A/n: From now on, I'll add a music list; this chapter was inspired by, "Awakening", by Alexandre Desplat, and "Drift" by Mica Levi.
: : One
Two hundred years after the world fell into grand scale war, the presence of humans began to remerge from the rubble and begin to rebuild a new life. Creative technology was rebuilt to cleanse the air, and wastelands were slowly being settled and cultivated into usable plots allowing food growth and encouragement of settlements.
While the world wasn't what it was years ago, it was a brand new one – the only one thing that hadn't changed was conflict. The settlements began to war with each other over 'new' land, scarce food territories, technology, slaves and reputation. Without order, it was impossible to work together. All that mattered was that each colony was able to sustain itself.
Unbeknownst to a burgeoning colony in the East Blue, the land underneath them was hiding a secret.
: :
Cheatgrass, dried undergrowth, hibernating trees and brush burned brilliantly in a wildfire caused by recent lightening, covering the area with a smoky haze that made the air hot, dry and polluted with ash. Without a way to fight it, the colonists could only work to protect their wall – bringing in gallons of salty sea water from the nearby harbor to spray along the line, allowing the fire to die eventually at their territory. The hills burned with a bright orange color, spreading through city streets long abandoned by time. Flames faltered and died amongst the skeletal remains of various buildings that were overgrown by foliage, and consumed by animal life that took root amongst the tallest of towers. Eventually, the fire began dying near the cliffs that separated a mountain from their area. Wildlife called out noisily while flitting through the remains of the city. While they fled the heat, this allowed the colonists to pick off the larger animals, to distribute amongst the families that were carefully guarded inside the colony walls. Life wasn't what it used to be – these animals were native to the colonists, but back in a world that was left behind, they could have been considered mutants. Surviving the aftermath of a war that nearly decimated humans, wildlife had adjusted to a world that no longer interrupted them with their pollutants. Many forms branched out to create new ones – others evolved.
The land east of the colony walls were burnt black, as if someone had dumped vats of ink over the terrain. The smoldering spots leaked smoke that dispersed only vaguely with the salty breeze running off the ocean waters miles away. Water trucks moved noisily outside the walls to keep the fireline at bay. The sound of colonists' voices carrying over the wall were positive, and the noises of construction, farmland activity, and blasts of dynamite destroying rock and old building formations to form roads and more living spaces boomed out over the empty wasteland.
Shielded by an aggressive ocean that was manageable only with small craft and dangerous cliff walls spilled down from uninhabited mountainsides, the colony was in a good spot. They used solar power to gather energy, wind from windmills posted to face the sea. Despite occasional conflict from hostiles that climbed over the walls in an effort to conquer and steal, this colony was quietly peaceful.
Booted feet paused in front of a row of hinges that were visible from behind smoldering vines, broken trunks of trees that had been hibernating over the winter season. Years of growth and what looked like displaced rock from a cliffside had kept a secret easily missed years previously when the colony rose from the emptiness.
Vibrating with excitement, Ussop swept away most of the curdled vines and used a hatchet to whack at blackened branches to clear debris away the from the door. Set at an angle into the ground, the doorway was clearly a treasure. It was rusty, marked black by the fire, the wheel stained with time.
"Guys! Guys!" he shouted with excitement, pulling a large branch from the door, tossing it aside as he realized what he was looking at.
Ussop replaced his hatchet and waited for his companions to stop arguing over who had to carry the gathering basket. He didn't want to remind them that both of them had individual baskets of their own to hold, but only one of them had forgotten his. Both of them didn't want to admit that it was himself that had forgotten the task.
Once he caught their attention, Ussop gestured at the door grandly. With the edges of winter fading, but the land still emitting heat due to the wildfire, he'd forgone his long sleeve shirt, wearing only a rabbit-fur vest over trousers held up by suspenders, his leather boots were folded at the calves; his long gloves were half-fingered, tied just before his elbows. He wore a fluffy ponytail with a faded print bandanna around his hairline, goggles atop of those. Over his shoulder was his bag used once he was outside the walls. A rifle clung to his back, ammunition belted around his waist.
The colony wasn't visible from this angle of the hillside, hidden behind a rocky shelf and some skeletal remains of apartment buildings that had been staggered down the hill. The wind caused old metal to creak and moan, and tall grasses that had managed to escape the fire rustled lightly. Birds called out with noises that echoed overhead as they swept from structure to structure, watching over nests. Hours ago, the trio had climbed over what remained of a fence designed to keep civilians out – battered caution signs with faded print could give no warning at all, and were nearly covered by trees that had been once nicely maintained by city workers.
"It's a doorway to hell," Zoro said gravely, walking up to it. His wolf-fur hooded half cape covered a plain, dingy t-shirt that was tucked into a haramaki and camouflage pants, black boots laced tightly. He wore a backpack that jingled slightly behind him, already weighty with a couple of rabbits, some hens that had been roaming throughout what was left of the brush. His goggles were around his neck, used when ash and fleeting embers of the land took to the air when the breeze picked up.
"Ah! You found your home! Welcome back!" Sanji said brightly. Wearing a wool hooded cape, he was wearing a brown vest and a half-sleeved blue shirt with a faded collar, high waisted trousers belted in place. He had a fox hide-scarf wrapped around his neck, the bushy tail dangling over his chest, where there were small, gold coins of no-worth dangling from the fur. His hands were covered with half-fingered brown gloves, and he wore a bag at his hip; mainly containing ingredients for his cigarettes, for anything edible he found outside. He refused to carry the basket, insisting that just because Zoro was bigger in mass, he should be the ass-load.
"You muckspout, I ain't going nowhere!"
"Guys, this is huge! This thing goes underground!" Ussop exclaimed, examining the lock. It demanded a key code or a card-key, the numbers faded with time. Crouching, he looked it over thoughtfully, Zoro sighing impatiently. Ussop quickly retrieved a cracked tech-pad, which was connected with the colony's data server; the ancient works left behind after the war two hundred years ago was used to lock doors, operate machinery locally, and bypass codes on anything that the scavengers found on their travels. He inserted a card-key just to see if the security lights would flash upon activation. Once they did, he eked a sound of joy. "Keen! This still has some power!"
"We should tell the others about this," Zoro said, crossing his arms. "Door's locked for a reason."
"Yeah, but if it's an underground bunker, it's our job to loot it. Let's at least get the job started before anyone else finds it," Sanji told him. "This area was a tech valley before the war."
"If that's so, maybe it's a server room?"
Sanji gave Zoro a puzzled look. "Like a restaurant?"
"No, you beardsplitter! Like computers and shit!"
"I can't read your mind!"
"I didn't say you had to!"
As Ussop made to break the encryption on the keylock, he watched the numbers flit by on his techpad as the card remained in place. Balancing it on his knees as he crouched, he tapped his fingers together, excited to see what remained inside of the underground bunker. Sanji was right – the area of which they lived in was a valley where a military base resided years ago – the houses' foundations left behind gave the new colony clues to the life lived here. Rusty military trucks were still sitting in rows in skeletal bunkers, with a couple of air vehicles standing on a long abandoned runway. Large structures that might have been office buildings had collapsed and fallen, leaving behind steel joists that still stretched towards the sky. The land had grown around the base, sometimes allowing its secrets to stand out, but the fire had given them plenty of area to cover to look for things like this.
"Nothing to scavenge in a server room."
"But the diggers would be jake about it."
"Robin would be jake about it, that's for sure."
"Do it for her, zounderkite."
The lock gave with a loud clink that caused both men to look startled, Ussop squealing with joy as he retrieved his key card, stuffing his instruments back into his bag with care. He then grabbed the wheel and jerked on it, trying to turn it to open. Grunting, he struggled while the other two watched with disinterest, smoke building in the distance as the fire found new fuel to latch onto.
"Will you help me?" Ussop then snarled impatiently at Zoro, who sighed heavily, swinging the basket into Sanji's stomach so he had to catch it. Ussop stepped aside as Zoro gripped the wheel and wrenched in one direction, straining to do so.
"Here, let a real man do it," Sanji said, putting out his cigarette as he stepped forward. That gave Zoro the extra drive to put more strength into it, the wheel finally screeching with protest as it started to turn. The sound of the latch retreating as the wheel pulled it creaked out noisily, Ussop dancing in place excitedly. Once Zoro lifted, yanking the heavy metal aside with more effort, the hinges cried out shrilly, both Ussop and Sanji looking into a stairway with metal railings that led down into a deep, dark nothing at the bottom. The concrete walls gave nothing away. Ussop's excitement died away and he cringed as Zoro released the door.
The air that hit them was musty, dank, and an ominous sound emerged from it. Ussop rapidly clung to Zoro.
"It's really deep," Sanji muttered, stepping closer to Zoro, the other elbowing him aside.
"We're gonna need flashlights," Zoro said.
"We're gonna go back to town and let Robin have at it, yeah? We're just scavengers, right? We only pick up things we see, not things we do not," Ussop said, turning away. Sanji reached out and snatched him back as Zoro rummaged through his pack for a flashlight in one of his front pockets.
"We're going. You worked so hard at opening it, let's reward ourselves," Sanji told Ussop, holding onto him with an arm around his neck as Zoro took the first step.
In what felt like moments later, the darkness enveloped them, Ussop shaking fiercely as the limited light of flashlights barely gave them ability to see around them. But they emerged into what looked like a building layout; there was another locked door that Ussop had no problem cracking with his techpad, but the fact that it was quadrupled layered, forcing both Sanji and Zoro to put all their strength into opening it, told Ussop that this was going to be a bad find.
Once the door had caught, all of them used their flashlights to examine what it was they had found. It was a clinic style lobby, with two chairs standing at attention near an office window that had layers of sheeting over the frame, accessible only through an intercom at the side. As Sanji examined the office through the window, Zoro caught sight of yet another door at the back of the lobby, shaking his head. Ussop clung to his back, fearful of the stillness that made it feel like they were venturing into a tomb of some kind.
Inside the office, Sanji could see an overturned landline phone – he hadn't seen any of those in person before, so he amazed at the sight of it before seeing scattered papers over the desk, on the floor. The chair with wheels had been flattened against one wall – as if someone had smashed it deliberately against the surface. Files were left in shambles – too far away for him to see what they contained. There was another doorway just beyond the main desk that was opened only slightly, showing him intense darkness leading into nothing. With a shrug, he turned away.
But as Zoro jerked upon the handle, the door opened with a loud creak, revealing a long, narrow corridor. The end had a warning sign that opened up to a broader hallway. There were warning stripes that broke across the plain walls, along with emergency lights posted within the center. There was something ominous about the setup that had him hesitating. The air was stale, heavy, as if gathering weight through the years; it only seemed to move upon the opening of the main door. Each of them pulled out field oxygen masks from their bags, Ussop's hands shaking as he did so.
"This was probably the base's underground treasure room," Sanji said, fiddling with his mask before slipping it on. He had a hard time with the mask over his face; a long ago memory made it difficult to cope with the feeling of being enclosed in. "Where they kept secrets and all that. Housed their highest officers."
"The warning signs are throwing me off," Zoro muttered, his voice muffled as he used his flashlight to examine the warning stripes.
"Let's go. If I'm right, them houses hold valuables," Sanji said, walking forward with his flashlight moving over the floor, wary of encountering anything creeping along the floors. Ussop clung to Zoro's backpack, walking close behind him as the swordsman ventured forward. Once they crossed the hallway and reached the y, they debated on their options. One corridor lead down into another staircase that disappeared beyond the cone of their lights, another directed them to a steel heavy door with Caution! signs plastered over the wheel.
"This one probably leads back to the office spaces," Sanji said.
"Nothing valuable for us to take," Zoro decided.
Sanji then posed against the wheel, miming the act of adjusting his tie. "Look at me – I work at this here office."
"You're a dumb rantallion!"
"What? I was spot on!"
"Where's the basket?" Ussop asked, looking at each of them. Both of them pretended not to hear him, so he heaved an exasperated sigh.
They went right towards the staircase, their breathing and movements being the only sounds that echoed noisily between the concrete walls. The stairway had more warning stripes on them, leading to another steel door. Once Zoro managed to tug it open, a wave of air swept over them with a forceful rush, bringing along with it fluttering pieces of paper, a musty stench and evidence of a once occupied area frozen in the hands of time. Once he was sure the door was settled against the hallway wall without indication of swinging shut, he released his touch on the surface, walking in with a wondrous expression like the other two.
The walls were brightly painted with the outside world; trees, a bright blue sky with scattered clouds, a sun emblazoned onto ceiling lights to the left, and a moon emblazoned on lights to the right. As soon as they stepped in, lights sparked on with a crackling noise, causing Ussop to shriek in surprise, hands clamping over his mask. The buzzing sound of electricity caused them all to cringe in reflex, but their attention was caught to the sight around them. The area was a great room – with worn couches that had been overturned, mangled with their cushions ripped and disemboweled. Pillows were strewn across the floor, lamps broken, lampshades crumbled by feet. Books lay scattered over the floor with pages ripped out, rustling at their feet. Pieces of a dish with lay scattered in a nearby hallway, along with stains of food that had long since disintegrated to mere bones and withered stems.
Sanji removed his mask first, inhaling of the sharp, musty air. It made him cough, but as he adjusted, he inhaled again. Zoro and Ussop removed their masks, looking around cautiously. The area was obviously a living room – but it seemed like something straight out of a book. To the left were more doors; straight ahead was a corridor that revealed opened rooms. To the right was another steel door with warning signs over them. The three of them investigated the living room.
Sanji paused in front of a near wall sized television set, taking in the flat screen tv with curiosity. He touched the screen, drawing a fingertip over it with slow wonder, then looked at his fingertips. He was puzzled at the lack of dust. There were dvds strewn around them, some half broken or cracked. He picked up a few titles, eyes wide at the content. He'd never seen these things, before, having only saw them in the books the archeologists lended out. The home stereo system had him crouching over it, twisting the volume dials, pressing buttons – a static sound filtered out through the speakers hung up on the walls around the large screen. He couldn't imagine what the device was for, having never seen one – but the sound startled him, and he quickly depressed the power button.
Zoro was looking over an iPad, turning it over and over in his hands, wondering what it was for. The screen was cracked, the corner opened to reveal shards of broken material. But there were Lisa Frank stickers pasted over the back, covering the apple. "Perona" was written in Old English across the bottom, near the home button. He'd picked it up from a plastic tool box that had tubes of colors inside, with palettes of broken dust that left pigmented colors across his fingers. There were pencils inside of it that had long since dried, leaving behind only the colored wood casings. A name brand was written over most of them, and he thought they were coloring pencils, so he searched for a sketching pad.
Ussop investigated a rectangular object with a small glass screen, with what looked like a directional button below it. Attached to it were earbuds that were faintly stained with ear wax, and he made a face as he saw this. The apple on the back of the device was something he'd seen before, but he didn't remember where. He pocketed it, then picked up a journal that had faded pictures of men's fashion. The styles inside made him snicker as he observed stoic-faced models in form fitting suits, with articles that gave interesting insights to travel, electronics, and how to pick up women. He saw a page that made him relook at the device he pocketed, seeing that it was an iPod, and it played music. But the battery had long since been damaged, and the screen refused to budge.
He looked at the publication date of the magazine, and whistled.
"This date reads here a month before the bombs hit," he said with incredulity in his tone. He looked at the others. "Guys, we're the first ones in here!"
Zoro squinted at the elaborately painted ceiling. "Weird how this place looks more like a house than military quarters."
"Maybe the people that made it used it to survive the fallout," Sanji said, turning away from the home stereo system, looking towards the doors. He brightened, coins jingling as he gave a skipping step towards them. "Maybe there are bodies in there. Let's go look at them."
"Let's not!" Ussop cried fretfully.
"Oh, that's jake with me," Zoro said, following after Sanji. He reached out to pull the blond back so he could be first, Sanji kicking at him to create space. The blond opened one of the doors and pushed it aside, revealing a bedroom covered in pink. From a four poster bed with a pink, frilly canopy with pink blankets that had unicorns on them, to the pink furry rug with pink painted walls, the entire room made them all cringe. There were posters of actors, cute animals and inspirational quotes tacked to the walls. There was a vanity stand in the corner with plastic racks of tubes, palettes, brushes and two shelves of colored bottles arranged in rainbow colors. Clinging to the wall near the stand were wigs with long, pink strands that looked like scalps. Near the closet were shoes arranged from simple heels to clunky boots. The closet was slightly open, revealing frilly clothing, dresses with ribbons and gossamer skirting.
"I think this was a girl's room," Ussop whispered, as if his voice would wake someone. But the bed was thankfully empty.
"Look at this stuff! I'm sure she was a princess!" Sanji exclaimed, wandering right in, looking for a dresser.
"Perv! Even for the dead!" Zoro snapped in outrage. "You desecrate the dead's things, they'll come back and bring you with them!"
"Don't wig, I'll be her prince!" Sanji said merrily, opening the closet door, and finding it to be a walk-in closet. The racks that held the dresses seen from outside lined one wall – the other contained shelves and drawers for the things he'd been looking for; dainty pieces of underwear that were lace and scraps of fabric. His mouth dropped open as he pulled a set from a drawer, faded material showing off frilly sides, lace that disintegrated at his touch, and ribbons that broke as the weight of it pulled it from his grasp. He reached in and pulled out more, lace collapsing in his hands as his hands came into contact with it. His nose started to bleed, and he clasped his fingers over his face with an awestruck expression. "This is what women wore back then…tiny little things that don't leave nothing to thought."
Zoro shook his head in disgust at him as Ussop looked over his shoulder, certain he heard something move. Leaving Sanji to his fantasies, Zoro moved to the next room, Ussop clinging to him fearfully. This one had black paint splattered on the walls in splotches – with each wall near covered by angry writing. The ink had faded, so he wasn't able to decipher what had been written. The rug was ripped up in some areas, revealing the concrete floor. The furniture was smashed, laying in complete disarray – the mattress propped up against the wall, with black sheets still clinging to it. There were miscellaneous items lying in chaotic clutter on the floor – some of them colored tubes like the ones he'd found earlier. Clothes lay in a massive pile in the closet – all of it black, gaudily printed material. One of the boots he found had the leather torn down the back from calf to heel. Faint splotches on the wall near the closet was of a different color than the paint – knuckle sized, as if someone had punched it repeatedly in anger.
The other room had a sterile feel to it – no posters, no color, with plain, worn sheets and a book left atop of the comforter. Aside from a desk with multiple texts sitting in the corner, it looked as if this room had been abandoned a long time ago. The closet revealed t-shirts and jeans, with shoes ranging from high tops to Vans shelved into neat rows. Without any personality to it, he couldn't tell what sort of person had once lived here.
The next one had a familiar clutter to it – magazines with animals, with National Geographic and Discovery piled into dangerous towers around the bed like an obstacle course. There were earthy destination posters all over the room, some overlapping each other, with writing that had caused the print to fade right into the wall. On the desk were various electronics, various pink slips scattered over them – there was a waste basket full of them next to it. The closet revealed a general mess – underwear, shorts, pants, shirts, and shoes that didn't match crammed into available places. There was a giant Jolly Roger painted over most of the posters overlooking the bed, which had been sloppily made. There were liquid stains everywhere, which made the bed look disgusting – Zoro could see wrappers peeking out from underneath, as well as plates and cups that held stains that were no longer decipherable.
"There are no pictures," Ussop observed, hands on his hips. "Are these the only rooms?"
"If it were hiding lots of people, these can't be the only rooms," Zoro mused. "But you're right…there are no pictures."
"No bodies, Bejabbers!" Ussop said with relief, hand to his chest.
Zoro confirmed this with a nod, walking back out. Sanji met them in the living room, mopping up his nose with what looked to be a t-shirt.
"If I sniff this hard enough, it smells like women's perfume!" he declared, holding it out to them. Ussop recoiled from it, Zoro giving him a disgusted look.
"Clean your face! Scobberlotcher."
They all meandered towards the open corridor, wandering through to peer into the rooms available. One was a dining room – it was once a grand presentation with a large, oak table, walls lined with wood panels, and elaborately decorated chairs; there was a chandelier hanging from the ceiling, its strands long since broken. There were printed curtains open to reveal a life portrait of a world with trees, a parking lot, blue skies. With the light coming from the broken light fixture, it seemed like a real world outside of the frame. The rug was faded with traffic use, chair indentations where they had been pulled out and in, over and over again. There was a music player in the corner of the room, with a speaker system that spread over the room. When Ussop pressed the Power button, the sounds of a dining area had them all jerking with surprise. Glass clinked, diners murmured, voices called out to each other as utensils scraped over plates. Music played faintly in the distance. For a moment, it felt like they had just stepped into a fabled restaurant, and looked around themselves for the sight of other diners. His skin pimpled with goosebumps, Ussop turned it off.
Sanji rubbed his arms, shivering. "It feels like I been hit with a ghost."
Zoro reached out and patted his shoulder with reassurance.
All of them ventured into another room – a library that looked as if it had been set fire, burning shelves, books, and tables all into a rug that had disintegrated over time. The stench of extinguished smoke lingered. There was nothing salvageable, here.
The one next to it was a gym – holding enough space for a court, a treadmill, some weights that had been strewn across the entire area, as if someone had thrown them from the racks. The bench was overturned, mangled into an unrecognizable mess. Beyond that was more space, but they couldn't see that far due to the darkness. The lights above had been shattered, allowing only the light from the hall to enter.
"Someone was mean," Sanji whispered, peering over Zoro's shoulder, where he was hiding with Ussop. Their voices, and breath, seemed to carry over the open space, giving it a spooky feeling. They quickly left that area and wandered into a medical office – this place, too, had been destroyed thoroughly. The floor was left with nearly a knee-high pile of metal, unrecognizable items, shelves, and a table that was barely poking through what looked like a cabinet. Four other rooms revealed too much damage for them to even guess what they had once been, and a few doors that they couldn't unlock – they returned to the living room, heading for the doors on the other side of the living room. Only one could be opened, and this revealed a narrow corridor that allowed them to walk through in a single file – Zoro opened the wheel, pushing the door in to reveal a very damp room that whispered with energy and activity. It felt like there were many people inside, but it yielded only four metallic pods. Walking down the steps, they touched onto metal floor that creaked with their weight. The walls were formed out of strange material – like sparkling wet concrete.
Eyes wide, Ussop looked up at the tubing that connected the units together, over the pipes that ran along the walls, the lights that slowly flared to life once they'd crossed the threshold. He found the source of power that whispered with use – looking the dash over, he tried to figure out exactly what it was as Zoro and Sanji walked a little further in, examining the modules propped upright against the walls. Half of them were metal – the other half was a glass-like plating that had long since been covered with grime and dirt that neither could move when they wiped at it. But they found handles, locking mechanisms activated by a single red toggle that was darkly stained with age and dust.
Ussop gasped, hands over his mouth as he looked over at the others, their attention to him. Taking a few steps towards them, clinging to Zoro, Ussop eked out, "These are con-taint-ment units! They got life inside!"
"Well, keen, let's see what sort," Sanji said. "Maybe they're seeds for crops."
"Or cool, ancient edible animals," Zoro theorized, rubbing his chin as he tried to imagine these pods holding the DNA of future food.
"Crops are better."
"Meat tastes better."
"You ain't ever had a properly cooked meal."
"You ain't either!"
"Maybe it's the officers that were living here!" Ussop exclaimed, scraping at the dirt over one tube with his fingernail. "That dash reads full power – whatever it is, it's been energizing them for the last two hundred years! Smooth! If we can harness that power for the colony's use, we wouldn't have to rely on solar and wind, no more!"
"I guess that's smooth," Zoro said.
"I don't know, that sounds like a lot of hassle," Sanji said.
"Guys! Get jived with me!"
"All I'm thinking is if other people hear about it, they're gonna want it."
Ussop patted on the tube he had been scratching at, slapping his palm loudly on the plating. "If these guys here are from two hundred years ago, think of the information they've retained from back then! We can use their brains for our own colony's value! We only know what was left behind, and what works – they might know more than us!"
Zoro and Sanji rolled their eyes towards each other, then frowned in sync.
"Ussop," Zoro said impatiently, crossing his arms.
"If they're from two hundred years back, they won't know much now," Sanji finished crossly.
"Someone gonna have to take care of them, and it ain't gonna be me. I'm busy."
"No one can trust you with a job, anyway."
"Look at him, he pervs out on old underwear! He can't be jake with a job like that!"
"This guy lacks common sense! He'll get them dead ten minutes flat!"
Ussop glared at them, hand on his hip, leaning against the unit as they looked upon him with twin expressions of reluctance. "I think the only reason why the colony keeps you guys is because I'm the only one that tolerates you both."
"We can at least tell the diggers what we got, here," Sanji said with a sigh, flapping the bushy tail of his scarf with nervous action. "Then maybe they'll make a trip down here for themselves for what's valuable."
"Besides, finding living things in con-taint-ment units is something you should take with a side of caution," Zoro said. "They in there for a reason."
"Yeah, to survive the war!" Ussop pointed out impatiently.
"Just find the one with the girl in it, and - !"
"Could you keep that sick part of you to yourself?"
"Look," Ussop interrupted them, pushing away from the unit. "Let's look around more. All this talk got me quaking."
"Ain't nothing else to look at, when we seen it all," Sanji pointed out.
Zoro looked at him. "But you can find stuff we can't see."
"I ain't smell nothing in here that's new."
"Bejabbers, you guys, you're giving me a headache," Ussop said tiredly, clutching his temples. He then caught sight of a separate color on the unit he was leaning on, and crouched down. Using his nail to clear away the dust and grime from the plate, he read "Kid". "Huh. This one's labeled as a 'kid'. What do the others say?"
Seeing that Ussop was onto something, Zoro and Sanji separated to find similar plates. They repeated the names they found.
"Perona…that's the girl, then," Zoro said with some consideration.
"I'm going to assume Kid's the one with the travel posters," Ussop said with a shrug.
"Maybe they were important ones – belonging to big shots on base," Sanji said, leaning against a unit marked 'Luffy'. "Spoiled brats that got to survive the war when everything else blew up."
"Like royalty?"
"Maybe."
Ussop scratched his forehead. "Well…how does that explain the mess we found?"
After seeing the others' shrugs, Ussop sighed heavily, looking over 'Kid's' unit with some thought. He pulled back, hands on his hips. "Let's let Robin know of this. She'll figure it out."
"I kinda want to press this button, here," Sanji said, eyeing a red toggle over a stained latch.
"DON'T DO IT!" Ussop screeched, his voice ringing out loudly within the enclosed space.
"It's mighty tempting," Zoro agreed, looking at the one just below his grasp. "I bet it don't do nothing."
"STOP!"
"Let me just press hers!" Sanji said, sidling up to Perona's tube with a cheeky expression. "I want to play with her button!"
"You dumb rantallion!" Zoro shouted at him, kicking him. In result, Sanji smashed up against the tube, effectively hitting the toggle. All of them froze for a few moments as they heard a loud click. A loud alarm rang out, causing Sanji to jump away, latching onto Zoro with startled action, Ussop already climbing up the other side of him for safety. Zoro stumbled under their weight, tripping over his own feet, the three of them slamming against Kid's tube. Ussop fell from Zoro, pushing in another toggle that gave the same alarm as it activated the locking mechanism.
"Well, might as well as do them all," Sanji said, brushing off his pants before reaching out and depressing the next two. Zoro and Ussop looked at him with shock, alarms ringing out as a sharp hissing sound cut through the stillness.
"Shitspray!"
"Why did you do that?"
"Let's keep it even! What's the worst that can happen?" Sanji scoffed, hands at his hips as another alarm sounded out, causing the glass to shake slightly. "If they're from two hundred years ago, they ain't any keen to what's happening, now! They'd have to rely on us to get by, right?"
"Sounds smooth to me," Zoro said, the trio of them moving closer to the door as they watched what looked like steam rise up from the opened tubes.
Breathing heavily, Ussop watched the tube closest to him, barely blinking. "Bejabbers…this is almost too wild for me."
"You babies, ain't nothing can keep for two hundred years, anyway!" Sanji scoffed. "I bet we'll only find bodies, inside."
Minutes passed as they continued to watch in silence, waiting for something to happen. But escaping air and the sound of draining fluids that rattled through old pipes kept them alert, watching the glass plating with nervous expressions. Zoro grew aware that both Ussop and Sanji were leaning heavily against him, as if keeping him between those in the pods and them. Eventually, one of the units started to move with a loud winding sound, the plating sucked into the metal frame, slowly revealing a sleeping young woman with vibrant pink hair.