Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

 Law woke up drenched in a cold sweat.

 Flevance. It was always Flevance…only worse because he’d see new bodies, Bepo, Chopper, Luffy…

 “You okay?”

 “Just another one,” Law muttered, rubbing his temples as he rolled onto his side. “I’m sorry. This has been every night…”

 “It’s fine,” Luffy said, pulling Law’s hands from his face and replacing them with his own. The contact was soothing and Law felt himself relax.

 “I can’t prove it or anything…but I’m pretty sure you had nightmares even before forgetting,” Luffy said gently. “So don’t worry about it, okay? I have nightmares too sometimes…”

 As always, the guilt started to gnaw at him. What if Luffy was wrong about that? What if Law was only waking him up all the time because he was messed up and broken now, instead of who he should have been-?

 Law jerked as Luffy pulled on his hair.

 “I said not to worry about it,” Luffy said firmly.

 Law felt himself smile despite everything. Luffy was good at that. “I love you.”

 Law realized what he’d just said when Luffy’s eyes widened. “You-”

 “I’m sorry!” Law blurted out. That’s all he had for Luffy these days, apology after apology.

 “Why?” Luffy asked, beaming. “You said you love me, why are you sorry? I lo-”

 “Don’t,” Law said. “Please, Luffy-ya, don’t.”

 “Why?” Luffy looked so confused. “I do lov-”

 “No you don’t!” Law said.

 Luffy frowned at him, eyes narrowing, “I think I’d know better than you.”

 “Luffy, you don’t love me, you love…the, the other me, the one with his memories,” Law said, pulling Luffy’s hands away from himself. “Not me.”

 Luffy rolled his eyes, “You’re still you; you’re just missing some memories. Jeez, Traffy, thinking I don’t know my own boyfriend…”

 “But your memories were affected too,” Law said. “Just…can’t you wait? Until we’ve fixed this?”

 “No.” Luffy grabbed Law’s shoulders. “Traffy, I love you, too. Okay? We’re going to fix things, but I already love you. It’s going to be okay.”

 No, not it wasn’t, not until they fixed this, until Law wasn’t broken anymore…

 “It’s going to be okay,” Luffy repeated.

 Law hoped he was right.

.o.o.o.

 “Okay, so, since everyone’s memories of who we’re even meeting are fuzzy—some say Kuzan, some say no clue—I’m going to go with we were supposed to meet D.R. and simply cannot remember him,” Sabo suggested. “Frankly at this point I’d assume Kuzan has no clue either so let’s not bet on help from him. Heck, he might not even know to show up.”

 “We know Mingo’s onto us anyway,” Luffy said. “We’re going to have to be sneaky before we can kick his butt.”

 “Bentham, Koala, and Nami are already working on costumes,” Robin said.

 “Okay but how the hell are we supposed to disguise Bepo?” Law asked.

 “Soot,” Luffy said.

 “What?” Law asked.

 “We’ll put soot from the machine shops on him and say he’s a panda,” Luffy said. “Pandas are almost as cool as polar bears anyway.”

 Law glanced backwards at Bepo, currently serving as a backrest for Law, Luffy, and Robin, “That work for you?”

 “…Can I have shower dibs?” Bepo asked cautiously.

 “Bepo gets dibs on first shower,” Law told the others. “Barring someone being seriously injured and desperately needing it cleaned.”

 “Works for me!” Luffy said. “Okay, we know Mingo’s built a factory or whatever that we’re going to wreck, and there’s this Sugar who’s a lady who looks like a kid but is really like more than Traffy’s age and we’re going to kick her butt even though she looks like a kid, and we’re gonna kick Mingo’s butt too if we can but we can leave him for the Marines if we don’t.”

 “Unless he’s got some kind of card up his sleeve…” Robin mused. “Jinbe, you were a Warlord. What do you think?”

 “The Marines would not be happy to have a Warlord publicly announcing he’d left, even if it’s insincere and forced,” Jinbe said. “It would hurt their reputations.”

 “But what if they said ‘ha-ha it was all a clever trap by us, the heroic Marines, that he tricked those pirates’ or something?” Luffy asked.

 “They can’t admit they lied to the public on such a scale. Can’t have people questioning other things, like the Impel Down jailbreak or Marinford,” Jinbe said. “Unless Doflamingo is far more vital than we know…”

 “He can’t be. The Marines should be thanking us for giving them a chance to get rid of him,” Law said, folding his arms.

 “We know he’s planning something though, he withdrew Monet,” Sabo said.

 “I’m not sure we need trap spelled out any more than it already is,” Jinbe said pointedly.

 “Yeah, but we need to fix our memories,” Luffy said. “So we’re going and we’re punching Mingo and breaking his trap.”

 Law nodded. Doflamingo losing was all that mattered, in the end.

 “…All right, I going out on a limb here but…is it just me or does this man look somewhat familiar?” Robin asked, eyeing the photo Law had grudgingly allowed to be shared.

 “Do you remember something?” Law asked.

 “No but…he resembles Doflamingo, don’t you think?” she asked. “And his initial s are ‘D.R’…”

 “You think…you think this person we forgot is related to Dolfamingo?” Jinbe asked, stunned. “That poor man…”

 “Why would so many of my memories, my personality in some ways, be dependent on anyone related to that monster?” Law demanded.

 “I don’t know but it seems a possibility,” Robin said.

 “You know, she’s right,” Sabo said. “Like Doflamingo with bangs and no glasses. Weird.”

 “This is giving me a headache,” Law complained, rubbing his temples.

 “Don’t think about it too hard then. You can do that after we fix things,” Jinbe said as Luffy patted him on the shoulder.

 “And we’ll fix them soon,” Luffy promised.

.o.o.o.

 “So you are the former Admiral Aokiji.”

 “Should I know you?” Kuzan asked the newcomer, a Marine in a lavender kimono.

 “Admiral Fujitora, one of the new promotions,” Fujitora said.

 Kuzan’s eyebrows raised. This man had to be older the Garp. Either he was really fucking powerful—enough so to make up for his blinded eyes—or the promotions had gone by seniority this time…not that he remembered this guy form anywhere. “Doflamingo mentioned he was calling the Navy about this…situation.”

 “As if we are his errand boys,” Fujitora snorted as he sat down next to Kuzan.

 Kuzan had to commend his Observation Haki if it allowed him to move about with such ease in the crowded bar. “Don’t like the feathery bastard either, huh?”

 “That’s one way of putting it. I cannot read the menu, do they have sake?”

 “Warm or chilled?” Kuzan asked.

 “Warm. I’m sure you’d feel otherwise,” Fujitora said.

 “Give me a cold beer any day,” Kuzan agreed.

 “So. I am here because the Navy ordered me. Why are you here?”

 Kuzan frowned. He’d had it made very clear to him not to mention the toy-ified Marine to anyone else. “Was in the area when Law called with his threat. I’m better equipped to handle the kid than you, no offense. I just know him.”

 “…That’s not all,” Fujitora surmised as his drink arrived. “He’s got some leverage, hasn’t he?”

 “He’s got leverage on a lot of things, being a Warlord and all,” Kuzan said.

 “A deplorable system. I would have it torn down,” Fujitora said.

 “You and me both,” Kuzan sighed, wishing he could remember why he came here at all…wishing he could remember that Marine that Doflamingo had captured. “You and me both.”

.o.o.o.

 Ace stretched as he woke up. They were maybe a day from Dressrosa at their current speed, and frankly Ace wanted to be well-rested.

 At least that was his excuse if anyone complained about his narcolepsy. He left the crow’s next and hopped down onto the main deck.

 Usopp and Shachi were doing weapon inspections for everyone who had tricks up their sleeves. Bentham was apparently kicking through various planks Jean Bart and Nami were setting up. And Luffy was relaxing on the figurehead.

 Ace went to talk to him, “How are things?”

 “Eh, pretty good. Robin had this neat theory that D.R. might be related to Mingo.”

 “Poor guy,” Ace said.

 “Yeah, that’s what Jinbe said,” Luffy said. “And thinking about it made Traffy’s head hurt so he’s napping.”

 “Who’s guarding Caesar?” Ace asked. He didn’t want to talk about Law. Law was driving him nuts with his sullenness and snappishness and his eye-rolling. He knew the guy wasn’t normally like that or anything but it was really hard to keep the kid gloves on when he saw him being curt with Luffy or spooking Chopper.

 “Zoro’s got it,” Luffy said. “He and Sanji got into it because Caesar tripped Sanji and blamed Zoro and Sanji bought it cause, well, Sanji and Zoro.”

 “They just need to fuck already and get it over with,” Ace muttered.

 “Hey, not everyone solves their stuff with sex,” Luffy said.

 “And as your big bro, let me be eternally grateful you’re one of those who doesn’t,” Ace laughed, clapping him on the shoulder. Because frankly the idea of Luffy having sex was just…wrong somehow. It would probably break Ace’s brain, just trying to imagine it.

 “So you’re going with the team looking for his factory thing, so Mingo doesn’t even have any newer chemicals to give Kaido,” Luffy said. “I mean, building, burn it, easy, right?”

 “Not with chemicals involved…might need to see what it is so I don’t, I don’t know, accidentally poison everyone by heating the wrong thing,” Ace said. “What about you?”

 “Team Punch Mingo in the Face,” Luffy said.

  “Aw, that’s the fun team,” Ace mock-complained.

  “Yeah well last time you were on the fun team and I wasn’t, so there!” Luffy said.

 “Oh come on, are you still made about that?”

 “Very!”

.o.o.o.

 The crew had some difficulty deciding on disguises. Naurally Bentham had his in the bag, but everyone else was a bit trickier.

 “Usopp, a dorky hat’s no good if you’re just going to have your hair fan out the back…” Koala sighed.

 “Well not like anything’s going to hide my nose,” Usopp said, shrugging.

 “Ueah but just the nose isn’t so bad,” Nami said, cramming Usopp’s hair under the hat. “There. Solved it.”

 “How’s this?” Chopper asked. He was in his Arm Point and wearing a heavy coat and a turban to hide his antlers.

 “As good as we’re going to get without you impersonating a toy,” Bentham said.

 “We should have done that,” Sabo told Law and Luffy. “All right, Koala, Nami, are we fine?”

  “…No,” Nami said, shaking her head. “Hats.”

 “You’re too obvious,” Kola agreed, helping Nami take them. “Here we go…”

 The moved Sabo’s goggles onto Law’s hat and planted it on Luffy’s head. Sabo in return got the straw hat while Law got Sabo’s top hat.

 “See? Disguised!” Nami said as all three grumbled. “Now, Law, stop being an idiot and either shut your coat or at least zip up your hoodie. Your muscles are nice and all but the tattoos have your freaking crew symbol in them.”

 “Oh, right,” Law said, eyes widening as he both zipped the hoodie and buttoned the coat.

 “You’ll take care of my hat, right?” Luffy asked Sabo.

 “As soon as we’re not undercover it goes right back on your head,” Sabo said solemnly. “Now please stop the puppy eyes…”

 “Do I have to wear this?” Law asked, poking Sabo’s hat. “I’d rather put my hood up.”

 “Okay, fine,” Nami said. “Sanji, how’s the wig?”

 “I make an awful brunette,” Sanji said. “But the bangs hide my eyebrows so I’ll maintain. Oh, let’s stick the top hat on moss head!”

 “My bandanna is fine for covering my hair!” Zoro complained.

 “We’ll leave my hat here,” Sabo said.

 “Jinbe, Brook, will you be fine on your own?” Ace asked.

 “I think we’ve got guard duty covered. We’ll join you when all hell breaks loose,” Jinbe said.

 “What makes you think that will happen?” Brook asked.

 “You do remember who we’re talking about, right?” Jinbe asked.

 “Oh! You have a point, I should sharpen my sword, yohohoho…” Brook said as the others disembarked, chained associate in tow. “I miss them already!”

.o.o.o.

 “All right, let’s get this over with,” Sabo said, shoving his hands in his coat pockets. “We’ll scope around the place a bit so the factory team has time to get there. Then some of us will return Caesar while the rest clear an escape route…hopefully.”

 “Got it, Sab-bro,” Franky said. “Let’s get a move on!”

 He, Robin, Usopp, Ace, Penguin, and Shachi headed off.

 “So, what, we just wait around?” Luffy whined.

 “I anticipated this,” Nami sighed, pulling out a coin purse. “We’ll find a restaurant.”

 “Nami, this is why we all love you,” Luffy said seriously.

 “I’m up for food,” Koala said.

 “What if someone notices we’re leading a big hulking guy by chained wrists?” Chopper asked as Jean Bart pulled an interestingly disguised Caesar along.

 “...He’s clearly Jean Bart’s kinky boyfriend,” Nami decided.

 “I am never moving heavy objects for you again,” Jean Bart swore.

 “Wait, guys…where’s Zoro?” Nami asked slowly.

 “Shitty Moss Head!” Sanji swore. “I’ll go find him, keep him out of trouble…we’ll work with the escape team, I guess! See you in a few minutes!”

 “Bepo, go with them, you have a good enough sense of direction to cancel Zoro’s crap one,” Law said. “…I think.”

 “Right, Captain!” Bepo said, jogging after Sanji. “Wait up!”

 Nami sighed, “Well this is a great start, huh?”

.o.o.o.

 Ace really would have sworn he was ready for anything when they headed for the factory…but anything did not involve being kidnapped by tiny dwarves with tails. “…Luffy’s going to be mad he missed this too, huh?”

Chapter Text

 Kuzan and Fujitora had been seriously discussing the best way to utterly demolish the Warlord’s system—and get Doflamingo in as much trouble as they could along the way because screw him—when one of Doflamingo’s associates game up.

 Kuzan eyed him. Senor Pink was one of the more tolerable members of the gang, despite dressing like a baby and having a weird amount of fangirls who didn’t seem to understand no meant no even if it was a guy saying it as insultingly as possible.

 “They’re here,” the man said simply, the pacifier not impeding his speech at all.

 Kuzan idly wondered if Fujitora knew what the guy dressed like. Surely someone had to have told him. “Great, let’s get this over with. If we take them by surprise no one has to get hurt.”

 He felt a little sorry for Law and Nico Robin—Law for the fact that Doflamingo had used him as a kid and Robin for the fact that despite her best efforts and crew who wanted to protect her, she’d walked right into a trap. The least he could do was not seriously harm them during their capture.

 There was also the fact that Fire Fist Ace could potentially be a huge problem for him personally and Straw Hat Luffy’s Conqueror’s Haki needed to be dealt with delicately—preferably by knocking him out before he used it.

 “We’re not ambushing them, well, not exactly and not right away,” Senor Pink said.

 “Why not? Aokiji’s idea has tactical merit,” Fujitora said.

 “We’re going to ambush them at the hostage exchange. We don’t want Caesar hurt,” Senor Pink explained. “We have to do this…delicately.”

 “Yes, Vice Admiral Smoker transmitted how easily the scientist was kidnapped by the pirate alliance,” Fujitora said. “He sounds fragile.”

 “And stupid,” Kuzan added because how did a gas logia, with any number of ways to hide and sneak attack people, lose when they had the home field advantage? “So, how do we do this, then?”

 “Taking orders from pirates…a sad day for the Navy,” Fujitora muttered.

 This prompted some of the fans to wax on about how “cool” Senor Pink was to do such a thing. Kuzan couldn’t tell if the guy was irritated, embarrassed, or both as he barked for them to pipe down and find someone their own age

 “Aokiji comes with me,” Pink said. “We’re hoping seeing him at the exchange will throw the crew off-kilter enough for an easy capture. If not, Fujitora and his men will be ready for them.”

 “Let’s get this over with,” Kuzan sighed, getting to his feet. “Nice talking to you, Fujitora.”

 “A pleasure, Aokiji.”

.o.o.o.

 “Oh thank goodness we found you!” Bepo said.

 “What?” Zoro asked. “Oh, yeah, was wondering where the rest of you went.”

 “The rest of…oh never mind, point is, we found you!” Bepo said, hugging him.

 “We?” Zoro asked.

 “Yeah me and…where’s Sanji?” Bepo asked.

 “Stupid cook, just like him to get lost,” Zoro said, putting his hands on his hips. Bepo groaned, smacking a paw to his face.

 “Captain’s not going to like this…” Bepo sighed. “No, wait he’s over there! Oh thank goodness!”

 He seized Zoro’s hand, ignoring the swordsman’s objection about hand-holding because he was not losing the guy again, and dragged him over to Sanji and the woman he was speaking with. “Sanji, who’s this?”

 “This is Viola,” Sanji said, smiling sappily. Viola waved, looking a bit bemused at Sanji’s reaction.

 “Stop flirting, love cook, we have a job to do,” Zoro muttered, folding his arms.

 “Oh, well, too bad for you, moss brains, I’ve been getting some important information. So shut up,” Sanji said cheerfully.

 “Please don’t fight!” Bepo said.

 “Viola is from the former ruling family here,” Sanji said. “The one Doflamingo deposed.”

 “…Princess to work with. Okay, yeah, this is familiar,” Zoro admitted. “What do you want?”

 “My niece, Rebecca, is imprisoned in the Colosseum as a gladiator, along with my father,” Viola said. “If your crew is really going to cause chaos on this island, we need to get Rebecca out at the very least. They’ll just use her as a hostage.”

 “Probably the sort of hostage Luffy might be iffy about letting get hurt,” Sanji added.

 “…Okay, we go to the Colosseum, I kick everyone’s ass, we take the princess and the king and walk out, meet the escape crew, proceed as normal,” Zoro said.

 “You know it’s not going to be that simple…” Bepo sighed as they started walking to the colosseum.

.o.o.o.

 “I’d vote we knock out Baby 5 as fast as we can,” Koala said. “Her powers sounded pretty diversified and like she plays support to the others a lot…”

 “He’s not listening,” Law pointed out, bonking Luffy on the head as the rubber man loaded up on noodles.

 “Umph-uh?” Luffy asked, mouth full. Law rolled his eyes.

 “We’re punching Baby 5 early,” Sabo said.

 “Mm-kay. Who wants to do it? I want to punch Mingo,” Luffy said.

 “Koala might be good, she hits hard,” Nami said, looping an arm around her fellow redhead.

 “Think we’ve stalled enough?” Jean Bart asked.

 “Clearly enough for Law,” Sabo muttered quietly. The surgeon was tense, constantly shooting glances at the castle.

 “Jean Bart’s right, we’ll need to get going soon,” Luffy said.

 “But Bepo and the two lovebirds aren’t back yet,” Koala said.

 “Jean Bart and Koala can find them as part of the escape team, I guess,” Luffy said. “It’s Sanji, Zoro and Bepo. They’re all awesome and will be totally fine!”

.o.o.o.

“So…you’re her niece?” Bepo asked as Rebecca and a weird, one-legged toy were introduced to the group by Violet. “Humans’ hair comes in a lot of colors…”

 “You came here with the moss brain, remember?” Sanji asked.

 “Sorry!” Bepo muttered. 

 “There’s a double tournament today,” Violet said. “My father was going to compete with Rebecca, but Doflamingo had him brought to the castle.”

 “And I still need to compete,” Rebecca admitted. “I’ll be fine, Aunt Violet, I’ve survived harder.”

 “Not when the island’s about to get turned upside down by an attack on the crew you haven’t,” the Thunder Solider said firmly. “You could be held hostage!”

 “My worry exactly,” Violet said.

 “Ours too, it’s the kind of thig our captain might fall for,” Zoro said. “So we’re here to make sure it doesn’t happen.”

 “I’m pretty sure a prisoner isn’t allowed bodyguards,” Thunder Solider said.

 “One of us will enter the tournament as her partner, obviously,” Zoro said. “…Err, kid, that’s not your real armor, right?”

 “There’s an armor weight limit,” Rebecca said. “And they made it even lower for me, specifically.”

 Sanji’s blood boiled. Forcing a young girl to compete in such clothing against her will? With the obvious hopes that the exposure would make it easier to kill her?

 Zoro elbowed him, “Easy Cook, no setting yourself on fire. We’re hiding, remember?”

 “Sorry. Well, if we have to keep the weight of your clothes about the same as they are now…let’s see, how much of this cape would equal my jacket?” Sanji asked, passing her his coat.

 “It’s a little heavy so…maybe six inches? Eight?” Bepo asked, weighing the green fabric in his paws.

 “That’s not so bad,” Zoro said, helping Bepo rip that much off as Rebecca donned the jacket over her bikini. “All right, so, we enter Bepo as Rebecca’s partner to keep her alive, and then grab the both of you when everything goes to shit. Got it?”

 “I like Rebecca fine, but why me?” Bepo asked.

 “You’re just a martial arts using Mink, that’s kind of standard,” Zoro said. “While it’s pretty well known Mihawk’s son is a guy with three swords and the cook’s flaming kicks aren’t far behind that.”

 “Wow, a kung-fu panda is the most inconspicuous…” The Thunder Soldier groaned.

 “I’m actually a polar bear with a lot of soot on him,” Bepo admitted. “So, Rebecca, what’s your fighting style?”

 “I use Observation Haki to avoid attacks and redirect my opponents’ momentum to get them out of the ring,” Rebecca said.

 “Oh, that sounds good,” Bepo said. “What about attacks? I don’t want to run into those.”

 “Um…I don’t know any offensive techniques,” Rebecca admitted.

 Zoro, Sanji, and Bepo all stared at her.

 “WHAT?” they demanded.

 “I don’t have any attacks!” Rebecca explained.

 “How?” Zoro asked. “No, worse, why?”

 “Zoro, breathe,” Bepo said.

 “Calm down, moss head,” Sanji added.

“No! She has a sword and doesn’t know how stabbing or slashing work?” Zoro said angrily. “Wait a…give me that!”

 He snatched Rebecca’s sword. “…The blade is blunt?”

 “Uh oh,” Bepo muttered as Zoro’s eye started twitching.

 Sanji planted himself between Rebecca and Zoro, “Don’t take it out on her, grass for brains, she’s a year younger than Chopper for crying out loud! Besides, they want her to die, so they might have given her a blunted blade.”

 “I don’t want to hurt anyone!” Rebecca explained.

 “Oh man, it’s like when we met Vivi all over again…” Zoro muttered. “Cook, explain!”

 “It’s all well and good to not want to hurt people, but sometimes you need to at least know how to hurt them, not kill them but just hurt them, in order to not be harmed,” Sanji said. “Not every fight is in a ring where you can rely on a ring out to win. What if the moss head and I were people who wanted to hurt you right now—as if I could ever harm a lady, how preposterous, but imagine—would you be able to fight back?”

 “Well I don’t know what you do…but if he’s the son of the Warlord known for his swordsmanship I’d doubt I could do much against Zoro,” Rebecca said, shoulders sagging. “My training’s been for surviving the ring, nothing else.”

 “Thing is, against odds like that you’d be better off going for a wound-and-run,” Zoro said. “Your Haki could probably help, too.”

 “And given we’re expecting to cause some serious chaos…well let’s get that part down at least,” Sanji said. “Grass brain, Bepo, you teach her…whatever you can. Violet and I will look for a sword that works.”

.o.o.o.

“All right, Operation Stop Sugar and Save a Princess it is!” Ace decided.

 “The extra numbers will be super help!” Franky agreed. “But, hey, Leo, could you get a message to our captains about this?”

 Robin nodded, “Mansherry could be a serious boon to the Donquixote side if they use her before we can free her. We’ll need to keep our side ready.”

 “Plus their poison idea is a lot safer than our plan of having to knock her out physically, if we really have to be so careful about touching her,” Penguin said.

 “Honestly I kind of thought we were just going to have Usopp slingshot a brick at her face,” Shachi said.

 “…Someone should have told me. I’d have brought bricks,” Usopp said, looking up from telling the tontatta more stories.

 “I like it as a backup! Get Uso-land some bricks!” Leo told some of his followers.

 “I’m with Leo, good backup,” Ace said. “I’ll be the second backup.”

 “…Burn her unconscious?” Penguin asked.

 “Smoke inhalation, idiot,” Shachi said.

 “Yeah, that makes more sense,” Penguin admitted.

.o.o.o.

 “I can’t believe they think they’re being discreet,” Doflamingo mused as Monet delivered a report of the Straw Hearts’ movements, drumming his fingers on the chair.

 “I can’t believe you put me in a chair and are moving that around instead of just me when I’m maybe eight inches tall. And yet here we are,” Rocinante muttered.

 “Do you ever shut up? Ugh, you must have been so annoying as a brother, talking all the time,” Doflamingo said.

 Rocinante laughed at the irony.

 “Or maybe just insane,” Doflamingo muttered. “Forgive his rudeness, Monet, you were saying?”

 “I didn’t really notice anything about Law that’s different from how you described him at Marinford,” she said. “He did seem very tense, but Straw Hat seemed to be reining him in.”

  “Ugh, the boyfriend, how did I forget?” Doflamingo snarled. Rocinante was almost knocked off the chair as Doflamingo patted his head at an awkward angle. “Well, no matter. I’ll get Sugar to make him forget Straw Hat too. Maybe then he’ll be the right hand I always wanted, fufufufu…”

 Rocinante did not like the look on his brother’s face one bit.

 “Who knows,” Doflamingo said, tossing his arms wide. “Maybe he’ll be looking for someone new with his boyfriend gone! And he did grow up so nicely…”

 “You’re sick!” Rocinante told him. “That’s your nephew! You knew him when he was ten!”

 “How are you say such things about the young master!” Monet cried.

 “It’s fine, Monet. I can deal with the traitor myself,” Doflamingo said. “Run along now. I’m sure someone needs to stall Aokiji a bit…”

 “Surely you can say it in front of your dear crewmember,” Rocinante muttered as Monet quickly left. “What’s the matter? Don’t want to debate your sick attraction to your nephew?”

 “Nephew?” Doflamingo laughed, before strings yanked Rocinante into the air, tugging at his wooden limbs. “We are Celestial Dragons, the blood of gods, Rocinante. A god does not take in a mortal as a son.”

 “Law is my son!” Rocinante yelled. He squawked as Doflamingo began to contort him in various embossing ways. “And you’re not a god, you’re a monster!”

 “A demon, actually. A god who fell,” Doflamingo said. “But I’m going to rise again, and take this whole world-”

 “Do you have any idea how many people think that about themselves? ‘I’m going to do this and then take over the world!’ As your little brother, let me tell you, you’re not unique, Doffy,” Rocinante said.

 “I am. Because I’m going to actually do it,” Doflamingo said.

 “You’re going to lose,” Rocinante hissed.  “Just like all the rest. And that’s what you hate, isn’t it. Being just like everyone else—oof!”

 Thrown into a wall. That was new.

 “I’m better.” The force of the angry Haki shook the room. “Better than anyone else who’s tried. And don’t you forget it.”

 And suddenly Doflamingo was all smiles again, and that was more terrifying than any feat of power he could accomplish. “Do you know what I’m going to do, Rocinante? I’m going to take your friend and your ‘son’ and have them fight. I’m going to make you watch as Aokiji hands me Law. Next, I’ll chain all three of you with seastone, Aokiji will be tired after Law after all. Then I’m going to have Sugar restore you to normal…so for just a moment, everyone realizes what really happened…before I blow ice-man’s brains out in front of you and Law.”

 Rocinante snarled “You’re an idiot if you think you can.”

 “You’re banking on Law beating Aokiji then?” Doflamingo said. “Interesting bet…”

 “Kuzan’s not so easily subdued. And while you’re trying to do that you’ll also have to worry about Straw Hat Luffy, Fire Fist Ace, Knight of the Sea Jinbe, and a lot of other people who could team up with Kuzan to take you out once you start attacking him,” Rocinante said. “To say nothing of the fact that I think that Admiral you had come would aid him over you. And assuming you did somehow kill them all…you’ll answer to Emperor Shanks, won’t you? You don’t get it, Doffy. The window for you coming out on top here is shrinking with every second.”

 “That confidence will be the death of you, little brother,” Doflamingo said. “And I won’t be the one to save you from it.”

.o.o.o.

 “So how much of a trap does this feel like?” Luffy asked Sabo and Law as they headed into the castle.

 “A whole lot,” Law said. “Let’s kill them for it.”

 “I’d focus on surviving ourselves before we think of what to do to them,” Sabo said as Luffy grabbed Law’s hand to make him relax and Nami and Chopper herded their hostage along.

 “Jean Bart and Koala should have our exit covered. At the very east they’ll be able to tell Jinbe and Brook to get the ships ready to flee if it really gets that bad,” Nami said.

.o.o.o.

 “You’re a really good fighter,” Rebecca panted as she and Bepo made it through another round.

 “Thanks!” Bepo said. “I had a lunatic beating the crud out of me, my captain, and my friends for a year!”

 “…Okay then,” Rebecca said. “I see where Zoro learned to teach.”

 “Oh. Oh, um, no. Zoro says after his dad’s training, Rayleigh wasn’t so bad,” Bepo said.

 “Zoro’s dad sounds scary.”

 “He’s a Warlord,” Bepo said.

.o.o.o.

 “How long do you think they can keep this up?” Viola asked Zoro.

 “Rebecca’s stances are getting a bit sloppy, she needs longer to rest than she’s getting,” Zoro said. “But I think they’ll be fine for the two more matches they have in the tourney.”

 “Fingers crossed everyone,” Sanji muttered.

.o.o.o.

 “Go time!” Ace declared as they reached the factory.

.o.o.o.

 “What are you doing here?” Luffy demanded, pointing at Kuzan.

“You’re talking to me not him,” Doflamingo said dryly.

 “Yeah, in a minute, Mingo. You here, reason,” Luffy demanded of the ex-Admiral.

 “I’m making sure this trade goes smoothly,” Kuzan said.

 “That sure doesn’t sound ominous,” Law commented.  

 “I upheld my end of the bargain. Now give me Caesar,” Doflamingo said.

 “…You’re too calm,” Sabo observed. “You should be furious. You should be panicking about an Admiral coming to kick your ass. But you’re…fine.”

 “Maybe I just think Kaido will help me,” Doflamingo said. “Or….maybe you’re right.”

 “About?” Nami asked, charging the tip of her staff and swinging it near Caesar’s throat.

 “This being an ominous trap, of course,” Doflamingo said. “You think the government would let a prize Warlord be bullied out of his position? No, no, no. Aokiji’s not even your real problem—the new Admiral Fujitora is here with a full squadron, in addition to my own crew.”

 “Why would they lie for scum like you?” Law demanded.

 “Because I am mightier than even the government,” Doflamingo said. “I have connections.”

 “You got the fucking Celestial Dragons to agree to this?” Sabo growled.

 “That explains a lot,” Kuzan muttered. “Anyway, kids, sorry, but you’re in the middle of a trap. Coe quietly, and no one gets hurt.”

 “You have to be joking. We have the hostage,” Law said.

 “And I can freeze weather girl there before she can zap him, what’s your point?” Kuzan asked. “I’m sorry it has to end like this Law, but you walked right in.”

 “Aokiji’s right. I’m afraid you’re in a bit of a bad position,” Doflamingo said as Buffalo went to free Caesar, Nami stepping back with a glare. “Oh, Law, did you really think this would work?”

 Law smirked, “Yeah. I did. But luckily I got overruled.”

 Buffalo was embedded in the wall by a kick from Caesar.

 “What?” Doflamingo gasped.

 “Oh, did you think we’d be foolish enough to bring Caesar right to you with what you did?” Sabo asked as ‘Caesar’ shifted into Bentham. “I don’t think so. Now, unless you’d like to take back this double cross and let the Admiral and ex-Admiral arrest you, our crewmates are going to kill your clown.”

 “He’s actually a scientist,” Chopper said.

 “Clown,” Nami and Luffy said.

 “Sorry for interrupting, but you all have no idea how many people you’re putting in danger,” Kuzan said.

 “Then arrest him, Ice-man,” Law said coldly. “And they won’t be in danger anymore.”

 “You know that’s not what I mean,” Kuzan said. “Law, you’re pushing your own vendetta over the lives of thousands of people.”

 “Says the guy who killed his own best friend to get an innocent island Buster Called,” Law sneered.

 The only warning anyone had was a sudden temperature drop before Kuzan punched Law across the room.

 “You have no right to talk about that,” Kuzan snarled, before blocking a Haki-coated Red Hawk from Luffy as Chopper helped Law haul himself out of the wall.

 “Fuck you,” Law snarled, generating a Room. “You want Caesar? You’ll never have him. Shambles!”

 Law, Sabo, Luffy, Nami, Chopper, and Bentham disappeared from the room and ended up in one of the courtyards.

 “How’d he even get Kuzan on his side?” Sabo wondered, tossing Luffy his hat in exchange for his goggles.

 “Memory mess-up, most likely,” Nami said as Law took his own hat back. “All right, this is the ultimate worst-case scenario. We need to get to the factory and help the others bring it down and then get the heck out of here.”

 “We need to find R, though!” Luffy said.

 “Taking out Sugar and the factory will handle that,” Sabo said. “Law?”

 “I’m fine,” Law said, “Just…really angry.”

 “That makes sense,” Luffy said. “Okay, let’s just—hey! Out of our way!”

 Some of the weaker crew members were bowled over, but Buffalo, Baby 5, Machvise, and Lao G seemed unharmed.

 “Remember who to hit first,” Sabo muttered, pulling out his rifle.

 “On it. Thunderbolt Tempo!” Nami said, launching an attack dead at Baby 5.

 “Look out!” Chopper yelled, knocking Law over to stop an ice lance from getting him in the back.

 Law’s eyes narrowed. Aokiji was the biggest threat…and seemingly aiming for just him. “Sorry Luffy. Shambles!”

 He warped himself and Kuzan—and Chopper, oops—to a street on the other side of the palace. “Tony-ya, find a transponder! Call the ship, tell Jinbe and the skeleton to kill Caesar! Now!”

 “Oh no you don’t!” Kuzan said, aiming for Chopper as he changed into Walk Point and ran. Law took his arm off before the blast of ice could exit his hand, causing it to mis-aim and nearly hit some fleeing civilians. “Damn it, Law!”

 “You made the wrong choice, siding with Doflamingo!” Law growled. “And it’s the last choice you’ll ever make!”

.o.o.o.

 “I knew it, Law vs. Aokiji,” Doflamingo laughed. “Law noticed the iceman wanted him and tried to be noble by pulling the fight elsewhere. Hmm…that deer that ran off could be a problem. Dellinger, handle it. Monet, go reinforce the rest of the family against Straw Hat.”

 “Yes, Doffy!” Both said, running out of the room.

 “Isn’t it a nice show?” Doflamingo asked, calmly prying Rocinante’s arms and legs off. “There. Now you don’t go running off on me. Sit still and enjoy the show…little brother.”

.o.o.o.

 While Franky fought the man in the diaper, Robin watched in horror as Sugar created more toys. She wondered who they were, who they’d been…and how they felt, forced to fight their friends.

 She quietly cursed as Trebol slipped her hold again. His mucus made impossible for her to get a good enough grip for a neck snap…at least Ace’s fire was keeping him back, but he was having to be too careful, to avoid burning the toys to bits…

 She felt something.

 Something grabbed her arm—one of the ones sprouting from the floor to restrain a toy lunging for Shachi.

 She couldn’t move.

 No.

 No, no, no.

 Only a doll, Robin watched helplessly as her friends' plan continued to fall apart.

Chapter Text

 Jinbe nearly lost his footing as the submarine lurched, “What on earth?”

 “I thought we were hiding in the sub so no one would find us!” Brook said as they saw sky outside the door’s portholes.

 “If neither of us made it surface…who did?” Jinbe asked.

 “…Should I deal with our hostage?” Brook asked.

 “Be ready to,” Jinbe said. “Oh no….”

 “The navy?” Brook asked as they peered outside. “Oh my! Is that one of the new…?”

 “Admiral Fujitora. I’ve seen him in the papers,” Jinbe said.

 “Hand over Caesar Clown and accept your arrest and we will not kill you here and now,” Fujitora warned.

 “…Is he really threatening you out on the water?” Brook asked, drumming his fingers on his sword.

 “I do believe he is,” Jinbe said, frowning. “We’ll need to chat with him about that.”

.o.o.o.

 “AAAAAAH!” Chopper yelled as he ran through the castle. “Got to find a transponder, got to find a transponder—where do these people keep transponders?”

 He trotted nervously in place for a moment, “Okay, okay, Doflamingo’s in here somewhere, got to be subtle about—ah!”

 He was knocked off his hooves by a powerful kick.

 “Huh. Talking deer,” the guy in heels mused. “Weird…”

 “I’m weird?” Chopper demanded, nodding at him. Oh, wait, better play defense. “Guard Point!”

 The next attack thankfully was absorbed by his thick fur, though it did send him rolling. “Oh no, not stair, not stairs!”

.o.o.o.

 “These people are harder to deal with than I thought they’d be!” Nami complained as Sabo barely got in front of her in time to block Buffalo, who was using Baby 5 as a sword, with his pipe.

 “At least the super-heavy man isn’t squashing our dear captain!” Bentham called, ducking a blow from Lao G as Luffy bounced back from Machvise landing on him yet again.

 “But we have to find Law and Chopper!” Nami said. “And Koala…Jean Bart…the factory team…”

 “This is bad,” Sabo agreed. “Nami, make some clouds for cover, then blow them away on the count of ten. I need to back up a bit to shoot.”

.o.o.o.

 “They’re safe,” Violet sighed as Rebecca and Bepo won their final fight. “All right, now, we just smuggle Rebecca out while everyone’s tired…”

 “Who’s the weird rectangle guy?” Zoro asked as a man in a headdress entered the ring.

 “Diamante. One of Doflamingo’s four chief executives,” Sanji said. “He’s a swordsman, remember?”

 “Oh no,” Violet said as it was announced the prize for winning was a fight against Diamante. “No…”

 “Okay, he’s giving them a breather, we need a plan,” Sanji muttered as Diamante continued playing the crowd.

 “All right…okay, as soon as he thinks he’s got Bepo and Rebecca cornered, the cook and I intervene. Sanji, I’ll block his sword, you kick his head in,” Zoro said.

 “Doable,” Sanji agreed “I wish we knew how the others were doing…”

 “I can help with that,” Violet said. “My Devil Fruit lets me see anything…they’re fighting the crew. I…I can’t quite tell how the factory fight is going…but your friends at the castle seem to be having trouble…and two one the streets…oh, no, Pica!”

 “Shit…can they hold on for just a few minutes?” Zoro asked.

 “I….think so. The redheaded girl seems to be dodging and the giant man is weathering his blows, but…Trafalgar Law seems to be struggling…” Violet said.

 “Law’s strong, he’ll manage,” Zoro said. “What about Chopper? Look for a tiny reindeer!”

.o.o.o.

 Chopper was getting dizzy. Dellinger had clearly decided knocking him down staircases was the way to mess with him in Guard Point. He tried to upset him, maybe make him mess up. “What, thought you’d give me a fun ride instead of a fight!”

 That sounded like something Law would say…well, when he wasn’t all weird anyway. Chopper would have to tell him after they fixed things.

 “Why you…”

 Chopper caught sight of a transponder snail, just sitting on an end table near a vase. If he could just get to it…

 Dellinger knocked him against a wall, “Got you now! Let’s shave this fur—whoa!”

 Chopper’s eyes widened as Dellinger almost had his tendon cut by a sword.

 “Go!” the old man in a blue cape yelled. “I’ll hold him off!”

 “Like hell you will!” Dellinger mocked.

 “Go!” the old man said.

 Chopper wanted to help him…but he had to use the transponder first. He had to get the message out. “I’ll come back for you!”

 He turned back into Walk Point, took the snail in his mouth, and ran.

.o.o.o.

 “My father stalled his opponent. He’s running with a transponder now…he’s really not so small, but reindeer do look rather distinct,” Violet said as the fight started.

 “He’s running around in full deer form?” Sanji asked as the fight started. “Must be in a hurry…”

.o.o.o.

 “Great, he can merge with stone and there’s rock everywhere! Just what we needed!” Jean Bart growled as Pica took over a house to loom over them once again.

 “Like either of us can’t break solid rock,” Koala said. “As long as we keep shattering him, he’s stalled out! Someone can come along to help us later!”

.o.o.o.

  Kuzan took a deep breath. He’d managed to keep Law from doing too much damage and gotten the street evacuated, at the cost of constantly getting limbs temporarily removed.

 “Law, I’m used to shattering, you’re wasting your time with it,” he scolded.

 “As long as you’re dealing with me, you’re not hurting my friends,” Law said. “And as long as you’re stuck fighting me, I can figure out how to beat you.”

 “With as crazed as you are right now? Doubt it,” Kuzan said. Law had been overusing Tact to try and throw Kuzan off to get close enough to rip his heart out—Fujitora had told him what happened to Smoker. Who the hell did that?—and needlessly wasting energy while he did.

 More importantly, he hadn’t noticed Kuzan had activated one of his sneakier techniques: Sub Zero, the ability to drop the temperature in a localized area. He’d probably notice soon, though, when he started seeing his breath.

 If he could just force Law into passing out, he’d be good. Then he’d make damn sure Doflamingo kept his end of the bargain.

.o.o.o.

 “Why isn’t stupid Mingo down here?” Luffy demanded, finally getting Machvise to stay down with a Gum-Gum Elephant Gun to the face.

 “He thinks we’re not worth fighting,” Sabo said. “Thinks he’s got it all under control.”

 “I’m going to break his stupid sunglasses across his stupid smile,” Luffy decided as he tripped Buffalo so Sabo could concuss him.

 “Great!” Nami and Bentham said, the ballet master kicking Lao G into Baby 5 so Nami could electrocute them both.

 “Let’s go get Mingo!” Luffy said.

.o.o.o.                                                                   

 “Jinbe? Brook?” Chopper called as he turned into Heavy Point. “It’s Chopper! Stuff went wrong! You have to…to…you know, Caesar, and then come help!”

 “Chopper?” Brook sounded worried…and like he was fighting people. “Oh no, are you in trouble?”

 “We all are! Please, hurry!” Chopper called, before hanging up. He ran back down the hall, changed into Walk Point, and smashed into Dellinger antlers fist right as the guy was about to finish off the old man.

 “Well look who’s back!” Dellinger mocked despite the puncture wounds. “Your head’s going in my room!”

 Chopped gulped and ran, Dellinger on his heels. The old man threw his sword, making Dellinger pause as Chopper rounded a corner.

 “I’ll deal with you later!” he heard Dellinger yell as he ran into a room and shut the door.

 It looked like a kid’s bedroom, with toys on the bed…Chopper really hoped none of them were Sugar’s victims…

 Oh no. He was cornered. Jinbe and Brook wouldn’t get here in time to bail him out…Law was fighting an ex-Admiral…Luffy didn’t know where he was…

 Chopper turned back into Brain Point and tapped his hooves to his head, “Think, think!”

 “Hide on the bed! Pretend you’re a toy!”

 Chopper looked up to see a limbless marionette puppet sitting on a chair facing a window. He looked at himself…yeah he guessed his Brain Point did look toy-like. “Good idea!”

 He opened one of the windows before jumping onto the bed and going still with a sweet smile pasted on his face, nestled between two bears.

 The door smashed open. Chopper forced himself to not move, not even blink as Dellinger menacingly entered the room.

 “You, Traitor!” Dellinger said, grabbing the puppet out of the chair. “Where did it go?”

 It? Chopper owed him a hoof-smack to the face for that one…

 “Out the window,” the toy said. “Surprised he didn’t end up in the middle of that nasty fight down there.”

 Dellinger glanced out, “Heh. Law’s getting his ass kicked. Doffy’s great, figuring out how to get a second Admiral on our side!”

 Wait, what? Law was in trouble in his fight? Chopper forced himself to hold still.

 “Well you’re disobeying Doffy’s orders right now, I’m supposed to be forced to watch the fight, nothing else,” the puppet said.

 “Shit!” Dellinger said, putting him back in the chair and turning him to look out the same window. “Well, smart of you to answer me! I’d have ripped your body off next!”

 Chopper watched the man in high heels leap from the window—that landing had to hurt, no matter what, he’d need his ankles looked at for sure!—and counted to ten before slipping over to the puppet. “Thanks.”

 “I’m not entirely selfless. My limbs are on the dresser. Can you get them?”

 Chopper turned into Heavy Point so he could reach and brought them back. “Here, better do this while I have fingers.”

 He slotted all four limbs back into place. “There. You someone their ‘Sugar’ turned into a toy?”

 “Yes,” the puppet said.

 “And you were watching a fight…Law!” Chopper yelped, seeing his friend fighting the ex-Admiral Kuzan. “Oh no, Law? Oh man, why is Kuzan fighting us? I thought he was helping us! He gave us the documents on the Donquixote Pirates! This is crazy!”

 “No, you forgot who gave them to you,” the puppet said. “But that’s for later! You have to get me down there! Please, Mr. Reindeer! I have to stop them!”

 “You think you can stop them?” Chopper asked. “That’s Law vs. an ex-Admiral down there!”

 “I can do it!” the puppet said. “I can get Kuzan to pause and I’m sure I can get through to Law!”

 Chopper’s eyes widened, “Are you R?”

 “R?” The puppet seemed pleasantly surprised. Well, as much as Chopper could tell, his face didn’t really change…

 “Law’s got a tattoo of an R and one photo he has of the guy we think is who he forgot was signed D. R.,” Chopper explained. “We know he forgot someone and we think it’s this R person.”

 “Yes. My name is Donquixote Rocinante,” the puppet said. “Law is my son.”

 Chopper felt his jaw drop—Donquixote?—and managed to collect his thoughts after a moment, “…That would do it.”

 “Do what?” Rocinante asked as Chopper peeked out the window. No sign of Dellinger coming back yet. He started looking for a good place to land.

 “When we were on Punk Hazard, all of the sudden Law’s whole personality shifted. Sure he can have a mean streak now and then but suddenly it was almost all the time. It was scary!” Chopper said. “But then we all realized that didn’t fit, either with our own memories of him or how he was on our crew or with Luffy or anything!”

 “So his personality did change…” Rocinante said, sounding pained.

 Chopper tied the puppet’s strings to his bag. “Yeah, a little. But then he noticed his memories didn’t make sense and…it’s really been messing with him. So if you’re his R, you can clear it up!”

 Chopper changed into Jump Point and leaped out the window, landing on a roof near the fight. “Huh. Little cooler here…”

 “Kuzan must be trying to freeze Law out!” Rocinante said. “We have to hurry!”

.o.o.o.

 “Chopper’s in danger!” Brook called over to Jinbe as he danced around the Marines Fujitora had ordered occupy him. Apparently his nonliving state was harder for the Admiral’s Haki to sense.

 “I see,” Jinbe grunted, barely avoiding a gravity well. “Then we have no choice…Brook, this may be a grave insult, but I need you to play as loudly and badly as you can!”

 “I’ll live—yohohoho, no I won’t!” Brook laughed, slashing enough Marines into submission to pull out his violin. He mentally sent it a small apology before playing the most screeching disaster of a ditty he could.

 Fujitora jerked in surprise—ah! His Observation Haki may have been strong, but his hearing was also part of what guided him!—at what Brook sadly had to admit was the most dreadful sound on the sea before Jinbe outright body-slammed him into the ocean.

 “Land on my back!” Jinbe called from the water. “I’ll swim to shore so we may join the battle!”

 “We’re coming, Chopper!”  Brook yelled as he leaped from the sub even as Fujitora’s men scrambled to save the sinking Admiral.

.o.o.o.

 Ace couldn’t quite remember something, so someone probably got grabbed. He increased the fire—if nothing else, the heat and smoke inhalation might knock out Sugar, and it was keeping Trebol back.

 Maybe his goo was flammable? Who knew?

 “Ace-land, look out!” one of the tontatta yelled.

 Ace turned himself into pure fire even as he turned, knowing what was coming, what the warning meant. If he was fire, she couldn’t touch-

 Oh.

 Oh no.

 Haki.

 He’d forgotten she might have Haki.

 He couldn’t move. He was some wood thing, maybe a doll, stuck immobile on the floor of a building he’d set ablaze.

 Oh shit. He’d been turned into a toy. And no one else could know. They were down to just Usopp, and…and he’d just fainted.

 No one else would ever know, then.

 Ace wondered if toys could cry. He didn’t seem to be able to. His brothers, his fathers, his grandpa, Marco….would anyone even remember him if he was destroyed before Sugar was knocked out?

 The fire crept closer as Sugar hauled Usopp up by the collar, the poisoned grape held mockingly between her fingers. Ace wondered if being a toy meant he’d still remember Usopp, assuming Sugar didn’t just kill him.

 Sugar forced the grape down Usopp’s throat.

.o.o.o.

 Kuzan jolted as Law’s sword rammed into his side.

 “Radio Knife!”

 Shit, shit, shit that one hurt. He had barely managed to turn his organs to ice and use Armament Haki and they still weren’t reassembling as fast as they should have. To say nothing of the electricity hurting like hell.

 He blasted Law into a wall the second the kid left himself open—panting, trying to get a breather, he was tired all right—pinning his limbs and making him drop his sword. “It’s over, Law.”

 “Tact.” Law’s hand twitched and the sword flew right at Kuzan’s face. Kuzan turned to ice and let it shatter part of his head before easily reforming it. “Chill out, now, like I said-”

 “WAIT!”

 …There was a deer in the middle of the fight all the sudden. Why was there a…right, one of Straw Hat’s crew. He looked skinnier right now, he’d been bigger and bulkier in the palace…

 Law looked panicked, “Damn it, Chopper-ya, run!”

 “Mr. Aokiji, Kuzan sir, um, this toy really needs to talk to you!” The deer—Chopper?—said, putting a puppet down in front of him.

 Kuzan’s eyes widened. The captured Marine. “You rescued him?”

 “I knew it! Doffy told you some story, didn’t he? And you fell for it, of course, because the memory thing!” the puppet complained.

 “…Uh…” Kuzan said. He saw Law start to really struggle and realized Tact could probably be used to shatter the ice, “You cut that out!”

 “Law, just wait a moment!” the puppet pleaded.

 “A moment to kill him?” Law asked darkly.

 The deer, now weirdly tiny and, okay, kind of cute, smacked a hoof to his head, “Law, you’re not helping yourself…”

  “I’m the R on your shoulder, Law!” the puppet insisted. “You both care way more about each other than this, but forgetting me made you forget that!”

 “The picture…” Law murmured, to Kuzan’s confusion. What picture? But for whatever reason, it made the guy stop struggling.

 The puppet turned to Kuzan, “Let him go.”

 Kuzan stared at his toy-ified friend, “I…why? He’ll just go nuts and start trying to chop me up again and in case you hadn’t noticed, I started this fight down a limb. Not sure this is a cool place to be lenient-”

 Suddenly, something happened. It felt like a mental shockwave. Kuzan stared, relieved as Roci—not his friend, no, Doflamingo had even lied about that, his lover—was returned to normal.

 His eyes went wide with panic a second later, “Law!”

 He quickly cancelled out Sub-Zero, the temperature returning to normal and Law dropping to the ground, shivering, as his icy restraints vanished.

 He’d almost…he’d been considering…Law was like his kid too, these days…he’d almost killed his kid…worse, he’d almost given his kid to Doflamingo…

 “Law!” Roci yelled, rushing over to his son with the deer. “Shit, he’s so cold…”

 “Give him to me!” Chopper said, holding out his arms as he turned back into an eight foot tall, furry humanoid. “I can warm him up faster and more safely, I have fur!”

 Kuzan could only stand there as Roci carefully handed Law over. Had he given Law hypothermia? He didn’t know, he’d been trying to do the temperature version of a choke-out but he hadn’t minded the idea of potentially killing what he’d thought at the time to be an unstable, dangerous pirate.

 “Cora-san?” Law sounded exhausted.

 “I’m right here, Law, son, I’m here,” Roci said. “You’re fine, just a bit chilly.”

 “Law, I’m sorry,” Kuzan said. He still couldn’t make his feet move to go over there.

 Law chuckled. It wasn’t a good sound, “Me too. No internal bleeding, I hope? Wasn’t sure how Radio Knife would effect a logia…”

 “I’ll be fine. I shattered and reformed the affected organs.” He left out that it had been a hell of a lot harder to do so than it should have been and he’d had to fully destroy them before they started to come back…

 “Huh, cool workaround…” Law mused. “…Ice, I may be kind of delirious cause I’m cold and exhausted….but…good fight.”

 Kuzan smiled weakly, “You too. Almost Admiral level at twenty-five. I was the youngest in generations at forty.”

“I’ve got the energy boosters,” Chopper told Law. “You can take one.”

 “Energy boosters?” Roci asked.

 “I use things called Rumble Balls to alter my Zoan forms and give myself extra ones that I developed by studying my Devil Fruit,” the deer said. “Law engineered something like that for himself from my notes to give him back some stamina for longer fights.”

 “I’ll need one hell of a nap and then be near useless for like over a day afterwards, but it’ll keep me in the game, prevent me from becoming a liability,” Law said. “And I’m getting in this fight. I want to help Ice take that fucker out for making us forget.”

 “I can get behind that,” Kuzan seethed. He was going to freeze those strings into needles and shove them through Doflamingo’s skull.

 “Are you sure they’re safe?” Roci asked as Chopper helped Law sit up.

 Law nodded. He looked a little better now, apparently giant-deer hugs were really good for warmth. “Yeah. Give it here, Chopper-ya.”

 “Okay,” Chopper said, pulling a green ball out of his satchel.

 Law all-but snatched it despite every other movement until then being utterly lethargic and swallowed it at once.

 For a moment he was still and then, “Room.”

 “What are you doing?” Roci asked when the effects weren’t readily apparent.

 “Fixing some minor damage from the fight with Kuzan, no issue,” Law said simply. “Also getting my blood circulation back up to proper speed now that the temperature has been corrected.”

 “Are you sure that second one’s healthy?” Kuzan asked, because it didn’t sound like it.

 “Trust me, I’m a doctor.”

 “So am I and I’m more…maybe-maybe not on it,” Chopper said, turning back into his smaller form. “I haven’t had the chance to study it myself and Law would probably lie if I asked since then people would try to stop him from doing it.”

 “I wouldn’t lie, I’d just tell you there’s no way in hell you could stop me,” Law said.

 “And?” Chopper tapped a foot.

 “It’s safe enough.”

 “Law!” Roci and Kuzan groaned, Kuzan smacking his forehead as he did so. Still the same stubborn brat.

 Law smirked, shrugging.

 “Traffy! Chopper!”

 “Luffy!” Chopper cheered as Luffy, the Cat Burglar, the Gentleman, and Bon Clay ran into view. “What are you guys doing?”

 “Planning to kill someone for making us forget Ace for bit,” Gentleman Sabo said darkly. He suddenly looked a bit sheepish, “And lost on the way back to Doflamingo…”

 “Also looking for Traffy since now we’ve all got our memories back and kind of need to regroup to fight,” Luffy said. He looked at Law and beamed. “Traffy, how you feeling?”

 “Better,” Law said, sending his fellow captain a small smile. “Now let’s go kick Doflamingo’s ass.”

 “Hell yes!” Luffy cheered. “Oh, also, there’s some guys chasing us.”

.o.o.o.

 “Let’s go!” Robin yelled. She was glad that there seemed to be no side-effects to having been turned into a toy—no loss of feeling in her limbs, no disorientation. It was convenient when being turned back into a person in the building your crewmate had set ablaze.

 “One sec,” Ace said, summoning fire to his hands.

 “Ace what are you doing?” Robin asked a moment before Ace blasted Sugar.

 Trebol yelled and tried to rush them, but Ace made a wall of fire to back him up.

 “Ace!” Robin said, pointing at the exit urgently.

 “I roasted her arms. She’s not grabbing anyone else,” Ace said darkly. “Not with third degree burns.”

 Robin nodded, “All right, good idea. But we need to go! We have to escape and find the others!”

 “Mansherry’s not here! We have to keep looking!” Leo agreed. “Come on, Ace-land!”

 Ace turned; the dwarves were already carrying Usopp away. “Yeah, we do.”

 “The palace.”

 “He, uh, stopped fighting all the sudden,” Franky said, pointing at Senor Pink when everyone turned to see what the man with the pacifier had said.

 “The princess with the healing tears is at the palace,” Senor Pink said, shaking with rage.

 “…Something wrong?” Franky asked as Pink joined them in walking out.

 “Yeah. And I just remembered what!” the man said.

.o.o.o.

 As soon as some of the toys turned into people, Sanji, Zoro, and Violet made their move.

 Sanji flew out of the stands, landing feet-first on Diamante’s face and then springing to land between him and Rebecca, “Let’s go!”

 “She’s all frozen up!” Bepo said, trying to pull Rebecca from the ring.

 “It’s her father, she remembers him,” Violet said as Zoro blocked Diamante. “Kyros.”

 “Well that is wonderful and touching and stuff but we need to move!” Zoro said, managing to knock Diamante back. “Come on, Sanji, aren’t you all about saving girls? I’ll hold him off!”

 “Sure you’ve got this, moss head?”

 “Get your lovesick ass in gear and go!” Zoro yelled.

 Sanji scooped Viola into his arms as Bepo finally just slung Rebecca over his shoulder and they rushed for the exit, Zoro keeping Diamante off them.

 “Mihawk’s son! Interesting, let’s see how close you are to your famous father!” Diamante said.

 “Closer than Vista and sure as hell closer than you!” Zoro said, knocking him back. “Tiger Hunt—whoa!”

 He ducked a Haki-blackened pole that clearly would have broken his spine if it made contact with his neck as intended.

 A man in a heart-patterned trench coat stood in the ring, though he soon threw the coat aside. “I’ll handle the swordsman’s apprentice, Diamante. Pursue Rebecca. We’ll need her as a hostage against the populace.”

  “Thanks, Corazon,” Diamante said, going to leave. Zoro tried to stop him, but Corazon was in the way-

 “Oh no you don’t!”

 Zoro’s eyes widened as a one-legged gladiator nearly took Diamante’s head. “Who are you?”

 “I’m Kyros,” Kyros said. “But you knew me as the Thunder Soldier.”

.o.o.o.

 Luffy’s group’s pursuers were quickly thwarted by Kuzan idly icing the street and everyone stepping back, allowing the guards to slide right past them. Law then calmly removed their legs for good measure.

 “Falling is so much funnier when other people do it,” Rocinante said, beaming.

 “Hey, what’s that on the television?” Nami asked, frowning as the image of Doflamingo on the screen began talking very loudly.

 “That’s one way to announce opponents,” Rocinante said as Doflamingo declared Luffy, Law, Kuzan, and a "King Riku" three star opponents; Rocinante, Sabo, Koala, Jinbe, Kyros, Sanji, and Zoro two star opponents; and the rest of the Straw Hearts, Rebecca, and Violet one star opponents.

 “Hey, he forgot Usopp and Ace!” Luffy complained.

 The screens all split, showing “God Usopp” and “Gol D. Ace” as five star opponents.

 “…Or not,” Luffy corrected. “Wow is he ever in for it.”

 “For what?” Rocinante asked.

 “You don’t use that last name with Ace,” Sabo said. A giant pillar or flame shot up in the distance. “See? It really pisses him off.”

 “Huh. Guess he was only ever somewhat annoyed with me, then,” Law mused.

 “Duh. You never called him that,” Luffy said.

  “How’s he even going to get anyone to comply outside his crew?” Chopper asked. “Lots of people are mad at him with Sugar knocked out.”

 “You had to ask,” Law groaned as threads arced across the sky.

 “What the heck is that?” Sabo asked.

 “My brother’s ultimate technique. The Birdcage,” Rocinante said. “We’re stuck until we take him out.”

 “The bars are string and there’s only so many; just walk between them,” Sabo said. 

 “Yeah, you’d think you could do that but…no,” Rocinante said. “You’ll be cut to pieces.”

 “You sure?” Luffy asked. “…Cool.”

 Nami and Sabo both punched him in the head. “NOT COOL!”

 “Damnit, Luffy-ya…” Law muttered.

 “We still have Caesar as a bargaining chip…” Nami mused.

  “Maybe not…” Chopper said. “Jinbe and Brook sounded like they were in trouble.”

 “He probably sent Fujitora to get back Caesar,” Kuzan mused. “I could head towards the coast, check on them…”

 “Friends of Uso-land and Ace-land!”

 “…Okay, I know I’m not delirious anymore, why am I hallucinating?” Law asked as a tiny tailed person ran up to them, before stopping to gasp for breath.

 “Ace-land…and Uso-land…agreed with our leader Leo…that we need your help to…free Princess Mansherry…before she is used to heal Doflamingo’s men!” the tiny woman panted. Chopper quickly picked her up and he and Law began to assess her condition.

 “There’s a princess involved?” Luffy asked.

 “If you knew the full details of what’s going on around here, there’s actually three if we count this new one…” Rocinante muttered. “And a king…”

 “This person could heal everyone we just had to beat up? Great, we don’t need to waste time doing it over!” Sabo groaned.

 “So we rescue the princess. Easy,” Luffy said as Chopper set the tiny lady on his hat.

 The ground shook.

 “What now?” Kuzan sighed before everyone’s eyes widened as a giant stone man rose up. “…Oh, well. That can’t be good.”

.o.o.o.

 “He’s not aiming for us—what’s he…Bepo! Sanji!” Koala yelled in panic as Pica advanced on their friends.

 Sanji quickly put down the woman he was carrying—wait, where did Sanji and Bepo get those ladies? Why was one of them wearing Sanji’s suit jacket, no pants, a cape, and bronze greaves?—to lunge at Pica with a fiery kick, “So just who is this shithead?”

 “A real pain in the ass,” Jean Bart panted. “Every time we break him he uses new rock!”

 “Well, let’s see what happens when I do it,” Sanji growled, flames bursting from his body.

 “…I thought it was Fire First who ate the Flame-Flame Fruit,” the woman in the spotted dress observed.

  “Oh, no, that’s just Sanji. He does that,” Jean Bart explained. Koala and Bepo both nodded in agreement.

.o.o.o.

 “Can anyone on either of your crews create water in steady quantities?” Rocinante asked.

 “Uh, my Shower Tempo can make localized rain,” Nami said. “Why?”

 “You and I are going to go and take out Trebol,” Rocinante said, grinning.

 “Uh, Nami’s really not a primary combatant,” Sabo said.

 “She doesn’t need to be, the water’s just to help me shoot the guy, I’ll explain on the way!” Rocinante said, grabbing Nami and racing off.

 “…So, what, is your dad a D too? Because he’s as bad as you, Luffy, and Ace,” Sabo told Law.

 “Farthest thing from it,” Law chuckled. “So…how do we do this?”

 “Well someone has to do something about the giant stone asshole your chef is fighting,” Kuzan said. “Going to be hard, there’s a lot of stone around to merge with.”

 “Nah, he’s easy,” Luffy said.

 “Do you not see that guy?” Law demanded. “I know it’s a little hard because of some of the ice walls but…oh.”

 “Duh,” Sabo muttered, smacking himself in the head. “Kuzan can just put a layer of ice between Pica and the stone in the ground and buildings so he can’t hide in it.”

 “Makes sense to me,” Kuzan agreed. “But then who’s handing Doflamingo?”

 “Us, obviously!” Luffy said, throwing an arm around Law.

 “I am not sending children to deal with a homicidal, desperate Warlord!” Kuzan argued.

 “I’m twenty-five!” Law snapped. “Also,” he flipped Kuzan off, “a pirate, so I don’t have to listen to you. Room, Shambles!”

 “I’ve really started to hate it when he does that,” Kuzan said as Law and Luffy vanished. 

 “Not that I don’t have the utmost faith in my brother or anything…but I’d feel better backing them up,” Sabo said.

 “I’ll assume you have seastone bullets like your father?” Kuzan asked.

 Sabo nodded, patting his rifle. Kuzan frowned, “All right then, go back them up. Bon Clay, Chopper and I’ll help the chef with the giant rock idiot and then we’ll see if we can find the rest of this bunch of lunatics you call your crew and rescue a fairy princess.”

"When you put it like that, you sound as crazy as you think we are!" Sabo called over his shoulder as he set off, Chopper and Bentham trying desperately not to laugh at Kuzan as he went.

Chapter Text

 “Are you okay?” Luffy asked as he and Law ran back towards the castle.

 “What? Yes, I’m fine, energy level is decent,” Law said. The Energy Booster was doing what it was supposed to, so he could fight. “Just fine.”

 “I mean are you okay, Traffy?” Luffy said. “You know, up here?” He tapped his head.

 Law bit his lip. The rush of memories and what it meant and how that changed things was messing with him a bit. To say nothing of the gnawing guilt over how he’d treated everyone. Especially poor Chopper. Bepo hadn’t known anything was wrong and Luffy could handle him being in a foul mood—even if he shouldn’t have had to handle it and Law hated how he’d been treating him like he was annoying because sure, he could be but he was Luffy so he was more than just annoying—but Chopper had known it was all wrong and he was more fragile and Law had been scaring him.

 “I will be,” he decided. Lying to Luffy would get him nowhere.

 Law realized they’d stopped running. Luffy was giving him an oddly serious look, “What?”

 Okay, kissing, wow, it was pretty good, but really not what needed doing right now. Law stepped back after it seemed clear Luffy wasn’t going to be the one to break it, “What was that for?”

 “I love you,” Luffy said brightly.

 Law stared at him. Oh…they’d talked about it, sure but…oh. He had his memories now and it wasn’t a mistake, wasn’t wrong or…

 “Shishishi, Traffy’s blushing!” Luffy laughed.

 “You ruined it,” Law said, pressing a hand to his admittedly-heated face. “There was a moment there, and you ruined it.”

 “Nah, just snapped you out of thinking about it too long. We’re in the middle of a fight, you know!” Luffy said.

 “You’re the one who stopped running!” Law said because damn it he was dating the most frustrating man on earth and it got frustrating sometimes.

 “Oh. Huh…anyway, let’s so punch Mingo now!” Luffy said, taking his hand as they entered the palace.

 “You’re utterly insane and I love you too,” Law said. He blinked as Luffy stopped walking—again—and hugged him.

 “Yay! Traffy loves me!” Luffy pulled back, “Okay, now we punch Mingo.”

 “You punch. I’ll cut,” Law negotiated.

 “Okay…who goes first?”

 “I’ll cut him and then you punch him into a crater?”

 “Oh, that sounds good let’s do it!” Luffy said. “See, you can make not-boring plans! And—Bellamy! Hi, Bellamy!”

  Law facepalmed. Why did Luffy know the guy with the large Donquixote tattoo?

…Why did he feel like that was an ultimately futile question?

.o.o.o.

 “So what exactly are we doing?” Nami asked Rocinante. If she was getting into a fight with a major combatant, she’d like to know why.

 “Trebol is one of my brother’s Four Chief Executives,” Rocinante said. “And honestly…the one I hate most. He gave my brother the String-String Fruit and is the one who really pushed the idea that his Conqueror’s Haki means he should rule. Made the problem much worse.”

 “Why is your brother such an ass…erm, the way he is? You seem normal enough,” Nami said.

 “Ah…our upbringing was very…not normal…it’s complicated and private,” Rocinante said. “But our parents were good people while Doffy…wasn’t. He got worse as time went on and after we separated as children it seems it got even worse than that. And the Four Chief Executives are part of why. They found out about his Haki and declared him their new gang leader.”

 “So they fed his ego,” Nami surmised. “Because that’s absolutely what someone like your brother needed.”

 “Exactly,” Rocinante said, grimacing.

 “…Law told us you were a Marine. I remember that now,” Nami said. “My adoptive mother was a Marine too.”

 “Really? Interesting—all right, he should be somewhere this way, if Sugar’s knocked out he’ll be delivering her to the palace…” Rocinante mused.

 “What’s the plan?”

 “Trebol ate a Paramecia fruit, the Sticky-Sticky. It lets him produce great quantities of mucus,” Rocinante said.

 “Ick,” Nami said, wrinkling her nose. “That’s why the water, then?”

 “Right. It loosens the mucus, makes it loose its stickiness,” Rocinante said. “Trebol hides his real body under a thick coating of the stuff. You’re going to wash it away and I’m going to shoot him. Even if it doesn’t kill him, I happen to have seastone in this pistol.”

 “Then you’d better not miss. I know how long Sabo spends carving seastone bullets,” Nami said as she pulled out her newest Clima Tact. “Not like we’ll get more on the fly.”

 “Tell me about it, it’s worse when you’re clumsy,” Rocinante said, shrugging. “But I carved these ages ago, and have a full chamber. Now, let’s sneak up. Calm.”

 Nami noted it was very good he’d silenced their movements, as he almost immediately tripped over a loose brick in the road and fell into a pile of rubble.

 And caught fire.

.o.o.o.

 “…I don’t even want to know,” Jinbe decided as he and Brook observed the strings that had blocked in the island. “We should find the others.”

 “Well, we have a burning building and a giant stone person to choose from,” Brook said. “Though I think Chopper was at the palace…”

 “You run over to the palace, you're far faster. I shall see if our allies need help with the stone giant,” Jinbe decided.

 “Very well! I shall hope to lay eyes on you again soon—oh no, I never shall!” Brook declared dramatically. “Skeleton joke! Yohohoho!”

 Jinbe chuckled as Brook raced off before heading for the palace.

.o.o.o.

 “Why is there a giant stone person?” Ace whined.

 “Ace, you’re in a bad mood, we get it, but calm down, bro,” Franky said. “I’m sure you’ll get to Fire Fist his face off or whatever…”

 “That’s Pica,” Senor Pink supplied curtly. “He ate the Stone-Stone Fruit. He can meld with any stone around.”

 “But this island is all stone!” Leo yelled angrily.

 “Then we must solve that problem somehow…” Robin mused. “But you have to admit, he is a convenient landmark to run towards.”

 “And between us and the palace!” Leo complained.

 “Well, we have a plan. Ace. Massive fire blast. That guy’s face. Boom,” Usopp said from where he was slung over Franky’s shoulder.

 “Or Sanji and a massive fire kick,” Robin observed.

 “Sanji’s stealing my fight!” Ace growled.

 “Ace, I promise you will get to punch someone, now focus,” Robin said, an arm growing out of Ace’s back and rapping him on the head.

 Ace seemed to snap out of it somewhat, “Sorry. Got a little carried away.”

.o.o.o.

 “Okay, so maybe I can’t shatter the shithead better than you two,” Sanji admitted to Jean Bart and Koala.

 “Apology accepted,” Koala said, planting her hands on her hips. “He keeps swinging around to wherever Bepo, Rebecca, and Violet move to stand…”

 “Well they are princesses,” Jean Bart mused.  “Of the family that apparently rightfully rules here.”

 “Oh, got it, potential hostages,” Koala said.

 “Or potentially huge morale blow to the citizens if killed,” Sanji mused. “…Let’s try to get away from him, find the others.”

.o.o.o.

 “All right, I’ll help your cook with Pica, you tell any of your crew who’s there the rest of the plan!” Kuzan said as his ice slide deposited him, Chopper, and Bentham on a roof near Pica’s latest contract. He made a second slide down to street level, which the deer and okama quickly jumped onto.

 “Koala! Jean Bart!” Bentham yelled.

 “Bepo! Sanji!” Chopper cheered. “Sanji, Kuzan’s going to help us beat the big guy!”

 “Well great, because what we’ve been doing isn’t working,” Sanji said.

 “Shatter him again, Kuzan will put ice between him and the rock so he can’t keep making more…are they golems? They seem like golems that he sort of…pilots,” Bentham said.

 “Great plan,” Jean Bart said, rushing Pica with Sanji. Jean Bart knocked him into the air, with Sanji slamming his heel into Pica’s construct’s face hard enough to shatter most of it.

 As soon as Pica left the ground, Kuzan coated it with ice. Pica fell onto it hard, making a few cracks but thankfully not breaking through.

 “All right, let’s finish this!” Sanji said. “Then we can help the Captains and the moss head!”

 “Ten Thousand Ton Vise of Hell!”

 “Wait, what?” Kuzan asked, looking up as Machvise slammed down into the ice, shattering it to bits. “Oh, come on…”

 “That you for the assist, Machvise,” Pica said before sinking into the stone.

 The Straw Hats, Hearts, Princesses, and ex-Admiral froze.

 Chopper snorted.

 Rebecca and Koala giggled.

 Jean Bart let out a deep belly laugh.

 “That—that’s his voice?” Bentham asked, trying desperately to stifle snickers that were making it out anyway.

 “It sounds like a squeaky toy!” Bepo chuckled, paws doing nothing to muffle the sound.

 Kuzan shook his head with a smile, “Just when you think you’re not going to have something funny happen—crap.”

 Large stone Picas were sprouting from the ground, boxing the group in.

 “Pica does not appreciate his voice being mocked,” a man in a mask said. Kuzan vaguely recalled Rocinante calling him ‘Gladius’ when they’d been spying.

 Gladius put his hand on one of the stone Picas. It suddenly bubbled and expanded-

 “Get back!” Kuzan yelled, making an ice wall between the others and that statue as it exploded.

 “Great, just what we needed. Backup for the stone asshole—oof!” Koala yelped as she was knocked back by Dellinger. “You want to fight, high heels?”

 “Shit, we’re sitting ducks with this wall Pica’s making,” Sanji growled.

 “They’re boxing us in!” Rebecca agreed, wide-eyed.

 “Then I’ll bust you out,” Kuzan said, freezing a few of the statues for easy shattering. “There! Hit them!”

 “You’re good at this!” Chopper said as Bentham, Sanji, and Jean Bart broken the affected statues.

 “Admirals do more than kick ass, we have to know how to tell people what to do,” Kuzan said. “All right, Pica’s the main concern, we’ll handle the others after him.”

 “You heard him! Take out the stone shithead first!” Sanji yelled.

 Gladius moved towards another statue only to lunge back from a fireball.

 “FINALLY!” Fire Fist Ace yelled, beaming like a madman.

 “…Any of you want to explain that?” Kuzan asked the group that was behind the incredibly eager logia.

 “Not particularly, no,” Usopp said.

.o.o.o.

  “They’re very skilled,” Kyros said as he and Zoro struggled to keep Diamante and Corazon pinned inside the Colosseum.

 “This is nothing. You should meet my father” Zoro said. “They’re just annoyingly good at covering for each other!”

 “You think if we remove one the other will fall easily?” Kyros asked.

 “Exactly!” Zoro said. “Then we save the others!”

 “Very well,” Kyros said. “I think we should-ah!”

 Zoro blinked at the rock had caught Kyros in the back. “…What?”

 He looked up. The civilians had long since fled, but the stands were filling up again…with members of the Donquixote crew. Weak members, sure, but the numbers weren’t a cakewalk. “…Shit.”

.o.o.o.

 “Luffy-ya either make your springy friend back down or I’m warping him out above the water!” Law yelled.

 “Bellamy please!” Luffy said.

 “I have to do this, I—urk.”

 Law and Luffy watched as Bellamy fell flat on the stone.

 “Erm…have either of you two seen Chopper?” Brook asked, coming out from the shadows. “He called us in distress from here…”

 “Brook! You hurt Bellamy!” Luffy groaned.

 Despite lacking eyes or lips, Brook managed to make a rather convincing ‘who, him?’ expression as he looked at Law while pointing at Bellamy.

 “Yeah, Blondie. Thanks,” Law said. “Let’s move, Luffy-ya. The musician can…get your friend to safety or whatever. Can we please go fight Doflamingo now?”

 “Yeah, that sounds good—hi Sabo!” Luffy said, waving as his brother entered the hallway. Law groaned. “Look, Sabo, it’s Bellamy! He’s joining now okay?”

 Law peered through his fingers, “Wait, what?”

.o.o.o.

 “This is getting out of hand…” Kuzan muttered.

 “How out of hand?” Robin asked him as she easily subdued a few Donquixote Crewmembers who had tried to sneak up on them.

 “I’m legitimately considering freezing everyone and sorting it out later,” Kuzan explained.

 “Birdcage puts a damper on that…” Senor Pink mused.

 “I was never said it was a perfect plan,” Kuzan admitted, shrugging.

 “Traitor!” Pica declared as he swung for Senor Pink, only to get drowned out by laughter from the opposing pirates and his stone arm easily shattered by a simple block from Kuzan.

 “Just…just don’t talk, okay?” Usopp asked the giant stone man. “You’re ruining it for everyone else.”

 “Pink, give us some weaknesses, bro!” Franky yelled.

 “Gladius can only explode things he’s in contact with,” Pink said. “You already know Pica needs stone. Buffalo can spin out of control if you play your cards right. Dellinger doesn’t think.”

 “How dare you betray the young master!”

 Kuzan quickly made an ice arch to block the blast of snow from above as another logia landed on the field.

 “Monet, snow, Fire Fist can take her easily,” Senor Pink said.

 “Busy!” Ace called from where he was fighting Gladius.

 “My Haki may be enough to overcome her ability to give frostbite,” Robin suggested.

 “Traitor!” Monet yelled even as she seemingly turned into slush to prevent Robin from snapping her neck.

 “He betrayed me first!” Senor Pink exploded.

 “What?” Baby 5 gasped before calmly shooting Bentham in the shoulder. Robin tripped her with an arm from the ground and Chopper used Horn Point to toss her into the air, away from everyone.

 “Didn’t anyone think it was weirdly convenient that my wife died right before we were going to use Mansherry to cure her? Anyone?” Pink asked.

 “Oh, Pink, my man,” Franky said, holding his heart in sympathy. A random low-ranking member of the Donquixote Pirates tried to smash his head in with a shovel…which broke on Franky’s metal skull. Penguin and Shachi both kicked him in the face in retaliation.

 “What?” Buffalo asked even as Jean Bart pulled a fantastic elbow-drop off and smashed his head into the pavement.

 “I went to ask the doctor and oddest thing…they found stings in her room,” Pink snarled.

 “And Sugar made you forget the doctor ever said it!” Usopp gasped dramatically while hiding behind Penguin and Shachi.

 “No!” Franky added, stunned.

 “This is becoming less of a fight and more of a soap opera with excessive violence…” Kuzan complained.

.o.o.o.

 Rocinante pointed excitedly as they located Trebol, rushing through the city with Sugar and using his goo to stick citizens to the streets in the way of the Birdcage.

 Nami nodded. Even though it didn’t make a sound, she yelled the name of Shower Tempo anyway.

 The spray of water caught Trebol dead-on, causing him to stumble and Sugar to slip from his grasp.

 Rocinante drew his gun, signaling Nami in an odd staccato fashion.

 She was pretty sure that meant ‘electrocute Sugar’ which seemed like overkill given the holy shit level of burns on her arms but, hey, better safe than sorry. So Lighting Tempo it was, electricity arcing in a silent, merciless arc into Sugar.

 Rocinante missed his first shot. Of course he did. Nami used Shower Tempo again as a distraction as the next round loaded. That revolver had eight shots, so seven more tries.

 Trebol swung towards them, a stream of goo flying off his hand. Nami blasted it with water, but the doused version still smacked into her nice jeans.

 Silent though her scream was, Trebol seemed to take enough notice of her rage to back the hell away.

.o.o.o.

 “Damn it, I hate the art lady!” Luffy swore.

 Sabo had to agree. Jora was an unnecessary complication to fighting Doflamingo—who was powerful enough to not need any complication, thank you!

 Their Haki was too strong for her art to warp them personally, thank goodness, but the environment was completely fluid under her command which meant Sabo’s shots kept missing, weird abstract things kept getting in the way of Luffy’s punches, and Law couldn’t see well enough to bisect her to make her cut it out.

 Or at least that’s what Law was loudly grumbling he wanted to do. Sabo sighed, “Got any other ideas, then?”

 “No. Jora’s Devil Fruit is one of the odder ones,” Law admitted. “I mean, she has almost no combat ability outside it, but it is very annoying…”

 “Wait, Traffy…would you say she’s strong willed?” Luffy asked.

 Law smirked, “Nope.”

 “Well, then go on ahead then,” Sabo said, reloading.

 The burst of Conqueror’s Haki briefly rocked the arena, and the art quickly returned to normal as Jora blacked out. Sabo instantly took the chance to get an unobstructed shot at Doflamingo, which the Warlord barely dodged in time.

 “We should have done that sooner!” Luffy declared.

 “Wouldn’t have wasted as much energy or time, that’s for sure…” Law grumbled.

 “And time’s something you don’t have much of!” Doflamingo laughed.

.o.o.o.

 It took only a few moments of Trebol being stunned by Nami’s rage for Rocinante to finally find his sense of aim and shoot him in the chest.

 “Took you long enough,” Nami complained, still trying to rinse the goo off her jeans.

 “Sorry!” Rocinante said. “…Should we just…I don’t know, leave them?”

 “Sugar’s probably too dangerous to just have lying around,” Nami admitted. “But I don’t have any sort of seastone to tie her up with.”

 “We have cuffs.”

 Rocinante and Nami went rigid as Admiral Fujitora entered the alley with a squad of Marines.

 “…So you’re the new Admiral,” Rocinante said. “Kuzan says he likes your style.”

 “I like his as well,” Fujitora said, waving for a subordinate to approach Sugar with cuffs. “We have pressing matters to attend to, Donquixote.”

 “We hadn’t noticed, truly,” Rocinante said, trying to guess their odds. “It’s not as if there’s a giant birdcage of killer string generated by my asshole brother or anything.”

 “So that’s what it is…” Fujitora mused. “As you can see, I am blind. The sound is rather…hard to place.”

 Sound. Rocinante’s eyes widened. Of course, a blind man would use his Observation Haki mostly through his sense of hearing…good. If he had to, Rocinante could fuck with his senses enough for an escape.

 “…Um, I put them on her ankles,” the Marines with the cuffs said, nodding at Sugar’s arms before remembering himself. “Her arms are really badly burned, sir.”

 “She got on Ace’s bad side,” Nami said.

 “So…you have Sugar in custody and Trebol is dead. What do you plan to do with us?” Rocinante asked.

 Fujitora frowned, “Well. Let’s think about that, shall we?”

.o.o.o.

 Zoro wasn’t sure when he’d started cursing, but he was pretty much stuck in a loop of “shit, shit, fuck you, fuck!” trying to deal with Corazon and the dozens of Donquixote crew members only too happy to die for an executive.

 It was very distracting. Normally it would be easy, sweep the weak and refocus on the stronger opponent. But, as much as he hated to admit it, Corazon was very skilled and unlike a lot of people with lots of help, knew how to use it.

 It was frustrating. His father would have killed them all by now, probably one-handed.

 His dad was kind of an asshole like that. Zoro restrained himself to cutting off limbs.

 Mostly. There was a lot of chaos so it was kind of hard to tell if someone had gotten impaled for a moment or not.

 “How are you holding up?” he called to Kyros. That Diamante asshole was slippery and kept pulling Devil Fruit tricks out of his ass.

 “Fine,” Kyros grunted. He was mostly just trying to keep Diamante within the arena, so winning wasn’t as big a deal for him anyway.

 Of course, the world decided it hated them and Kyros took a bad hit from one of the weaklings giving Diamante and opening, which meant Zoro tried to rush in to help him, which meant Corazon nearly smashed Zoro’s skull in, which meant Kyros turned around to block Corazon, which meant Diamante made a beeline for the exit.

 “Damn it!” Kyros and Zoro both swore, swords slamming into Corazon in frustration.

.o.o.o.

 Jinbe’s eye twitched. He’d thought the battle royale on Fishman Island had been ludicrous.

 This. Was. Worse.

 “What did you all do?” he demanded, slipping between Kuzan and Jean Bart to assist Penguin and Shachi.

 “We don’t know man, it just kind of happened!” Shachi sighed.

 “I blame the stupid flamingo guy!” Penguin said. “Also sort of Law’s dad, it sounds like he kind of got captured and cause some issues and…anyway, still mostly the flamingo guy!”

 “What is our status?” Jinbe asked as Chopper used Horn Point to launch Bentham into the air to flying-ballet-kick a large spinning man.

 “Ace is fighting an explosives guy that way,” Shachi said, pointing. “Kuzan is running crowd control, but him icing the streets made Robin, Koala, and some other people slide that way. Nami and Law’s dad are off to shoot someone, apparently. Senor Pink, Usopp, Leo, and Franky went to go rescue the Fairy Princess in the palace-”

 “What?” Jinbe asked flatly.

.o.o.o.

 “You’d better know where we’re going!” Leo yelled.

 “Chill, Pink’s got this!” Franky said.

 “Weird choice of words, you know, given the crazy snow-lady chasing us!” Usopp said.

 “You’re a sniper, right? Shoot her,” Senor Pink said.

 “I’m being carried upside-down!” Usopp complained.

 “So sit up!” Leo scolded.

 “I can’t get a break…” Usopp sighed. "Okay, okay...let me see..."

 Surprisingly, he did manage to snipe Monet while hanging upside down from te shoulder of a running cyborg. "Huh. Well would you look at that!"

.o.o.o.

 Robin was not in a particularly good mood. While she’d easily incapacitated the majority of the Donquixote Pirates she and Koala had been dealing with, Machvise’s thick fat and musculature made going for a simple neck snap impossible with normal sized arms and his constantly-shifting weight made it hard to keep a grip with larger ones.

 To say nothing of his annoying habit of leaping into the air and slamming down. If Robin hadn’t managed to steal his giant coin and toss it away she was sure that would be even more trouble.

 Making matter worse, Dellinger’s increased speed now that he had fully revealed his half-Fishman traits was giving Koala all sorts of trouble.

 Robin frowned. Time to take a gamble.

 She made a clone to hold Machvise off for a moment and turned to Koala’s fight. “Trienta Fleur!”

 Two arms sprouted from Dellinger’s shoulders, grabbing his head. The distraction slowed him down, allowing Koala to plant her foot squarely in his face and send him flying.

 “Seis Fleur!” Robin said, restraining Dellinger with six arms that sprouted from the ground.

 She felt her clone be pummeled into flowers and turned to face Machvise. “Ochenta Fleur: Cuatro Manos!”

 The four large arms held Machvise in place. She’d need more force to take him out of the fight though. Maybe four more giant arms yanking his limbs in different directions?

 Damn it, he got out again. He kept shifting his weight out of her grip and being too heavy to hold still. “You’re certainly trying to keep this interesting,” she said.

 “Arabesque Brick Fist!”

 Machvise stumbled backwards from the shockwave and Robin seized his limbs with giant arms, pulling him into a spread eagle position.

 “Bigger the guy, the more water in their body,” Koala said. “And the more effective Fishman Karate can be!”

 “Dellinger?” Robin questioned.

 “Stomped his ankles. He’s out,” Koala said.

 “I’ll hold this one like this; you attack from above,” Robin said.

 “You’ve got it!” Koala said, jumping into the air. “Five Thousand Brick Kick!”

 She slammed down into Machvise, and Robin smiled as she heard ribs break. “Well that’s handled.”

 “We should find the others, help them out,” Koala said.

 “I’m sure we could regroup around one of Pica’s newer bodies…assuming he’s not out of the fight and we’re all spilt up,” Robin said. “This really has gotten out of control…”

 “Look!” Koala cried.

 Robin looked up. Doflamingo was swinging from strings attached to the bars of the birdcage.

 “He’s outside of the range Sabo can shoot accurately!” Koala groaned even as Luffy, Law, and Sabo appeared on the wall of the castle and Sabo tried a shot anyway.

 “And probably outside the range of Law’s rooms if our surgeon is too tired,” Robin said. “But not outside my range. Ocho Fleur!”

 Eight arms sprouted from Doflamingo’s body and tried to grapple with him. Strings quickly sliced them up too much to stay workable. Robin tried again. “Dieciséis Fleur!”

 It still failed. His Haki was stronger than hers, so she wasn’t going to be able to defend her arms properly. But it had served its purpose.

 “Gum-Gum Slingshot!”

 “Room!”

 With Doflamingo distracted, Luffy was able to launch himself and Law close enough for Law to make a workable Room.

 “You all right?” Koala asked as Robin inspected her bloodied arms.

 “A decent amount of bandages and I should be fine,” she said.

 “Let’s find Chopper,” Koala said, tearing the lower half of her sundress off to serve as the needed bandages. “You need to get those looked at.”

 “Agreed. It’s Luffy and Law’s fight from here…” Robin sighed.

 “Koala! Robin!”

 Sabo must have just decided jumping off the castle and running made sense. “Oh my gosh, Robin, are you all right?”

 “Give me your coat!” Koala said, ripping it into more strips when Sabo handed it over.

 “I’ll be fine, you should catch up, see if you can shoot Doflamingo,” Robin said.

 “Out of seastone bullets, been down to regular for over a dozen rounds,” Sabo said. “And I’m not good enough at using Armament Haki on my rifle to get around that.”

 “Great, we’ve reached the war of attrition stage then,” Robin said. “And if I know our Captain that is a war we will never lose.”

 “Luffy might not be one to back down…but that doesn’t mean he can’t be outlasted…” Koala said.

 “It’s Luffy. Not a chance,” Sabo said.

.o.o.o.

 Law took the landing hard, not bothering to warp them to the ground in a desperate effort to conserve energy. Luffy had tried to keep himself between Law and the pavement but Law knew he’d still have bruises from the drop.

 “You okay?” Luffy asked.

“Got a handful more Rooms left. Trying to be very precise,” he said, standing slowly. “We need to go a few blocks over. That’s where you punched him.”

 “You need to save energy right…I’ll punch him over here so you don’t have to waste energy getting over there!” Luffy decided before taking off.

 “…I guess that makes sense?” Law hazarded.

 All right. He’d seen Doflamingo hit the ground pretty hard but he obviously wasn’t out because the Birdcage was still active…

 Sabo was back at the castle and Law had no idea where anyone else was.

 It was very hard to think tactically right now, he was fighting exhaustion and he was still emotionally worn out from getting his memories back and the Birdcage was making a very annoying skritch noise as it dragged itself forth.

 All right, going by the buildings he could make out Doflamingo had landed to the…right?

 Okay, then he was going to move left.

 Sure enough he was just out of the way in time for the pink-feathered jackass to go sailing through the buildings. Law smirked. When he was right he was oh so very right.

.o.o.o.

 “That had better be all of them,” Kuzan sighed.

 Sanji nodded. They’d finally managed to keep Pica isolated from the rocks long enough for Sanji to kick him into unconsciousness. “Should we follow the others to the palace then? Princess Violet, do you know how they’re doing?”

 Violet focused, “They only just reached it. I think they accidentally took the long way...no, some streets were blocked. It looks like Senor Pink is giving them directions but Franky is in the lead.”

 “I’m not sure if we'll reach them much faster, then…” Sanji mused. “We should—Rebecca look out!”

 Rebecca blocked the blow from the surprise arrival of Diamante, but his sword’s odd, winding nature made it lash towards her face anyway.

 Bepo caught the tip between his paws before it could get Rebecca’s eye. “Ow! Okay, not as good at that as I wish I was…”

 “Then why’d you do it like that?” Rebecca asked.

 “Oh, so I can use Electro,” Bepo said. Rebecca yanked her sword out of contact with Diamante’s at the warning so only the executive got zapped.

 Thinking quickly, Rebecca attacked his right hand since it appeared to be his dominant one, and managed to inflict enough damage so he dropped his sword.

 The blade was quickly iced over upon hitting the ground, because apparently Kuzan didn’t feel like letting this fight get prolonged at all.

 Rebecca then shifted her weight before swinging low for Diamante’s legs, if not to cut through than at least to injure him enough to keep him from moving around too much. She managed a slice across one knee that gave Bepo time to back up and lunge with a flying kick to Diamante’s head right as the flutter man went to draw his pistol.

 “We did it!” Rebecca cheered as Diamante was knocked out by the force of Bepo’s kick. “Great job, Bepo!”

 “Thanks,” Bepo said as Shachi pulled out a small medical kit and hurried over to look at his paws “I think it’s pretty shallow, Shachi, really…ow!”

 “Still got to clean it,” Shachi said as he finished rubbing the disinfectant over the paws.

 “Got any more of that?”

 “ROBIN!” most of the group yelled in a panic at the state of their archaeologist’s arms.

 Shachi looked at the small bottle of disinfectant, “…Probably not enough but we can try…”

 “What did you do?” Sanji yelled, arms flailing.

 “Tried to put Doflamingo in a headlock,” Koala said as Shachi used up the last of his disinfectant and almost all of his bandages on just one arm.

 “Good try, at least,” Jean Bart said.

 “All right, so do we head to the palace, or try to find Doflamingo to help the captains?” Sanji asked.

 “Or both,” Kuzan said. “I think Jinbe and I are the only ones with a real shot against Doflamingo, no offense. The rest of you should probably take the palace…”

 “We have a third idea!”

 “Was this a designated meetup place or something?” Penguin muttered as Nami, Rocinante and some random Navy ensign approached.

 Chopper and Bentham wordlessly pointed at all the giant Pica statues about, making the location fairly easy to spot across the whole island.

 “…Oh, yeah,” Penguin said, rubbing the back of his head. “My bad.”

 “What is the third idea and why do you have a Marine?” Jinbe asked.

 “Admiral Fujitora sent me to tell you he agrees with the plan!” the ensign squeaked, looking at all the powerful pirates nervously.

 “What plan?” Kuzan asked.

 “To slow down the birdcage,” Rocinante said. “His men haven’t bothered us much since it formed because they’ve been rushing civilians out of the way.”

 “Knew I liked that guy,” Kuzan said, smirking.

 “But in case you didn’t notice, we’re getting awfully boxed in by now,” Nami said.

 Everyone who’d been fighting took the time to appreciate that yes, the bars had gotten a whole lot closer while they’d been absorbed in beating people up.

 “Since the cage is made from a Devil Fruit power, we have two defenses,” Nami continued. “Haki, and the seastone building we kind of half blew up.”

 “Oh, I get it!” Sabo said. “You’re saying we try to shove the cage, right?”

 “Sounds good.”

 Everyone turned to look at Zoro.

 “How’d you get here? And don’t say the giant statues, I meant without getting lost!” Sanji demanded.

 “He was with me,” Kyros offered, coming up behind Zoro.

 “Kyros, it’s good to see you,” Violet said.

 “All right, all right, everyone does their meetups later,” Nami said. “We have to deal with the Birdcage now because I don’t want Luffy to kick Doflamingo’s ass only to find out a ton of people died while he was doing it! So if you can’t use Haki to where you think you can block the cage, get to the factory! If you can, opposite side of the cage! Move it!”

 “Rebecca, Kyros, and I will help with the evacuation. The citizens will listen to us more,” Violet said.

 “Good plan,” Sabo agreed. The groups split, Chopper going with the Dressrosa royals in case they came across injured civilians.

 “I might be able to try an ice wall…put some Haki into it, see how it goes…” Kuzan mused, going with the factory team.

 “But then why are you with us?” Rocinante asked. “Your Haki’s probably stronger than everyone else who went the other way…”

 “Think about it—Fujitora’s probably over there already,” Kuzan said. “Puts an equal amount of Admiral-level Haki on either side of the cage. Might help.”

.o.o.o.

 “Are we there yet?” Leo complained. “We have to save Mansherry!”

 “It’s right this way,” Senor Pink.

 The group stopped as they turned a corner—a man in a blue cape was walking towards them with Brook.

 “Yohoho~! Some of my dear crew at last!” Brook cheered. “Look, I met the king and we found a fairy princess!”

 The entire Mansherry Rescue Team fell flat in shock.

 “Well…now what?” Usopp asked.

 “I could really go for a break,” Senor Pink muttered.

 “That sounds so nice,” Usopp agreed.

 “Not with the birdcage closing in it doesn’t!” King Riku said. “We have to stop it somehow!”

 “And probably get out of the way…” the guy slung over Brook’s shoulder groaned.

 “Bellamy? What are you doing here?” Usopp asked.

 “Oh, good, someone knows him. Luffy says he’s joining!” Brook said.

 “…Yeah, okay,” Usopp muttered.

.o.o.o.

 Luffy was having a bit of a hard time. He’d used up almost all his energy and really, really needed a break to catch his breath. Normally he’d tag Law in, but they could all tell Law was on his last legs as far as energy went and really, really, should only get involved if absolutely necessary.

 He slammed Doflamingo through another building, dropped to one knee as he tried to take in enough oxygen to keep up with his current increased blood flow—or at least that’d how Traffy explained why he always got short of breath after using Gear Third for a long time. Luffy didn’t know. He wasn’t a doctor.

 Oh shit, shit, tired now. Damn it.

 His eyes widened as Doflamingo reappeared—how was Mingo still going?

 “Shambles.”

 One of the broken bits of stone in front of Luffy became Law, Kikoku raised and blackened with Haki to block the blow. Luffy grinned.

 “Hey, Traffy.”

 “Luffy,” Law grunted, more focused on who he was blocking than his boyfriend.

 “You’re getting tired, Law. I can see it,” Doflamingo taunted.

 A wave of Conqueror’s Haki crashed against Law, who stood firm.

 “You’re not getting Luffy,” Law snarled. “You’re going to lose.”

 “Your knees are going to buckle any moment now,” Doflamingo mocked. “Overusing that power of yours, tsk-tsk. Who’s going to stop me?”

 “Luffy,” Law said.

 Doflamingo laughed, throwing his arms wide. “And who’s going to stop me from killing Monkey D. Luffy before he can stand again?”

 Law smirked. “Him.”

 Doflamingo yelped and barely dodged a massive, white-hot fireball that was prefaced by a jolt of Conqueror’s Haki.

 “Get the hell away from my brother!” Ace snarled.

.o.o.o.

 “No good, it cuts through the ice! I can’t get enough Haki behind a wall that big!” Kuzan said.

 “Then we’ll keep pushing the factory!” Jean Bart said. He looked at the Tontatta. “Come on, little guys, let’s do this!”

 Kuzan sighed, coating his arms with Haki. He was just going to have to shove at the bars he could get within his reach, then. He stepped over a hunk of seastone that had fallen off one of the factory’s broken walls.

 Wait.

 “Hey!” Kuzan barked, getting the attention of some Marines that claimed Fujitora had sent them since they couldn’t use Haki. “There’s a bunch more seastone on the ground here! If you’ve got enough pushing the factory, I want anyone extra without Devil Fruit powers to grab a hunk and add to the perimeter!”

 “Yes sir!” several Marines agreed, grabbing chunks from the size of dinner plates to shields and rushing against the bars of the cage.

.o.o.o.

 “The third D! I wondered when you’d join the party!” Doflamingo laughed.

 Ace growled. “Fire Fist!”

 Doflamingo dodged the column of fire that smashed past him, though buildings, and outwards into the wires of the Birdcage.

 Ace kept track of his attacks and dodged with his Observation Haki while quickly creating a net of fire between them and Luffy and Law with Flame Fence. “Law, you got Luffy covered?”

 “He’ll be up in two minutes, buy us that!” Law called back.

 “You got it,” Ace said, quickly dodging razor strings from above. “Firefly!”

 Doflamingo calmly dodged the small green orbs of fire, “Little slow to hit someone with, don’t you think?”

 “Fiery Doll,” Ace said, smirking. The lights all sped up, smashing into Doflamingo all at once and lighting him up. “How do you like that—whoa!”

 “Switched with a String Clone, but nice try,” Doflamingo mocked as Ace barely dodged a kick.

 Ace snarled. He was having to be too careful to really cut loose—the constriction of the Birdcage had forced all of Dressrosa into incredibly close quarters. None of his bigger, more dangerous techniques were viable in this kind of situation. Even if Law could protect himself and Luffy from the fire with Shambles or anything else, there was too much a chance of hitting someone else.

 Okay, smaller, more targeted attacks. He could do this. Even if he couldn’t defeat Doflamingo, he could still keep him busy. The guy was clearly past caring, he was probably burning through energy faster than Ace’s fire was burning through everything else. “Saint Elmo’s Fire!”

 The twin lances of flame shot forward. One missed entirely, reducing another building to ash—oops—but the other caught Doflamingo’s left hand and pinned him.

 Ace hoped it was painful.

.o.o.o.

 “Come on, we can do this!” Sabo yelled.

 “Little less yelling, little more pushing!” Zoro said.

 “I can sense it slowing down,” Fujitora said. “We’re almost there!”

 “Well then put your shitty backs into it!” Sanji said.

.o.o.o.

 “Come on, everyone!” Bentham yelled.

 “Push!” Nami said. “We can stop this thing if we just push hard enough! Then Luffy and the others can win!”

 “Push!” all the Tontatta cried as they, the Marines, and the civilians gave it their all.

 “Come on…”Jean Bart said as he shoved at the factory.

.o.o.o.

 The castle crew continued helping people up the side of the mountain as the bars drew even closer. Brook raced around, grabbing anyone who couldn’t move on their own to get them out of harm’s way.

 “Come on Luffy,” Usopp said as he pulled another kid up onto the ledge. “You can do it!”

.o.o.o.

 Ace ducked another sheet of strings, “Come on, that all you’ve got left? My brothers and Law really used you like a punching bag, huh?”

 “You piece of shit!” Doflamingo bellowed.

 Ace winced at the wave of Conqueror’s Haki. He was too strong willed to faint by a mile, but the force…he summoned his own to push back. “I won’t…lose to you…”

 “Oh ho….we do have a weakness…” Doflamingo purred. “This.”

 It was stronger than what Luffy used when they tried it on each other, similar to Rayleigh’s, maybe…Ace could feel it grinding him down, forcing him back.

 “You barely have the power. And the son of a king too, how sad,” Doflamingo mocked as their Haki clashed.

 Ace snarled, “Son of an Emperor!”

 He tried to use his fire, it was always hotter when he was mad, but the energy from both of them squashed the flames out before they could do much, the Haki too strong to allow anything else…

 Shit. He was losing. He wasn’t as strong as Luffy at this…wasn’t strong enough…

 A Room extended.

 “Shambles.”

 Ace was pulled back to where Law had been with Luffy, “What?”

 He quickly caught Law as the surgeon collapsed, “Law! What’s going on?”

 “You bought enough time,” Law said.

 “Gum-Gum King Elephant Gun!”

 The other Conqueror’s Haki was familiar, stronger…Luffy’s.

 Ace’s head whipped around as Doflamingo sailed past them and crashed into a crater over ten feet deep. He hoped Law saw it, he couldn’t tell if the taller man had moved.

 Ace carefully set Law down before walking to the crater, intending to fry the bird before he could get out of it.

 He frowned. Doflamingo wasn’t moving. The Birdcage began to disappear.

 Ace used his Observation Haki. No, not dead, just unconscious, then.

 Ace wondered if that was good enough. He wondered if frying him here was better…

 “Ace, I did it! Look, look, no more stupid cage!”

 Yeah, it was. No need to snatch Luffy’s glory. “Sure did. Might want to check on your dumb boyfriend, though!”

.o.o.o.

 For a moment, as the Birdcage vanished, there was silence.

 Then the cheers shook the island.

 Nami catapulted herself into Bentham with relieved if slightly hysterical laughter, who only loosened his grip on her to take Penguin and Shachi into the group hug to as they all cheered at the top of their lungs. They only stopped because Jean Bart picked them up and startled them as they were drawn into an even bigger hug.

 Kuzan let himself relax. Finally after all this mess he could let the tension out-

 And nearly get knocked over as Roci tripped in running over to him.

 “Hey, Roci,” Kuzan said, barely managing not to fall over himself as he caught his other half. Nobody saw that near stumble, right? Yeah, he’d played it cool. “Missed me?”

 “You have no idea,” Roci said before kissing him.

 For a moment, all was right with the world.

 And then he was reminded of the audience as several people hooted and cheered, including what had to be a Marine yelling “Aw yeah, go Admiral Aokiji!”

 “Let’s do this later,” Roci muttered.

 “Look at this place. We really going to get a later?” Kuzan asked. “I’ll be lucky to get a nap, much less get lucky.”

 “What is it with you and talking with this shit around other people?” Roci demanded. “Oh well, better find Law and his friends, mop up…”

 “This isn’t a messy room in headquarters,” Kuzan complained.

 “Yes, those are usually much worse,” Rocinante agreed as they set off to find the others.

 “You’re a filthy liar,” Kuzan complained as the pirates fell in step behind them.

 “You knew that when you fell for me,” Roci said, managing to be suave for all for half a second before his foot found a pothole and his face hit bricks.

 “…Can you believe he and I killed the gooey guy?” Nami asked.

 “That so?” Penguin asked. “…Impressive.”

.o.o.o.

 “Well that took all of no time,” Sanji said as Koala and Sabo continued making out.

 “You’re in public!” Jinbe groaned.

  “Like they care,” Sanji chuckled shaking his head.

  “Eh, let them celebrate, cook. We did good,” Zoro said.

 “Yeah, guess we did, moss head,” Sanji said. “Corazon?”

 “In pieces.”

 “Nice!” Sanji laughed.

 Fujitora cleared his throat.

 “What, don’t tell me we have to fight you now,” Sanji complained.

 Fujitora cleared his throat again, “It is truly unfortunate that my men’s loud celebration allowed the pirates to escape without my noticing.”

 “Oh, right,” Zoro said.

 “Let’s just go,” Jinbe said, herding the others away.

.o.o.o.

 Luffy wandered back up the street to Law, waving to Bepo and some ladies that showed up with Bepo as they entered the street, “Hey guys! Bepo, you okay?”

 “We’re good! You?” Bepo asked.

 “Tired!” Luffy called before finding Law and sitting next to him. “Hey, Traffy.”

  “So…we won,” Law said.

 “Yep,” Luffy said, sitting down. “…Can you move?”

 “Yeah, no,” Law said. Luffy helpfully pulled his head into his lap. “Thanks, that’s better.”

 “You were awesome,” Luffy said, grinning down at him.

 “You were too,” Law said. “…Hey, Luffy-ya?”

 “Yeah?” Luffy asked.

 “Love you.”

 Luffy beamed, leaning down for a kiss, “Love you too, Traffy.”

 He leaned back, just barely resisting the urge to flop back all the way as Law dozed off. Sleeping looked nice. “Hey, um, it’s Rebecca, right? You…you guys know a place to crash? Cause we need to crash.”

 “Um…not really…” Rebecca admitted. “Aunt Violet?”

 “Well the palace is a bit of a disaster right now,” Violet sighed as Bepo picked Law up and tried to help Luffy stand at the same time. Rebecca caught Luffy as he stumbled.

 “Somewhere out of the way might be better anyway,” Ace said before grabbing Luffy and picking him up, slinging him over both shoulders. “You know, Marines everywhere and such.”

 “Hey!” Luffy whined, trying to get Ace to put him down.

 “Lu, you’re not walking any time soon and we all know it,” Ace said. “No whining, captain.”

 “Nyeh,” Luffy said, sticking his tongue out at his brother. Jeez, even that felt tiring.

 “Let’s find you both a bed,” Violet said as Luffy let his eyes drift close.

Chapter Text

 Rocinante was stunned they’d gotten everyone in the house. Some of Kyros’ neighbors had obviously donated bedding, since there was no way the man owned over thirty quilts and who knew how many pillows, especially given that the house had been unoccupied for nine years.

 The actual bed had been claimed by Law and Luffy—well, claimed on their behalf by Rebecca who’d had Bepo and Ace dump them in it as they’d been passed out since the battle ended--and yet despite neither of them waking up at any point they’d still somehow tangled together in their sleep. It was pretty cute. Chopper sometimes hopped on up and joined them when he wasn’t tending to everyone.

 Koala and Sabo were under a quilt on the floor, while Ace had decided a table was a lovely place to sleep, and on top of a quilt instead of under one, too. Rocinante had given him a pillow out of pity. Zoro was dozing. He’d previously been splitting a quilt with Sanji…until the blond had woken up and yelled at “moss head” for “hogging” the bedding before storming off to procure food. Bepo had taken his place and Zoro had quickly repurposed the bear as a pillow, even after Bepo hogged the blanket.

 Bellamy had tried to sneak out, not feeling worthy of being with Luffy’s friends. Robin had arms from the floor pin him until he went to sleep again, and he wasn’t willing to argue with her while she was injured and annoyed. Jinbe was currently a pillow for four people, but was awake and reading a book Violet had brought during one of her check-ins.

 Several of the others had been up at various intervals, but most just ate what Sanji provided and tried to go back to sleep. A handful had wandered off into the city to check on the situation.

 Usopp had done that and come back loaded down with clothes for his crewmates. Apparently Leo and several other Tontatta were stress-sewers and had made presents. Nami had already changed into her new dress, before cheerfully informing Rocinante he owed her for getting her old outfit ‘ruined.’

 At Chopper’s suggestion, he’d paid up.

 Kuzan was trying to doze but Rocinante hadn’t exactly let him get a good nap in. He was in the best shape out of everyone and so that meant he got the brunt of the work right now, keeping an eye out for the Marines and getting information.

 …Something told Rocinante he was going to owe Kuzan for this one. Depriving him of naps was usually a tactic of last resort.

 Luffy yawned and sat up as Rocinante was helping Chopper with the wounds on Bepo’s paws. It was a little tricky since Bepo didn’t want to get up and Zoro was still sleeping on him.

 “When is it?” Luffy yawned.

 “It’s been a little over nine hours,” Rocinante said.

 “Oh…Traffy’s not going to be up for a while then…tell Sanji to bring me meat later, okay?”

 And he was out again, clinging to Law like Rocinante’s son was a tattooed teddy bear.

.o.o.o.

 “What’s that noise?” Shachi asked as he helped Penguin and Sanji restock the Sunny’s kitchen.

 “The Den Den Mushi. Oh no!” Sanji said, his eyes widening. “We forgot!”

 “Forgot what?” Penguin called after him as he rushed down the hall.

 “That other people would forget Ace!” Sanji yelled back before answering the snail. “Thousand Sunny, Blackleg Sanji speaking.”

 “What the hell is going on?”

 Sanji didn’t know if Conqueror’s Haki could be transmitted via transponder snail, but Emperor Shanks was making a good argument for it. “Ah, sorry, we totally forgot the memory thing would affect other people.”

 “What. Happened?” Shanks snapped. “Benn and I somehow forgot we had three kids!”

 “Ah…well, I’m sure Ace would be flattered you noticed, given the short timeframe he was affected,” Sanji said. He mouthed ‘get Ace’ to Penguin who nodded and ran off.

 “Not just us. Pigeon Marco has a picture of himself and Ace and for a few minutes had no clue who Ace was even when he was looking right at it,” Shanks said. “You idiots got the chill chicken to freak out! Do you know how hard that is? And then none of you answer either of us for over fifteen hours?”

 “We were all recovering from the battle. Short version, Ace got grabbed by an enemy with the power to make everyone who ever knew you forget it,” Sanji said. “She was knocked out and Ace and all her other victims were returned to normal.”

 “…Recovering from the battle?”

 “We sort of teamed up with Trafalgar Law’s parents and took on Doflamingo…and his entire crew. And for some of us, the Marines, including an Admiral. But Law’s stepdad used to be an Admiral, Aokiji that is, so…”

 Wow, it sounded even worse when he said it out loud.

 “All right, my turn.”

 Sanji didn’t recognize this voice. Shanks was easy, he talked too loudly and so anyone nearby heard him when he was chatting with his sons over the snail. “Err-”

 “Benn Beckman. The other dad,” Benn said.

 “All right, what do you need?” Sanji asked.

 “Well, for one, Shanks to calm down, his Haki’s making the ship shake,” Benn said. “And two, you to tell me how the boys are.”

 “Ace is just tired but I sent someone to get him. Sabo’s a bit banged up but should be fine. Luffy is exhausted, but otherwise fine,” Sanji said. “He’s napping.”

 “Good. Shanks, they’re fine, so relax,” Benn said. “Now what’s this about Law? His parents?”

 “We teamed up with them to fight Doflamingo,” Sanji said. “It got very complicated and I’m not sure there is a short version for it. But Ace fought him for a bit at one point and did a good job, though it was mostly Luffy and Law fighting him, Ace was mostly fighting…well first this guy who blew things up and I’m not so sure after that. I was fighting this other guy and Aokiji was trying to help and it was this big mess of a lot of us fighting a lot of the other crew and-”

 “What about Sabo?” Benn asked, cutting him off.

 “Was helping Luffy and Law with Doflamingo, I think, but then he showed up with Robin and Koala so…” Sanji said. “It was kind of a mess. Doflamingo did this thing that was going to kill the whole island in a time limit and at the last second Luffy and Ace finished him off with help from Law.”

 “Where are you now?” Benn asked.

 “Still Dressrosa. The Marines aren’t really looking for us yet. Hell, Admiral Fujitora’s not so shitty, he announced publicly that pirates saved the island and made sure the news couldn’t be tampered with.”

 “Interesting…” Benn said.

 “Well, good to know they sometimes recruit people with souls,” Shanks said.

 Sanji relaxed at hearing someone frantically running across the upper decks and held out the receiver so when Ace barreled into the room it was easy for him to grab it. “You. Talk. Now.”

 “Hey, dads,” Ace said, grinning apologetically at Sanji as he did so. “Sorry, we forgot you’d have been affected too.”

 “You’d better be sorry!” Shanks scolded.

 “Um…so…we won?” Ace offered weakly. Sanji smothered a snicker at Ace’s obvious inability to figure out what to say. “…Erm…”

 “We were worried,” Benn said.

 “I’m sorry,” Ace said. “We thought I’d be okay since she didn’t seem to have Haki so I just went to turn into fire when she grabbed at me…and she had Haki. I screwed up.”

 “…All right, then,” Shanks said, sounding a bit mollified. “I’m just glad you’re okay.”

 “Yeah. We’re all okay,” Ace said. “You…you should have seen Luffy though. Punching Doflamingo into a crater. It was great.”

 “Oh that sounds awesome. You going to have a party?” Shanks asked.

 “When we get away from here. I think we’re pushing our luck with Admiral Fujitora not arresting us yet…” Ace admitted.

 “Wow, I like this new guy!” Shanks laughed.

.o.o.o.

 “Well, well, well,” Doflamingo purred. “I did not expect this.”

 “Really?” Rocinante asked. “Because I am fairly certain I promised you this.”

 “Promised me what?” Doflamingo asked as Rocinante sat down outside his cell.

 “To be here when you lost,” Rocinante said, smiling. “And to laugh at it.”

 “…Well you’re not laughing,” Doflamingo said petulantly.

 “Let me work up to it. It was a long week,” Rocinante said. “Oh, but that was a great ending. Very dramatic.”

 “You’re stalling,” Doflamingo said. “What, working up the nerve to kill me?”

 “Doffy, if I wanted you dead I’d have helped Kuzan sneak in here.” Rocinante idly wished for a cigarette, but he didn’t want to risk starting a fire in here. “You were right, I can’t kill you. But if I had to have you die, I could ask and it would happen. Kuzan’s made more ethically dubious decisions than offing a criminal who’s chained up because his significant other asked and he’s admitted that loudly enough to where I got the hint.”

 “All right, see, now I’m curious,” Doflamingo said. “You don’t plan to kill me and you’re not ready to laugh yet. Then what is it?”

 “What did you do to get this coveted status of yours? What are you blackmailing the Celestial Dragons with?” Rocinante asked.

 Doflamingo smiled, “Aw, Rocinante. It wouldn’t be blackmail if I told any old spy who asked me!”

 “Well it’s not saving you anymore, is it?” Rocinante said. “And the Marines will never let you get the information out now so you can’t ever tell. Of course, if I like it I just might give you a hand, brother.”

 “Oh, Rocinante!” Doflamingo laughed. “You can be diabolical! Oh, big brother is so proud of you!”

 Rocinante was going to need a shower after hearing that. No, two showers minimum.

 “So you want to know what I have on the Celestial Dragons…” Doflamingo said. “Well, let me let you down gently, it’s not information. Not exactly. But the information I can give you is still interesting.”

 “So it’s not some secret?” Rocinante asked.

 “It is. The national treasure of Mariejois,” Doflamingo said. “I stole it. And if the world ever found it…it could be bigger than One Piece. Very important stuff, little brother.”

 “It’s not here,” Rocinante surmised. He wracked his brain, trying to recall anything about a national treasure from his childhood…damn it sometimes he hated being two years younger…

 “Of course not. Why make it easy?” Doflamingo asked. “But don’t worry, I have a backup. Kaido knows I had something very important hidden. I’m sure it’ll be in good hands if he finds it first!”

 Rocinante paled, “You told Kaido? Worst of the Emperors Kaido?”

 “Mm-hm. He’s my business partner, after all. He’ll be awfully mad at Law and Law’s friends…interrupting our plans like that,” Doflamingo said. “Looks like your son is still in trouble Rocinante, fufufu—…. …? …!”

 Rocinante smirked as his brother’s head snapped towards him. “I told you, hehaha. I get the last laugh.”

 Doflamingo silently yelled what were doubtless profanities. Rocinante didn’t know. It was hard to read lips when people talked too fast. He laughed harder.

 “I’m not even all that sorry about this. I’m sure Impel Down will be a lot less fun when you can’t shout at people. Goodbye, Doffy. Thanks for the information. Heh, can’t believe you didn’t see it coming! Hehaha-ha!”

 He waved over his shoulder as he shut the door on his brother.

.o.o.o.

 Law slowly blinked into consciousness.

 His breath caught. They’d won. They’d won.

 “Traffy?”

 He smiled as Luffy sat up and leaned over him, “Hey.”

 “Took you long enough.”

 Law would have been more annoyed if Luffy hadn’t been beaming. “Oh, did me overusing my powers to save your moronic life, leading to be being passed out for hours-”

 “No guilt trips,” Luffy complained.

 “Then don’t whine,” Law said, reaching up to jab Luffy in the cheek.

 His arm fell halfway there. “Damn it.”

 “Still tired?” Luffy asked, catching his hand and, seemingly sensing his intention, helping Law poke him.

 That was just weird. Law’s whole relationship with this lunatic was weird.

 He loved it.

 He really hoped it wasn’t too obvious. He had a reputation. Well, he assumed he still had it. Luffy didn’t think so, that was for sure. But Luffy was Luffy…

 “You okay?” Luffy asked, sounding a bit genuinely concerned.

 “Yeah. Just…going to be a bit useless until my body finishes recovering. Should be another…ten hours until I’m a hundred percent?” Law murmured. “Maybe?”

 “Okay,” Luffy said. “You hungry?”

 “Yeah,” Law said, going to sit up. Luffy helped him, and he sagged against the rubber man as soon as he was upright. “Feel like shit…”

 “Want me to carry you?”

 “You’re half a foot shorter than me, I can’t see it being comfortable,” Law muttered into his shoulder.

“Want to just sit here and make whoever comes by bring us food?” Luffy asked. “I’ve been doing that already!”

 “I want to get up…just…just give me a…minute,” Law yawned.

 “You can go back to sleep if you need to,” Luffy offered.

 “No.” Law frowned, but took a deep breath. “Just…help me up, okay?”

 It took a little negotiating, but they managed to get Law standing and moving in a way where it wasn’t too obvious he was leaning on Luffy.

 “Real backlash from your green rumble ball.”

 “It’s not a rumble ball, it’s an energy booster!” Law complained as they made it outside.

 “Hey, Captain’s up!” Bepo cheered.

 “Took you long enough—we had to make sure Ace didn’t eat everything,” Nami said.

 “Shut up! Like I eat nearly as much as Luffy!” Ace complained. 

 “Yeah but Law likes rice balls and you almost ate all those,” Chopper said.

 “Feeling all right?” Rocinante asked as Luffy tried to help Law sit down with him and nearly dropped the surgeon instead.

 “Just tired,” Law said.

 Robin handed him a mug of coffee. “Black as your soul.”

 “You are a goddess,” Law said frankly before downing most of it. “So, how’s things with Blondie?”

 “It’s Bellamy,” Sabo corrected. “He’s fine. We only had to tie him up for a little bit when he tried to get arrested with the rest of his crew.”

  “Wow…Mingo really gets a hold on people,” Luffy said, pouting. “Bellamy, you’re staying and you’re our crew now!”

 “Um…okay?” Bellamy offered, merely looking bewildered. Law felt mild pity for him. He had no idea what he was in for… 

 “Dads say hi,” Ace added to Luffy. “And Shanks claims Mihawk says hi to Zoro.”

 Zoro grunted. “He claims…”

 “Hey, your dad can be a distant, stoic weirdo and still love you. I mean, Law’s a creepy stoic weirdo and he loves Luffy,” Koala said.

 Law rolled his eyes, “Don’t bring me into this when I’m too tired to pull off limbs.”

 “Holy shit, you must be out of it,” Ace laughed.

 Law flipped him off. The coffee was definitely helping and Sanji was smart enough to have enough cup ready to pass him. Good. “Shut up. So, anyway, when do we leave?”

 “Well soon would be good,” Rocinante said. “Fujitora may be giving you leniency but other Navy members have arrived by now. True, most of them are to guard my brother’s crew on the way to jail, but I’d recommend getting while the getting’s good.”

 “Also the sooner we leave the sooner I get a nap so I’m all for leaving,” Kuzan complained.

 Law snickered. Depriving Kuzan of time to laze around had to be upsetting the ex-Admiral.

 “Yeah, we need to get going,” Luffy agreed. “You said you wanted us to drop you somewhere?”

 “Preferably,” Rocinante said.

 “Okay,” Luffy said, shrugging. “So, Sanji, there’s more breakfast, right?”

 “Of course there is,” Sanji said, rolling his eyes as he went inside to grab more food.

 “Like he’d forget you’re a bottomless pit,” Sabo said.

 “Always good to check, shishishi!” Luffy laughed. “Feeling better yet, Traffy?”

 “Yes because coffee,” Law sighed, starting on his third cup. His father looked mildly alarmed at how fast he was drinking it. “Don’t worry, Cora-san, this is normal.”

 “Law’s a fairly heavy caffeine addict,” Chopper agreed. “So his body does react well to the addition of it and it should help alleviate the aftereffects of the Energy Booster while also bettering his mood.”

 “Yeah. That,” Law agreed as Luffy shoved a plate of eggs at him. “Fine, fine, I’m eating.”

 “Well don’t fill up on coffee anyway, we have a meeting to go to at a teashop,” Rocinante said.

 “…We have what?” Law asked.

 “Sengoku’s here,” Kuzan said.

 Several of the crew cringed. Great. They really did need to book it if someone as powerful as Sengoku was available to back up Fujitora, even if Kuzan would be on their side for it.

 “He’s not looking to arrest anyone right now, he’s busy helping Fujitora with bureaucratic…stuff,” Kuzan added, idly waving a hand before grabbing a muffin with it.

 “Fujitora told everyone we saved the island, not the Marines,” Nami told Law. “And made sure they news couldn’t be suppressed like in Alabasta.”

 “…I like this new guy,” Law said.

 “Yeah, tiger-guy’s really cool!” Luffy said. “And his powers are so awesome and it’ll be great to fight him one day!”

 “Gravity manipulation, right?” Law asked.

 “And it’s very powerful,” Jinbe said. “Brook and I only prevailed in protecting Caesar because we were out on the sea and I had enough water to use to my advantage.”

 “He’s terrifying!” Brook agreed. “…But fair, I’ll give him that.”

 “Oh, hey, what about Caesar?” Zoro asked as he finished off a bottle of beer. “We still have to hang onto him?”

 “Ugh, do we have to?” Luffy whined. “He’s not cool like Bellamy, I don’t want him…”

 Bellamy looked even more confused now. Law chuckled. And so it began…

 “Thought you’d say that. I vote we boot him to Fujitora as a distraction so we can run away,” Sabo said. “Especially since it might make us a target for Kaido if we keep him.”

 “Eh, who cares about Kaido?” Luffy asked. “If we fight him, we fight him, right?”

 “Let’s not go looking for it until we’re stronger. It took three people plus Sabo assisting to fight Doflamingo,” Law said. “And Kaido’s far stronger.”

 “Your dad’s about on even keel with him,” Kuzan told Luffy. “So if you think you’re not ready to fight Red Haired Shanks, you’re not ready for Kaido.”

 “Oh,” Luffy said. “…Yeah, okay. Train, then kick Kaido’s ass, and then fight Shanks. Thanks.”

 “Huh, you got Luffy to agree with you. No small feat, Ice,” Law said.

 Kuzan shrugged, “You all aren’t ready. Even after this mess. Might as well keep you alive to see what you do with living.”

 “So, turn in Caesar it is, then?” Robin asked.

 “Yeah,” Luffy said.

 “He’s annoying,” Law agreed.

 “And ungrateful for my or Penguin’s cooking!” Sanji added.

 “Kick him off,” Bepo said.

 “That’s sounding pretty unanimous to me!” Sabo said. “So, Luffy, we—he’s not listening anymore, is he?”

 “Nope,” Law agreed as Luffy and Ace continued talking about punching Doflamingo. “Odd brother out again.”

 “Sucks being the sane one. I get it from Benn,” Sabo said wryly.

.o.o.o.

 Sengoku was waiting for them at the tea shop. Law was surprised to see gray streaks in his beard and afro. Sure, Garp was long gone gray but it was odd to see it so suddenly on Sengoku.

 “I hate to break this to you, father, but we’re pressed for time,” Rocinante said.

 “Yes, yes, Tsuru and Fujitora will be on you soon enough,” Sengoku said. “Time enough for at least one cup.”

 “And you won’t be on our tails as well?” Law asked warily.

 “Not active duty anymore. No need to arrest you, Law…or you two, depending on what you get up to,” Sengoku added, eyeing Rocinante and Kuzan.

 “We’re looking at our options,” Rocinante said, smiling. Law wondered just what his father had planned to where he was being so calm yet also so obvious that he wasn’t done meddling.

 “Roci, if you make me get a bounty before I’ve had a nap, we’re going to have to talk,” Kuzan complained as they were served.

 “Is there caffeine in his? I think Ice needs caffeine,” Law asked the server with a smirk.

 “I’m not an addict like you, thanks,” Kuzan said. “Remind me, how many cups of coffee have you had this morning?”

 “Three,” Law admitted. “I did need them, you know.”

 “No, really,” Rocinante said, ruffling his son’s hair with a smirk.

 “Exhaustion is the drawback of your power,” Sengoku said. “To be fair, without that check on it you’d be nigh unstoppable.”

 “Except with sufficient Haki,” Law pointed out.

 “You’re clever enough to get around that,” Senoku said.

 “He’s already somewhat gotten around the stamina thing,” Rocinante said proudly.

 Law kicked him, “He’s still with the Navy. Aren’t spies supposed to know discretion, Cora-san?”

 “We also know when to act indiscreetly to get people off their guard,” Rocinante said knowingly. “Or when certain information will intimidate more than aid.”

 “Thank you for the info on info,” Kuzan chuckled. “Now, what do you want, Sengoku?”

 “To know what the hell happened. I forgot my son for a bit over a week, Kuzan, of course I got concerned,” Sengoku said.

 “Doffy turned me into a toy and acted like an asshole. Not much to it,” Rocinante said. “Though I did get you some information on illegal arms trading from his rambles, happy early birthday.”

 “He just told you?” Sengoku asked as Law and Kuzan’s eyes widened.

 “Oh trust me he went on and on about all kinds of things. He loves to talk,” Rocinante said, tugging some paper from his coat. “Wrote down what I remembered. Mostly weapons trade stuff and his ‘I want to rule and burn the world’ stuff. Maybe a little more, there was a lot.”

 “Listening to him for a week; maybe I had it easy,” Law joked.

 “Ugh, trust me, he hoped you didn’t,” Rocinante said, shuddering. “I learned more about what my brother thinks of my son than I ever needed, thanks.”

 “Let me guess—has to do with him flirting with me?” Law asked.

  Sengoku spat out his tea as Kuzan sat up straighter. Sengoku finally managed to sputter out, “What?”

 “Doflamingo flirted with me. It was creepy,” Law said as if discussing the weather. “Asked me out for drinks.”

 “Send Impel Down a note—Sadi-chan gets him,” Kuzan said even as Rocinante fell out of his chair at Law’s blasé delivery of the upsetting information. “You okay, Roci?”

 “Agreed,” Sengoku muttered as Law and Kuzan helped his son up.

 “He what?” Rocinante asked.

 “…Flirted? It was creepy,” Law repeated. “But then he’s creepy. So whatever.”

 “You don’t even care?” Sengoku asked.

 “Of course I do. It. Was. Creepy. But he got his ass beaten so I’m fine,” Law said.

 The older men eyed him warily but Law didn’t much care. It was over with as far as he was concerned and if at all possible he wanted to never talk about it again. “So, heard his crew was arrested.”

 “They were,” Sengoku confirmed, seemingly gratified for the change in subject.  

 “So…what happens to them?” Rocinante asked quietly.

 “Senor Pink will be serving community service here for the rest of his life, on the request of the royal family in light of his change of allegiance and aid in the battle,” Sengoku said. “After Fujitora’s broadcast it’s not like we could say no. Law’s boyfriend has apparently declared Bellamy his new crew member and we’re just going to say the Hyena slipped custody. Tsuru wants to try and rehabilitate Baby 5, given how her mental state is both an easy sell as an excuse and can be used to…well…”

 “Tsuru’s going to initially take advantage of her to get her to join and try to fix her afterwards,” Law said bluntly. “Tell her she’s needed and play on that and train her out of it only after she’s signed up. She makes a good weapon.”

 “Yes,” Sengoku said coolly seeming annoyed at Law’s dig. “The rest…”

 “Dellinger was an infant when he was brought in!” Rocinante said. “How he was raised is not his fault!”

 “He’s also murdered over fifty people for Doflamingo,” Sengoku said. “Baby 5 was merely an accessory to murder and Senor Pink…again, hands tied anyway. But Dellinger and Buffalo are lost causes.”

 Rocinante sighed. Law glanced at his father. He knew he loved him, knew he was glad to have saved him…but also knew deep down that Rocinante had wanted to save more than just him. “They were the only three who stayed, plus me. You scared plenty of others off.”

 “Thank you,” his father said, giving him a small smile. Law smiled back before returning to his tea.

 Mostly due to Rocinante’s efforts the conversation strayed to lighter territory. Law had just agreed to tell Luffy, Sabo, and ace that Garp said “hi” when Rocinante stood up, seemingly signaling Kuzan.

 “Law, spend a little time with your grandpa,” Rocinante said. “We’re going to grab some alone time before we’re stuck on a boat with you and your lunatic pals for a few days.”

 “…What’s his angle, you think?” Law asked as Rocinante and Kuzan walked off.

 “Damned if I know. Rocinante almost never lies to me; makes it hard to know when he is,” Sengoku snorted. “…You were the first thing he ever lied about, you know?”

 “What?” Law asked.

 “Minion Island. I’m not stupid enough to think you ‘accidentally’ ate the Op-Op Fruit when you just so happened to be dying of a disease probably only it could cure,” Sengoku said. “It was the first time he ever lied to me…make it be for a good reason, that’s all I ask.”

 “But you’ll never think it’s a good reason. I’m a pirate,” Law said.

 Sengoku sighed, “Law-”

 “You lied to me.”

 “What?” Sengoku asked.

 “The day Cora-san introduced us. You lied to me,” Law said tightly. He remembered it. Tsuru had brought them straight back to Marinford. He’d only just finished curing himself before they’d arrived and had been in a foul mood from exhaustion and general dislike of the Navy. He’d tried to remember his manners for Sengoku, for Cora-san’s father, though. He’d been a bit intimidated by the then-Admiral, too.

 “What do you mean?” Sengoku asked. And for a moment Law didn’t want to tell him…but then he glanced around at the ruins of the islands and he was too pissed off at the Government, and his grandfather who was a willing part of it, to care.

 “You told me…you said you’d keep me safe,” Law said. “And you lied.”

 He’d known it was more about his powers than himself but…damn it between Sengoku’s seeming sincerity and the faith he’d been rewarded for having in Cora-san…he’d let himself hope it would be true.

 “Law, I meant it-”

 “I know damn well you meant it when you said it!” Law snapped. “But it didn’t matter when Doflamingo was made a Warlord, did it?”

 “That was not my decision,” Sengoku said. “It came from the Elder Stars.”

 “Yeah. Them. There’s what, five of them?” Law muttered. Suddenly he smirked. “You know, bringing down Doflamingo...wasn't as fun as I’d hoped. Maybe they’ll be better.”

 “What?” Sengoku asked, eyes widening.

 “My new goal is to kill the Five Elder Stars,” Law said smoothly. Hell, they were a threat to the crew anyway with Luffy’s plans of being the Pirate King, so might as well, right? “What are you going to do about it?”

 Sengoku frowned so Law pushed, “You know I’ll do it so what are you waiting for? Arrest me.”

 “Law, you’re being cruel,” Sengoku said.

 “I have a reputation for it,” Law said. “So, going to do your job or not?”

 Sengoku frowned at him, “You’re not serious, so no.”

 “You have no way of knowing if I’m serious,” Law countered. And he was kind of liking the idea the more he thought about it…

 “Law, do us both a favor, and drop it.”

 Silence settled over the tea stand, with the very terrified server understanding at once that he was to have heard nothing if he wanted to remain unscathed.

.o.o.o.

 “There you are,” Rocinante said as he and Kuzan found the leopard Zoan outside a bar. “Knew I’d seen you somewhere before!”

 “Gentlemen,” the Cipher Pol agent said. “You do realize that since you’re no longer government operatives I no longer have a reason not to kill you?”

 “You have a reason. His name is Kuzan,” Rocinante said. Kuzan patted the agent on the shoulder, leaving a dusting of ice behind as a warning. “Now why are you here?”

 “Monitoring of Doflamingo’s weapons trade and his reasoning for wanting the former Aokiji here along with Fujitora,” the agent said as they steered him into an alley. “Both are now moot anyway.”

 “You fought the Straw Hats at Eines Lobby,” Kuzan said. “Rob Lucci, right?”

 Lucci raised an eyebrow, “Not sure why that matters. But you have no reason to know any Cipher Pol information anymore. As an apology for our last meeting, Donquixote, I’ll let you walk away this time.”

 “Oh really? Only this time?” Kuzan asked.

 “You’re both meddling where you shouldn’t, all to help criminals,” Lucci said. “I do work for the government, unlike you two traitors.”

 “Watch yourself, spots,” Kuzan warned, amused. “I’ll give your tail frostbite.”

 “Now, Lucci,” Rocinante said, sitting down. “I wish I could believe you, really, but you’re in CP0 now, have been since I helped you get rehired. The top tier of the Cipher Pol organization. Do you really expect me to think that you’re really just here for things we already know about? No. We both know that’s stilly. So, do you want to fess up, or do we need to make this discussion less civil?”

 Lucci looked amused, “You’re honestly threatening me.”

 “Just making things clear, though if we’re being totally honest he’s threatening you with me,” Kuzan said. “Now why were you really here?”

 “As I said. It is moot now,” Lucci replied.

 “Then you should have no reason not to tell me,” Rocinante pressed. “Talk. Don’t worry, not a soul will hear.”

 “Of course, that also means not a soul will hear if you don’t and we get drastic,” Kuzan added. “What’s your angle, assassin?”

.o.o.o.

 Law, Kuzan, and Rocinante left Sengoku at the tea stand not long after the tall couple had returned from their errand.

 Law was annoyed with how cagey his father was being about what they’d run off to do, but understood that it was pretty much Cora-san lying or clamming up about it at this point. Then again, he was just plain annoyed in general after his conversation with Sengoku.

 He was a little sorry he’d lashed out like that but…it had been simmering for nearly ten years. He’d had to. After the last week, the last few days, after the hell he’d seen on Dressrosa…he’d had to.

 “I am so fucking tired…” Kuzan complained.

 “You can sleep on the ship,” Law said. “We’re leaving now anyway.”

 There was a slight rumble and Rocinante sighed, “Oh, what now?”

 They hurried—Law being somewhat dragged by his father as fast movement was still well outside his abilities for the moment—down to the harbor.

 “…Why is your crazy boyfriend fighting Admiral Fujiora?” Kuzan asked and Law was surprised to hear a genuinely testy note in his voice. Apparently Kuzan was really getting pushed to his limit for putting up with this sort of thing.

 Which meant Law probably could have had a better answer than a sarcastic, “You answered your own question: he’s crazy.”

 Kuzan shot him an annoyed look and Law was pretty sure the only reason he wasn’t being tripped by a spontaneous patch of ice was the fact that Rocinante still had a grip on his arm and would have fallen too. “Well get him to stop it.”

 “…You think I have any say over this?” Law asked, bemused. No one talked Luffy out of a fight once it was already going. It was a crucial factor in his planning, after all, handling that extreme impulse.

 “Law, can you try?” Rocinante asked, pinching the bridge of his nose.  

 “What are you guys talking about?” Sabo asked as they reached the rest of the group, hanging near the Sunny and Scalpel.

 “They think I can talk Luffy out of fighting,” Law said.

 “You’ve…met my brother, right?” Sabo asked, bemused. “Let him get it out of his system, then we’ll go.”

 “Neither of them’s even giving it their all, this is so for show,” Ace complained.

 “To be fair, Fujitora likely needs to make some gesture of compliance with his duty after his stunt with accepting blame for what happened here,” Jinbe said. “And Luffy likely just wants to see what Fujitora is capable of.”

 A gravity pulse sent Luffy slamming into the side of the Thousand Sunny, timely intervention from Jinbe saving him from drowning as he bounced off an into the water.

 Law nodded, “Okay, that should be-”

 “My turn!” Zoro declared, only to drop like a sack of bricks when Kuzan punched him in the head.

 “Oh hell no,” Kuzan said. “We are getting on that boat and I am getting a nap! Are we clear?”

 The rest of the pirates chose that moment to remember that this guy was an ex-Admiral and therefore probably worth listening to. Especially when he was angry. Everyone quickly boarded the ships.

 Kuzan stalked over to the Sunny’s mast, put his back to it, slid down, and bowed his head. “Nobody wake me up. Not even you, Roci.”

 “Now that’s being serious about napping,” Penguin muttered as Jinbe hauled Luffy aboard.

 “Navigators, tell me you have a course,” Law said, desperate to make it stop seeming like his stepfather was running the show.

 “Aye-aye!” Bepo said. “Nami and I plotted one into new waters!”

 “Sounds good!” Luffy called over his shoulder as he bounded to the figurehead of the Sunny. “Set sail and let the ice guy nap!”

 “Let’s just get out while the getting’s good,” Law said.

.o.o.o.

 Sengoku sighed at the panicked report from a young ensign. A member of CP9 had been found frozen to an alley wall…with thawing instructions neatly pinned next to him.

 It seemed Law wasn’t the only one determined to make trouble…

.o.o.o.

 Rocinante quite liked what he saw of his son’s crewmates and…co-captain? Slightly superior in rank captain? The exact power dynamic was unclear but both went by captain while Law often allowed Luffy to have his way…

 In fact he liked what he’d seen of Luffy, even more than he had when they’d planned this whole debacle several weeks ago. Of course Luffy had to have his approval, though, he often made Law smile. Nothing could get him on Rocinante’s good side faster.

 Kuzan spent most of his time lounging against the mast or in bed as the navigators wound a rather complex maze of routes in order to throw off pursuit before dropping Kuzan and Rocinante somewhere to continue their own plans. Kuzan had complained about waiting to take a vacation and therefore the liberal amount of napping was probably his version of payback.

 Dating a sloth had real perks when the guy was too lazy to get proper revenge.

 “What are those?” Luffy asked him, leaning over his shoulder.

 “Photos,” Rocinante said, showing him.

 “Hey, there are from our fights on Dressrosa!” Luffy said. “Who took these?”

“A Navy photographer,” Rocinante said. “From what I gather, Fujitora often has trouble filling out reports since he cannot describe the visual portions well, so he hired a few extra photographers to get images for him to just toss in the folder.”

 “So why do you have them?” Law asked, looking at a very nice picture of Robin incapacitating several enemies.

 “Sengoku had them and…well, not like they were going to see the light of day, the Navy would never publish images of pirates doing anything heroic if they could help it,” Rocinante said, shrugging.

 “…You robbed Sengoku to mess with the Navy’s propaganda machine?” Law asked, sounding mildly awed. “Damn, Cora-san.”

 “Ooh, Shanks would like this one,” Luffy said, pointing at one of Ace tearing into Gladius. “And Mihawk would want the one of Zoro and the pole guy.”

 “Some of them are more for personal pride but yes,” Rocinante said. “But also in case I run into Shanks or Mihawk and need to stay on their good side.”

 “You’re smart, that’ll totally work,” Luffy said.

 “Thank you,” Rocinante said. “So what have you been up to?”

 “Fishing,” Luffy said.

 “Chopper and I were studying the anatomy of a fish for the purposes of devising a way for the Devil Fruit users on the crew to not run out of air as quickly underwater,” Law said. “Really it would require total lung reworks from what we can tell.”

 “So it’s out,” Chopper said. “On the upside it taught us more about Jinbe’s gills!”

 “Oh, wonderful, I helped raise a mad scientist,” Rocinante laughed.

 Law just smirked like the proud brat he was, and Chopper beamed, apparently taking being called a mad scientist as close enough to a compliment for him.

 “Yeah, Traffy’s super smart,” Luffy said, grinning. “It’s cool!”

 “Glad you think so,” Law said.

 “Course I do, you’re mind. We’re totally getting pirate married one day,” Luffy said.

 “I think that takes a few more years of exclusivity, Luffy-ya,” Law said, flushing scarlet as Rocinante tried to wrap his head around what Luffy had just said.

 “Yeah, like five,” Bepo agreed from his spot on the deck. Rocinante was still baffled. What the heck was ‘pirate married’?

 “Are we sure it’s a hard rule, though?” Usopp asked, still fishing. “I’d argue Ace and Marco are pirate married and they’ve only been together a bit over three years.”

 “Well the duration does have a point, it’s not just the exclusivity but the fact that it’s being made obvious that the exclusivity will be maintained,” Law said. “But you have a point, Fire Fist and Phoenix are very obvious about their relationship being intended to last.”

 “So pirate married is just two pirates who are practically married?” Rocinante asked, fighting the urge to tease Law about Luffy’s declaration.

 “Yeah,” Usopp said. “Like Luffy’s dads, right Luffy?”

 “…Ace and Marco are already pirate married?” Luffy asked.

 “I’d guess so,” Usopp said.

 “Even the Navy knows about them!” Chopper piped up. “Marco got mentioned on Ace’s post-Marinford poster! That has to mean something!”

 Luffy frowned, nodding.

 Rocinante remembered a day or two after Dressrosa, there’d been a rather…annoyed call from some of the Whitebeard Pirates who had determined Ace could not be trusted to take care of himself—yes, the multiple burned buildings, burns on Sugar and Gladius, and scorch marks on Doffy’s coat and left arm really supported that theory, gents—and therefore needed to either shape up or stay where they could see him, which had led to someone, he assumed Marco though he’d never heard the man sound so very embarrassed, yelling at them to get off the damn snail, what was wrong with them, and if they were bored he’d give them something to do.

 It really surprised him how loud some people this crew chatted with on the snail could get.

 “Anyway, it’s way too early to talk about that kind of thing,” Law said, even though there was a small smile on his red face. “Drop it.”

 “Yeah, okay,” Luffy said, rubbing the back of his head and grinning.

 Rocinante frowned. Something about that grin seemed forced.

 “Anyways, gonna go find Sabo. Maybe he’s got something fun to do,” Luffy decided.

 “Don’t drown,” Law commented idly, pulling out a book and leaning against Bepo.

 Rocinante wasn’t entirely sure how Pirate Married worked, but he was pretty sure Law and Luffy were already acting like it.

.o.o.o.

 “Well I don’t know how he’d take it!”

 Ace paused at hearing Sabo snap. That was a weird enough occurrence to justify eavesdropping.

 “Well then we just ask Ace…I guess,” Luffy said.

 It was about him? “What the hell, guys?”

 His bothers both had the decency to look guilty when he barged in to Sabo and Koala’s room.

 “I can’t believe you’re talking about me behind my back!” Ace growled.

 “Well Luffy just wanted to make sure it was okay to ask you before he did. Right Lu?” Sabo asked.

 “Yeah it’s kind of…I wanted to check,” Luffy said. “Didn’t know how to…say it.”

 “Say what?” Ace asked, folding his arms.

 “Well, um…Ace?” Luffy asked. “I…you’re happy here, right?”

 “Yeah, of course,” Ace said.

 “I mean…you wouldn’t…you know, rather be…” Luffy muttered. “Ace, do you want to leave?”

 “What?” Ace asked.

 “He wanted to know if you’d rather be on Marco’s crew,” Sabo said, rubbing his arm.

 Ace was quiet, probably from being put on the spot like that, “…What do you mean?”

 “I don’t want you to stay if you’d be happier somewhere else,” Luffy said. “I only make people stay when they won’t be happier somewhere else.”

 “Oh,” Ace said.

 “Yeah,” Sabo agreed. “We know how much you like him, you know.”

 “Do you? Because…I talked about this, actually. With Marco,” Ace said.

 “What?” Sabo asked, eyes widening.

 “Does that surprise you?” Ace asked. “We’re together…well, a couple, not, you know, in the same place but…but we talk.”

 “What’d you say?” Luffy asked with trepidation.

 Ace smiled, “That I want to be there when we find One Piece and you become Pirate King. I’ll be a Straw Hat til then.”

 “And…after?” Sabo asked, catching the wording’s implications easily. He always was the smart one.

 Ace frowned, folding his arms. “I…I…guys, I love Marco.”

 “So you’d go,” Luffy said quietly.

 “I said my dream was to be free to be what I want, and what I want is to see Raftel, see what Roger hid, and, see Luffy become Pirate King,” Ace said. “It’s still those things. But…after…I have another dream for after.”

 Luffy smiled sadly, “We never really talked about after.”

 “Yeah…” Sabo said. “Guess it makes sense…we might not all stay together…”

 “We’ll always be brothers. And I’ll always roast anyone who tries to hurt you,” Ace said.

 Luffy chuckled, “I guess that’s okay. If you’re happy. And if I can drop in!”

 “You drop in? You’re the one who took over a totally awesome island!” Ace said. “I am going to drop in like crazy to show off that place!”

 “Shishishi, I can’t wait to make it an awesome base!” Luffy said. “After we find One Piece, anyway!”

 “Seriously, Raftel’s going to have to be damn awesome to top Punk Hazard,” Ace said.

 “Tell me about it. Jeez, should we ask Shanks? So we don’t get our hopes up?” Sabo asked.

 “That’s cheating, I’ve got to kick his ass and then he’ll tell us what he knows about Raftel!” Luffy said.

 “Please, with how Law and I had to save your butt against Doflamingo, you’re nowhere near beating our dad,” Ace said.

 “Oh yeah? How about I kick your ass then?” Luffy asked.

 “You mean how about I melt your rubber, right?” Ace asked, smirking.

 They broke into a fight pretty easily, but it was the good kind of fight, the fun kind they’d been having since they were kids. It was the kind of fight that made Shanks laugh and Benn shake his head at them.

 Which meant it was also the kind of fight that Sabo broke up by smacking them both upside the head with his pipe and then running like hell.