Christ, another replacement chapter? Really? Sorry, I really underestimated how long this would take to fix.

Lovino shrugged at his father "This is Antonio, Long story short, my crew mutinied, they left me on an island and then that bastard showed up, lost my fishing hook, disappeared for a while, came back and now we're acquaintances" he stated, not wanting to say they were friends seeing as he knew virtually nothing about Antonio apart from the fact he liked tomatoes.

His father didn't look particularly impressed "So he nearly had you starve to death and abandoned you?" he asked incredulously, Lovino rolled his eyes, this was Romulus' way of vetting Lovino and his brother's friends.

"He came back" he retorted sharply because he was tired,

"shh, no, I want him to answer!" Romulus replied curtly, glaring at Antonio who was feverishly rubbing his arm where Romulus had pulled the two apart.

"Huh, what? I wasn't listening" Antonio smiled absent mindedly. Lovino felt like telling him that there was no use being good natured, his father was not side tracked by a nice smile (not that Antonio had a nice smile, he had a shitty smile that did not make Lovino want to return it in the least!)

Romulus scowled and turned to Lovino "And he is your last loyal man?" he grumbled, he turned back to Antonio "you lost my first born's only way of catching food and then disappeared and left him?"

"um...yes..." Antonio replied.

Romulus' scowl had been bad before, but now he looked murderous "right then, throw him over board" he ordered.

Lovino was about to step in because they'd just gone through this shit on Arthur's stupid ship when Antonio suddenly grew a back bone.

"That wasn't my fault, get all the facts before you condemn me" Antonio snarled, Lovino and Romulus froze for a few moments

"I can see why you keep him" Romulus murmured before striding off.

Lovino looked back at Antonio who now seemed back to his cheerful self, Lovino frowned.


"What in the fuck is wrong with you!" Lovino shrieked,

Antonio shrugged "Who knows" he smiled, it looked as though he was safe for the time being. Lovino ran a hand through his hair in exasperation before stalking away, Antonio didn't want to be left on his own so he followed him below decks.

Lovino stopped at the bottom of the stairs and glared at him "Stop following me, I'm getting into some decent clothes!"

"But I don't want to be on my own!" Antonio wailed. Lovino simply raised his middle finger and stormed below decks. Antonio just stood there, bereft of the only friendly and familiar face on the entire ship.

"Are you alright?" asked a voice that didn't sound homicidal, and that was good enough for Antonio for the time being. Antonio turned and saw a short-ish man with blonde hair and a beard.

"No I am not, amigo" he sighed, sitting down.

"Boyfriend trouble?"

"What?"

"Nothing, My name's Francis, and you?"

"Antonio" Antonio replied.

The Frenchman nodded "Don't mind Lovino, he's always had a temper"

Antonio nodded vigorously "But he's so cute too" he stated adamantly. Francis grinned

"Definitely." he murmured

"Definitely what?"

Francis just smiled cryptically "Do you want some lunch?"

Okay, so maybe Lovino had been a little harsh with Antonio, he could have waited outside his father's quarters while he got dressed. And hell, what would that idiot do on his own? And he dressed so weirdly, he could be killed in the time it took for Lovino to get dressed. He was dressed and ready to run off to see if Antonio was okay...and then he caught sight of himself in the mirror. His hair was all over the place, his clothes didn't match and for some reason that didn't bother him. But he knew that it should do, and he couldn't hear any sounds of distress, so he got changed (more quickly than he had ever done so before) and charged back above decks.

Only Antonio wasn't there. Lovino grabbed a passing arm, "Have you seen an idiot?" he asked the startled looking sailor.

The sailor nodded "The one with the brown hair who yelled at the captain?" he asked

"That'll be the one" Lovino replied.

"In the galley with Francis"

For fucks sake, he can't have been gone more than ten minutes! And Francis was fucking scary, how was he supposed to save Antonio from whatever mess he'd gotten himself into.

Francis was better than not homicidal, Francis was actually a lot of fun. Antonio knew that pirate ships wouldn't have had much in the way of edible food. And Francis had lamented the lack of decent food because what was he supposed to achieve with 'A block of solid meat so heavily salted the sea would send it back' and 'I'm not even sure what that is but something is moving inside it!'

Antonio, having worked by giving children's tours of a museum couldn't help blurting out "Oh well, it's extra protein" which used to be a part of the tour. Francis slapped his arm and laughed

"That's a nice way of thinking about it" he grimaced.

And then a wooden spoon hit Francis in the back of the head. Francis wasn't affected but he pulled a face and turned around. "Ow" he exclaimed.

Lovino appeared, Antonio peered around at him. "Don't you kill him!" Lovino shouted.

"Why would I do that?"

Lovino seemed to finally register what was going on "You really weren't going to kill him" he said, sounding relieved.

"Are you okay, Lovi?" Antonio asked.

Lovino ran a hand through his hair and groaned "I'm fine, you've just been nearly killed so often lately that I assumed, you bastard." His face was bright red and he looked very embarrassed. Antonio fought the urge to comment on it, but he was robbed of his chance to fail dismally when Lovino left.

Francis rubbed the back of his head and then drew his hand away looking appalled, his hands were gummed up with a thick paste. "That spoon was in the porridge" Francis moaned mournfully.


Lovino had never been quite that mortified before, He was terrified of Francis and he'd thought he'd been quite proud of himself for going to protect his acquaintance (He still wasn't going in for the friend thing yet) and then it had turned out that Francis was only giving Antonio food. So he'd stormed back on deck and pretended that nothing had happened. When he'd slammed the doors the rest of the crew had looked alarmed as most of them weren't yet used to Lovino's antics.

Lovino perched himself on the gunwales of the ship and placed his hands over his burning face, blushing, fantastic. He was embarrassed and red and dammit Antonio was bothering him in more ways than one, firstly, Lovino worried that he was actually beginning to consider Antonio a friend. Secondly He had no idea how much Antonio knew about his childhood but it was enough to put him on edge. He started to gnaw on his fingernails, a habit he had managed to steer clear of until now. He sensed a presence long before his father spoke "That's a filthy habit, Lovino, " he smiled.

Lovino scowled and shifted, but still took his fingers away from his mouth. Romulus had always been perceptive when it came to his children so it wasn't surprising when he noticed that Lovino wasn't really himself. "What's wrong?" he asked sternly

"I think Antonio knows" Lovino replied, Romulus' face froze,

"I think we might need to go to my quarters."


Francis was frantically clawing the porridge out of his hair, Antonio grinned at him.

"Stop smiling, this stuff is disgusting!" Francis exclaimed.

"You cooked it" Antonio replied with a smug look on his face.

Francis looked appalled and wrinkled his nose "I did not cook that, even with the worst ingredients in the world I could never cook that" He retorted, sounding ridiculously offended at the assumption that he had cooked the porridge.

"Who did?" Antonio asked. At which point the door was kicked open by a man with white hair and red eyes.

"Hi Francis, wow, what happened to your hair?" smirked the man. And then Francis launched himself at him.

"You and your stupid porridge! Do you have any idea how hard that stuff is to get out of hair? DO YOU!" he cried as he tackled the other to the floor flamboyantly (Antonio had never seen a flamboyant rugby tackle before, he hadn't ever known it was possible but apparently Francis could).

"What the hell did my porridge do?" He laughed loudly, as he managed to push his friend away.

"The Captain's son threw some at me!" Francis exclaimed indignantly. The other man pulled a face

"What did you do?" he chuckled, casually giving Francis a friendly dead arm.

Francis pulled a face "Stole something from him" The white haired man gave him a questioning glance.

"What did you take from him?" asked Antonio, trying to keep his voice under control because he didn't like to think that his new friend was upsetting Lovino. He'd never really liked people who were cruel to others, especially not others who he happened to like.

Francis looked at him "Nothing that can't be returned," He replied simply before turning back to the other man "This is Antonio, he came here with Lovino, Antonio, this is-"

The other man elbowed Francis out of the way "And I am Gilbert Bielschmidt, most awesome man on the seven seas!" he announced proudly. It seemed like Gilbert was the sort of person to go in for a high five or something like that. So Antonio held his hand up, Gilbert looked confused and at that point Antonio remembered what had happened when he tried to give Lovino a high five, so he decided to abandon all hope of ever giving anyone a high five ever again.

Francis rolled his eyes "You are not the most awesome man on the seven seas, you even told me that my cousin Ma-" He didn't finish his sentence, Gilbert slammed a hand over his mouth and glared at him

"I said he was the most awesome on the land, if I ever stepped foot on the land then I'd be the most awesome on the land" Gilbert said urgently

"Still nicer than anything you've ever said to me" Francis muttered.


Romulus and Lovino entered the captain's quarters, Romulus took his seat behind his desk "You think he knows?" Romulus asked as Lovino sat opposite him.

"I know he does" Lovino replied bluntly, Romulus groaned and leaned back in his chair slightly.

"How much?"

"Enough to know about my dreams"

Romulus nodded slowly and frowned, "And you're sure you don't want him thrown over board?"

"Yes. He's a bastard but I'm pretty sure he won't say anything"

Romulus gave a rare scowl which made him look uncannily like the son which was sat in front of him. "I thought you'd only told Feliciano, your Mother and Me about those dreams" He said, concern lacing his words.

"So did I"


As it turned out, Francis and Gilbert were actually very nice people. Antonio had only spent about two hours in their company and already he had become firm friends with them. He'd learned that Francis was a very good cook, a very good flirt and an average gunner, He'd also learned that Gilbert was an awesome everything...though Francis said that Gilbert's flirting prowess was extremely exaggerated. Gilbert was in the middle of regaling them with a story about his awesome childhood running around the woods with 'A girly boy' and 'A boy-ee girl' When Lovino entered the area followed by his father. Romulus nudged Lovino's shoulder and Lovino pulled a face, Romulus nudged his shoulder again and Lovino groaned "I'm very sorry for messing up your bastardy fucking hair" he spat sarcastically.

"Close enough" muttered Francis and Romulus in unison.

Lovino stalked back above deck.

The trio were about to start their conversation again, but Romulus stopped them. "Antonio, I want a word with you"