Chapter Text
Following the premise of the movie set five years after dinosaurs made it into the mainland from the tropical islands inhabited by dinosaurs , Spandam (Krebs), a representative of the pharmaceutical company CP9, contacts former high-ranking military officer Zoro for an extraction mission, setting a meet up with other people to be apart of this job he's giving.
The meet up is set in a closing dinosaur museum since one of two of Spandam's contact works there—or 'used to work' now that the it's closing. He introduces paleontologists Nico Robin and Surgeon Trafalgar Law to Zoro, finally discussing what this extraction job was about.
Spandam tells them that CP9, the pharmaceutical company he represents, plans on having their rep (Spandam) travel to Little Garden, one of the islands populated by the dinosaurs located in the Earth's equator, to extract DNA samples from a Mosasaur, Titanosaur, and Quetzalcoatlus so they could create a medical drug to save a lot of lives.
However, Little Garden became off-limits to humans after a containment breach 17 years ago, which is why this job was gonna be done in secret, only letting people involved know about it and be paid millions of berries for helping out with this extraction job. All three of the contacts agree, the two doctors out of curiosity and thirst of knowledge, and Zoro for the money.
Spandam and the other three then travels to the crew he contracted to help them with their trip to Little Garden and with the extraction.
To Zoro's surprise, this 'crew' Spandam that they are gonna work with was actually Luffy's crew. Luffy has been a close friend of his from way back in high school as they lived in the same town. The boy—no, the man always dreamed of having his own crew and sail the seas with them, and he was there. He was the very first crewmate Luffy had followed by Nami, the three of them sailing the seas with their almost-broken down little ship that they bought with the money the earned back in senior high school.
Seeing Luffy's crew that they called Straw hats, he's glad to see how he was there when Luffy achieved one of his dreams to sail, and he couldn't be anymore prouder to see him have his crew of seven people.
But meeting this way after so long of not being in contact, he feels his anxiety for this mission spike up knowing the dangers of going to an island infested with dinosaurs. He doesn't have it in him to see someone he knew for so long to maybe get mauled to death by a T-Rex—no, he won't let that happen, he will not let his friends die again with him around.
If only he could, he would've told Luffy and his crew to back out from this, but knowing Luffy, once he's set on his decision then there's no going back. All he could do was fight Nami over making that decision, with her retorting that Luffy indeed agreed to Spandam's terms and that maybe, just maybe, she also thinks the amount of berries they will get rewarded with by CP9 is huge enough for their crew.
Luffy introduces the Straw hats to Zoro, Robin, Law, and Spandam. Robin introducing herself gets one of the crew to react in such a bizarre way that gets Zoro's attention. The blonde guy with the curly brows was fawning over Robin with heart eyes and all, getting Zoro looking at the man frowning and accidentally commenting at his behavior, which ends up with them getting into their first of many fights.
Law rolls his eyes at the sight of the two idiots fighting before introducing himself. One of them seems to perk up at the mention of him being a medic for this job, but he tries to ignore him and his straw hat that rests in his back.
It was the crew's turn to introduce themselves, starting with Nami, then Usopp, Sanji, Franky, Brook, Jinbei, and finally, Luffy. Law looks at the crew and their own captain, thinking their captain surely is young compared to a lot of them, maybe in his early 20s, but one thing he's sure of is the aura the captain exudes is for sure matching of his title despite the very toothy grin and innocent glint constantly on his face.
Of course, Law unknowingly stares at Luffy and the man just tilts his head in confusion as a response.
Spandam then catches their attention with a loud cough and once he got all of their attention, he reminds them of their objective and the terms he gave them that they all agreed on. Once their extraction job successfully ends, Spandam would get the DNA samples and the rest gets the money.
With their ship already prepared to sail, Spandam's team including the Straw hats sets on their journey to Little Garden.
Inside the cabin, Spandam shows the team in the topographic map their first target that was fortunately tagged during its captivity, the Mosasaur, more than 150 miles away. Robin explains to the crew about the Mosasaur and why these dinosaurs are mostly only found alive near or in the equator.
The others didn't expect Law to suddenly speak up after being so quiet the whole time since his self introduction, but he starts talking about the history of the island that they'll head to after getting the sample from the Mosasaur, telling them more about the containment breach 17 years ago and how the island is not a controlled environment.
This reminds a lot of them the danger they're about to face, something they agreed on beforehand. Law sees Nami and Usopp visibly shudder while the rest of them had their faces tightened, except for one of them.
Their captain, Luffy, lights up in determination, as if there isn't any chance of losing their lives in this mission. Law sits there quietly, observing Luffy as the rest goes back to their own tasks in the ship.
As for Robin, she takes notice of Spandam handling a firearm and a glass cartridge containing some sort of chemical. She questions her and he answers that it's neurotoxin for them to have a chance of survival during this mission. She retorts that its a sin to kill a dinosaur, and before anyone could retort, Luffy chimes in, promising they won't kill any dinosaurs during this extraction job, a statement that got everyone frozen for a second.
Franky reminds his captain the possible scenarios that they'll encounter during this job and Brook asking him what they'll do if they had no choice, in which he responds with a wide grin. Finally making up his decision, he turns to face Robin and doesn't take back his promise. What he doesn't promise, though, is that he won't hesitate to fight back against the dinosaurs if it's for the safety of his crew and everyone else with them.
Spandam, however, scoffs at their little discussion with his back turned to them. Law reminds all of them that their primary job is to only extract DNA samples, not harming any animals.
On the deck, Law and Robin opens a crate showing large darts that will be used for extracting blood samples from their target. Law explains to the crew and Zoro how it will work, emphasizing how it should be shot within 10 meters of the subject to penetrate their hide and once the glass cartridge of the dart is at full capacity, it will self-eject a couple hundred feet in the air and a parachute will open for it to float back down.
Zoro catches the dart falling from the sky that Law used for demonstration and comments that he guessed he will be shooting that thing, which must've aggravated Sanji, grabbing the one in his hand. The blonde curly brows calling the job 'basic' gets him worked up and starts taunting each other over which of them can do a better job.
Jinbei interrupts their 'fighting' and suggests that Usopp is better fit for the job. That interruption only gets them to notice that the others around them were giving them weird looks.
Of course, it takes Usopp a second to realize what Jinbei just suggested, distracted by the weird flirting Zoro and Sanji were doing out in the open. He opposes Jinbei that there might be someone better for the job, but because of everyone agreeing with Jinbei, he admits that he might actually end up dying trying to do 'basic remote biopsy darting'. He couldn't really back out now that Luffy's compromised with him that he'll be there behind him to keep him from actually falling off or being a Mosasaur's lunch.
Spandam also reminds them in case that they didn't pay attention before in their initial meeting back in the mainland that there is still an abandoned village complex that has a helipad in Little Garden, located on the Southwest ridge.
He mentions that CP9 hired an exfil team to monitor their ship's radio frequency, so that when the team goes silent for 24 hours, they will do a flyby with a medium helicopter at exactly sunset on the second night relative to that. Emphasizing on how that team will only be hovering for exactly two minute before they leave if no one shows up in the village complex, this makes the atmosphere around the crew tense again, reminded by how dangerous this job is.
Their hopefully-not-last-night in their ship, Sanji prepares a feast for them while Brook sings and plays the keyboard, lightening up the atmosphere. Spandam of course mulls over a corner of the cabin while everyone feasts and enjoys the remaining of their time before they encounter their first target—well, not exactly everyone.
Robin laughs along the others as Usopp boasts about his brave encounter with an alligator, while Zoro somehow is having another argument with the crew's cook and weirdly very close in proximity, Law winces at that sight. He, however, sits in the corner seat of the couch in silence, quietly observing the loud scene.
For such a dangerous mission, he didn't expect to be having a feast in the midst of it. The Straw hats sure are a weird bunch, he thinks. In case that this might actually be his last few days alive, he'd rather have it feel like it's his last dreadful days on Earth, not celebrating a festival.
Out of nowhere, he feels something warm brush against his cheek, bringing him out of thoughts and to only notice the familiar curious eyes gazing at him, straw hat still hanging from his neck.
"You hungry?" Law subconsciously shakes his head to the captain before he asks another question, waving with something in his hand.
"Do you need to use the bathroom? Just head there in—"
Finally realizing that it's Luffy that interrupted his train of thoughts with sandwich on hand, he slaps his hand away on instinct to finally stop the crumbs from falling everywhere near him.
Suddenly aware of what he did, he looks around expecting the others to give him looks but surprises himself that everyone is still doing their own thing. He apologizes to Luffy, telling him that he just caught him off-guard, not mentioning his dislike for bread.
"But what the hell did you mean the bathroom?" He glares at Luffy, offended by the man's previous assumption.
Luffy snickers at him taking offense and shrugs. "Well, you looked like you were holding back your shit with that frown on your face."
"I was just thinking."
The captain rolls his eyes at his statement, responding with, "Then stop. Here, eat this sandwich Sanji made. Every thing he cooks are just the best!"
The way Luffy looked at him with bright eyes and his toothy grin, he feels something in his chest stutter but decides to ignore him. He looks away, taking a second before deciding on what he'll respond with.
"I–I don't like bread…! So, stop forcing me to eat it—"
Luffy of course stuffs Law's mouth with an onigiri instead, followed by Luffy lecturing that he should've said so. A knit on his brows forms again once Luffy calls him an unfamiliar name. 'Torao', was what the captain could make out of his last name when he first introduced himself. But even after correcting Luffy, he still stuck with the new nickname that Law now has to get used to.
Maybe he really should let himself relax while there's still time.
The next morning, only half of them are awake when Spandam finally sees the Mosasaur's tracker on the map only a few miles away from them. Law wakes the others up just in case.
The team gets reminded of their plan once they encounter their first target, Law enumerating the step-by-step of their process:
- Jinbei will be steering the ship until the foredeck is within 10 meters of the Mosasaur;
- Usopp that's going to be tied to the railings at the foredeck assisted by Luffy will wait until they're within 10 meters to fire the dart at the Mosasaur's hide;
- Nami will be spotting over the bridge roof for Jinbei to give comms of the top view;
- Once the dart is shot and ejects itself on the sky, Nami will give out comms to Jinbei where the glass cartridge of the sample will land to steer to ship near it;
- After completing the first objective, they'll escape to the short of Little Garden;
- Camp out for the night and decide on the teams for the next objective;
- The team led by Spandam will seek out the Titanosaur, be very wary of their predators instead;
- The team led by Nami will seek out the Quetzalcoatlus that's located on a cliff side somewhere the South East river;
- The tasks for each team will be done simultaneously for efficiency;
- Teams meet up at the abandoned village complex before sundown; and
- Camp the helipad until the helicopter arrives
Brook also reminds them about the compartments and other locations storing life vests in case of emergency.
After that, the only thing left to do for them is to wait. The gun Usopp will be using is already loaded with the dart for the extraction and Luffy already has the sling bag on him containing the extra darts if misfire happens.
All of them either quietly gazes at the horizon to look out for any incoming movement or nervously copes with what they're about to do.
Hours later, the silence breaks when Franky yells at the crew, alerting them of the incoming massive creature swimming beside their ship, already catching up to them. Usopp is the first one to panic, almost quietly backing up to the cabin before Luffy puts his arm over his shoulder, pushing him along with his body to prepare their position at the edge of the foredeck.
Already feeling the rush of adrenaline, Luffy gives out a loud cackle with his boyish grin brimming with positivity while he pushes Usopp to their assigned position. Witnessing how the rest of the team, even Usopp, lighten up as their morale boosts up from that simple act Luffy did, Law starts to see why his crew adores him as their captain despite his foolish acts and stupid remarks that he has witnessed so far.
Law helps Luffy with strapping down Usopp to the edge of the foredeck with the belt on his waist before handing him the gun loaded with the dart. The crew cheers him on, assuring him that they have his back. As for Spandam, he peeks over the deck's railing with his grip fully tightening as he feels the nerves heightening the more the Mosasaur came into view.
Nami takes her position over the bridge roof, yelling to the bridge the creature's position with her hand firmly wrapped around the railings. Jinbei takes in Nami's comms and steers the ship closer to the Mosasaur, finally no longer parallel with its direction.
The others on the deck remains at the edge of their seat, waiting for the moment Usopp fires the dart. And he does. They witness their long-nosed marksman fire the gun accidentally and miss the target—and they all get splashed by the water before anyone could react.
The ship leans to the side as the Mosasaur almost does a number on their ship's foredeck. And being momentarily blinded by the sea water splashed onto Usopp's eyes, he falls off the foredeck and fortunately just hangs off the railings while the ropes strapping him down kept him from fully dropping.
This position of his though will forever be a core memory and fear of his, because once he realizes that the Mosasaur already placed itself under the foredeck, he for sure thought it was the end for him. He will forever be grateful for Luffy though when he grabs him upright and they retake their position.
The next second, Usopp finally takes his shot and the dart successfully attaches to the hide of the Mosasaur, which causes the creature to back off a little. Luckily for them, after the glass cartridge reaches full capacity, it flies off and lands on Sanji's area with the parachute slowing down its landing.
With the first sample on hand, Spandam announces it to the crew and orders them to prepare for their escape to the island. During their brief celebration, Spandam takes the first sample from Sanji and keeps it in the suitcase before heading inside the cabin.
Jinbei follows Spandam's order to head to the Little Garden's shore. In the midst of that, however, Nami still on the bridge roof stops the rest congratulating Usopp for surviving that experience with an alert that she sees multiple forms of orange dorsal-fin-looking things to the direction they're heading.
Jinbei takes caution of the notice trying to avoid the orange form, but when it still follows their ship's direction, the rest of the crew and him takes a closer look only to end up confused. Confused and reluctant to believe that what they are seeing are a pack of Spinosaurus swimming around their ship that's currently in deep sea water. Robin couldn't believe her eyes.
As if the sight isn't scary enough, Nami sends another alert to the crew that the Mosasaur is swimming back to their ship at a quick rate. This gets Zoro hastily shouts for Nami's attention and orders her to get back down the deck, a call unluckily a few seconds late when a Spinosaurus collides against the ship hard enough that almost knocks off the red-head to the sea if not for the tight grip she had on the railing.
Franky tries to initiate getting the life vests for the crew, but because of Jinbei yelling out that the engine is overheating, he passes the message to Brook instead and goes down the engine room to assist their helmsman. Brook follows his instruction and starts giving out the life vests to the ones near him.
Amidst this event, out of panic, Usopp suggests sending a distress signal but Robin being the only one on the deck not absorbed by the chaos caused by the dinosaurs, seeing Robin affirming this proposition, he rushes inside the cabin to get to the radio.
His attempt to send a signal ends up unsuccessfully though when Spandam appears behind him with the radio that he just took from him. Usopp hears the door on the side of the cabin that's just behind him blast open along with the loud banging of the Spinosaurus against their ship. On top of this, Spandam makes up excuses to Usopp to not alert anybody unrelated to their mission, which only ends up on deaf ears with how dread has taken over Usopp.
Usopp not taking in what Spandam is yapping about, he takes the radio from him and makes another attempt, which Spandam responds with a strong shove at his body ridden with anxiety. This action gets Usopp to squeeze his eyes shut, only to not feel anything a second later. Instead when he opens his eyes, Spandam is a step back from him and he hears someone else yelp followed by stomps of feet going farther behind him.
Looking behind him through the open metal door leading to outside of the cabin, his body freezes when he sees Luffy slipping forward off the platform, barely holding on to it. Finally being in control of his body, he runs to Luffy to offer a hand but ends up being a second late when he falls off and the ship already leaving him far behind with its rapid pace.
The shock of watching Luffy fall off right in front of him without even being able to help, Usopp's body almost completely stops functioning still squatting in place. Of course, Spandam takes advantage of that, pushing him off and making sure he gets completely off the ship's platform. During this, Usopp accidentally tears a ligament on his wrist before finally plunging into the water.
Without any guilt, Spandam looks around the cabin to check if anyone saw him and luckily, everyone was out on the deck. He breathes a sigh of relief before conditioning himself to pretend that didn't happen.
Right outside the deck, Zoro successfully gets Nami to jump to the small platform on the ship's side with him catching her, which earns a side eye from the blonde cook before focusing on Robin's safety.
Law feels relief for a second seeing that no one else has fallen off yet—and of course he takes that back when he hears a loud splash on the other side of the ship. Following the source of the sound, it takes him a few seconds to track where the splash came from because of the ship's speed only to see far back the familiar straw hat and its owner floating on the water.
He takes a second to look around where they are now and observes that there's a sea cave connecting to the Little Garden mainland near Luffy.
Next thing he knew, he's already in his life vest, rescue can and another life vest in hand, and he's already jumping to the water to get to the crew's captain.
Everyone is stumped at the sight of their medic jumping off to save Luffy, making some of them alarmed that they're currently being hunted by a Mosasaur and its pack of Spinosaur. Robin sighs seeing that the creatures disregard their presence in their domain.
Another splash takes the crew's attention. Following where the sound came from, they see Usopp being swept away by the sea's waves. The remaining Straw hats start to feel the panic creep up to them, only until Sanji speaks up about trusting them to reunite with them later on in the main island since they currently have the dinosaurs' attention at this moment.
Suspicion arises within Robin when Spandam goes out of the cabin but the thought slips away when Brook gets her attention to go with him and Nami off to sea because the ship might crash, and so she hurries her way to the two of them at the side the deck preparing to jump off.
Someone grabs onto her before she does though, Nami and Brook already jumping off and not noticing her absence. Robin looks back to see Spandam furious at her.
Before she could ask why, Spandam is already firmly reminding her that he can't risk her being gone during this whole operation, she is their paleontologist after all. If that was all it was.
Another disruption on the ship throws all of them off balance as the ship tilts to the left while being pushed by the Mosasaur against a rock cliff's base.
Despite being sandwiched between the dinosaur and the rock cliff, the ship persists to go forward with Jinbei manning the bridge. They all grab onto the ship while simultaneously avoiding its left side to not get caught along by the rocks. Unfortunately for the Straw hats, this deals a major blow on their ship, already giving Franky a lot of headaches from below the deck to fix once the mission is over.
The next moment, they're finally out of the cliff's range and the Mosasaur diverges as shallow water comes in-between it and the ship. This gives Jinbei the opportunity to yell out for the remaining crew to jump off on shallow waters since the Mosasaur won't be able to reach them there.
He assures his crew that Franky and him will be fine, telling them to meet up at the shore. And then they all plunge into the shallow waters, leaving their two crew mates in the ship, preparing themselves to crash into the rocky end of the shore.