Chapter Text
Start over; my darling.
Be Brave enough to find the life you want and courageous enough to chase it.
Then start over and love yourself the way you were always meant to.
- Madalyn Beck
May 5th 1520
East Blue - Dawn Island
The spring sun’s rays pierced the foliage of the jungle trees. Hidden inside the cool shade of an oak a young boy lay, a worn straw hat sitting upon his crown of raven hair and a thin scar resting on his left cheek, a few seconds passing before he awakes.
Luffy opens his eyes and is met with the familiar sight of Dawn Island. He’s dreaming, he thinks distantly and reaches to sit up only to realise too late that his limbs are shorter than expected and crashes to the ground. Nose deep in earth he brings his hands to his face. Where swells and deep scars once covered his skin there are now few, and no traces of the big gashes and burns he suffered in his fights. That is not to say that there aren’t any worrisome marks — He lives in the jungle, was raised by pirates and bandits of course his hands wouldn’t be like those of a noble — but this little after years of fighting and sailing?
He must be in a childhood dream he concludes happily. But they were rare and far between and last he remembered he hadn’t been sleeping. Curious. He pinches and stretches his rubbery cheek before letting go. He didn’t really feel pain but he did feel something which was quite abnormal. ‘I’ll ask Robin’ he thinks only to remember she was not there. Nor was his crew.
He wasn’t sure if he really was in a dream but he was hungry— do people feel hunger in dreams? — so he sits up (mindful of the shortness of his arms and legs this time) to get crocodiles at the river he used to go hunting with Ace and Sabo. At the thought of Ace, he pauses before quickly pushing his thoughts deeper inside. It had already been more than two years he should be over it. He didn’t really think he’d ever truly be over it.
Luffy shakes his head sharply before whistling to himself Bink’s sake’s tune. Although he was glad it wasn’t a nightmare he couldn’t wait to wake up.
East Blue - an island
An old bar stands at the foot of a green mountain, it is run by an equally old man who looks as if every breath could be his last. The bar had been run by his father, and his father’s father, and his father’s father’s father, and so on.
In this particular old bar, a man sits still on the stool of a beaten table, nursing a mug of alcohol head low and brooding. Suddenly. As if struck by a sudden bolt of lightning he stands up and marches out, drink left undrunk and bill unpaid. He makes his way across the town in quick strides, his three katanas clinking on his hip.
After a few moments, he stops catching something with his grey eyes. His gaze rests on a crinkled newspaper. As if possessed, he picks up the piece of paper and checks the date again. He hadn’t touched his sake so he was sure he wasn’t drunk, but this? Running his hand in his moss-like hair he thinks. After some time he draws two conclusions: he’s gone back in time and it’s because of one of the Grand Line’s mysteries.
Zoro really regrets having left his booze. As he’s always said, nothing helps insanity like a good drink. Despite his regrets, his conclusion does make sense: his body feels unfamiliar: too small, too weak, too lanky, too young, hakiless, and he has two eyes. He’d thought it had been a dream at first but his dreams aren’t elaborate enough to create a village he must’ve visited only once. Besides, it wasn't out of the realm of the Grand Line. He rearranged his thoughts, and decided his first course of action would be to see if he could find his crew and if they had come back too.
He sits up and starts making his way to the port. A walk that should have taken a few minutes ends up taking an hour because the buildings keep moving, and despite whatever the witch says it was not him lacking a sense of direction thank you very much.
East Blue - Somewhere at sea
Between two barrels of beer lay a body curled up and pressed against them as if in search of warmth. Red strands of hair cling to their forehead covered in sweat. A noise is made in the distance and suddenly their eyes snap open already searching the room they are in.
Nami had woken up some time ago in this unfamiliar environment, she had, like every member of her crew, believed herself to be dreaming before having registered a stabbing pain on her side. Bruises covered her too-thin ribs making a show of blue and yellow on her pale skin. There was a calendar in the storage room that must be used for the food but thanks to it she’d noticed the date. She had wanted to cry then, not because of the pain (it was nothing compared to what she had experienced before), but from the fear that she had lost her family. Again. It had taken her a moment to compose herself again, but she could only show weakness for so long, especially in an unknown environment. She had decided then that she would find her crew again and if they didn’t remember it would be fine. Luffy had asked her to join once before and he’d do it again, that she was sure, and this time she would not hesitate.
Decided she brought herself up to her too-small height and put a hand on her injuries. It was time to see what treasure this ship was keeping. As she wandered the halls hidden in darkness and shadows (a very robin-y method) she saw a mob of pink in the otherwise dark room. Intrigued and feeling a vague sense of familiarity she approaches it creeping like a cat. As the person ( the mob of pink was a person) comes into the light she recognises him as Coby, Luffy and Zoro’s friend she met in Water 7. Wasn’t he a marine? What was he doing here?
She frowns before trying to remember all she knew about him: he was a marine, was under Vice Admiral Garp the fist’s wing (Luffy’s grandfather), had worked on a certain Alvida’s ship before following his dream, and was Luffy and Zoro’s friend. She guessed Alvida had been a pirate then, one with horrible tastes in interior design, but still a pirate.
She took a deep steadying breath before making her way towards the unsuspecting boy.
East Blue - Baratie
A popular ship for pirates, marines and civilians alike was, as usual, buzzing with the ever-moving clientele. Smells and aromas of northern to southern and eastern to western blue food wafted through the kitchen occasionally mixing with the smell of grand line cuisine. Between the shouts and cheers of the crowd and cooks the crash of a plate could be heard. As heads turn towards the sound, a young server stands frozen, they soon go back to their meal. The waiter however stays still as if prettified, long after the clientele lost interest in him, before quickly moving as if snapping out of a dream to scoop up the fallen food. The crowd had gone back to their conversations but the staff took a little longer to move, eyes lingering on the retreating back of the teenager.
Zeff walks amidst the flow of people, his wooden leg sounding on the floor. The eggplant hadn’t dropped his food since he was about ten and still learning the ropes, he was worried (although he’d never admit it even under the worst torture of Impel Down). He makes his way to the door of a room —where he knows the boy likes to go when he wants to be alone. He never understood why that place out of all the rooms of the Baratie. It was close to the kitchen, small in size and the sound of conversation easily made its way through the wooden walls. The kitchen, he can understand the need for its closeness. The need for the constant sound of human presence? That he didn’t, not really.
He knocks on the door before opening it a crack. The light of the hall floods the small dark room and he can make out Sanji’s shaking frame hunched next to the tiny window. His cigarette is lit he notices but it trembles in his hands. Sanji stares with a strange sort of intensity at the sea lost in thought. After a deep albeit wobbly large inhale of smoke he straightens up as if having come to terms with a big decision, through the gesture he catches Zeff in the corner of his eye.
“ You made a plate fall,” starts Zeff.
“ I know .”
“ I don't know what's going on but you better fix it, quickly. I don’t want any more food to go to waste. Although, thankfully, it was only your shitty fish .” Zeff takes some of the salvaged salmon and plops it in his mouth. “ Still as disgusting as ever,” he comments. There is no reply, no insult, no jab and he lets the silence hang between them. It isn’t tense nor charged, just one for Sanji to think. The eggplant will say what he needs to say or maybe he won't; he isn't one to probe and not one to comfort. Sanji knows.
“ I know you don’t find my food bad ,” he begins.
“ Course I do " he answers in a heartbeat, but he is surprised by the suddenness of the statement.
“ Stop pretending shitty geezer ” he says with so much certainty Zeff could only relent.
“ No I don’t, eggplant your cooking’s damn good. What’s gotten into you though,” he asks, curious.
“ It’s complicated .” This is his only reply. Sanji puffs another cloud of grey smoke before starting again. “ Would you believe me if… ”
East Blue - Gecko Islands- Syrup Village
On a warm sunny afternoon, as two teenagers talked, (although one was doing most of the listening while the other most of the talking), a silence suddenly came upon one. In the middle of a courageous tale of a certain captain Usopp, the words faltered on his tongue and the story stopped as if cut abruptly by a pair of scissors. Looking wildly around the boy turned as if searching for something. After a few moments and the tentative call of his name, he finally looks back at the girl who he was, moments ago, talking with. A pause occurs as he looks at her before the buzz of conversation starts again as if nothing had happened.
Usopp was a liar. A very skilled one at that, he could lie as well to the world as to himself. And so, after realising he was talking to a very much younger Kaya, not with his crew and back in Syrup village he did the only thing he could think of: push everything down and deal with it later. He lied expertly to Kaya, not by weaving the tale he was currently recounting but by pretending everything was fine and he was not, in fact, freaking out. After he bid her goodbye and was making his way to his empty house, he started listing everything he knew about his current predicament: he was younger, Kaya was younger, Kuro was still at the manor, his crew was not here and he was back in his village and not on the Grand line. After a steadying breath and a short mental breakdown, he put a plan into action: he had to get fitter, get rid of Kuro and find his crew. Easy right?
It wasn’t. He didn’t know where Luffy, Zoro, Robin and Jimbei were although he did have an idea for the rest; and he couldn’t sail away to meet them without leaving Kaya alone with Kuro; without forgetting the fact that maybe he had been the only one to come back and what if, what if,... this was death? Maybe he’d died and this was hell? He shook his head to rid himself of his intrusive thoughts. He’d start with getting fitter, and he’d deal with the rest later.