A/N: Uni hasn't been going great, so my MA won't be done this year, but next. I suppose it's a good thing in one way, since I'll have more time to finish it off and do a better job, but at the same time it's a little upsetting as to how everything went down.

Anyway, hopefully you enjoy this (almost filler) chapter! Water 7 will be starting soon!

Shanks had been in almost disbelief at the fact that Buggy had actually called him.

Not to get him wrong, they had kept in touch since their Captain's death, but the two of them knew that they were going to be following different paths and Buggy had once told him that he didn't want to get in Shanks' way. (Didn't want to see him fall like their father; had been a silent whisper that Shanks knew Buggy hadn't wanted him to hear.)

But also in disbelief for the fact that Buggy had called him on behalf of another.

"You've got your own protege now?"

Buggy was silent, before almost shrieking, "She calls me Uncle, Shanks! Uncle!"

Shanks burst into laughter, "How'd you manage that?"

His brother grumbled, as the snail rolled its eyes, "Absolutely no idea, taught her a few knife tricks after she stopped me from doing something I'd regret, next thing I know I'm helping her set up an information network and she's calling me uncle!"

Shanks' humour died off, he knew better than anyone what those days were like when you felt like you were alone in the world, with very little family left around to support you. He at least had his crew, and whilst Buggy's own were decent to him, they definitely did not know half the stuff that he had been through in his life, "You okay, Bug?"

"Better than I was, its better when I'm around my crew. It was the anniversary, you know? I needed some alone time."

Shanks' reply was quiet, voice soothing, "That's good. You know I'm here for you, right?"

Buggy's reply was equally as quiet, "I know Shanks, I know."

The silence between the pair was comfortable, before Buggy got into the reason that he had rung in the first place.

"She wants to speak with you, if you've got the time. Asked me to pass along her den den number."

"Was there any reason why?"

"She didn't actually say, only that she wanted to talk to you about something."

Apart from Luffy being her Captain, he'd seen the wanted posters, he couldn't really think of a reason why she would want to talk to him. He was an Emperor, and most people found them significantly intimidating, especially rookie pirates from the East Blue.

The only reason that he could think of a rookie pirate wanting to contact him was to ally themselves with him, but he couldn't see Luffy going for that even if he wouldn't have minded it. Shanks could not for the life of him think of a halfway decent reason that she wanted to talk to him, unless it had something to do with Luffy.

Shanks voiced this opinion, with his only reply being Buggy making a noise of agreement in the background, his brother seemingly distracted by something happening on his ship.

"I'll give you her number, but then I've got to go, somethings come up."

Shanks was immediately on high alert, "Anything you need a hand with?"

The snail rolled its eyes, "Not really, but if that changes I'll let you know, okay?"

The conversation didn't last long after that, with Buggy leaving Ebony's number and a meaningful comment that Shanks would hear from him again sooner rather than later before the snail fell asleep and Shanks was once again alone with his thoughts.

For Buggy to contact him on behalf of someone else, he had to have both liked and trusted the person and thought that the reason they needed to speak with him was a legitimate enough one, too.

Shanks grinned, he knew that Luffy would have an interesting crew and this was only proving it.

He couldn't wait to talk with them.

The complaints box, once Usopp had finished making it, went down a treat. With Robin serving as the 'keeper of complaints', it felt less like I imagined a confessional would, and more like a supposedly anonymous forum for venting about people and problems. There was, however, a slight problem.

"It's been two days, how on earth could it already be full?"

Nami wasn't wrong to be voicing her complaint, sitting in her deck lounge chair as Sanji almost danced towards her, holding two plates of food, the rich smell mouth wateringly delicious.

"Sanji and Zoro probably filled it up with complaints about each other."

Zoro, having heard my comment grunted, "It's true, doesn't mean you have to come out and say it."

Sanji, for once in agreeance nodded, gently handing Nami and I a plate each. "Moss head is right, we need a bigger box."

"Or less complaining," Zoro gave me a glare, whilst Sanji turned away, blushing up to his ears. "What did you even complain about anyway?"

"His smell."

The two of them answering in sync would have been comical, if not for the fact that the two answers were exactly the same. And then it was fucking hysterical.

Rolling my eyes, I shouted towards Robin who had just come up from being checked over by Chopper.

"I think we should go over the complaints today, Robin!"

Luffy chimed in, "Shishishi! Let's get them over with!"

Something that was going to be bi-weekly was going to take place immediately because two of the crew had somehow managed to fill the box up already.

"Sounds good! I'll bring the box down!"

Of the seventy or so complaints, over half of them were Zoro and Sanji repeating themselves. Some were about Nami and her interest rates, Luffy and his eating habits, Usopp and the smell of his science experiments, and a few about Ebony and the takeover of the office space, as well as hiding future knowledge. Robin and Chopper had no complaints towards them, but to be fair to them they were probably the least problematic of the crew. Or at least for Robin, the crew hadn't had enough time to really get annoyed with any eccentricities that she had.

Chopper was just adorable, and doing his job as the crew doctor incredibly well.

Discussing how two deal wit their complaints was another issue entirely, and short of letting people fight it out (Luffy, Sanji and Zoro were particularly enthusiastic about this) they didn't have a large amount of options to choose from.

Talking it out seemed to be the only way.

Discussion went on late into the afternoon, and soon it was time for

Luffy wasn't too happy about learning a future that may not happen, but the rest of the crew had convinced him enough that he knew that knowing difficulties that had been faced by an alternate version of the crew was a necessary evil, even if he knew that Ebony didn't feel comfortable discussing it.

He didn't enjoy hearing her talk about the crew and the world in general in such a detached way, as though she wasn't apart of any of it.

"This is going to sound weird, but I'm going to call the world of One Piece I grew up reading and watching the 'canon' timeline and the one that we're all living in the 'outlier' timeline," Sanji and Robin, the two who were paying the most attention nodded. Luffy, Zoro and Chopper were all looking a little lost, whilst Nami and Usopp were taking notes. "It'll be easier to differentiate events from what happened here, and what happened there, yeah?"

"Makes sense, but why 'outlier'?"

Looking at Sanji, Ebony couldn't help but frown, "Outliers weren't a thing in the canon timeline, or at least if they were it was never mentioned once."

"So canon events of Water 7, some of which we've already managed to avoid."

Merry took this moment to pipe up, "Usopp and Luffy haven't argued, or fought and Usopp hasn't left the crew."

Ebony rolled her eyes, pointing at the personification, "You're going to either make this really easy or really hard to get through, aren't you?"

She pouted, "I'm only here to help!"

"We know."

Usopp was shaky as he wrote this down, "Glad we avoided that, no offence Luffy but I never want to have to fight you unless I absolutely have to."

Luffy pouted at the sharpshooter, "We should do friendly spars eventually."

Zoro and Sanji nodded in agreement, "It would be fun."

Ebony rolled her eyes, "And we would need at least a week spare, and an abandoned island. Let's think about that another day, yeah?"

Nami, ever the one to get the crew back on target slammed her hands onto the table, "Can we get back to the point of this meeting?"

Merry waved her hand, "Sure, sure."

Ebony was going to struggle with this, and everyone of the crew knew it. She'd been protecting herself ever since she came to this world, and with the information that she knew being out to so many people, even if it was just them was going to strip away a layer of protection away.

"So there's going to be a group of assassins, CP9 waiting. They've been undercover for something like five or so years in various parts of the City of Water waiting for a certain man to slip up and make an appearance again so they could make a move on the schematics for the Ancient Weapon Pluton. Finding Robin there was a bonus for them."

Robin went stark white, "CP9?"

Ebony nodded, "Unfortunately, but long story short the crew came out on top."

Merry patted the outliers shoulder, "So many details floating about that brain of yours, Ebony."

She laughed, "I know, but what information is necessary for everyone to know, and what is there because I hyper-fixated on the details?"

Merry held up a hand, and began listing things off with her fingers, "Franky, CP9, Sogeking, money getting stolen, Sanji using knives to fight in a kitchen, Enies Lobby, declaring war on the World Government, Franky setting the schematics for Pluton on fire,me being unable to sail any longer with you all, Luffy getting inspired to create Gear 2 by watching Soru, Buster Call, the fucking idiot who called it, Perfect Clima-tact, alliance with Galley-La and the Franky Family. Do I need to go on?"

Ebony couldn't help herself and laugh at the gobsmacked look on the rest of the crews faces as they processed the words their ship had said.

Sanji was the first to break, "I'm sorry, a knife fight?"

Ebony smiled at his confusion, "Yeah, canon timeline Sanji said that because he was in a kitchen and using knives anyway, the fighting with only feet rule could be broken."

It took Robin a bit longer to react, hands clutching at the table hard enough to cause slight indents. "A Buster Call?"

"Fucking Spandam, yeah. Canon timeline Straw Hats stopped it from ever taking place, and Robin? She lives. She thrives. She's nakama."

Robin looked as though she wanted to cry, but was holding it all back. The others could tell that she wasn't quite ready to believe the words that both Ebony and Merry were telling her, but weren't going to interrupt it.

Robin took a deep breath in, "She got a new beginning, a fresh start, didn't she?"

Ebony grinned at her, "She definitely did."

Robin was silent for a moment, as though deciding on something but wasn't ready to disclose it. "I'll think about it."

Nami was next, cheeks red and fists shaking, "Whose bright idea was it to declare war on the World Government."

Ebony gave her a droll look, "I'll give you three guesses and the first two don't count."

Luffy eyed his navigator warily, backing away slightly from the women who was slowly turning her head in his direction, but before she could say anything Ebony had continued to speak.

"Honestly I say we do it this time, too. Not like we're not already in massive trouble with them anyway, and with whose on this crew and all the shit we all know it's only a matter of time before literally everyone here becomes a priority if they aren't already."

Nami turned her shock towards Ebony, as Luffy laughed and Zoro nodded in agreement.

"What did they do to declare war? I can't see Luffy just shouting that he declares war, it had to be something else."

Merry laughed, "Oh! I wish you could see it! Usopp shot the flag and it burst into flames when Luffy asked him to."

"I'm not doing that." "Usopp is still doing that."

Luffy gave Usopp a look, to which he immediately folded and nodded. "Can I still wear a mask?"

Luffy shrugged, "Up to you, I'm not going to judge even if I find it weird."

"When, if, it comes to it then you can make up your mind then." Sanji patted Usopp on the shoulder, as it was clear that the sharpshooter wasn't entirely sure as to what to do.

The rest of the evening was spent discussing plans, with Merry chiming in every now and then to remind them to leave Franky to her, and if her plan failed then Robin was on back up.

(The woman in question only smiled a mysterious smile, to which the men of the crew crossed their legs and hoped to never get on her bad side.)

The crow was an unexpected addition to the boat, but Ace welcomed the company nonetheless. He had known that Ebony had been attempting to replicate the news coo training with crows, but hadn't actually realised that she had succeeded.

"Have you got something for me?"

The crow nodded its head, gesturing towards its back with its sharp beak. Ace took the small tube off of the crows back, before handing the bird a small slice of dried meat with a forlorn look on his face.

Unrolling the paper from the tube wasn't difficult, but the crow was clearly waiting on payment in the form of more meat, because it climbed atop Ace's arm and tightened it's grip with sharp, sealstone tipped claws. Ace held back a wince, but not before giving the crow the rest of the meat that he had been hiding away.

"Nearly as bad as Luffy, I swear."

The letter itself was wrapped up in what looked to Ace at a glance to be a newspaper, but not one that he certainly recognised, as well as three new wanted posters that he was looking forward to seeing. After unrolling the newspaper and setting it to the side alongside the posters, he could see the letter with Ebony's characteristic swirled handwriting, as well as Bailey's own towards the bottom.

'Hey Ace!

I wrote this before leaving Loguetown behind, and fingers crossed we've spoken since then, but if we haven't then I've got some news. I've gone and joined your brothers crew! Surprise! (Probably not to be perfectly honest.) It's definitely going to be an adventure, and I'm thoroughly looking forward to it.

(If I have spoken or seen you since, then hopefully it was a long enough meeting that I was able to talk to you about some things about myself that need to be spoken about in person and not through a letter.)'

Ace could picture it in his mind and the image wasn't a pretty one. A letter being intercepted, and a subsequent manhunt until a very public execution immediately on the spot, with him being none the wiser and unable to help her, forever wondering what had happened to his friend.

'Hopefully I managed to tell you what I needed to, and I really hope that you don't hold me keeping secrets against you, but I needed to find my footing here before I felt comfortable sharing anything that would remotely dangerous towards my own life.

Gods, I'm sorry if that sounds callous. I should have told you first, to be honest, you were my first proper and true friend here.'

Ace could feel his ears burning and knew that had he been wearing his hat it would have been set alight. He had friends, family certainly, but very few just came right out and said that they were his first true friend. It made him feel things that he didn't at present want to name.

(He would have to eventually, but that day wasn't today.)

The rest of the letter just went on to tell him about what was going on, and how the newspaper that she'd been planning on putting out was almost ready for publication around the world and underground.

'If a particular fruit has been stolen, and you go after the culprit (please don't, or if you do take some backup, please) remember a few things. If the holder touches you with their hands, you will not be able to use your devil fruit powers at all. Any and all abilities related to your devil fruit will stop working. Normal devil fruit weaknesses still apply, but keep your distance, stock up on some seastone bullets if you can. If the holder uses what amounts to a blackhole, they will be vulnerable even if it happens to be a wickedly dangerous move.'

She knew him far too well, and he hoped that it wouldn't come to it, but deep in his heart (or was it his limited observational haki, he wasn't sure at that moment) he knew that a fight would happen and he only hoped that he would be victorious.

He scanned the rest of the letter, before coming to Bailey's note at the bottom, writing very similar to that of Ebony's, but distinct enough for Ace to be able to tell the difference.

'Ace, be careful. Please. I know Ebony knows things that she probably shouldn't before things happen, and that's her business, but a few nights before she left she had the worst nightmare that I have ever seen or heard of, crying and screaming in her sleep about something happening to you. I think she's seen your death, Ace. Be careful, don't be reckless. Stay safe, if not for yourself but for your brother, for Ebony.'

Ace felt cold, as though he hadn't eaten the Mera Mara no Mi. Ebony knew how he, or at least a version of him had died. And if it didn't have something to do with Blackbeard, he would eat his hat.

He knew then and there that it was time to call for backup.

Ace had promised once before that he would never die, and he wasn't going to be breaking that promise to his little brother anytime soon.

He would never, ever forgive himself for making his family cry.

"Deuce? Whitey Bay here. Ace finally called, we're going in."

A/N: Alright, so lets talk about the live action. is it perfect? absolutely not. but the chosen actors are spot on, the costuming, the sets, the music? I loved it all!

I'm hoping that the next chapter will be done by the end of the month, and we should be starting my version of the Water 7 Arc, so please stay tuned for that!

Stay safe and hydrate!