DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN ONE PIECE

Happy New Years!

Chapter Three

Four days was the limit I had to get everything squared away on Scarlet Island because, in four days, the Log Pose would be set and the Whitebeard Pirates, along with myself, would be off to the next one. And, after asking what the heck a Log Pose was, I stood in the middle of my ruined house and thought as hard as I could about what I should do in my four days.

There was, of course, the thought of simply staying on their ship until we left, because I couldn't think of anything right away that I wanted to do here. But there were two problems with that. One was that Stafford had said that he needed to clear a room out and make it into a small bedroom for me. Two was that Marco said he didn't want a brat on the ship any longer than he absolutely needs to. So it was 'kindly suggested' that I move around the island and take in the sights for the last time in a while, if not forever. And I took that to heart because really, four days, my departure was a done deal already because the Captain pinky promised me. So what could really go wrong in four days?

After a good while of thinking it through, I came up with nothing to do. I couldn't plan out my four days in advance. So I decided that the best first step was the house. It had been a mess since the day of the incident, really due to the men of the island rushing in and struggling with Kaeli when trying to apprehend her, as well as the medical teams coming in and starting emergency treatment on myself and Margie and pronouncing everyone else dead already. It was a busy day, is what I'm trying to say, and I had never had the energy to clean up. Why clean if I'm going to have to stare at the house as it used to be when we were all happy every single day until I died or left?

I also owed it to my mom to finally clean. She had always been the neat freak, fretting about every single dirty dish or muddy boot print that tracked across the floor. If there was one thing out of place, the whole house went on lockdown and we cleaned. That was why Kai and Yuvi always got in trouble for starting mud fights when it rained, and I was always pissed for being blamed. Mom was strict when it came to hygiene and cleanliness in general, and no matter how much she loved you, if you were messy in any way, she was tough. And she was probably rolling over her in grave for the past year because I allowed her house to stay in such a state for so long.

With a plan in mind, I set to work. Starting with the kitchen. I picked up a chair that had been resting near the pantry, standing it up on it's legs and pushing it to the counter, standing on the seat and grabbing a birds nest in my hands. The mother bird, resting on her eggs, peered at me through one open eye while I moved her nest out of the house and into a tree in the back yard. And the process was repeated for the rest of the nests in the kitchen, as well as any others that I found in other places of the house. In all, I moved thirteen nests out into various trees around the house, careful not to anger any of the birds and get my eyes pecked out, as my dad assured me would happen if I ever messed with a nest.

I grabbed a large towel from the floor, placed it on the floor, leaned over so my hands held it, and ran it all along the kitchen floor. This moved most of the debris - - broken glass, splintered wood, bits of ceiling, silverware, plates - - to one side of the room. I did this again to push it out of the back door. This entire process was repeated to move the same debris from the living room, into the kitchen, and into the pile forming outside the backdoor. I straightened the table, lifting the large mahogany piece of furniture from the floor with absolutely no grace, placing the chairs around it like we did all the time back then. One chair at each end of the rectangle, for mom and dad. Two on the left side, for myself and Kai, and two on the other side for Kaeli and Yuvi.

The broom sitting snapped in half against the wall, because I may or may not have had a fit of rage a few months ago, was put to use for the first time in a long time. Dust and dirt and smaller pieces of glass and wood were swept into the dust pan and thrown into a bucket, for the garbage can that had once sat in the kitchen disappeared some time ago. From the shed to the left of the house, I grabbed out many pieces of wood that my dad had kept in hopes of building a bookshelf, as well as the toolbox he had received from my mom a very long time ago. I set to nailing the boards over the broken windows in order to prevent anymore birds or rain or anything of the sort from dirtying the house again.

At the end of three hours, I was resting in the hallway and catching my breath, staring at the two locked doors before me, both locked from the inside. I had done that the first time I came back to the house in hopes of preserving what was on the other side. In hopes of keeping mom and dad's room as they last left it, as well as Kai and Yuvi's. My back was pressed against mine and Kaeli's old room, the door I had kept unlocked. And I was scared to go in there because much of my frustrations were taken out in that room on her belongings. Her bed was in tatters, a knife having been taken to it every time a birthday passed. All photos of her in our room were torn to shreds. The wood floor had many small bloodstains from accidentally cutting myself during a session of destroying everything that reminded me of her.

And that was when the cleaning, which had been going so well, got hard. Because I wanted to go in those locked rooms and tidy up, maybe dust a little and board up those windows as well. But on the other hand, I couldn't seem to make my hands move to pick the locks. I couldn't stop the shaking that overtook my hands whenever they got close to the doorknobs. And there was also the room behind me, that I hadn't entered in weeks, which was nothing that I wanted to clean. I didn't want to see that stuff anymore now that I knew I was leaving.

The front door opened with a creak just out of sight, and I tensed. "Yo, kiddo, you here?" I relaxed in an instant because there was only one person on this island that called me 'kiddo'. And to further prove that I was correct in my assumptions, Stafford came around the corner, his eyes still trained on the kitchen area with a confused look as he spoke to me. "So, uh, I see you've been making use of your spare time."

"Mom would be pretty mad if the house messy and I just left." Images of my mom's ghost getting revenge on me for leaving the house in it's previous state plagued my mind all of a sudden, and I had to shake them away. Stafford nodded and finally looked at me, coming to stand by my side and look down at me with a long hard stare. When I started to feel my skin prickle, I frowned. "Is something wrong?"

He flopped down beside me so suddenly that I jerked away from him, though he didn't notice as his eyes closed from the force of his grin. "I don't know, is there something wrong?" His question confused me, and it showed because he chuckled and tilted his head back against the wall, still observing me from his peripheral. "I've been outside calling your name for a few minutes before finally coming in."

"You have?" I didn't believe him. I hadn't heard him at all! "Were you yelling?"

"Was I yelling?" He scoffed and hitched a thumb at his chest. "Do ya take me for an idiot, kiddo? Of course I was yellin'!" I deadpanned at his 'pirate talk' and he chuckled before becoming serious once more. "So, why not tell me why you're so deep in thought for a five year old." I slapped his hand when it came to rest on my shoulder and glared. "Six?" My frown deepened. "No way in hell are you seven!"

I slapped him hard on his chest now and huffed. "I'm eight you stupid pirate!"

"You're so small!"

"How tall do you expect me to be?!"

He opened his mouth to yell something back, but instead of words, he simply laughed loudly. A laugh that came from the gut that had him gasping for air and me patting his back with the fear that he would suffocate and not get any air into his lungs. When he was finally able to speak again, he did so while wiping tears from his eyes and still giggling slightly. "I think that's the most emotion I've seen that's not depressing as shit! Good for you, kiddo."

I crossed my arms over my chest and shoved his arm. I wasn't depressing. "What do you want? I'm busy?" But I was secretly glad he was here because that meant that I still had more time to prepare myself for the rest of my cleaning.

Stafford had to actually think of his reason for coming here before he exclaimed and pounded his fist into his hand. "Got it!" I rolled my eyes. "Okay, so, I was walking around earlier and heard these guys in weird robes talking about some 'demon possessed child' that they were gonna try to fix before 'she leaves and brings the evil elsewhere'." I stared at him blankly and he looked expectant. When nothing happened, he sighed. "So, like, is that...you?"

"Yeah."

A hand clapped the back of my head and I was left rubbing the sore spot. "Don't say that so casually, dumbass!" I don't apologize and simply looked away from him. These names are familiar to me. The Priests have been calling me by these names since the incident, and there was never anything I could do about it. I was 'cursed'. The cursed have no say in their treatment. But they can run and hide, which had become my life since the exorcisms became more intense. Stafford sighed and placed his head on the back of my head once again, rubbing in a soothing manner instead of slapping it. "Marco heard 'em too, and he said to make sure you were alright."

That surprised me because it seemed Marco didn't like me as much, but I said nothing about that. I pulled away from Stafford's hand and stood up, stretching my arms and shaking my head. "I'll be fine."

He stayed longer, sitting beside me in the hallway, and we talked about a lot of things, though I can't remember what exactly we spoke about. I remember he cracked a few jokes, and made a big deal of my lips quirking up only slightly because he was 'making progress'. And when he left, he asked when I would finish cleaning, because he would come pick me up, but I shook my head and shrugged. "It's fine," I said, picking the lock of my mom and dad's door. "I'll just sleep here."

He left. I stayed. I went into my parents room, trying to ignore the photos and different things around the room that would remind me of what had once been. I dusted. And dusted. And dusted until the tears were streaming down my face and I had to go back into the hallway and take a break. Then, when my tears were dried and my heart calmed down, I went into Kai and Yuvi's room where the process was repeated and I ended up back in the hallway drying my face and evening out my breathing. I rushed back into those rooms and boarded up the windows with as much care as I could before leaving them once more, locking the doors from the inside to never go back in.

And then I had to deal with mine and Kaeli's room. I didn't get the sadness that I did when I went into the other two rooms, but instead felt a raw, unhinged anger and pain that made the air thick. My hands trembled as I entered the room, and continued to grow progressively shaky as I gathered every ruined thing in the room and simply threw them from the window. I wouldn't have been able to make it to the door. I moved quickly, trying to breathe evenly around the lump that had formed in my throat.

When I got to my part of the room, the part I hadn't been to in about a year, I froze. There were many things there that were still in good condition. Things that hadn't been ruined by my throwing things around. A framed photo of the whole family. A small bear that had been given to me by Kai and Yuvi on my birthday one year. A seashell that seemed to be nothing of value, but really it was very important because it was the last one I had grabbed from the beach with my mom and dad. And tucked under my bed, something I had set aside after the incident and never looked at again, was a bag or money. Coins and bills, an unknown amount that I had collected from every room of the house.

I finished cleaning out the room, the end result appearing to be a room for a single person, and left the room. On the way out, I grabbed the money and nothing else. I wanted to bring no reminders of my past along with me to the ship except for the memories. No physical evidence. If I had been more dramatic, I'd've burned the house down as well before leaving the island for good, but that was stupid.

That night, I slept on the kitchen floor in the spot I had been sleeping in for the past few months. And for some reason, my heart felt lighter.

888

"Psst. Psssssst!" My nose twitched as something brushed against it. Dust? A feather? "Oi, you're not dead, are you?" A hissing whisper in my ear. The voice unfamiliar in my foggy, half-asleep state. "Oh my god, she's dead." Now it was louder, leaning away from my face and sounding disbelieving, but also a little amused.

Footsteps, hard against the ground and hurried. They stopped. Heavy breathing. A growl. A slap. "Don't be a fucking idiot, Thatch!" Laughter, more slaps, and a small scuffle.

I woke up when a foot connected with my leg, not hard, but a mere tap. Things were getting annoying, and it was hard to sleep when, upon glancing over, two grown men were wrestling on the floor, one slapping the other many times in the face with a victorious grin. "Don't feel to good, does it?!" The man on top laughed at the other.

Stretching upwards, I tuned the two of them out and moved to look out the open front door. The sun was high in the sky. It had to be around noon. "What are you guys doing here?" I felt like I asked that question a lot since I met the Whitebeard Pirates, but they were always showing up unannounced and for seemingly no reason other than to come see me. It was weird and a little off putting. I looked over my shoulder at the two men, now standing and straightening their clothes, and frowned. "What time is it?"

"It's well past noon!" The aristocrat pirate jumped forward and grabbed my shoulders, a look of mischief in his eyes. I blushed at the close proximity and, from what I heard, had reason to believe his name was Thatch, even though it was a dumb name. "And you were still asleep! What were you doing last night, huh? Partying before you left? Well let me tell you, you're too young to party like that, and as our travelling companion, it's my duty to look after you!"

My blush disappeared as soon as he opened his mouth, and my expression went to that of a deadpan one.

From behind Thatch, Stafford reared up and smacked him on the back of his head. "She's not partying, dumbass!" I pursed my lips and slid out from Thatch's hold, unnoticed. "I told ya she was cleanin' up her house, but you're a fucking idiot!"

"Hey, watch your language, moron!" Thatch whirled and slapped a hand over Stafford's mouth. "She's only five, so show some class." I held my tongue and slipped out of the door, again unnoticed, and moved away from the house.

I had just turned a corner when I heard a great yell from back at the house. "She's how old?!" I rolled my eyes and continued on to my next destination. Lion's Tavern was dead at this time of day, but that didn't mean it was closed. I always came here to relax during the day. Sitting at the bar and drinking juice or eating some snacks while Josie, and sometimes Loo, cleaned up the place for the next night. Sometimes I even helped, but today would not be one of those days. I was tired from yesterday.

Stepping through the door, I waved to Loo who was on sweeping duty, brushing glass and crumbs and dirt into a dustpan with an annoyed expression. He hated helping Josie. I sat myself on a bar stool and rested my elbows on the counter, waiting patiently for Josie to come from wherever she was.

"So Kitten, how was your day yesterday?" Loo asked while still sweeping, grunting when I gave only a shrug of my shoulders and didn't even turn to look at him. "Those pirates came in last night. Kept talking about ya." Now I glanced over at him, mainly from the tone he used. More annoyed, kind of pissed. And his face matched his tone perfectly. "Any ideas why?"

So he doesn't know yet.

Again, I shrugged. And at that moment, Josie came from the back carrying a crate of alcohol, placing them on the shelf behind the bar with a glance in my direction accompanied by a smile. "Well, look what the cat dragged in! I thought I said to come back yesterday?"

Had she? I thought back to the other day, but couldn't remember for the life of me. But, Josie didn't lie, so I grimaced and lowered my head. "Sorry about that. I was busy."

"Ah, it's fine. Loo! Dammit, you moron! Stop sweeping up perfectly good cups into the garbage!" The man being scolded grumbled and cursed under his breath, but stopped once Josie spoke again. "So, I heard you're leavin', Mara."

Before I could respond, Loo yelled loudly. "Leaving?! Where the hell are you going?! To a new house?!"

"Shut up, Loo." Josie warned with that glare that could get any of the rowdy men in line, and Loo was no exception. She turned to me with softer eyes and smiled. "I think that's good that you're finally getting out of here, what with everything that those Holy Bastards are saying about you. I don't think you're way of leaving is very smart though."

I cocked my head to the side and frowned. "What do you mean?" My way of leaving? My way of leaving shouldn't matter so long as I get out of here and live a better life, right?

Josie nodded and stopped her work, coming to stand in front of me and leaning against the counter so her face was closer to mine, probably trying to keep Loo out of the conversation. "I mean, you're putting your life in the hands of pirates. And yes, I agree that they seem like good people, but that could just be the surface, and also could just be what we've seen. There are many members I haven't met, many that haven't come onto the island." I nodded along with what she was saying, taking it all into consideration. "I mean, there could be pedophiles on that ship for all we know, and do you really think that the handful you can trust will be able to protect you 24/7?"

I had nothing to say to that. She had a valid point. She had many valid points. I could very well go to that ship and leave with them, only for everything to be a trap. A way to lure kids onto their ships willingly. And then what? Dad used to keep us informed on what pedophiles would do if they ever got their hands on us, and it wasn't good. Would I be killed? Raped? Sold? Turned into a slave?

As if reading my mind, Josie frowned. "A lot of bad things could happen to you on that ship, and I want you to be 100% certain that you really want to go with them. That you really trust them with your life. Because once you leave, there's no going back. And we won't stop you if you want to go with them in the end."

"Ha, speak for yourself, Jojo!" Loo swung his arm around my shoulders and looked to her with the angriest expression I had seen on his face. His cheeks were red and his eyes were hard. Like glass. Piercing. Josie scowled at the man. "I ain't lettin' Mara go with those criminals. Over my dead body!"

The sound of the door closing behind us caused the three of us to jump. Loo whirled around, bringing me with him, and Josie peeked around us. At the door stood the pineapple head. Marco. And he looked as bored as he always did, but his shoulders were more squared. "Ah, I was just looking for you, Mara." I furrowed my brows because I didn't know that he knew my name. Marco walked forward, completely ignoring the tense atmosphere. "Stafford and Thatch were supposed to tell you, but they're idiots. Anyway, your room is done on the ship, so I can show you to it if you'd like."

"You can't be serious!" Loo turned, grabbing both of my shoulders, and looked me dead in the eye. "You already have a room? Come on Mara, you're a kid. Not a pirate! Think about things before you do stuff like this! Do you want to end up like the rest of your family?!"

Josie gasped behind me. "Loo, that's enough!"

I pulled out from his hands and jumped from the stool. "I know what I'm doing, so stop worrying about me." And I went to Marco, meeting his eyes as I craned my neck up. "I'll go see it since you came all this way."

He led me down the streets, most likely noticing that people were avoiding the both of us to the best of their abilities, but not commenting on it. He was a famous pirate. He was probably always avoided. And I didn't comment because I was 'cursed'. I was used to it.

And neither of us spoke until we got to the docks and was ready to go up the gangplank. Marco turned to look at me and smirked. "Over his dead body, huh?"

"You heard him?" I covered my face to hide my blush while Marco hummed out a yes. But then I peeked up at him and thought back to mine and Josie's concerns, and figured that I should get it all out in the open now rather than wait until later. "I...Mister Marco, can I trust you guys?"

"We're pirates, kid. You probably shouldn't trust pirates. Or strangers for that matter, since you're so young. Especially strange men."

I nodded, already knowing that, but pressed on. "I mean, you guys aren't going to...do things to me, are you?" He stopped in an instant. I nearly ran into the backs of his legs. Looking up, I saw that his whole back was now rigid and, though I couldn't see his face, I was sure it showcased a shocked expression. "Mister Marco...?"

He turned and knelt down to my level, his eyes no longer droopy as they were snapped open with alertness and surprise. "What the hell are you talking about? Do things to you?" I shrugged and relayed my thoughts from the bar, how they could kill, rape, sell, or enslave me. With each concern, his face became more disbelieving. "I don't - - we're not those kind of people, kid. None of us are. You can trust me on that."

"But you just said that I probably shouldn't trust pirates, strangers, or strange men." I pointed out, not trying to sound like a smartass, but coming off that way despite that. "And you're all three of those."

Marco sighed and hung his head. Then spoke quietly, his hands on my shoulders and his voice sincere. "No one on this ship is going to do any of those things to you. You won't get hurt, okay?" I hesitated, but nodded when he looked up at me. "And if you want, you can talk to the nurses about how everyone is, since they're women and you're a girl. That might establish more trust, right?"

I agreed readily, because he was right, it was easier to trust a woman more so than a man. That was why I was on better terms with Josie than with Loo. She understood me more than he did. Just like those nurses that I had a glimpse of yesterday would understand my concerns more than Marco or Thatch or Stafford.

He said that my room can wait until I speak to the women of the ship, and I was led to the hallway that I believed was the one I walked through with him yesterday to see Whitebeard. He moved to one door and knocked a few times, waiting patiently until someone from the other side asked who it was. And when he made it known it was him, with company, we were invited into a room that looked cleaner than any room I had ever seen, especially since it seemed four people shared the room.

Three women, however, were present when we walked in. Two blondes and a redhead. One blonde sat at a desk, shuffling through paperwork while peering over his glasses in our direction before getting back to what she was doing. The redhead was sprawled on one of the beds, holding a newspaper in her limp hands and smiling my way. The third woman, the other blonde, was standing in the middle of the room, arms crossed and her foot tapping against the wooden floor.

"Who's the kid?" The blonde in the middle of the room demanded, looking between myself and Marco with an annoyed expression. Her eyes were a bright green and hardened to look like the emerald that had once hung from my mom's neck. A pretty color, but very cold and distant.

From the bed, the redhead jumped up and slapped the other woman's arm. "Be nice, Heather!" She approached with a grin, kneeling down beside me and patting my head. "You're so cute~! Marco, who is she?" The woman looked to the man beside me, then back to me. It was then that I saw that her eyes were a yellow color, something that I would associate with a bird rather than a person.

"This is Mara. Mara, this is Jade," He indicated the redhead in front of me, and she grinned. "Heather," The blonde in the middle snorted at her name and moved to the bed that Jade had been on, grabbing the newspaper and flipping through the articles. "And over there is Lynn." The third woman waved slowly over her shoulder, not looking up from the papers before her.

Jade nodded and jumped up, smoothing down her pink dress and peering at Marco. "And is there a reason that cute little Mara is on this ship…?"

"She's gonna be travelling with us." The three women all looked to me now with more interested, Lynn actually looking up from her papers. "And, as a young girl, she had concerns that the three of you will ease. Got it?"

A silence stretched between the five of us before Jade clicked her feet together and saluted the man playfully. "Aye aye, Commander!" She then grabbed his shoulders, turning him around and shoving him to the door. "Now get out so we can have a girl conversation."

Somehow, I ended up sitting on the chair that Lynn had occupied, facing the three women that were now sitting on the floor in a semi-circle. Jade had her hands in her lap, Heather was fixing her braid, and Lynn was cleaning her glasses off on her dress skirt. I swung my legs nervously in the air, hands going to my knotted and dirty hair, fingering the brown locks as we all simply...sat.

"So," Jade started, clapping her hands loudly and startling the rest of us. "Marco said you have some concerns? Well, what's up?"

I was suddenly embarrassed. Too embarrassed to say the things I said to Marco earlier because I was scared I would get the same disbelieving reaction that he gave me. So I simply said, "What's the crew even like?"

And this question got me a different explanation from each woman. Jade assured me that there weren't any completely evil guys on the crew, just some that looked a little creepy. The guys were all nice enough and wouldn't do anything like hurt a woman or a child or anyone innocent, because then they would answer to 'Pops' and that wasn't fun when they were in trouble. Heather, with a grin, said that they were all pigs and that they weren't worthy of being called men. This earned a slap from Jade, but Heather stuck by her words, not apologizing. She was just being honest, she said, and thought that was the best for me, though she was still grinning when she said that. Lynn loved the whole crew and saw really no faults in them because, as she said, if they were able to live under Whitebeard and call him Pops, then they couldn't be bad at all.

But there were some things that they all agreed on wholeheartedly.

"No matter what, day or night, for every little thing, those men will find a reason to throw a damn party." Jade held up a finger.

"They're loud and obnoxious most of the time." Lynn held up two fingers.

"And it takes a good punch to the head - - multiple times - - to get them to bathe and get the smell of ass and sweat off of their bodies and clothes." Heather held up three fingers.

I nodded slowly, taking in everything that the three women said about the crew. They seemed like how I imagined them to be; rowdy, but not evil people. And Whitebeard was descibed how I perceived him to be upon our second meeting. He was kind and caring and truly loved everyone on the ship. Heather, Jade, and Lynn had nothing but good things to say about their 'Pops', and it was nice to know that they weren't going to decieve me.

Heather's green eyes were suddenly directly level with my own brown eyes, and she looked analyzing. Critical. "When's the last time you changed these bandages?" My eyes travelled from her face to the bandages covering my body and I frowned. They were dirty now, from cleaning the house and sleeping in them. I hadn't changed them since the other night when Stafford came and brought me to the Tavern. Heather clicked her tongue and moved to grab my arm. "I'll change them, so gimme your damn arm."

I pulled away and smiled. "Ah, no thanks."

A vein throbbed in her forehead. "No thanks?" My smile wavered as I could see the flames of rage literally coming from behind her. Jade, still seating on the ground, called Heather's name nervously, but she was ignored. "I am a nurse! You will let me change your bandages!"

I had successfully got away from Heather's hands by sliding out of the chair and making a beeline for the door, turning to look at them over my shoulder and thanking them really quickly before leaving and shutting the door firmly behind me. I sighed heavily and leaned against the door, shaking my head. "That was close."

"What was close?" I squeaked in surprise and was ready to bolt away when laughter rang through the hallway, and I looked up to see Thatch and Stafford standing against the wall across from me. Thatch had been the one to speak. "Runnin' from Heather? Don't worry, everyone does at some point. She's the mean one."

The door behind me flung open and the blonde in question turned her fiery rage on the impeccably dressed pirate. "Who's the mean one?!" Thatch gave a feminine scream and made a run for it, the angry nurse dressed in her pink uniform close behind, brandishing a clipboard that she managed to smack into his arm several times before they rounded the corner and disappeared from sight. Leaving only Stafford and myself.

The man beside me sighed heavily and scratched the back of his head. "I swear, Thatch never learns his lesson."

"What do you mean?"

He chuckled. "Heather can't stand that man, and he always has to say things about her." He rolled his eyes and jutted his knee outwards, hitting it gently into my side. "Marco said to show you you're room. He's busy."

I followed Stafford down the hallway, turning out into the deck of the ship, and in through another door nearby that led into another hallway. There were doors lining the walls on both sides. We passed several before coming to a stop in front of one that had been left open.

Peering in, I saw the basics of a bedroom. A bed, of course, complete with a blanket, pillows, and a small bear resting in the middle, which confused me until Stafford said that it was Pops' 'welcome to the ship' present. A desk sat against one wall, a small window over the top of it with a chair in front of the desk. A chest sat at the foot of the bed, most likely empty and waiting for me to put things in it.

Stafford cleared his throat and brought my attention to his grinning face. "Well, do you like it, kiddo?"

I nodded. "Yeah, it's nice."

"Great!" He clapped once and steered me out of the room. "Now is time for the grand tour. You'll need to remember where the bathrooms are, and the mess hall definitely, and Pops room because, well, that may be important. I'll teach you how to climb up the crows nest and you can even sit in with me on watch some nights! And you can see the training rooms and learn how to shoot a gun maybe, yeah?"

He led me all around, commentating on everything and everyone, and in the end, by the time I was leaving the ship to go back to my house as the sun went down, I forgot every single thing that he said and could no longer remember where my own room was.

[A/N]: So this chapter was originally twice as long, but since it was bordering 10,000 words, I decided to cut it in half. (God that's a long fucking chapter!)

So, how do you guys like it? Do you even like it at all? And I really hope that I'm doing the Whitebeard Pirates justice because I don't know if I'm even writing Marco or Thatch right or even Whitebeard! I mean, with my OCs I have more liberty, but with those three specifically, I need to be somewhat right!

Anyway, I hope you guys liked it! Like, favorite, review and all that jazz please! Give me your constructive criticism and everything because I do read every review and answer questions when they're asked!

Love you guys and see you soon~

XoXoXoXo