One Piece: Unforeseen

| The Luminous Island (Part 28) |

(Somewhere in the South Court)

"Are you okay?" Holding his hand out, Luffy offered to help up the kid that he'd just knocked over.

"Hn..." Clutching his dislocated shoulder, Jax bit his teeth in pain. "I'm fine..."

"You don't look fine," Luffy pointed out, his hand still held out.

"Well how'd you feel if someone ran into you going a zillion miles an hour?" Smacking his hand away, Jax got up on his own. For a short minute, all of his attention was on his arm and the pain coursing through it. But then realization smacked him like a ton of bricks.

He'd been found.

Taking a shaky step back, he eyed Luffy. He didn't look like a citizen or a guard, but even then, he didn't trust him.

Removing his straw hat, Luffy scratched at the back of his head and looked around, ignoring Jax and his rigid stare. "Do you know where I can find someone named Aro?"

"A-Aro?" Jax stumbled over his words.

He was familiar with that name. He'd become familiar with that name the second he stepped on the surface of the island.

"Yeah," Luffy nodded, stilling looking around, "do you know where I can find him?"

"W-Why do you want to know where he is?"

Luffy looked down at Jax. Setting his straw hat back on his head, he grinned. "So, I can kick his butt."

(Somewhere in the Central Court)

Chopper stuck to the side roads and out of sight while he walked around the Central Court. He lost sight of Franky and Robin when a mob of slaves rushed by them and knocked him over. Since then, he'd been trying to find them with no luck.

"Franky!"

"Robin!"

When a GN soldier appeared, marching in his direction, Chopper stopped in his tracks and urgently jumped behind a pillar.

"This isn't good!"

Shaking uncontrollably, he pressed his back against the pillar. The GN soldier walked right by him without noticing his presence.

Slumping down, he let out a relieved sigh. "That was too close!"

Jumping back to his feet, Chopper made sure that there wasn't another guard around before he went back to his search.

When he reached a fork in the road, he frowned and stared up at the sign that offered directions. "Now which way?"

"Oh!" His eyes lit up when he read Hospital on the sign. "A hospital? Maybe I should check it out. I can see if they need my help until I can find Franky and Robin!"

(North Tower – Beneath the sand)

Mae watched silently as two GN soldiers walked past her without taking notice.

The two soldiers appeared to be more advanced than the others she'd run into. With a closer look, she made out the number 54 engraved on the back of one of their shaved heads.

54. She thought to herself.

Then it clicked and she remembered what Jael said about the GN soldiers. The higher the number in their name, the deadlier they were.

When the GN soldiers disappeared around a corner, the hand dropped from her mouth.

Still hunched over and on her knees, Mae maneuvered herself around to see who saved her from being seen. It wasn't someone she'd met before. He had beautiful golden-brown skin and olive eyes that could be seen through a mess of dirty-blonde hair.

"Sorry about that," the man whispered, offering her an awkward smile. "I didn't want you to give my position away. It took me a while to get back beneath the sand. And I figured you didn't want to be seen either, seeing as you're hiding behind a tree."

Mae didn't bother to ask the man why he was hiding from the GN soldiers. The discolored ring around his neck, where a collar had been, let her know why he was hiding. He was a slave.

"It's fine," she dismissed. "And you're right, I didn't, and I don't want to be seen. I need to relay a message to someone and I'd rather not waste time fighting."

"Relay a message?" The man looked over Mae and then back down at her. Even though he was crouched down, he was still much taller than her.

"Yes," Mae nodded, "to Ma'."

The man's eyebrows pinched together. "Ma'? You don't mean Colette by chance, do you?"

"I do."

Looking back over Mae, the man scanned the gardens and then he looked back down at her. "That's who I'm going to see. I also have a message for her."

(GN Tower)

"Where are we going?" Sanji asked, following Jael as he led them away from the GN tower.

"Just follow me. I have an idea."

"Would you care to share this idea with me?" Sanji was growing tired of Jael's vague responses.

Maneuvering around construction tents and tape that blocked off a large section of the Central Court, Jael finally stopped when he reached a boarded-up brick building.

Sanji observed the padlocked buildings around them. "Where are we?"

Jael smirked. "We're in a construction zone. The area is being remodeled. It has been for a while now. Don't worry, no one will know we're here. This section doesn't have working surveillance. And the guards are too preoccupied with the slaves to check this area."

"Okay," Sanji kicked aside some dirt, "but why're we here?"

"We want to get into GN tower to shut down the system, right?" Jael pried a slab of wood off the brick building, revealing a window.

"Yeah."

"Well," Jael pried another slab of wood off and made an opening in the window for them to slip through, "this is how we're going to do it."

"How's being here going to get us into GN tower?"

"This building is an old control room. Before the GN tower was constructed, each court had multiple buildings where GN soldiers were controlled. This building was one of them."

"Okay, so we're going to shut the system down from here?"

"No," Jael climbed through the window and moved out of the way for Sanji. "We're going to take control of a GN soldier and then we are going to use him to get into the GN tower."

Sanji climbed through the window and into the dust filled room. "But won't they notice if one of their soldiers are taken over by another operating system?"

"They would," Jael nodded. "That's why we are going to take over a soldier that isn't being occupied."

"A soldier that isn't being occupied?"

"GN soldiers need maintenance. When they're in que to be worked on, they're shoved into a storage room inside the GN tower until it's their time to be worked on. We're going to use one of them to open a door and let us into the tower."

"This sounds like it's going to get messy," Sanji frowned. "Do you even know how to work the controls or how operate a GN soldier?"

Jael ran his hand over a control board,collecting dust between his fingers. "No, but how hard could it be?"