Disclaimer: I don't own One Piece. Everything belongs to Oda-sensei.
Chapter 1: A meeting with a coward.
"Ah... the weather is pretty nice today," A black-haired teenager exclaimed to himself as he sat relaxed on his small dinghy. "Who would've thought I'd get into such a disaster on a nice day like this!?" He continued seemingly unconcerned as he was slowly dragged into a huge whirlpool.
"There's no one around me to help me and it'll be really bad if this boat wrecks...since I can't swim after all," He continued his monologue as he watched his doom coming nearer and nearer. "Wait a minute! It actually doesn't matter if I know how to swim in a situation like this," He said brightly as if he wasn't on his way to end his journey before it even began. He looked around and took notice to his barrel of water behind him. He knew he only had seconds so he quickly got rid of the water and locked himself into the barrel.
"I really hope this will work or Shanks and Ace will be laughing at me when we meet at the netherworld." And fell asleep immediately. The old dinghy was destroy mere seconds later while the barrel with Luffy in it was tossed around and around.
-]I[-
Coby the pink-haired coward sighed heavily while he rolled the barrel. I'll have my revenge on the hag sometime. I'll join the just Marine and hunt her down! It was Coby's greatest dream but he was no fool. He knew that he'd never escape and would most likely die as Alvida's servant.
"What? You're saying that barrel of sake got washed up on shore, Coby?" One of Alvida's many pirates asked mockingly. He looked at the barrel with greedy eyes.
"Ye...yes. There seems to be something inside it. What should we do with it?" Coby was right that there was something in it. But it was not sweet sake. It was actually his salvation to his horrible situation.
Two other pirates joined the one at the door. They began to argue about the pros and cons to steal a barrel under their boss' nose. But they never reached an agreement. The barrel lid exploded and to Coby's infinite surprise, a young man jumped up from the barrel with a gigantic smile!
"What a nice nap that was!" He shouted with glee. He looked around and took notice that he was outside what was supposed to be a warehouse and that four people was staring at him with wide eyes. "Looks like I'm saved. I thought I was gonna die on my first day of my journey!" And broke out into joyous laugher.
He then turned to Coby and the three stooges. "Who are you?" He asked curiously. He never got an answer as a woman screamed at them to stop slacking off and tossed a heavy iron mace at the warehouse. The wooden structure completely collapsed from the force of the mace. The wooden barrel began to roll away and Luffy was forced to follow it since he never had time to escape from the barrel.
-]I[-
Luffed rolled several hundred meters until he finally stopped inside a forest. He was dizzy from the journey and he closed his eyes. He snapped open his eyes ten minutes later when he heard soft footsteps nearing him. It was the pink-haired boy he'd seen earlier. He looked nervously at Luffy.
"Um... are you all right? Did you get hurt?" The hesitant voice and the soft eyes told Luffy that this boy was no danger to him. He'd never seen such a craven person in his life!
"I'm fine. Just a little surprised, that's all. So, I'm Luffy. What is this place?" He was not really interested but Makino had taught him that manners what important, so he decided to listen to her for once.
"This is the breeding ground of 'Iron Mace Alvida'. I'm a caretaker of her ship. I'm Coby." So the little boy was a member of a pirate? Not something Luffy expected.
"I see... actually, that's not important." Luffy sniggered at the shrimp's expression. But he had bigger problem now. That stupid whirlpool had destroyed his dinghy so he was stuck at this island for now.
"Hey, Coby! Do you have a small boat? Mine got caught in a wicked whirlpool."
"Whirl...whirlpool? You were actually caught in a real whirlpool?"
"Yeah, that whirlpool was really scary." Luffy pouted with his arm crossed. He was put out that his first day as a pirate was nearly his last one.
"A normal person would've died already, but if you want a boat I have one...but," Coby lead the way to what you could barely call a boat... Luffy thought it looked more like a coffin and he quickly and mercilessly pointed that out. Coby laughed weakly. It was really nothing much but he told Luffy that he'd worked more than two years on it.
"Spent two years on it...and you don't want it more?"
"Yeah...I don't want it any more. I was going to run away with this but I don't have the courage to do it... I'm gonna be a caretaker for my whole life even though I have another dream." He then proceeded to tell his sad tale of how he was going to fish two years ago but instead walked right into Alvida's ship.
Luffy could only shook his head in disbelief. "You're stupid, useless and a real coward. I hate people that are stupid, useless and cowards." Coby cried at Luffy extremely blunt statement.
"You're right. If only I was brave enough... why are you sailing, Luffy-san?" Coby decided to ask. Maybe Luffy could help him to find his hidden courage to stand up against his extremely fat tormentor.
"I want to become the Pirate king!" Luffy proudly said with a thousands watt smile. Coby wasn't prepared for that.
"What? What? Pirate king was the title of Gold Roger, who had everything in the world. Are you saying that you are looking for the 'One Piece', the world's greatest treasure?" He shouted bewildered. How could someone that looked so stupid actually try to find the most searched treasure? "Are you stupid? Do you want to die or something? All the pirates in the world are looking for One Piece!"
Luffy was definitely not impressed with Coby's outburst. "So what, so am I." He calmly said while sitting on Coby's coffin...boat.
"Impossible! Impossible! Utterly, utterly impossible! There's no chance for you to become in this era. You don't even have a boat. Imp-" Luffy grew tired of Coby's out-of-this-world tirade and decked him with a simple punch to his forehead.
"I'm not afraid of death. It's my greatest dream to become the Pirate king and that's why I'm not fearing my death." Coby was awed by the pirate's conviction. The little rosette compared his resolution with the black-haired ones. It was really miles and miles apart. Hopeful tears began to appear in his black eyes.
"Luffy-san, will I also... be able to grasp my dream? If...I'm willing to put my life on it?" He asked while swallowing deeply. For the first time in two years he felt hope,,, of becoming something more than a mere coward... and Alvida's punching bag.
Luffy paused a moment. Was there actually something more to the boy than what he'd showed ever since their meeting? "And what's your dream, Coby?"
"Will I be able to become... a marine?" Really? A marine? Luffy couldn't help but associate the word 'marine' with his grandpa and began to sweat while feeling great paranoia. He hoped Garp was far, far away from East Blue. Coby continued explaining not noticing Luffy's panic.
"Luffy-san, I know it means that we'll be enemies! But joining the marines and catching bad guys has been my dreams ever since I got caught." Coby was now really excited and didn't hear Luffy's blunt "I wouldn't know."
"I've to at least try. I'd rather die trying to get out of here and join the marines than stay here and be a slave for my entire life! And then... I'll finally be able to capture Alvida!" Luffy smirked but sensed that an attack was coming. He jumped away from Coby's pathetic boat and thus missed being crushed by Alvida's mace. But the boat didn't survive that attack and was completely destroyed.
"Who did you say you are going to arrest, Coby?" The fat woman asked with a nasty smirk. Coby stared sadly at the remains of his hard worked two years project.
"Do you really think you can escape from me, Coby?" She continued gloating before focusing on Luffy. "Are you really Roronoa Zoro? How disappointing... anyway, before you die, I'm going to ask you... who's the most beautiful woman in the four blues?" Luffy saw that the courage began to slink away from Coby and decided to puke fun on the rude woman.
"Who's this ugly, rude woman, Coby?" Alvida and her pirates all felt their jaws dropping. How dare he this cur insult Alvida-sama, the greatest woman in all the seas?
Coby grabbed Luffy's shoulders in panic and began to shake the future Pirate king. "Luffy-san! Quick, repeat after me! In all the seas, the lady who is the most..." Luffy's prior resolve of not being afraid of death entered Coby's mind and made him change the sentence completely. "... rudest, damned bitch is Alvida!" Had that really slipped from his mouth. It was really liberating to scream the truth for once, but now he was afraid of the result. Alvida was now beyond pissed and Luffy's continuing laughing didn't help a bit.
"YOU DAMNED LITTLE BRAT!" Alvida roared and lifted her weapon to club Coby to his death. Coby definitely saw his death coming but didn't regret telling Alvida off. But he was disappointed he wouldn't see if Luffy would succeed his dream or not.
Luffy was now impressed by the little pinky. He'd stood up to his worst nightmare and didn't seem to regret it. Now he'd to save the boy. He grabbed Coby's collar and dragged him back. The iron mace hit Luffy's head but he received no damage at all.
"The mace is useless against me because my body is rubber." Alvida backed away in fear when she realised she was up against a devil fruit user. Luffy used his rubber ability to stretch his arm backward and then the arm flew forward just like a pistol. His hand hit the large face of Alvida and she was knocked out with a single punch. How disappointing...was this really a pirate worth five million beri?
"Prepare a boat for me and Coby! He wants to join the marines so stay out of his way!" Luffy ordered and looked unusually serious.
And that was the beginning of a great friendship between Coby, the former coward, and Luffy, the future Pirate king.
A/N: Whew, a new story. This is now my second active story and I'll do my best to juggle between them. I'll take inspiration most from the manga but may loan a thing or two from the anime. This chapter is not beta read and that is why I'm searching for one or two beta readers. PM or send a review if you are interested.
/Lord Raihu.