Hello, and welcome to the dictionary definition of FAIL. DDx I made this for Usopp, because he doesn't get enough love, but then I fracking MISSED his BIRTHDAY. LIEK SRSLY. I am the worst peron.

Anyway, this was intended to be the 45th chapter of Foster as a sort of Omake-type thing, but I decided I didn't want to do that. It breaks too much from the current story that it really wouldn't have fit anyway. But, after, like, more than a week of writing this, I could not bring myself to trash it, so now this is a standalone. I will pretend for my own benefit that this is not the most half-assed, nonsensical thing I have ever written.

One more thing-this isn't beta'd. Like, at all. Sorry, Llanyia. D: Sometimes when something's already late, I'm just like, pff, whatever, I'm already late, what's another day? but sometimes I can't stand it and this is one of those times. so, I posted this raw story. Raw like editorially, not like emotionally, or without subtitles, or not fully cooked.

EnjoyhopefullytothebestofyourabilitiessorryIknowIs uckbutyayeverybodylovesUsopp~

"Guys, guys! Do you know what day it is?" Usopp asked excitedly, taking a seat at the breakfast table with the others. Five sets of sleepy eyes looked at him blankly. "Oh, come on! It's not that hard! Just think about it for a second," he goaded, barely able to sit still.

The more awake of the group, Nami and Vivi, exchanged inquiring looks and shrugged when nothing came to them. Luffy mumbled to himself something about no meat for breakfast and pouted, apparently not having heard Usopp. Zoro looked like he didn't even try to think of what day it was, just gave Usopp a bored look. Sanji was nodding off over his cereal, but he, at least, looked like he was trying to figure it out.

"Really? Not a one of you? Don't you keep up with the date at all?" The curly-haired boy crossed his arms over his chest and most certainly did not pout. "You guys have five minutes to think of what day it is before I get really upset."

"What? We're supposed to be thinking about something? But it's not even school!" Luffy whined, dropping his head down on the table with a thunk. "It's too eeeaarlyyy!"

Usopp rolled his eyes at Luffy and leaned forward on his elbows. "I'm not telling you to do anything hard, just think about what day it is!" he insisted, raising his eyebrows at each of his friends. "Just think about it."

"Monday...?" Vivi suggested slowly, her brow creased in thought.

"No- well, yes, it is, but other than that!" Usopp said, flailing a bit to emphasize his irritation. "You can't honestly have forgotten? Every one of you?"

Sanji sighed wearily, slouching in his seat. "Sorry, Usopp, but the chef got me up at four this morning to chop cabbage and cube chicken... I can't think straight," the blond explained slowly. Usopp only pitied him a bit. They were all still supposed to remember, no matter what.

"It's not that difficult! Seriously, guys, just- what month is it? Do you at least know that much?" Usopp asked desperately.

Sounding agitated, Nami responded, "Yeah, it's March. What's your point?"

"But, it's not March!" Usopp threw himself back in his seat, arms in the air. "Best guesses! All of you! What is today?"

"April?" Zoro suggested sarcastically.

"Yes, keep going!" Usopp bounced up and down in his seat, grinning excitedly.

The others all looked bored with and confused by his little guessing game. "...April first?" Vivi offered, looking like she wasn't sure April first was even a real thing. The table's occupants, barring Usopp, shared an "ohh" moment and nodded a few times, accepting that date as true.

"Exactly!" Usopp clapped, smiling like the happiest person on earth, despite his frustration at the slowness of their revelation. "You get it now, right? You get the significance?"

"Uhh... Yeah! Yeah, it's April Fool's day!" Luffy announced merrily, digging in to his breakfast more enthusiastically than he had been. The others all nodded their agreement and more or less resigned to a calm breakfast.

He'd known his friends to be dense at times, but Usopp couldn't help himself. He openly gaped. "That's not- Well, no, it is April Fool's day, but it's also my birthday!" he whined indignantly, raising his voice perhaps a bit more than necessary.

For an extended moment, everyone at that table and even some people at other tables looked at Usopp like he had a bug on his face. Then, the gazes became questioning, and then confused, and finally comprehending.

Luffy was the first one to really react and not only did he laugh, but he pulled out all the stops. "Good one, Usopp!" he commended after he'd calmed down a bit. "You almost had me there!"

...Huh?

"Yeah, that was really convincing," Nami told him, clapping Usopp on the back and smirking. "Not as good as me, but convincing."

Vivi giggled into her hand and nodded in agreement. "I almost forgot how much you like to joke, Usopp-san, that was really a good setup," she complimented, reaching across the table and patting the top of his hand.

"Into the pranking spirit a little early, aren'tcha?" Zoro asked, annoyed. Whether at Usopp or at himself for having the same reaction as everyone else, Usopp couldn't tell.

"I think that was brilliant," Sanji said slowly, smiling. "Realistic is good in practical jokes."

"But I wasn't joking!" he tried to say, finding himself instead catching flies in his mouth. How could they forget? He remembered all of their birthdays and, although the timing of his own birthday was somewhat unfortunate, he expected them to do the same. That wasn't too much to expect of one's closest friends, he had thought, but he couldn't be sure anymore.

The others seemed to be ignoring his flabbergasted face as they carried on casual conversations like he wasn't even there. Forgetting his birthday was one thing, but ignoring him? Oh, no. No way. "Hey- Guys! I'm not joking, today is my birthday!" Usopp said, finally, after he regained enough composure to speak. "I'm eleven today! I told you guys, like, a million times last month! Come on!"

"We already figured out it's a joke, Usopp, it's too late to add on the crazy raving part," Nami criticized, not even bothering to look up from peeling a tangerine. "Don't push your luck, here."

Luffy tried to say something through a mouthful of food that came out as nonsense and bits of breakfast. A beat after he finished, Sanji heaved a sigh and translated, "He said, 'No, let him go on, that was really funny.'"

Usopp was not impressed enough by Sanji's skills to not be upset at them. "I wasn't joking!" Usopp half whined, half shouted, annoyed beyond simple reasoning. "You guys are the worst!" he snapped, standing abruptly and stomping out of the dining room, leaving his friends to stare after him. For the time being, he didn't care if he looked or sounded childish. His friends were traitorous turd balls, so he figured he had earned the right.

As stealthily as he could, Usopp navigated the narrow hallways leading to the back door of the orphanage. The door was old and rusted half to death, but he knew just how to push it so that it wouldn't make a sound to signal his escape. He tip-toed down the steeps stairs and jumped over the rocky patch at the foot of the steps and then he was off through the tall weeds and practically leafless trees towards the Going Merry Shack.

In just over a month, he had only visited the clubhouse once. At the moment, remembering the cold stone floor, the gaping windows and stark decorations, it seemed an appropriate place to sulk. And sulk he would because what else could he really do about it?

As he trudged through the thick grass in the gray morning light, Usopp wondered how long he would have to stay out at the club house before they realised he was serious. On any other occasion, maybe he wouldn't have thought it would take that long, but after their display at breakfast, after such thoughtless, assuming, rude... y'know, mean, behavior, he had a feeling he'd be there for at least a week.

That means I'd have to skip school, he thought, his pace faltering a bit. The only time he could see Kaya was at school, not to mention he'd only ever skipped once or twice, but- No! The great, corageous, brilliant Usopp skipped school all the time. So, just for a day, or a week, or a day, he could skip with a clear conscience because he got good grades and all the teachers loved him anyway. Yeah. That would work. Totally.

Usopp thrust out his chest and held his head high. Yes, that would serve them right. He would skip school and eat linch with the children who weren't old enough to be in school and he would ignore his friends thoroughly and completely until they earned such a title as "friend" with him. That's exactly what he would do. And he wouldn't be lonely, either, because he would always have adoring fans lined up to get him presents and cake on his birthday.

"Yeah!" Usopp said loudly to himself. "Who needs crappy friends, anyway?" He attempted to kick a rock out of his path and instead he slid on it and landed flat on his back with a squawk. Looking up at the cloudy sky, Usopp sighed with what little air he still had in his lungs. That was not how he had intended to spend his eleventh birthday, but it could be much worse than lying on the ground, alone and unable to breathe properly. Well, not much worse, but a little worse. Something typical like, it could be raining.

Just as he was thinking that, the low rumble of thunder sounded in the distance. Perfect. Just what he needed. Stupid friends, an unfortunate birth date, no air, dirty overalls and rain. Barring mention of the stick poking him in the ribs. Which was hurting, but no more so than the rock under his head and the stretch in his lungs after a long few seconds of failed or shallow breaths. It just wasn't his day.

Usopp sat up with a grunt and took a few deep breaths before he even tried to stand. As he pushed himself off the ground, the first few misty drops of rain landed lightly on his nose, his eyelashes, his arms. The clubhouse was in his sights and he started towards it once more, feeling, if at all possible, more lonely than before.

Distantly, Usopp could hear high voices and dogs barking and he hoped irrationally that they were wishing him a happy birthday, because he sure as heck needed it. Not that being wished a happy birthday by strange people and strange dogs would count for much when his own friends didn't remember his birthday, but he would not refuse it.

When he got to the front "door," which was really only a section of chicken wire fencing they'd found somewhere, he noticed the floor was cleared. There was no ugly rug or short, squat, three-legged table visible from the outside. That was odd.

"Is somebody in there?" Usopp called, his legs beginning to shake. There was no answer, so he stepped forward slowly and carefully. "Hello?" he called again, leaning this way and that to try and see if anyone was inside the clubhouse. He hadn't heard any of the others talking about visiting the clubhouse, so he didn't know who might've moved things since he was last there. He hoped to God it wasn't burglars. Or hobos. Or racoons.

"He-ee-ello?" Usopp lamented the shake in his voice and the chattering of his teeth as he stepped forward and grabbed up the splintered, balding broomstick from the ground just outside the house. "If anybody's in there, you better come out now with your hands up! I'm a very d-d-dangerous person! I-I've got four black belts in karate alone!"

There was a rustle from inside the building and Usopp shrieked so loud all other sounds ceased around him. Then, as he was swinging the broom around wildly and wailing like a banshee, a small, spot-billed duck waddled into the doorway. "Qua-quack."

"CARUE! You evil, malicious chicken, you nearly gave me a heart attack!" Usopp wheezed, clutching his chest for his own benefit and dropping to his knees like he was made of jelly. He wasn't sure how, but he would exact his revenge on that duck for scaring him half to death. "I thought you were a mass-murderer or an animal or something!"

The duck gave him what could only be described as an unimpressed look. "...Quack?"

"Hey, don't insult my intelligence! I meant a dangerous animal!" Usopp corrected upon seeing the duck's attitude. Then, after catching his breath for a minute, he realized something. "What are you doing out here anyway? It's a little cold and it's starting to rain and I thought Vivi kept you in her pocket?"

Carue just quacked at him again and wandered off out of view. What a moody duck.

"Well, I'm coming in there, so you better not have any friends with sharp teeth or claws!" Usopp called out, getting up slowly and holding the broom straight out to warn anyone and anything in advance that the great and powerful Usopp, wielding only a basic weapon, could still hurt them.

When he got to the little fence-door, Usopp leaned over it and looked both ways. There wasn't much to see usually, but as he looked around it seemed even more bare than normal. Except for Carue and the door leading to the cramped little bedroom, there was only a biggish cardboard box that he was assuming contained some of the missing furniture.

"What happened here?" Usopp asked, perhaps addressing Carue, perhaps himself. He carefully threw one leg over the little fence and stumbled into the small shack, looking for signs that someone else had been there recently and hoping that the shack wasn't haunted. Carue waddled up to him and flapped once, quacking as loudly as a foot-tall, three-pound duck could quack. "What? Th-th-th-there's n-n-not a g-g-ghost here, i-is there?" Usopp asked meekly.

If ducks could have eyebrows, he was certain Carue raised one. "Quack quack, qua," the duck honked, waddling up to Usopp with his wings outstretched as if to shoo him.

"What? Is it n-n-not safe?" the boy questioned, shrinking in on himself and backing into the fence. The little duck jumped up a bit and chattered on in a strange but cute ducky way. "I know you're trying to tell me something, I know it, but I can't understand you! I'm not eerily intuitive like Vivi!" Usopp told Carue, gesturing vaguely towards the path that would eventually lead back to the orphanage. "Or good at translating like Sanji, or stupid enough to guess like Luffy... Or brave enough not to care what you're saying like Zoro... Or smart enough to tell you how to properly communicate like Nami... I don't know what to do with a stupid duck yelling at me on my birthday! I just don't!"

He didn't know what he was doing venting at a bird, but it was helping a little bit. "You know, as great and cool and awesome as they all are they're all idiots, too." Usopp leaned against the doorway, putting aside the chill he determined was unimportant at the moment that still told him the shack might be haunted. "They all forgot my birthday, Carue, and now I'm going to be by myself. Maybe they won't even want to be friends with somebody who is childishly upset about something that will be small in the long run, like a birthday," Usopp said soberly, ignoring the duck's quacks and honks and flails. "Maybe I'm in the wrong here. I probably am. I'm not right much and I could've just explained it calmly. Why aren't I calm?"

The spot-billed duck was squawking frantically as he spoke and Usopp finally took notice of it with a little annoyance. "What are you being so noisy about, Carue?"

"I told you he would come out here!" A very familiar voice interrupted the sounds of a panicky duck and the wind blowing.

"So, the duck is a guard dog? Vivi-chan, did you approve that?"

"Well, yes, Carue is-"

"It was her idea."

Usopp listened with confused interest as at least four out of five of his friends were, by the sound of them, coming towards the clubhouse. They were having a very tame, nonchalant conversation as far as he could tell, but he couldn't hear their footsteps. They must not be very close yet.

"Are you sure Usopp is in there?" Now that familiar voice threw him. Chopper was supposed to have gone home with Doctor Kureha, as of nearly a week ago, but he was absolutely certain that was Chopper's voice. "It looks deserted."

"Vivi told her chicken to yell when it sees Usopp." And Zoro too? Something must be up. Zoro could not be bothered to go anywhere he didn't want to go, so either he'd been leveraged by the two-headed Nami-San, or something really important was going on.

"Now, Zoro-san, that was rude! Carue isn't an 'it,' he's a boy!" Vivi scolded and Usopp snickered to himself. She'd apparently missed the part where Zoro called Carue a chicken.

The six voices, all talking over each other at various times, became underlined by the sounds of crunching grass. It seemed to peaceful and nonsignificant to be happening on his forsaken birthday.

At that moment, Usopp realized the duck had stopped freaking out and that he hadn't revealed himself to the others. He didn't know why that was, especially since it seemed they might be looking for him. "What do you think, Carue? Should I step out?" he whispered, squatting down with the doorway to his right. He wasn't so very sure he felt up to seeing the others when he was still certain he was upset.

The little duck was not amused.

"Hey, Usopp! Don't go in the other room!" Luffy called loudly.

"Idiot! If you tell him not to, he'll know something's up!" Nami's voice was followed by a smack and Usopp cringed, feeling Luffy's pain.

But, wait... Something's up? Don't go in the other room? Compelled by the spirit of the natural curiosity promoted by anyone telling him not to do something, Usopp crept forward with his eyes on the black door that would hopefully still lead to a little bedroom-bathroom combination, and not hell. As a last minute thing, he scooped up Carue to take with him for whatever protective purposes a baby duck could serve.

Carue quacked loudly in protest, flailing and flapping, but Usopp held him tightly. If there was something scary in there, he decided, he would just close the door right back and the duck would be none the worse for wear. Yeah. And he would be safe, too.

Shaking like a leaf, Usopp stepped up to the door holding Carue under his left arm. He reached out and missed the knob on his first attempt, but he got a shaky grip on it at his second attempt. He swallowed loudly and turned the knob with less than productive wobbling. It took a few seconds longer than it maybe should have, but when the door opened, Usopp used it and the little duck as a shield and peered into the room cautiously. And then he blanched.

"Hey, I said don't go in the other room! Chopper, I think his ears are broken!" Luffy's voice was right behind him and then somebody was pulling on his ears, but he couldn't even pretend to care. Inside the little bedroom on the clunky table that had been in the main room was a short, round birthday cake iced yellow with two thin candles implanted in the middle. Around the table were six boxes all wrapped in shabby-looking gift paper.

"What..." He tried to finish the thought, but it wasn't coming to him. Somehow, he'd dropped Carue and stumbled forward because he was directly in front of the cake and staring down at it. "Whose cake is th- Wait a damn minute!" Usopp whirled on his friends, thoughts returning to him in a heap. "You got me! You got me! the Great Usopp-sama has been gotten by his underlings!" he shouted, waving an accusing finger at them all.

Vivi and Chopper looked apologetic while Luffy beamed, Sanji laughed, Nami pretended to inspect her nails with a smirk and Zoro raised an eyebrow as if to say, "You're just now getting that?"

"That was the meanest thing ever! I thought you guys were gonna disown me as a friend! You're the worst!" Usopp ranted, making a show of being angry, all the while inching closer to the cake so he could rake a finger through the icing.

"Happy April birthday Fool!"

"Uhh... Luffy, that's not actually a thing..."

Did that come together? Yes? No? Usopp? Okay. I thought it was pretty bad, but I like Usopp and I like Carue and he was missing in Foster! D: I don't know where he went! So, I gave him a leading role so that he doesn't run into my room and peck me to death in my sleep. Also, I thought it was amusing to have Usopp interacting with someone who couldn't speak. He has quite a lot of imagination. Don't get down on yourself Usopp, everybody loves ya~ ;D

Review if you liked it, review if you think I suck a**, review if Usopp's mystery nose makes you laugh, review even if you don't give a damn. Because I like reviews. And so does Carue. Bewarethesleeping-eyepecker.