The soft hum of Brook's violin strings resonated across the empty field as he closed his eyes, lost in the melody. The soothing rhythm should have brought him comfort, but instead, there was an undeniable weight in the air. His usual ease was replaced with a nagging, suffocating anxiety. Every note sounded hollow. He suddenly stopped mid-play, a cold chill running down his spine.
"...Wait..." Brook mumbled, his voice trembling slightly as the realization slowly set in. "Where... where am I?"
His skeletal hand lowered the violin, the strings slipping from his grip as his heart began to race—if a heart could race in a body that was nothing but bone. His body felt strange, unfamiliar. Everything—the world around him—felt wrong. His gaze darted around the unfamiliar landscape, the sky, the smell of the air. The waves of confusion crashed over him like an overwhelming tide.
"...Is this some kind of joke?" Brook muttered under his breath, thinking perhaps the crew was playing one of their usual pranks on him. He half-expected Luffy to burst out laughing from behind a tree, or for Nami to scold him for slacking off with his violin. He even imagined Chopper's worried voice asking if he was okay.
He straightened up, attempting to shake the feeling of unease. "Yahaha! You can stop hiding now, I know you're all out there." Brook called out with a forced chuckle, his eyes scanning the horizon for any sign of his beloved Straw Hat crew. But the silence that met him was thick, suffocating. His heartbeat echoed in his skull.
But then, as he turned his gaze to the ship behind him, his breath caught.
The ship wasn't the Thousand Sunny—it was a much older vessel, worn down by the passage of time. The sails were tattered, the wood cracked and decayed. "No..." he whispered, his eyes widening as realization slowly clawed its way to the surface. "This... this is my ship."
His fingers trembled as they gripped the edges of the violin. The rumbling memories came rushing back—memories of a crew he had once loved, a family he had lost. The Rumbar Pirates.
This ship—this was their ship.
He looked around, his skeletal form stiffening. The deck was eerily familiar, the worn planks beneath his feet almost comforting. But the crew—the crew he had known and lost—their absence was a suffocating weight on his chest.
"No..." Brook whispered, his voice shaking as the cold truth set in. "This can't be real... I'm back. I'm back here… but why?"
The sudden grief came crashing down on him like a tidal wave. "I... I lost them once. Is this it again? Have I lost everyone… again?" His breath caught, and for a moment, his vision blurred. His body—his fragile, bony body—collapsed, sinking to his knees, overwhelmed by the weight of it all. The ache in his chest was sharp and unrelenting. He reached up with trembling fingers to wipe away his tears, but of course, nothing came. His hollow eye sockets were dry, and yet the sorrow… the sorrow felt so real.
His heart, if it still beat, would have shattered into pieces. He squeezed his eyes shut, clenching his jaw, fighting against the flood of emotions that threatened to tear him apart. The memories of the Rumbar Pirates—his first family—were flooding back, memories of their laughter, their music, their final moments together. The weight of their absence, the terrible emptiness, was a pain he had thought he'd buried long ago.