ASLZ and Law

Dadan glared at the grinning Marine, she knew now who to blame for the two brats adopting strays as it seemed to be in the blood, or the letter D. Garp stood before her with an almost crowd behind him, each person looking various degrees of uncomfortable and out of place.

'Garp,' she almost snarled, 'just how many people do you intend to drop on me. The other two were problem enough, especially as they keep bring home brats of their own.' Which he was more than well aware of after his last visit of throwing four small bodies around in a ravine.

The bastard just laughed. 'Well, I was promised to drop them off here before I realised that Luffy needed more training, so it doesn't really matter.'

Dadan just signed, having given up on fighting her increasing number of charges about a week after Zoro arrived. She just hoped this lot didn't eat as much as three of the other four brats tended to, if so there was a high chance that they would eat the Mountains out of game before another three years were out.

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Rocinante didn't have a clue how to respond to this situation; he had spent a rather eventful two-year trip getting over the Red Line to East Blue, and a further half year being dragged around by the insane Marine Vice-Admiral before him, and now stood before a rather run-down shack where said insane Vice-Admiral wanted to leave him, his son, and his son's friends, to the tender mercies of a colourful group claiming to be bandits.

He should have known better than to trust someone like Garp.

Law, for his part, didn't know how he felt. He was the one that said they could trust Garp, a man he hadn't even met, based on a feeling in his gut that may or may not have been caused by a half-remembered dream. Instinct wasn't something he normally put credit in, he preferred well thought out plans based on years of research, but that same feeling in his gut told him that he was going to have to change that, and soon, if he wanted to survive.

Looking back at the other three who had decided to tag along, Law remembered that he should have had more than enough practice during the two and a half years he and Rocinante had been traveling.

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"Eventful" was one way to describe the trip between the North Blue and East Blue, however the word itself left rather a lot lacking and was a bit of an understatement. A clumsy ex-marine trouping over half the world with no funds while dragging a traumatised child with him when neither of them could swim was going to be difficult no matter what. Add in the need to avoid notice from not only said ex-marine's previous employers that were a world-wide organisation, but also his insane brother who ran a rather extensive criminal organisation and things got exponentially harder.

Law did not consider himself a child, nor did he consider himself traumatised, however he couldn't deny that he suffered from nightmares that left him sweating and terrified that Cora-san, now Rocinante, had to wake him up from.

They were always the same, yet completely different, as the ones he had had during his days of unconsciousness after eating that fruit. He would see his home burning and his parents perishing and witness over and over again Cora-san dying in the snow because he trusted someone that turned out to be a traitor. He would dream of just how easily things could have gone differently, but these weren't dreams, they were memories, and he wished that he couldn't tell the difference. Things were familiar that shouldn't be, but Law didn't think that either of them had really considered just how wrong these dreams were until he started to get flashes during the day and referring to things that he shouldn't, couldn't, know about.

It was small things at first, using his devil fruit as if he had been practicing with it for years, knowing the exact treatment for a rare disease for which the cure should be unknown.

Then it moved on to larger things, important things like knowing who to trust, seeing a face and getting glimpses of their future. Sometimes he would just blink and it would be all over with nothing but a lingering confusion to show it had ever happened. Other times it was a bit bigger than that, passing out cold in Rocinante's arms for no apparent reason and waking up spouting nonsense that ended up being a little truer that any of them wanted it to be.

He scared Rocinante, the poor man just wanted to look after him and make sure he was okay and safe and instead he kept collapsing, and it worried him to no end when that would happen. However, he knew he terrified at least two of the tag-a-longs, people who were in fact a result of the very dreams they seemed to fear.

It was on one of the first few islands that they stopped on. Law spent the whole day frowning at their surroundings, getting hammered by the feeling of familiarity and the need to do something, something specific. The need had only gotten worst and Rocinante was left to worry about how twitchy his son was getting.

Law's sleep that night was restless, filled with those same dreams of half forgotten memories, but this time they all seemed set on the same island on which they were now sleeping. He dreamed about meeting people, people that would have become his family after he had lost his for the second time. People who would stick with him despite a questionable first impression.

The next morning he was even more twitchy than the day before, not long after breakfast he more or less begged to be allowed to go for a walk in an attempt to alleviate all the excess energy he seemed to have. Rocinante wasn't too happy to let him out of his sight, but given Law was a teenager he had to admit that coddling probably wasn't a good idea, no matter that the boy had been very sick up until recently.

Law was gone for no more than thirty minutes when he stumbled across the people from his dream. A polar bear mink cub was huddled on the ground as two human boys hurled abuse at him; Law would never claim to be a good citizen, by any stretch of the imagination, but he refused to be a bystander for bullying if he could help it.

Five seconds later and the two boys were in pieces on the ground, screaming out in shock and surprise as their eyes told them they had been beheaded and the rest of their body told them that they were still in one piece, thank you very much, and still quite capable of feeling and controlling their limbs.

Mores the pity when law casually stepped on some sensitive parts on his way over to the polar bear.

'Hey, you okay?' the Cub looked up at him with wide, terrified, eyes. The person before him had saved him from a possible beating, but he seemed to have killed his tormentors when the bear wasn't really sure they deserved it.

'Don't worry about them,' the boy seemed to have read his mind, 'they just have to put themselves back together, rather like a jigsaw puzzle, and they'll be fine.' As if to demonstrate that the dismemberment hadn't done any permanent damage the boy casually stepped on a hand that had been twitching on the ground, the sudden howl of pain seemed to indicate that whatever was going on, his tormenters could at least still feel their extremities.

Didn't stop the polar bear from insisting that they helped with the reassembling. It took a surprisingly long time.

The two of them talked while they worked, ignoring their two other groaning companions, swopping introductions and stories and generally building up a rather good friendship. Bepo, the surprisingly polite polar bear, found himself getting attached to the rather sadistic teenager that had come to his rescue. He wouldn't deny being pleased when the other boy, Law, asked if he would like to travel with him while the two of them worked to get strong enough to take on the grand line.

Eventually the two of them had the other two boys back in one piece with all the pieces in the correct place. The two bullies had spent the last hour or so not saying much, only groaning when Law decided to be a little rough with the individual limbs he was handling. Now that they were together again they were giving each other, and the duo in front of them, considering looks.

Suddenly they bowed.

'We sincerely apologise for our behaviour, and humbly request that you take us on as your apprentices,' they said in complete synchronisation. 'I'm Shachi, and he's Penguin,' the one with the green hat continued.

Law raised an eyebrow. 'And why would the two people whose ass I just kicked want to follow me?' he said, though he had a feeling he already knew the answer.

'Because your strong,' Penguin said, 'and we respect that. It also means you can beat up the people who are stronger than us.'

Law gave them another long look, before shrugging. 'I'll have to ask, but it should be okay, as long as you don't mind being enemies of the world government and Doflamingo.'

All three of the new comers looked at each other before nodding, Law suspected they thought he was joking.

And that was how the four of them ended up running into a panicking Rocinante, who had surpassed worried after the first hour in which Law had failed to return.

The five of them had travelled almost smoothly after that, Rocinante's clumsiness got them into a few tight spots and constantly being hunted meant that nothing ever went truly smoothly. It was after almost a month of traveling together that they had had their first of three run ins with Doflamingo and Bepo, Shachi and Penguin learned that no, Law had not been joking or exaggerating. Of course, by then it was to late to back out and the three of them now had to make their peace with their new life of adventure.

Rocinante still didn't, and didn't think he ever wanted to, know where Law had found the cursed sword. Law quietly agreed with him, and wished he could share in his father's ignorance.

Neither of the original ex-pirates had remembered to tell the three other teenagers who it was they were traveling to meet with in order to go into hiding, and they definitely hadn't thought the three of them would freak out quite that much. It was only after they had crossed the red line and met up with Garp that the two of them realised that they hadn't really told the rest of Law's "crew" just how they had ended up drifting around the north blue.

Quite frankly the five of them would have taken running and hiding from the Marine's and Doflamingo for the rest of their lives any day over having to spend time on the insane ship captained by Garp. Rocinante had never been so thankful that his own adopted father had kept him as far out of the madman's grasp as possible during his marine training than he was in the first hour after having set sail with the man.

Law felt incredibly sorry for the man's trainees, and any sons or grandsons the man may have somehow managed to spawn.

He ignored the feeling in his gut that told him that, yes, this man did have a few family members and, yes, he should feel sorry for them and take this idiot's actions as a warning for how they may behave.

He also had a feeling that Garp's behaviour somehow explained the revolutionary that was in the process of gaining fame, but he studiously ignored that one.

And so after six months of insanity, here the five of them were, standing outside a bandit hut and hoping like hell that the man would at least be reliable in hiding them. The five of them were also wondering about the "brats that bring home other brats" that the lead bandit, who seemed to be a woman, had mentioned. Rocinante thought, hoped, she may have been joking in order to prove a point. Bepo, Shachi and Penguin were all firmly in the same boat as Rocinante.

Law suspected that she was being serious, and that said "brats" were going to be interesting, but something sounded wrong about the numbers she had mentioned, he didn't know why …

It was soon after that the four children who all looked younger than him turned up.

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The four boys trooped back to the Bandits hut with the catch of the day, two large bears and a buffalo that would hopefully get them and the bandits through the next meal without difficulty and maybe half way through the next as well. All four were getting stronger as the months passed by and Zoro had fit straight back into his place next to Luffy with no difficulty whatsoever.

They paused at the sight that greeted them now as they saw about five people standing outside the Bandits hut, and a couple of bags of luggage suggesting they were intending on moving in.

'Wasn't us! This is not our fault, we didn't do it, you can't prove anything.' A few of the bandits weren't sure what was sadder, the fact that that was the boys' response to seeing more people joining the gang of bandits or that all four of them had managed the whole sentence in complete synchronisation.

'We know,' Dadan growled out, 'this one is Garp's fault, apparently we run a safe house for those that are running from the marines as well as a day care.'

The two oldest boys looked at each other, shrugged, and turned around and to and get more game for the meal and hopefully use the time unsupervised to discuss this latest development in the "what the hell happened to the time line" disaster that they had not so secretly brought Zoro up to date on when it became obvious that he remembered at least some of what was going to happen.

Luffy, however, did not move with them. Instead he was staring with starry eyes at the group of new comers.

'Hey, Gramps brought them, so it's not our fault, but I can still keep the polar bear, right?'

The bandits almost all fell over as they lost strength in their limbs, the group of new comers had their mouths fall open in shock, and the three oldest boys just grabbed Luffy by the arm and started dragging him into the jungle.

Sabo and Zoro, as they helped drag the struggling eight-year-old away from the commotion, were both thinking that one of those people looked strangely familiar, and way too knowing. After all, the one with the overly fuzzy hat had just smiled in rather creepy manner rather than react with the same amount of shock as the rest of his group.

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