As the Strawhats were traveling the sea, just having fun, Kairo's eyes flickered open.
"Are ships falling from the sky a usual weather for the Grand Line?" As those words left his lips, Nami opened her mouth and said:
"No, it's not. While the weather in the Grand Line is impossible to guess, ships falling from the sky is not one of them."
Her brow furrowed.
"Why do you ask?" she questioned.
"Oh, 'cause one's falling right now." As those words left his mouth, Nami looked up to see the sight of a massive ship falling toward them.
"HAAAAAAA!"
Jeez, was she loud. Usopp looked up and his soul left his body.
"Move the ship out of the way! If she gets hit, she'll sink!" Nami calmed herself and ordered. Sanji, of course, was on it. Luffy was seen trying to punch some of the ship away.
Kairo meanwhile just watched this with light amusement, resonating with the world. He resonated with the ship and knew it was nearing its end, yet the ship for some odd reason seemed to like them. He didn't know why, but the ship really liked them.
Deciding to spare the ship the fate of being destroyed like this, Kairo did a simple hand seal, clutching his sword a bit. As he did, a gust of wind blew into their sail, causing the ship to move out of the way of the debris.
"If I close my eyes and focus, when I open them I'll find out it's nothing but a dream." Usopp closed his eyes. He could do this. This was nothing. This was just a simple dream. All he needed to do was close his eyes.
Usopp took a deep breath, and then slowly opened his eyes.
"Only a dream," he muttered—before coming face-to-face with a skull.
"HAA!" His eyes seemed to pop out of their sockets as his soul literally left his body. Usopp passed out right there.
After a bit, it stopped. The ship that came from the sky was still floating in the water, though it looked like it would go under in a very short time.
Robin's eyes landed on the skull. She walked to it before beginning to rebuild it.
"Creepy."
"A woman who can examine a skull so closely is a woman I like."
"What kind of woman don't you like?" Zoro asked.
Robin looked at the skull, noticing it had two cracks.
"This person died from rapid decompression. When air pressure around a human body suddenly changes, gases in the body expand. These holes were caused by that expansion breaking through the skull."
Her gaze landed on the doctor. Chopper, seeing this, stepped up to explain.
"She's right! That would mean this person died while rising up to a much higher altitude—like being blown upward into the sky."
Chopper explained a bunch of science stuff that Kairo frankly just tuned out.
"From this skull I can tell that the man was in his mid-30s. He was quite healthy."
"How can someone tell so much from bones?" Zoro added.
Robin smiled before saying:
"I am an archaeologist. It is in my job description to know that."
While they were speaking, Kairo's gaze went to the ship where Usopp and Luffy could be seen kidding around, jumping into it trying to see if there was anything inside.
Kairo didn't say much, just let them be. What was the worst that could happen?
...
The boat sunk.
If it wasn't for Sanji jumping in the water, Luffy would've been done for. Thankfully, Usopp was there. Cool.
"You idiot, did you forget you're a devil fruit user? You can't even swim properly!" Nami reminded him.
Luffy just smiled a bit, pulling out a map.
"I found this in the ship."
Nami opened the map. Robin took a peek. The map seemed to be about Skypiea—a sky island.
Wait... did that mean that above them, there was—
She looked at their log pose. It was pointing up. Did that mean the island was above them? She even pondered if the log pose was faulty.
How the fuck could they check that?
"How do we even check that... It's not like we have wings and can fly there to see if it's real," Nami said, annoyed.
She felt the glare of the sun on her face.
"Hey Kairo, move your wing close. The sun's beating me."
Yes, she was using his wings as something to shield her from the sun.
As those words left her mouth, she paused... then, as if every Strawhat was in sync, they looked at the Lunarian perched on top of their ship.
Kairo didn't like that smile on their faces at all.
"Fine, I'll check it."
Kairo spread his wings a bit, jumped high into the air, and flapped them as he flew higher and higher into the sky. Within seconds, they couldn't even see him. He had gone through the clouds. Well, now it was just a matter of time until he came back.
Luffy was looking at the sky. Wings looked cool. He wondered why anyone would ever hide them. If he had wings, he would spread them and fly into the sky. Why care about what other people think? The wings are yours and no one else's.