A/N: Well it sure is nice to be back. I have not written anything for a long time because my laptop committed suicide and has taken months to fix but now has literally nothing of mine on it. For those who don't know my name is Shambles X (Well it's not but you know what I mean.) and I wrote a story called Romance Dusk a long time ago. I am not writing any more of it as after such a long time I doubt anyone will be interested or be able to remember anything about it (I know I can't) I would like to thank everyone who read that story and for all the support I got. If there is any demand for it I will attempt to carry on with it but if not then it is dead and may it rest in peace.

Now onward, that first bit was longer than intended so I will make this brief. New story. Hope you like it. Please review. Oo and I don't own One Piece.

Chapter 1.

Ain't that a Kick in the... head.


10 years after the death of the pirate king Monkey D. Luffy the age of piracy was still alive and well...

"But Vice-Admiral I really don't think that is a wise decision." The marine officer shifted uncomfortably. Objecting to a command given by a superior officer, a Vice-Admiral no less, seemed almost like treason.

"My decision is final Lieutenant. We have stalled the boys release for far longer than would be considered fair. Certainly not parent-like by any stretch of the imagination." The Vice-Admiral sat back in his large office chair. The spring squeaked against the added weight then let out a metallic sigh as he leant forward again. He drummed his finger against the desk in the moments silence that came before the Lieutenants carefully worded response.

"We have no way of telling what will happen to him though sir. It's too much of a risk to let him roam free, we don't know what he's capable of. Anything could happen!" He had felt himself getting more frustrated as he spoke until the last words were a shout. He suddenly remembered his place then saluted. "I apologise Vice-Admiral. I spoke out of turn."

"No, no Lieutenant I have always valued your input and your concerns are well founded but there is just nothing more that we can do to delay his progress. Look at this." The Vice-Admiral admiral strained as he lifted a large pile of paper onto his desk, it landed with a thud and stacked almost to the ceiling. The table groaned slightly under the sheer weight. "This is- er this is-" The Vice-Admiral attempted to look round one side of the paper obelisk and then peered round the other. He let out a sigh and shuffled his chair a few inches to the right. The unused wheels let out a terrible high pitched screech which caused both the Vice-Admiral and Lieutenant to flinch.

"As- I was saying these are the medical forms and legal documents we sent him to slow him down. They were all completed within a day, we have five more rooms full of piles like this. He is not a prisoner here and we would do well not to make him think so. I am sending a Pacifista out to trail him and intervene if he gets into or causes any trouble." The Vice-Admiral still did not look sure about his decision but had resigned himself to whichever outcome it may produce.

(-)

A boy walked out of the marine HQ's front gate, shielding his hazel eyes from the strange sight of the sun and smiled slightly as he felt the sea breeze bustle through his messily spiked light brown hair. His smile turned to a frown as he looked to his left and saw a hulking robotic figure engineered to look similar to the ex Shichikubai Bartholomew Kuma.

The boy was technically a man in all but experience as he was in fact twenty years old, his face was pale but not in an unhealthy looking way. On his left cheek he had a Kanji tattoo which roughly translated to knowledge and a set of three identical ear rings which dangled from his left ear each looking like a golden fang. His expression was one of knowing arrogance, entirely unintentional but gained, none the less, from being considerably smarter than his peers. He would never say so of course, he always chose to be considered an equal by his base comrades. Another strong sea gust swept past blowing his white marine jacket around his legs, like an officer jacket the white coat had justice written on the back in Kanji but unlike an officers jacket it was not adorned with tassels and medals and other shiny memorabilia of greatness, it was just a plain white coat. Unlike an officer he didn't drape it over himself like a cape but wore it as a coat should be worn, with arms in it. He was a researcher not a soldier, not any more anyway, he had no time for such trivial pomp and circumstance. He tugged the hood of his red jumper over his head and pulled the draw strings in an attempt to form some sort of defence against the bitter wind that was picking up. The rest of the boys clothes were items of practicality, purely function over form. He had tatty black cargo pants tucked into thick black ankle high, steel toe capped work boots that had been loosely tied for maximum comfort.

Eddy shuffled the strap of his duffel bag back up onto his shoulder and shot the Kuma lookalike another disapproving narrow eyed glare. He gave it a lazy punch and then walked toward the ship biting his lip with tears in his eyes, trying to shaking off the pain in his fingers. The Pacifista lumbered after him obediently.

(–)

"Edward, wake up. We are ashore." A voice echoed around the boys head in the darkness. "Mister Knox, it's time to go." This second voice was mechanical and made him grind his teeth in annoyance even in his sleep.

Edward Knox opened a sleepy eye, the world above slowly came into focus. A blue sky with the occasional fluffy white cloud floating past was the first thing he saw, a few sea gulls soared in ever changing random patterns that he followed with his eye looking for any repetition. Suddenly his view was obscured by the cubist features of the Kuma-bot which blocked out the sky and the sun casting a dark shadow over Edward's face. He sat up and pulled the hood back off his head then glanced round at the faces staring expectantly at him. He looked toward the Captain of the ship.

"Call me Eddy." He said pulling himself to his feet and dusting off his coat half heartedly. "And you-" He pointed an accusatory finger at the Pacifista, "-don't call me anything. Now stay!" He paused for a moment, looking the large motionless robot up and down. "Good boy-man-robot-thing." He said turning to walk down the gang plank onto the dock, he shuddered as he heard several heavy footed steps behind him. "Look, I don't want a baby sitter I just want to experience the real world and maybe do some research while I am at it. I order you to leave me alone!" He gestured angrily with his arms.

"Cannot comply. Contradiction of primary objectives. Request denied." The Pacifista replied in his robotic monotonous voice.

"Oh well that's understandable, I suppose we can just try and-" Eddy's feet skidded on the cobbled floor for a second before he took off speeding down the street, a cloud of dust kicked up in his wake. The Pacifista slowly turned to watch him disappear round a corner in the distance.

"Heat signature locked. Initiating pursuit."

(-)

Eddy gradually slowed to a gentle walk once he felt he had put enough distance between himself and his heavily armed nanny. He let out a relieved sigh and shoved his bag up onto his shoulder before pressing onward in search of something interesting in this, his first visit to a place that wasn't a marine base. His stomach let out a low drawn out growl that sounded like thunder rolling in toward him, he grabbed his unhappy sounding midriff and glanced round the bustling street. Eddy's face lit up when he spotted the saloon style bar a few yards away. He ran through the crowds of people, his mouth watering slightly at the thought of food. It had been forever since he'd eaten something, it had in fact only been three or four hours but it certainly felt like forever to him.

As he approached the swinging saloon doors he smiled at the sound of drunken frivolity booming out from inside. He pushed through the small torso height flaps and glanced round as the shouting and laughter became silence, like someone had just pressed mute. A room of eyes stared at him, none breaking their gaze or silence for even a second. He had noticed people staring at him as he walked through the streets but in a confined space it was far more obvious. Eddy rubbed the back of his neck nervously and smiled in an attempt to break the tension. It didn't work. His feet thudded against the wooden floorboards, amplified by the comparative silence, the walk to the bar felt like miles under the suspicious scrutiny from the tables of disapproving faces.

"What you want?" The barman grunted in a voice that showed as little hospitality as he could manage. "We don't like strangers round here."

"Erm, I have money." Eddy replied nervously, slightly shaken by the cold greeting, he pulled out a wad of notes and waved them in front of the barman's now sparkling eyes.

"Hello my friend!" The barman suddenly began, in a friendly but loud voice. A huge smile had spread across his face. "Welcome to my bar. What can I get you? Drink? Food? Anything just ask." Eddy was even less comfortable now than when the man had just glared at him.

The rest of the bars patrons had already returned to their drinks and conversations. That is, all but one. A man in the corner of the bar, sat at a table by himself stared coldly at Eddy's back, more specifically the justice kanji down the centre of it. He had one arm on the table with a drink in his hand and many empties scattered around it, his other hand was by his side and had been from the moment Eddy had stepped through the front door. The man suddenly stood up flipping his table of empty bottles over in the process. He had drawn a gun from its holster on his waist.

"Damn, marinesh think you own, think you own the who-whole damn plashe. Think you can get away with anything and ignore the needsh of m... of ush reglar folksh. I'll show yer." The man staggered toward Eddy, mumbling similar remarks as he went. Eddy didn't hear him until it was to late. He turned round as the shot fired off and a thick dark liquid splashed against the wooden floor. Eddy looked down towards the puddle, eye's wide in shock. Then to the broken bottle in his hand.

"That was a good shot." He said as the man staggered round in little circles not taking his eye off his target.

"I-I wash aiming for yer head. Now sh-shtand shtill... All of you." Eddy looked around the empty space surrounding him then back at the drunken scruffy man. Suddenly his eyes widened. He heard a repetitive thud coming closer.

"Uhoh." He said as a beeping noise began outside. He leapt over the bar knocking the barman over with him. The front of the building disintegrated in the path of a bright yellow beam of light and flaming wooden shrapnel flew into the wall over Eddy's head. He slowly popped his head back up to see what was left of the bar as well as a scattering of stunned patrons flung in all directions. Where the pickled gunman had been standing there was now just a smoking pile of ash and a pair of boots. Eddy grabbed a bottle of beer and sighed before taking a swig out of it and glaring at the Kuma-bot. He flung the bottle which smashed against the Pacifista's face.

"You suck." Eddy growled as he walked past the large cyborg, carefully stepping over piles of rubble and back into the street. Eddy didn't look back at the Pacifista but if he had he would have seen some sparks and smoke start to appear from the recesses of Kuma's face as the syrupy alcohol from the beer bottle worked its way into the robots circuitry. His head slumped and his arms drooped, while his systems shut down one by one.

(-)

Eddy continued to walk through the town, pondering his current situation. He knew they would do something like that, he knew they wouldn't just let him go. He just wanted to explore and see what life was like, real life, not the sheltered existence he'd had in the marine bases. The marines raised him from a baby that's more than he could say about his real parents, they had just abandoned him somewhere at sea. It wasn't a bad life, the marines between them treated him like their own child and hadn't even objected when he decided he didn't want to be a soldier, despite the years they had spent training him. They gave him a great education, just like he had requested and even his own lab when he was old enough, including notes and schematics from several of Dr Vegapunk's creations. But when it came down to it, he was twenty years old and had only experienced life through what he'd read in books.

"What the hell d'ya think your doing?" A voice yelled somewhere nearby, snapping Eddy out of his own little world. He looked across to see a group of badly dressed men stood round a woman who was currently looking at them in terror. A bag of gold and assorted gems had scattered across the floor glittering like constellations in the night sky. "I think you need to learn to watch where your going!" The leader of the group yelled, his face contorted into a evil snigger.

The man was tall, around seven foot with greasy blonde hair and was wearing a black suit of armour with a black cape that had a skull and cross bones insignia in the centre, he held the full face helmet to the armour under his arm like the dismembered head in tales of horsemen who are slightly shorter than they should be.

"B-but you walked into me." The woman whimpered as she stared fearfully into the pirates face. He raised his free hand and struck her across the face, knocking her to the ground. Eddy's fists had clenched tightly at his side as he watched. He looked around at the other locals walking by trying not to notice what was going on so they wouldn't be dragged into it.

"Do you know who we are?" The man yelled at her, despite being less than a foot away. The woman nodded, tears running down her cheeks. "Good, then you know that no-ones coming to help you. The marines here are in our pocket, in fact I think we'll get a medal for dealing with the girl who could've damaged the treasure that they are due" He gestured to one of his subordinates without taking his eyes off the girl. He put his helmet on as someone handed him a large metal lance which he grabbed and raised above his head with the pointed tip aimed downward.

"Haaaah!" He brought the weapon down with such force it caused a crater in the floor, sending an small explosion of rock in all directions. The attack had missed. "What the hell happened?" The armoured aggressor shouted. He looked across to see the woman standing unharmed with Eddy holding her hand, a look of disgust on his face.

"Haha, a marine eh? You obviously didn't get the memo. Your boss works for us and that means you work for us. Now bring that girl back here this instant." The man said patronisingly while pulling the lance out of the stone floor and walking toward Eddy.

"No." Eddy replied bluntly. He stared coldly at the armoured individual before him.

"What did you say to me?" The man yelled. He had stopped in shock at the sheer impertinence of this stranger.

"I said no." Eddy repeated, still not breaking his gaze.

"I am Captain Razor of the Steel Razor Pirates. I own this town! Now give me the girl or Your gonna get hurt."

"No."

"Stop saying that dammit. You can't stop me taking her. Lieutenant Nezumi has ordered that no soldier is allowed to lay a finger on me or my crew. Now get out of my way, I will deal with you in a second. Maybe if your good I'll make your death quick." He marched toward the girl, arrogantly chuckling to himself. The sound bounced round his helmet giving a stereo effect.

"You made just four mistakes." Eddy said calmly as Razor had closed half the distance between them.

"Oh really?" He stopped walking again and theatrically pretended to ponder what they could be. "And what exactly do you think they were?"

"Firstly you struck a woman and assumed no one would object. Second you are still under the impression that you are in control of this situation. Thirdly-" Eddy began charging forward, yelling as he ran. "-I'm not a soldier but finally and most importantly-" He drew up level with the armoured man, his fist drawn back and clenched so tightly that it turned white. "I can lay far more than a finger on you!" He thundered his fist forward with power far beyond most peoples capabilities.

Razor didn't even think to protect himself, he had never expected anyone to ever stand up to him. He flew back wards skimming across the ground like a stone on water until he eventually gambolled backwards into a wall with a sound like a sack of pans. The steel clad pirate sat motionless on the floor propped up by the wall alone, his metallic black helmet dented inwards and blood leaking from his nose, seeping through the gaps in the helmet and slowly dripping onto his chest plate.

The remaining pirates looked at Eddy, then at each other and then dispersed, quickly fleeing in all directions. Eddy watched as they ran, smiling victoriously at what he had accomplished on his very first day, an adventure. Once the last of the pirates were out of sight though, Eddy's expression changed.

"Yeooooooow!" He yelled at the top of his voice clutching his throbbing hand. "That hurt like hell! I wasn't expecting it to hurt that much! Someone help." His eyes welled up slightly as he nursed his now bright red digits.

He turned to the woman, the tears in his eyes had miraculously vanished and he was now smiling confidently with his injured hand carefully tucked away in his pocket. "You're safe now." he said, approaching her slowly.

This was the part where he was thanked and praised, maybe even granted some kind of reward. Just like in the adventure stories he had read as a child. As he drew closer he tripped on a piece of rock scattered in Razor's earlier attack, he stumbled forward desperately flapping his arms in an attempt to keep his balanced but it was no good. The young woman let out a yelp as he fell forward on top of her.

"Erm sorry about that." He said laughing nervously still on top of her but she wasn't looking at his face. The woman had turned bright red in a combination of embarrassment and anger with a look of sheer rage on her face. Eddy followed her gaze down to see that his hand had landed with unfortunate precision onto the woman's chest. Eddy now turned as red as his hand had been but couldn't remove his hand, it was a deer in the headlights situation of the worst kind, worsened still by the fact that under the pressure his hand started to twitch slightly. The woman let out a scream and knocked Eddy backwards, he sat trying to say something. He knew that this had gone badly, at no point in the stories he'd read did the hero inadvertently grope the damsel in distress.

"I-I-I-I..." The events had gathered a crowd who were now tutting in disapproval. The girl stood up, huffed and marched away. "I didn't mean toooooo!" Eddy finally managed to force the words out but it was too late, she had left.

(-)

'-Reboot initiated-' The words ran across the inside of the Pacifista's eyes, for only him to see. '-The system encountered a problem and needed to close. Would you like to send an error report?-' The robot returned to an upright position and looked around. '-Error report cancelled-' A group of people had amassed around the Kuma statue, none of the townspeople had ever seen a Pacifista close up before. It was an exciting experience for them. They all took several steps back when it started to move, then all ran when it took a few steps forward because a little excitement is one thing but standing near an active killing machine is something else entirely. '-Retrieving mission objectives...-' There was a moment of still silence while the robot waited for an update. '-LOADING... Objectives: Eliminate all threats #FRAGMENT DAMAGED# Edward Knox. Repairing objectives. TARGET LOCK restored. Objectives repaired... LOADING... Objectives: Eliminate Edward Knox.-'


A/N: Well that is the dreaded first chapter looks like. I hope you enjoyed it, second chapter will hopefully be around soonish and maybe my laptop will even survive throughout this one. As I said there may be people who have read my other story and if you have you know I LOVE OC's. LOVE THEM. Not mine of course, I am creatively stunted at best but yours dear reader are what makes my heart skip a beat. (Too much? I thought so. I will tone it down a bit.) So yeah if you want to submit characters please do and I hope to do them justice. If you want to submit characters you have given me before that is also fine because I have none of them any more. Please review and let me know all the little mistakes I made. (But no need to be petty though eh.) And that's that. Character structure thing below, don't have to use it but they usually help. Thanks for reading. Bye. ShX

Side note, submit characters by pm if you can because there are a few Loons on this wonderful website who will try and get me banned for not mentioning this little tid-bit. Toodles.

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