Lara's POV;
“This island is called Geral-Island, it's south east of Loguetown and should be good to resupply some of our food and other necessities”, informed Nojiko. The book she got had a section with each sea and their island listed in it. She joked that the author even wrote down where Raftel was, marking it off as a wishful thinking by the author.
Both Lia and I knew that this was indeed the real position of Raftel and that the book has Nami's wish of a world map in it. Neither of us said so, as it would be too much trouble.
Maybe Nojiko will see it at some point when she compares our visits with the book?
“That's good, any marine presence?”, I asked.
“There is a small building with their symbol, most likely a small station acting as the local police”, answered Lia. The others looked at her in wonder, we were still a few kilometre away from the island.
“So no problems then, let's dock and look around”, I said with a nod and the Shadow closed in on Geral-Island. The island itself wasn't too big, a village with a harbour on our side, a little mountain in the middle, and a forest all over the land.
A few minutes later we were on land and looked around, there were noticeably no people out and around. We walked around, searching for the market or a food store and found not a single soul on the streets.
“Creepy village, not a single person outside?”, muttered Yosaku, speaking out what I have thought.
“Yeah, you think something happened?”, asked Johnny while looking around. I thought the same and let my observation Haki scan the village. There were people, they were only inside the houses. I couldn't quite get a feel for their emotions.
“There definitely are people here, let's knock on a door and ask”, I told them and walked up to the nearest house and knocked. Nothing happened for a minute and I was just short of knocking again before the door opened and an old man looked at us.
“Be silent and, leave!”, snarled the man and then slammed his door close.
“Well, that was nice”, I commented and looked at the others. Nojiko, Yosaku, and Johnny looked as clueless as I but Lia was frowning.
“Something bothering you Lia?”, I asked.
“It's just, I felt barely suppressed rage coming from the man. And it's not only him, the whole village feels like a well of rage”, she said after a moment of thought.
“Feel? I could see that he was angry, but why are the other villagers the same, did you see them?”, asked Nojiko.
“A form of Haki, it's called observation Haki and allows someone to anticipate the attacks of your enemy by feeling their presence. This presence also holds the person's emotions. Lia is way better in it than I, that's why I couldn't feel the same”, I explained. Our group walked further inwards and found the market. There were a well and a few stands, but no people.
“And now? There is no one who we can buy from, the old man shouted at us and this village feels like a ghost town”, asked Nojiko.
“Let's just set sail, it's not as if we desperately need the food”, I suggested. Johnny and Yosaku nodded in agreement. We just wanted to walk back, when I heard a crash. It was faint and the normal humans in our group definitely didn't hear it.
Then, directly after came screams of rage and wet hitting sounds.
“There's someone hitting someone else”, I said and both Lia and I run towards the sound to investigate. The other three followed quickly with questioning looks.
We run through the streets and the sound got louder, we now were also able to hear what the screaming person was saying, or more like raving.
“HEHE, die DIE! HAHAHAHA, yes DIE! you loud idiot!”, it was the sound of a woman. The wet sounds were still there in between her screams.
“Now I hear it as well, there's a woman shouting”, informed Nojiko us. Another turn of the street showed us what was happening.
There was a woman, sitting on a man and hitting in on his face with her fists. The face of the man was already caved in and the guy probably dead, not that this stopped the woman from continuing.
Stolen story; please report.
Her hands even looked to be broken.
“Stop that!”, shouted Yosaku. The woman took notice of him and turned around. Her face was splattered with blood and her eyes blood shot.
“More idiots! They have to die as well, yes yes, they TOO will die!”, she screamed and jumped at us. We, who came to get her away from the guy, were too close to stop her and she crashed into Johnny.
Both fell down and she began to hit in on his chest using her hands clasped as a hammer. Johnny tried to get her off, but she didn't let go and even tried to bit him in the neck. She was just short of biting into his jugular when I grabbed and pulled her off of him.
She raged and struggled in my arms but was not strong enough to break the hold. She was, however, stronger than a normal civilian her stature and aura should have any right to.
“What the hell is with her?”, asked Nojiko while inspecting the still raving woman. She was trying to bite me now and spittle flew everywhere.
“As if she is possessed”, muttered Yosaku who had helped Johnny up. He touched his chest carefully and then sighed in relief, seems like nothing broke.
“The witch has strength, this will definitely bruise”, he said and tried to calm down. It was exactly this moment that the door to our left was thrown open and a family of four crashed out. A young couple, a ten-year-old boy and a girl of six years.
All of them had the same crazed expression and bloodshot eyes. They spotted us in seconds and jumped forward. “Be silent! You have to be SILENCE! Or we make you silent!”, screamed the mother. Her two children agreed with a really high pitched yes and all four tried to grab Lia. A second later they were pressed into the ground by an increase of gravity. Yet they did not stop to scream bloody murder.
“Something is definitely wrong here”, I stated. My statement was followed by more doors being thrown open and screams all over the village.
“What should we do about them?”, asked Nojiko while gesturing at the still struggling five villagers.
“We can put them out”, suggested Lia and increased the pressure. The four now cried out in pain. I gestured to her to stop that, the others were not yet so accepting of killing unknown people.
“Better not, they might just be sick. The problem is that only Lia and I know how to safely knock someone out. You three will have to stay close and it might come down to killing them if they manage to overwhelm us”, I replied. Nojiko, Johnny and Yosaku nodded slowly, not liking what this might means.
“Then let's go back to the ship”, accepted Lia. She gave all five of our captives a hit on one of their pressure points and they slumped down.
The screams were now coming closer and we had to leave the street. A few turns later we were confronted with the first two dozen people. We took another turn to evade them, but they saw us and were now following. This happened a few more times.
“They are stopping us from reaching the Shadow”, shouted Nojiko, who seems to have found a tactic in these crazed peoples attacks.
“And now?”, asked Lia from my side, we were knocking out anyone who was jumping at us from the sides. Yet, there will soon to be too many for Lia and me to knock them out without leaving the others exposed.
“Let's go in the forest, we will be able to lose them there”, shouted Yosaku. I nodded to Lia and we run into the forest. The thick foliage and close standing trees made the pursuit of a mob impossible and we lost them after running for close to an hour.
“What the hell”, breathed Johnny in exhaustion. He, Nojiko and Yosaku sat down the moment neither Lia nor I could hear them anymore.
“Lia, are you able to feel a second village on the other side? They might not have the same thing”, I asked once the others regained some breath.
“...no, there is no village, but a group of forty or so is inside the mountain and another presence half an hour in front of us, in between the mountain and us”, she said after concentrating for a moment.
“Then let us go and seek this person out, in case it's another crazed one we can take him out easily”, I suggested. The others nodded and we began to trek this single presence.
We caught up to the presence and sneaked in on it. It was a man in his mid-twenties. His hair was black and skin colour more of Italian heritage. He was of normal size, not one of those extremely large humans that you so commonly find in One Piece. Maybe 1.8 meters, not more. He wore a black suit with a dirty lab coat over it.
His back was turned to us, cooking something on a small fire. I sneaked up to him, sword drawn, and held the blade at his neck.
“Hello, are you one of these crazy ones? Or are we able to speak with each other?”, I asked.
Rather than to answer the man choose to turn around in a swift motion and drew two blades, or rather scalpels. I felt him doing that and knocked his blades out of his hands, before placing my blade at his neck again.
Now he was faced towards me and the others. He had dark brown eyes, a high forehead and his hair was pushed back and slick from hair gel. His eyes weren't bloodshot and he hasn't flung himself in my blade yet, that was a good sign.
“You don't look like one of Treteto's goons”, he noted. There was a noticeable hole between his two upper front teeth, a natural one.
“Who's Treteto?”, I asked, not yet putting my blade away.
“A doctor with questionable morality. Who're you? My name is Josef Mengele. A doctor that wants to stop this blot in the world of medics”, he answered. I pulled the sword away and the others came into the clearing.
“We've seen the people in the village, wanted to look for a second one on the other side of the island. You said you're a doctor, do you know what they have?”, asked Nojiko.
“I have my suspicion, I know that they are drugged and not ill. Something in their water makes them hypersensitive to noise and aggressive. It also increases their strength and limits higher thought processes.
I had to defend myself as well, after seeing how a group of children have beaten an old man to the death. The following research showed me that there is a medication in their water. I was not yet able to discern its specific effects, but someone put it in there”, he said, explaining his findings so far.
“Did you try to spy on the well? I mean they have to drink”, asked Yosaku. By now Josef has already sat back down and continued with his cooking. He made a rabbit ragout.
“I tried, yes. But the villagers get out in the night and walk around. Anyone out on the day is getting hunted by the slightest noise. But I have found foot prints of roughly twenty people coming regularly inside the village. Their trail comes from this forest and I was following it until you found me.
“Now about you, who are you? I haven't seen a long-ear-human in a long time, and never twins”, asked the doctor.
“I'm Lara, this is my sister Lia. The woman with blue hair is Nojiko while the guys are Yosaku and Jonny. We're adventurer and wanted to resupply”, I said and gestured to each of them.
“You said something about a doctor named Treteto?”, I added.
“Yes, I had to work with him in the past. He wanted to make a drug that increases the fighting potential for the marines. His moral was always questionable and he got fired when his latest test killed fifty marine soldiers. This stinks like his doing. The effects are similar to his tests”, he explained. The part of his involvement with this other doctor was short and quickly spoken, probably something that troubles him.
“Why are you here?”, asked Yosaku. He was still standing and leaning on a tree.
“I'm a travelling doctor, I visit the world for ways to cure the ill and help where I can. I once heard that there were no longer any reports coming from Geral-Island and thought it might have something to do with an illness”, he said. There was a desire of atonement in his aura. Interesting.
“It's a good idea to follow these tracks, but are you able to fight those guys? I mean you've said there are at least twenty”, asked Nojiko.
“I'll manage, wouldn't be my first fight with numbers on their side”, Josef answered with a shrug.
“We can help. I mean we can, do we?”, offered Jonny before looking at me with a pleading expression. He really wants to help.
“Sure”, I agreed easily. This is just another interesting adventure and who knows maybe we find out who is financing this Treteto. Might be Don Flamingo, the marines or Germa 66. All of them are into this stuff. And there could be a chance for me to recruit this Josef Mengele. We need a doctor and he does feel and seem like a nice guy.