Cross-Brain AN: Just for the record, here's a key for the transitions in this chapter, and all future chapters:
-o- = Scene Change
~o~ = Entering/Exiting Flashback
Two hours of revelations, planning, and preparation later, we found ourselves standing on the main deck of the Sunny, circling the barrel we had picked up before we entered the Triangle. I looked around at the crew, and my mouth turned up into a smirk. "So, who wants the honours?"
Several of the crew looked positively eager to crack it open; Luffy, in particular, looked to be a second away from ripping off the top. Then someone spoke.
"If I may?"
All eyes turned to Brook, his bony fingers clenched white-knuckled around his cane—not in fear, not with his expression, but in grim determination.
Even so…
"You sure about that, Brook?" I clarified. "I mean, the last time you did this—!"
"The first time I was presented with such a barrel," Brook interrupted me, his entire being devoid of emotion. "I went through a whirlwind of hope and despair that ultimately left me in a state worse off than my first forty-five years in this hell of fog and terrors. And now, five years later, you present me with another such barrel. And now that I have it before me, in all that it implies…"
In a flash, he was looming over the barrel, his fleshless digits digging into the wood.
"Now I feel more than I have in the past fifty years combined," he all but growled out. "Hope is there, yes, burning bright, along with elation, rage, anticipation, even fear, but above all else? I feel vindication. Because now, after having been violated so many years ago, after failing because of my own weakness, you have given me the opportunity I have longed for. You have given me the opportunity to take it all back. To take back everything that has been stolen from me…"
Brook wrenched his arms up, ripping the top off the barrel.
"WITH MY OWN TWO HANDS!" he roared to the world.
Not even a second later, the flare held within was loosed and roared into the heavens, burning a gaping hole in the mist.
"Alea jacta est…" Donny muttered grimly.
"Eh, that doesn't really make sense," Luffy said, digging his pinkie up his nostril. "'Cause we're not betting anything. We're going to win."
"…OK, I'd expect that kind of confidence from you," an unnerved Vivi said. "But since when do you know Latin?!"
"Eh, that's all I know; I remember Benn saying that every time they played a dice game," Luffy said, still picking his nose.
"Shanks' first mate," I tossed out in response to everyone's confused looks, which got 'ah's of understanding. "Still, there's no denying it: you've gotten a lot smarter, Captain."
"Shishishi! Thanks!" Luffy grinned ear-to-ear before tilting his head to the side. "So, now we just… wait?"
"Not that long, captain," Brook grimly answered, his cane briefly spinning before he grabbed the head and planted the tip in the ground. Brief nervous tic aside, he looked ready to go, thanks in no small part to Nami's surprisingly adept needlework restoring his once-tattered suit to its full glory. "Moria is an insatiable demon. None is safe from his greed and gluttony; he will fall upon any new shadows that enter the Triangle with the utmost swiftness. Of that, you can be completely certain."
And damn if Brook wasn't right. I suppose that if any credit were due to the Undead Island, it would be to their sharp awareness and strong work ethic. Because not even fifteen minutes after we unleashed that artificial star, a shadow loomed on the horizon, steadily approaching us with the details slowly becoming more distinct in the haze.
I swallowed heavily as I watched the largest moving object I'd ever seen approach us. An uneasy feeling started to rumble in my stomach as our objective, our opponent, loomed over us, but I snapped my hands into trembling fists and set my jaw in a scowl, burning determination reducing that fear to ash.
Any fear I held came from my knowledge of the past. Before, Thriller Bark had been one of the closest near misses in Straw Hat history, their victory and their very lives coming down to the wire.
Before, the Straw Hats had stumbled into this hell of darkness and trickery without a clue to what awaited them. Before, the Mysterious Four had held all the cards and were able to run circles around the Straw Hats before they knew what was what.
But this… this wasn't before. This was now.
This was here and now, with a Straw Hat crew that included me and so many others. Now, the Straw Hat crew was stronger than they'd ever been. Now was a Straw Hat crew that knew precisely what lay before them, in excruciating detail, and knew how to beat every trick and trap that Moria and his cadre could send at them.
Now… now was a Straw Hat crew with a plan.
~o~
-Two Hours Earlier-
After my dramatic announcement, we proceeded with a brief round of introductions and explanations, including how I knew all that I did. Brook took it rather well.
"Yohohohoho! That's one of the most outrageous stories I've ever heard!" Brook laughed. He then seemed to smile. "And it's one that I'm perfectly prepared to believe. I see that the rest of the crew already believes you, and you already know so much that you shouldn't. Besides, why should I doubt when I'm the living proof of how little the word 'impossible' applies in the Grand Line?"
"Good," I nodded. "That saves some time explaining things. Now, let's get down to business. Brook, start spilling your guts on Thriller Bark."
"Oh, wait!" Soundbite cackled, and I grinned alongside him as I pointed at the musician.
"You don't have guts!" we chorused.
"YOHOHOHOHO! SKULL JOKE!" Brook cackled, clapping his hands.
"Skull joke!" echoed the Kiddy Trio and TDWS.
"Really, Cross?" Nami groaned, slapping a hand to her forehead, a motion most of the crew imitated, though I was gratified to see Robin hiding her giggles behind her downturned hat.
"Oh, come off it, Nami! This?" I pointed at Brook. "This bony bastard's jokes are golden. You should try it sometime! No, wait, lemme guess." I smirked as I then pointed at her. "Over your dead body, right?"
"Right," Nami nodded in agreement. "Over my dead—!"
THWACK!
"HOOF!" I wheezed around the cloud-fist that had rammed itself into my gut.
"You done?" she asked dryly, her foot tapping on the deck.
I raised a shaky thumbs-up. "Just about…"
"Good," Zoro said in a bored tone. "Now, can we get back to this Thriller Bark place?"
"Mrph…" I grunted as I righted myself. "Brook, all yours."
"Ah, yes, yes, of course," Brook nodded in agreement, adjusting his collar slightly before standing up straight. "I believe I should start with the most pressing issue at hand. As you'll recall, when I joined the crew earlier, I said I could not yet leave the Florian Triangle. Trust me when I say that this decision is not one I make of my own free will." His empty sockets somehow gained a far-off, wistful look. "Oh… to but see the sun shining once more…"
He then shook his head with a scowl. "But. That is not possible. For you see, I am missing an intrinsic—!"
"Necessary," I informed a confused Luffy.
"—part of my being." He shot a glance at me. "Do you have a candle or—?"
"Funkfreed." I looked over at my sword. "Your blade is still pristine from when I polished it earlier today, right?"
"Uh…" the elephant-blade blinked in confusion. "Pretty much, yeah. Why?"
"Hang it behind Brook's head, and you'll see."
"If… you say so?" Funkfreed complied, going half-and-half and positioning his nose above and behind Brook's skull, taking care not to touch his afro.
There was a moment of non-understanding from the crew, until Conis snapped her hands to her mouth with a gasp.
"B-Brook, you don't have a reflection!" she gasped.
The skeleton nodded solemnly, raising his cane up, inching out his blade and staring at the blank metal with sorrow. "Nor do I appear in any photographs taken of me. But both of these supernatural phenomena are mere symptoms of my greater and far more deadly affliction. An affliction that can kill me as dead as dust, in spite of already being so dead for many years."
Nobody even tried to laugh at that.
Brook slammed his cane shut and looked up, slowly sweeping his gaze over the crew. "I have no shadow."
A ripple of shock and, more importantly, confusion ran through the crew.
Brook sighed, crossed his arms behind his back, and started to pace across the lawn. "Allow me to start at the very beginning: As you all know by now, I've been trapped in the Florian Triangle for fifty years. The first forty-five of those were due to a broken rudder and a lack of resources with which to fix it. But then, five years ago…" He raised a trembling fist before him. "I stumbled onto an island…"
And so his story went, telling us the highlights of his experience upon Thriller Bark: the nature of the walking dead that inhabited it, the mechanics of the Shadow-Shadow Fruit, including the consequences of sunlight without a shadow, his defeat at the hands of his own shadow-possessed zombie…
When he finished, the crew's mood was mixed. Some were scared, some were revolted, a few were violently eager, and pretty much the whole lot of them were livid. But I wanted to push things just a wee bit further, and so I spoke up.
"Lemme give you all a little context about the wielder of the Shadow-Shadow Fruit," I announced. "The zombies on this island? All of them, every single one, has a number somewhere on their body. A serial number, to keep track of when they were produced. Granted, not all of the meat-puppet bodies are active at the same time; a lot are still in cold storage waiting for shadows, but the largest number I saw?" I scowled as I raised my left arm and pointed to my upper limb. "Was right here. And it read 900. And!" I spoke up as a wave of shock and rage washed over my friends. "Those are just the Zombies. There are still 100 more assorted shadows trapped on that island, including however many more I didn't see from my admittedly limited perspective. So, in all? Over one thousand people around the world don't have shadows. One thousand people haven't seen the sun in years. One thousand people… condemned to fear and darkness."
The waves of palpable outrage radiating from my friends were impressive, yes, but hell if I wasn't gonna try and top it.
"And it. Gets. Worse," I chuckled darkly.
And now, more shock than actual anger.
"How?" Vivi demanded incredulously.
"Simple." I crossed my arms behind my head in a faux-innocent gesture. "When the shadows were released in the story, we got a few flashes of their owners regaining them." My expression turned thunderous. "One of those owners was a maid. A civilian maid."
I practically heard my blood sing when I felt death itself appear before me again. Oh, yeah, now they all wanted blood.
"Why," Boss snarled murderously, pulping his cigar between his 'fingers.' "Have the Marines not terminated this bastard yet?"
"Because the user of the Shadow-Shadow Fruit is one Gecko Moria." I let that sink in with those of us who were in the know before raising my finger to give that one last crumb. "Once worth ฿320,000,000."
The penny dropped with everyone else, but it was Luffy who really got the message, his face darkening further as he slammed his fist into his palm.
"Warlord," he snarled.
"Mmhmm," I nodded solemnly. "Which makes the presence of even Marine shadows in his repertoire all the more damning. Pirate, civilian, Government… it doesn't matter who you are or where you're from, Thriller Bark is an equal-opportunity hellhole. And the World Government is perfectly content to let him go about his business, so long as his primary prey of choice is pirates." I swept my gaze over my friends. "Everyone nice and pissed off now?"
Luffy snorted menacingly in response. "We were pissed off enough when he only took one of our friends' shadows, Cross. Now?" Luffy reached over his back and slammed his newly forged and thoroughly reinforced pipe on the deck. "Now we're gonna make that Gecko bastard pay."
"Dearly," concurred several of the crew.
I slowly nodded, smirking. "That's exactly what I wanted to hear. Alright, gimme a bit, and I'll outline the new and improved plan of attack I've come up with, but while I'm doing that… Usopp, Sanji, Chopper?"
"Prepare for sodium chloride warfare," Chopper nodded as he plopped down on the grass and started digging a field-lab from his bag.
"Start making Salt Stars," Usopp muttered as he went off to fetch a mortar and pestle.
"Salt-filled lunches to go," Sanji conceded. "I don't approve of using food as a weapon, but if a riceball could literally mean the difference between life and death…" He shook his head with a smoke-filled sigh as he walked towards the pavilion. "Well, I suppose someone'll be eating them either way."
I watched the sniper and cook walk away before a slight nudging at the side of my neck snagged my attention, and I glanced at my colleague, who had a cocked eyestalk.
"Just… wondering, but we are staying OUT OF THE ACTION THIS TIME, RIGHT?" Soundbite asked nervously.
I cocked my eyebrow at that. "What, you scared of a few zombies or something?"
"Mere walking dead? Pshaw! NOT ON YOUR LIFE!" Soundbite puffed out what little chest he had, then shrank in on himself. "It's the salt that has me pissing my shell…"
I started to open my mouth to reassure him, but then I shut it when I realized that the likes of Luffy were going to be flinging the stuff around as well, so… "Okay, justifiable paranoia right there. I'll get you some protection."
"Phew…" Soundbite sighed in relief before eyeing me curiously. "Still haven't answered MY QUESTION, THOUGH."
At that, I shot a smirk at the snail. "Well, where do you think we'll be, hmm?"
That got a smile from Soundbite that was all teeth. "RIGHT IN THE THICK OF IT! Just the way I damn well like it!"
I chuckled and held my fist up so that he could bump his eyes against my knuckles. "You damn well know it."
~o~
Soundbite gave a low whistle, most likely deliberately reverberating the noise to play along with the miniature suit of custom-made medieval armour he was clad in, his eyes peeking through his slightly raised visor. "STILL READY TO get into the thick of it?"
"Mrgrgh…" I grumbled beneath my breath in response as I watched our only escape route slide shut behind us.
To be perfectly honest? Up until we found ourselves looking at the island itself, I wasn't really worried at all. And it wasn't the island itself that changed that; we were strong enough and forearmed enough that I wasn't too worried. It wasn't the jaw-shaped gate that had just shut us off from the rest of the world, either; honestly, if you want to make a disembodied mouth intimidating, you don't give it square white teeth, you make them rotted or sharp, or at least add a few red stains.
No, no, the part that got me worrying?
It was when, mere seconds after entering the snare of Thriller Bark, one of our oldest and yet youngest crewmates suddenly dropped to her knees and clamped a hand over her mouth as she started dry-heaving.
"Merry!" I yelped, hastily running over and kneeling next to her and rubbing her coat-covered back. "Merry, what's wrong, what's—!?"
"Stillborn…"
"Eh?" I blinked in confusion. "Wha—?"
"This place…" Merry looked up with tears brimming in the corners of her eyes, her hand clamped firmly over her mouth. "It's… It's stillborn…"
"…bastard."
All eyes turned to look at Franky, who currently seemed to be doing his best impression of an angry Sanji, fire blazing in his eyes.
"It's not enough that he makes a mockery of life with all the people he curses and the zombies he makes," the cyborg snarled, his fists all but groaning from how tightly they were clenched. "But he curses his own ship, too?!"
"Wh-What awe you tawking about?" Carue asked nervously.
"This place…" Merry groaned in response, shuddering and spasming. "It's… not really a ship. The spirits of ships… t-they're born of the love and care a-and compassion of their crews… b-but this… this…" She shook her head miserably. "It started as a ship, I-it was supposed to be one, but… but once it was done, no one showed it any love. No one cared, no one… no one's seen it as a ship. An island, a hell… never a ship. And because of that, Thriller Bark… it… it…" Merry hunched over, letting out another gut-rattling wretch.
"Marine Battleships and some pirate ships…" Franky ground out, glaring daggers at the Jolly Roger-spangled sail that loomed on high through the mists. "Their ships can be stunted through lack of care, because their crews only see them as vessels of war or transportation or whatever. It's sad, but it's a fact of life, and they're still seen as ships. But whenever a ship this badly neglected ever came through Water 7…" Franky literally snorted a stream of fire. "Iceburg and I had our differences… but between us, we made sure that the bastards who did shit as heinous as this never did it again."
I frowned as I considered that. I had given thought to everything we'd do here except for the island itself; I thought we would just leave it abandoned as it was in the story. But with what Merry and Franky said…
"Alright, everyone, addendum to the plan: try to limit damage to the island proper and the parts that make it seaworthy, and we'll come up with something when the rest of this mess is over. But for the time being, they already know we're here. So, for starters…"
I clapped our brand-new musician on the back. "Brook, you're up."
"Gladly!" Brook nodded back before doffing his hat to the rest of the crew. "Well, my friends, I'm afraid I must be off! Fortune willing, we shall meet again on the other side! But for now!"
He leapt over the edge of the Sunny and, the moment he hit the top of the water, he shot off towards the dark island looming, blurred legs kicking up enough water for a motorboat and a cackle of "YOHOHOHOHOHOOO~!" trailing behind him.
I tried to keep my cool in place as my newest friend disappeared into the distance, but I couldn't help but start gnawing on my metal-encased thumb, which was most likely why Luffy clapped his hand on my shoulder and stuck his carefree grin in my face.
"Mah, don't worry about it!" he chuckled, melting away my worries. "He's following your plan, remember? And it's a good plan! After all, you made it, right?"
I hesitated for a second before matching his smile and nodding right back. "Yeah… yeah, it is a damn good plan."
~o~
"Alright, everyone, first thing you all need to understand about Thriller Bark?" I stated. "It's that this place is run like a nightmare funhouse. All of their tactics, all of their members, all of the abilities that they bring to bear, they're all intended to be used in subterfuge. Tricks, traps, illusions, the whole enchilada. Shadows are an integral part of Thriller Bark, and if we just run in guns blazing?" I slammed my fist into my palm. "This place will shank us clean between our ribs when we're least expecting it."
The crew exchanged uneasy looks at that, but Boss drew attention to himself with a hard snort.
"We get it, this place is gonna be tricky as all get-out," he grumbled as he gnawed on his cigar. "So what're we gonna do about it?"
"Simple…" I patted myself down for a second before withdrawing a stray piece of scrap paper from my pocket and holding it up with both hands. "They want to fight smart, we're going to fight smart right back. We're going to enter through the front door, and while they think we're falling for their tricks…" I tore the paper in half. "We're going to dismantle their entire operation, piece…" And then into quarters, "By piece," And then into eighths before casting aside the confetti. "Before they even have a chance to realize what's going on."
Everyone started to nod in agreement until I spoke up again.
"But!" I hastily snapped my finger up. "If we're going to do this right, then everything has to be perfect. No deviations, no getting sidetracked. I'll try making sure no one has a job they can't handle or at least has someone nearby who knows what they're doing, but even so…" I shook my head slowly. "Moria may be the weakest of the Warlords, but he still has as much mastery of his Devil Fruit as Crocodile, and about as much tactical skill. As such, I cannot stress this enough: One slip-up, one misstep, and this whole place will fall on us like a ton of bricks. Got it?"
"We've got it, Cross. We'll be as careful as we need to be," Sanji said, and similar sentiments came from the rest of the crew.
I looked Luffy dead in the eyes as I spoke again. "Captain, I'm going to plan things for your part in this the best way that I can. But I need you to try as hard as you can to follow through. You know how much is on the line here, and you remember what happened the last time you gave a Warlord an inch."
"…I still want to kick Moria's ass," Luffy grumbled.
"You'll have your chance once he's run out of tricks to hide behind," I promised. Thankfully, that seemed to mollify Luffy, and he nodded.
"Alright, then. Now, we'll be starting with taking care of the only living members of Thriller Bark's crew, the Mysterious Four, consisting of Moria and his three subordinates. More specifically, we'll be taking care of the two that actually have Devil Fruits and who are even close to combat-ready. Brook."
"Hm?" the skeleton replied, cocking his head to the side.
"Your first job upon us reaching the island will be to bamboozle the Ghost Princess of Thriller Bark, Perona." I paused for a moment before allowing myself a snicker. "I love the fact that I get the chance to use the word 'bamboozle'."
THWAP!
"Focus on the task at hand, got it," I winced apologetically as Robin's hand disintegrated.
~o~
"Yo-hohoho, Yo-ho-ho-ho~" Brook sang as he strolled through the woods, pausing slightly as he came upon a graveyard before bounding clear into the center of it and raising his voice. "Yo-hohoho, Yo-ho-ho-ho~"
As if on cue, all the graves around him began trembling, and dead hands began to claw their way to freedom. Brook came to a halt in the middle of the cemetery, casting his gaze about as the earth shifted and roiled beneath his feet.
Suddenly, the soil right beneath him split, and a half-rotted hand clamped down upon his shin, and a groaning zombie pulled itself up and out of the earth…
Before suddenly cutting itself off when it caught sight of the bleached white skull mere inches from his face.
"Hello there, mister zombie," Brook hummed politely, tilting his head ever so slightly to the side. "Remember me?"
What little blood the zombie still had in its head shot out of it. "Oh, shi—!"
That was as far as the revenant got before Brook crammed his bony fingers down its throat, depositing a tiny amount of salt in the zombie's stomach.
Still, that small amount of salt was enough to push all of the shadow right out of the zombie's now truly lifeless jaws.
Then, the second that his leg was freed, Brook blurred around the graveyard, darting to and fro between the graves as the living dead tried to wrench themselves from the earth. By the time Brook came to a halt, all of the zombies were fully free, all standing at the ready…
But after a second, half of them collapsed into true lifelessness, their shadows ripping themselves free of their jaws and soaring away beneath their comrade's horrified gazes.
The surviving zombies only had a second to process what they'd just seen…
"Ahem."
Before a cough caused the embalming fluid in their veins to freeze. They jerkily turned their heads and stared in horror at the skeleton in their midst as he inspected his blade with the utmost casualness.
"I'm only," Brook mused offhandedly, "going to say this once."
He then glanced up from his blade at the zombies, his face a mask of pure, uninhibited murder.
"RUN."
And just like that, the zombies began fleeing as fast as their enhanced bodies would allow, raising the alarm that the scourge of Thriller Bark from five years past had returned to exact his vengeance.
As they ran, the zombies received simultaneous encouragement to flee and discouragement in the usefulness of it, as every other second it seemed that one of their number or another suddenly fell flat as their tendons were shredded, giving them each only a few moments to scream in terror before they were silenced by their ill-gotten souls fleeing their bodies. More joined the fleeing chase as it progressed through the woods, but their numbers were cut down as quickly as they were built up.
Eventually, the stampede of the once-living disgorged into yet another graveyard opening, scrambling to get away as their recently awakened comrades clawed their way to freedom and joined in the chaos.
Fortunately for them, upon reaching the new graveyard, Brook cut off his pursuit in favour of leaping upon the nearest crypt and slashing his sword out in a grandiose manner. "Accursed zombies of Thriller Bark! I am the dreaded Humming Swordsman, returned from the mists after five long years! There will be no survivors! For I am here! I am here! But soon, you will not be here! The dreaded Humming Swordsman is here for your souls!"
'I will have to ask Cross where he came up with that speech, it even sent shivers down my spine! Oh, but I don't… no, I do have a spine. Botched skull joke,' Brook reflected with a frown, even as the zombies cowered before him. Which was all well and good, but for his part of the plan to work, he still needed a—!
"Horohorohoro~"
Brook was silently grateful for the Negative Hollow that popped up from the stonework a foot in front of him. After all…
"GYAAAAAAH! GHOOOOOST!" he howled, flinching back and throwing his hands up in terror.
Now he didn't have to fake his shock.
The surrounding zombies all paused in their panic, exchanging shocked looks before staring up at their aggressor in confusion. "You're… afraid of ghosts?" one of them called up incredulously.
Brook exaggerated his panting and chest-clutching as he stared at the cartoonish spectre that was wagging its tongue at him. "Y-Y-Yes! Terrified! Deathly afraid, even—oh, but I'm already—Aheheh, getting off track, sorry. A-a-anyways, i-it was bad enough seeing just zombies the l-l-last time I was here, b-but now—!" Brook kept up his act for a bit before breathing a heavy sigh of relief. "W-W-Well, I suppose it could be worse… t-t-that thing barely looks r-r-real! S-S-So long as I d-don't see a human-looking g-g-ghost, I-I'll still be able to d-defeat you all, and reclaim my shadow!"
The zombies all slowly turned their heads to stare at one another, before slowly turning their heads back so that they could smile malevolently at the skeleton of their nightmares.
Brook immediately, though he actually already had a damned good idea of why they were all so chipper (for moving corpses, at any rate). "Whyyyy are you all staring at me like that?"
"Horohorohorohoro… I expect…"
Brook's spine went ramrod straight as a high-pitched voice chuckled echoingly behind him. He sloooowly turned on his heel…
And had to squash the surge of victory he felt when he came face to face with a pink-haired gothic Lolita who was clearly floating upside down in the air.
Perona smirked victoriously, entirely unaware of Brook's own sentiments. "They're all smiling because of me," she crooned.
She then snapped her face forward with a smile that was all teeth. "BOO."
"GYAAAAAH!" Brook shot his hands in the air, shooting away from the Ghost Princess so fast that he actually left a dust trail hanging in his wake.
Perona righted herself, cocking an eyebrow after the fleeing skeleton before casting an incredulous look at the zombies. "So, that was the Humming Swordsman that's had you all shitting yourselves over skeletons for the past five years? Seriously!?"
"Hey, it's not our fault! He's really, really fast!" one of the zombies indignantly protested.
"Yeah!" another piped up. "Maybe if you hadn't slept through that shitshow five years ago, then we wouldn't be down a load a' zombies in the first place!"
"They're right!"
"Lazy princess!"
"Why dontcha do something useful?!"
Perona's head was bowed as the insults kept flowing out from the rapidly revolting (in both senses of the word) zombies, a vein throbbing on her forehead and her teeth grinding together…
"Yer not that cute!"
Until that particular comment caused her jaw to jerk to the side with a particularly sonorous SNAP!
"SHUT IIIT!" the suddenly gigantic Perona screeched at the zombies, cowing them all into submission while a few stray Negative Hollows put several down and out for good measure.
The Ghost Princess huffed and puffed as she marginally came down from the high of her rage, and turned her nose up in a derisive sniff. "You damn uncute bastards… I was going to have some fun chasing that sissy skeleton all over the woods, but now? I think I'll leave him to you clowns! Have fun sucking on salt, rot-for-brains!"
And with that, ignoring the panicked protests of her underlings, Perona turned to fly back to her room…
"…On second thought."
Only to spin around and see that the skeleton was back in the midst of the zombies, looking up at her with a blank face.
"You're actually too cute to be scary," he remarked.
Perona blinked, unsure how to react. On the one hand, she didn't like that he wasn't scared, but on the other hand, she could hardly take offense to someone calling her cu—
"Would you mind showing me your panties?"
All movement in the graveyard froze, the zombies staring at Brook in abject horror while Perona…
Perona's expression remained blank for all of ten seconds.
Then her eyes slowly rolled up into her head, and a pair of gigantic, orb-shaped hollows appeared hovering at her sides.
"When you die this time…" she hissed malevolently. "There won't be enough left FOR YOU TO COME BACK TO!" The last phrase was screeched furiously, emphasized by the Ghost Princess flinging her cackling Special Hollows at the skeleton.
Said skeleton then did the smart thing and vacated the area, not even taking the time to purge the remaining zombies. The giant ghosts exploded near him, but the resulting smokescreen only helped him to duck and cover behind a tree, following which he tugged on his jacket and brought a pocket that held a snail close to his jaws.
"The princess is chasing phantoms," he quickly hissed out. "I had to improvise to keep her interested, but she won't be bothering you for a while."
"Roger roger, buy all the time you can," came the response. He resumed running with a not inconsiderate amount of real fear.
'Even so,' he reflected, glancing over his shoulder at the pursuing Hollow-Woman. 'Cross certainly earned his place as the tactician. Apart from the hiccup on her part, his plan is working perfectly so far!'
~o~
"Just to confirm…" Vivi started to raise her hand with a grim expression.
"No, Perona is not a legitimate princess," I assured her. "That's just what she likes to call herself."
Vivi heaved a sigh of relief, but it was wiped away by my own scowl. "But unfortunately, it's an apt epithet. Her power comes from the Hollow-Hollow Fruit, which is one of the most dangerous Devil Fruits I've ever seen. It lets the user create 'ghosts', or at least things very much like them. She has a few variations… but the most dangerous are also her most commonplace: her Negative Hollows."
I shuddered fearfully. "If one of those dopey-looking bastards touches you, it'll rob you of all will to live. It only lasts a few minutes at most, sometimes just a few seconds, but considering how she can slam you with one while you're getting bumrushed by a horde of zombies…" I trailed off; the uneasy looks on everyone's faces indicated they got what I was getting at.
"So, what's the weakness, Cross? It's not like she doesn't have one if we got past her in your story," Sanji inquired.
I shook my head with a regretful grimace. "That's the biggest problem, Sanji; I can't be sure that anybody on the crew as we are now has any chance of beating her in a straight-up fight. The only thing I know of that can protect you against the Negative Hollows…"
I turned my regretful look on Usopp. "Is being so pessimistic that they can't sink you any lower?"
The sniper froze. "And… you've been boosting my confidence from the day you told us the truth," he breathed in horror.
I sighed again, massaging my face. "Yes, and I realize that the easy way out isn't an option because of that, but if you'd seen what I've seen, what would have happened if I hadn't done everything that I possibly could?" I snorted as I jabbed my thumb downwards. "If I had let it happen anyway just so we'd still have a trump card against Perona, you wouldn't have let me within a half-mile of Sunny, and that's not an exaggeration, meaning that that point is moot. Alright?"
I took in everyone's disconcerted expressions, many of them clearly wondering what could have possibly been that bad. But going off the fact that a few members of the crew were bowing their heads or looking at me with resigned acceptance, they had figured out what the answer was.
I clapped my hands together to get their attention back. "Anyway, what's done is done, and we're getting off track. The Negative Hollows aren't even what I'm most worried about with Perona's abilities. No, the true threat…" I pointed at my eye. "Is her remote viewing. Perona can see through the eyes of her Hollows, and because they're intangible, she can make a lot of them, and her range is freaking huge…" I moved my finger to point at Soundbite. "We have a voyeur on our hands to match ours. If we want to try and pull any covert operations on Thriller Bark, our first order of business will be to disable Perona."
I tsk'd derisively as I started pacing, my hands folded behind my back. "An act easier said than done, unfortunately. Yet another tool in the Hollow-Hollow Fruit's varied arsenal is that of astral projection; she can leave her body as an intangible, invulnerable ghost herself, and go wherever she damn well chooses while leaving her real body locked up in the depths of Thriller Bark. Basically, this means that we can't touch it."
"So, if I have this right…" Conis started counting down on her fingers. "We can't hurt her, we can't counter her, can't even touch her…"
"AHA!" Su barked, jabbing her paw at me with a grin. "But she does leave her body, so that means we can still speak with her! You're going to distract her!"
"Or more specifically, I will distract her, is that right?" Brook confirmed.
"More than that, Brook. You're going to go ashore ahead of us, garner as much attention as you can, and the second you see a Hollow, you cement her attention on you so that she doesn't look anywhere else. How you do it is up to you, but if you want my advice? She's got something of a trickster-sadist streak in her. Play on that and let her think she can get a few screams out of you, and you'll have her undivided attention. After that…" I shrugged with a careless smirk. "It just comes down to two simple factors: keep ahead of her at all times and don't let the ghosts touch you."
"I believe I can manage, Cross," Brook nodded confidently. "Because as I'm sure you're aware, I can be very, very fast."
I nodded proudly. "Glad to hear it. Now! The distraction of Thriller Bark's surveillance will be phase one of our plan. Phase two, the infiltration, will begin once we're certain they're in the blind. And for that part…" I held up a quartet of fingers. "The rest of us will be splitting into four teams."
~o~
I took a calming breath as I prepared myself for what was coming before raising my voice so that everyone could hear. "Alright! Perona—and by extension, Thriller Bark—is blind! If we're going, then it's now or never! Everyone ready to rumble?"
"Let's go!" Luffy cheered eagerly.
"Thanks for the seat, Zoro," Chopper said gratefully.
"Mmph," the swordsman grunted, somehow managing to look dangerous despite having what resembled nothing so much as a reindeer plush on his lap.
"We're all good, Cross!" Franky said.
"And we're good here, too," I nodded in confirmation. I then rapped my fist against the wall. "Let's roll out!"
"You got it!" Merry announced from up top. "Alright, everyone, brace yourselves, because we are doing this for the first time ever! Deploying Soldier Dock System, Channels 1 and 2!"
I grinned eagerly as the chamber we were in slowly rotated to the left, the dock gate sliding open and exposing us to the light.
"Oh, this is gonna be fuuun…" Soundbite squealed.
"From Channel 1!" Merry boasted. "Our Covert Ops deployment vessel…"
There was a jolt as the powered-launch apparatus Franky had installed in the SDS activated, and we were shot out of the berth like a cork from a bottle. The second our grinning white zodiac hit the water, I twisted the throttle and gunned its cola-powered engine so that we steered out and away from the Sunny.
"In homage to the Whitebeard Pirates, the Mini-Moby Motorboat!" Merry laughed from up top. Her laughter redoubled as a secondary clunk echoed from the opposite side of the Sunny. "And from Channel 2! Our Mass Troop Deployment vessel…"
There was an almighty roar from behind the Sunny, and then our other faithful metal steed shot into view, barely even skimming over the waves; it was moving so fast. Large enough to fit nearly a dozen people and powered by an impressive aircraft-grade propeller latched onto its back and piloted by Franky, the—
"Gator Glider!" Merry cheered eagerly.
—was nothing short of a lean, mean, speed machine. This description was only hammered home by how, even laden down with the vast majority of our crew, the vessel sped into the mists at a speed comparable to a non-Shaving Carue.
Once they were gone, I shot a final farewell salute at Merry before revving the Mini-Moby's motor and piloting my team towards the ghost island's shoreline. I slowed our speed when we actually hit the mists and started actually getting close to the island, and we came to a full halt once we bumped into the lip of the island's 'moat'.
And then, after taking a second to reassure my friends that the current would carry the Mini-Moby straight to the dock proper, we all jumped in.
It wasn't a small fall, that's for damn sure, and it was practically unclimbable from the bottom, but thanks to us willingly jumping into the abyss, we were able to control our falls by sliding down the damp and mossy walls of the crevice.
In my honest opinion, our flawless landing at the bottom was quite the feat of badassery.
I took a second to adjust the brim of my cap before glancing around at the rest of my team. "Alright, everyone good to go?"
Robin smiled confidently as she thumbed her Stetson up. "Of course."
Usopp was adjusting the collar of his cloak uncertainly as he glanced around, but ultimately he settled for plastering a shaky grin on his face and clamping one hand down on top of his new (and admittedly pretty cool) hat and using the other to shoot me a thumbs up. "Good to go!"
Conis beamed sunnily even as she tapped her knuckles against the barrel of the Burn Bazooka that was poking over her shoulder, alongside the rest of the armaments she was packing. "I didn't exactly choose to carry all of this to look pretty."
"We came here to kick ass and chew bubblegum!" Su announced with a flick of her tail. "And considering what that stuff does to my fur? I hate bubblegum."
"All in all, Cross?" Lassoo leered malevolently as he shoved himself off my back and licked his chops in anticipation. "I'd say we're good to go. So, let's go already! I want to see some zombies burn."
I stiffened as I processed that particular tidbit before shooting a look at my mutt. "Lassoo, I don't know how you've hung around Soundbite and I this long without picking up on this particular tidbit, but when it comes to zombies—!"
"GRRR!"
"CANI-BLAST!" Lassoo howled, spinning around and vomiting up a pillar of flames that engulfed the 'poor' Cerberus Zombie that had just shown its head.
"KAI!"/"KAI!"/"YIP!"
I sighed as said Cerberus Zombie switched to writhing around on the ground, attempting to bat out the flames crawling over its necrotized hide.
"Heheh!" Lassoo scratched his paw under his nose proudly. "Fire is and always will be the best solution!"
"Noooot really…" I slapped a hand to my forehead with a sigh. "Because see, the thing is? While it might think that it's feeling pain, it'll soon remember that it actually doesn't."
"Eh?" My dog-gun blinked up at me in confusion. "And what does that matter?"
"It matters," Soundbite explained dryly. "Because once it remembers, not only will the zombie continue to chase us…"
The two-thirds Cerberus chose that exact moment to roll back onto its feet and resume its mismatched snarling, only now it had flames burning all over and within it as well.
"BUT IT WILL DO SO WHILE STILL ON FIRE!"
"Ah…" Lassoo started backing away from his growling pyrrhic counterpart. "I… see your point."
"Glad to hear it," I sighed despondently, even as I prepared to run like a hellhound was on my heels. Oh, wait, it was. "So, are there any other questions anyone would like to ask?"
"Uh, actually, I have one."
All attention turned to Usopp as he squinted at the Cerberus. "That third head, the yellow one… is that a fox?"
My gut dropped out from within me, the Cerberus briefly looking stricken before it started snarling and growling louder than ever.
I slowly turned my head to pin Usopp with a cyanide-deadly glare. "You. Dumb. Fuck. I just went over this!"
"Aheheh…" The sniper backed away fearfully. "Sorry?"
"Apologize later," Conis sighed in defeat. "For now, unless I miss my guess—?"
"ROOOAAAR!" the immolating zombie howled in triplicate.
"RUN LIKE HELL, DIPSHITS!" Su yelped.
"DAMN STRAIGHT!" I yelled back, turning on a dime and running like hellfire from the revenant canine.
"Sonnuva-sonnuva-sonnuva—shit!" Lassoo yelped as he scrambled to keep up. "Of all the times for you to send that damn sword somewhere else! And Soundbite, weren't you working on some brand new badass move or something!? Can't you just blow it to damn pieces!?"
"Love to, can't!" Soundbite grimaced, his eyestalks pulling independent 180s. "TOO MANY DIFFERENT TYPES OF FLESH FOR ME TO GET a common frequency! I'D ONLY BE ABLE TO BLAST A bit of the damn THING!"
"Is it just me, or has your Awakened Devil Fruit not been of any help at all since we left Enies Lobby?" Su snapped.
"…I CAN still use GASTRO-PHONY at a distance. HOW WOULD YOU LIKE THE BISCUIT TREATMENT?!" Soundbite snapped. Conis and Su reacted only in confusion, but everyone else winced, and then I turned a glare on the snail.
"And you aren't doing that to the hellhound… why, exactly!?" I demanded.
"…PLEASE HOLD," Soundbite whistled to the side.
Before I could rip a chunk out of the snail's hide—or shell, as it were—the pursuing Cerberus suddenly stumbled in its pursuit, hacking and wheezing. It spent a few seconds like that before all three heads swung into one another, and they resumed the pursuit, angrier than ever.
Soundbite blinked in honest shock. "Sonnuva bitch, SCARFACE BACK THERE JUST KNOCKED ITS hearing out of commission!"
I blinked in surprise before refocusing on running for my life. "I will admit, I probably should have seen that coming." I glanced around, looking for something that I could use to fend off the mutts. Putting them down for good could send out the alert too soon, meaning we had to find some way to escape before—
I smirked as I saw an upcoming tree, and moved a hand to my belt. "That'll work," I muttered, shooting the grappling hook and locking it around the tree branch. "Everyone, after me!"
As Lassoo secured himself on my back, I pulled the cord, reeling myself in and onto the branch as Usopp mirrored me with his own belt, and Robin provided makeshift ropes for everyone else. Within seconds, we were safe in the boughs of the perfectly normal (a metal heel to the closest thing I could find resembling an eye confirmed it) tree, with the Cerberus zombie circling angrily below. Ultimately, however, it snorted acridly before turning its back and padding away, presumably to either return to its den or to find someone to put it out, leaving behind a stench of burned fur. Eurgh.
Once we all hopped down and dusted ourselves off, I started to speak, but Soundbite, snickering to himself, grabbed my attention. "Care to share?"
"N-No no, NOTHING! Y-You just do whatever!" he managed to choke out through his giggling.
I cocked my eyebrow in blatant disbelief. "If… you say so…" I then shrugged the matter off in favour of properly addressing everyone else, starting by gesturing at the woods around us (once I was sure that Soundbite was properly Scrambling us, anyways). "Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the haunted woods of Thriller Bark. They're dark, damp, fog-ridden… and absolutely packed to the gills with the living dead."
"An absolutely charming locale," Robin hummed with… way too much honest sincerity for comfort.
"One I really wanna get out of as fast as possible…" Usopp gulped as he strangled the staff of Kabuto. "Which way out of here?"
"Soundbite?"
"ROAD'S thattaway!" Soundbite indicated with his eyestalks.
"Thanks," I nodded gratefully as I started walking in the direction he indicated. "C'mon, gang!"
I dug my heels into the ground as I registered what I heard. "What just came out of my mouth!?"
"Heeheehee…" Soundbite snickered.
"Sounds like Soundbite's having some fun at your expense!" Lassoo raised his paw to his mouth and chuckled. "Reeheehee—eh!?"
I shot Soundbite a flat look as Lassoo clamped his muzzle shut. "Okay, once is you messing around, twice is a trend. What's the con?"
Soundbite opened his mouth to reply, but before he could say anything, a flock of bats shot out of the trees, screeching and flapping. All of us tensed as they flew by—except Usopp, who let out a shriek and practically Shaved into Conis' arms, clutching her neck and shoulders like a life preserver.
Conis blinked at our sniper in surprise. "Uh…?"
"Drop him," Su deadpanned, prompting Conis to do so and unceremoniously drop to Usopp the ground.
"WOW, I DIDN'T EVEN plan that, but it still worked out PERFECTLY!" Soundbite snickered.
"OK, seriously?" I deadpanned, casting a sidelong glare at the snail. "Why are you—"
"HAVE YOU REALLY not noticed our group?!" Soundbite outright cackled.
I glanced around in confusion for a second before 'ah'ing in realization and pointing everyone out one by one.
"Male Coward—"
"Hey!" Usopp squawked indignantly.
"Female Beauty—"
"Uh… thank you?" Conis leaned away from me with a slightly uncertain look.
"Female Brainiac—"
Robin chuckled, though she was looking at me curiously.
"Male leader…" I pointed at myself before slowly looking down at an incredulous Lassoo. "…and a talking dog," I finished, disbelief evident in my voice. "Sonnuva bitch we're freaking Mystery Incorporated, One Piece Edition."
"HAHAHA! YES!" Soundbite howled maniacally. "And cue tree-assault in THREE, TWO—!"
"…meh."
"HOOHOO—COME AGAIN!?" Soundbite squawked incredulously.
"You heard me, meh," I said dismissively. "This isn't the universe playing merry hell with my sanity; it's me unintentionally making something happen. And honestly? It's actually a little funny."
Soundbite blinked a few times. Then he looked up at nothing. "You gonna take that lying down?" he asked.
A second or so later, a branch spontaneously snapped above me, clattering to the ground so that it was leaning against my torso, shoving its smaller branches at Soundbite's face. Said snail had snapped into his shell, and upon poking his eyestalks back out, looked for a moment, and then narrowed them.
I, however, couldn't help but snicker, given the fact that the branches directly in front of Soundbite's face were suspiciously arranged into what very much resembled a fist with the middle finger raised. "Looks like there's a fine line between driving me crazy and taking orders from a snail."
"Well, screw you too," the snail grumbled.
"Okay, watch it," I chuckled as I started walking towards the road. "Honestly, the last thing I need is another close encounter of the electric kind, got it?"
"GURK!" Soundbite thankfully decided to shut himself up as he shot back into his shell, his eyes poking out and glancing at the sky fearfully before he suddenly tensed up. "Uh, Cross? I'm not the only one who should be LOOKING UP."
"Eh?" I glanced at him in confusion. "What are you—?"
"Well, isn't this quite the development?"
"GAH!" I jerked backward and fell on my ass, flinching on account of the freaking vampire bastard that had just dropped out of the branches and who was hanging upside down before me. "For the love of—! We already have someone on our crew who gets her kicks doing that, we don't need anyone else!"
"I'm inclined to agree with our… dubiously beloved tactician," Robin chuckled as she and my friends stepped up beside me, she herself helping me to my feet as they stared up at the squat bat-winged zombie.
"My humblest apologies," the vamp-zombie simpered through his ever-present grin. "My name is Hildon. I am something of the majordomo around these parts. It is an honour to welcome you to our humble, horrifying home of Thriller Bark, Straw Hat Pirates."
I took a brief moment to appreciate nobody in our current group having the stupidity to ask how he knew who we were before responding. "Well, that's a warmer welcome than I was expecting," I remarked. "Can't really say I'm surprised you recognize us, though. Fans, huh? Or did you just get our wanted posters?"
"Oh, you've acquired a poster of your own, have you?" Hildon perked up—or down, as it were—eagerly. "How riveting! No, we were completely unaware of that! The News Coos haven't been coming around lately, for some reason. Really…" He tilted his head to the side with a sigh. "It's quite vexing if I'm being honest. What have we ever done to them?"
Coming to a likely conclusion, I sent a silent word of thanks to Coo before refocusing on the zombie as he continued.
"But anyways, yes! Fans!" Hildon nodded eagerly before tilting his head with a despondent frown. "Up until recently, anyway…"
"Recently?" Conis questioned curiously.
"Ah, well, you see…" Hildon crossed his arms over his chest and bowed his head despondently. "Our domicile is quite isolated, you see, and we're quite interconnected around here, so we've only ever had or needed a single Transponder Snail. But a few weeks back…" He spread his wings in dismay. "We were attacked!"
Conis, Su, and Usopp exchanged glances as they heard that, while I blinked in comprehension. A glance at Robin and Soundbite showed that they had come to the same conclusion, and I looked back at Hildon with a well-schooled expression of curiosity. "And… these attackers stole your Transponder Snail?"
"HA! If that were all that they did, we'd probably have just laughed it off, but no such luck! You see, a few weeks back, two different pirate crews joined in an alliance and, without any provocation whatsoever—!"
I only just managed to keep from coughing out a not-so-subtle 'bullshit'.
"—attacked the island without an inkling of remorse or hesitation!" Hildon swung his arm over his eyes in despair. "We didn't do a darned thing to them, and yet they started tearing our humble abode apart at the seams! Even going so far as to steal our only connection to the outside world! Oh, woe is us, woe says I!"
I rolled my eyes at the ham-tastic performance, but stayed silent.
Eventually, Hildon quit his fake blubbering and wiped the non-existent tears from his eyes, grinning widely. "Ah, but now you're here, and you can regale us with marvellous tales of your adventures in person! If you'd be so inclined, anyway."
Now that actually snagged my attention, and Robin's as well, if her glance at me was anything to go by. "To confirm, when you say 'us'…?"
Without any warning, Hildon dropped from the canopy and flipped around to land on his feet. He then shoved his thumbs in his mouth, blew out a harsh whistle…
And with a clatter of hooves and grinding of wheels, an old-fashioned but well-designed horse-drawn carriage came rolling towards us, drawn by two things that were definitely not traditional horsemen. Seriously, what the fuck was sewn onto that second horse's neck!?
"By 'us'," Hildon chuckled in what I bet was meant to be an inviting tone. "I mean the master of the glorious manor where I serve. I refer to the illustrious home of the world's greatest medical mind…" His fangs glinted in the lantern-light. "Doctor Hogback."
"Yeah, because that's not suspicious at all," Lassoo muttered beneath his breath, before jumping with a yip of pain, presumably on account of a hand that was rapidly disintegrating from where it'd sprouted on his backside.
"Lead the way," Robin invited with all the casual ease someone who had the epithet 'Devil Child' should have.
Credit to Hildon, he didn't even twitch, though I suppose already being dead might have had something to do with it. "Please, allow me," he offered politely, swinging the carriage's door open and gesturing for us to step inside.
I climbed in with a nod of thanks and took a seat by the window, and I couldn't help but share a victorious grin with Robin as she sat next to me.
I wasn't foolish enough to think that everything would certainly be smooth sailing from here, but damn if it didn't feel good for my plan to be going right so far.