Wishfull-Star: 3

Kae Membrana: Luffy's mom isn't mentioned in the story. There's also no proof that it ONLY happens to Ds. There could be many like him that aren't Ds, hiding away. We will meet some later hehe. I was disappointed in the Bleach final couples, too. I'm not gonna spoil it for others, but I don't like who Ichigo ended up with. Also, in anime, why is shorter hair seen as older? We got Naruto who had his hair get short in the end and then Ichigo's hair got short and boring too. Hopefully Luffy never gets a buzzcut in the end haha.

I'm gonna call poorly done chapters "oopsie" chapters. When there is under my standard 3,000 words. So, enjoy the oopsie chapter.

I did what the manga did and made Ace not accompany them in the desert. That was all anime. which was a good choice, they should have put way more screen time with Ace. Enjoy~

Ace would be spending the night there, and then would leave the next day, returning to his hunt. They had a rowdy dinner, Ace almost face planting in his food when Luffy shoved him so he fell backwards instead of forwards. "Shishishi, Ace has narcolepsy," Luffy said simply.

Chopper was in awe. "And he was on his own once? And he's a big time pirate?!" Luffy nodded. "Wow. Narcolepsy is hard to deal with on your own, even with medication." Luffy bragged his big brother was awesome. When he woke up, he returned to his food, making sure he didn't talk with his mouth full.

They had dessert, and Zoro was irritated that Luffy was going to sleep with Ace on the floor like old times. Both were on the floor with Luffy's leg thrown over his brother's leg, who didn't care about being punched in the face during their sleep. They looked like two kids sprawled out, and not two strong pirates.

He was bummed to say goodbye to his brother so soon, but understood that his search for Blackbeard was very important to him and their crew. He gave him a piece of paper. "What's this?"

"Keep hold of that. If you can't find me in your own ways, use this. It'll guide you to me. Well, everyone, leaving my stupid little brother alone is worrying, so make sure you take good care of him. It was nice meeting all of you." He gave a special smile to Zoro, who barely nodded, nobody else catching it. "Luffy, next time we meet, we'll both be stronger. " The younger one nodded.

"I'll come see your crew some day. Promise!" Luffy called while Ace got on his cool little craft powered by his flames. Ace grinned, saying everyone would love him. "Love you! Be careful, okay?!"

"Love you, too! And you be careful, too! Get your bounty up higher next time we meet!"

"I promise!" Ace zoomed away on his little craft. Luffy was so happy to have seen him, even if it was brief. He put the paper in the tight space between his hat and the red ribbon, making sure it stayed. He bounced back to Zoro. "No more jealous Zoro. Hmmmm, I'll make you not jealous," he said, and dragged Zoro into the storage room, making everyone blush a bit. Vivi was the brightest red about it, and Nami jokingly said she'd heard it once. Zoro was quite vocal.

Once they were back out, Vivi gave them all cloaks with hoods to wear to keep their skin from being burnt. "Heh… but it's already so hot!"

"Actually, it will keep you cooler. It looks like it would be hotter, but it's not." Luffy thought that was amazing, and didn't question it. They rounded the Sandora river, and were getting ready to disembark and head to Yuba, where the leader of the rebellion was. Vivi wanted to negotiate, but Luffy wanted to fight!

They didn't know if anything Vivi said would work, or if the hatred was too deep. Hopefully it would stop. 700,000 people were in the rebellion. A lot of people that could die and kill. "I… we'll find out on our way there just what Crocodile has done to this country. We can stop the senseless violence," she said strongly. "I won't let Baroque Works have their way!" she shouted, balling her fists.

All of them agreed. Vivi was one of them, they all felt that way. Maybe they hadn't said it, but still. Sanji made some lunch boxes for them for crossing the desert. Luffy liked exploring new things, but he'd never liked the heat. So going through an empty dessert seemed like it wouldn't be fun at all.

"Let's go! Upa!" Luffy cheered at the railing as they got closer to the shore to dock. Vivi corrected him. "Yuba!" They dropped off the ship, all wearing long robes and some sort of headdress to cover their heads. Luffy's was just tied around his hat. When they started to leave, a turtle-seal popped up. "Oooh~!" Luffy called in interest, only to flee. "No, come back! Urgh," he mumbled angrily.

Vivi said, "Well, it's a good thing they left. They're usually very violent. He would have attacked one of us." She sounded sympathetic, and Nami smiled. They walked in the back of the ground, close enough that it would be hard to see they were holding hands. Sanji was distracted with arguing with Usopp, and Luffy had his hand tightly held since he wanted to explore and was getting distracted from what they really needed to do.

"Vivi, were those creatures that live in the ocean? They swam pretty far up into the river," Sanji wondered. Vivi and Nami stopped holding hands.

"They're ocean mammals. Ever since the ancient times, the Sandora river has sustained the country. But lately the river has lost the force it once had. Now it's being pushed back by ocean currents. That's why the kung fu dugongs are here. The water they're in is salt water. Unsafe for drinking or growing food."

"Is that why this village dried out?" Zoro asked, rubbing his thumb over Luffy's knuckles, barely noticing picking his hand up to gently kiss the back. Sanji rolled his eyes. Despite how in love with all women he was, he never looked down on Luffy or Zoro for being the complete opposite of him in the preference department.

Vivi shook her head. This village was already dry, they just used water from when it rained. "Up until recently, it was thriving full of greens. Now it's completely dry. In the last three years, not a single drop of rain has fallen," Vivi said sadly. Vivi assured Chopper that the town they'd been in was sustained by the Katorea Oasis. "Even in Alabasta, we survived with little rainfall. But there was one place that always got more rain than others, Alubarna. The city was built around the king's palace. It was called the 'king's miracle'."

But two years ago, the king was blamed to have been using dance powder for the rain, a powder that causes rain to fall, but the powder sucked up all the moisture in the air around it, causing droughts, taking away even the chances for it to rain. The king's home supposedly only had water from the dance powder.

"But it caused a huge war… the loss of life was profound. After that, the World Government outlawed using or creating dance powder. The powder that brings happiness and misery at the same time…" After that, it stopped raining everywhere but the king's city. Of course that looked suspicious.

"You're dad is evil!"

"He was framed," Zoro said patiently before Usopp could yell at him. "No matter how good a ruler is, there will always be those that oppose them, and might do this- take drastic measures, do something terrible." Vivi nodded. She knew that Crocodile's plan had started years ago, with the strange weather. It was when the people first started to be manipulated.

Vivi said, "There was such a huge scandal, and somehow the dance powder ended up in the palace under his nose!"

"Heh, are you sure he's not the bad guy?" Luffy asked, picking his nose absentmindedly. Nami smacked him, yelling at him to trust Vivi's dad like he trusted Vivi.

"No, he's right to be skeptical. The plan is too good. But that is not the truth. My father would never put his beloved people through such pain! He would never let his people starve from no food, die from no water, sparking a war and rebellion that only continued to get worse. It was all Crocodile! He took everything! The rain, the faith, the happiness! He stole the lives away from so many! I WILL NEVER LET HIM GET AWAY WITH THIS!" she cried, becoming very emotional, reasonably so.

Lufy was furious, seeing Vivi's tears. He couldn't help but take off some of his anger by going with Sanji and Usopp and wrecking a nearby building. Luffy walked up to her and said, "Well, we're all here to stop it, right? And kick Crocodile's ass! Let's go. I'm getting anxious."

Zoro mused that he wanted to fight the number agents. Sanji vowed to protect the ladies.

"I will do the best I can!" Chopper said strongly. He latched onto Luffy's back, and Luffy held him on his shoulders. He was still so clingy. Usopp was scared and worried, but didn't protest saving Vivi's country, no matter how much effort it took. How scary any of it must be.

The next day was spent in the agonizing heat, making all of them miserable and sweating inside their clothes. Luffy hated being in the robe, he wanted to cool off, but nothing was cool. Not the air, not the sand, not even the breeze. It was terrible. Chopper was in the worse off right now as he was covered in fur.

Zoro was pulling him behind on a sled. "Zoroooo, let me, too," he complained.

"No, it can't take that much weight. You have to walk like the rest of us." Luffy called him mean and said he wished Ace stuck with them longer. "He was made of fire, it's not like he could cool us down," Zoro said, sounding just fine even in the heat. He was so tough.

Luffy explained, "He would'a distracted me. Mehhhh, I wanna see him again." Sanji commented they sure were close. He sounded wistful about it. "We were always together when we were young, and he'd never thought me drinking human blood was weird. It's hard to explain, but we both helped each other out a lot."

Usopp commented that he wished he had a sibling. "Shishishi, Ace tried to kill me a lot when we first met!" he said in amusement. Some got angry, demanding to know why. "Cause I was annoying and he was really cranky! But Sabo was there, so he kept him from being too mean." Vivi wondered when it changed. "After Sabo was gone. Then we got closer."

Nobody said anything about the loss of his brother. He took a blood bog out of the pouch inside of his robe and drank a small portion.

"How did you get human blood when you lived in the forest?" Chopper asked, voice tried and tongue out from the overwhelming heat.

Luffy had a donors when he wasn't sent blood bags. "You never drank from Ace?" Luffy hadn't. Only other humans. The bandits gave him blood in blood bags if necessary. They were jerks a lot, but kept Luffy alive. In the beginning they'd been freaked out, but then Luffy got really sick without it, like he had before. Then they gave him blood so that didn't happen anymore.

Sanji said, "You sure get lucky with the people you're around. You sure you can't smell good people?" Luffy shrugged. He felt good feelings from good people sometimes. But he was wrong about one. It was frustrating him. When he was asked who it was, he was frustrated with himself saying anything.

He glanced at Vivi, and asked her not to be mad. "Oh… okay," she said slowly. Everyone stopped and Luffy looked down. He said, "Miss All Sunday." Vivi's face hardened, and Nami took her hand to calm her down. "There was also Bon Clay. Two enemies didn't give a bad feeling. It's frustrating. I want to hate Miss All Sunday because of how much pain she's put Vivi through."

Luffy looked up, and apologized to her. "I can't help the feelings, but I don't let them take over my actions. I won't let it block my actions if we ever meet up again," he vowed. She nodded, relaxing. The princess thanked him for being honest.

They were hungry, Luffy especially, as the little amount of blood just wasn't enough, so they stopped at the nearest rock. He had to carry all of the stuff after losing rock-paper-scissors, and it was exhausting. He wished he had super strength with being part monster. If he had to drink blood, he wished he had some pay off! Hopefully it would manifest, right?

"Rocks!" Luffy shouted once some came into view. He zoomed there, dragging the stuff behind him. He put it under the shade, and saw some dead birds on the ground. Ooh, food! Luffy ran at them, but they jerked up, seeing him, and stopped pretending to be dead. "Hey, come back, food! Jerks!" Luffy shouted, trying to catch one with stretched out arm, but the others pecked at his hand painfully.

Usopp asked what he was doing. "There were birds pretending to be dead! How rude. Jeez." Vivi said it was for the best that they ran away. They played dead and then stole things. "How rude, I was right!" Luffy said. "Well, I protected everything," he added proudly, hands on his hips.

He looked up and to the side. "Something is coming. Maybe food!" he got up and ran towards it before seeing it was a huge lizard, big enough to really eat him. "Help me!" Luffy shouted as he was nearly eaten.

"A giant Sandora lizard!" Vivi screamed. There was a camel running away from the thing, too. Luffy jumped onto its back and rode it away. Before he got far enough to turn around and use a couple seconds to attack.

Zoro, Luffy and Sanji all attacked at the same time, killing it easily. Luffy wiped his brow. "Phew! Man, that was close. Neehee!" he laughed. Nami punched his head. "But we got food from it! And a camel, too."

"You guys didn't even put up any trouble," Vivi said in surprise. Nami called them all monsters.

"Haha, welcome to the monster club!" Luffy cheered as they prepared cooking the meat on a stone. Some laughed, and Zoro sat and yanked Luffy into his lap, kissing his neck softly. Vivi blushed, and she and Nami held hands with their sleeves down and covering them. Luffy and Zoro smiled. And Nami smiled back. Too bad they couldn't openly show affection.

Nami didn't want everyone to know. It wasn't like she told Luffy her preferences, he just figured it out somehow. Once the meat was cooked, conserving most of their food but eating some, they also fed the camel.