A/N: Beta by Navigator101, updated on 10/18/18.

Chapter 5

Nothing is impossible,
the word itself says 'I'm Possible'!

- Audrey Hepburn

"Hey, brats. Come here and bring those things I asked for-yoi," Marco called out from the deck one morning.

"You think they can hear you?" Vista asked. "Where are they anyway?"

"We can hear just fine," came a muffled reply before a door opened up from the deck floor.

All of the commanders had come out of curiosity when they heard Marco ask Izou to help the boys with something. Now they were watching in surprise at the hole opening up in the floor and the three boys climbing out of it.

"So that's how you've been popping up everywhere," Haruta said in amusement, wondering how he hadn't noticed them coming and going through the hidden door before.

"Got one for every room," Sabo said proudly as he handed three pistols to Marco.

Haruta crouched down to where the hole had been. He knocked on the floor a few times, trying to figure out how it worked.

"You'll never open that door," Ace said with a smug expression as Luffy giggled by his side.

Haruta turned to innocent, naive little Luffy in hopes for an answer. "Do you know how this thing works?"

"It's a mystery door," the boy cheered.

Blamenco had to keep himself from laughing at his brothers' curiosity. The boys wanted to keep the doors a surprise, so he wasn't going to tell anyone how they worked or where they were placed. Not that he could fit in them himself. The one in the kids' room was the only one big enough for him to fit into anyway.

"These aren't the same as the one you showed me before-yoi," Marco's voice distracted the 12th Division Commander from asking more questions about the doors.

"You said we'd be training, so I left it mostly intact. It still fires off paint, though," as if to prove his point, Sabo took one gun and fired a shot at the cabin's wall. "I think they have about a hundred shots each."

"You left the recoil-yoi?" Marco raised an eyebrow at how the boy's arm reeled back a little.

"You said you wanted to know how good we are with them, so I left it mostly intact. And mostly for Luffy," Sabo explained.

"Why? You know he's not strong enough to handle that sort of recoil-yoi." Marco knew, with the boy's lack of muscle strength, Luffy wouldn't be able to stand after shooting a round with this type of pistol. He should have told the boy to use a more light-weighted pistol.

"Luffy can handle it," Ace said as he dragged Luffy with him to where their other brother was.

"All right, then. How are your aims with these-yoi?" Marco asked as he led them down the plank and onto an island they'd docked at, with all the Commanders following.

"Good enough? We get the job done," Sabo answered with a shrug.

Marco sighed. "Not the answer I wanted-yoi." He pointed to a tree. "Aim for that black spot."

Getting the idea, Ace and Sabo raised their weapon and took aim, with Luffy looking at them before mimicking them. While the two older boys slightly flinched after firing their shots, Luffy went rolling backwards, head over heels. Blue and red paint dotted the tree trunk, both inches away from their intended target, and a yellow spot a few feet above.

Sabo quickly ran over to Luffy and helped him back to his feet. "Luffy, you were supposed to aim for the black spot. The really big one right there," he bent his head next to his brother's so they would be eye level and pointed at the target.

"Oh," the boy's eye widens. "Opps. Wrong black spot." He took his stance again from where he stood, which was a few feet further away.

Marco placed a hand over his eyes and shook his head. He looked back up after the next shot went off and saw Luffy rolling back again. Why did that brat leave the recoil for the poor boy? He turned his head to the tree to see yellow right in the center of the spot he chosen as their target.

"Marco," Kingdew called out after inspecting the tree. "The kid's first shot was actually spot on. He nailed a fly." The large man pointed to the first yellow that Luffy had shot.

Marco wasn't the only one shocked by the extreme accuracy the boy had. Everyone, with the exception of the two older brothers, were speechless.

Thatch laughed. "You did say 'black spot on the tree.'"

Marco turned to the boys. "I still don't see why you left those guns as they were if Luffy's just going to roll off after each shot. That's just creating an opening for enemies to take advantage of-yoi."

Sabo scratched his head as he hummed, thinking of a good way to explain the reason. "Not quite sure how to explain it. Let's just say that Luffy uses anything and everything to his advantage. We've rarely had to worry about it before."

"Right, fine-yoi," Marco sighed once more and ran a hand through his hair. No point in trying to understand the kids. He'd just have to wait until the end to point the problems out to them. "I'm actually no good with guns, so I'm going to have you go at it with Izo-yoi." He waved the cross-dresser over. "Who's going first?"

"I am," Ace said as he walked and stopped a few feet in front of Izo.

Marco took a gun from one of the other boys and gave it to Izo. "Stop when you're both out of ammo, or when you hit something vital. 'Out of ammo' is six shots. Your field is within a 15-foot radius, and I will know if you go out of bounds." The match started as soon as Marco reached Sabo and Luffy's side.

The first thing Ace did was to jump high into the trees, using the foliage as coverage. He then jumped to another branch and another to distract the commander. Once he got behind the man, Ace fired a shot.

Izo was told not to use Haki during their little training session but was still able to dodge the red paint fired. It was a poor aim that was going towards his feet. Nonetheless, not wanting the boy to think it'd be easy, he took a step to the left and turned around to fire where the shot came from.

"Ack!" Ace fell from the tree, crashing into the bush below. "That's not fair," he moaned as he detangled himself from the bush. There was bright red mark in the middle of his forehead.

"That would have worked on an average person," Izo stated, "if you can control your aim. Maybe we should have asked a non commander to do this instead."

"Well, that didn't last long," Sabo sighed in dread, when Ace tagged him in.

The match with Sabo started and ended similar to Ace's.

"I think he's cheating," Sabo grumbled as he dusted his pants.

"I wasn't cheating," Izo defended himself. "You both have lousy aim. Neither one of you would have been able to hit me anywhere important, even if I didn't move."

"It's okay, Sabo," Ace gave his brother a confident grin. "It's Luffy's turn. Time for revenge."

"Luffy, you better win this round for us," Sabo gave the smaller boy an encouraging smile.

"Okay~," Luffy cheered as he bounced over to stand in front of Izo.

"Izo," the man turned his attention to Marco, "you can use Haki with this kid-yoi."

"You sure about that? He's just a tiny shrimp. I don't want to be called a cheater again, especially when I didn't cheat to begin with."

"Trust me," Marco gave the other two boys' creepy grin a thoughtful look. "And it's not cheating if he's using it too. And take this," he tossed the man the other paint pistol he took from Sabo. "To liven things up-yoi," he smirked at Izo's disbelief.

"My turn! My turn!" Luffy sang as he bounced around in front of Izo in excitement, carelessly waving his pistol in the air over his head.

"Sure, sure," Izo smiled fondly at the boy. Seeing the boy wasn't stopping his strange dance of joy, Izo took aim at the oblivious boy. It'd be the boy's own fault for not paying attention. Instead of landing the hit like he'd expected, the red paint landed a few feet behind the still dancing boy instead.

It had to be a coincidence. Izo shot off both pistols in his hand in succession. He was sure at least one would hit since the boy had his back to him. Instead the red and blue paint ended up flying past the boy's head as he continued to dance.

Izo glared at the two snickering boys who were with the rest of the commanders. He turned his eyes back to the boy in front of him. "Luffy, you do know that our match has already started, don't you?" he asked patiently.

"Oh, it is?" Luffy tilted his head, causing the boys at the sideline to laugh harder. "Okay." It was then that the cheerful boy's face went from all carefree smiles to something more alarming. Izo didn't know how to describe it, except that it was like all trace of emotions left the boy.

Instead of jumping to the trees like his brothers did, Luffy charged straight at Izo and tripped over his own feet. The man took advantage of that and fired, wanting to get this done and over with but missed when the boy used his hand to flip himself over and upright and continued to run past him and into the bushes.

Using Haki, Izo tried to locate the boy but nothing showed, other than the others at the sidelines. He held both pistols up and readied them. He dodged a shot that came too close to his face. Then another and another, each one coming too close for comfort from different directions, making it harder for him to pick out where the boy was. Izo grinned in victory when the sixth projectile was sent in his direction.

He vaguely heard Ace and Sabo telling Marco to not end the match yet.

Then, from his left, Luffy came out of the bushes and charged at him once more. Foregoing the pistol still in his hand, the boy launched himself at Izo with a kick aimed at the man's head. Izo quickly, with practiced ease, placed one of his weapons into his sash and grabbed the boy's leg before it made contact.

"You used all six of your shots, brat," Izo said with the boy dangling upside down in front of his face. The kid had the audacity to aim the pistol at his face.

"But you didn't," Luffy grinned with a face that the commander never want to see on the boy ever again. Luffy pointed to where Izo had placed his second gun earlier. It was no longer there. Then he saw another gun, abandoned right in front of his feet.

"Shit!" Izo tossed the boy, just as red brushed his cheek.

Luffy rolled to a stance and fired once more, only to topple back and roll away as Izo sidestepped the shot. The man took aim at the rolling boy but was stopped by Marco.

"Why'd you stop it?" Izo demanded.

"Look at your chest-yoi."

The Sixteenth Division Commander looked down to see a red stain right over his heart. "How –"

By now the two older boys were on the floor clutching their stomach from laughing so hard.

Izo looked at Marco for an explanation. "The kid took another shot in mid-recoil-roll-yoi."

The crossdresser looked at Luffy, who was still trying to shake off the dizziness from the last roll.

"You've got to be kidding," Izo deadpanned. He had heard the last shot but thought it was a wild shot, not a well-aimed one.

"No," Ace said as he wiped the tears from his eyes. "That's why we kept the recoil."

"He uses anything and everything to his advantage," Sabo repeated himself, panting from the laugh. "If anyone thinks to shoot him while he's rolling away, it'd be too late."

"So, you're saying it's planned-yoi?" Marco asked in interest. He didn't think the brat could even form a plan, much less, aim from that strange position.

"No," Ace finally caught his breath back, "Luffy doesn't know how to think like that. Luffy's just unpredictable."

Izo thought back on every shot the boy fired and realized that each one of them would have been dead on if Izo wasn't as skilled as he was. "That was certainly entertaining. You're good with that, brat," he complimented the boy. "Maybe you should start carrying one around for protection. New World is a lot more dangerous than Paradise. Something not as heavy-weighted. I may have something in my room." He mumbled the last half to himself.

"Wait, then how did he not roll away while he was hiding in the bushes?" Kingdew asked.

"The tree," Luffy answered. He jumped up to a branch and braced his back to the trunk to show them what he did.

"All right. You said you can use just about anything, right-yoi?" Marco asked as he held out a sword to hand over to them.

Sabo and Ace looked at each other before Sabo turned back to answer. "We can, but we're actually not all that good with swords. We'd just swing that thing around and hope to hit something."

"I see. That might be too dangerous then," he placed the sword down and picked up a bo staff. "You said you can use this, right-yoi?"

The two older boys' eyes lit up. "That, we can use," Ace said as he took the offered staff and swung it around, testing it. "A little lighter than what we're used to, but we can use this."

"Right, I forgot-yoi. You mentioned hunting with pipes before." Ace and Sabo nodded. "Okay, then. This time you'll spar with me-yoi." Marco walked out to take Izo's place with Ace following.

"Aren't you going to use one too?" Ace asked.

"No. I don't usually fight with weapons," Marco answered. "Don't worry about holding back-yoi. Just come at me like you would an enemy."

"Oh. Well, okay then," Ace smirked as he made the first move. He swung his staff up and then down towards Marco's head, but the man was much faster and easily dodged.

Marco was impressed at how well Ace was able to handle the bo staff. The boy was even able to withstand his kicks that were blocked with the staff. He knew the kid was strong, now he knew how strong. He continued attacking and giving the boy room to attack back.

At one point, he kicked the staff out of the boy's hand, only for the Ace to completely ignore the weapon and attacked him with his bare fist. Marco had thought Ace would retrieve the staff. The spar continued on with Marco kicking, and Ace throwing whatever he could at the man, before Marco kicked Ace hard enough to send him towards his brothers.

"That's it," Marco ended the match. "Not bad-yoi," he smirked at the boy. "We'll have to work on your speed though. Next-yoi."

Sabo left Ace, who was rubbing his sore spot, with Luffy and grabbed the forgotten staff on the ground.

Marco found that the two older boys had similar a fighting style. Basically, anything goes. They fight dirty if they have to, aiming for places normal people wouldn't dare to think to hit. He dodged a thrust to his midsection before kicking the staff, but Sabo was more persistent in holding onto his weapon. Marco didn't get the chance to unarm Sabo and ended the match in the same manner he did his brother, kicking him towards where his brothers were.

Marco put down his leg and frowned. "Where'd the other two brats go?"

"Luffy got hungry," Vista answered. "Looked like Ace fell asleep or something, so the brat dragged him over and complained about being hungry and wanting food. Thatch took them back to the ship for some snacks."

"I'm surprised Ace didn't wake up after being manhandled like that," Haruta winced. "I mean, the shrimp was literally dragging him by the arm. We told him to leave his brother to sleep here, but he insisted Ace wanted food too."

Sabo looked around, thinking his two brothers would still be around. "Really? I'm more surprised that Luffy left me. I'm not surprised he took Ace with him. This is the second time he's left without the both of us." Sabo smiled at that. "Maybe he'll finally learn to be on his own. I mean, we've never left Luffy alone before. Unless he was too injured and unconscious, but we'd always be by his side before he woke up. Even better," he looked at them with a bigger smile, "he said what he wanted to someone that wasn't us."

Marco ruffled the boy's hair. "It only took him eight months to do that-yoi." They all headed back to the ship and towards the galley. "And he can read and write now. Little by little, he's growing-yoi. You two are doing great."

Sabo felt himself blush. Never in his life did he ever think he would feel this proud about raising a child at his age, not to mention, he and Ace were children themselves. It wasn't easy, but he knew Ace would agree with him that Luffy made them proud.

The second they walked into the galley, Luffy ran over to Sabo with a slab of meat in hand and gave him a greasy hug. Sabo patted him on the head and asked if Ace was awake yet.

"I'm awake," Ace grumbled from his spot at a table in front of Thatch. There was a huge pile of food before him, but he had his head on the table.

Sabo sat down next to him and started eating with Luffy. "You fall asleep again?"

"Ugh. Don't remind me. I woke up to Luffy trying to feed me. Not sure how he did it, but I'm actually full."

"Aww. Don't say it like that. Your little brother thought it'd be nice to feed you before he fed himself," Thatch grinned.

The rest of the group took a seat with the boys and Thatch. The commanders had nothing planned for the day, so they all decided to take the day to spend with their youngest shipmates and get to know them better.

"Again?" Marco asked.

"Luffy calls them 'Nap Attacks,'" Ace mumbled. "That's the third time I just fell asleep out of nowhere."

"Oh? This is the first I'm hearing about this-yoi," Marco raised an eyebrow at him.

Ace turned his head away with a blush. "Didn't think it was important."

"Ace," Sabo smiled brightly. Ace's head turned his way. "You do realize that Luffy dragged you here without me, right?"

"Yeah," his brother said fondly, before scowling. "That explains why I'm so sore. So how did you do? Sorry I missed it."

"I didn't drop my staff," Sabo said proudly.

"You two have the same fighting style," Marco said. "I'm guessing you learned together?"

"Yeah," Sabo answered. "We fought and hunted together before…well, yeah…"

"And Luffy? How is he with a staff?" Haruta asked.

"Don't know. Never had a chance to give him one to use," Ace shrugged. "But probably wouldn't hurt anyone since he has no muscles. Might leave some bruises, though."

Marco agreed. They'll have to work on that. Whitebeard pirates are known as the strongest, but they were pirates, nonetheless. The kids will need to learn to take care of themselves eventually.

"After you finish eating, I want to do a few tests on this 'Nap Attack' of yours, Ace," Izo said. "It may not be anything serious, but it doesn't hurt to know what's going on with your body."

-*/-*/-*/

"Brats," Whitebeard drawled, as he closed the door to his room and walked over to take a seat on his bed. He chuckled in amusement as Luffy popped his head up from the floor. He'd watched them when they made the door and even gave them permission to add the listening tube to his room. They told him where it was so he could plug it up if he wanted to talk about something he didn't want them to listen in on.

"Hi, old man," the boy greeted and crawled out of the hole to let his brothers through.

"You need something?" Sabo asked. This wouldn't be the first time Whitebeard called them to do some errands for him.

"How is your training going?" Whitebeard gestured for them to sit with him on his bed.

Luffy quickly ran over and sat in his usual place on Whitebeard's knee.

"Hard to say," Ace said. "Marco's way stronger than we are, and we have nothing to compare ourselves to."

"Marco turns pretty when he let us hit him," Luffy threw his arms out in a cheer as he talked about Marco's Devil Fruit ability.

"I hear you wouldn't let Luffy learn how to use any weapons?"

"Yeah," Sabo answered. "We figured Luffy needs to work on his strength. Truthfully, we don't like seeing him use weapons. It just reminds us of … of before. And he doesn't need to learn how to use them. He already knows how to use them."

Whitebeard nodded. He understood what the boy meant. Even if he's never really seen them fight, he's sure that it's a sight they don't want to see again. Seeing a young boy they've practically raised themselves doing things they don't like, would bring bad memories.

"I hear you have narcolepsy, Ace?"

"Nap Attack? Yeah. No idea where they came from. Never had them before," Ace shrugged it off as unimportant. It doesn't sound like this narcawhatsit is life threatening.

"Do you like it here?"

"Yes," Ace gave the big man a small smile. "The people are nice. No one's asked us anything we don't want to answer."

Sabo nodded. "Ace and I have always dreamed of being a pirate. You've given us that and freedom. You don't know how much this means to us."

"You wanted to be pirates? At such a young age?"

"Pirates are free!" Luffy cheered with his arms up in the air.

"Is that so?" Whitebeard grinned.

"We told Luffy stories about pirates. Even before we got stuck in that place, all we ever wanted was freedom," Ace said, looking to the floor.

"Ace had to hide so the government wouldn't find him, and I had to hide from my parents. At least here, there are people that know we exist," Sabo said. "We're tired of running and hiding."

"Then you might not like what I'm about to say," Whitebeard frowned.

"Why?" both of the older boys asked, dreading what Whitebeard was going to tell them.

"We're nearing Sabaody Archipelago. I need you three to stay on the ship and out of sight. Basically, stay under the ship until we leave there. That place may seem like a grand place, but it has its dark side. Sabaody is close to Mariejois, where World Nobles live."

"Slavery," Sabo growled. "I've heard of the place from my parents."

Whitebeard nodded. "As such, I want you to stay away from there and out of trouble."

"We're fine with that," Ace crossed his arms. "It's better than going back. I like my freedom, thank you very much."

"Also, everyone will have to be off the ship. So it'll just be you three. There will be someone I trust that will be coming on board to coat the ship. Even then, I want you three to stay hidden."

"What do you mean 'coat the ship?'" Sabo asked.

"In order to cross Red Line into New World, ships need to be coated in order to travel underwater." Whitebeard looked amused as the boys' eyes widened.

"Travel underwater? You can travel underwater?" Ace said in wonder.

"Yes. Come on deck once we depart to experience it. It truly is something else."

The boys cheered at seeing something new. It was like another adventure. They couldn't wait.

"Also," the stern voice caused the boys to be quiet, "I've let you guys wander off on your own at each island before, but after we get to New World, you won't be able to do that as often. A commander will be with you everywhere you go. New World is nothing like Paradise. There are more dangers out there. The pirates and marines are much stronger, and the islands are more dangerous."

The boys nodded in understanding. They may be losing some of their freedom, but Whitebeard was only looking out for their well-being. At least they're no longer slaves ordered around to do mindless killings. They were still free.

"Is it possible for you to buy something for us then?" Sabo asked. "We were planning to do some shopping."

"What is it you need?"

"A hammock big enough for the three of us and some blankets. We want to sleep in our hideout, but it gets too cold at night."

"All right. I'll have Marco get those for you."

-*/-*/-*/-*/-*/

A/N: ˭̡̞(◞⁎˃ᆺ˂)◞*✰