Chapter Text
45 million berry was a shit ton for a first time bounty.
Now did it hold a candle to Zoro’s 60 million or Robin’s 77? Oh hell no. But for Kari who got her tail twisted in the netting of her hammock twice a week and has to beg Nami to help cut her out? Well it was a little more than eye-opening.
Like her? Worth 45 million? She’s pretty sure literally every member of the crew could name one time she’d done something stupid enough to have that number drop fast.
“I’m going to throw up.” Kari announces as she sits on the deck while the others inspect the various new bounties.
Someone thrusts a bucket into her arms before that could be a possibility.
While she held onto the bucket for dear life, Luffy complimented her, “Hey 45 million is a better bounty than mine! Good job Kari.”
Nami leans over to squint at the sheet, reading, “‘Omen Borne: Kari,’” She whistles, “a little too edgy for my taste. But then again the Marines don’t know that you think the universe revolves exclusively around our planet.”
“It does. The stars shift a little throughout the year.” Kari dips her head into the bucket and moans.
“I’m sorry— you think the universe revolves only around us?” Robin asks. It’s that tone that every first timer achieves upon discovering Kari’s negative intelligence modifier.
“Just wait till she tells you about how the world is flat.” Usopp elbows Robin’s side with a big grin.
“Quit moaning.” Zoro scolds, snatching her bounty out of Luffy’s hands and handing his off to someone else to inspect. “It’s not even that high.”
“Not that— not that high?!” Kari’s head snaps up and she all but abandons her bucket so she can snatch the poster out of Zoro’s hands, pointing at it in horror. “This shit would get me blacklisted by even the most forgiving of churches back home!”
“Oh boo hoo, woe is me.”
Kari drops the poster and just goes for straight up tackling the swordsman. It doesn’t do all that much considering she has a strength modifier about as depressing as her intelligence, but she can understand why barbarians get high off their rage when fighting. That shit was fuel.
While the pair roll around and wrestle on deck, Usopp bends down to snatch up Kari’s abandoned bounty. He gives it a tentative look before saying, “You have a very off-putting smile.”
“Maybe that aided in her getting that high a bounty?” Chopper guessed.
“Nah,” Sanji mutters, glaring at the bounty of Zoro and recalling Alabasta, “Kari traumatized a lot of Marines when we were in Rain Dinners.”
“Speaking from personal experience,” Robin hums, smiling from where she is draped over a sun-chair and basking in the shade of an umbrella propped above her, “the World Government does tend to give bounties based upon how much of a threat the individuals could be to them.”
“On the run since you were younger…” Usopp mutters and Kari doesn’t know what the hells he’s talking about as she’s too busy trying to choke out Zoro and get him to call uncle.
And while Kari and Zoro rolled around, they paused when noting the suddenly brief sprinkling of water pattering down on them. And more so the shadow that was suddenly blocking out the sun.
Both glanced up and felt their hearts drop down to their asses.
“Brace yourselves!” Kari and Zoro screech. The warlock clings onto Zoro while he fumbles for the railing of the stairs, grabbing and clinging with all the strength he could muster.
Everyone paused, glanced up at what had made them panic before immediately falling into panic as well and scrambling for the nearest nailed down surface to cling onto.
A massive ship fell out of the sky and rocked the Merry.
Everyone was a screaming mess as they rode out the waves battering against the Merry’s hull and threatening to send them sinking into the Maiden’s embrace.
Really, if anyone were to pay a better and proper look, they’d recognize that they were actually being nearly capsized by half of a galleon that was dropping out of the sky, like a god tossing a toy they were no longer interested in.
And worse yet, even after the ship sinks down, allowing a few lingering waves to batter and rock their ship, more starts to fall.
“Everyone in the galley!” Sanji shouts, bracing the door open for everyone to sprint inside while evading the falling loot that was crashing to the deck and more than likely to crack their heads open by the force they garnered.
But soon enough everyone was holed up in the galley, waiting for the silence that meant the downpour of barrels and bodies had ended. While waiting, everyone silently processed the trauma of what had just happened and it was Kari who broke the prolonged quiet.
“We’re cursed!” She shouts, tugging at the brim of her hat in dismay.
No one could immediately negate the idea because no one knew what on earth had just happened.
“It’s uh,” Usopp sputters in trying to convince himself that this was all just a bad dream and soon they’d be waking up and just fine and they’d be continuing their adventure without ships falling out of the sky. “Maybe it was a mass hallucination?”
“I don’t know,” Zoro mutters, peeking out the porthole window and at the final dregs of supplies descending. “Looks pretty damn real to me.”
“This is all my fault, isn’t it?” Kari mutters from where she is still poorly hiding beneath her hat.
“How the hell would this be your fault?” Nami gripes. “Did you magic half a ship to fall on top of us?”
“I— no—”
“Then stop being a baby.” Zoro gripes. He pauses in his assessment at the sights outside. “I think it’s finally over.”
Everyone releases one big sigh of relief.
Slowly, they begin to meander their way outside, and right before Kari can shakily follow, a small hoof worms itself into clinging to leg. She doesn’t need to look to know Chopper is likely just as wigged out as everyone else. So she steals herself, gets her act and personal qualms together, and shuffles outside with the reindeer being dragged along.
The deck has definitely seen better days.
There are a couple bodies (fully decomposed and just left as skeletons, Kari notes) strewn about. A couple barrels cracked open, revealing rotten fruits and other goods. Even some broken crates with various supplies.
It looked like a battleground.
“This is an omen.” Kari announces. “I’m the only one here qualified enough to say that, and this is textbook omen shit.”
Again, no one can really refute her remark.
“For the sake of my sanity,” Usopp breathes, literally quaking in his boots as he inspects one of the skeletons, “let’s assume it’s not an omen and throw out some guesses on why this just happened.”
“I am in agreement with our lovely second mate in assuming the gods have forsaken us.” Robin says pleasantly while also inspecting a corpse in morbid fascination.
“Kari,” Chopper sniffs from where he is still clinging onto her leg, “are we gonna die?”
”Oh no we wouldn’t die.” Kari waves off.
“Oh, w-well that’s good…”
”It’s just more than likely that our friends and loved ones will be forced to reconcile with the sins we currently commit from here until the end of time.”
Chopper starts wailing.
Nami throws a shoe at Kari, where she got it from was, of course, unimportant. “Stop saying ominous shit!”
Someone needed to start rolling some investigation checks stat.
Nami starts screaming.
Because of course she does.
“What?!” Sanji shouts, ready to kick the living daylight out of whatever was causing Nami to give such a guttural screech. “What is it?! Whose ass do I need to beat?! Marimo’s?!”
“What the hell, cornbread?!”
“The log pose!” Nami gasps, staring down at said device, “It— it’s broken!”
“How can it be broken?!” Usopp yells, pulls at his hair in disdain, “We just got it!”
“It’s facing up!”
Kari gasps, and everyone locks onto her, as if suspecting her to admit to some great deliverance of knowledge only a magic user could have.
“The moon!”
“Idiot!”
Nami takes out another shoe, the other fated pair to the previously chucked footwear, and starts smacking Kari with it in the hopes it might solve their second mate’s chronic dumbassery.
While Kari is busy trying to defend herself from Nami’s shoe onslaught, Robin taps her chin thoughtfully, peering up at the wide blue sky and the distinct lack of anything from which the ship could have fallen from.
“...A sky island.”
That gets the crew to pause.
“Our log pose is stuck on a sky island.”
“Sky island?” Luffy echoes, his eyes widening with sparkling awe. Whenever he looked such a way it always spelled guaranteed trouble.
“See!” Kari shouted, throwing her arms at Robin in emphasis. “I just said that! Why isn’t Robin getting hit?!”
“She’s new.” Nami answers, wielding the shoe much like Zoro might hold his katana. “And she’s not dumb. Don’t even pretend that you said the same thing.”
“But the moon—” Kari shuts up real fast when Nami raises the shoe higher.
“But I don’t see any sky islands…” Usopp mutters, shielding his eyes from the sun and peering above.
“It wouldn’t just be an island.” Robin explains, peering up alongside everyone else. “There would be a sea with it.”
“There’s a sky island and a sky sea?!” Chopper shouts, sounding awed and looking close to vibrating in frequency with Luffy with how excited the pair were at the prospect.
“I’m lost.” Sanji mumbled, scratching at his head with a pinched expression.
“You and me both, corndog.” Kari mutters, pauses, and immediately puts on an excited smile. “Zoro! Corndog! Corndog!”
Zoro gives a hardy laugh and Sanji can’t help but feel significantly closer to dubbing Kari an honorary man just so he can throttle her without any moral repercussions.
“Alright!” Luffy declares, pointing at the sky with all the focus a captain ought to have. “Let’s set sail for the sky island!”
“One small issue.” Zoro mutters, interrupting the excited air after coming down from his laughing fit. He folds his arms and glares up at the sky. “How do we get there?”
Now that has everyone pausing.
Then they all slowly look at Kari.
Whom of which is poking at one loose broken off piece of wood from one of the barrels. It’s as the dawning silence reigns for a couple seconds too long that she finally looks up. Seven pairs of eyes staring right at her.
“...Yes?”
“We need to get up to the sky island.” Luffy says.
Kari blinks. “...Yeah?”
“What magic you got, chief?”
Kari blanches, immediately fumbling to get her head on straight. “Wha— you want me to get up there?!”
“We’d prefer you getting us there, but yes.” Usopp nods.
Kari can’t help but stare at them in bewilderment, “Guys I know I’m magic, but that doesn’t mean I can perform magic.”
“You literally—” Nami cuts herself off, dragging a hand down her face in annoyance. “Alright, the wizard’s a bust—”
“Warlock, dammit!”
“—any other bright ideas?”
There is a disturbing amount of time which is put into thinking up their next course of actions. And really, it probably would have gone on even longer had it not been for their newest crewmate rescuing them from their inevitable embarrassment. “We should scavenge the wreckage to see if we can find any pertinent information.”
“I was about to say the same thing.” Kari says, and fails her deception roll so hard that no one even bothers looking at her.
Luffy is positively enthralled by the idea of scavenging that he all but launches himself to the floating galleon. Usopp follows swiftly enough after Zoro mentioned being too tired to fish their captain out if he falls in. And it’s more than clear that Kari is in no shape to do the same.
So they're left to scrounge their deck, uncovering a coffin and allowing Robin to assess.
Kari’s nose scrunches at the immediate odor. “That shit is foul.”
“I thought archeologists like rocks?” Nami asks, hiding behind the mast with Chopper.
“Rocks and bodies have a lot in common.” Robin says delightfully, picking up what appeared to be the shattered remains of a skull.
“No? They don’t?”
Chopper’s comment is ignored as Robin continues assessing, beginning to puzzle piece the skull back together with surprising ease.
Sanji sighs dreamily, “A skeleton and a pretty lady, what a combo!”
Zoro and Kari share a concerned look.
“Ah ha.” Robin says pleasantly once finished re-making the skull.
She places it down on deck for the others to scrutinize. Kari can’t help but wince, tail swaying side to side in her unnerved state. Zoro none so subtly slides closer to Kari, but no one calls him out on it.
“This hole is man-made.” Robin observes, tracing the hole thoughtfully.
“So that’s what killed him?” Sanji asks, his awed expression sobering.
“No,” Robin remarks, “These are old, more likely results from a brain surgery.”
“...Yes.” Chopper mutters from behind the mast, shuffling in place nervously. “It… a long time ago people used to make holes in the skull to relieve the pressure of tumors. But… nobody does that anymore.”
“So we don’t have to worry about you drilling holes in our heads?” Kari jokes.
Chopper looks appalled by the thought.
“This man died 200 years ago.” Robin mutters, leaning back to scrutinize. “He was in his mid-thirties. It seems he got sick on the high seas and died. By comparison to the other bodies on board, he’s significantly more well preserved. Likely due to the tar.” Robin pauses, thoughtful. “His clothes seem to be from the South Blue. If I had to guess that ship was an old exploration vessel.”
Robin taps her fingers on deck thoughtfully, eyes searching for something none of them could imagine. Before suddenly she pauses, rises, and says, “I’ll be right back.” And quietly treks inside the galley.
While everyone still looks distinctly uncomfortable with the reality of them nearly being crushed by a — highly likely — ghost ship, Kari thinks ah screw it and gets closer to the casket.
It seems her scrutiny garners attention, her crewmates quietly watching as she stares down at the bones that remain. Tentatively, she reaches inside and tugs out one larger shard, what once might have been part of the humerus. She holds it up to the sky, squinting at it.
“...Maybe we should leave the excavating to the archeologist, Bug—”
“Do you guys do mummification here?”
They’re startled by the question.
“Wha— I mean, different places may have their traditions, but—”
“Is it generally frowned upon or something?” Kari asks, picking up another piece of bone to scrutinize, even going as far as to sniff the thing.
Nami is scrambling to find her words, “I— I don’t know but I don’t think it’s common—”
“Mummification isn’t all that common out on the Grand Line.” Their heads turn and find Robin stepping out from the galley, lugging a small book with her as she approaches. She seems amused and — dare they admit it — a tad bit impressed. “Though it isn’t unheard of out in the South Blue.”
“Ah,” Kari nods, settling one of her bone fragments back into the casket, “then that makes sense.”
“What’s up? What about mummy’s?” Chopper stutters.
“This is a botched mummification attempt.” Kari answers, pointing at the casket before standing back up and patting herself down lest any bone dust cling to her. “That’s why shit stank so bad.”
“Aren’t mummy’s supposed to smell… good?”
“If you did it right, yeah.” Kari nods, deciding to go on and explain while Robin thumbed through her book. “But if you did it wrong? Then it can reek. What gave it away was the tar. But I also saw the bones.” She points at the fragments she’d been inspecting. “They’re hollow.”
“Hollow bones?” Nami gapes.
“Osteoporosis.” Robin helpfully adds.
Immediately Chopper’s eyes light up in realization. “Dehydration.” He breathes. “And that’s—”
“Part of the mummifying ritual.” Kari nods, scratching at her chin thoughtfully.
“How the hell do you know so much about this shit?” Zoro asks, raising an expectant brow.
And Kari… pauses.
Her lips thin, her brows furrow and she doesn’t immediately answer. In fact, it almost looked like she was searching for an answer. But slowly, very slowly, she says, “The temple I grew up in handled a lot of the dead.” She slowly folds her arms, rolling her shoulders back as if to stave down some deep lingering nerves. “We practiced it.”
And for Kari, who may as well be allergic to talking about her past, that was something they couldn’t even try to ignore.
“Hold on, you know how to mummify people?!” Nami practically screeches.
Kari’s expression is more than obviously uncomfortable with the topic. “I didn’t really— I didn’t participate in it. I was an onlooker. Apprentice? No— it was different. I was—” Kari’s lips suddenly thin. She looked ill with whatever memories were bothering her, “It’s complicated.”
“No shit, complicated.” Sanji mutters, rubbing at his face with a new set of views in regard to Kari. Even Robin had temporarily abandoned her page flipping to give Kari a look full of curiosity that she was sure she’d regret later.
It was more than obvious that the crew wanted to press but with the thwacking of her tail, Kari grit her teeth and put on her most pleasant smile. “Can we table this discussion for later? Preferably never actually, but— but can we get back to the matter at hand?”
“Oh we are so revisiting this—”
“Ah!” Robin says suddenly, and in an instant, everyone is staring back at her. She lifts the book up and taps at the page she’d been searching for. “Here we are. The St. Briss from the South Blue. It went missing 208 years ago.” She snaps the book shut with an echoing thunk and smiles. “That’d be the ship that fell on us.”
And it seemed that was enough to get the topic back on track. “So that ship was sailing above us for 208 years before it fell on us?” Nami blanches.
Kari spares a cautious look at Robin, more than able to pick up on the fact that she’d deliberately turned the attention away from her. And Robin, as if sensing her staring, winks.
“How the hell did you figure that out from looking at a bunch of bones?” Sanji mutters, staring in awe down at the casket with new respect and wonder.
“They say dead men tell no tales, but there’s always a story or two lingering still.” Robin explains.
Kari leans over to Zoro and whispers, “They tend to be jammed between the ribs.”
Zoro gives her an appalled look, but doesn’t draw attention to the comment. Because he was a good friend like that.
“If it was an exploration ship,” Robin starts, getting up and dusting herself off, “then there are likely to be records on board we can peruse.”
And as if hearing this remark, Luffy’s voice calls from over the distance, “Ship’s sinking!”
“What the hell?!” Nami shouts, “Why can’t we have anything easy?!”
“Where’s the fun in that, Nami-swan?”
While they fished out their captain and sniper from the wreckage that was more than content to sleep in the Maiden’s embrace, Sanji wanders next to Kari.
“...So… mummy’s—”
“Sanji.”
“Shutting up.”
A couple minutes go by in which they have to yell Usopp’s ear off about not being able to do the one job they’d entrusted him with, and Luffy being none too helpful in talking about treasure and adventures, and Luffy finally slowed down enough to reveal his great find.
“I found,” he breathes like he is waiting for a drumroll that no one is eager to supply him with, “a map!”
“We found a map, actually.” Usopp corrects, drying himself off with the towel supplied to him via Chopper.
“Check it out!”
He showcases his map and the grand luxurious art presented.
Kari would never admit it, but it’s with great pride that she can admit she can basically sound out the name… she thinks.
“...Skypeia?” She asks very very slowly.
Sanji throws an arm around her in good spirit. “Hey! Good job!”
She definitely preens under the praise.
Each of them take their time in inspecting the map, awing at the reality that there was an island sitting right over their heads! Ripe and ready for them to explore, pillage, and all around have a good time. They’re damn near bursting at the seams by the time they come down enough to try and talk about a proper game plan.
“I’m all on team ‘let’s-go-to-sky-island.’” Nami assures while Usopp, Chopper, and Luffy are singing about the potential adventures they’d share above. “But we should figure out how to get there first.”
“Well that’s your job. You’re our navigator aren’t you?” Luffy asks.
Nami smacks him for that.
“Kari!” Usopp calls. “Magic time!”
“And I already said I can’t do jack-shit!” Kari snaps.
Robin, quiet in thought up until this moment, glances up to say, “It’s likely the records on their ship might be able to supply us with some useful information as to how they got up there. It could even have the answers we’re searching for.”
And like a flip of the switch, Luffy was all smiles and new focus as he puffs up his chest and grins like the psychopath he is. “Alright! Then we’ll have to dive down and get our answers!”
“Bad news, cap.” Zoro says, and it’s hardly sarcastic. “You’re a devil fruit user and the minute you touch the water you might as well be an anchor."
“Well then I’ll hold my breath for a really long time!”
“Honestly, it’s kind of a miracle we’ve made it this far.” Chopper mutters.
Zoro gives him a little pat on the hat in offer of support.
Usopp taps at his chin, muttering to himself thoughtfully. Then his eyes light up. “I got it!” He points dramatically in the air, “The great captain Usopp, revolutionary of the high seas, supporter of dreams, head of the 52nd battalion of—”
“Can the ‘great captain Usopp’ wrap it up and tell us his genius plan, already?”
“—I know how we can scavenge the ship!”
It’s brilliant.
It’s stupid.
It’s so utterly them.
And it is making Kari want to throw up her arms and call foul play with how she was roped in before she could conveniently vanish into the galley.
“I am not scuba diving to that ghost ship!” She hisses much like a cat threatened with bathtime.
“Kari, you’re being a brat right now. So we’re gonna need you to wrap up your tantrum and don the barrel.” Nami says, completely ignoring Kari’s offense.
“What part of not scuba diving did you not get? I’m not gonna miss—”
“I’ll hack off 30% of your debt.”
“—out on this fun action! Usopp, where’s the barrel?”
Now donned in her stupid ass barrel that was doubling as breathing gear, which Kari was also questioning how it would still let them sink — listen she was a dumbass, but even she knew that air pockets float — she deemed herself ready to go.
That didn’t mean she had to be happy with this shit.
“I look stupid.” Kari grumbled as she hoisted her barrel up higher so she could wobble forward.
Zoro, donned in his own stupid ass barrel, hobbled after her, complimenting, “I don’t know, I think this is your best outfit to-date, horn-head.”
“Sanji.”
“Bug, I’d kick his ass for you, but this shit is putting my center of balance off kilter. So let’s put a pin in that until after we complete this mission.” There’s a bit of smoke fogging up Sanji’s circular window that Usopp had managed to hammer into each of their make-shift scuba gear.
Chopper mutters something about not smoking while you have limited oxygen, but goes ignored.
Kari sulks, pauses, and asks, “Can you at least verbally kick his ass?”
Zoro blinks at her, “Can you not?”
“Oh I can,” Kari assures, “but it’s much funnier when I don’t give you the satisfaction.”
Zoro is suitably offended.
There’s a brief flash out of the corner of their vision, and they turn to find Nami with a shit eating grin, a den den mushi currently printing a photo of their lacking hubris.
“Hey!”
“Nami-swan, how could you?”
“You know I’m gonna find that shit and tear it up in your sleep right?”
“Not if it’s in my bra, you’re not!” Said photo immediately gets thrust into said blatant hiding space.
“I hate you.” Kari hisses.
“Sure you do.” Nami grins, and they were all definitely gonna regret this later.
Robin, who had been quietly observing with Chopper until this point, smiles. “You look positively wonderful.”
Kari points dubiously at their new archeologist. “You’re full of shit, Robin!”
Her hand is lightly smacked by Sanji. “Don’t go around calling a literal goddess a piece of shit!”
“I said she’s full of shit! Not that she’s a piece of shit!” And Kari has to pause and doubletake on what Sanji had just compared Robin to. “And Sanji, while Robin may have a shitload of hands on— ugh— on hand, she’s hardly goddess material.”
“Oh?” Robin’s head tilts, her eyes sparkling with blatant curiosity.
“Yeah,” Kari shrugs, which to those watching looked like her barrel briefly burst to life before resting again, “you’d barely qualify as a demi-god, no offense or anything.”
“Why’re we even talking about this?” Zoro gripes, looking as haggard as he can while donned in a massive barrel that did nothing for his general physique. “Gods aren’t real.”
There are varying hums of agreement or disagreement, but none of them even touch Kari’s reaction of staring at Zoro for all his worth and questioning how he had made it this far in life running on nothing but pure unadulterated impudence. “Zoro. I get my powers from a god.”
Zoro blinks. “I thought you said you got your powers and magic from a patron?”
“Yeah, a patron who just so happens to be a— I’m sorry, did you think I meant patron like customer?”
Zoro wisely does not answer the question. Instead, he shrugs and turns his head away. “Eh.”
“Eh?” Kari’s fingers twitch like she’d ready to throw down with the swordsman here and now. “Eh?”
“Still don’t believe it.”
“Sanji.”
“Again, Bug, I can’t really throttle his ass right now, but I promise that the minute I’m out of this I’ll toss him to the Maiden myself.”
She has to trust he’d fulfill his end for now, but she’s never been filled with this much unbridled offense in her life. Like, c’mon, what world doesn’t have gods? That’s like— the whole point!
Luckily she is saved from further questioning Zoro’s general intelligence and sanity by Luffy kicking open the galley door and waddling out in his contraption. And really there was no better word to describe the comical sight of their captain. Because the double barrel attached together, rubber tubes acting as deterrents to incoming water, and the whole nine yards was just plain comical.
Really it would have been much easier to just let the trio sink into the sea without the living embodiment of waterphobia coming with them, but nothing could negate Luffy’s need for adventure. Not even diving into the thing that might as well be his natural born enemy.
“Alright!” He announces, grin as wide as they come. “Let’s go!”