ONE PIECE

Two Worlds, One Family

A young woman struggling to find her place in the world wakes up to find a bunch of cats in her room...cats that turn out to be the characters from her favourite TV show, One Piece! Bound to each other, whether they like it or not, and trying to figure out a way to find a certain somebody's lost Nakama and get everyone back to their home, what follows is bound to be chaos, friendship, tears, romance - and, adventure! (Kind of a re-write of Straw Cat Pirates).

Parental Warning - the following chapter contains:

. Infrequent mild coarse language

. Mild drug references/usage

. Medical procedures

. Adult themes

. Low level violence

. Low level sexual references

_-_ Warning: Long chapter is long - pity me, I had to write it. _-_

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Angels And Demons

"Ow..." Nami landed roughly on the ground but, for a second, all that she could think was: That hurt...that must mean that I'm alive... With this in mind, she opened her eyes, and found herself in a cave of sorts. "Okay, a cave. I think I can handle that." She nodded to herself. She then began checking herself for any injuries, by moving her limbs. "Okay, legs, check. Neck, check. Ears, check. Tail, check." She nodded again, and stood up. "Right, now...wait...a minute." Nami froze, and looked down at her orange paws. "Oh no..." Here we go again...

Nami looked around her, and that was when she saw a blonde cat sprawled out over a rock, and a smaller black cat curled up in the fetal position. As she watched, the blonde cat slowly came to, and shook his head.

"Okay...where am I?" Sanji muttered.

"Sanji?" Nami called to him.

Sanji started, and then he happily cried out: "Oh, Nami-Swaaaan!" He bounded over to her, but stopped when she brought out her claws.

"Don't." She said flatly, and the blonde-haired cat had enough sense to stay back. They went over to try and wake up Luffy, only to find that their captain was contently asleep - when they tried to wake him up, he hissed at them, so Sanji was forced to carry the smaller black cat on his back while they headed off in no particular direction.

Nami had no idea how to navigate her way through this strange place, which wasn't lit with light - it seemed to be lit with some sort of grey light - so, they just walked, and hoped that they would find the others.

"I really thought we were dead." Nami said presently, as they continued to walk.

Sanji nodded. "So did I, but I'm glad we're not, Nami-San. I just hope that Emma-Chan, Robin-Chan, Georgia-Chan and Tashigi-Chan are okay."

"Why are you calling her Tashigi-'Chan' now, Sanji?" Nami rolled her eyes. "She's our enemy, remember?"

"Oh...right..." Sanji looked sheepish.

"Your devotion to women is going to get you killed one day, Sanji," Nami scolded him. "Just like with Kalifa."

The blonde didn't say anything, as Luffy slept on.

"Still..." Nami averted her gaze. "I find it...admirable."

"Oh, Nami-Swan..."

"Let me finish." She said sharply, and turned to face him. "I don't want you to respond to what I'm about to tell you, Sanji." She looked firmly at him, and he stood there waiting. "But...if you can stop flirting with every girl you meet...you're going to make a girl very happy one day." She looked aside, blushing slightly.

"N-Nami-San..." Sanji was stunned. "What brought this on...?"

"I said I didn't want you to say anything!" Nami snapped, just as a white ball of light appeared behind her, and Sanji froze. "Huh?" Nami turned around and, seeing the light, she gasped, and leapt at Sanji, cuddling up against his side in fear. "It's the light!" She cried. "It's come for us!" But, I said what I had to say, so I have no regrets!

Sanji, however, had a different train of thought: Nami-San's cuddled up to me...she admires me...I'm so...happy!

Luffy just slept on, and so didn't see when the ball of light created a huge hole in the ceiling of the cave, much to Nami and Sanji's shock. The sky shone blue above them, but they were more focused on that light...

"This is so unsuper..." Franky, in his blue-cat form, stated, as he walked along.

"Just make sure you don't fall off." Usopp, who was shaking, replied, as he carefully put one paw in front of the other. "It's...it's a long way down..."

"Hmm..." Robin mused, as she peered over the edge of the clouds. "It could even be that there is no land beneath us."

As Usopp looked horrified, and nearly tripped, Franky asked: "And, how do you figure that?"

"Well, we're in a different world, aren't we?" Robin reminded him. "We are lucky that we did not have our blood smeared across the stone table as an offering."

She continued walking, as Franky and Usopp froze, both of them thinking: Why does she always say stuff like that?

They then hurried to catch up with her. "Still, what did Zoro mean when he called that Marine 'Kuina'?" Franky wanted to know. "Wasn't that the girl from the village who died years ago?"

"Remember that photo that we saw of her at the dojo?" Usopp recalled. "If Kuina was older now, she'd look exactly like Tashigi, without the glasses, that is."

"That still doesn't explain why he called Tashigi 'Kuina'." Franky said.

"Actually, it does." Robin stated.

"How?" Franky wanted to know.

Robin half-smiled. "You sound as if you don't believe me."

"Well, you're supposed to be the one with all the facts." He replied.

Jeez, they're like an old married couple. Usopp thought and, for some odd reason, his thoughts turned to Kaya. A childhood best friend, that he almost lost. Suddenly, he couldn't imagine how Zoro must have felt, not being able to prevent Kuina's death, not being able to protect her. If Kuro had managed to kill Kaya, then...Usopp stopped walking, and stared down at his paws. He would never have been able to handle that.

Franky noticed that Usopp had stopped walking, and turned around, guessing instantly what was troubling the patchy-cat. "Hey, Usopp," Franky began walking backwards. "You're thinking about Kaya, aren't you?"

Usopp looked up, startled. "How did you...?"

"Emma." Franky said simply.

Usopp rolled his eyes, imagining Emma in his mind, saying: I read it in a book. He walked on, looking at Franky who was still walking backwards. "Yeah, so, what should I do? The Government went after Kaya because of me - because she's my friend. And, I wasn't there to protect her."

"But, she's okay now." Franky pointed out.

"Yeah, I know!" Usopp sighed. "But...that's how it is, isn't it? It's always somebody else who's protecting Kaya. I wonder...if it had of been Luffy, like it was before, then would he have been able to protect her, the way Sumi and the Whitebeard Pirates did? I mean, I know how to talk to the talk, but Luffy can talk the talk and walk the walk! He has enough strength and courage to back up all his words, but me...I'm useless. I'm not strong or brave like Luffy, and Zoro, and Sanji..."

"I think that you are brave, Usopp." Franky informed him.

"Shut up!" Usopp snapped. "I don't need you to patronise me!"

"I wasn't trying to." Franky replied. "Look, Usopp, maybe it's true, that you're not as strong as all of us."

Did he really have to say all of us? Usopp rolled his eyes, but continued to listen.

"But," Franky continued. "My mentor once said that lots of people are afraid to admit that, which is why those that can are really brave. Also, you're not useless, Usopp. Someday, you'll become the Prince who will protect Kaya. Because, in your heart, there is...immense courage."

Usopp was speechless, as he absorbed what Franky had just told him.

"That's how everybody sees you, Usopp-Kun." Robin said.

"I have total confidence in you, Usopp." Franky grinned. "Super confidence!"

Robin then stopped suddenly, and added: "Oh...this is interesting."

"What is it?" Usopp asked her, and then he looked up, and his eyes widened. "Ne, Franky, look out!"

"Whaaa...?!" Franky had walked backwards into Robin, and together the two of them tumbled off of the cloud path.

"Aaaaaaaaa!" Usopp screamed.

Law got up slowly, carefully checking himself for injuries, before he realised that he was a cat again. Rolling his eyes, and sighing, he took a good look at his surroundings.

The first thing he noticed was that he was in a jungle, and he could hear people and the ocean. The strange thing was, however, despite the sun shining and the humidity that he could sense in the air, he didn't feel anything - he didn't feel hot or cold or even numb. He just...was.

As Law was just deciding that this was very, very strange, he heard a groan behind him, and turned, hoping that it wouldn't be Ace, and discovering that, of course, it was.

The other black cat looked up at him, and his eyes narrowed, before widening in recognition. "YOU!" He leapt at Law, who immediately extended his claws, and the two of them began to fight but, before they could get much further than a few scratches and some biting here and there, a call made them both stop what they were doing immediately.

"Ace-Chan! Law-Chan! Help!"

The two black cats looked all around them, and then up. There, tangled in brown vines above their heads, was the red and white cat. Emma.

"Emiko!" The two male cats called to her in unison, and then they exchanged a glare.

"Guys!" Emma sounded panicked. She was struggling. "One of you, quickly, try to use your Devil Fruit power!"

Ace blinked, an then focused his ability...only to find that he couldn't. It was still there, but he was unable to harness it, like he usually would have. It was as if he was no longer a Devil Fruit User...

He traded a startled glance with Law and, from the slightly concerned look in the surgeon cat's grey eyes, he knew that he was not the only one.

They both looked back up at Emma.

"We're in another world, and we can't use our powers here!" She stated the obvious. "But, please, can you help me get down from here?!"

"Don't worry, Emiko, we'll find a way!" Ace replied. "Somehow...maybe somebody will come along..." He muttered, and then noticed that Law was smirking. "What?"

"Baka." Law said bluntly, causing Ace's blood to boil. "Haven't you noticed it? Two things, actually."

"Such as?" Ace was beginning to see the beauty in clawing out those grey eyes.

"Well, one," Law jerked his head in the direction of a group of people who were walking by. "Notice how none of them seem to notice us? Perhaps we're ghosts?"

That stopped Ace for a second and, up in the trees, Emma froze as well.

Law continued: "And, secondly, since Emiko's tangled up in the vines, it means that we can interact with inanimate objects, at least. So, it's up to us to get her down."

"Okay then, genius, how?" Ace asked scathingly.

Law gave him a wry look, and then sat down for a second, thinking. He looked all around him, and noticed how climbable the tree looked. He looked it up and down, judging its distance. "Hai..." He muttered to himself, nodding. "Okay, Firefist, get up there and use those fangs of yours for something useful - cut those vines." He ordered.

Ace just stared at him. "Oh? And while I get to play the hero, what will you do?"

Law's smirk grew. "Somebody's got to stay here in case she doesn't land on her feet."

Ace extended his claws. "Why you ijōna little..."

"Uh, excuse me?!" Emma called, cutting him off. "The vines are about to snap on their own!"

Both Law and Ace looked up again, and realised that it was true. In half a second, the vines had snapped, and Emma was falling.

Being a cat, of course she managed to flip herself upright.

She also landed on both Ace and Law.

"That's right...nothing to see here..." Ace muttered, realising that a very interesting part of him was in contact with the area around Emma's stomach. He gulped.

Unfortunately for Ace, however, Law had managed to get a second kiss from Emma in the space of less than a day.

Emma, who was stretched out across the two cats, froze, but not for the reason that both men thought. She suddenly leapt off of them, and stared at something, gasping: "It-it can't be!" She sounded distressed, and yet excited, all of a sudden and, without warning, she took of running.

Ace and Law hurried after her, in time to see her leap out of the bushes, and land in the huge hotel swimming pool.

Georgia sighed, and would have wrung her hands, but she didn't have hands anymore. She had awoken to find herself in what appeared to be a church - the big stained-glass windows and the overall feel of the building being like the Temple Of Time from Zelda were a big giveaway - and as a cat. A chocolate-coated tortie, with whiskers and pointed ears a tail and everything.

"Okay, no longer will I say that I might have envied Emma a little bit." Georgia muttered, pacing up and down the pew she was standing on.

"Why should you envy her?" A voice said, and Georgia looked over to see Tashigi - as a human - sitting on a white chair at the front of the church. In her lap was an unconscious green cat.

Zoro? Georgia thought, shaking her head slightly. She noticed the compass that Emma usually always wore, now around Tashigi's neck. Only, Georgia was suddenly convinced that that wasn't Tashigi...her voice had sounded different and her eyes, which were usually dark blue, were now a sort of muddy brown. The glasses which Tashigi needed to see were now in one hand - she used the other to pat the back of the green cat's neck.

Georgia carefully regarded the young woman, and then said: "Well, not envy exactly...just..."

"I think I understand..." A little voice said from behind Georgia. "But, first, do you think you could help me?"

Georgia blinked, and then jumped up onto the back of the pew. Looking over, she saw a little brown cat. The blue nose and the antlers told her that it was Chopper.

She immediately reached over, and clamped her teeth around the scruff of his neck, pulling him up.

"Thank you." Chopper said shyly. He hadn't really had much to do with Georgia, and didn't really know her that well, but he could guess how she was feeling. "Georgia, it would be natural that you felt jealous of Emma - I mean, she was involved with something wonderful and exciting, and it's normal for humans to wish to be a part of something so exciting."

"I'm not jealous!" Georgia snapped, and Chopper looked taken aback. "I mean...oh, forget it." She sat down again. "Where are we, anyway?"

"I'm not sure." Chopper looked around him, and then over at Zoro. "Oh no, Zoro!"

"He's fine." The woman holding him said - her voice even sounded younger than Tashigi's, so it definitely was not Tashigi. Maybe her body, but not her spirit. "It's you two who should be worried."

"Why?" Georgia and Chopped asked together, bad Chopper added: "Where are the others?"

"Facing the first part of The Test." The woman replied. She seemed to be calm, but Georgia and Chopper noticed the possessive way in which she placed a hand on Zoro's back as she said: "If they can't complete the test, then they'll die."

"Why do you say that so calmly?!" Chopper cried, as Georgia dug her claws into the wooden pew.

She wouldn't exactly call Emma and the others friends, but she didn't want them to die. Okay, so she'd been using them to get her and her sister home, and knew very well that they would face the possibility of being captured due to her actions.

That didn't mean she wanted them to die, however.

"What kind of test?" Georgia asked suspiciously.

The woman nodded her head towards a stained glass window, which shimmered and then blurred, forming a new picture. "Watch." She said quietly.

The beam of light had expanded, and its rays woke Luffy up. "Huh? Wazzup? Where're we going?"

Nami was nearly sobbing, as she was picked up by some invisible force. "This is it! We're going up to Heaven!"

"What?" Luffy blinked, as he clung onto Sanji's back, much to the cook's annoyance. "You mean we're dying?"

"Baka!" Nami snapped. "Don't say it like that!"

Suddenly, and without warning, the light vanished, and they found themselves standing in a place that none of them recognized - it was a house, and they were standing in a hallway.

"Hmm..." Luffy said, standing up on Sanji's back.

The cook immediately shrugged the captain off, and Luffy tumbled to the floor.

"Look." Nami said suddenly. "Look at that photo on the wall!"

They all looked up, and saw a picture of three people - a Mother, and her two daughters.

"That's the same photo that Emma has on top of her piano at home." Nami said.

"Oh, hey, yeah, you're right." Luffy nodded. "So then...this is Emmy's house? Her old one?"

A voice suddenly said: "Yes. She knows all about you." A man wearing a white cloak said, as he appeared in front of them, startling them. "But, now is the time for you to learn about her."

"Who are you?" Nami wanted to know, as she and Sanji were instantly on guard. Luffy was just staring at the man.

"That doesn't matter." The man replied. He had a gravelly voice. "For now, just watch, and learn - you will be able to see these people, but they won't be able to see you."

"Why are we here, anyway?" Sanji wanted to know.

"You will see." The man replied, as he started to disappear. "But, I warn you...you might not like what you see..."

Usopp peered over the edge of the cloud tentatively, not sure he wanted to see what he was about to see but, at the same time, he knew that he had to look.

What he saw was that Franky had landed on top of Robin, and their lips were touching. The other thing that he saw was that they had landed in the middle of some kind of rainbow-coloured pool, that was slowly sucking them into its depths.

"Oh no!" Usopp cried, as Franky and Robin started to vanish. "What do I do?! Oh, I know, I'll go for help, that's what I'll do! I'll go for help!" He promptly fainted, and fell into the pool along with Franky and Robin.

"Still feeling totally confident, Franky?" Robin asked him.

"Did I say that?" Franky replied, as they both took deep breaths, on instinct.

The world turned black around them for a second, and then they were both standing in the middle of a school yard. How did they know it was a school yard? From the sign, that read Primary School, and they both remembered that Emma had mentioned something about it once.

When Usopp came to, he slowly shook his head and stood up. "Oh, we must be back in Emma's world...hmm?" He suddenly noticed a car speeding towards them, and screamed, pushing both Franky and Robin out of the way. They landed on the grass, and a group of students ran by...walking right through the three cats!

Franky gasped, and Usopp looked terrified.

"No! We've died!" The two men yelled.

"Hmm..." Robin shook her head. "Perhaps not..."

"That is right, Nico Robin." A woman's voice said, and the three cats looked up, to see a figure wearing a black cloak standing before them. She had a sweet and gentle voice. "You have been taken back in time as ghosts, but you are not dead. You will find that you are not Devil Fruit Users here, as your job is to merely observe and learn. Learn about Emma's past, as she learned about yours." The woman raised a hand, and gestured to a glass window, where pieces of paper were blue-tacked. "Begin your search for her, here."

Robin, Franky and Usopp watched in silence as the woman disappeared, and then Robin began walking towards the windows.

"Wait, Robin, you're not seriously going to go, are you?" Usopp asked her and, when she just looked over her shoulder at him, he sighed. "Okay, let's go and follow the advice of the stranger in the black cloak."

"Jeez, anything sounds super bad when you say it like that." Franky rolled his eyes, as they followed Robin over to the window and, by Robin standing on Usopp standing on Franky, they were able to find where Emma's classroom was.

They searched all over the primary school, and eventually found her, in classroom A1...

"Emiko!" Ace and Law shouted in unison, running to the edge of the pool in horror. Neither of them could swim and, if nobody could see them, then how could they save Emma?!

"Yes?" Her head suddenly appeared above the water, and they looked down in shock to see that she was treading it. She was blinking, looking slightly shocked herself. "I know, right?" Her gaze turned thoughtful, and then she looked up at Ace, and said: "But, that also means that I can do this..." She leapt up, and wrapped her arms around his neck, dragging him into the water with her.

He was startled at first but then, he realised, he too could swim again - it was as if, in this world, their abilities had been cancelled out, along with their inability to swim.

As Emma smiled mischievously at Ace, and Law just rolled his eyes, she said: "I also know where we are...this is Bali, some time around 1998..."

"And, how do you know that?" Ace asked her, also treading water (God, it had been a long time since he'd been able to do that!).

"Caaan yooou feeeel the loooove toooniiiight!" A child's voice suddenly sang and, as the three cat's watched, a little girl with very long dark brown hair, wearing a green one piece bathing suit with an orange skirt and bow, came flying out of a nearby hotel room, and launched herself into the pool. Water went everywhere.

"Emma!" A woman with curly dark brown hair immediately sped out of the room as well, holding a bottle of suncream. "I told you to wait until I'd put the suncream on you!"

"But Mu-um!" The little girl said, as she emerged, grinning, and only a few feet away from where Emma and Ace were. "I wanted to act out that scene from The Lion King, you know, where Simba jumps into the water, and then he pulls Nala in with him!"

"I don't care, now come back up here, and then you can go back in." Lee replied, as Sarah appeared behind her, in a maroon t-shirt and a pair of black shorts, and a Bad Girl baseball cap on her head. "Sarah, keep an eye on your sister." She added.

"I'm going out." She replied, shrugging.

Lee sighed. "Then take her with you."

"No way."

"Sarah."

Ace looked at Emma, who was watching the scene unfold, with her hazel eyes shining as she watched her eight-year-old self.

"Hey, Emiko..." Ace said. "You never told me you weren't a natural red-head."

Emma responded by trying to dunk him under the water, before swimming huffily over to the edge, where Law helped her to get out of the water by grabbing onto the scruff of her neck with his cat fangs. She shook herself, making the water droplets go all over Law, and he gave her a Look.

"Oops, sorry, Law-Chan." She giggled, and then rubbed up against him. "Better, or worse?" She asked him, smirking.

"Much better." Law smirked back, just as Ace emerged from the pool, dripping wet, and glaring murderously at Law.

Emma sighed. "Now come on you two." She said, just as an eleven-year-old Sarah called something out to somebody in the hotel room.

"Come on, Nanna!" Sarah called and, a second later, an old lady with short dark brown hair emerged from the room.

Emma gasped, and froze, her eyes fixed on the old lady. "Nanna!" She whispered, and both Law and Ace then remembered that she'd stated how her Grandmother had died. She took a few steps forward, as the old woman walked down the steps of the room's porch, and began to walk along the path with Sarah.

"Oh, Nanna!" Eight-year-old Emma hurried to pull herself out of the pool. "Where are you going? Can I come?"

"I thought that you wanted to go swimming?" Eleven-year-old Sarah rolled her eyes. "You wouldn't stop talking about it on the plane. We've been in Bali, what, five minutes?"

"Oh, stop it, Sarah." Emma said firmly, before turning to her Nanna. "Where are you guys going? Can I come with you?"

"We're going to the shops up the road to get some torches and batteries." Her Nanna replied, smiling. "And, of course you can come - go and get changed, little lamb."

"Okay!" Emma said chirpily, before scurrying back up to the hotel room.

Law and Ace both glanced at Emma, who had tears in her eyes, but she was smiling.

"I'm so...happy..." She whispered, nuzzling up against Ace's neck. "This was my favourite trip..." She purred. "And...I get to see my Nanna again...I miss her so much, you guys..." I can't even begin to describe this right now...but, what if it means something?

~1996: School~

"This must be Emma's classroom." Usopp whispered, as they crept up to the door.

"Why are we whispering and creeping?" Franky wanted to know.

"I don't know!" Usopp hissed back as Robin, who was walking normally, went right into the classroom, and jumped up onto the desk in the centre of the front row. "Robin!" Usopp gasped, and then he and Franky followed her into the classroom.

Robin was looking at the girl at the desk, and then she smiled. She instantly recognized the very small child. Five years old, and going on six, Emma Pax was cute, with her dark brown hair tied up in a tight ponytail and secured with ribbons. She had (fake) sapphire stones in her ears, and a beaded necklace around her neck. She wore the same medium blue polo shirt and dark blue pleated skirt as the other girls in the classroom, one of whom she was talking to right now.

"Hey, isn't that Mayling?" Usopp wondered, as he and Franky joined Robin on the desk.

"Who's Mayling?" Franky asked.

"One of Emma's two best friends." Usopp replied, glancing at the glasses-wearing Chinese girl, and then looking around the classroom. He spotted Krystal in the third row, with her golden brown hair that had been long and straight even then, pointedly ignoring a boy who was pestering her.

"Emma, I still can't believe you got the same mark as me." Six-year-old Mayling said. "I told the teacher we didn't copy."

Emma nodded. "Me too. Mummy and Daddy even came up to the school, and told her that I don't cheat. So, we're okay!"

"We're okay because we didn't cheat." Mayling replied. "And, because she knows you get good grades in everything."

"Well, so do you." Emma pointed out. "You even get good grades in maths."

"Yeah, but you got the highest grade in our spelling test last week." Mayling reminded her. "Are the teachers giving you special work or something?"

Emma nodded. "Uh-huh! They got some work off of the year five teachers - I like spelling more than maths." She rolled her eyes.

Mayling laughed. "Maths is fun - numbers are just like words, after all."

"That's what Daddy says." Emma replied. "Anyway, let's go and save Krystal - she's being harassed by Matthew Twaiman again."

Mayling nodded. "Yeah, she looks like she's about to slap him!"

They hurried over there, and Robin, Franky and Usopp took a look at the papers on the desk, which appeared to be a mid-term report card.

"A hundred percent in everything except maths, where she got a seventy-nine percent, which is still very good." Robin smiled. "The two teachers think that she's a lovely student. It's written here that she intends to become a vet-nurse, a police officer, a singer, or a pensioner."

"That's good, well, except for the pensioner part." Usopp nodded. "She's pretty smart."

"Yeah." Franky agreed. "Only...I can't help but think that something's wrong..."

"You mean, that something might be about to go wrong?" Robin corrected him, and the cyborg-kitty nodded, just as the scene began to shift around them.

"What's happening?!" Usopp cried.

"We're in transition." Franky realised. "We must be about to go to a different place!"

"Or, a different time." Robin mused.

"Okay, do you think that you could maybe stop correcting me?" Franky asked her, and she merely smiled at him as their world went black.

~1996: Home~

"School is fun, but I like the holidays better!"

Nami, Luffy and Sanji stared in shock, as a now six-year-old Emma rode her bike (pink, and with streamers on the handlebars) down the street.

"Yuck!" A girl who lived across the road and was a year younger than Emma, replied. She was slightly chubby, and had shorter brown hair than Emma. Her name was Peta Sommerton. "i don't like school at all!"

"But, Peta, you're only in pre-primary." Emma pointed out, riding ahead of Peta.

"Hey, wait up!" Peta, who still had training wheels on her bike, peddled furiously, to catch up with Emma, who had cycled all the way up to the top of the driveway.

"Hey, Peta, lookit what I can do!" Emma cycled fast down her own driveway, across the street and all the way up to the top of the Sommertons' driveway, without even peddling.

Peta's eyes widened. "Be careful!" She warned her friend, as she followed her. "Remember when Tanya fell into the rose garden?"'

Emma narrowed her eyes at the offending bushes across the road, as she and five-year-old Peta left their bikes on the driveway. "I wish Mummy would get rid of those things." She said, as she and Peta went into the house, leaving Nami, Sanji and Luffy to run and catch up before the door was closed.

They found Emma and Peta in the kitchen, where Tracey Sommerton (called Aunt Tracey by all the kids on the street) was making sandwiches.

Emma was standing at the fridge, looking at a report card on the fridge. "Is this Brooke's?" She asked Tracey, who nodded distractedly - with four kids to take care of while her husband was at work, she had her hands full, especially since the neighbourhood kids were in and out all day.

"She only got a forty-two percent in society and environment this year." Emma stated bluntly, just as the front door banged open.

Tracey said: "Emma, don't be rude."

"I'm sorry." Emma replied, contritely, as a group of kids came into the kitchen.

There was eight-year-old Brooke and her nine-year-old sister, Amanda. There was a then nine-year-old Sarah, and her friend, nine-year-old Leigha Silver. Then there was Leigha's twelve-year-old sister, Kristy. And, finally, there was nine-year-old Tanya Callows, and her twelve-year-old sister, Melissa.

The seven girls were talking and laughing loudly as they took sandwiches from the plate on the counter, and a few of the girls went into the games room to watch TV, even though two year old Mattie (Tracey's youngest child and only son) and two-year-old Michel (Leigha and Kristy's younger brother) were watching The Land Before Time.

There was a commotion from in there, and Tracey went to go and sort it out.

Meanwhile, Emma was asking Brooke about her grades.

"Oh, fuck off." Brooke snapped back.

"Huh?" Emma blinked, just as Tracey came storming back in, looking livid.

"Who said that word?!" She demanded to know, of the ones who were still in the room.

"It was Brooke!" Luffy called.

"She can't hear you talking, Luffy." Nami rolled her eyes, and watched as Tracey grilled the kids.

Brooke began to look worried, and then she said: "It was Emma!" She pointed at Emma, who just looked confused.

"Oh no..." Sanji muttered, shaking his head.

"Emma, did you say that word?" Tracey asked, crossing her arms.

"What word?" Emma asked. "Which one?"

"She said the 'F' word!" Brooke stated.

"No, I didn't!" Emma gasped. "Sarah! Sarah!" She ran into the games room, and the three cats that she couldn't see followed her. She was tugging on her sister's arm. "Sarah, Brooke said I called somebody fat, but I didn't!"

"Huh? Fat?" Sanji blinked, as Tracey came into the living room.

"Uh, yeah." Nami sighed. "Just look at Aunt Tracey and her daughters - Emma's obviously been told not to use the word 'fat'."

Tracey grabbed Emma's hand, and marched her back home, where she proceeded to tell Lee what had happened.

"I feel kind of bad for Lee." Nami said, as Lee tried to deal with the TV repair man and Tracey and a confused Emma. "I mean," she went on, when both Sanji and Luffy gave her odd looks. "She can't very well tell Aunt Tracey that, for Emma, the 'F' word is 'fat', because then she'd have to explain to her why."

"I agree completely, Nami-Swan!" Sanji said.

"I feel more sorry for Emmy." Luffy remarked, as Lee told off Emma, and said that she would have to go without Nintendo for a week. Apparently, this was a death-sentance, and sent Emma into a state of hysterics, much to Lee's embarrassment.

"But, Mummy, I didn't do anything wrong! Please, Mummy, don't take the Nintendo off of me!"

"Be quiet, and go to your room, right now!"

However, when Bruce got home that night, both he and Lee apologized to their youngest daughter, and also grilled their eldest daughter for not standing up for her sister.

They also gave back the Nintendo.

"Damn straight." Nami nodded, as everything around them suddenly began to turn white. "Wh-what the...?!"

~1997: School~

Robin, Franky and Usopp watched as six-year-old Emma kissed her Mother goodbye at the classroom door, which was now A6, as she was in year two. Inside, as the class was started by a smiling African lady, the three cats located Emma, and watched as the teacher handed out spelling tests that she had graded.

"A ninety-two percent, Joshua, very nice."

"Eighty-four for you, Jameila, excellent work."

"Forty-two percent, Rebecca - you need to work harder."

A very tall girl with olive skin just rolled her eyes.

"Emma, ninety-seven percent - keep up the good work." The teacher smiled at Emma, who grinned back, and looked happily at her success.

"Teacher's pet." Rebecca muttered, and Emma glanced at Rebecca, before looking back at her paper and frowning.

Robin, Franky and Usopp noticed that she frowned throughout most of the morning, but when they followed her out to the lunch area, she was all smiles again, as she greeted Krystal and Mayling.

As the three girls ate lunch together, they chatted, and then Mayling happened to ask Emma about Rebecca Winrow.

"We know she's been bullying you about your marks." Mayling said, as she ate her cookies.

Emma just shrugged. "i don't care about old Winslow." She said.

Krystal giggled. "Isn't he that blue thing from Cat-Dog?"

"Yup." Emma replied, and the three girls laughed.

They finished off their recess, and then moved to the playground to play.

"Let's play Farthing Wood?" Emma suggested.

"What's that?" Mayling wanted to know.

"We get to pretend to be animals." Emma replied. "the ones who had their home destroyed and had to find shelter at White Deer Park. You know, that show on ABC?"

"Oh, yeah, I watched that show." Krystal nodded. "I get to be Vixen."

Emma nodded. "Okay. I want to be Whisper."

"And I'll be Lady Blue!" Mayling grinned. "You red foxes had better get off my territory!" She added, and began to chase Krystal and Emma, who laughed and shrieked as they climbed across play equipment and over huge black tires that were places in the leaves.

"Look at that." The three cats heard Rebecca say, as she and her friends sat on the blue-painted benches near the playground. "Emma, Krystal and Mayling are so weird."

"Did you hear Mayling's News this morning?" Another girl added. "Who cares about her stupid trip to Hong Kong?"

"Yeah, she got presents for Krystal and Emma - why didn't she get us anything?" Another girl added.

"Because they're selfish, that's why." Rebecca nodded, just as there was a shriek from where the three girls pretending to be foxes were.

"Look!" Emma held something up in her hand. "I found gold! We found gold!"

Everybody immediately crowded around the three girls.

"It's not gold." Robin confirmed, as she, Franky and Usopp jumped up onto a nearby black tire (they were the huge ones, used on big trucks). "It's just a rock, spray-painted with gold paint."

"Still, it must be pretty exciting for a kid." Usopp stated, as Emma, Krystal and Mayling grinned, and declared themselves pirates, much to the amusement of the three cats.

"Show-offs." Rebecca mumbled, crossing her arms. "I'll get you for this, Emma." She added, under her breath.

"Uh-oh..." Franky mumbled, as the scene began to shift around them. "That doesn't sound too good..."

~1997: Home~

Six-year-old Emma (who was going on seven) was sitting in front of the TV in the evening, watching Feral TV and colouring in a picture.

Nami, Sanji and Luffy sat on the couch, still as cats, and watched as Emma traced expertly around her hand with a texta, before adding rings and nail-polish.

"Now," she said thoughtfully. "Who should it be for?" Just then, Bruce came into the games room. "Oh, I know, it's for Daddy!" She wrote To Daddy, Love Emma on the piece of paper, and hurried to give it to him.

"Thank you." Bruce said, but Nami and Sanji noticed that he was looking solemn. He turned off the TV, and sat on the couch with Emma, as a now ten-year-old Sarah came in, and sat with them.

Nami peered out of the games room, and into the kitchen, where she could see Lee standing behind the counter. There were tears pouring down her face, as she sobbed silently.

A moment later, they found out why.

"Girls," Bruce said, taking the one girls' hands in his own. "Last night...Pop went to sleep, and he didn't wake up again."

"Oh." Sarah said, blinking.

Emma's reaction was more pronounced. She stared up at her Father, and realisation dawned on her face. "You mean he's...?" And, when Bruce nodded, Emma began to cry - hard. Bruce could only hug her, as Sarah got up and left, and Emma talked with her Father for a little bit, trying to understand, and Bruce couldn't say much at all.

"Didn't Emma once mention that her Pop was on her Dad's side of the family?" Nami whispered, as she and Sanji and Luffy followed Emma and her Dad out to the kitchen, where Lee was still upset.

Sanji nodded. "Yeah. It must be hard on him, too...look at his eyes. Those are the eyes of a man in pain."

Nami nodded her understanding, as Lee tearfully hugged Emma, and told her that when she'd found Pop, he had looked very peaceful.

Emma went into the study, where Sarah was playing a computer game, and angrily demanded to know why Sarah was not crying.

Lee had to come and explain to Emma that people handled their grief in different ways and, that while Sarah may not show it, she was very upset, as well.

"Not as upset as Emma." Nami said softly, as they watched Emma hug a grey and green sweater that had been her Pop's favourite, and reminisce with her parents about the days on her Great-Grandfather's farm. "It sounded like she was really close to her Pop."

Luffy looked thoughtful. "You know...she once said to me and Ace that we were really lucky to still have our Grandfather...I didn't understand her then. Now, I think I do."

"That's good, Luffy." Sanji said, nodding in approval, as the scene began to shift around them. "Oh, here we go again..."

"I still think she's crazy for idolising him, though!" Luffy rolled her eyes.

"Luffy!" Nami scolded him, whacking him upside the head with her paw as their world went white.

~1998: School~

Robin, Franky and Usopp hid under the desk in the demountable classroom that was T3, and watched as Emma, now eight-years-old, got scolded lightly by her teacher for failing a maths test.

"Emma, you must work harder at maths." The teacher said. "It's really not as hard as it seems."

"But...what is division?" Emma asked. "Why do we need it?"

The teacher sighed, and took out a book. "Here, this is for you to read." She said, and Robin noticed how Emma's eyes lit up - reading! "It's called 'Maths, Friend Or Foe?' - do you know what a foe is, Emma?"

Emma nodded. "Uh-huh - it's an enemy, like Rebecca Winsl-Winrow." She corrected herself quickly, and both Franky and Usopp snickered.

The teacher did not look pleased. "Emma, please try to get along with Rebecca, or at the very least, avoid her when you can."

"That's just the problem, Mrs. Oliver, I can't." Emma stated. "She always comes and finds me when I'm playing with Krystal and Mayling and Kimberly, or playing Cactus Chasie with Andrew..."

"Cactus Chasey?" Franky and Usopp asked in unison, at the same time as Robin said: "Who's Andrew?"

Mrs. Oliver just sighed. "Please study hard, Emma - we have a maths test coming up. And, stop using orange pencil to rule your margin lines - it looks tacky."

"But, Rebecca stole my red pencil." Emma replied.

"Then ask somebody if you can borrow theirs." Mrs. Oliver said, as the school siren rang, signalling the end of lunchtime. "Don't use orange."

"Okay." Emma nodded, and returned to her seat.

"What's wrong with orange?" Usopp wondered, as the scene around them began to shift.

"I dunno, but it seems like Emma's really struggling in maths." Franky said.

"Of course." Robin nodded. "She considers it to be Mental Abuse Towards Homo-Sapiens."

"What?" Franky and Usopp asked in unison, as they all blacked out again.

~1998: Home~

"Hey, look." Luffy ran down the carpeted hallway. "They moved houses or something - neat!"

Nami and Sanji followed him at a much slower pace, onto the tiled floor and then into the carpeted room at the front of the house, where the TV was.

There, Emma was sitting on the floor, playing the Nintendo 64. Next to her was a man they had never seen before - he had dark skin, and a friendly face, and he was laughing as his futuristic-looking race-car crashed into another wall, before sailing off the edge.

"So how's Bali?" Emma, who was eight-years-old, asked the man, as she finished the race in third place. "How's Tini? Why didn't she come with you?"

"Bali?" Sanji mused. "I've heard Emma-Chan mention that before..."

"Oh, of course, it's that place she used to go for holidays." Nami nodded. "She loved it there, apparently."

"Oh, yeah, she told me that she used to eat a lot of Jimbaran Fish when she was over there." Luffy remembered.

"Tini is very busy with work." The man said, smiling. "Do you like the bracelet she got you, though?" He asked her.

"Of course I do, I love it!" Emma said, holding up her wrist, where a black, hot pink and bright green bracelet made of leather was clipped. Her name was on it. "Karma, tell Tini I said thank you, okay? oh! And, I'm going to write her a letter, so can you give that to her?"

Karma grinned. "Okay." He then pointed to the stack of N64 games. "Hey, Emma, what's that game?"

"Oh, that's Banjo-Kazooie. It's not two-players, though...we could trade turns?" She suggested, and Karma nodded, so Emma started up that game, which seemed to involve a honey bear carrying a red bird in a blue backpack, jumping and swimming and flapping their way across really cool levels.

Emma was really involved in the game, however, and forgot to give Karma a turn. He didn't seem to mind, though.

"She hasn't really changed, has she?" Sanji asked, smiling, as the scenes around them began to change, yet again.

"I dunno..." Nami said thoughtfully. "She seems a bit more talkative here...she kept eye-contact with Karma and everything. Something must've happened..."

"Hmm..." Sanji mused, as they whited out.

~1999: School~

Franky and Usopp waited outside of the girl's bathroom, as Robin went into there.

The black she-cat looked all around, and then found the tiny nine-year-old Emma, huddled up in the last stall of the bathroom. She was shaking, and there were tears cascading down her face.

As Robin watched, a figure appeared in the doorway, and Rebecca Winrow walked in. She found Emma, and Robin watched in silence as Emma tried to get away, but Rebecca was too big.

Robin stood there, unable to do anything, as the bigger girl hit Emma across the shoulders, before pushing her into a wall.

"How dare you tell Ms. Kelly that we all needed more maths help!" Rebecca snapped, glaring at Emma. "If you hadn't opened your big mouth, then we'd all still be able to get away with learning about the stupid Duyfken! You ruined everything!" She kicked Emma's shin, before turning and walking out of the bathroom, and leaving Emma crying and shaking by the wall, until a pale girl with freckles and strawberry blonde hair came in.

"Emma?" The British girl, Kimberly Coasts, asked, as she came in. "I've been looking for you...oh my God, what happened?!" She asked, hurrying over to her best friend.

Emma sobbed, and began to tell Kimberly what had happened, as Robin left the bathroom.

Outside, Franky and Usopp took one look at Robin's stony face, and asked her what had happened.

She shook her head. "I do not wish to talk about it." She said flatly, as Emma and Kimberly emerged from the bathroom behind her.

"Why hasn't your sister done anything?" Kimberly asked. She was holding onto Emma's arm and shoulders.

"Sarah won't help me." Emma sniffled.

"Come on, let's get you up to the sick bay." Kimberly suggested. "We can tell the teachers."

Emma just nodded, and the two girls began to walk away.

The three cats made to follow them, but their world suddenly began to go black.

"What was that all about?" Usopp wondered out-loud, and glanced at Robin, but she pointedly turned away from him.

She herself knew how cruel kids could be, and she knew now that Emma knew that too. At least she'd had a friend like Kimberly around to help her get through it.

~1999: Home~

"Oh, wow, we moved again." Luffy commented, looking around the new house in awe.

Nami rolled her eyes. "Baka. It's not our house."

Luffy gave her a Look. "Oh, I know that, I just...hey, food!" He bounded over to the coffee table, where a plate of chips and a bowl of sauce were, but Sanji held him back.

"Luffy, look!" The blonde cat said, and Luffy looked.

There, sitting on the couch, with their feet up on the coffee table, were a nine-year-old Emma, and a nine-year-old Ashlee. The two cousins were watching a recording of The Spice Girls Live In Istanbul, but they weren't exactly getting along.

"Ginger's better." Ashlee was saying. She was wearing a cool pale green and white t-shirt, and a black skirt.

"No, Baby is!" Emma replied. She was wearing a Pokemon t-shirt and jeans.

"You only like her because she has the same name as you." Ashlee pointed out.

"Well you only like Geri because she has the same hair as you." Emma retorted.

"You should dye your hair." Ashlee said suddenly, tugging on a lock of Emma's (now much shorter) dark brown hair. "I think it'd suit you."

"No way." Emma rolled her eyes. "I mean, me, a red-head? Like, even..."

"No, just ask your parents." Ashlee insisted. She reached over and dipped her fingers in the tomato sauce and, before Emma could stop her, had smeared it down the strand of hair that she was holding. "There, you see?"

"Ashlee!" Emma cried, and then raised her voice. "Mum! Dad!"

Lee and Bruce, sitting over in the kitchen with Rose and John, pointedly ignored her.

"Guys!" Ashlee called as well, mainly just to annoy them further - she'd never get away with this at home. She tried to get their attention another way. "The tomato sauce is on the floor!"

And, Luffy chose that moment to take a flying leap at the table and, of course, the tomato sauce did end up on the floor.

"How did that happen?!" Lee cried, as she and Rose rushed over with paper towels.

Emma and Ashlee both pointed at each other. "She did it!"

Lee snapped: "Outside, now! Both of you!" She pushed them both outside, and then rolled her eyes when the two girls began to laugh.

"So...do they get along, or do they not get along?" Sanji wondered, still not quite understanding how women worked.

"Yes." Was Nami's reply, as the scene began to shift around them. "Don't worry, Sanji - you'll understand someday..."

~2000: School~

Usopp, Robin and Franky followed Emma across the school oval - on top of not wearing frilly socks to school anymore, she had started leaving her Mum at the car, instead of being walked to the classroom.

Emma was holding a purple Connector Texta (the one that connected at the lid to other Textas of its kind) and writing on her hand. "Okay, so seven-seven's a forty-nine." She muttered, writing the number down on her thumb. "It's not cheating." She told herself. "I just need a little bit of...help, to remember what the number is...that way, I won't have to stay in at recess anymore!" She walked into the classroom and sat down, and Franky, Usopp and Robin watched as the school day began.

The teacher brought a small box of little numbered cubes to the front of the classroom during the very first lesson of the day, and began to draw some out, randomly. The kids who had that certain number had to get up and recite the times-tables of that day, which happened to be seven.

The last number called was Emma's, which was number nine.

She stood up, and held the sheet out in front of her - it had rows of numbers written as things like 7x4, but without the answers. They were just there for reference, but Robin, Franky and Usopp suddenly understood that she could now see the answers that were on her thumb.

She started reciting very quickly, and finally finished, looking both surprised and pleased, as the teacher congratulated her.

"Keep working hard, Emma." He told her. "You have potential."

"I...I guess so." Emma nodded, and sat down, trading a smile with a girl with white-blonde hair that sat next to her, but another girl with white-blonde hair glared across at her.

"You didn't finish them last week." The glaring girl said, as the teacher had walked out of the classroom to speak to another teacher. "So don't act like you're suddenly a genius, Emma."

Emma swallowed, and then looked determined. "Be quiet and mind your own business, Kelly." She said, and the girl sitting next to her stared at her, her blue eyes shining like she couldn't believe that Emma had just stood up for herself.

Kelly frowned. "Don't say that." She said, but Emma pointedly turned away from her, and began to talk to her friend, leaving Kelly to stew in her own annoyance.

"She shouldn't have cheated." Usopp said, frowning, from where he, Robin and Franky sat on the row of cubbies (which, in Australia, were called pigeon-holes, for some reason).

"Hmm..." Franky shook his head. "I think that it's okay - after all, the more times she writes down the ones she tends to forget, the more she'll remember them!"

"Are you sure about that?" Usopp wanted to know, as their world began to black out.

"Pretty sure, yeah." Franky nodded.

~2000: Home~

Nami, Sanji and Luffy watched as Lee and Bruce went out for a walk during the evening, leaving the two girls home by themselves.

They wandered down to the activity room, where Emma was watching The Saddle Club on TV.

"No, Cobalt!" She sobbed, as the black stallion was injured in a jumping accident.

Nami noticed a pair of pretend stirrups slung over a towel on the back of the couch, and rolled her eyes. No doubt, Emma liked to pretend to ride the couch like a horse and, sure enough, there was her bike helmet on the couch, and a pair of purple gum boots - Emma was horse-crazy, apparently.

"If Mum and Dad would just let me ride, then I'd be a better rider than Veronica!" Emma declared, wiping away her tears. "Oh no, they have to have Cobalt put down! Poor Carole!" She hugged a nearby horse toy.

"She sure is emotional, isn't she?" Luffy commented, as he chowed down on a chocolate bar.

"What the...where did you get that from?!" Nami snapped, just as some loud punk music began to play from a nearby bedroom.

Emma frowned, and paused her video (on the scene of Cobalt dreaming about galloping through the fields once more, as he is dying), before going over and knocking on the door (due to a sign stating that one could not enter until one had knocked). She then opened it, and said: "Sarah, can you please turn that down?"

"Go away." Sarah said, from where she was sitting at her desk.

Nami, Sanji and Luffy crept into the room, and realised that the walls were dark blue, and that the ceiling was pitch black. Posters of slightly scary-looking rock stars decorated the walls, and the music playing loudly from the stereo was Freestyler, by Bomfunk MC.

Emma went into the room. "Whatcha doing?" She wanted to know. "Oh, you're drawing Kari, from Digimon!" She said, admiringly. "That's really good."

"Mmhmm." Sarah replied. "Now, go away."

"Okay." Emma turned, but then she gasped. "Oh! You got the Digimon card from the butter!" She gasped again. "Oh! It's Patamon! Sarah, can I have it, please?! He's my favourite, you know that!" She picked up the card, with the little orange flying pig on it.

"No!" Sarah snapped. "Get out!"

"Please, Sarah, I'll trade you three cards, and I'll unpack the dishwasher for the next two weeks!" Emma said, still holding onto the card.

"I said no!" Sarah stood up - she towered over Emma. She tried to take the card back, but Emma held on stubbornly.

So, Sarah hit her.

And, not just a little push or the whacks Nami or Sanji sometimes gave to the back of Luffy's head.

There was a very audible sound as Sarah's fist connected with the side of her little sister's head, and Emma immediately fell to the floor. The card fluttered from her fingers, and Sarah picked it up.

Nami, Sanji and Luffy noticed how she looked at her sister with disgust and, when Emma didn't move, Sarah said: "Hmph. Yeah, right - get up and get out."

Slowly, and without looking at her sister, Emma got up, and hurried from the room.

The three cats had to scurry to avoid being shut in when Sarah slammed the door, and only then did the tears begin to flow from Emma's eyes. She ran to her room, and the three cats hurried after her. Emma slammed the door shut, and climbed up onto her single bunk-bed, grabbing her favourite stuffed animals and sobbing into her pillow.

"We did not just see that." Nami whispered. Sure, she and Nojiko had fought sometimes, although Nami had been in a slightly different situation by this stage in her life, but Nami knew that Nojiko would never have hit her like this and, if she had, then Bellemere, had she still been alive, would have hit Nojiko back twice as hard. She knew that Nojiko respected her enough not to, though.

"Poor Emma-Chan..." Sanji muttered, and actually looked around for a cigarette, like he usually did when he was upset.

Luffy didn't say anything. He was thinking of himself and Ace, and how they used to do that all the time. But, when he voiced this opinion, Nami just snapped at him.

"Luffy, you don't know anything, do you?!" The tabby cat raised her voice to be heard over Emma's sobbing. "Nobody should do that to anybody, especially not to a younger relative who can't defend themselves! Remember Emma's reaction to her cousin Clinton making that death-threat to Ashlee's younger brother, Mitchell? You and your brother are just...you're just..." She glanced over at Sanji, as their world began to shift. "Sanji, help me out here, I said something rather good one morning before coffee, remember? What was it?"

"Anomalies." Sanji said promptly, remembering.

"Hey!" Luffy was indignant. "Ace and I do not have tentacles!"

"Those are anemones, you baka!" Nami and Sanji snapped in unison, as they all whited out.

"Oh, well we're not that, either."

"We never said you were!"

"Shishishi, you guys are talking at the same time!"

"Just shut up and let us get to the next scene!"

~2001: School~

"I don't have my sheet with me." Eleven-year-old Emma whispered, as she dug around in her desk tray.

"You didn't bring it?" Krystal whispered back. "We were supposed to."

"Oh well." Emma shrugged, as everybody else at her table started their work.

"Oh dear..." Robin muttered, sitting on the shelf above the school bags, near the window, with Franky and Usopp.

"What-oh?" Usopp asked her.

"She should be asking to look at somebody else's work-sheet, but that just hasn't occurred to her." Robin stated, shaking her head.

"Yeah, but they have to keep on turning the sheet over - wouldn't that just be annoying?" Usopp wondered.

Robin just sighed, as Emma chatted to her friends about Digimon and Pokemon, and didn't do her work.

When it came time for the work to be collected, he sent a girl named Ashleigh Osbourne around to collect the sheets. When the slightly chubby girl got to Emma, she asked for her sheet, and Emma said that she hadn't done it.

"Mr. Barnes!" Ashleigh called. "Emma did do her work!"

"Why not?" Mr. Barnes asked from his desk.

"I-I left the sheet at home." Emma replied, as everybody in the class turned to look at her.

"Then why didn't you borrow somebody else's sheet instead of just twiddling your thumbs like an idiot?!" Mr. Barnes was famous at the school for having the shortest temper of any of the teachers. "Stand up right now!" He was also an ex-policeman.

As Emma stood up, looking pale, Franky whispered: "I agree that she should have used her initiative, but don't you think that's a bit too harsh?"

"Tell him that." Usopp replied, jerking his head in Mr. Barnes' direction, as the teacher angrily asked Emma to explain herself.

"I...I left the sheet at home..." Tears had gathered in Emma's eyes, and she looked really upset, as everybody in the classroom stared at her. A few people snickered, but her three best friends (Krystal, Mayling and Kimberly) were sympathetic to her, especially when she went on: "It's been...bad at home...Granddad has cancer, and today Mum went into the hospital to have cancer removed from her hand..." She burst into tears, and Krystal, who was sitting next to her, immediately stood up and put an arm around her best friend's shoulders.

The kids in the class merely stared at her.

Mr. Barnes looked slightly taken aback, and then said: "That still doesn't excuse what you did." This earned him a glare from Krystal. He sighed. "Go and wash your face...Krystal, go with her. Everybody else, take out your maths books."

As Krystal and Emma left the classroom, and a few of the girls snickered because Emma was crying, Robin just shook her head.

"I hope she was okay." Usopp said, as their world began to shift.

"That's why she has her super friends with her, Usopp." Frankly said, as Mayling and Kimberly hurried out of the classroom, and the three cats blacked out.

~2001: Home~

"Oh wow, looks like a party." Luffy was eyeing the food table - Sanji had to hold him back, as Nami tried to figure out whose house they were at.

She went into the house when somebody opened the door, and saw, to her surprise, a hospital bed. Oxygen tubes were hooked up to it and, when Nami jumped up onto the bed, she saw an old man lying there, with tubes hooked up to him and an oxygen mask over his face.

"Hmm..." Nami said, and then she looked over at the girl sitting by the man's bedside. Her eyes widened when she realised that it was Sarah. The fifteen-year-old was drinking Passiona, and writing in a book. Nami leaned across, craning her neck, and saw that it was a very deep poem, full of rich emotions and a lot of pain. Nami looked up at Sarah, who suddenly glanced up. Nami cringed, but then she realised that Sarah was looking at her Granddad.

There was suddenly a low, steady whine from one of the machines, and Sarah stood up suddenly, putting her book, pen and drink down. "Granddad?" She said, reaching out a hand. Her eyes widened. "D-Dad? Dad, come here, please!" She called.

Oh no... Nami realised, and dashed out the door when it was opened by Bruce. She weaved around peoples' legs, forgetting that she could just run straight through them, and found Luffy fishing in a koi pond - how on earth was he swimming? - and Sanji had been watching Emma play with a girl around her own age, who was a half-relative. Emma had a rope tied around her waist, and the other girl (Rachael) had been pretending to 'lunge' her (when you exercise a horse by letting it run a circle around you on a long lead line). Rachael was currently up at the house.

Nami ran up at to Sanji. "Sanji!" She said. "This is bad...Emma's Granddad's just died."

"Oh no..." Sanji muttered, voicing Nami's earlier thoughts, just as Rachael came back to Emma.

"I think Granddad's a-gone." Rachael said, matter-of-factly.

"What?" Emma whispered, the colour draining from her face.

"I think Granddad's dead." Rachael stated.

It was Emma's turn to say: "Oh no..." As she untied her 'lead line' and headed up to the house, hardly caring about the prickles on her feet. The eleven-year old found her Mother, who was crying, and received confirmation that Eric was indeed dead.

Nami, Sanji and Luffy (who had not succeeded in catching a fish, so he snagged a salmon pattie off of the BBQ instead) followed her around, as she found her Dad and sister (who weren't crying) and Rachael's older sister, Maggie (who was Sarah's age).

Maggie was crying but Rachael, like Sarah, was completely dry-eyed.

So was Emma, too, that is until her Nanna came out, red-eyed and sobbing.

That was when Emma's own tears started to fall, slowly at first, but then they became a torrent. She and her Dad took a walk out the front, where Bruce comforted her as best he could, by saying that Eric was out of pain now.

"I'm glad that she's always had her family by her side." Nami whispered, as they began to white out. "It's so important for her to have this, even if they aren't always good to her."

"I agree." Sanji nodded. "What caused her Granddad's death, though?"

Nami, remembering Sarah's poem, gave Sanji a Look. "Smoking."

~2002: School~

Franky, Robin and Usopp watched as twelve-year-old Emma got out of the car, and waved goodbye to her Mother.

"She looks blue." Franky commented, as they followed her across the basketball courts.

"I'd say brownishy-red." Usopp replied.

Franky rolled his eyes behind his sunglasses. "No, no, no - I mean she's depressed."

"Oh." Usopp blinked. "I wonder why?"

"We'll probably find out soon." Franky said, as Emma went over to her desk and sat down, placing her favourite Pony Pal books on the desk and resting her elbows on it.

"Mayling!" the heard her call, as the Chinese girl came into the classroom. "I got the Sailor Moon stickers for you!" She held them up and waved them about.

"Thanks." Mayling took the sheet of stickers. "But, I thought you were going to Penang?"

Emma's face fell. "Umm, no, Nanna has cancer."

"Oh, I'm so sorry..." Mayling said, giving her a quick hug. "Do you have to be in the sports carnival on Thursday?"

Emma shook her head. "No, Mum said I can skip it - I haven't trained for it, anyway."

"That's right." A new voice said, and a very athletic-looking girl came up to them. "I bet you just made it up so that you wouldn't have to do the sports carnival."

"I did not!" Emma snapped, but she was looking decidedly uncomfortable. "Go away, Kara!"

"Oh, and by the way, did you know that you have a massive lump on your neck?" Kara pointed out.

"I said, go away!"

Kara just rolled her eyes, and flounced off.

"Don't worry about her." Mayling said, putting an arm around Emma's shoulders. "Hey, thanks for the stickers, by the way."

Emma tried to smile. "Sure."

"Hey, I got you something from KL." Mayling said, reaching into her backpack. "They're really cool." She added, trying to make Emma feel better. "Ta-da! Catch-A-Bubbles!"

As Emma and Mayling gushed over the bubbles that, supposedly, never burst, Robin was shaking her head.

"Children can be very cruel." The black cat stated, as their world began to black out.

"Yeah, but how much longer are we going to be caught in this time-warp?" Franky wanted to know.

"Who knows?" Robin mused, smiling slightly. "Maybe forever?"

Usopp gulped.

~2002: Home~

"I was born in Oklahoma, in the rolling Osage Hills!" Twelve-year-old Emma sang, and her voice wasn't nearly as good as it was going to one day become but, as Nami, Sanji and Luffy watched, Emma seemed to be happy, holding a cowgirl Jessie doll and singing along to the song. "And i rode my pinto pony at full gallop for my thrills!" She sang that part very loudly.

Just then, Lee came into the activity room.

"Emma, I need to talk to...what are you wearing?" She asked, raising an eyebrow at her daughter's getup, which was supposed to make her into a cowgirl.

"Sorry." Emma apologized, and stopped the video. She sat down. "What's up?"

"I think you know." Lee looked at her. "Your teacher called me - why didn't you tell me what you did?"

"What did I do?" Emma asked her.

"You wrote a very mean note to a girl in your class." Lee looked disapproving. "Saying something about her being an ugly meanie?"

Emma pouted. "Mum, it was her fault - she and Nicole Gash were ganging up on me, and calling me weird and a freak."

"Well, maybe if you'd stop taking all your horse books to school, and talking about Sailor Moon, then the kids would stop calling you weird?" Lee suggested.

Emma turned away. "I don't care."

Lee frowned. "Well, you should. You're going to apologize to Kristie on Monday, and you're also grounded for a week - no going to see Krystal."

"But, Mum!" Emma cried, turning to face her Mother as she stood up. "That's not fair!"

"Well, you should have thought about that before you wrote a hate note. How would you feel if somebody wrote that to you?" Lee asked her.

"Fine, I'll apologize for writing the note." Emma muttered, perking up slightly when a younger-looking black Ranger appeared at the door, wagging his tail. Emma immediately hurried out to see the puppy, leaving Nami, Sanji and Luffy to contemplate what had just happened.

"I agree that writing a note may not have been the best move," Nami stated, sitting down. "But...she shouldn't be punished further than having to apologize, I think..."

Sanji agreed, as their world began to white out.

Law and Ace had been following Emma around for the past four days although, in between all of the strange transitions, where day suddenly became night and vice-a-versa, it had really only been a few hours. They noticed that she seemed to be happier than they could ever remember seeing her. She stayed very close either to her eight-year-old-self, or to her Nanna, and would occasionally nuzzle up to either Ace or Law, to express her happiness.

The three of them also took their time to swim whenever they could, as they had all realised that it might not last. Well, as long as it didn't run out when they were in the water...

During a particular evening, as Law and Ace watched Emma watch her family - her Mum, sister, Nanna and Aunty Cheryl (in a wheelchair), that is - eat dinner, men with guitars came around to all the tables, asking for song requests.

When they got to the table with the five females at it, they asked eight-year-old Emma if she wanted to hear Macarena or Can You Feel The Love Tonight?.

She, of course, chose The Lion King song, and grinned as the men started to play the song, and sing.

Emma also began to sing.

Ace nonchalantly sidled up to Emma, as Law glared at him in a calculating way. Ace just looked stubbornly at him, before cuddling up to Emma's side.

"You really like this song, ne, Emiko?" He asked her.

"Mochiron." She purred and then, at the exact same time as her eight-year-old self, and in the exact same tone of voice, added: "It's my favourite movie!"

Ace blinked at her, and then smirked. "Have I ever told you how cute you are?"

She looked away, and would have blushed if she could have. "Really?"

He pounced on her, pinning her to the ground under him. "You bet." He said, as she purred. "Once we get back to being humans, Emiko, I am going to..."

"Uh, I hate to interrupt," Law said, sarcastically. "But, Emiko, your Nanna just got up and left."

"She probably went back to the room." Emma replied, as Ace glared at Law. "I remember thinking that at the time."

"She went the other way." Law stated.

"Oh." Emma blinked. "Maybe we'd better follow her..." She said, getting out from underneath Ace (much to the black cat's disappointment) and heading in the direction that Law had indicated, with him and Ace right behind her. "I have a feeling that we're here for a reason, after all..."

"I knew she was going to say that." Ace muttered, and Emma stopped.

Turning around, she looked from Ace to Law, and then down at the ground. "I...I'm sorry." Her ears had drooped, her tail was on the ground - she was looking the picture of complete sadness all of a sudden.

"Emiko?" Ace took a step towards her. "What's wrong?"

"What's this all about?" Law wanted to know, blinking in surprise.

"I...I was so happy, to be able to watch a time in my life that I loved so much," Emma muttered. The red and white cat kept her eyes cast down, as she lay down on the ground. "That...I didn't even realise...I didn't think that...you guys wouldn't want to be doing this. I mean, Ace-Chan, you must be so worried about Luffy right now, and...well, we don't know if he and the others are alright. And...I was so caught up in myself, that I didn't even think about your feelings...either of you, so...I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I was so selfish." She closed her eyes, keeping her chin on the ground. i'm such a baka! How can I call myself their friend - or, something more, or whatever the Hell I am with them - if I didn't even pay any attention to them? A few tears escaped from her eyes, as she just lay there on the pavement. It was the one with smooth stones stuck in the cement, and she had always loved it. Somehow, it seemed to bring her comfort.

Suddenly, something small and rough-feeling, like sandpaper, touched her face, just under her eyes, and she opened them to realise that it was Ace - the black cat was licking away her tears!

Emma glanced at him, as he lay down with her.

"Emiko," he said, placing his paws over hers. "I'm not angry at you." He told her. "I'm so sorry if it had seemed that way."

"But...I was so selfish..." Emma mumbled.

Ace chuckled gently. "What, you think I'd be angry at you for that?" She looked up at him. "Emiko, you're doing exactly what I'd probably do if I was in your situation."

"If it was Sabo?" She asked, in a voice barely above a whisper.

Ace smiled slightly. "Probably." He admitted. He moved towards her, and nuzzled up against her. "So, don't worry about it, please. For now, I'm just happy that you're happy, and I don't mind following you around this place."

"Me either." Law said, and Ace blinked. He had almost forgotten that the surgeon-cat was there, but now Law walked a bit closer, much to Ace's annoyance as he stood up. "Emiko, I really don't mind following you around. Like you said, we're probably here for a reason, so we should find out what it is." He leaned down a bit closer to look at her in the eye. "Besides, you must be worried about them, as well. For now, this is good for you - to be distracted."

"I thought you told me before that I needed to focus." Emma said, in a small voice.

Law gentle placed a paw on the top of her head. "When you're by yourself, Emiko - and, I don't plan on leaving your side ever again."

Ace rolled his eyes.

Emma smiled, as Law stepped back, and allowed her to stand up. "So...you two really aren't angry at me for being selfish?" They shook their heads. She smiled slightly. "Then...I guess I'm sorry for being so emotional. I guess nothing's changed, huh?"

"Nothing's gonna change, except with regards to this guy." The two male cats replied, and then jerked their heads towards each other - they ending up hitting each other by mistake.

Emma stared at them for a moment, and then started giggling. Soon, she was laughing outright, and though Law and Ace glared at each other, they were glad that she was at least over her emo state.

"I am curious, though, Emiko," Law said, as they resumed their search for her Nanna. "Why did you think that we were angry at you?"

"Well," she glanced at him. "Because the two of you were arguing...what was the reason for that, anyway?" She asked them curiously.

"You really don't know?" Ace asked her. She shook her head. "Oh boy..."

"It's not because of me, is it?"

"No!" Ace cried, his eyes wide. Well, yes, but no!

"Of course not." Law said calmly. "I just can't stand Fire-Fist's entire being, is all."

"And I can't stand Trafalgar's inability to concede defeat." Ace retorted.

"And I think I know where my Nanna went." Emma said suddenly, and began climbing a staircase. "I hear her voice, you two, so come on!" They don't like each other because they both like me, right? Oh dear...

~2003: School~

"Oh, so it's a new school?" Usopp asked, watching a thirteen-year-old Emma put her school books in her locker.

"Seems so." Franky nodded.

Emma wore a new uniform, a blue shirt with a maroon tartan skirt, black stockings and a maroon blazer, with black shoes and a maroon tie. The uniform seemed to hang from her - she hadn't really grown much in the last year or so.

Robin, Franky and Usopp followed her, as she walked past other students on their lunch-break, too. Everywhere she looked, she saw groups of people, but none of them, despite being in her year, acknowledged her.

In the end, she went to the library, and just sat there, reading, until the bell rang again.

"Well, what was the point of that?" Usopp wanted to know.

"The point is," Franky said. "That she hasn't made any friends at her new school."

"But, why not?" Usopp blinked.

"Weren't you paying attention in primary school?" Franky asked him. "People think she's weird...I can understand that."

"So can I." Robin admitted.

"But, if she doesn't try and make friends soon..." Usopp realised, as they started to black out.

"Then she'll be exactly like she is as an adult." Robin confirmed.

~2003: Home~

"Hey, so she's moved again?" Nami realised, as they stood in the darkness of Emma's new room.

"Yeah, seems so." Sanji nodded, just as Emma stirred, and sat up. In the moonlight, they noticed how pale she was, and that she was shaking. They followed her down the hallway, to her parents' room, where her Mum and Dad woke up immediately.

"What's wrong with her?" Luffy wanted to know, hoping up onto the bed.

"I don't know." Nami and Sanji replied in unison.

"Mum..." Thirteen-year-old Emma said, holding onto her stomach. "There's a pain in...my stomach..." She took a few steps, and then she collapsed.

"Emma!" Lee gasped, as she and Bruce reached out to catch their daughter. "Bruce, call an ambulance!"

"It's fine." Bruce said, although his voice was tense, as he and Lee laid Emma out across the bed, next to the black cat that they couldn't see.

Luffy looked at Emma's pale face. "Emmy..." He whispered.

"What could it be, Bruce?" Lee asked worriedly, as she got a cold flannel, and Emma's eyelids began to flutter.

"It could be appendicitis." Bruce said, noticing how Emma's hand immediately flew to the right side of her stomach.

"Wh-what happened?" Emma whispered.

"You fainted." Lee said, as she placed a wet flannel on Emma's forehead.

"Oh..." Emma sounded upset. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be." Lee and Bruce said in unison.

"We'll take you to the hospital." Lee added. "Bruce, go and wake up Sarah."

Emma just groaned, and closed her eyes again.

"You'll be okay, Emmy." Luffy whispered to her, even though she couldn't hear him. "You grow up to be strong, and you even turn into a cat!"

"Why's that a good thing?" Nami rolled her eyes, as they vanished again.

~2004: School~

"It doesn't seem like she did a good job at making new friends." Franky commented, as they watched fourteen-year-old Emma sit in class, reading by herself and waiting for the teacher to start class (it was an art class). She was wearing her summer uniform - a blue nurse-like dress with a maroon jumper. On the jumper were an assortment of pins - a little green one with Nirwana Club: Bali Dynasty written on it, an orange ribbon, and a black ribbon.

"Hey, Emma?" A girl with short dark-blonde hair sauntered over to her. "What's with all the ribbons?"

"Huh?" Emma looked up from her book (The Secrets Of Jin-Sei) and then looked away. "Oh, well, they're just...important to me, I guess...?"

"Why?" Another girl, a tall dark-skinned girl who was very pretty, had also joined them, along with a few others.

Robin, Franky and Usopp jumped up onto a nearby desk, and saw how nervous Emma looked, being the centre of such attention.

"Oh, umm...this one's from Bali," Emma pointed to the green pin with dancing frogs on it. "The orange one's...for the Bali bombings, yeah? And the black one's for skin cancer."

"Have you ever been to Bali?" A random boy asked.

Emma nodded. "Yeah, I've been going since I was a little kid, and we're going back again next year, because my Nanna loves it there." Robin noticed the way she touched the black ribbon when she said that.

"Lucky." The first girl said enviously. "I've never even been to Rottnest."

"That's because you get motion-sickness." The dark-skinned girl pointed out, and they laughed.

Except for Emma, who merely smiled, and returned to her book.

The teacher, a large man with orangey-red hair, called the class to order then, and everything went smoothly until he called emma up to the front of the classroom.

"What is this?" He asked, holding up a piece of paper.

"My report?" Emma guessed, and Robin noticed that she shifted uncomfortably.

"I can see that," the teacher stated. "It has your name on it, which is why I called you up here. What I don't know is why you chose this piece." He held up the print-out of the painting that she had chosen to report on, which was a giant wave threatening some small fishing boats.

"That's The Great Wave Off Kanagawa." Emma replied quietly. "It fit the theme of romanticism in art during the 1830's."

"I was referring to romanticism in art in Europe." The teacher stressed, as he took out some other reports by Emma's fellow classmates. "Like this, or this." He then held up her report. "This is from Japan."

Emma bristled - the three cats watching could recognize it almost instantly. "You never said that it had to be from Europe."

The teacher appeared not to have heard her, and pointed to a particular section of her report. "And this - what is this?"

Emma didn't say anything and, curious, Usopp jumped up onto the table behind the teacher, and read the part of the report that his finger was pointing to. "'You can tell that, when this wave hist them, there's going to be a massive loss of life - the white crests of the wave appear as little claws, waiting to grab at the poor fishermen'." Usopp blinked. "What's so weird about that?"

"It's her interpretation of the painting." Robin remarked quietly.

Franky looked at her. "Hers, or yours?"

Robin just glanced at him.

"That's how I interpret the piece." Emma shrugged, not meeting the teacher's gaze. "It's not my fault that some people here don't find that romantic." She added, albeit under her breath, so the teacher probably didn't hear her.

"Well, while I respect your interpretation of the piece, this was not what the brief stated." The teacher replied. "Have your Mother sign this and then bring it back to me tomorrow morning." He raised an eyebrow. "And, what are all those ridiculous things on your dress?"

"M-my badges." Emma replied, taking the report off of the teacher.

"They're not part of the school dress code." The teacher stated, and Emma sighed. "Take them off."

"Fine." Emma muttered, through gritted teeth.

"That's a bit harsh, isn't it?" Usopp mused. "I mean, she was just stating her opinion."

"Now we know why she has a hard time expressing herself in the future." Franky agreed.

"How come we all seem to have an opinion on this, anyway?" Usopp wondered, as they started to disappear again.

"Well, it's not like we have anything better to do right now." Franky pointed out.

"Touche."

~2004: Home~

"Wow, this is the house that she's in now!" Luffy pressed his face to the glass sliding doors. "But, hey, look - it looks different outside!"

"They must've done some landscaping over the years." Nami agreed, coming to stand beside him. "Hey, there's Emma." She added, as Emma walked up to the house from out the back, and Ranger followed her.

They watched as she knelt down to give her a hug, but then both girl and dog jumped, when a door slammed open from somewhere in the house.

"GET OUT!" A voice that they all recognized as Sarah's screamed, and Emma hurried into the house, looking terrified.

Nami, Sanji and Luffy followed Emma at a run, down the hall to her sister's room, where they found her trying to slam their Mother's fingers in the door.

Lee was bracing the door with the heel of her other hand, but Sarah was stronger than she looked.

Emma lunged forwards, and pushed against the door as well. "Sarah, stop this!"

"GET OUT!" Sarah yelled again, in a terrible voice - it sounded like a banshee was screaming.

"NO!" Both Emma and Lee yelled in unison, and all three of them were crying, but Sarah seemed more angry than upset.

Emma suddenly lunged again, but this time she managed to hip-and-shoulder the door open, and grabbed onto her sister's wrist. "Sarah, why are you doing this?!" She gasped suddenly, and wrenched her hand back, when she realised that it, along with Sarah's wrist, were coated in blood. "Sarah?!" Emma gasped, as Lee stepped into the room, looking pale, and took her daughter's wrist, taking in the deep and frenzied scratches, which were the result of Sarah cutting herself.

"Emma, go and call your Father." Lee said, in a shaky voice, as Sarah broke down, and Lee embraced her.

Emma nodded, and hurried out to the kitchen, and the three cats followed her. "It's gotta be the Roaccutane." They heard her mutter, as she picked up the phone and pressed the speed-dial number.

"Well, that was certainly unexpected." Sanji commented, sighing.

"I'm glad that she stood her ground." Nami nodded. "This must've been such a scary time for her."

"Yeah...it seems that her family isn't perfect." Sanji said, as they started to white out.

"Nobody's is." Nami replied.

~2005: School~

"Oh, look, she made a friend." Usopp pointed out, as they watched a fifteen-year-old Emma sit on the grass and chat with another girl.

The other girl had tanned skin and short golden blonde hair, and she was small like Emma.

"Wait, you had appendicitis?" The new girl asked, in a British accent. And, when Emma nodded, she grinned. "No way, me too! I also had open heart surgery."

"I had thyroid cancer." Emma said quietly.

"Oh, wow!" The new girl looked impressed. "Hey, what are your hobbies? I like horseback-riding and watching anime, and I like reading and video games!"

"No way..." Emma looked surprised. "I like all of those things, too! Do you have horses, Sara?" She asked suddenly.

Sara nodded. "Yeah, we've got two, Toby and Chiv - hey, you should come over and ride sometime! My Mum and I could teach you!"

"Really?" Emma tried her best not to look too excited, and failed miserably. "That'd be so cool! I've always wanted to learn how to ride!"

"Then it's settled." Sara grinned. "Hey, what're your favourite animes? Mine are Sailor Moon and Inuyasha."

"I like Sailor Moon, too!" Emma grinned. "I also like One Piece."

"Yes, well, I should think so." Franky nodded.

"Franky, I hate to say it, but you sounded just like like somebody's Mum when you said that." Usopp told him, and Franky cringed.

Robin smiled.

"Oh, yeah, my brother Ian watches that." Sara nodded. "You should watch Inuyasha - it's the best."

"Okay." Emma nodded, looking happy for the first time at school. "Hey, so, tell me about your horses. What breed are they? Colours? They're both geldings, right? Do you ride English, or Western?"

"Well, she seems to be happy." Robin commented, sitting back on a nearby bench. "I was a little worried, since Krystal, Mayling and Kimberly didn't go to this school with her, but..."

"But what?" Usopp asked, as they started to black out - again.

"We haven't heard anything about Kimberly or Sara from Emma, which makes me think that something bad happens in regards to them." Robin said quietly.

"Oh dear..." Franky mumbled. "Not super..."

~2005: Home~

"We're in a hospital." Luffy stated the obvious.

"Yeah, but why?" Nami wondered, then she noticed somebody that she recognized. "Oh, hey, wait a minute, there's Lee!" They all bounded over to the woman, who was pacing in front of a set of double-doors. A red light with a needle designed onto it was aglow atop the doors.

As Nami, Sanji and Luffy watched, the doors swung open, and Lee looked up hopefully.

A blonde-haired nurse came bustling out, and headed into another, nearby room.

Nami, as she watched the doors swing, time it carefully, and then leapt through, just as the doors swung shut behind her.

"Nami!" She heard Luffy cry, but she ignored him, and just followed her senses to a group of surgeons crowded around an operating table.

Nami carefully jumped up onto a shelf that was at the back of the table, and took a look. She wished that she hadn't.

Lying on the table, with an oxygen mask over her face, was Emma. The fifteen-year-old was under general anaesthetic but, what really made Nami feel squeamish was the fact that she was also under the knife. A large incision was in her throat, and the doctors were busy taking out a large, reddish-coloured organ from the right side of it.

"Place that in the thyroid bed." One of the surgeons was saying, as something white was placed into the now hollow chamber at the right side of Emma's neck.

Eww... Nami thought, not understanding why Law loved performing surgery so much. She wondered if he'd ever done this before, and how Chopper would react to it.

"Now, close the strap muscles with a single figure of eight suture." The surgeon instructed. "And then one, or at most, two, around the outside..."

"Doctor, we have intense bleeding around the first row of stitches!" A female surgeon suddenly said.

I can't watch anymore of this... Nami thought, going to step off of the shelf, and ending up falling instead. As a row of gauze bandages dominoed their way down. And, I'm SO glad that Luffy and Sanji didn't just see that! She added, as she whited out.

~2006: School~

"There she is." Franky recognized Emma, who was walking through the crowds of students, towards a group of girls, one of whom was Sara.

"Hey." Emma greeted Sara, but she looked slightly nervous.

"Oh." Sara glanced at her. "Hey...oh, wait, Amy, sue the red one, not the blue one!" She was showing Amy how to make braided bracelets.

"I-I got you a present." Emma said shyly, holding out the wrapped gift (she had done her best to wrap it but, let's face it, she was no wrapper). "Our Japanese class got to go to Rottnest last week, and so I got you something for your birthday."

"Oh, umm, thanks." Sara mumbled, unwrapping a beautiful opal necklace, which she held up to the light, and then put back in the wrapping paper. "It's nice." She put the bundle in her dress pocket.

Emma frowned. "It's this week, isn't it? I didn't miss it?"

"No, you got it." Sara replied.

"Sara, why have you been avoiding me?" Emma wanted to know.

Amy glanced up, interested.

"I haven't." Sara mumbled, looking decidedly uncomfortable.

"Yes, you have." Emma insisted. "You see me coming down the corridor, and you turn and walk in the other direction. What did I do?" Emma looked hurt.

"Okay, you really wanna know?!" Sara snapped, suddenly looking annoyed. "It's because every time we're together, all you can talk about is horses this and horses that! It's starting to get really annoying! Like, who cares that you learned to do a rising trot? I've been able to do that for years!"

"But, Sara..."

"You know, I'm beginning to think that the only reason you wanted to come over all those times was so that you could ride Toby." Sara added, crossing her arms.

A range of expressions flitted across Emma's face, including hurt, anger and betrayal. "Yeah?" She put her hands on her hips. "I'm beginning to think that the only reason you became friends with me was because you were new and didn't have anybody else! now, you're tossing me aside like a piece of paper! No offence, Amy."

"None taken."

"Yeah, well, at least I can make friends on my own." Sara said, raising an eyebrow. "Unlike you."

Emma gasped, and then she turned and ran away from the situation, muttering how it was just like with Kimberly, and how everybody kept on leaving her.

"i hope Mayling and Krystal don't decide to ditch me, too..." She muttered.

"Don't worry, Emma-Nee-Chan," Franky said, as their world began to shift. "They won't..."

~2006: Home~

"Where are we now?" Sanji wanted to know, as they stood on the grass outside of a house that was the only one lit up on the otherwise dark street.

"I dunno, but here comes a car." Nami pointed out, as a dark blue car pulled up in the driveway, and Emma and her Father got out.

They were walking very slowly, and Emma stopped before she reached the door.

Bruce placed a sympathetic hand on her shoulder, and said: "Come on, let's go in." He opened up the front door, and they walked inside the house.

Nami, Sanji and Luffy followed them quickly in, to avoid being shut outside, and walked across the hard wooden floors, and into a living room.

Three people were sitting on the couch, and all three of them were crying - one was Emma's Aunty, one was her mother, and one was her sister.

Emma took one look at her sister, and her own tears started up. She hugged her sister, and their parents put their arms around them, in a group hug. Emma then hugged her Aunty, who was intellectually handicapped. She had lived with her Mother for all of her life, but that would never be the case, ever again.

"I want to see her..." Emma whispered.

Lee wordlessly took Emma's hand, and led her down the hallway.

Luffy, Sanji and Nami followed them, into the room at the end of the hallway.

Lee's other sister Bev, and Bev's daughter, were standing on either side of a bed, where an elderly woman lay, unmoving.

"Nanna..." Emma sobbed, as tears flowed freely down her face. She knelt by the bedside, and buried her face in the sheets, unable to do much else. Lee could only comfort her daughter with a hand on her shoulder, as she too was struggling to cope with losing the woman that had held all of their lives together for so many years.

"So this is what happened..." Nami whispered, surprised to find tears in her own eyes, but she guessed that, after knowing Emma for the amount of time that she had, seeing her in this kind of pain was going to be almost unbearable. "Poor Emma..."

Sanji nodded silently, but he couldn't help but wonder why they were being shown all of this.

As they began to white out again, Luffy posed the question: "How much longer are we going to be doing this for?"

~2007: School~

"Is that...Emma?" Usopp blinked.

"Our Emma-Nee-Chan?" Franky stared.

"She certainly looks quite different now, doesn't she?" Robin mused, taking in Emma's black eye-shadow, black headband, black nail polish and doubley-pierced ears.

Seventeen-year-old Emma was currently getting in trouble for her excessive fashion statements. She was ordered to take off the make-up and nail polish, and Robin followed her to the girls' bathroom again, where she locked herself in a stall that had its own sink.

Meanwhile, two other girls stepped into the bathroom.

"How'd you go with your ECS exams?" One of the girls asked, as she began to check her hair in the mirror.

"Okay." The other girl replied. "What about you? How'd your food-N-nut prac. go?"

"Yeah, it was good." The first girl replied, now running a brush through her blonde hair. "Couldn't believe we got stuck with Emma in our group, though." She added.

Oh no. Robin though, sitting up high on the window-sill. Emma, who was hidden away in the last stall, had paused in the removal of her eye-shadow, and was now silently staring at her reflection in the mirror.

"I mean," the first girl went on. "Can you believe she's started wearing make-up now? Does she think that will make her more popular?"

"It's black, and she's goth." The second girl said flatly, shrugging. "Do you remember the dress that she wore to the year ten dance? She was so pale back then. That dress just looked terrible."

"Yeah, and the worst part was, she thought she looked good." The first girl responded. "Did you hear what she said to Shane when he asked her out?"

"Yeah, but he wasn't being serious." The second girl reminded her. "He was just bullshitting - nobody would ask Emma Pax out."

"Yeah," the first girl agreed, and then snickered. "She can't even cook. Like, in the prac., she was saying how she knew how to cook cannelloni. And I said, well, it's conchiglioni, so shut up, you know?"

As the second girl giggled, Robin wondered: Aren't they the same thing, but one has tubes and one has shells?

Robin just shook her head, and watched as the two girls left. She turned, and watched as Emma sank down onto the floor of the bathroom stall, and took out a red and black MP3 Player.

She turned on the music, and Robin could hear it clearly, at the volume that it was. It was some heavy metal song, and Robin smiled, as she started to black out. So, this was when the heavy metal love had started...

~2007: Home~

"You're going to fail if you keep doing this!" Bruce was saying to Emma, who was standing there, staring defiantly at the floor.

Nami, Sanji and Luffy watched on in silence. This was going to be a very bad argument, they could tell.

"I did the assignment, but Ms. Glendinning wouldn't let me finish my speech." Emma mumbled. "She said that it was too long..."

"She is your teacher, and you will do as she says." Bruce said firmly, crossing his arms.

"Wow, he's stressed." Sanji commented, and when Nami and Luffy just looked at him, he said: "It's a man thing - just look in his eyes."

"I'll...take your word for it." Nami replied, watching as Bruce stooped down to pick up a book that was lying on the floor.

"Look at this!" He angrily brandished the book, and Emma took a few steps back. "I've told you not to leave this shit lying around where Aunty Cheryl can trip on it, because that would be all we'd fucking need!" He began to tear the book up.

"No, Dad, stop!" Emma shouted, stepping forwards and reaching for the book.

She never even saw it coming. Bruce's hand whipped across her face, sending her reeling backwards, and her hand flew to her face, her face a mask of shock and horror, as tears slowly gathered in her eyes.

"I'm fucking sick of this!" Bruce muttered angrily, throwing the book down and then turning and walking away.

Emma sank to her knees, and her tears dripped unhindered onto the bamboo flooring.

"Emmy..." Luffy said, stepping up to her.

"She can't hear you, Luffy." Nami reminded him gently, also wishing that she could comfort Emma. She kind of knew how she felt, after all.

"No, but..." Luffy suddenly got an idea and, as Sanji watched, he quickly rearranged the torn up pieces of book into a (lop-sided) heart with wings.

Sixteen-year-old Emma sniffled, and then happened to glance down, and saw the symbol. She gasped, and looked all around her but, of course, there was nothing there for her to see. She smiled a bit, though, as she quickly messed up the papers to avoid anybody seeing them.

Luffy also smiled, looking happy with his handiwork, but Nami slapped him upside the head, with her paw. "You baka! Do you know what you've just done?!" She asked him angrily, as they began to disappear.

"Yeah - I just made our nakama feel better." Luffy replied.

"WRONG!" Nami shouted. "You just created an ontological paradox!"

"A who now?"

"She means that you messed up the space-time-continuem." Sanji supplied.

"The where and the when now?"

Emma, Ace and Law hopped up the steps, which had a smooth reddish-brown tile. Too smooth.

Law, who was at the top of the steps already, turned around, and called encouragingly to Emma: "Your front legs are for pulling, and your back legs are for pushing." He then reached down again, and pulled her up by the scruff of her neck.

"Thanks." She said, smiling at him, as he fussily adjusted her ribbon.

"Hey, what about me?" Ace complained - he was still only halfway up the stairs.

"You get up by yourself, Firefist." Law replied flatly, as Emma wandered off, still in search of her Nanna.

"You don't like me, do you?" Ace glared up at Law.

"What was your first hint?" Law asked sarcastically.

"Emiko is mine." Ace reminded him.

"Would you stop saying that?" Law asked him, as he finally reached the top of the stairs.

"Just don't forget it." Ace told him.

"It won't matter anyway." Law muttered.

"What was that?" Ace gave him a Look.

Suddenly, they heard Emma scream - really scream - and both of the male cats took off running in that direction, side-by-side.

When they got to where she was, however, they both froze, and stared, in complete and utter horror and shock.

On the top floor of the hotel, was Emma.

Surrounding her were strange creatures - they looked like monsters crossed with dinosaurs crossed with bugs. Their eyes were red, and glittered malevolently.

One was holding onto Emma, and had its pincer-like claw around her throat.

Emma looked at Ace and Law, her eyes unfocused. "Help...me..."

"Whoa, weird place..." Luffy said, looking around at the pink and red and black landscape.

"No time to admire the atmosphere!" Nami snapped. "What is this place?!"

"It's a realm between realms." Said the same male voice that they had heard before, and they looked to see the man in the white cloak. "The time has come for you all to be reunited...well, for the most part, anyway."

"And what does that mean?" Sanji asked, just as a female voice spoke up from behind him.

"It means that I have three of your friends right here."

"Mellorine!" Sanji cried, turning around quickly, and gazing up at the black-cloaked woman. He caught a glimpse of a soft face, with freckles scattered across her nose, before he looked back down, and saw Franky, Robin and Usopp standing next to the woman.

"Hi, guys." Usopp said easily.

"Robin-Chwan!" Was Sanji's response, as he tried to nuzzle up against the black cat, but she simply side-stepped and briefly bumped-heads with Nami, who looked happy to see her again.

"What about the others, though?" Luffy asked. "Ace and Emmy and Zoro...?"

"They're busy, right now." The man with the gruff voice said. "Meanwhile, you lot still have things to see."

"Only now, you will see them together." The woman said, as all six of the cats began to vanish.

~2008~

Nami, Robin, Usopp, Luffy, Sanji and Franky appeared in the same house as before.

"We're back in Emma's house." Nami looked around her.

"Oh, so this is Emma-San's house..." Robin mused, just as a seventeen-year-old version of Emma herself appeared, with her parents.

"Okay, let's sit down." Bruce suggested, and they all sat at the table.

"I'm sorry...so sorry..." Emma was saying, as she clasped her hands in her lap. She was wearing black jeans, and Disturbed t-shirt. She was frowning, and looked upset with herself. "I...I don't ever...want to take Ritalin, ever again..." She was clenching her fists under the table. "Ever..."

"But, Emma, you need them." Lee said. "You have ADD, and you can't concentrate without them."

"I don't care!" Emma said. "I...I let you guys down, and cost you two thousand dollars..."

"Which you still owe us." Lee reminded her.

"She sounds like you, Nami." Usopp narrowed his eyes.

"Shut up!"

"I-I know." Emma muttered. "So...I'm going to get a job...at the newsagency...w-with Nee-San..."

"She's calling her 'Nee-San' now." Nami whispered.

"Mmhmm." Franky nodded.

"Okay, if that's what you want." Bruce said calmly, sighing. "We're proud of you for deciding to go off the tablets."

"Yes, it was my choice." Emma nodded.

"Just let us know how you're doing from now on, okay?" Lee asked her.

Emma nodded again. "O-okay..."

"And stop stealing." Lee added, and Emma cringed. "We know that you were stealing your sister's Dexamphedamine..."

"I-I'm sorry..." Emma muttered. "Really..."

"Didn't Law say something about a chemical in-balance?" Nami asked, and then realised that nobody else knew what she was talking about, since they hadn't heard the conversation. She sighed. "I think she would have acted differently when she was on that medication."

The others nodded, as the world around them started to turn grey.

~2009~

Nami, Robin, Usopp, Luffy, Sanji and Franky appeared in the middle of a busy street, and had dodge a steady flow of traffic.

"Th-that was close!" Luffy panted, once they were safely on the footpath. "Shishishi..."

"We almost ended up as road-kill!" Nami agreed, shaking her head.

"This world is super strange!" Franky stated, watching the cars go by. "I hope we get to come back here for real, sometime!"

"I think we're back in Fremantle..." Sanji said, looking around him.

"I just wanna know when these weird time-warps are gonna end." Usopp grumbled, just as a figure walked 'through' him. "Yikes!"

"I can't believe you did that, Emma!" Sarah was saying, as they shut up the shop. "That's stealing, and you know it!"

"But, it was an accident!" Emma exclaimed, actually wringing her hands. "I added up my time-book wrong, and got the wrong numbers! You know how I am with maths!"

"How the Hell did you get five hundred and twenty-two out of four-hundred and seventy-five?!" Sarah snapped, turning around to place her hands on her hips. "Mum and Dad aren't the only ones you have to worry about - Chandra is furious!"

"But it was an accident, Nee-San!" Emma insisted. "Please don't tell our boss, I'll pay the money back, or he can deduct it from my next pay, or something!"

"No." Sarah shook her head. "You'll pay the money back, but you're being let go."

"What?" Emma gasped, as the six cats stared up at her from the side of the footpath. "How come?"

"Chandra's selling the business - we're all being let go." Sarah said. "That's why I got that job at LJ Hooker. You should start looking for a new job, too - just don't steal from them."

"But it was an accident!" Emma snapped.

"What did you spend all of your money on, anyway - more Transformers?" Sarah sneered.

"Shut up!" Emma snapped, and then looked past her sister, to where a young man was walking towards them. He was tall, with green eyes, and dark blonde hair. "Oh, hi, Mike."

Sarah turned around, suddenly with a big smile on her face. "Hi, Mikey-Moo!" She threw her arms around her boyfriend's neck and kissed him.

"What happened to Ben?" Usopp asked, as the six cats tried not to watch the kissing - it was excessive.

"She must not have met him yet." Nami replied, as they started to grey out.

"Oh no, not again..." Usopp groaned.

"I should think that you'd be used to it, by now." Nami replied.

Robin was smiling. "Nami-Chan, you can't live without Usopp-Kun, can you?"

"What?!"

~2010~

Nami, Robin, Usopp, Luffy, Sanji and Franky fell into an unfamiliar room.

"Okay, really, we need to start carrying around cushions!" Nami declared.

"Yeah but, once again, you're on top!" Usopp complained, as they all started trying to detangle themselves from each other.

"Okay, so where are we, now?" Luffy wondered.

"A hospital room, by the looks of it." Franky stated, looking at the white-sheeted bed, and the heart monitors and such.

"Oh, I hope it's not another operation..." Nami muttered, as they crept around the corner of the room and took a look at the occupants.

"Hey, there's Emma." Usopp nodded to her. "But, whose baby is she holding?"

Nami glanced at Emma, and then over at the hospital bed. "Well, that's Rickie-Lee, there, so...that must be Bella...when she was newborn." She added, judging by the reddish-pink skin and the size of the infant in Emma's arms.

"She doesn't look very comfortable, does she?" Robin mused, as she leapt carefully up onto the bed, being careful not to jostle Rickie-Lee.

Nami followed suit, but the male cats stayed on the floor.

"Oh dear, she's not doing it right..." Nami commented, seeing that Emma was struggling to hold the newborn.

"How can you tell?!" Luffy called from the floor.

"I just can!" Nami called back and, just then, Bella began to cry.

"See, you made her upset, Nami!" Luffy accused her.

"She can't even hear me, baka!" Nami snapped.

Just then, Rickie-Lee managed to lean forwards - it was a real test, since she was so large, even for a pregnant woman. "Is she okay? She looks like she's gonna drop her."

Nami gasped. "Oh no, she did not..." She narrowed her eyes at Rickie-Lee, as Clinton took Bella off of Emma, who looked like she was struggling not to cry.

"Oh, Emma-Chwan...you poor thing..." Sanji sympathised, as their world began to turn grey.

"She'll learn one day." Franky said confidently. "They all do."

"And how do you know that?!" Nami shouted.

"I just do." Franky replied calmly.

"Learn what?" Luffy asked.

Nami just groaned.

~2011~

Nami, Robin, Usopp, Luffy, Sanji and Franky landed roughly in the activity room of Emma's house. In the present day, it held a couch, and a lot of kitchen appliances). In 2011, however, it had only a chest of drawers, and a mattress.

Sitting on the mattress, with her legs tucked up to her chest, was Emma. The mattress barely had anything on it, save for two sheets and one blanket. The pillow looked like it had seen better days.

"Why's she just sitting there?" Luffy looked around. "Where's all her stuff?" He went over to her nearby bedroom door and, despite everybody's warnings, managed to jump up and latch onto the door handle with his paws. "Hey, it's locked! It won't open!"

"What?!" Sanji came over, as well. "Let me try!" He did and found, to his shock, that it was locked.

"But, what about all of her clothes?" Nami glanced back at Emma.

"And her books." Robin added. "There's nothing in this room, really..." I can understand how this might feel for her...

Just then, footsteps approached, and Lee and Bruce came into the activity room. Bruce brushed aside the makeshift door, which Emma had made with an old towel.

"You're not allowed to have a door, you don't deserve one." He told her.

When Emma didn't reply, Lee said: "This is for your own good, you know. How does this make you feel?"

"I dunno." Emma shrugged.

"You should have been making more of an effort - when we let you use the computer, you just recreate." Lee told her. "Do you even want a job?"

"I don't know." Emma muttered.

"Come out." Lee said - it wasn't a question.

Emma got up and followed her parents, holding her writing book and a small, stubby pencil.

Along the way, Bruce said: "You didn't get a job when we told you to, and you haven't been making any effort - what are you going to do about this?"

"I don't know." Emma replied sullenly.

Her Father suddenly stopped, and grabbed her by the shoulders, slamming her up against the wall, to the shock of the cats who were watching.

"Stop fucking saying that!" Bruce shouted.

Emma's face had gone pale, and she had started to shake. Tears fell down her face, as Lee gently detached her husband's hands from Emma's shoulders. But, when Emma tried to hug her, Lee turned away.

"Go out to the family room." She ordered Emma, who went without question.

"Holy God..." Usopp muttered.

"How the Hell could he do that to her?!" Sanji wanted to know, looking annoyed. "Emma-Chan's his daughter, for crying out loud!"

"At least now we know why she acts the way she does." Nami said suddenly, as they started to vanish. "What did you guys see?"

"School." Franky and Usopp said in unison.

"And?" Nami wanted to know.

"She's probably never really felt safe anywhere." Robin replied calmly, as they all vanished.

~2012~

Nami, Robin, Usopp, Luffy, Sanji and Franky appeared in the middle of a dark street, and all of them jumped when a door suddenly slammed from a house that they had suddenly appeared in front of.

"Oh dear, now what?" Nami wondered, as Emma and Lee came out of the house, talking in hushed voices.

"Mum, are we leaving?" Emma asked. They noticed that she was pale.

"No..." Lee was tense - her hands were clenched. "Oh God, I wish your Father was here...why did he have to work tonight?"

"What do you think is wrong?" Emma asked. "Who was that guy...Ben, was his name? The friend who dropped Sarah off...?"

"I think that they're a little bit more than just friends." Lee muttered grimly. "Did you catch that scent though, Emma?"

"That weird scent on him, and her?" Emma asked. "I thought that was alcohol."

"It was, but there was something else on them, as well."

"What was it?"

"Marujana."

Just then, there was a blood-curdling scream from inside the house, making all six of the cats jump.

The front door slammed open, and they all noticed Mike, who was being pushed out of the house by Sarah. Her eyes were wild, and she was screaming unrepeatable things, in a blood-curdling, banshee-like scream. Basically, she was telling him to fuck off, and get out of her house.

"Well, that certainly changed quickly." Sanji commented, gulping, as Sarah attempted to hit both her Mother and Mike, before she demanded her phone back.

"Who has my phone?!" Sarah snapped. She suddenly noticed Emma, standing at the end of the driveway, and took a step towards her.

"Don't you go near her!" Lee said, quickly placing herself between her two daughters. Right now, Sarah was the last person she was afraid of.

Sarah pushed past her Mother but, instead of running at Emma (which Sanji had to admit, he had briefly been afraid of), she had grabbed her Mother's keys, and was attempting to get at the car.

When Lee tried to stop her, there was a scuffle, in which both Lee and Sarah (and the car) were scratched, and Mike went back into the house and quickly called his Mother, who lived nearby.

Emma, meanwhile, was standing stock-still on the driveway, and could only watch as Sarah took off running into the night.

Lee didn't seem to be able to go after her, but Mike's Mother, Sue, said that she'd do it. Meanwhile, his Dad, Steve, started having a go at Lee, saying that it was her 'bloody daughter's' fault and everything. Sue presently came back, told Steve to go home, and then went back into the house to take care of her son, leaving Lee to go and find her eldest daughter.

Meanwhile, Emma was sitting on the driveway, which had only been built a month ago, just after the once happy couple had moved in.

"I thought that she loved him..." Emma whispered, just as there was a shout from the park nearby.

"Emma, help!"

Emma gasped, and jumped up, running into the darkness.

"There she goes." Nami said, watching her go, as everything started to turn grey again.

"I had no idea she'd had to deal with this." Usopp admitted.

"None of us did." Sanji said. "She kept it all inside of her..."

"Secretive..." Nami agreed. "I think that all of us here can understand that."

"Aye." They all agreed, as they all vanished.

~2013~

Nami, Robin, Usopp, Luffy, Sanji and Franky found themselves standing in a classroom.

"Hey, it's Emmy's TAFE place!" Luffy realised, looking around happily at the familiar place.

"And, there's the Emma-Chwan that we all know and love." Sanji pointed out, to where everybody was crowded around Emma's computer.

"Hey, there's Georgia." Usopp noticed the other red-head, who was sitting nearby. She wasn't one of the ones crowded around Emma's computer, but she kept glancing over, as if interested.

Emma, meanwhile, was showing everybody how to convert a SWF file to a PDF file.

"So," she said, her voice shaking slightly, but she seemed to know what she was doing. "You just click here, and th-that's how you can link all of the resources to it, otherwise it won't play the s-sound, which is what we w-want." She then clicked on the imported folder, and some animation began to play. "S-see?"

"Oh, wow." Christine said.

"That's so cool." Charlotte added.

"So that's how you do it!" The lecturer declared. He grinned. "Great job - star pupil, Emma!"

Emma blushed, and swallowed. She didn't smile, but the cats knew instantly that she was pleased. As the crowd dispersed, Emma clicked on a different page, and a picture of a heart with wings appeared.

"You see?!" Nami glared at Luffy. "You created an ontological paradox when you moved that paper around back there!"

"I did not!" Luffy protested, jumping up onto the desk next to Emma. "See? It's from that show she watches, Cardcaptures Sasakura."

"That's Cardcaptor Sakura," Sanji corrected him, also jumping up there. "And...oh, look at this!" All of the cats carefully jumped up onto the desk, so as not to disturb any of the papers belonging to either Emma or Christine. "Look at that other box on the computer screen - it says that she's passing all of her courses!"

"Our little genius." Nami smiled, as they began to grey out. Her face fell. "And, she's going to be failing her course, since she's in our world..."

"Do you think that she wants to go back?" Luffy wondered, and they all exchanged a glance.

"What do we do?" Ace couldn't take his eyes off of Emma or, more to the point, off of the monster strangling her.

"If we go in there, we get killed." Law stated bluntly. "But, if we don't..."

"Then Emiko dies." Ace finished.

The two male cats nodded, and prepared to pounce at the creatures (there were four of them) but, just then, there were a series of flashes of light.

Luffy appeared in red, Nami in yellow, Usopp in brown, Sanji in dark blue, Franky in light blue, and Robin appeared in pink.

"M-Minna!" Emma gasped, trying to push herself away from the creature that had her, but he squeezed tighter. "Minna..." She whispered.

Luffy suddenly leapt forwards, and clamped his jaws onto the thing's arm. It howled, and began trying to shake him off its arm. This caused him to let go of Emma, who landed near Robin and Nami, who immediately began to help her up.

The others, meanwhile, were facing the creatures, as Luffy landed near to them.

"Okay, so, what are those things?" He asked, and then he gasped. "Eww, yuck, my mouth!" He spat something out, that he had managed to snag off of the creature.

They looked at the thing.

"It looks like...a cell?" Usopp (who was all the way over the other side, as far away from the battle as he could get) called, squinting. And, when the others looked at him, he added: "What? Chopper showed me a picture one time...once." he added, when Nami shuddered.

Law agreed. "It is. But, that one doesn't look too healthy..."

"Of course..." Emma gasped, as Ace came over, and nudged her carefully, to see if she was alright. "Those things..."

"Look at the ribbons on their necks." Robin commented.

"I didn't notice them before," Emma admitted. "But, now I do...whoa!" She cried suddenly, as one of the monsters lunged for them, and one managed to clip Sanji's shoulder.

"What? What about them?" Nami asked quickly, as they all jumped out of the way.

"I think..." Law, who had caught on, began, and a monster lunged at him, heading for his side.

Emma ran, and pushed him out of the way, and they hit the wall. The first monster came for Emma's throat again, but Ace latched onto the back of its stick-like leg, and it became distracted, allowing Emma and Law to escape.

The fourth monster kept trying to go for their chests.

"This one's got a pink ribbon." Nami commented, as she dodged.

"That's the breast cancer awareness ribbon." Emma informed them. "Clear is lung cancer, and..."

"Black is melanoma." Robin stated calmly, expertly dodging the attacks of the one that kept on going for their shoulders.

"So then, these things represent cancer?" Usopp guessed.

Emma nodded, and narrowed her eyes at the one with the blue, pink and teal ribbon. "That one's thyroid cancer - that one's mine to defeat."

"And, how do you intend to do that, Emiko?" Ace wanted to know.

"Umm...I dunno, but we'll think of something!" Emma replied.

"Perhaps..." Robin mused, and Law glanced at her. "If we can locate their weak spots, then...?" She glanced at Law.

"We might be able to defeat them if we attack them where they're attacking us?" Law guessed.

Robin nodded. "Pretty much."

"Okay." Law took charge all of a sudden. "Luffy and Usopp, you take skin cancer - aim for its shoulders. Robin, you and Nami take breast cancer - you know where to go. Sanji, you and Franky have got lung cancer - both sides." He narrowed his eyes at the last one. "Firefist and I will..."

"No, I'll do it by myself." Emma said suddenly.

"Emiko, let us help." Ace said. as the others set off to do what they had to do.

"I can do this." Emma said firmly, never taking her eyes off of thyroid cancer.

"Hai, we know that, Emiko," Ace stressed. "But..."

Just then, thyroid cancer leapt at them and, without thinking, all three cats dodged, before coming back around to clamp onto the thing's neck.

It let out a howl, as did the others, and then all four cancers collapsed, into twitching and horribly oozy messes.

"Umm, okay, eww." Nami commented, trying to shake the cancer blood off of her, and Usopp looked horrified, Luffy was poking at skin cancer, and Emma was just shaking her head in disbelief.

Law nudged her neck. "Ne, are you okay, Emiko?"

"H-hai..." She replied, gazing up at him, just as Twister appeared.

"Very good..." The god praised them.

"It's you!" Nami exclaimed. "Do you know where we are, and why we're here?!"

Twister nodded. "Yes - this is all a test." He waved his scythe, and the cancers went flying out of the window. They landed with four very audible splashes in the pool. He then turned to Emma. "You managed to defeat Coby - I am impressssssed, but you ssstill have many obstaclesss that you mussst overcome." He waved his scythe, and Emma became a human. "Now, I will return you to Kuina for your final tessst."

"So, it was Kuina." Franky realised, as they all started to vanish, in rainbow light.

"Told you." Robin replied.

Kuina (in Tashigi's body) raised her head, and said: "Oh."

The eight cats, and Emma, had suddenly appeared, blinking around them at the church.

Chopper looked thrilled. "You guys!" He cried, running to them.

Even Georgia smiled. "Oh, so you passed the test?"

"Not quite." Nami stated, glancing at Kuina, who had stood up, and placed Zoro on the chair. "Twister said that we had one more test to face..."

"Yes." Kuina nodded. "But, it is not you." She pointed to Zoro. "It is him."

"He's your childhood best friend and rival, isn't he?" Emma questioned, stepping forwards.

Kuina laughed shortly. "Ha! Rival, nothing. I beat him, all two thousand and one times." Her face softened. "But...we had made a promise, on that day...one of us would become the world's greatest swordsman...for me, that dream ended. Here, catch." She tossed the compass to Emma, who caught it and, suddenly, everybody was a human (or, in Chopper's case, a reindeer-human) once more. "Let me ask you guys something." She said, in a serious voice. "What did you learn about Emma, when you saw her past?"

Emma was horrified, and turned to the others. "She...she showed you my past?" She gasped. "Oh-em-gee, no, no, no..." She buried her face in her hands, and so didn't see Kuina's smile.

"Who'll go first?"

"I'll go." Nami volunteered. "Emma's shy, and meek, and can be kind of a jellyfish at times."

"Oh, okay, so I'm not perfect, but you guys are supposed to be my friends!" Emma complained.

"But, she's getting a lot better at standing up for herself." Nami flicked Emma's forehead, with a smile. "She's alright."

Emma looked surprised.

"Yeah." Usopp nodded. "Sure, she's scared of certain things, like centipedes. But, she's always there for others, when they need her."

"Thanks Usopp..." Emma mumbled.

"She's got a kind heart." Sanji stated. "She's a good girl, no matter what anybody else says."

"Thanks, Sanji-kun...I think..."

"My turn!" Luffy volunteered, raising his hand. "Okay, umm...so, she doesn't like cleaning and housework and stuff...oh, and one time, her sister hit her, but she loves her sister, and I bet she wants to be more like her, but not the screaming and swearing stuff!"

Emma was banging her head against the pew - Law had to stop her from doing that.

"Emma-Nee-Chan, that's bad for you." Franky told her. "After all, you've had plenty of medical problems, after all, so you need to take care of yourself. You tend to put others first though, because you think that you're not good enough, don't you, little Nee-Chan?"

"I guess so." Emma replied, as Law placed an arm across her shoulders.

Ace glared at him, and Robin decided that it was time for her to go.

"Emma-San has trouble trusting people." She said. "She tries to shut them out and keep them at a distance, to avoid being hurt again." The archeologist calmly gazed at Emma, with a small smile. "She believes that, by doing so, she'll protect herself when, really, she just wants to be loved. She wants to trust people. She wants it desperately." I understand, Emma-San - I understand it, and you know that. Don't shut us out - keep on letting us in, just like you have been...

Emma nodded silently, with tears pouring down her face. She turned, and buried her face in Law's shoulder, and he hugged her.

"You did learn something - good job." Kuina said. She glanced behind her at Zoro, who was starting to stir. "I'll tell you something, though - not everybody is going to be able to leave here."

"What?!" A few people cried.

"Oh, don't worry." Kuina said. "You can still complete your mission to stop Infinity from destroying the worlds."

What? Emma thought, narrowing her eyes at Kuina-Tashigi (Tashigi-Kuina?).

"You just need to decide." Kuina said. "Emma, or Zoro. One of them lives, and one of them gets to stay here with me."

"No way!" Nami and Luffy cried in unison.

Law and Ace were watching Emma, and they suddenly knew what she was about to say.

"I'll-"

"NO!" Law and Ace shouted in unison.

"Guys, it's fine!" Emma replied. "Come on, Zoro has a dream that he has to live out, don't you, Zoro?"

"Huh, what?" Zoro was still trying to wake up. "My dream...?"

"There, you see?" Emma shook her head, and took a step forwards. "Come on, she said that you could still complete your mission."

"But, what about my mission?!" Ace and Law said in unison.

Emma stopped, and turned around. "Huh? What?"

"Emiko!" Ace grabbed her wrists. "What I was going to say, before we were all transported here...if anything happens, no matter what, then you are my dream!" Emma's eyes widened. "No matter what, I want you!"

Law was clenching his fists, but he didn't say anything, as the seconds ticked by.

Kuina suddenly spoke up again. "Okay then, how about this? You two just have to answer this question for me, okay?" They all just looked at her. "Okay, this is the question - what is Emma's dream?"

Everybody was silent for a minute, including Emma, who was just staring at the floor. My dream? Wait, do I even have a dream? What about all the stuff I said I wanted to be, back when I was a child? What about my graphic design course, and becoming an author and an illustrator? And...yet...

"Well, that one's obvious." Ace spoke up, and Law was smirking. "She wants to become..."

"Recognized as an adult." Law supplied.

"And, respected." Ace added.

"She wants to love," Law said.

"And to be loved, by people she can trust, as Robin said." Ace nodded.

"She wants to be smart,"

"Strong,"

"Brave,"

"And, beautiful."

"Even though she already is." The two men said in unison.

"But, above all," Luffy suddenly spoke up, looking firm. His arms were crossed, and he was nodding. "Emmy wants to be that kind of lady - you know, the ultimate kind of lady, and everything. The one that people look up to and everything, and to be something. For people to treat her like she's a somebody, rather than the nobody that she thinks that she is."

Emma was staring at the three of them - at the two men that loved her, and at the one who considered her to be like an older sister/nakama - and nodded, with tears glistening in her eyes. "They're right...that...that is...my dream...pleas,e take me with you, you guys...Zoro and me, both..." She added, and glanced over at Kuina, who was smiling slightly.

"Well, you missed out on a part but, congratulations." She said. "You passed...you all passed...you can go back to your world, and continue with your mission now." She turned to Zoro. "I possessed this young woman's body, since I knew that you thought that she looked like me. But...before you go...and, before I return this woman's spirit to her body...may I ask...?" She suddenly held a sword in her hand.

Zoro blinked, looking surprised, but then he nodded, and reached for his swords. "You guys go ahead." He told the others. "I'll be awhile."

They all nodded and, although some of them wanted to stay and watch, they walked through the doors at the other end of the chapel.

"Just like old times, huh, Kuina?"

"Especially since you're about to lose, Zoro!"

Back in the real world, they got a surprise, to find a bunch of kids, and a skeleton cat.

"Brook?!" Nami, Usopp, Sanji, Luffy, Franky and Chopper all cried.

"Yohoho, hello!" Brook was a skeletal cat, and seemed happy to see them, despite not having any eyes. "I've missed you all so much!" He added. He then trotted up to Emma. "Are you the young lady who can turn me back into a human, even though I'm not a human anymore?"

Emma nodded. "Umm, y-yes, I am...?" Wow, this is...weird...

"Then, I have just one question for you." Brook smile cheerfully up at her, and alarm bells began ringing in Emma's head.

Nami and Robin looked over at Brook sharply.

"May I see-"

"No, may I see your panties?!" Emma suddenly cried, pointing at Brook, and everybody stopped and stared at her in shock. She suddenly smiled, and sunk down to her knees. "Except, that...skeletons don't wear panties, especially not skeleton cats! You're pretty lucky that there are no hungry dogs around Brook!"

They both started laughing, as the others just stared in amazement, except for Luffy, who was laughing with her.

"Amazing," Sanji just shook his head. "They just hit it off straight away."

Emma was happily hugging Brook. "Cutie!" She exclaimed.

"Hey!" Law and Ace both exclaimed.

Emma just smiled, and stood up, stepping back, and touching her hand to the compass. The reddish-pink light emitted from it and, quite suddenly, the nine-foot-tall skeleton in the suit was standing there.

"Good day." Brook tipped his hat to them all. "Or, should I say, good evening? I can't tell if there's an evening chill - because I'm a skeleton!" He, Emma, Luffy and Usopp all laughed.

"Okay, I did not see that coming." Nami remarked, referring to Emma's liking to the talking skeleton but, well, at least she didn't hate him. "Anyways, so, where did all of these kids come from?"

"Gnikat erew ew...I mean, we were taking care of the skeleton-cat-thingie!" One of the kids called to them.

"I think that they were the little Piggie-Gremlins that we saw, but they're back to normal now..." Emma said, just as Bepo, Penguin and Shachi came into the clearing.

"Captain!" They all called to Law, who looked pleased to see them.

Then, a group of villagers came into the clearing, following the three Heart Pirates.

The kids all gasped, as did many of the adults, and then they ran to them. Parents and children embraced, and there was a lot of hugging and tears.

Nami smiled, as she and the others stood back.

"That's so sweet." Usopp commented, wiping his eyes.

"Why, Usopp, are you crying?" Nami teased him lightly.

"No!" The sniper lied, sniffling, and then swiping at his eyes. "I have...allergies..."

"Yeah, sure." Nami just rolled her eyes, and then she glanced at Emma, who was watching the kids and their parents. At first, Nami thought that Emma was thinking about her own family, back at home, that is until Emma glanced at Law and Ace, and blushed.

Nami suddenly remembered that Kuina had said that Luffy, Law and Ace had not been able to guess all of Emma's dream...and, suddenly, Nami was able to figure it out, exactly what kind of lady that the red-head wanted to be.

She smiled. Hopefully, Emma would learn how to hold a newborn, then!

Just then, through the portal that was there and, yet, not there, Zoro came. He was holding Tashigi in his arms, and she was back to normal.

He also had blood covering one side of his face.

"Zoro, oh no!" Chopper cried, as they all hurried over to him.

"What happened?" Law calmly asked him, although he had a feeling that he already knew.

"I lost an eye." Zoro replied calmly.

"Did you at least win?" Emma asked, as almost everybody else gasped in horror.

"Hang on, how come that's what you're worried about?" Nami scolded her. "You're so...I dunno, into that sort of stuff!"

Emma shrugged. "I dunno. I wanted to be a vet-nurse when I was younger...I guess that I just got used to blood."

Law was smirking, but a few of the others were looking a bit squeamish, especially Nami, who was remembering the thyroidectomy!

~Bali, 1998~

"Mum, where are you?" Lee found her Mother standing on the top floor of the hotel, smiling about something. She joined her Mother at the window. "Mum, what are you...holy God, what happened to the pool?!" She cried, staring in shock and horror at the four horrific black shapes that were in the water. People down below were horrified.

Peg, however, was just smiling. "It's alright, Leonie," she said, nodding calmly. "It all got taken care of..." She glanced behind her, at the smiling short lady with the bright blue eyes. "Have faith, my dear child..." She added, putting an arm around Lee's shoulders. "For, beneath every fault, there is a saving grace..."

Author's Notes:

. Okay! So, it was all about Emma's past, pretty much! XD

. A yellow-eyed Georgia (first link when typed into Google) cats . animal - world Color - Pattern - Cats / TortoiseShellCat . php

. Freestyler, by Bomfunk MC OoO youtu . be / So _ pKHgP _ 1k

. A total thyroidectomy (warning - NOT for the faint-hearted, as nothing is blurred except for the guy's face!) OoO youtu . be / ZUhpivAkeHI

. Happy Mothers' Day, to all the Mothers and Mother-Fathers out there! ^^

. I had an ultrasound yesterday...because I found another weird lump, so I thought that I'd better go and get it checked out. I got my results back on a nice little compact disc but, unfortunately, I am not a doctor, and so I cannot read what it says! I'll have to wait until Monday to find out what it is! ^^ Oh well...

Shinobi . Hikari . Ookami - okay, I won't force you to make the video, but the thought of Akainu doing THAT nearly made me choke on nothing - with laughter. XD And, yes, Law and Ace were at each others' throats again, in this chapter - literally. Thanks for the review!

Shingheart of ThunderClan - you were right, but the reason for their transformations will be revealed in the next chapter. ^^ Now, about your favourites list...lol, at Nami being a pervert. She was just being cautious, that's all! Ah, yes, I love Beauty And The Beast, too! I love Zuko and Toph, too! And, of COURSE Robin has morbid senses! I mean, she's, like, the QUEEN Of Morbidness! And, who can tell what the reviewers are thinking? This is worse than Team Edward and Team Jacob. *Gets shot at*

Cocoa Liddell - don't worry, she'll sort herself out, soon...MAYBE... _ And, Ace and Law will get to have their says, as well. Thanks for reviewing!

MsWildLuck - yes, I got that one from Avatar! I loved Book Three! ^^ Thanks for reviewing, and I'm glad you liked those parts!

KaiF . Raphaella - suspense is what makes the world go around! Thanks for the review!

Mugiwara Wolf Spirite - in Digimon Adventure 01, a weird spirit thingie possessed Hikari's body. This was kind of like that, but not really. And, yes, Zoro and Kuina got to have another battle! I bet that it was epic (I mean, come ON, Zoro lost an EYE!) but, sadly, we did not get to see it! :( Nuf si gniklat sdrawkcab. XD And, yes, lol, Law, you should have known better!

Firetrail - hmm...well, we'll just have to wait and see now, won't we? ^^

AiSoraix3 - yeah, I wanted to have some familiarity that people could relate to, but not an overload-of-overloads...just a normal overload was fine. :) Lol, Ace x Emma...well, we'll just see then, won't we? Thanks for reviewing! XD