An: This will be a Sabo chapter. Unlike the last two Sabo chapters, this one takes place at the same time as Luffy's adventure. If you think I own One Piece, then I'm flattered but at the same time wondering which psychiatrist I should call.

*** Undisclosed location

The bounty hunter Alaric planned his latest ambush for Top Hat Sabo. He had tried several times to kill the famous pirate but failed.

He had been stalking Sabo for almost the whole day, but his first mate Pacha and his second mate Chin had stuck with him all day.

Finally Sabo was alone, in an alleyway. Alaric snuck up behind him and transformed into his Cerberus form immediately. He pounced at Sabo, all three heads snapping at Sabo's one. Each head was big enough to devour Sabo whole. The middle mouth came down upon Sabo's head, intent on tearing it off.

Instead of Sabo's head coming off, it was instead Alaric's teeth which broke.

'God Damn it! It's that Haki stuff that some people try, how is his so strong?' he thought.

Alaric yelped in pain. Sabo spun around, swinging his sword as his arm stretched. Because of his rubber body, the sword almost hit Alaric in the middle head. Alaric moved backwards quickly, enabling his dark purpley black aura of hell.

"Bite of Hell!" Alaric yelled/roared. The Cerberus seemed to grow in size. His eyes turned blood red. His muscles started to bulge more than they did before. His dark aura encompassed the entire alleyway, it had been a bright alley when they arrived, but now it was almost pitch black, with what little light there was being tinted purple.

Alaric looked truly sinister. His aura would have frozen a lesser man in place, but Sabo was not a 'lesser man'. In fact he was a much greater man.

Sabo leapt up, and yelled, "Gear Second!"

Sabo moved fast, but Alaric moved faster. Not even in Gear 2 was Luffy fast enough to avoid all of the hits. He was bleeding heavily from his right shoulder and his left knee was all but busted.

Sabo took a deep breath and used his newly developed move.

"Jet Soru!" Sabo literally vanished. The only way to locate him would be to mathematically calculate his location relative to the huge spurts of wind that were being raised by Sabo's speedy movement (that or observation Haki). He was moving at at-least 6-7 hundred km/h.

He slammed his fist into Alaric's middle jaw.

"Jet Pistol!" Not to mention, his hand was already armament-coated… ouch!

Alaric's aura immediately faded, and he went flying into the nearest wall. He transformed into his human form, with a broken jaw, that would probably have been more severe if he didn't have such a strong skin and bone when he was a Cerberus.

Sabo halted his gear second. He was still red in the face, panting a little.

"I wi' kill yu wan dei!" said Alaric, attempting to speak properly through his broken mouth.

Sabo looked at him, "Join my crew."

"Why would I do that?"

"I like you, so join my crew."

"Even after all the times I've tried to kill you?"

"Yes."

"… I want to, but I'm honour-bond to keep fighting you or accept that I have been bettered."

Sabo's face turned a little harder, "Then accept it. There's no shame in being weaker than your captain."

"You are not my captain!"

*** Next Day

"Commence Operation: Assassinate Top-Hat-394." Said Alaric under his breath.

Sabo walked into the clearing in the forest, on a morning jog. He was wearing a white sleeve-less vest that was drenched with sweat. He was jogging while holding up a 5-tonne boulder, which's original weight had been 200 kilos but had been increased, courtesy of Pacha (Happy to help, captain).

Alaric knew he would be tired and holding a huge boulder would slow down his response reflexes. He had 20 gunmen whom he had hired with the bounty of the 200 million pirate, Black Bat Langstrom. His gunmen were the best. Each of them were being paid 20-mil for the job.

As Sabo slowly jogged through the large clearing, 20 bullets came towards his head, each at a different position, 1 through the nape of his neck, 2 through his brain, 2 aiming for each eye, 4 going for his open panting mouth, 1 for each nostril, 2 for each ear, another 2 for his throat, and finally 4 aimed at different points of his hairline.

In a split-second, Sabo had dropped the rock and spun around, using observation Haki to locate and catch the bullets. After that several more bullets aimed for him, which he deflected off of himself by using his armament Haki.

Sabo sent out a concentrated pulse of Conqueror's Haki, as strong as he could (pretty considerable) attempting to knock out the gunmen before he had to fight them hand-to-hand.

Several men fell out of the tall trees. They were all huge, each one at least 7 feet tall, towering above Sabo. Their muscles bulged, and they were all wearing metal armour and a black mask with a sniper's scope attached to their right eye.

Despite Sabo's immense conqueror's haki, they were all still conscious, though they had fallen to their knees.

Not wanting the fight to last long, Sabo activated gear 2nd and immediately went for the big guns (gatling pun!).

"Jet Gatling!" Sabo yelled, his fists moving so fast that they couldn't be seen without haki. The hitmen who had already gotten back to their feet, jumped out of the way of the fists. A few of the more unlucky ones were knocked out cold, the speeding fist breaking the armour of the hitmen. The remaining hitmen pulled out their swords and charged Sabo.

"Gear 3rd!" Sabo inflated his arm and armament coated it. All of the swords clanged against the armament-enforced gigantic arm uselessly.

"Gigant Pistol!" The huge fist sent the hitmen flying. Sabo's arm de-inflated back to normal. Sabo fell to his knees panting, while this would not even have been a little troubling when he was at full power, he had already jogged over 70 kilometres with a 5-tonne boulder on his back, so he had a right to be tired.

As Alaric crept up behind Sabo, with a sword in both hands and a grin on his face, Sabo's observation haki was activated.

'What the hell, another attack.' Thought Sabo.

Despite his extreme exhaustion, Sabo stood and whirled around driving his fist into Alaric's jaw, sending him flying backwards, both swords clanging out of his hands.

Alaric got up, unsteadily, his vision still spinning.

'How did he know I was coming? In fact how does he always seem to protect himself?' thought Alaric as he transformed into his Cerberus form.

The giant Cerberus slammed his paw down onto Sabo's head but Sabo gripped it with an inflated hand, and broke it.

Alaric let loose a yell of agony and transformed back to his human form.

"God Damn it! Why can't I beat you?!"

"You can't beat me because you aren't strong enough." Said Sabo amicably, as if that was a fact of life.

"That doesn't explain how always know when I'm attacking and how you make your body hard enough to break my bones!?"

"Oh that, that's Haki."

"This is Haki!" said Alaric in disbelief.

He had heard of the mystical power of will that was possessed by the strong new-world pirates. He had never thought that he would witness it in his life in the first half of the Grand Line.

"Yup."

"But… how… This is the first half!?"

"I'm just getting a head-start, besides what do you think got me a bounty of 450,000,000 beli. The World Government doesn't just hand out bounties that high to nobody."

"But…But…But…"

"Join my crew!"

"Why do you always say that!?"

"Uh… Because I want you on my crew. The level of determination you have is astounding, you kinda remind me of my brothers."

"Very well then…"

"Huh?"

"I accept the invitation, captain Top-Hat."

"Call me Sabo."

*** Marine Epithet Department

"Top-Hat had recruited the infamous Paradise bounty hunter, Alaric. It is up to us to give Alaric a scary epithet that will make the public fear him as much as he needs to be feared. Let us commence our brain-storming session."

"How about triple-tongued, cuz he had three heads when he is in Cerberus form?"

"Nah, some 9 mil idiot up in Shabondy took it, don't you remember? It was just last week."

"I was on leave last month."

"Oh, well it's taken."

"Anyway, I was going to suggest Black-Puppy Alaric."

"Ummmmmmmm."

"Kiss-Me-Puppy Alaric?"

"Really?"

"Of course!"

"Foo Foo Cuddly Poo Alaric?"

"This is getting really old, Johnston." Commented the Head of Department dryly.

"The transcript readers are getting bored with the repetitive pattern that our meeting always take."

"There are transcript readers?"

"Didn't you know? All of our transcripts are published onto the snail-net via the computer snail."

"Oh."

*** Sabo's ship, the Top Pride

"You have a bounty already Alaric."

"Really?"

"Yup."

"What is it, I've always wondered what my bounty would be."

"Guardian of hell Alaric, 367 million beli."

"Cool."

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