NicoRobinDevilChild: Thank you.
Thatch blearily opened his eyes to the blurred faces of the 5 brats they decided to keep on ship. He groaned as he got up and felt a headache split his head as the 5 brats blurred into focus.
That's when the events of before hit him like a 40-ton sledgehammer. All of a sudden, he felt a whole lot more dazed.
"What were you doing in the rafters?" Usopp's nervous voice snapped him out of his daze, and he firmly tried to ground himself to the ship.
"Why were you brats in the rafters?" he jabbed playfully, but the mood was too somber to even acknowledge his return with a laugh.
"We asked you first," the one with green hair—Zoro—growled, while flashing an inch of his white katana to him.
Thatch resisted the urge to giggle maniacally, because, did that kid really think that despite being an Asura and having 3 swords, he could actually beat someone who knew the trade for as long as he?
"I was in the rafters to set up a prank on Jozu," Thatch smiled somberly, "Instead I walk in on… this," he gestured to the gathering he ended up walking in on, "So, tell me," Thatch's eyes immediately became serious, "Is what you said really true?".
Ace pressed his lips together in a grim line, before saying, "Yes," he hugged his knees to his chest, and let out a shaky breath, "Teach will kill Whitebeard, I don't know how, and I don't know why, and I have no idea what he could possibly want out of it, but he wants to kill Whitebeard, so…"
"Watch your back," Luffy finished.
Thatch plopped down and groaned while kneading a headache with his thumb and pointer, "But, how will we tell Oyaji and the rest? I mean, they have to know…" Thatch looked lost.
"We don't," Zoro spoke, "They wouldn't believe us,"
"You don't know that!" Thatch denied vehemently, "They would believe you!" the words left his mouth before he could think about the meaning of what he said.
"No, they wouldn't," Usopp whispered, drawing the attic area's attention to himself, "Over someone who's been with them for a long time, as opposed to 5 brats who they met not even a fortnight ago,"
The implications of that sweet little piece of enlightenment slugged Thatch in the face like a forty-ton sledgehammer.
"Okay, then…" Thatch started slowly, "What do we do instead?"
Sabo chose to make his presence known to the group at that moment, "We keep a watch on him,"
"Whoa!" Thatch jumped at the sound of the unnaturally quiet blonde's voice.
"No one, and I mean no one will be alone in his presence. Keep tabs on him," Sabo continued, graciously ignoring Thatch's less-than-manly yelp, "We need to stop him, and Thatch?"
"What?" Thatch turned his head towards the sound of his name.
"Watch your back; I don't like the way he looks at you," Sabo finished ominously.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Thatch yelped.
"He looks at you like..." Sabo struggled for the word, "He's hesitating on whether or not he should… off you right then and there, or something like that," Sabo grimaced, "I don't like the contemplative look on his face when he looks like that.
Thatch shivered, and nodded, "Affirmative, I'll be wearing my two katana on my waist at all times from now on," another shudder wracked his spine.
"You have katana?" and just like that, the mood flipped, turning from grim to childlike curiosity.
"Why, yes, yes I do," Thatch answered with a hint of amusement.
"Can… Can I see?" Zoro asked apprehensively, his eyes widening childishly.
"I left them back in my room, but I can get them, if you'd like," Thatch offered.
Zoro frowned and sat back down, from the leaning position he had unconsciously gotten into, "No, no, it's fine, maybe later?"
"Yeah, sure," Thatch smiled and turned to Luffy, "Is the prank still on?" he questioned.
Luffy grinned and nodded so fast his head almost became a blur, "Hell yeah, it is!" he cheered.
"Prank?" Sabo asked apprehensively, "Do I even want to know?" he sighed and shook his head, "No, I don't,"
Thatch began giggling maniacally, "Sabo, right? You're brother is a genius,"
Ace smirked and muttered, "If he thinks Luffy is a genius, then I can only imagine the heart attack we'll get this time,"
Usopp smiled, "Can I join in, can I join in?" he excitedly asked, "I want to join innnn~" Usopp whined.
Luffy and Thatch looked at each other before unanimously agreeing.
""Sure!""
Sabo groaned, "Why do I feel like I'm going to be having a headache soon?"
"Because you will be," Zoro replied, utterly bored.
All he got in reply was another tired groan, and for another few moments, all was good with the world, oh wait—
"THAAAAATCH!" a voice under them bellowed.
Thatch promptly paled, and then started giggling, "Oops, forgot about Jozu, I'll see you lot later!" and then he jumped down the rafters and sprinted away from a mountain of a man in a diaper and painted baby blue, with confetti sticking out of certain parts of his diaper. If one would look closer, they could see that the diaper in and of itself said in bright red letters,
"IT'S A BOY!"
Ace couldn't take it anymore and burst into peals of laughter after Jozu left, stomping after Thatch, who was in a similar state.
Luffy just smirked, "That'll be nothing compared for what we've got planned," he said slyly.
Ace turned to Luffy, clearly skeptical about his claims and proposed, "Then, how about a bet?" he smirked, "If you can find a way to make all of us laugh for at least thirty seconds straight, then you win, if you can't? Well, then I win,"
Luffy bounded over and got ready to shake his older brother's hands to seal the bet, but before he could, Zoro cut in, "It isn't a bet if you don't stake anything," at everyone's inquisitive stares, he sighed and elaborated, "I mean, if Luffy wins, Ace has to do something for Luffy, and if Ace wins, Luffy has to do something for Ace,"
"Anything?" Luffy asked excitedly.
"Anything," Zoro confirmed, and for a moment, a wave of regret washed over him when he saw both D brothers snap their heads up and grin. One was maniacal, and the other was dangerously competitive. He smashed that emotion though, before it could grow into anything else.
Sabo rolled his eyes and plopped down on the hard wood of the rafters, while groaning, "Let the games begin,"
He didn't know how right he was, when he said that.
o…o
TWO WEEKS LATER:
"Oh. My. God," Ace gaped at the sight of Marine HQ, or at least, the abomination that it looked like now.
"'Oh my god' is right!" Whitebeard chuckled, drinking in the sight of a good portion of Marine HQ's marines acting nothing short of hilarious.
"This?" Zoro gestured towards the destruction, "Is awesome,"
"If I ever have hatchlings of my own, this is going to be one hell of a story," Usopp murmured in reverent awe, his wings ruffling in the breeze. So that's what they needed the pigs for… he thought absently.
Sengoku and Garp were the only Marines spared from the destruction, and both had… varying reactions to the wonderful chaos before them.
Garp was spilling his guts in damn-near hysterical laughter, while Sengoku looked ready to pop a blood vessel.
"Garp," he gritted out, the veins on his forehead throbbing and pulsing violently, "Shut. Up,"
Garp's only response was to burst into even more hysterical laughter, but he promptly sobered up when Vice-Admiral Tsuru's biting voice cut through the chaos, "And how do you suppose we fix all of this, Garp?"
Tsuru fixed the Marine Hero with a glare, which probably would've been more effective had she not been wearing a ballerina dress topped off with a bright yellow bonnet.
It took everything Garp had not to double over in laughter at the sight of her.
Sabo, who was currently gawking at his little brother, Thatch, and Haruta, managed to gain some semblance of reality and proceeded to sit them down and interrogate them.
"How… HOW?!"
Well, it was sort of an interrogation, what with the only word Sabo saying being 'how'.
Luffy held an expression of smug satisfaction as he looked at Ace expectantly,
"What?" Ace asked uneasily, his eyes shifting from left to right.
"You owe me, dear brother, you owe me," and then Luffy let out a shrill laugh of delight, which honestly sounded more like a cackle, which sent shivers down Whitebeard's spine.
Ace just groaned and jumped up to rest on Whitebeard's shoulder before resting his chin on the palm of his hand.
"Gurarara! How about this, you tell us how you pulled this," he gestured non-specifically towards the destruction, "at the Moby Dick, hm?" he raised an eyebrow in a questioning fashion.
"This is going to be one hell of a story," Thatch giggled, sending meaningful looks at Haruta, who seemed to somehow understand what those looks meant.
Once they were inside the Moby, with neither Sengoku nor Garp making a move to stop them, Whitebeard gestured for the three pranksters to finish their story in the galley.
"Okay, okay…" Thatch tried to hide his giggles but failed, "It all starts… when…"
o-o
Luffy smirked and walked to Thatch, who was hanging out at a spot in the rafters. It was not quite the spot which the ASLZU used to talk privately, but a good spot nonetheless, and more or less private.
"Come on, come on!" Thatch urged while next to him, Haruta beckoned for Luffy to come up.
Nodding happily, Luffy swished aside his long hair and grappled the hand offered to him with one rubbery arm, before using it as leverage to rocket upwards.
Once up there, the three shared a secret smile, and they got to planning.
"Okay, Luffy," Thatch started, getting out some blank paper, "You've got the end goal out and done," he drew a picture of Marine HQ in destruction, identical to what would happen 2 weeks from then, just slightly less… chaotic, "But we need the path to get there,"
Haruta tapped his chin and hummed, "That's a real complicated end goal, I'd love to see it, but are we 100% sure it's even possible?"
Thatch gasped scandalously before glaring at his prank-buddy, "We'll make it possible, don't even question it!" he turned to Luffy and smiled, "Any ideas?"
Luffy did a signature D thinking pose, and hummed. After a few moments, his face turned red and smoke came out of his ears, "Thinking is hard!" he flopped his arms down to his sides, and the steam around his head dissipated.
Haruta frowned for a moment, but then he grinned brightly, "We want the marines to go crazy, yes? And then broadcast this wondrous spectacle to the whole world, yes?" Haruta grinned crazily when Thatch and Luffy nodded along with him.
"Then…" he leaned in close, the other two mimicking his action, "It's time for a stealth mission," he pumped his fist up, and Luffy groaned, "I'm bad at stealth, though!" he argued, "I'll keep tripping over my hair,".
Thatch stared at him, "Oh yeah, that reminds me, if you don't like your hair so much, why do you keep it long?"
Luffy grimaced, "They liked the look of a crazy feral boy as their final match," he said ominously.
Haruta pushed down his rage and offered, "Well then, how about we cut your hair for you? It would be easier for stealth!"
Luffy looked at him and nodded slowly, "Well, okay, but I like the long hair, I just don't want it… that long,"
"Gotcha," Thatch winked.
After that, they finished planning everything out.
"Are we sure we want to do this?" Haruta said skeptically, as they put on stealth gear.
"What? Getting second thoughts now, Haruta?" Thatch teased.
"No!" he pouted, "We just planned it out really hastily, is all, there seems to be a lot of holes in the plan, and I don't think it'd be good for something as elaborate as this," he said uneasily.
"Let's go!" Luffy cheered, while jumping up and down at alarming heights, now that the weight of his hair was gone from his head, leaving what was once a bush of hair down to his feet and more, now to shoulder length.
The three snuck inside Marine HQ, like pros. Luffy included. Who would've thought that rubber was an insulator?! He didn't make a sound.
Once they got to the barracks, Thatch snickered soundlessly and gave Luffy and Haruta markers he hid in his pompadour.
"Thank god that bread-hairstyle is good for something," Haruta playfully, but quietly jabbed.
Thatch made a mock offended face and gestured towards the barracks as if to say, 'let's just do it already'.
Luffy couldn't have been happier to comply. He jumped around, drawing monstrosities on the walls soundlessly, while Thatch and Haruta drew horses on the Marines themselves' faces.
When they were done with their work, the three stepped back and admired it. What was once clean walls and pristine floors, now was purely vandalized.
"Your drawing ability could be used for blackmail," Thatch joked in Luffy's general direction.
Luffy just shrugged and smiled.
"Onward!" he whisper-shouted, careful to not rouse the Marines in their vicinity.
The next room they were in was slightly bigger, with a lot more decorations, and fewer barracks.
"Huh, we must be moving up the ranks," Haruta said thoughtfully.
"Time to wreak more havoc, then," Thatch grinned sinisterly.
In this room, Haruta drew on the walls, while Thatch and Luffy put makeup on the still sleeping Marines. The ones designed by Thatch were halfway decent, whereas the ones designed by Luffy…
They looked like demented clowns.
Thatch fought hard not to snicker at the monstrosities before them. "Next!" he cheered quietly.
The next room they were in was probably for the Vice-Admirals, considering Garp was in there and such.
"Do you want to vandalize your Grandpa?" Haruta questioned Luffy, who promptly shook his head, "Why, though?" Thatch asked.
"Fist of Love," Luffy replied while repressing a shudder.
Thatch and Haruta shared a look and smiled, "Okay, then let's do worse to everyone else!"
Luffy smiled in return.
In this room, they barricaded the doors, and windows, before proceeding to paint the Marines' skin light blue, with their clothes bright orange. Thatch crossed out the 'Justice' on their cloaks and replaced the message with 'KICK ME'
Haruta was nowhere to be found in this room for the moment, but when he returned: "I finished clogging the toilets, is he here yet?"
Luffy was going to shake his head, but then he felt a familiar presence enter his domain, and he smiled.
"Usopp!" he cheered silently.
Said Harpy-kid, perched on the rooftop and shot a quizzical look at his captain.
"Remind me why you need 10 pigs, 16 chickens, 5 cows, 2 horses, and 1 dog?" he asked exasperatedly, "I located them, and I dragged them here, that alone took 2 days, but why do we need them? My wings are aching," he whined quietly.
Haruta gasped, "Why—sorry— 'why do we need them?' are you stupid? They're a part of our master plan!"
Usopp bit his lip to stifle a groan and nodded, "I'll transfer them up here, then," he paused from liftoff, "Are you sure that I can't ask Marco for help? His wings are more powerful than mine after all,"
"No!" Thatch whisper-shouted, "Marco must never know, he's going to ground us for life!"
Usopp rolled his eyes, "Okay, fine, I'll get the farm animals. Still don't know why you need them, though,"
Then, Usopp took off into the night sky, doing a sloppy dive and plummeting down to earth before righting himself and gliding over a bunch of fields.
"I'm helping him," Luffy resolved, before jumping out the window and rocket launching him towards Usopp.
If Usopp had been alone, it would've taken hours for him to go one by one with the farm animals to the Marine Base. With Luffy's nigh-superhuman strength, however, it took less than 5 minutes.
Soon, the Marines' room was crowded with a bunch of farm animals, all clambering for attention.
"Some poor farmer is going to wake up in the morning to find his barn emptied out, and put in a Marine Base," Thatch said in a voice that had a mixture of regret and shamelessness, however that was possible.
Usopp huffed, but said nothing and flew away, muttering about aching wings and grooming feathers.
Luffy smiled and walked out the door, barricading it from the outside.
"Did you put in the Visual Den-Den Mushi?" Thatch asked Haruta, who nodded in response, "Yes, what do you take me for?" he huffed indignantly.
Next, was an Admiral's room, "Kizaru" Borsalino's to be exact.
Luffy got out an Haruta got an apple he stole from the Marines' kitchen, and carefully shoved it into the Admiral's mouth. The Admiral did nothing but snort at the sensation and continued sleeping.
Thatch took notice of the fact that Kizaru was cocooned up in his blanket like there was no tomorrow, and promptly began to sew both ends of the blanket together.
"Are you stupid?" Haruta hissed, snatching the needle and thread away from Thatch, who just whimpered, "Everyone knows that you're supposed to sew it to the victim," Haruta smiled mischievously and sewed the edges of the blanket to Kizaru's pajamas.
"He isn't getting out of that anytime soon," Thatch observed, "Let me help," he snickered and looked into Kizaru's personal closet. Thatch frantically looked around, before locating the belts, and handing them to Luffy so he could rocket them out of existence.
Haruta tapped Thatch's shoulder and showed him some kairoseki handcuffs he nabbed from a nearby vault.
"I managed to get three without alerting the alarms," Haruta said quietly.
"One for each Admiral, then," Thatch said, but faltered when Haruta shook his head.
"No, we can prank Akainu a different way, one handcuff needs to be saved for Sengoku," Haruta whispered.
Thatch nodded in understanding, and grabbed one handcuff from his friend.
He slowly walked towards the Light Admiral and shuffled the cold handcuffs inside his blanket. The man whimpered from the feeling, and turned over, but nothing more happened.
When they got out of the room, Thatch was breathless with concealed laughter, "He WHIMPERED!" Thatch whisper-shouted, "Marine Admiral Kizaru Borsalino, WHIMPERED!" Thatch was almost yelling at this point, and Haruta had to cover his mouth with a hand to stop him from screaming.
He fixed his best friend with a scathing glare and gritted, "Yeah, I know, but right now, we're so close, we can't mess this up, if we do, we'll get caught, and that won't be good, Oyaji doesn't know this, Marco doesn't know this, only Usopp does, and by my bet, he's sleeping right now, and he won't be waking up anytime soon. If anyone ends up waking up too early, I'm blaming it on you!"
Thatch sobered up for a while after that.
It seemed that Aokiji wasn't in the Marine Base at the moment, so they ended up having to not prank him.
Oh well, that just means more for Akainu.
When they reached Akainu, they booby-trapped his entire room with tripwire, they ripped apart all his clothes and got a Den-Den Mushi to sing "Mary had a Little Lamb" over and over when the tripwire was hit, and it wouldn't stop.
Luffy repainted all of Akainu's clothes a bright green and purple, before setting up a bucket of water for him to trip over once he got out of bed. All in all, Akainu Sakazuki was going to be trolled.
They had some preparation before this particular night, and they checked out what the Admiral was allergic too. Turns out, one particular allergy was cinnamon.
Haruta was sure to sprinkle an abundance of that all around his room. Thatch carefully handcuffed the Marine Admiral in kairoseki, while Luffy kept channeling some of his own Devil Fruit energy to fill in the empty gap.
Once the cuffs were on, he slowly drained out the amount of Devil Fruit energy he was channeling into the Admiral, and they left.
"What was that?" Haruta questioned, just before they got to Sengoku's room.
Luffy frowned, "They made me awaken the Devil inside my Devil Fruit, now, I'm a monster," he smiled, "I will protect you, though!"
Thatch smiled, "Okay, but first, we break down Marine HQ,"
Then, he opened up Sengoku's door.
Haruta opened a pocket in his bag and carefully took out 24 eggs, a roll of toilet paper, hot pink glitter, and a pair of bunny ears.
Thatch took out a permanent marker, and drew on the wall, 'WHITEBEARD PIRATES FOR LIFE!'
"Was that really necessary?" Haruta questioned.
"It is always necessary," Thatch droned, before bursting into a fit of silent giggles.
"You're right, it is," Haruta handed 8 eggs to Thatch, and 8 eggs to Luffy.
"Woohoo!" Luffy quietly cheered, and began throwing around the eggs, letting the whites stain the walls, while he gathered the yellows and dumped them on Sengoku's sleeping form.
Turns out, Sengoku was sleeping in his office, on a pile of papers, must've clocked out from the overdose of work and stress.
Haruta threw toilet paper and made the lines hang from the rafters like confetti streamers.
Thatch sprinkled the pink glitter all over the walls and on top of Sengoku the Golden Buddha himself.
The three stepped back to admire their work, "Marine HQ is going to be so destroyed next morning," Haruta remarked.
"Agreed," Thatch said with pride, while Luffy giggled in response.
o-o
"…And then that brings us to today, in which Marine HQ is in more shambles than ever before," Thatch smiled, looking at the gaping galley of pirates.
"So that's why you were so quiet with your pranks," Marco said with a look of absolute horror on his face, "You were preparing for… this," he gestured to Marine HQ which was nothing more than a speck on the horizon by the end of the story.
"Oh yeah, by the way, that was all recorded," Haruta tacked on, much to the growing horror of their blond phoenix brother.
"And broadcasted," Luffy said proudly.
Marco promptly fainted.
"Ah! Marco died!" Luffy gaped, before Zoro smacked him upside the head, "Idiot! He's not dead!"
Haruta turned to an idle Den-Den Mushi, which he spoke to in a mysterious tone, "I ask this of you, adoring public—"
o…o
SOMEWHERE IN SABAODY:
"Adoring masses? He's getting too carried away," Silvers Rayleigh chuckled and shook his head.
o…o
SOMEWHERE ON THE GRAND LINE:
"That was ingenious," The Revolutionary Dragon commented, while recording the film of Marines running around like headless chickens wearing hot-dog costumes.
"Was it truly that easy to infiltrate Marine HQ? If so, then why haven't we done it yet?" Koala asked.
"Because we're still a growing movement, we barely have enough resources, let alone people to infiltrate Marine HQ, and even if we had the chance before, it's gone now. They'll no doubt be upping security measures after this,"
"At least we know that Akainu is allergic to cinnamon," Koala remarked.
"…Yes, that was a… sweet piece of information…" Dragon smiled.
o…o
SOMEWHERE IN THE CALM BELT:
Boa Hancock sniffed imperiously and looked down on the Den-Den Mushi before her, before grudgingly proceeding to admit, "Okay… So maybe not all men are bad…" she turned to her gaping sisters, before hastily tacking on, "But only the young one, he's so cuuuute!" she gushed.
Sandersonia and Marigold felt a strong feeling of foreboding in the future yet to come…
o…o
"—We would like to propose an offer!" Haruta announced, practically feeling the audience lean forward in anticipation, "If the Whitebeard Pirates ever come to your island, those who want another sweet piece of hell, should come to me or Thatch and give us your vote. We will be counting them up. If by 3 months we have more votes to stop pranking, we stop pranking the Marines, and vice versa," He smiled warmly.
"This is Haruta, 12th Division Commander of the Whitebeard Pirates—"
"And Thatch, 4th Division Commander of the Whitebeard Pirates—"
"And Luffy—"
"""Signing out,"""
Haruta hung up the Den-Den Mushi and sighed before turning to his father.
"So," he clapped his hands together, "Any questions?"
"Never… ever… do that again," Marco wheezed, while leaning on Jozu for support.
Thatch shrugged, "No promises,"
Marco groaned and buried his head in his hands.
Whitebeard smiled and looked at the 5 brats he took in, This is going to be fun…
AN: Sorry, had a bit of a writer's block there, didn't know what to do for the prank, had to be creative and you know... So, tell me how this chapter was!