Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The world had gone quiet.

Buggy's eyes fluttered open, and he was lying on something far too soft to be a ship’s deck. It was a patch of grass, wait... no, not grass, synthetic, stiff and too green, like someone had painted it. The sky above was choked with pale grey clouds that didn’t move, and there was no smell of salt in the air, no creak of masts, no raucous caw of seagulls. Instead, the only sound was a faint, low whine, like the kind snails made when they were about to talk, except there were no snails around. Just that sound, persistent, as if the world itself was charging up to scream.

He sat up slowly. His body felt... wrong. Light. Small. The sleeves of his coat drooped over his hands, now too short to fill them. His boots were gone. Replaced by soft shoes with loops instead of buckles. When he stood, his legs wobbled. He stumbled forward and crashed into the side of a strange, angular metal thing, like a carriage, but with no horses and all the windows were shattered. Inside were seats and buttons and a cold silence that settled into his bones.

Something had happened.

He remembered shouting. A blinding light. A voice, maybe a laugh. The kind of laugh you heard in the middle of a magic trick gone wrong or maybe right for someone else. He had been on the Grand Line, on his ship, shouting at someone and then… nothing.

Now, here.

A scream echoed in the distance, sharp and human, then quickly cut off.

Buggy turned in a slow circle. The buildings loomed around him like giants, tall and glassy, many of them broken, with vines climbing up their sides like they were being dragged down to the sea. Some had giant signs, glowing boxes, but the letters made no sense to him. They blinked, buzzed, or stayed dark entirely.

He raised a hand or tried to. It moved, but did not come apart. His fingers stayed attached. No click, no float, no familiar tug of his Chop-Chop Fruit. He stared, tried again, this time gritting his teeth. Nothing. Not even the tingle of devil fruit power. Like it had been scrubbed from him, like someone had stolen it from the inside out.

Buggy didn’t panic, not at first. He was a great pirate, after all. Buggy the Clown! Emperor of the Sea! But when he caught his reflection in the glass of a nearby window, his breath caught in his throat.

A child stared back.

Red nose, still bright and round. But the face around it was smooth, unscarred by the years. His eyes were rounder, brighter, less fierce. His chin soft, his mouth smaller. His blue hair was choppy, like it had been hacked off by tiny scissors. And worst of all, his height barely reached the door handle of the metal carriage.

His clothes were wrong too. Whoever had dressed him (had he been dressed? Had he just poofed into this?) had a sick sense of humour. A long-sleeved, blue and white striped shirt, tucked into shorts that had pockets, small but functional. Knee-high socks, one slightly sagging, and scuffed-up boots that looked like they’d seen a single adventure before being handed down to him.

And then there was the hat.

Buggy snatched it off his head, staring in horror at the floppy, oversized thing. It was blue, like his hair, but with a stupid little brim that drooped pathetically over one eye. He threw it to the ground, stomped on it for good measure, then, after a second of hesitation, snatched it back up and jammed it onto his head again. (It was cold, okay? And he wasn’t an idiot! He needed something to keep the wind out of his ears.)

Buggy wanted to scream. Instead, he leaned against the cold surface and laughed, sharp, desperate giggles that didn't feel like his own. And then, quite suddenly, the laughter twisted. His throat tightened. His knees gave out.

He cried.

For a moment.

Just a moment.

The tears came fast, hot and angry. His chest ached, his small hands clenched into fists against the ground. No, he thought furiously. No no no no no. He wasn’t supposed to feel this way. Pirates didn’t cry. He didn’t cry. But the tears came anyway, stupid and wet and childish, and all he could do was bury his face in his sleeves and pretend it wasn’t happening.

Minutes passed. Or hours.

He sat there, small and trembling.

When Buggy finally lifted his head, the afternoon sun hung lower in the sky. It made long shadows stretch across the cracked pavement. He stood, his legs stiff and shaky. The city was silent and empty. Buildings looked like dark, vacant skulls, and the wind whistled through broken windows. Rust ate at old signs, making their words unreadable. He walked, his boots echoing in the quiet. He passed overturned cars, their metal dull in the fading light, and streets choked with trash. The air felt heavy and still.

Then, he saw it - a crudely painted sign, tacked to a leaning lamppost. "Survivor Camp -> This Way." The arrow pointed down a side street. Survivor of what? A war? A plague? The city was clearly damaged, but this felt bigger. Like the whole world had broken. Still, the sign gave him a direction in this empty place. He followed it.

The street was deserted. No birds, no stray animals, just the wind blowing through the ruins. Buggy kept walking, guided only by the sign, until the buildings thinned out into a wide, open space. Ahead, it was a mall. Its entrance, though scarred, still stood out in the surrounding emptiness.

The big glass doors opened with a sigh.

Buggy didn’t question how the place still had power. Music played faintly, distorted and slow, like it was underwater. It was something jazzy, maybe. Or maybe meant to be comforting. But it just made the emptiness feel thicker.

He stepped inside cautiously, small shoes squeaking on the polished white tiles. The air was stale, filled with a hundred artificial scents - old perfume, plastic plants, greasy food that had long since rotted into mush. He passed store after store with mannequins in clothes too strange, too clean, all staring ahead, smiling without eyes. One of them wore a red jacket that caught Buggy’s attention. It looked pirate-y enough. He tugged it off the dummy with a grunt and threw it on over his shirt. It dwarfed his tiny frame even more, but it made him feel better somehow.

He was halfway through inspecting a rack of brightly coloured hats when he heard it, the soft drag of feet behind him.

“Oh! Hello?” he chirped, spinning around.

A man, maybe... stood just outside the store entrance. His skin looked like it had been soaking in saltwater for days, puckered and grey. One eye dangled from its socket. His shirt was torn, stained with something dark and dry. He didn’t speak. He didn’t even breathe.

Buggy tilted his head. “You okay, old man? You look like hell.”

No response. The thing’s head twitched, then jerked away from him, like someone had tugged an invisible string. It stumbled back. Then turned — and walked the other way.

“Rude,” Buggy muttered.

He wandered out of the store and into the mall’s main atrium. It was huge — four floors stacked in an open circle, with glass railings and wide escalators frozen in place. Vines hung from the ceilings like the guts of some fallen beast. There were fountains, too, cracked and dry, surrounded by benches and paper cups.

Then he saw them.

Dozens of people. Or... what looked like people.

They were gathered in clumps, some leaning against broken shopfronts, some sprawled on the floor. Their bodies twitched, heads jerking now and then like they were listening to something no one else could hear. Their skin was all wrong. Pale and bruised. Their mouths hung open, many missing lips or noses entirely. Buggy wrinkled his nose.

“Hey!” he called out cheerily, raising a hand. “Do any of you weirdos know where I am? I think I got lost.”

The effect was immediate, but not what he expected.

They turned. One by one. And then they… parted. Like he was the tip of a spear, and they were water. They shuffled aside, clearing a path for him without a sound. Some didn’t even glance his way. Others stared right through him.

Buggy blinked. “...Oookay. You guys are even worse than Marines at hospitality.”

He wandered further, stepping between them, heart thudding in his chest for no reason he could explain. Something primal itched under his skin. They weren’t normal. He didn’t know how or why, but his child mind was starting to squirm.

But then, his foot kicked something, a plastic cup. It skittered across the tiles and smacked into the leg of a kiosk.

The sound seemed to echo.

He looked up just in time to see a screen flicker on above the fountain, one of those mall display things. It showed a grainy image, from a camera angle somewhere high. A lone girl, maybe in her late teens, darting down the top floor hallway, a red backpack swinging behind her.

“Wh—?”

A loud crash shattered the silence.

Buggy’s eyes jerked upward as the girl, the same one from the screen, came hurtling over the second floor railing, screaming. She hit the ground with a sickening crack. Her scream turned into sobs, broken, panicked. Her leg was twisted under her.

The air shifted.

Every one of the silent figures around Buggy turned. Heads cocked. Mouths opened wider.

Then they moved. Faster than before. Limbs jerking, arms outstretched. They surged toward her like a wave, hissing and groaning.

Buggy stood frozen, a child’s eyes wide with shock. “Hey—HEY! Stop—she’s—!”

But they didn’t stop. They fell on her in a snarling mass, arms clawing, teeth gnashing. Her screams rose, became pure terror — then gurgled into silence. Buggy stumbled back, fell onto his rear, eyes locked on the horror before him. His stomach churned.

His pirate’s mind, older and sharper, slammed through the wall of childish confusion.

They’re dead.

They’re eating her.

They’re zombies.

Buggy clapped his hands over his mouth. He didn’t scream, but it took everything in him not to. His body trembled — not just from fear, but confusion, a storm of mismatched thoughts and feelings. His adult brain grasped the danger, the logic. His child heart only knew he wanted to run, hide, cry.

He crawled backward until his back hit a bench. His breathing was fast and shallow. He wanted his ship. His crew. Hell — even Alvida. Anyone. Anything familiar, but all he had were the monsters and the fact that, somehow, for some reason… they didn’t want him.