Marco had been beyond happy – heck, he'd been elated to have his family back. With that revelation, he released the tight grip he kept on his feelings and behaviour all this time. So when he witnessed first-hand the state of things his family hadn't bothered with while he was gone, the annoyance hit him full-force.

"Did you all seriously just dump all of the paperwork into my room, yoi?" He stared into his room, eyes twitching in irritation as he felt the beginning of the ever so familiar headache creeping in. "Am I supposed to sleep on paper now, yoi? It's everywhere, yoi!" He really wished he was exaggerating, but he could not when literally all he could see was paper, paper, and more paper. Behind him, Ace and Thatch wore sheepish looks on their faces. Marco just sighed and shook his head. "Whatever, let's go check the storage room first, yoi."

"Well…" He really should've paid more attention to the wince that appeared on Thatch's face and Ace averting his eyes.

"What is this, yoi?" That headache was quickly escalating into a migraine, Marco thought to himself as he took in the sight of the storage room before him with a deadpan look. "Those food have gone bad, and I can tell that we're lacking in a few supplies at first glance alone, yoi. And when did we decide that COBWEBS were fantastic decorations, yoi?"

"We never really bothered with it…" Ace mumbled behind him.

"Yes, I can see that, Ace. Very clearly, in fact, yoi." He sighed. "I'm afraid of what more I'll find out, yoi."

He was not wrong. All in all, by the time Marco had finished surveying the state of everything, he was left with so much paperwork that for the next few days, black and white were all that filled his vision. The thought of leaving so he didn't have to deal with all this even briefly crossed his mind, but of course, he would always choose his family over everything else.

A rather unfortunate fact.


"Okay, on hindsight, that was a bad idea." Thatch admitted to the Phoenix in front of him, arms crossed.

"What else, yoi?"

"We're sorry?" Haruta grinned sheepishly.

"We won't do it again?" Ace added, matching his accomplices' expression. Marco just sighed.

"Mess hall cleaning duty for a week, and I expect a report on all the damages you've caused with your pranks, yoi." He said, before stomping off to his room, mentally adding another item to the list in his head for 'paperwork to be filled in'.


"Oyaji, stop him!" Haruta whined. "He's been in his room ever since he returned, and he hasn't stepped out even once! Nobody has even seen him for DAYS! We've been scolding and nagging at him nearly 24/7, but he's not listening to us!"

"I doubt Oyaji can do anything about it either, Haruta." Izo said from beside Whitebeard's chair.

"Why not? We all know that if there's one person Marco would always listen to, it'd be Oyaji!"

"He already tried." Ace grimaced. "Ended up making things worse, actually." At Haruta's questioning gaze, Vista stepped up.

"He sort of…added to the paperwork Marco's dealing with."

"How?" Haruta asked, as Whitebeard sighed for what seemed like the umpteenth time. The rest of his brothers around Whitebeard just chuckled sheepishly, sharing looks.

"He attempted to squeeze into Marco's room to make him even move from that spot…and ended up cracking the doorframe."


Was there a maintenance on or something? I've been trying to log in since, like, yesterday!

Anyway, sorry for the hold-up! I'm basically just writing ideas as they come to me randomly (but I'll still leave this as In-Progress until I'm sure I'm out of ideas), and this came to me about 2-3 days ago, but when I tried to login to post it, I got an error :/ It's just a short chapter, but I hope it made you guys laugh even a little! :3 Enjoy!