Disclaimer: I do not own One Piece. Neither does librastar. Happy reading.

The minute hand of the clock didn't seem to be moving at all.

A you're an apricot,

B you're a blueberry,

C you're a chocolate full of chips...

Teacher Zeff walked round the class, making sure every single student was singing along but Monkey D. Luffy wasn't listening for a further second. And the the song they were currently learning wasn't helping either.

"I'm hungry!" He yelled for the tenth time that hour, stretching his skinny arms into the air and bursting out of his chair eagerly in restless agitation. "When's recess?!"

Teacher Zeff's mustache twitched, his long dirty blonde plaits swinging menacingly as he hovered over the small black-haired boy still beating his chest and decrying his apparent starvation; utterly oblivious to Zeff's growing irritation. "You'll listen to what I say for the rest of the lesson you little eggplant, or you'll only be getting fruits for recess! You got that?"

Zeff gave Luffy his best glare, the one usually reserved for people that made fun of his school lunches but instead of bursting into tears, Luffy merely grinned and threw back his head in laughter. "Shishishi! Okay old man! I'm going to become King of the Playground so I have to eat to keep up my strength!"

King of the what..?! Zeff rubbed his temples. If he had known that Dragon's son would have been such a handful, he would have put more effort into convincing Principal Sengoku to let Dragon find another elementary school, even if that man did scare the living daylights out of anyone who came within a five mile radius of him. It was only the first day of the new school term but he was already developing a headache from the newest batch of children. Thank goodness his own boy had had the sense to behave himself during his old man's class. "Here, finish up writing these alphabets, then you can go for recess."

Luffy whooped loudly, grabbing his pencil and frantically scrawling some alphabets onto the exercise book. Sighing loudly at the illegible scribbling before him, Zeff decided that his sanity was more important than Luffy's education at this stage and waved him out for the mid-morning break.

Wolfing down his sausage sandwich and apple in five seconds, Luffy turned his attention to exploring the vast playground they had been let loose in for the next twenty minutes of that morning. As he walked up to the swings, he noticed a small pink-haired boy around his age running back and forth from the canteen, carrying cups of iced juice for an enormous black-haired girl sitting on one of the swings. Her bottom was so huge it was spilling out of the seat and every slightest bit of movement was accompanied by an ominous creak from the obvious strain of the excessive weight it had to carry.

"Who is the most beautiful third grader of all, Coby?" she purred, admiring herself in her little handheld mirror as the boy, Coby, nervously handed her another cup to drink. "You...you are, Alvida-sama." he stuttered, wiping his brow tiredly as she guzzled the juice greedily before tossing the empty cup at him. "More juice, Coby. The heat from the sun is so hot, a delicate creature like me cannot possibly be expected to walk about in this absurd weather!"

As the miserable first grader shuffled back towards the canteen, Luffy ran after him. "Hey wait! Why do you have to keep serving juice to that fat kid?"

Jumping a foot in the air rather comically at the sound of Luffy's voice, Coby stared fearfully at the black-haired boy for a few seconds before whispering, "It's because of her metal ruler - everyone in my class, even the teacher, has to obey 'Iron Ruler' Third Grader Alvida, if not well...things don't go too well when that happens.." He shivered again, his entire body seeming to shrink as his eyes darted nervously back and forth between Luffy and Alvida. "She's beat up plenty of kids in the past, both girls and boys! I should get going, if not she will beat me up too…"

"Hey, wait." Luffy put his hands onto his hips and tapped his foot. "What's your name?"

"C-Coby..."

"Coby? Hmm, well that's a cool name..."

"A-Ano..." The pink haired male blushed and looked over at Luffy with a bashful expression. "What's your name?"

"Me? Shishishi..." Luffy laughed loudly, smiling his wide, idiotic smile as he crossed his skinny arms over his chest. "My name is Monkey D. Luffy, and I'm gonna be King of the Playground!"

"K-King of the Playground?!" Coby stared at the boy in shock. "Impossible...absolutely impossible! Completely and utterly impossible! To become the Playground King is just impossible! There's lots of playground bullies and lots of mean teachers and- eek!" Coby let out a cry of pain when little Luffy swung his fist and landed a blow to his head. Coby crouched into a small ball and held his head tenderly, a small bump forming over the spot in which Luffy had dealt the blow. "Ouch...why did you do that, Luffy-san?!"

"Because you were being annoying." Luffy replied simply, carefully adjusting the straw hat sitting atop his head. "Now I'm hungry again. I need meat."

"Oh well..." Coby stood up and chuckled. "I'm used to it anyway. I should really go back to telling Alvida how pretty she is, or else she'll give me another smack to the head.."

"Do you really wanna go back to her though?" Luffy tilted his head to the side and picked his nose. "She doesn't seem like she's a good person at all - in fact, she's nothing but a no-good bully!"

"O-Of course I don't want to go back to her!" Coby clenched his small fists and looked down at his shoes. "I...I know I'm a really small person.." He opened one of his tiny fists and looked at the palm of his hand. "But I...I want to be on Safety Patrol with all the other big kids!"

"Safety Patrol?"

"Yes! It's my dream!" Coby clenched his fists once more and looked at Luffy, determination clear in his eyes. "I know that it means we will be enemies since you want to be the Playground King, but standing up to bullies has always been my dream! Do you think I can do it?"

"How should I know?" Luffy blinked, confusion written all over his face.

"I have to at least try!" Undeterred by Luffy's non-response, Coby adjusted his thick, purple glasses. "Maybe I can...maybe I can even stand up to Alvida!"

A dark shadow suddenly loomed over the two boys, a rather dark aura radiating from the person in waves. Luffy's instincts and Coby's common sense told the boys to move out of the way - narrowly escaping as a thick metal ruler slammed down onto the spot the boys were originally standing in, an ominous 'thwack' sound echoing as it smacked the ground. A heavy set girl dressed in a cowboy outfit leaned against the life-size metal ruler, her lips curled into a sneer and jet black locks falling in curls past her shoulders.

"Who did you say you were going to stand up to?" Alvida growled, narrowing her almond-shaped black eyes at both boys. "Eh? Coby? Do you think you can really stand up to me?"

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" Coby squeaked, holding his hands over his head as his eyes squeezed shut. "I was just going to get you more jui…" His voice trailed off as Luffy stood up.

"Hey now." Luffy stated, putting his hand on his precious straw hat and glancing over at the pink haired boy. "Maybe you should say what's really on your mind. What do you think...Coby?"

The little pink haired boy stared at his new friend for a few seconds, before he turned to stare back at "Iron Ruler" Alvida. He clenched his fists as he remembered every unkind word Alvida had ever said to him. He remembered how she would often smack him for the tiniest things and how she had made him into her personal chore boy. He remembered, and he felt angered at that- so he decided to take Luffy's advice and to take a stand against this girl, no matter how frightening she was!

"Coby, tell me..." Alvida gave him a sinister smirk, putting her little finger onto her chin thoughtfully. "Who do you think is the most beautiful girl in the world?"

"Not you!" Coby pointed his finger at her. "You're the ugliest, meanest, rudest girl I've ever met!"

"You little brat, how dare you?!" Alvida screeched, clenching her iron ruler and raising it menacingly above their heads. "I'll make you eat your words!"

"Well said, Coby!" Luffy grinned and shoved the small pink haired boy behind him. "RUN!"

The two boys took off, with the heavy set third grader chasing after them. They were fast, but even Luffy was surprised at how fast Alvida could run. Round and round the playground, up and down the swings. She finally cornered the two first graders when they slipped down a slide.

"I've got you now.." She muttered darkly, raising her iron ruler and swinging it down onto the two boys. Coby cowered in fear and closed his eyes, but Luffy stuck his skinny arms up and curled his fingers around the ruler, stopping her dead in her tracks. He smiled and laughed his strange little laugh. "Shishishi...that won't work on me!" He pulled his fist back as Alvida struggled to free her iron ruler from Luffy's (pardon the pun) "iron" grasp. "Gomu Gomu no..." His arm shot forward. "Pistol!" His fist connected with her stomach and he sent her, along with her iron ruler, flying backwards.

Coby's mouth became a round 'O' in shock at the sight of Alvida knocked-out on the ground, her iron ruler lying harmlessly a few feet away from her side. "That was amazing!"

"Shishishi," Luffy grinned, standing up and dusting his hands on his denim shorts. "And just in time for the end of the break too." The bell rang loudly, signalling the start of mid-morning classes. He stole another glance at Alvida's prone figure. "That wasn't too bad but I'm going to need more strong nakama if I want to become the Playground King…"

Coby gulped. "You mean like Roronoa Zoro?"

"Hmm?" The black-haired first grader walked companiably back with his new-found friend. "Is he strong?"

"Strong?" The bespectacled boy yelped. "Rumour says he's a big, scary monster...and he's just one grade above us, in the second grade! He wanders the playground hunting for victims; nobody escapes him!"

"Sounds interesting - so I'll see you at lunchtime and we can go look for him! Ja ne, Coby!" Luffy waved and ran back to his classroom.

Coby waved his arms frantically. "No wait, Luffy!" He sank to the ground in resigned misery. "Why did I even bring him up?"

A/N: Hello everyone! This story has indeed been reuploaded. Librastar, the other author of this story, and I are currently working on adding new chapters so please be patient with us!

So come join Monkey D. Luffy on his journey to become King of the...Playground? Whaat?

Also, Merry Christmas everyone! I hope you all have a pleasant day. And a Happy New Year as well