Pirate Lessons (written for jubin; no pairings; characters are Luffy+Shanks; prompt is "sniper"; no spoilers)

Wahooooo! Shanks taught me a joke today: Sniper? I barely know her!

I'm not really sure what it means but everyone laughed real hard when he told it at the bar so it must be really funny. A real pirate joke! I can't wait 'till I'm a pirate so's I can use it. I told it to Makino an' she laughed but Mayor said it was disgraceful for a boy to be carrying on like a seadog. The Mayor is so funny!

I asked Shanks if he'd take me with him on his next trip. He said no. Whatever - I'll show him! I'm gonna be just like him! I'm gonna have a hundred people in my crew and we're gonna have a huge ship and have parties all the time! I'm gonna find the One Piece and that'll make me the PIRATE KING! And everyone's gonna wanna be my friend. Then me an' Shanks will put our crews together and we'll have one big awesome crew and me an' Shanks will have lots of cool adventures. An' when he's in trouble 'cause another pirate's making him walk the plank, I'll jump in and save him and he'll say "Thanks, Luffy, you're a real lifesaver" and I'll say "Saver? I barely know her!" and everyone will laugh and it'll be so cool.

Me an' Shanks are gonna be the best pirates ever.

Maybe Makino can come and make us lunch.

I asked Shanks what do I need to make a pirate crew and he said this is what you need:

A first mate. That's Ben. He is the guy who always takes the captain's side in a fight. I asked why would a pirate crew fight if everyone is friends but Shanks said you just need one.

A navigator. I dunno who is Shanks's navigator but he is the person who tells you where you are going.

A doctor. In case you get sick but I never get sick so I don't think I'll need one.

A cook. Makino said being a pirate cook sounded like fun but she'd rather stay here in Fuchsia so I gotta find someone else.

A sniper. That's Yasopp. He can shoot things from really far away. He is soooo funny but sometimes he's real boring. Like when he drinks a lot of beer and starts telling stories about his son who is the same age as me. Like when I do something bad he always says his son is the best son ever and he's so smart and so brave and so good at fixing stuff that's broke and hoooooow much he misses him and he wants to see his son again and it's so boring! I asked him why is he a pirate then and he said I wouldn't get it and I said yes I would and he said he loves his son but you can't help going out to sea.

I didn't get it so I asked Shanks how come he made Yasopp join his crew if Yasopp had a wife and a son the same age as me.

Shanks said he didn't make Yasopp do nothin' 'cause you can't make anyone do nothin' they don't want in that case

an' I said why did Yasopp want to leave his son if he loves him soooo much

an' he said sometimes there are things you want but not the way you want to go to the circus or eat ice cream before dinner, an' you gotta do them no matter what, even if you love your son a whole lot

an' I said doesn't his son feel sad 'cause i'd be real sad if Ace left me alone

an' he said Yasopp's son is the son of a pirate! An' his wife is the wife of a pirate! They understand exactly how Yasopp feels and if they don't then there is just no helping some people

an' I said I don't get it

an' he said listen, Luffy, what's something you wanna do more than anything

an' I said I'm gonna be the Pirate King!

an' he said how're you gonna do that

an' I said I'm gonna sail around the world an' find the One Piece

an' he said but you gotta leave the village to do that, right? But you love everybody here, right?

an' I said maybe Makino can come

but he said what if she can't

an' I said maybe the Mayor can come

but he said what if he can't

an' I said in a real small voice maybe Ace can come

but he said what if he can't

an' I didn't know what to say.

Shanks said if no one could go with you would you still want to be the Pirate King?

I thought about it real hard and I said yes because I wanted to be the Pirate King no matter what, even if I had to go alone.

Shanks said then stop picking on my sniper and then he pointed at my shirt and said hey what's that and I looked down 'cause I thought there was a stain and he flipped his finger and hit me in the nose! He yelled hey everyone! Luffy here thinks he can be a pirate but he still falls for cheap tricks like this! An' everyone laughed at me and Makino had to bring me a glass of juice or else I woulda beat Shanks up right then'n there!

That was last week. This week I ate a devil fruit so now I can stretch my arms like a rubber band and I got kidnapped by bandits and thrown into the ocean and a Seaking almost ate me but Shanks saved me and the Seaking ate his arm and today he and Ben and Yasopp and Lucky Roux and everyone sailed away.

Shanks gave me his hat, but he didn't take me with him.

I cried a lot.

But he tol' me to keep his hat safe so I am and Makino says we'll definitely meet again so we will and Ace says this just means I gotta get stronger so's I can meet him on the ocean someday so I'm gonna. I'm gonna be just like Shanks!

Here is something else Shanks said to me: he said, you know, Luffy, pirates never travel alone. The best pirates are always part of a crew, 'cause otherwise it's no fun. An' the very best pirates are the ones who can recognize when someone's just gotta go out to sea no matter what.

So it'll be okay if Makino and Mayor and Ace can't come with me 'cause I won't be alone. I've got Hat now and there are lots of friends waiting for me somewhere and we're gonna have lots of adventures and parties all the time and when they're in trouble I'll jump in an' save them and when I'm in trouble they'll jump in an' save me

an' it's gonna be so cool.

--End--
notes: This was the hardest to write - it was difficult finding the right POV and the right group of characters. At first I was going to do an exchange between Luffy and Usopp with Shanks in absentia, and then a Luffy-Shanks-Yasopp combo about Usopp, and then Luffy and Shanks meeting up in the future...but none of those felt right. But I remembered I've wanted to do a Luffy 1st person POV for a while, and also that I wanted to explore a possible fear of being alone - so this was a first result. It came out pretty well. I'm glad the feeling remained fairly upbeat; for such a cheerful guy, Luffy gets thrown into a lot of angsty situations in my fics OO Also, jubin might have wanted a Shanks/Luffy pairing but I took the easy way out and interpreted it as genfic XD