Chapter 12

No matter how serious life gets,
you still gotta have that one
friend you can be completely stupid with.

- Unknown

With the boys now 11 and 14, their captain deemed the three of them strong enough to take care of themselves in New World without a chaperon. Or at least Ace and Sabo were, but they can easily take care of their youngest (aka: keeping him out of trouble). What they don't know is that Marco usually sends someone to tail them just in case something happens. Well, Luffy knows but Marco made the kid promise to not say anything to his brothers about it.

All the crew members have seen how much stronger the two older boys have gotten when they fought alongside them during enemy attacks. Luffy mostly sits on Whitebeard's lap on the sidelines, unless Marco lets him help out. Whitebeard and the commanders didn't want any unwanted people to see Luffy's talent. Especially now that he's capable to hold his own after all the training with the commanders.

-*/-*/-*/

Currently, the boys were roaming around a small town on a random island they landed at to restock. With them growing as much as they have been, the crew had been restocking more than they used to. Thatch and Kobato, at least, were happy with how much they've grown. Though they were still worried about Luffy not being as tall as most boys his age. Ace and Sabo's old clothes at his age were still a bit big on him.

They entered a clothing store to buy some new clothes. Ace eyed Luffy in one of his old outfits. It made the boy look even smaller. The shorts were obviously being held up by a belt and went well passed his knees, almost like a capri, and the short sleeved shirt had to be bunched up in the back and tied off so it wouldn't get in his way. They had wanted to buy something that would fit better, but Luffy had insisted that he was fine with their old clothes. Besides, he likes having a tail.

Luffy turned to tug on Sabo, who was standing next to the boy, looking at something on a shelf. "We're being followed."

That had Ace's attention. He took his purchase and joined his brothers. "Who?"

Luffy shook his head, indicating he didn't know. "There's two, though. Kinda strong but not really."

Sabo looked outside, just giving it a cursory glance as he thought. He didn't see anyone out of the ordinary. "We shouldn't cause too much trouble for the people here. They might be following out of curiosity. Remember that one guy that followed us because he wanted to join the crew?"

They remember that. The man had followed them because he saw them leaving Moby Dick and followed them, hoping for a chance to ask them if he could join. This was at the last island. They beat the man up because he seemed suspicious and caused such a commotion that the people there were afraid to talk to them afterwards. Thatch laughed at the poor man when he came to see what was going on. Too bad for him, Whitebeard didn't take him because the kids didn't like him. It was more like, Ace and Sabo didn't like him because the man was trying to be sneaky, and they didn't want him near Luffy.

"Could be that. Let's just see what happens. But if they want a fight, we'll be ready."

Ace and Luffy nodded, and they left the store to wander the town a little more. They followed Luffy around, going in and out of stores that caught his interest.

"Opps," Luffy said sheepishly as he turned around to his brothers. He'd accidently led them down a deserted alley with a dead end.

The dead-end alley wasn't long. It was long and dark enough that they didn't realize it was a dead end until it was too late. It was also short enough that they were caught off guard when two people all of the sudden ran towards them.

There wasn't enough time to defend themselves when Ace and Luffy were handcuffed together.

"Dammit," Ace cursed as he felt himself growing weaker. He fell to his hands and knees and saw how his youngest brother dropped face down right next to him. "Luffy?"

"Sabo," Luffy said weakly as he lifted his head and reached his free arm out in front of him.

Ace looked up in time to see them cuff Sabo as well and took off with him. Ace yelled out Sabo's name. He pushed himself up and tried to help Luffy, only for them to fall back down. Not knowing what else to do and with only the thought of saving Sabo on his mind, Ace crawled his way towards the alley entrance, dragging Luffy along with him.

"Ace? Luffy?" Ace looked up to see West at the mouth of the alley looking down at them with worry. "What happened? Where's Sabo?" West is screwed. He knows he's screwed. Marco is going to kill him. All because he took his eyes off the kids for a few minutes.

"Sabo," Luffy whimpered. "People came and took Sabo."

"We have to go get him back," Ace said, still crawling.

"Okay. But first, we have to take care of you guys." West picked them both up and carried Luffy in his arm while Ace was tossed over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, facing forward.

"What is this thing?" Ace shook his left hand, jingling the chains. "I feel like mush."

"Probably seastone. It takes away your Devil Fruit's power," West explained. "It's supposed to make you feel like you've been dumped in the sea, sapping your strength."

"Can you tell which way they went?" Luffy nodded at Ace's question. "Good. Keep track. We're getting Sabo back as soon as we get this thing off."

"Marco!" West called out once their ship was in view.

They saw Marco walking up to the rails to look for them before he transformed his arms to wings to get to them faster.

"What happened?" he asked once he took in the handcuff and the lack of Sabo.

"Get these things off us right now!" Ace demanded, kicking his legs weakly.

"Pops, they took Sabo," Luffy whined weakly from West's arm.

"Seastone-yoi?" Marco asked, knowing that if it were just regular cuffs, Ace would be able to break them off easily. The boys nodded anyway. "Get on the ship. Bekky is still on board. He can get those off for you-yoi."

"Hurry! We have to get Sabo back," Ace demanded, practically whining.

Ignoring Ace's urge to go faster, West relayed what the boys had told him to Marco.

"Those guys were well prepared-yoi. They must have known about your fruit abilities beforehand. Otherwise, why would they use seastone? Those things are too expensive to just use normally," Marco pointed out. "They could be dangerous-yoi."

"According to Luffy, they're not strong. We were just caught off guard," Ace huffed. "They cheated."

"Should I round up everyone?" Bekky asked as soon as he got the cuffs off the kids.

Marco had to hold them by the back of their shirts to keep them from running off the save Sabo themselves.

"It should be fine," Marco said. "I'll go with them. I'll give you a call if we need back up-yoi. Which way?" He transformed into a phenonix, grabbed the boys, and flew in the direction Luffy pointed.

"There's lots of them now. In there." Luffy pointed to a small marine base below them.

"The marines?" Marco's eyes narrowed. "What would the marines want with Sabo-yoi?"

Ace shrugged as Marco landed right next to a solid brick wall where there were less guards. "Who knows. Maybe his parents finally got fed up and decided to pay the government to get him back."

"Make sense-yoi," Marco mused. "Wait here. I'll go get him."

"Wait," Ace pulled the man back by the arm before he could transform again. "We'll go. I already told that stupid dad of his to leave Sabo alone. He didn't listen, so we'll make sure he listens this time." Ace gave him an evil grin.

"Fine, but if I think you need help, I'm coming in-yoi."

"No worries," Ace brought up his a flaming fist. "We'll make sure you won't even have to lift a finger." Both he and Marco frowned at how small his flames were and how it flickered unsteadily.

"Hurry up, let's go," Luffy urged them, not noticing what was wrong.

"It might be because you and Sabo share fruit powers. It should be fine after you get the seastone off of him-yoi," Marco said. "Don't worry. I'll keep an eye out on you boys."

"Okay," Ace nodded. He had originally wanted to punch a hole in the wall, but with how his fire is acting, he decided against it. Instead he used Luffy to rocket them up and over the wall.

Marco stood nearby, listening as he heard a few shouts. He then decided to take flight in order to keep an eye on the kids in case he needed to step in. He was cautious to fly high enough so the enemies wouldn't notice him but low enough to keep an eye on the boys.

As soon as Ace and Luffy were over the wall, they took down the few men that were under them and ran towards the building where they were sure held their brother. After taking a few more men on their way, Luffy pointed out one of the men that had attacked them in the alley. Ace didn't recognize him now that the man was in the usualy marine uniform, rather than street clothes.

The man saw them and ran in the opposite direction, only to be stopped by a sword being pointed at his neck and a dagger by the smaller boy sitting on his shoulders.

"Sabo's keys. Now," Ace hissed from in front of the man, as Luffy glared at everyone else to back off, from his higher position.

Not wanting his head lopped off, the marine quickly complied and led them to the room where they put all their keys, asking/begging other marines they run into to let them pass. After getting the keys, the man took them to the prison cell that held their brother.

"Sabo!" Luffy cheered once they made it. He jumped off the man, who fell to the ground from the force of the jump on his back.

Ace kept an eye on the marine quivering in the corner as Luffy opened the cell door and very carefully, very slowly, unlock the seastone on Sabo. It had taken a few tries before Luffy was able to unlock the cuffs without touching it and draining his energy. He wouldn't let Ace help him, insisting that he could do it himself and that he'd save Sabo.

"That feels so much better," Sabo stretched his body then picked up his top hat off the ground.

"Me too," Ace said. "Apparently, if just one of us touches seastone, it'll affect the other one too."

"That's intersting," Sabo said. Now that they were free, Sabo gave Ace a grin, and they lit their fists on fire, causing the poor marine hostage to cry out in fear. "Ace?"

"Yeah?"

"This place sucks. I think we should burn it down."

"That's a great idea. Oh! How about our signature? You know, Luffy's drawing?"

"Oh, I like that idea. Maybe that bastard who thinks he's my father will finally leave me alone," Sabo grinned even wider.

They both turned their grin to the poor man on the floor. "You picked the wrong people to piss off," they both said as Luffy laughed behind his brothers.

Ace took out a marker he had in his pocket and doodled on the man's face. "There. Make sure you tell that bastard that Sabo belongs to us, not him."

"Lots of people coming," Luffy told them as he giggled at the sight of the marine quivering in fear with Ace hovering right over his face.

As soon as Ace finished, he and Sabo turned to face the oncoming group of marines and gave them an eerie grin before unleashing a Hiken right at them. Ace then grabbed Luffy, and the three of them ran right through the inferno. They are going to teach Outlook III to never go after Sabo again by crushing this marine base. If that doesn't work, maybe asking their Pops to fly them to Dawn will. One way or another, Ace is determined to free Sabo from his parents.

Marco flew around in circles, pacing in the sky, as he waited and waited and waited. It's only been a few minutes, but waiting and not knowing how his kids were doing was aggravating. After ten minutes, he was done waiting. Sure, he trusts them to be able to take care of themselves, so he's not going to barge into the base to look for them. Instead, he's going to unleash his aggravation on the marines for taking his kid.

He landed right behind a group of marines who were rushing in to the base to fight and kicked the nearest one, alerting the rest of his presence.

When the kids finally came out of the building, they found Marco shaking the life out of a marine with his Phoenix talons and wings flapping, keeping him airborne. "...and tell that asshole that Sabo is my kid, not his, and the next time anyone tries to kidnap any one of my kids again, I'm to tear them limb by limb," he lectured before tossing the marine to a pile of bodies next to him.

Ace and Sabo stopped a few feet of Marco, each holding a mop. Somehow, Ace wasn't as surprised as he thought he'd be that Marco had left a message for the stupid noble before he could.

"Pops! Pops," Luffy ran over to give the man a hug, splashing paint he was carrying all over the man's shirt. "Look! We got Sabo's back."

Marco eyed the blond boy and was relieved to find no injury. He gave the blond boy a smile, "Good to have you back."

"Glad to be back," Sabo smiled widely back.

"Graffiti-yoi?" he nodded to where Ace was smearing paint that Luffy was carrying with a mop, onto a wall.

"Our symbol," Sabo said. "It's our initials, and the wings represents our freedom."

Remembering what Luffy had told him about birds having freedom to go where they wanted the one time the boy asked him to take him flying, Marco nodded in approval. It was a simple drawing of a wing on each side of their initials, ASL. Very symbolic, he thought.

"Luffy thought of the design," Ace said as he finished up his art. "Though his drawing was a mess."

"Ace refined it. We thought about using it as our signature," Sabo grinned with his arms behind his head. "Didn't think we'd be using it this soon, though."

Marco shook his head at the boys and laughed as the two older boys went on to paint more of their symbol around the base.

"So?" They slowly walked back to their ship. There was no hurry. Most of the marines were already too injured to move or dead. Any that were too scared of the children and hid during the kids' 'tour' of the base would be too busy tending to the dead and injured, also putting out the fires they caused.

Sabo shrugged. "That bastard father of mine offered the marines a nice sum if I were to be returned home unharmed."

"That's what Ace thought-yoi," Marco nodded.

"I did overhear that someone tipped them off about where I've been and stuff. Hence the seastone, I guess," Sabo shrugged

"I'm worried about the tipper," Marco said after a brief pause. "We should let Pops know. Who knows what this person knows and how much they've told the marines-yoi."

When they returned, most of the crew were already back on the ship, standing on deck with weapons drawn. The crew gave a loud cheer when the four of them were seen. Bekky and West had went out to gather as many of their siblings as they could so they'd be ready to attack if needed.

Later that night Marco found himself in his captain's room.

"What's wrong, son?" Whitebeard asked at the worried look on the first commander's face. He motioned for his son to sit on the bed next to him.

"I'm beginning to think there's something wrong with me, Pops-yoi," Marco sighed into his hands.

"Have you gone to see your brother?"

Marco huffed and crossed his arms as he remember's Izo's smirk and his dismissive wave. "Yeah. He told me to talk to you about it-yoi." He continued at Whitebeard's raised eyebrow. "Every time I see the kids in danger, I get this urge to kill everyone and anyone that gets in my way of saving them-yoi. This over protectiveness is wrong, and I don't know what to do about it. It's to the point where I almost want to keep them in my sight at all time. I can't do that though. They're growing boys who are definitely strong enough take care of themselves-yoi. I mean, they did just take down a Marine base today. They were lucky there were only low level marines, nothing higher than the one captain there. Would you believe those brats took their time running around an enemy base? Why couldn't they just get Sabo and come right back out? Instead, they just leave me out there, worrying about them because I have no idea what was going on in there, and I didn't want them to think that I didn't trust them enough to take care -"

Whitebeard paused as he let the information sink before he laughed loudly, interrupting his son's rant. "There is nothing wrong with what you're feeling, son. That is perfectly normal for a parent. And yes, you are now a parent. There is no denying it. I feel the same way about you and your siblings. There are days that I want to keep the ship in Paradise or in one of the Blues, where it's much safer, but if I did that, no one would be happy. You have to learn to not be too over protective. It's hard, but don't worry, you'll figure this out."

-*/-*/-*/

A few weeks after the whole Sabo kidnapping event, Garp paid the Whitebeard crew a visit. He was led by Marco to their training room, where he watched his grandson duel with their youngest commander. Haruta, if he remembered correctly. He watched as the boy took up a stance with two swords, which were smaller than normal to fit his size. He recognized the stance as Vista's.

"Practice-yoi," Marco explained. "He needs someone who'd be able to keep up with him and his different fighting style. He did insist that he wants to just fight with only his Devil Fruit's power, but I think it'd be best to keep training him with everything else as a precaution-yoi. He's getting to the point where he can switch styles flawlessly and make them his own."

Luffy's eyes wandered over to catch his grandpa's before the boy was forced to pay attention to his opponent again. Garp strayed his eyes to his other two grandsons standing up in the stands. They haven't noticed him yet it seemed.

Marco let them continue for a few more minutes before calling for them to stop and gathered the boys and all the commanders to the meeting room.

Luffy ran up to give his grandpa a hug that was returned. Ace and Sabo greeted him with their usual "Shitty Gramps" and a grin. It was all per usual. He didn't mind, but that didn't stop his Fist of Love though.

"What's brought you here today, Garp," Whitebeard asked once the door closed.

"Teach," Garp answered. Well that, and to check up on his grandsons after he heard what had happened to Sabo. "He provided the government information about your crew in exchange for a seat as a Shichibukai. I don't know what information he gave though."

The commanders started talking all at once to each other, pondering what the traitor was planning. Whitebeard held up a hand to quiet them and gestured for the marine to continue.

"No idea what he's planning, especially since he has no bounty. The government wasn't even aware of him until then. He accused me of being a pirate's informant of all things. Could you believe that?" Garp laughed. "Of course they have no proof or reason to doubt the Great Marine Hero. Sengoku isn't stupid enough to believe a pirate, but I've been put on temporary leave. I mentioned going back home to East Blue, and low and behold, the bastard learned about some shitty Noble looking for his son." He looked at Sabo.

"I'm surprised he's just now making his move-yoi," Marco said.

"He was probably bidding his time and gathering supporters. He now has a crew. They call themselves Blackbeard Pirates." Garp scoffed. "Because of all this, I won't be able to offer you anymo information until things cools down. The bastard even told them my grandsons has joined your crew. Good old Sengoku. He told Teach that that wasn't possible since my grandsons disappeared years ago," he gave another loud laugh before worry took over his face.

"Teach doesn't know too much about the boys," Whitebeard offered when Garp looked to Luffy in worry. "Only those in this room knows their story. Teach was already long gone before Luffy made it known to the rest of the crew of his skills. Even still, they don't know anything passed that they were once slaves. That's as much as Teach knows."

Garp nodded in understanding. He knelt to give each of the boys a hug before leaving, knowing that Whitebeard would keep his grandsons safe.

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

A/N: Not too sure about this chapter. I liked it when I wrote it, but after typing out, I'm not too happy with it. Oh wells.

I've had a few people mention that the story seems to be moving fast. It is. I didn't want to write a long story. :x