Luffy's day had gone from bad to worse. First, he was woken up with a 'Fist of Love' from his grampa before the sun was even up, and then he was forced to 'train' so he could 'become an upstanding marine' until breakfast before even more training until lunch. It didn't matter how many times he told gramps he was going to be the king of the pirates – gramps would just hit him and tell him he was going to become a marine before making the training harder.

He was exhausted. Gramps had left him to eat, and said he'd be back to train him more when he was done. Luffy wanted to run but was too exhausted and knew Gramps would find him and just make training even harder.

Finishing the last of his food, he flopped onto his back to rest as much as he could. Staring up at the sky, he frowned when he saw smoke. Lots of smoke. The last time he'd seen that much smoke, the Gray Terminal had been burned by the nobles.

Sitting up quickly, Luffy's heart skipped a beat when he realized the smoke was coming from the opposite side of the island from the Gray Terminal. It was coming from Windmill Village.

Ignoring his exhaustion, Luffy ran towards the small village he'd grown up in. The closer he got, the more smoke there was, and the hotter it got. Coughing, he squinted through the smoke to see in front of him. He was nearing the village when he was forced to stop as the edge of the forest was on fire. Spinning sharply on his heel, Luffy ran to the left to try and find an opening he could get through.

The smoke was stinging his eyes and making it harder to breathe. He wished Ace were with him, but his big brother had left half a year ago to become a pirate. Gramps had been so mad. His training had been worse than ever when he'd found out Ace was gone.

Pushing his brother from his mind, Luffy saw a small opening in the flaming trees and didn't hesitate to throw himself through it. The heat was almost unbearable, but he didn't care. He needed to make sure Makino and the other villagers were alright.

Stumbling when the smoke was too bad to keep his eyes open, Luffy tumbled and bounced the rest of the way out of the forest, coughing as the smoke cleared a little. Rubbing his watering eyes, Luffy squinted before his eyes flew open, the stinging forgotten as he laid his eyes on Windmill Village.

Building were destroyed, and pools of magma littered the ground. The smell of burning flesh reminded Luffy of the Gray Terminal fire, and his eyes watered at the thought of the villagers burning to death. Clenching his teeth, he forced himself up and half ran half stumbled closer to the village. "Makino!" His voice was horse from breathing in the smoke and all the coughing he'd done. "Makino!" He had to find her. He had to make sure she was okay.

"Makino!" He couldn't find anyone. The corpses he saw were too disfigured to be identified. Swallowing down the fear that one of those burnt corpses was Makino, Luffy kept going. The village was small. With most the buildings destroyed, there weren't many places to search. He rounded a corner and froze when he saw what used to be Makino's bar. Now there was nothing left. Only bits and pieces of rubble, still smoking as the magma cooled. This was where he'd been raised. This was where he'd met Shanks. This was where he'd run to hide from his grampa. This was as close to home as Luffy knew, and now it was gone. Destroyed.

When Luffy found whoever did this, they were going to pay. First though, he needed to find Makino and make sure she was alright. Wiping the tears from his eyes, he balled his hands into fists and turned around. The last place to look was the harbor. Making sure his hat was secured on his head, Luffy marched towards the docks. He sped up as he heard voices, hope rising. He made it to the top of the small hill and relief washed over him as he saw Makino and most the other villagers at the bottom. His relief soon turned to a white-hot anger when he saw they were all chained together, a Celestial Dragon standing in front of them, waving a gun around.

"MAKINO!" He watched her head jerk around to stare at him along with everyone else's.

"LUFFY! RUN!" Luffy didn't want to run. He wanted to make these bastards pay for destroying his home and hurting the people he loved. "PLEASE!" Tears were in Makino's eyes, and Luffy felt angrier than ever when the bubble headed bastard hit her. He took a step forward before a hand landed roughly on his shoulder and he was thrown back.

"Get out of here brat!" His eyes widened.

"Dadan? What are you-"

"It doesn't matter! Get out of here! If the marines catch you, they'll either kill you or you'll become a slave!"

Luffy's stomach tightened. "But Makino-"

"There's nothing you can do!" Dadan turned and fixed him with a glare, kicking him towards the burning forest. "Get out of here, now!" He opened his mouth to argue, only for the words to get caught in his throat when a gun went off. He stared as Dadan fell to her knees, blood dripping from her mouth. "R-Run Luffy. Go!"

"I can't leave you here!" Luffy ignored the tears running down his cheeks.

Dadan struggled to her feet before grabbing the front of Luffy's shirt and throwing him as hard as she could towards the burning forest. He hit the ground hard and bounced twice before skidding to a stop. Jumping to his feet, he watched, horrified, as Dadan and the rest of the bandits were swallowed by a wave of magma.

Luffy was rooted to the spot as a large man in a red shirt and white marine coat stopped in front of the spot Dadan and the others had once stood, a look of distain on his face. Luffy shivered when the man looked at him. His heart was pounding, and he knew he should run, but his legs wouldn't listen. Hearing a branch snap behind him, he whirled around. For the first time, Luffy was happy to see his grampa.

"Grampa! You have to help Maki-" He never got to finish, as his grampa's fist collided with his stomach so hard he was sent flying all the way back into the rubble of one of the destroyed buildings. His head was spinning and Luffy felt like throwing up everything he'd eaten. He coughed and tried to sit up, wondering what was going on. Gramps had never hit him that hard before. He struggled onto his knees, looking up when a shadow fell across him. Luffy shivered. His grampa had never looked as scary as he did right then.

There was none of the normal warmth in his grampa's face, and his eyes were as cold as steel. "I don't have any grandchildren." Luffy swallowed, feeling as though someone had just dumped him into a freezing cold lake. He didn't notice the cuffs in his grampa's hand until one clicked around his left wrist and all his energy was sapped from his body. He didn't understand what was going on. Just earlier his grampa had been laughing and smiling at him while he trained him, but now he was acting like he didn't know Luffy as he dragged him over in front of the bubble headed bastard who'd hit Makino.

"A devil fruit user?" The bubble bastard grinned and Luffy shivered. "Take them all to my ship. If they resist, kill them."

Luffy still hurt from the punch he'd gotten earlier and with the weird cuff thing draining his energy, he couldn't fight as he was dragged onto the ship and thrown to the deck with the rest of the villagers. Coughing in pain, he looked up when someone nudged him and smiled weakly at Makino. He struggled to get onto his knees with his hands cuffed behind his back. Makino helped as much as she could and smiled down at him when he slumped against her.

"Are you alright Luffy?"

"These weird cuffs are making me tired." He looked up at the woman who'd raised him and felt rage building up again when he saw the bruise on her cheek. They'd hurt Makino, and they'd killed Dadan and the other bandits. Luffy felt his eyes start to burn as he tried to hold back the tears. He refused to let the bubble bastard see him cry.

"It's going to be okay Luffy."

"Shut up!" Luffy glared at the marine who'd yelled at them. Grampa had always told him that the marines were the good guys, and that he'd protect them. Yet here they were. The marines had killed innocent people, and his grampa hadn't hesitated to hand him over to the bubble bastard who'd shot Dadan. He always told them to call him grandpa, but now he was claiming he didn't have any grandsons. Luffy didn't understand. His head hurt from trying to think about it, and his stomach still hurt from where his grampa had hit him. His throat was burning from the smoke he'd inhaled and from trying to hold back his tears. He hated this.

Glaring up at the old man who refused to look at him, Luffy couldn't contain his rage. "WHY AREN'T YOU DOING ANYTHING?! WHY ARE YOU JUST STANDING THERE?! YOU ALWAYS TOLD ME THE MARINES WERE THE GOOD GUYS! YOU SAID THEY PROTECT INNOCENT PEOPLE!"

"Luffy! Calm down! Please!"

He ignored Makino and struggled to his feet, tears falling. "WERE YOU LYING TO ME?! WAS THIS WHAT YOU WANTED TO TURN ME INTO?! A COWARD WHO STANDS BY AS INNOCENT PEOPLE ARE KILLED AND TAKEN AWAY?! IS YOUR JOB MORE IMPORTANT TO YOU THAN THE PROMISES YOU MADE TO ME?! MORE IMPORTANT THAN YOUR FAMILY?!" Luffy didn't even see the punch coming. He crashed against the side of the boat and the world went dark for a moment.

He blinked up at the figure above him, trying to make everything stop spinning. "I haven't had a family since my wife died. If I did have a grandson, they wouldn't be a weakling like you." Luffy felt his heart shatter. He didn't understand why this was happening. He wanted this to be a bad dream. He wanted to wake up and have everything go back to normal.

He wanted his big brother. He wanted Ace.

He barely heard Makino yelling through the pounding in his ears, but even through his tears he could see the gun that was pointed in her direction. Staggering to his feet, he stumbled forward on unsteady legs and hurled himself at the bubble bastard, sinking his teeth into the arm that held the gun. He refused to let this bastard kill Makino. He'd taken everything else away from him – Luffy wouldn't let him take her too.

The pounding in his ears turned into a dull roar, drowning out all other noise. Someone grabbed him and threw him back, but Luffy wasn't about to give up. He would save Makino. He saw her wide eyes, tears running down her cheeks as she yelled something at him, but he couldn't hear her. Luffy felt pain in his chest. He looked down and stared at the red fist that pulling away from him. He looked back up and watched in what seemed slow motion as the bubble bastard once again took aim and fired just as the pain in his chest exploded into something worse than he'd ever felt before. Black spots danced in front of his rapidly fading vision, and the last thing he saw was Makino's body hit the deck before he fell over the side of the ship and into the ocean below.


So. Yeah.

For anyone wondering about why Garp did what he did...I might explain it in the later chapters, but for now just know he did have his reasons. As for Dadan and the bandits being killed off so fast...it was Akainu. It's one thing for them to go against Bluejam, another entirely to go against an Admiral. And it hurt to kill off Makino, but for the sake of the story it needed to be done. And as for the Celestial Dragon, he was supposed to visit Goa Kingdom again, but wound up in Windmill Village instead and when they didn't show the "proper respect" he decided to make them his slaves and kill anyone who resisted.

Let me know what you thought!