"Kurooooo, why aren't we catching any fish!" Luffy whined.
"Catch what now?" Kuro questioned strangely.
"Fish, I'm hungry Kuro!" Luffy cried.
Kuro arched an eye, "You're not hungry, you're Luffy, and I thought we were going to catch a friend, not fish."
"Friend? How do you catch a friend with fishing?" Usopp looked weirdly at Kuro.
Kuro looked weirdly back at Usopp, "Of course you can catch a friend by fishing, you just gotta believe."
"Yeah I don't believe you," Usopp bluntly replied.
"I believe Kuro," Luffy smiled.
"Thank you, Cap," Kuro shed a tear.
"You're welcome," Luffy grinned.
"Both of you are crazy!" Usopp shark teethed.
Suddenly, Luffy's line was pulled on.
"I caught something!" Luffy yelled with happiness.
"Looks like a big fish!" excited Usopp.
"Looks like a strong friend!" excited Kuro.
Luffy pulled and on the hook was Bon Chan.
"Helloooo," Bon Chan smiled, "Thanks for saving me."
Usopp became stone face without emotions.
Luffy was awed with surprise.
Kuro decided to introduce himself, "You're welcome friend, my name is Kuro, what's yours?"
Bon Chan got off the hook and started dancing on the ship, "I'm Bon Clay but you can call me Bon Chan."
Kuina and Zoro looked curiously at the swan-dressed man.
Nami and Vivi wondered who he was.
Chopper wondered how they caught a man by fishing.
Looking at the crew, Bon Chan started introducing himself to them and they introduced themselves back.
"Say Bon Chan, where are you headed? Perhaps we can give you a ride since you seem lost at sea?" Kuro suggested.
Bon Chan swiveled around, "Thank you but I believe my crew will find me up soon, as for where I'm going, I'm currently on a secret mission, what about you guys?"
"Secret mission!?" Luffy, Chopper, and Usopp beamed.
Kuro smiled, "Secret mission huh, we're on a secret mission too. You see Princess Vivi over there!" Kuro pointed at Vivi, "She's trying to stop Warlord Crocodile from destroying her country with civil war, from what she's gathered, Crocodile is Mister Zero of some organization named Baroque Works and we're on our way to stop him."
Everyone became dead silent, and not a sound was heard.
"Why would you tell him that!?" Vivi, Kuina, and Nami knocked Kuro on the head with shark teeth.
Kuro looked at the three strangely, "But he's a friend."
"What do you mean!?" Nami shark teethed, "We just met him!"
"Uhm actually, I'm part of Baroque Work," Bon Chan explained.
Everyone looked at him, "Ehhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"
Bon Chan smiled, "But if what you said is true, then as a friend, I will help you guys save Alabasta."
Everyone except Luffy and Kuro's Windows XP stopped working.
Luffy and Kuro held hands with Bon Chan and started dancing.
"Yay, we have a new friend," Luffy laughed.
"And he's weird like me!" Kuro laughed happily.
The three danced around like idiots until Nami got them to stop.
After a long explanation from Bon Chan, they came to trust him and found out more about Baroque Works plan.
Bon Chan ship came and they said farewell.
"We'll see him again right Kuro?" Luffy smiled.
"Most likely," Kuro grinned.
"How could you guys trust Bon Clay?" Vivi questioned.
Kuro looked at Vivi and smiled, "Let me lay down some facts, princess. First off, you trusted Mister Nine and Miss Monday. What this means is that there are good people in Baroque Works that are being used by Crocodile without their knowing. Second, Kuina's observation haki lets her detect whether someone is a good person or not."
Kuro looked at Kuina with a smile, "Bon Chan was a good person right?"
"Too good for his own good," Kuina replied with a sigh.
Kuro turned back to Vivi, "And third, Luffy caught Bon Chan as a friend, and so as a friend, we trust Bon Chan."
"Yeah!" Luffy cheered.
Vivi couldn't really find a good counter for Kuro's facts other than his third so she sighed and let it go.
The strawhats continued sailing with peace.
The strawhats were on the run and the Marines were hot on their heel.
Getting on their ship, they started sailing away.
Tashigi jumped on the Merry and pointed her sword at them, "Face me, pirates."
"Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee," Everyone heard Kuro squeal with some sick joy, "By Gold Roger, do my eyes deceive me?"
Kuro jumped off the crow nest and faced Tashighi.
Tashigi knew who he was and was prepared for a fight.
Everyone looked at Tashigi and was surprised to see that she looked like Kuina except for Zoro.
Zoro frowned, he did not like that Tashigi was on their ship, he wondered what kind of crazy reaction Kuro would have.
"Nope it looks like my eyes didn't deceive me," Kuro grinned, "But I thought Gold Roger's son would be bigger."
'What?' was all everyone thought.
Ace frowned but everyone was focused on Tashigi wondering how in the world she was Gold Roger's son.
Tashigi was confused too but quickly came to the conclusion it must be a pirate tactic.
"I'm not Gold Roger's son!" Tashigi yelled, she had to stall for time so reinforcement would arrive, "Your tricks won't work on me!"
Kuro looked at her with a dull look, "Oh it's you Tashigi, fancy seeing you here, but..." Kuro turned to a fleet of Baroque Works, "I'll deal with you later."
Everyone watched as Kuro swiped at the water and a huge wave rose toward the Baroque Works fleet and swallowed them.
"Cool!" Luffy's eyes beamed.
Kuro's sweat dropped, a lot of people might have drowned from that, he did not feel comfortable with Luffy being chill with him killing.
He turned his attention back to the opened mouth Tashigi, "Alright then, back to you, you either walk the plank or we keep you hostage."
Tashigi regained her composure, "Neither, I'll fight you all till my last breath!"
Kuro was about to knock her out when Kuina jumped down from the crow nest and stopped him.
Kuina could see it in Tashigi eye's, the girl's pride would be hurt if she was taken out so easily after all the hard training she had done.
With her observation, she could tell that Tashigi was a good person.
Kuina turned to Luffy, "What do you think we should do with her Cap?"
Looking at Kuina, Luffy could feel she expected something from him, he didn't know what it was but he'd tried his best.
"Let's keep her till Smoker finds us again," Luffy smiled.
Kuina nodded, she was satisfied with that answer.
Kuina knocked out Tashigi and then turned her attention to Ace who was by Luffy's side, "You seem strong, who might you be?"
"Same can be said about you," Ace grinned, "I'm Ace, Luffy's brother, who might you be?"
A small surprise formed on Kuina's face with big surprises on everyone else faces.
Kuina smiled, "You seem brighter than Luffy."
Ace smiled back, "I definitely am, thanks for taking care of my little brother."
"Hey!" Luffy whined.
Kuro felt the need to back Luffy up, "Don't take what they said Cap, they need to think 'cause they're dumb while smart people like us don't need to think, we just do what we gotta do."
"Yeah!" Luffy yelled with agreement.
Everyone sweat dropped at their logic.
"I never knew you had a brother Luffy," Nami stared.
Everyone agreed with Nami.
"He's cool right?" Luffy grinned.
"He's about to be when I'm done with him," Kuro whispered.
"What's that Kuro?" Luffy questioned since he didn't hear what Kuro whispered.
"Nothing," Kuro smiled.
"I heard what you said," Ace grinned, "Wanna have a piece of me?"
Kuro grinned, "Of course, I've been itching to test myself against an emperor commander ever since I got my bounty."
"That's quite the confidence rookie," Ace grinned.
"More of excitement than confidence," Kuro grinned back.
"Let's test each other when we get on land," Ace suggested.
"Agreed," Kuro accepted.
The crew found out more about Ace as they talked with him.
Luffy got a Vivire Card from Ace and the strawhats partied.
Reaching land, Ace and Kuro faced each other as the crew watched.
When the fight started, everyone became amazed as Ace's arm turned to flame.
They wondered if Kuro was going to pull out his sword but instead, his hand turned to darkness.
Darkness and fire, the two clashed against each other like logia's.
After catching Ace with his darkness arm and disabling Ace's logia, Kuro delivered a haki punch and knocked Ace to the ground.
"What was that?" Ace got up and stared curiously.
Kuro grinned, "That's just one of the abilities of the darkness fruit."
"You ate the darkness fruit?" Ace questioned with narrowed eyes.
Kuro shook his head, "Nah, but I did eat a devil fruit that can imitate other devil fruits so I wanted to give you a taste of the guy you were chasing after."
Ace made an O with his mouth and then grinned, "Thanks for the heads up."
The two got back to fighting and Ace stuck to ranged attacks while Kuro kept trying to pull him.
At the end of the battle, both of them were very tired and considered the fight a tie.
"Thanks for the fight," Kuro smiled, "You made my haki stronger."
Kuro pulled out a chainsaw knife and held it to Ace, "Take this as my gift, if you heat it up, it'll become sharp enough to cut through seastone."
Ace accepted the knife with a thanks.
The strawhats continued traveling with Ace for a while and then split up.
"Kuro, I'm hot," Luffy tiredly said.
"Would you like some ice, Cap?" Kuro smiled.
"Yeah, but I don't think you have any," Luffy dazed.
"But I do Cap," Kuro gazed ahead.
"You do?" Everyone perked up.
Kuro nodded and pointed his hand up toward the sky.
Snow shot out of his hand and fell around the strawhats.
Chopper got off the sleigh with excitement.
Everyone felt the snow falling on them and became happy.
"Do you have water Kuro?" Usopp beamed.
Kuro grinned, "Of course, how much do you want?"
"A river!" Usppp yelled.
Everyone watched as Kuro pulled back his arm and shot out a river of water.
With excitement, Usopp, Luffy, and Chopper got into the water and started playing.
"How did you do that?" Tashigi who was forced to follow them questioned.
The others wondered how too.
"I ate the inventory fruit, it allows me to store nonliving objects in my body," Kuro elaborated.
Nami and Sanji beamed at the thought of keeping stuff in Kuro.
Zoro and Kuina thought he was lying because of Tashigi.
Vivi thought it was a very convenient ability to have.
Arriving at Yuba and meeting Toto, the strawhats decided to stay for the night.
After finding out from Toto that the rebel army was closing in on Alubarna, Vivi wanted to get to the royal capital quickly.
Unfortunately, Luffy found a palm tree with a nice shade.
"What are you doing Luffy?" Vivi questioned with confusion.
"He's about to do what's called a pro gamer move," Kuro explained.
"A pro gamer what?" Vivi questioned along with everyone else.
Kuro just smiled and got under the shade with Luffy, "This sure does feel nice Cap."
"Doesn't it?" Luffy grinned.
"Join us, we can't be crying in the sun after all," Kuro encouraged.
Everyone looked at the two as if they were crazy.
Zoro sighed and took a step, he got under the shade with them.
Kuina didn't know what the heck was going on, but she decided to go along with it.
One by one, the strawhats came under the shade with confusion.
"Join us, Vivi, Miss Tashigi," Kuro encouraged.
"We're supposed to be saving Alabasta from Crocodile, not laying in the shade!" Tashigi explained while feeling lost.
Vivi seemed genuinely confused, "I don't understand."
Kuro laughed, "Looks like you consider us friendly since you said we're, Miss Tashigi."
Tashigi became stunned at his words.
Kuro turned to Vivi, "If you're our friend, shouldn't you let us help you, shouldn't you let us risk our life for you? You remind me of Nami, someone who's just too stubborn to ask for help."
"Nami?" Vivi looked at Nami and Nami seemed just as confused.
"Won't you come under the shade with us?" Kuro hopefully asked, "Let us march through hell for you."
Vivi seemed to become hesitant, "I do consider you all my friends, but that's why I don't want any of you to get hurt or die."
Kuina smiled, "That's more of a reason for us to help you."
Sanji saw Vivi struggle, "We're tough, we won't die so easily."
"Let's kick Crocodile's ass," Luffy yelled with determination.
"Thank you," Vivi started crying and came under the shade.
Tashigi too sighed and joined under the shade.
