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The third most common question posed to eighteen-year-old Ensign Floran Coby is, "How the hell do you handle Garp so well?"

(First most common question is, "is your hair seriously naturally pink?" Second most common question is, "no, really, isn't that kind of a sissy color?"

People who survived asking the first and second most common questions usually weren't in any shape to be asking the third.)

Monkey D. Garp, vice-admiral of the Marines and current mentor to their newest little hand-to-hand prodigy, is generally acknowledged by all who've personally met him for more than five minutes to be a difficult, not very intelligent, obnoxiously boisterous, monstrously strong, impulsive, hot-headed, eccentric, gluttonous, and forceful man by all means.

When there is a problem he considers petty, he prefers to resolve things in his favor- with his Fist of Justice (and agonizing pain).

Really, learning under him is downright nostalgic for Sakura.

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Many of those terms used to describe Garp fit Tsunade as well- so long as you flip 'not very intelligent' to 'doesn't know when to quit at gambling,' 'obnoxiously boisterous' to 'frequently drunk at inappropriate times,' and 'gluttonous' to 'a very worrying alcohol problem' -, and her 'handling' of him has been learned from her experience with corralling her former mentor.

It's quite easy, once she boiled it down to scenarios and solutions.

If he falls asleep in the middle of something? For not urgent cases, Sakura moves him out of the way, briefs him what happened when he wakes up, and in between, tries to either stand-in for him or find a stand-in. For urgent cases, she tries to wake him up as fast as possible, which may or may not include the faintly ridiculous (but undeniably effective) method of waving a donut under his nose.

If he isn't the mood to hear any excuses or explanations (which he will interpret as excuses)? Get the hell out of the way, warn others to flee if time allows, and either wait for him to cool down and come to terms with his own brand of screwy logic, or bravely make the sacrifice of weathering his punch(-es, depending on how angry he is about the subject).

If he wants to burst through walls 'to look cooler' and order his subordinates to repair the damage? Bow to the inevitability of his whims persisting, apologize to the owner of the broken walls, and take the compensation out of his paycheck.

If he goes off on another rant about his no-good ungrateful grandsons frolicking off to be pirates instead of respectable Marines? Let him complain, nod encouragingly while looking attentive, and make occasional sympathetic noises.

Also, in her personal case, the last scenario often included weathering a 'playful' punch to the shoulder as Garp went on to declare some variant of, "Coby, m'boy, you're the fine Marine grandson I never had! Bwahahahaha! Now get me another rice cracker, and gimme a hundred more push-ups!"

(Very carefully, she avoids ever telling him that she only became a Marine because the other option was this world's version of being rogue or missing nin.

Oh. And nobody really liked bounty hunters back in the Elemental Nations. They made enemies by the bushel and allies by the blue moon.

In comparison, a government-backed law-keeping force sounded pretty much the closest thing they seemed to have for ninja.)

Sakura has never been so fervently grateful to have unlocked this chakra-replacement "Armament Haki" before she got transferred to Garp as his unofficial protege. She's fairly certain she would've suffered grievous brain damage by now from his skull-punches, and grievous bodily damage from his other punches.

Bogard holds her impressed respect as well, as Shizune's counterpart to Tsunade's Garp; 27 years as his right hand, and not have keeled over from stress by now?

Her own composure is only this steady and unruffled from another lifetime of high-tension warfare, and having literally died and gotten better.

Still, there are far worse people to serve under than pseudo-Tsunade.

Like Sakazuki, who always gave her a distinct pseudo-Danzo vibe.

Or, no, that's not really accurate.

A psuedo-A, the Fourth Raikage, going off of what Tsunade had often let slip in her drunken complaining sessions?

She mulls over this pleasantly amusing game of trying to match up people 'Haruno Sakura' knew with people 'Floran Coby' know, as she walked towards the gangplank to greet the new chore boy they'd come to pick up from the 153rd Branch. Helmeppo, is it?

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"How the hell do you handle Garp so well?" yet another Marine exclaims in disbelief, after watching "Bone-Breaker" Floran calmly convince Garp "The Fist" to visit the island's donut shop, and leave the 'boring, fiddly paperwork stuff to us.'

The pink-haired teenager, and one of the youngest Ensigns yet, just straightened his clipboard and smiled fondly. "I don't; we don't, as his crew. We work around him, and he gives us things to work around. It works. In fact, he reminds me a lot of my old mentor- who would bash in your head and then shatter apart a few mountains if you ever implied she was getting older or weaker."

'There's another monster like Garp out there!?' the questioner mentally sweat-dropped.

"Now," Floran added briskly, smile growing sharper, "if we can move onto the shipment of seastone we came here to load up on?"

A shiver involuntarily ran down the other's spine. It was a perfectly sweet smile, calm and collected, that nevertheless caused intense discomfort and a sense of approaching doom for those on the receiving end.

(For some reason he couldn't quite pin down, he was reminded of the smiles given by any medical professional when faced with a commonly unruly patient stubbornly refusing treatment or rest.)

He quickly lead the way to the warehouse, and breathed a sigh of relief once the vice admiral's ship departed their port.

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Sakura!Coby Part 3:

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