. "Ooh, ooh! I see a ship! ...And there's a person out there? AHH! THE SHIP WAS DESTROYED!"
"What do you mean?" Toffee asked, helping Chopper up when his panicked form toppled off from where he sat.
"Th-there's a bull! And it's running straight here!" Chopper shrieked out.
"You're not making sense! Calm down!" Zoro lectured, pinching his temple when Chopper continued to babble.
"Oi! Someone's coming!" Sanji pointed out, getting on the defensive along with Zoro. This mysterious individual seemed to be rushing toward them, and if he had been the one to destroy a ship like Chopper had mentioned... "Hey! What do you want!"
"To eliminate you!"
The man, wearing a tribal looking mask with bull horns, ended up kicking Sanji away. The same happened to Zoro before he could draw his blades, and he had even managed to knock Luffy to the ground before the straw hatted male could react.
"He's fast!" Toffee gasped out. For once it was her shadow who had impacted with the floor. Heartless had tried to slash at the male, only for him to easily dodge the creature's attack. The masked assailant had then distanced himself from the vessel, pointing a bazooka of all things, directly at them.
Just when it seemed like the Going Merry was about to be shot, an older masculine voice declared, "That is far enough!" and a figure came charging at the masked man, hitting him with a javelin and sending the Straw Hats attacker falling down into the clouds.
"What? Who is this now?!" Nami screeched out when the man, dressed in armor reminiscent of a knight, landed on the railing of their ship.
"I am the sky knight," the now known elderly male introduced calmly despite the looks of worry or distrust he received. Turning his back on the crew he gazed off into the distance. "He's gone..."
"What the heck is going on?! Who was that?!" Nami demanded, furrowing her brows at their supposed savior. She then turned to look at Luffy, Zoro, Sanji, and Heartless with a scowl. "And what's with you guys?! You're pathetic, losing four against one!"
Toffee went to help up her red-faced shadow with a small smile. "You can't be angry with them too much, Nami-chan. With the different air pressure here, it would make it difficult to fight against an opponent who's used to it..."
"Even so..." Nami sighed out, placing her hands on her hips while watching Chopper thank and bow before the older man.
"I had no choice. This one is on the house...Tell me, are you Blue Sea people?"
"Blue sea people? What's that? Oh, yeah! Who are you?!" Nami questioned considering the guy had started to head up onto the upper deck.
"I am the sky knight" he repeated, not seeming inclined to give his real name. "Blue sea people is the term for those who live beneath the clouds. In other words, did you come up here from the blue seas?"
"Yeah! That's right!" Luffy answered, continuing to lay sprawled out on the lower deck.
"Then that explains it. This is the White Sea, 7000 meters in the air," the sky knight explained. "The White-White Sea even further above reaches 10,000 meters high. Ordinary Blue Sea people can't possibly endure it here."
Sitting up, Luffy hit at his chest. "Alright! I've gotten used to it!"
"Yeah. I feel much better now," Zoro joined in after taking a deep inhale of breath.
The sky knight looked at the three teens incredulously, and he gave a dismissive wave of his hand. "No, no, no! That is not possible!"
"Anyway, why was that guy speeding on top of the clouds?!" Chopper brought up. The white bearded male had started to mutter to himself.
"Now, now. Hold on. I'm sure you have many questions, but let's talk business first. I am a freelance soldier-for-hire. These seas are fraught with danger. If you don't know how to fight in the sky, guerrillas like that one will come after you and turn you into food for the skyfish. For a 5,000,000 Extol One Whistle, I will help you."
"What're you talking about, old guy?" Luffy asked, tilting his head in confusion.
"What?! That is quite cheap! I won't lower it a single Extol more! I need to earn a living too, you know!"
"What in the world is 'Extol'? And what's this 'whistle' or whatever?" Sanji muttered. The man wasn't making a lick of sense.
"You came here via the summit of High-West, did you not?" the sky knight inquired, eyes wide. "Then you must have passed an island or two."
"Wait! You mean there are other ways of coming to this sky ocean?!" Nami cried out in shock. "And an island or two, does that mean that there are lots of sky islands?!"
"Don't tell me you came here via the..."
"We rode the Knock-Up-Stream," Robin mentioned before the knight could finish his sentence.
"My word! That monstrous current?! So there still are people gutsy enough for that..."
"It wasn't a normal route after all...!" Nami sobbed out, tears pouring down her face. Her misery quickly evaporated, and she launched at Luffy, violently shaking him. "We could've died, you know! We could've done it more safely if we had gathered more information!"
"C-come on, Nami. We all made it here safely. That's all that matters, right?" Toffee brought up awkwardly. Though when Nami turned to her with a rather demonic gaze, Toffee squeaked and held Heartless in front of her face. "H-here. Let Heartless-kun's cuteness calm you down."
"There's nothing cute about him!" Nami snapped despite the shadow giving her a puppy dog expression.
"Yes. You should be grateful you're all still alive. That might not have been the case if you had taken another route," the sky knight brought up, surprising everyone. "100 people head into the sky, a few arrive, and someone survives. That is the gamble. But with the Knock-Up-Stream, everyone dies, or everyone arrives. That's it. Not all can make that all-or-nothing bet, especially these days. I now see that you are capable navigators with courage and skill."
Usopp gave a proud look as he shot up from where he had been laid out for the longest time. "Yes, I must admit it was only because I was here! While these guys were on their knees crying and giving up on life, I told them 'I will navigate us'-" His bragging was instantly cut off by Nami harshly pinching his cheek.
Extending out his hand covered by plated mail, the sky knight displayed a whistle. "One blow of this One Whistle...and I shall come to your aid! Normally, I would charge five million Extol, but I will give you the One Whistle as a present!"
"Wait! We still don't know your name!" Nami shouted out.
"I am Gan Fall, the Sky Knight! And this is my partner, Pierre!" A pink and purple spotted mid-size bird gave a large squawk of greeting. "I forgot to mention it, but my partner, Pierre...is a bird that ate the Horse-Horse fruit and gained its powers. In short, he becomes a horse with wings! Namely..."
"No way! Wow! A Pegasus!" Nami squealed out in delight. Only for hers and everyone else's features to fall flat from seeing the rather underwhelming bird-horses actual transformation.
Gan Fall bearing his farewells, Sanji couldn't help but mumble out after the old man had disappeared on his 'mighty stead', "That was a weird thing it turned into...
"Was there even a reason for it to transform?" Nami murmured skeptically.
"Good question..."
Robin let out a small hum. "In the end, he didn't tell us anything,"
"I wonder how we're supposed to get higher up...?" Toffee whispered while looking skywards.
"We'll just call that old guy and ask!" Luffy said cheerfully, bending to pick up the whistle. This led to his face being harshly stretched out by Nami and Usopp who reminded him it was only to be used in emergencies.
"For now, let's take our ship somewhere," Zoro suggested. When Chopper told them to look in a certain direction, the green haired male rose a brow and glanced off into the distance as some of the others did the same.
"What could that be?" Robin pondered. "A waterfall?"
"Isn't that a weird cloud?" Chopper voiced nervously.
"Alright! It's decided! Let's check it out!" Zoro announced with a grin.
Making their way over to the unknown target, the Straw Hats only managed to get so far before their path was blocked by large and thick looking clouds.
"Those don't look like ordinary clouds, do they?" Toffee voiced with a small frown.
"Right. If they were, they'd keep moving forward..." Nami agreed, her expression troubled.
"Let's touch one and find out!" Luffy laughed out, winding up his arm as if he were about to pitch a baseball. "Gum-Gum Pistol!" The dark-haired male was shocked when his fist returned back to him. "It bounced off!" Letting out an excited cry, Luffy leaped onto the closest cloud. "Look! I'm on it! I'm not sinking! It's all fluffy, like cotton!"
"Now how does this work?" Nami wondered, feeling more disturbed than amused.
"It's mysterious..." Robin agreed. Though she gave a small smile when Chopper, Usopp, and even Toffee and her shadow had joined in jumping around on the clouds like a couple of kids.
Nami sighed at the five and mentioned dejectedly, "But this means the ship can't go through places filled with these...Hey! Find a route that the ship can take!" Twitching when Usopp called Luffy over, thinking they were still just playing around, the young navigator perked up when she heard something about a gate. "Did you say gate?"
"Yeah! There's a big gate under that waterfall thingy!" Luffy replied, hopping back onto the ship with the others.
"There are manmade objects in a place like this?" Sanji mused, finding that a little hard to believe.
"There could be anything in this ocean and it wouldn't be surprising..." Robin stated.
"We'll find out what it is after we get through here!" Luffy proclaimed, their ship having to take numerous twists and turns to bypass the thicker clouds.
After a bit of bickering on what turns to take, Nami blinked when realizing the clouds were parting. "Alright! Looks like we're through! The waterfall-like cloud really was a waterfall!"
"What a grand looking gate..." Toffee said softly in amazement. It looked like a star, or maybe it was supposed to resemble lightning bolts more? But the title really stood out being called 'Heaven's Gate'. She just wasn't certain if it was just an elegant title or something they should be more concerned about.
Squinting his eyes, Usopp gasped and pointed forward. "Look! Over there! Someone's coming out!"
There was a walkway and multiple doors upon the center of the gate, and a rather short older woman emerged from one, snapping pictures of the crew. What stood out the most about her were the wings on her back.
"It's an angel! Is that what angels are like?!" Luffy gawked, his face having turned a little blue. "She's like a pickled plum!"
"If she really is an angel, I don't think you should insult her like that," Toffee told Luffy with small a laugh. "Um, ma'am..."
"I am Amazon. The Heaven's Gate inspector. Sightseeing? Or perhaps war?"
"I-I guess it's kind of like sightseeing..." Nami answered a bit meekly. Why were those the only two choices?
"We wanna go to the sky islands!" Luffy added in his usual excitable tone. "They're past this gate, right?"
"What do you mean by 'war'?" Zoro questioned, narrowing his eyes at the odd lady.
"It doesn't matter either way," the woman said rather ominously in her raspy voice. "If you're going to the upper area, pay the entrance fee of one billion Extol per person. That is the law."
"O-one billion?!" Usopp squawked, almost falling backwards.
"There's that 'Extol' stuff again..." Sanji grumbled, shoving his hands into his pockets.
"Whatever it is, one billion sounds really expensive!" Chopper said with a frown.
"One billion per person...Eight billion for eight people..." Robin chimed in quietly.
Toffee frowned at this, a sudden thought hitting her, and she rushed off to gather up the treasure she had taken from Bellamy. "I'm not certain if this is the same as Extol, but would this be enough for us to get through?"
The old woman eyed the three medium sized treasure chests. "That would be enough for only one of you."
Usopp grew indifferent. "Are you serious? All that treasure, and only one of us can get in! I'm starting to think this old lady's trying to scam-"
Slamming her hand over Usopp's mouth, Nami quickly spoke up, "U-umm, so about the money...If we don't have enough, what does that mean for us?"
"You can pass. Or you don't have to pass. I am neither a gatekeeper nor a guard. I simply ask your intentions." Amazon explained, much to the pirate's alarm.
I'm not sure why, but something about this sounds suspicious...Papa and Theo always said if something's too good to be true, then it usually means it is and there's dire consequences around the horizon Toffee thought.
The gray-haired woman was snapped out of her worries when two large pincers latched onto the side of the ship, that belonged to a lobster of all things, and it was soon carrying the Going Merry toward the waterfall at a startling pace. It reminded Toffee of a twirling toy she used to have the way the pathway twisted about. This was just a lot more fun than the toy had been, even with the fear of possibly falling off the vessel.
"There's the exit!" Chopper cheered once they got closer to the end of the winding route. "There's something written!"
"Godland...God's Land, Skypiea?!" Robin read out, a little startled by those words.
"It's not an exit...It's an entrance!" Luffy announced with a wide smile. The ship landing with a crash after the Express Lobster tossed them aside, Luffy brightened even more at what laid before them. "An island! It's a sky island!"
How beautiful! It looks like a little slice of paradise Toffee thought in wonder. Through the clouds that surrounded the island, she could make out large vines that towered upwards, going even higher into the sky, and what looked like perhaps a jungle. And from what she could make out of the houses from this distance, they looked almost similar to palaces in a way. Even if that man attacked us earlier, I might just be worrying for nothing...A place that looks serene like this couldn't possibly be all that dangerous.