A/N: Hello everyone :D and I s'pose thanks for reading this again XD (especially EchoesXGrace for reviewing *gives a plushie*) Here is the third chapter and I have more stuff to add because I can't think to put it with the other notes I put in the previous chapters XD

Mmkay, so, later on you'll read that it says Iceburg's living area in the Galley-La HQ is on the third floor. I was going with that since his room was on the third floor, the rest of his 'house' would be too, since it's odd to just have it all mixed up ._. *imagines a bedroom right next to a conference roon* XD

OH! While looking over my notes, I noticed that Tallie comes literally the year after the whole Tom-gets-sent-to-Enies-Lobby-and-Franky-gets-hit-by-train part of the series. It so.....conveniently works with my story it's scary XD

Disclaimer: I don't own One Piece, because if I did, we'd see a lot more of Smoker than we do now D:

"My little Tallie," Lato kneeled, eye-level with the girl, his blue eyes meeting with her unusual ones – green dusted with gold. "I need to talk to Iceburg-san now. Could you go wait over there?" he pointed to a pile of wood a bit away, so she would be unable to hear them talk.

"Sure," she said, and bounced over to the spot like only an uncoordinated little girl can. After a few minutes of her watching (to which she could only see Iceburg solemnly nod occasionally to whatever Lato was saying) she saw Iceburg turn to the nearby teen as he started to walk over to where she was sitting.

"Hey," he said to her, running a hand through his already slicked back hair. "You hungry? I'm going to get some Mizu Mizu Meat, wanna come?"

The girl just stared suspiciously at him. "Lato-san told me to wait here. We're gonna leave soon."

A dark look came over the boy's face, but disappeared just as fast as it came. "That so? In the ship with the moon figurehead on it?"

"Yep," she said proudly. "So I gotta stay since it's all fixed."

"Ahm...sure, I guess," he said, walking back over and said something to Lato. Lato, in turn, looked over to her and called with a smile, "Go on Tallie, nothing will go wrong." She just tilted her head and when he gave another warm smile, the girl just felt like she had to believe him.

After all, he was her Lato-san. Why would he lie to her?

And so, when the teen came back over, she took his outstretched calloused hand in her tiny smooth one and walked where he led – further into the city, taking the land route.

"What are all those animals in the water?" she asked, gesturing to the canals with her free hand.

"Huh? Oh, those are yagara bulls," he replied, leading her further down a main 'street.' "You sit in the boats that are harnessed to the yagara, and they take you wherever you want."

"Oh." They finally arrived to where the teen wanted to go, a Mizu Mizu Meat stand.

"Just two." He gave the clerk several berries and received two aqueous looking pieces of meat. Handing one to the girl he said, "Here. You're very first Mizu Mizu Meat."

Taking a bite, the girl found it tasted very good, but it felt like an odd cross between steak and gelatin. "Whoa," she giggled, "this is weird."

"You get used to it," he smiled slightly, taking a big chunk out of his own. After sitting quietly for a few moments on a bench in the shade, finishing their food, the two decided to return to Dock 1.

But, as they got close, the girl heard a slight chiming of bells, like the sound the stars would make if they could. "No," she breathed.

"What?"

"The chimes. We only ring the star chimes as we start to leave." Without any warning, she sprinted away from him and through Dock 1, following the sounds of the chimes.

The chimes that meant her crew were leaving.

That meant Lato had begun to leave.

That meant she had been forgotten.

That meant she was now alone.

"Lato-san!" she yelled. "Lato-san! Wait! Where are you goin?!"

Lato!"

LATO!"

LATO-SAN!"

LATO-SAAAAAAAN!"

But they didn't notice the little girl up to her knees in water, calling out repeatedly for the ship's captain. Nor did the ship turn around, ignoring her hopes that they would notice she wasn't there. When she couldn't see the boat anymore, she turned around and walked back to dry land, where the blue-haired man was standing.

"Nmaa, I'm sorry Tallie-chan," Iceburg said, to which she looked at him with a fierce look in her eyes.

"They'll be back," she told him. "Lato-san will notice that I'm not there and come back. He will."

Iceburg just nodded, surprised to see no sadness whatsoever on the young girl's face; she truly believed they would come back for her. "There a small apartment nearby for you to stay until then. It's better than waiting outside." The girl merely replied that she would wait outside for the rest of the day; there's no need for an apartment. Lato-san would be back.

She waited at the shore well into the night, only allowing Iceburg to bring her to the apartment when she could barely stay awake long enough to argue with him.

The next day, Iceburg found the girl sitting on a barrel, facing the sea. He just sighed, remembering the previous day's conversation.

I'm not asking you to take her in as your own, or to give her to an orphanage." Lato told Iceburg, then added with a gloomy smile, "Stubborn kid probably wouldn't let you do it anyway."

"Did you tell her you were going to leave her?" Iceburg's young apprentice asked heatedly, everyone knowing he meant, 'Does she know you're abandoning her alone in a city she knows nothing about?'

"It's not like that," Lato tried to explain. "She's just a young girl. We only brought her along since I was taking her best friend, Tsuda, with us. Other than him, she was alone, this dejected, yet tough, little street rat that no one wanted. She lived in the back streets well enough, but the Grand Line is much too dangerous for her. One curious look on deck during a storm could send her slipping off into the ocean. I wouldn't be able to live with myself if something like that happened."

"Nmaa, so she would be fine living by herself, even though she's that young?"

"It's the only way she'd want to live, as far as I know her. Only way she has lived."

"I'm starving," the fifteen-year-old grumbled as he started to walk away. "I'm taking the little kid with me to get some food. If she says she needs permission I'll come back to ask you to tell her."

You can tell her I said it's alright to go," Lato replied.

"She's more likely to believe someone she looks up to than a stranger," the teen retorted brusquely, already walking away.

"Will the boy tell her?" Lato asked.

Iceburg just shook his head. "I doubt it. Though I can say he doesn't like you. He saw how happy the girl was with you. Nmaa, that's probably why he's taking Tallie along, after hearing what you said."

"It's terrible, I will admit it. Even more terrible that I am asking someone I've met only three days ago to help."

"When do you plan on leaving?"

"Depending if she goes with him, it'd be best to leave now."

Iceburg just shook his head, knowing that he'd help the girl no matter what that man Lato said.

If someone listened hard enough, little footsteps could be heard walking towards the Galley-La HQ in the pitch black of night. Also, if that same person listened harder, he would notice that small sniffling noises were being made as well. And, since it was one something in the morning – what the said pitch blackness was the result of – there would be an occasional stumbling sound caused by the perpetrator of the other noises tripping.

A small hand lightly rapped against the front door. Several long moments later it opened, revealing a very surprised and sleepy looking Iceburg.

"Nmaa, hello Tallie," he said, stifling a yawn, as if it were the most normal thing to have a child knocking at his door in the middle of the night.

The usual fierce look on her face was a complete opposite of the tears trailing down her face. "...I-I'm sorry, -hic- I'll go b-back now; you're -hic- t-tired." She furiously wiped her eyes to make it look like she was fine, despite the hiccupping from the tears.

"No, come in," he stepped to the side and she hesitantly walked in. "I could make some hot chocolate if you'd like." The young girl just nodded and followed Iceburg to the third floor where his living area was, reaching out and grabbing the sleeve of his gray nightshirt.

When they arrived at the third floor he led her to a living room-esque area that connected to a small kitchen. She went to the couch and pulled her knees up to her chest while he went to make the cocoa. When it was done, he poured two mugs and sat at the couch as well.

"The sounds are different here," she muttered after sipping a bit from her mug, unwilling to admit she was a bit scared of the new city. "Did Lato-san hate me?" she asked suddenly.

Iceburg placed his untouched mug on the coffee table in front of them. "No, he seemed to care for you very much. He thought it was best for you to stay here."

"Tsuda's only ten," the girl replied, also putting her drink on the table, and wrapped her arms around her knees, "but he wasn't left here...Everyone said my parents left because they hated me. They said my parents wanted a boy, but got me. They left because they hated me. How could Lato-san leave if he cared for me?" Tears were now falling down her face again.

This girl was not a 'dejected, yet strong, little street rat' as Lato had said. She was just a frightened eleven year old that got left behind.

"Nmaa, would you like to stay here until morning?" Iceburg asked and the girl nodded her reply. She rubbed her eyes again – feeling stupid for crying – then noticed something on the table. It was a blueprint of a ship Iceburg seemed to be working on. Ignoring that, as she herself didn't know about blueprints, she flipped it over, grabbed a pencil on the table and began to draw.

"That's an excellent picture of a yagara," he noted when she finished a few moments later, telling the truth. For a child, the girl drew as if she were a practiced artist.

"They're weird, I like them," she replied, leaning back. Then, she turned to Iceburg, "I must seem pretty weird too, going from crying to saying random things to drawing. What an oddball huh?"

Iceburg just laughed and a few moments later exhaustion got the better of the girl, for she curled up and fell asleep. "Nmaa, with all the oddballs we've had," he said to himself as he covered the girl with a blanket, thinking of his fellow apprentice from when he was younger, "one more won't hurt."