One Piece (Love Story) [Part One]

Chapter One Hundred and Seven [Rewritten]

"Wha...?" I owlishly blinked, flicking my wrists and sending water droplets flying from my fingertips as my mind struggled to process what had just happened. There was something jarring about how sudden the shift was—there was something unsettling about the painful change in pressure followed by the sharp and sudden surfacing through what felt like a sea of water. Unlike the roaring winds and pelting specks of rain down below, everything was peacefully quiet up here in the clouds.

"What the...what just happened to us?" Zoro panted, just as confused as everyone else as he looked around. "Is everyone alright?" he asked.

"Hey, look guys! Out there—what's that?!" Luffy shouted, taking the attention off of our sudden and bizarre entrance as he pointed towards the delicate clouds that drifted around us in an endless sea of white.

"What in the world...?" Sanji muttered.

"It's solid white" Luffy gaped as if shocked by the lack of color.

"They're clouds!" Chopper awed.

"So this is what it looks like up in the clouds? Oddly enough despite being so white, it looks really pretty" I smiled as I took a second to really admire how serene everything looked. "Perhaps this is what one sees when they die..." I mumbled, already feeling quite pleased with the thought that after death one would get to see something so peaceful and beautiful.

"What was that?" Zoro asked with a raised brow.

"Oh nothing, just talking to myself" I chirped, hooking my arm around his own as I widely smiled up at him. "Look at how pretty the clouds are" I pointed, quick to move his attention elsewhere as he quietly hummed in agreement before huffing a small smile the second he looked down at me.

"But how? Why aren't we falling?" Nami asked, struggling just as much as the rest of us in processing what she was seeing.

"Clouds float, boats float—same thing" Luffy dismissively waved.

"No, it's not!" Zoro, Sanji, and Chopper snapped.

"That's not how logic works at all..." I sweat dropped.

"Oh no, Usopp's not breathing!" Chopper suddenly cried out as he was quick to worriedly hover over the still sharpshooter who hadn't moved an inch since we emerged from the clouds.

"He's not?" Luffy concernedly asked. "Someone do something—mouth-to-mouth!" he frantically ordered.

"Alright! I'll do mouth-to-mouth on Nami!" Sanji offered.

"But...Usopp's the one that needs it, not Nami..." I frowned.

"Moron" Zoro rolled his eyes before a sly grin suddenly tugged at his lips as he snaked an arm around my waist and leaned down close to my ear. "Do you need mouth-to-mouth?" he teasingly asked, sending a shiver down my spine.

"No!" I embarrassingly snapped, quick to press the palm of my hand against the side of his face as I harshly pushed him away. "What part of Usopp's the one that needs it don't you men understand?" I huffed as he laughed.

"Usopp! Come on—speak to me!" Chopper pleaded as he started to perform chest compressions on Usopp.

"He's alive!" he and Luffy cheered when the sharpshooter's eyes finally snapped open.

"I am?" he sounded surprised as he sat up before screaming. "Then where are we—what's with all these clouds?! They're everywhere!" he cried.

"We all died and went to Heaven, I'm sorry you had to find out this way" I deadpanned, leaning down close to Usopp's face as he paled.

"Move!" I snickered as Nami roughly pushed me aside. "Ignore her, basically it's...it's an ocean in the sky" she said, struggling to find the proper words to describe where exactly we were despite not sounding all that confident in her assumption.

"No way, seriously?!" Usopp gaped in bafflement as he stood and rushed over to the ship's railing so that he could look down at the fluffy white clouds that surrounded us.

"But look, the Log Pose is still pointing up" Nami pointed out.

"So we must still be somewhere in the middle of the Cumulorgalis cloud" Robin suggested.

"So that means there's even more up above us?" I asked, curiously peering up.

"Wait, you mean we have to travel even higher?" Chopper frowned as he tilted his head.

"That's what the Log Pose says at least" Robin nodded.

"Did I hear you call me a moron?" Sanji asked, getting in Zoro's face as if he only just now suddenly remembered hearing the moss-haired man insulting him earlier.

"I don't know, did you?" the swordsman asked.

"We haven't even been up here for an hour, could you two please not fight yet" I sighed.

"An ocean..." Usopp muttered before suddenly unbuttoning his overalls and proudly showing off his smooth chest. "Here I go! Cloud swimming champ, Usopp!" he boasted atop the railing.

"Looking good" I playfully whistled, causing Luffy to laugh and join in as Zoro lightly frowned with the roll of his eyes.

"Yeah, you can do it!" Chopper cheered alongside the captain and me.

"Hey, you can't swim here, we still don't know anything about this place" Sanji pointed out.

"Watch me" Usopp cockily grinned before diving off the ship's railing and into the sea of clouds.

"He did it!" Luffy gasped.

"He's so brave!" Chopper awed.

"Or incredibly stupid—one or the other" I shrugged.

"What's the difference?" Nami grumbled, causing me to laugh.

"Aw man, it's not fair" Luffy huffed. "I wish I could swim like that" he childishly pouted.

"I bet it's the most fun thing ever..." Chopper mumbled with a pout of his own as I gave the two's backs a comforting pat.

"Hey...um...he's not coming back up" Zoro said after a moment of silence had passed and there were no signs of the sharpshooter emerging.

"You know, it's quite possible that this ocean might not have an actual bottom" Robin remarked.

"Well, we are on a cloud, and clouds aren't really known to be solid" I agreed.

"Say what?" Sanji blinked.

"Idiot! Did that fool just fall through the clouds?!" Zoro grounded out.

"Usopp!" Luffy worriedly shouted, quick to stretch out his arms and shove them right through the clouds as if attempting to blindly find and grab the sharpshooter.

"I just told him not to go in there!" Sanji frowned.

"Luffy, stretch out as far as you can" Robin calmly ordered.

"I can, but I can't see where he is!" Luffy cried.

"Just leave that part to me" Robin said, crossing her arms as she used her Devil Fruit powers. Closing her eyes, her brows furrowed in concentration before finally, she spoke up after a moment of silence. "There he is."

"What? Where?" Luffy frantically asked as the raven-haired woman mumbled to herself before giving a firm nod.

"Okay, now pull him up" she instructed.

"Alright, I got him!" Luffy nodded while doing as he was told...though he looked to be struggling as he did it.

"Is he heavy?" Chopper curiously asked.

"He shouldn't be that heavy" Robin frowned.

"With how scrawny he is, I doubt he could be that heavy..." I muttered.

"Come on, Luffy" Chopper urged.

"Pull harder!" Nami frowned until the rubber man's arms finally burst through the surface of the cloud—Usopp in his grasp. "Yes, he's back" she sighed, now holding her chest in relief.