It took less than a day to get to the nearest island and find a tattoo parlour willing to cover up the remains of the jolly Roger on his back. And despite Ace's reluctance to cover up the remains of the mark that had become his pride, he still knew exactly what design he wanted to replace it.
And so it was that several hours (and several thousand Beri) later, Ace exited the tattoo parlour, fragmented Jolly Roger completely covered by a beautiful blue phoenix with fiery outstretched wings rising up from a field of flames and hibiscuses. It was beautiful and heart-breaking all at once.
The phoenix was just different enough from Marco's Zoan form that it wouldn't get any questions, but it was enough to remind Ace of what he was fighting for. Or more specifically who he was fighting for.
Feeling the sunshine on his face, Ace tipped his hat up and stared up at the blue skies above him before letting out a wide grin. He was approximately two days away from the island where he'd recruited his first mate Dusty, and after that it would take him a further two weeks to track down the remaining eleven spades and procure his ship the Card deck.
Ace may have planned to stay under the radar a little longer than he had done in his original timeline, but that didn't mean he couldn't pull any of the crazy stunts that had made him so infamous the first time round. It just meant he couldn't get caught doing them.
Ace's grin widened to shark like proportions, the Spades had always been good at doing subtle work, even if they had preferred to go big and flashy. And getting some recognition now could hopefully go a decent way in convincing the Whitebeards later on that Ace was an ally not an enemy.
It was also worth mentioning that Ace currently held a marineford sized grudge against the world government, in addition to a myriad of insider information on the marines, that the shitty geezer had accidentally let slip whilst he was visiting his grandson in Impel down.
Ace shuddered at the reminder of his prison cell and shook his head resolve firm in his mind. Never again.
He needed to get his ship and crew first, but after that...
The teen erupted into slightly manic laughter scaring off most of the passers-by on the street. Getting his laughter under control Ace made his way back towards his boat whistling cheerfully under his breath, this was going to be fun.
Several miles away at the nearest marine base, the commodore in charge shivered as a dark sense of foreboding rushed through him. Something big was coming, and whatever it was, the Marine had a feeling it wouldn't end well for him.
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Garp stared down at the latest batch of bounty posters and sighed. It had been several weeks since the old Marine had gone to Dawn island only to find his oldest grandchild missing and he was, for lack of a better term, incredibly confused.
When Luffy had originally revealed that Ace had run off to become a pirate Garp had expected an easily followed trail of destruction and havoc everywhere the teen went. Instead? There was nothing.
There had been practically no sightings of the freckled teen, since he had first set sail and while Garp was overjoyed at the fact his grandson hadn't immediately run off and gotten the biggest bounty he was capable of, he was starting to get slightly worried.
Not too worried mind you, Garp knew the brat was strong enough for just about anything east blue could throw at him, and there hadn't been enough time since he'd set off for Ace to have made it to the grand line already. So logically Garp knew his grandson was probably fine.
But the lack of news was still somewhat concerning. And it wasn't like Garp could just ask if anyone had seen his grandson, because that would draw attention to him, and that was the last thing Garp wanted. Especially if the reason he'd heard nothing about his grandson was because he'd finally decided to abandon his ideas of piracy.
Garp paused, maybe that was it! Maybe the brat had finally seen the light and was going to join the Marines! Whistling cheerfully at his delusions, Garp picked up the latest marine reports and felt his hope die a swift and painful death upon reading the first page.
Ace's name and picture may have been missing from the report (the little shit was too sneaky to be caught unless he wanted to, probably due to years of jungle hunting, and attempted hiding from Garp himself) but this little stunt still had his grandson written all over it.
"GOD DAMN IT SHITTY BRAT!"
Somewhere across the ocean Ace stopped what he was doing and promptly hightailed it back to his ship as fast as his legs could carry him before demanding his crew to set sail as fast as humanly possible.
Looking at the newspaper he'd managed to swipe the fire logia couldn't help but grin, he was probably going to regret his actions later, but for now he'd enjoy it. At least he was sure to have gotten on the Whitebeards radar.
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Marco was just finishing filling out the last of his paperwork when the vibrations started. And while the laughter that accompanied the shaking was a familiar sound, it was unusual for it to be so loud that it actually affected the ship.
Realising he wasn't going to get any more work done with his father's laughter still rocking the ship, the first division commander decided it would be easier to go and track down the cause, rather than attempting to wait the vibrations out. Walking out onto the deck Marco was confused to see that Whitebeard wasn't the only person bent over in laughter.
Noticing Thatch nearby, the Phoenix grabbed his brother's shoulder "What the hell's set everyone off yoi?" Still shaking from laughter, as well as the increasing vibrations of the ship, Thatch held up what appeared to be todays addition of the paper.
"Some..Someone in east blue snuck into," the chef's explanation was cut short by his helpless laughter.
"Thatch, I swear to god, finish the gods damned explanation yoi." Shoving down one last amused chuckle the chef held up the paper once more, easily displaying the large Ace of spades in the centre of the page.
"Some unknown snuck into several different marine bases all around east blue and stole the psychological evaluation of every marine ranked Commodore or higher they could find, before sending a copy to each and every publishing agent from the blues to the new world."
The Phoenix's eyes widened in shock "No way." Thatch nodded an eager grin bright on his face, as laughter danced in his eyes. "Yes way!"
"And the best part is, is that no one has a clue who did it! The only hint the guy left was the Ace of spades card he sent the publishing agencies alongside the reports. The Marines are baying for blood, but no one can identify anyone capable of infiltrating several different marine bases and getting away completely clean. Or at least not out of the pirates currently in East blue."
Marco raised an eyebrow in question "Revolutionaries?" The fourth division commander was quick to shake his head "Not their style, I doubt any higher-ranking revolutionary would go so far out of their way to release such harmless yet humiliating information, and I doubt any of the lower ranks would have the skill to pull off such a large scale operation."
Marco nodded in realisation "I see, and the same circumstances apply for pirates in the area as well. There are no known crews in the area that could manage something like this, but a new crew shouldn't have been able to pull it off so well. And in theory the marines should have noticed a new crew with this amount of skill forming..."
Thatch nodded in confirmation as the Phoenix trailed off thoughtfully "Has Haruta's information network been able to uncover anything else on the culprit yoi?" Thatch shook his head.
"Nothing so far, but then again he's spent the last half hour cackling over the Den Den Mushi with one of his contacts after learning about one of the Vice Admiral's pathological fear of cushions..."
The chef trailed off as both commanders simultaneously looked over at their shortest sibling who was now giggling in a frankly disturbing manner...Dragging their eyes away from the slightly worrying sight the two commanders silently agreed to continue their conversation whilst pretending they hadn't seen anything.
"Anyway, as I was saying, the marines have nicknamed the person responsible as Spade, creative I know, and they're currently offering a relatively decent reward for any information on the guy. I think they're less concerned with the actual information released and more annoyed about the blatant security breach."
Marco stared at the prominently displayed Ace of Spades and smirked "The culprit certainly seems like an interesting guy yoi." Thatch gave an eager nod of agreement "Anyone who's capable of causing that much chaos is definitely alright in my books, hopefully the guy will do something else interesting soon!"
Chuckling at his brothers excited expression Marco grinned "I think they will. He or she left a calling card to identify themselves with, I doubt they'd bother if they weren't planning on doing something similar again in future."
"Good because I think Haruta's already this close to asking Oyaji to recruit the guy." Marco let out an amused snort "Well then I wish Spade the best of luck in trying to avoid an eager Haruta. I'm gonna go ask Oyaji to turn down the laughter a little bit before someone gets thrown overboard by the shaking."
"Have fun! And when you get the chance I seriously recommend reading the paper Marco!" Giving his brother an indulgent smile Marco couldn't help but sigh as he heard particularly loud chuckle followed by a telling splash and the loud cry of "Man overboard!"
At least no one could ever say that being a Whitebeard pirate as boring.
Authors note
So that's chapter two done! The poor marines are gonna have their hands full for the next few chapters *evil grin* On the matter of Aces crew I can freely admit to having no clue what their actual names are but I think I heard Dusty was the first mate from someone? Anyway, thank you to Eyilin, Nacchu, AstralSakura and LittleOneTale for the reviews, I especially loved LittleOneTale's request to "make them suffer" XD hopefully this is a decent start for Marine suffering, next chapter should be out soon! Hope you enjoyed!