A.n I own Nothing.

Hey guys, been a while. So this story is not abandoned, there has just been a lot going on. Form my own injury, my mother's near-fatal car accident, the bushfires we had here in Australia for close to 5 months, and now Covid-19. Due to all these incidents, it had been very difficult to find inspiration to write. I am trying to catch up with my writing and I hope all my readers are staying safe and healthy during this troubled time.

As always, please Review

Connor and Ezio walked down a long straight narrow and dark corridor, it was dimly lit by lanterns on the wall that were of equal distance apart. Every ten meters the walls and roof showed the World Government Logo; however, the paint was faded as the tunnel had not been maintained as the rest of the building.

"It's convenient how this place is lit," Connor stated, "I thought secret passages were dark and maze-like,"

"Most are. Creativity is one of the many things the Marines and World Government lack," Ezio agreed.

"What else do they lack?"

"A lot of things...Common sense, Morality and a sense of Humour would be the top three,"

"You're not a fan of the government are you?"

"Not as such no," Ezio answered "Are you?"

Connor shook his head. "So are you a pirate too?" he asked.

"Nothing so glamorous as that. Perhaps if I was I would have exciting stories and tales of daring to recite to the lovely ladies," Ezio said wishfully "You are lucky you know,"

"How so?" Connor asked.

"Women love men of danger and of the sea. You being a pirate and having stories to tell gives you a significant advantage over most men...once you are older of course," Ezio claimed "By the way how old are you?" he added.

"13 and I don't think it works that way,"

"Oh trust me, it does," Ezio assured "and having good looks helps too,"

As soon as they Ezio said that, a circler part of the roof moved away and Chimney fell through it and landed on top of Connor. Ezio blinked and looked at the roof to see the passage that Chimney had come from seal back up.

"See you already have girls falling for you," Ezio joked.

"That's not funny," Connor moaned as he and Chimney both got up.

"Hi Straw Hats boy," Chimney greeted with a smile.

"Chimney, what are you doing down here? Where's Kokrou?"

"I don't know, after you all disappeared I ran off to play and fell down a hole," Chimney claimed.

"There's a joke I could make there...but it's inappropriate for young ears," Ezio commented.

Chimney looked up at Ezio and tilted her head slightly.

"Hi, who are you?" she asked.

"Greeting little Bella, I am Ezio Auditore," Ezio introduced.

"Hiya Mr. Ezio, I'm Chimney," Chimney said cheerfully "So what are you doing in this secret passage? Are you playing a game?"

"We're looking for Robin," Connor claimed.

"Along with the bad man who took her," Ezio added.

"Oh, so you're playing Hide and Seek," Chimney said "I like that game and I'm really good at seeking,"

"It's not really a game," Connor snapped.

"Let's go find them and then we can hide from them," Chimney said and ran off in the direction that Ezio and Connor had been heading.

"What an energetic young lady," Ezio said.

"That is one way of putting it," Connor agreed.

"Well come on, we should keep an eye on her to make sure she doesn't get hurt," Ezio said and continued walking.

"Aren't we supposed to be looking for Robin?" Connor asked.

"We can do both," Ezio shrugged.

Connor ran to catch up with Ezio and Chimney. Once they were all together with Chimmeny a few steps ahead of the boys she started singing about exploring secret passages. Connor looked up at Ezio.

"I know your only helping us temporarily, but I think you and Sanji would get along," Connor claimed.

"Who?" Ezio asked.

"Sanji, he's the ships cook," Connor explained "he was the one with blond hair and in a suit,"

"Oh him. I apologise, given the situation I did not have time for your crew to properly introduce ourselves. I would very much like to get to know you all...particularly that feisty redhead and your missing friend," Ezio said.

"Oh yeah you and Sanji will get definitely get along," Connor commented. He then looked over his shoulder back in the direction that they had come from "I hope he and the others will be alright,"

"Don't worry, I'm sure they are fine," Ezio assured.

"Yeah, after all, they took on Crocodile and won," Connor said confidently "I bet these government guys are nowhere near as strong as a Shibki,"

Ezio chose not to comment on that.

Luffy ran though the tower screaming at the top of his lungs, calling out for Robin and Lucci; declaring that he was going to save her. He had no idea where he was going nor did he realise he was completely and utterly lost in the Tower of Justice's many confusing hallways and staircases that looped around on each other.

However, despite that, he still kept running.

Nami ran through one of the many hallways, there were bars and various steel doors lining it and Nami could see into small contained rooms. She had found herself in the dungeon part of the Tower of Justice, despite this she kept running.

"Just got to find a key and steal it...no need to fight," Nami said to herself as she ran. She kept running however around the next corner however she stopped as sitting there in the middle of the hallway was the pink-haired CP9 agent. He started stamping his ringed staff up and down.

"OIYOI! HOLD IT RIGHT THERE YOU DAMED PIRATE!"

Nami took a step back and looked at him worriedly.

"TODAY ON THIS 100TH YEAR I Kumadori MEET YOU ON THE FIELD OF BATTLE! OIYOI!" Kumadori yelled and stamped his staff harder and faster.

'He's so loud,' Nami thought, she was unsure if she should wait until the strange man had finished or if she should leave to find a different CP9 agent to fight.

"Got to find a kitchen," Franky panted as he ran. "I can't fight CP9 in my current state,"

Like the other Straw Hats Franky was running through the halls, however, he was not looking to find any of the CP9 agents just yet; he was looking for a kitchen first. He thought back to his battles on the sea train as well as using a lot more energy than he should have resisting capture against CP9. Unlike usually Franky's normally straight and spiked hair sagged over his eyes.

"I've used up too much Cola and need to recharge, I won't be able to win if I'm not maxed out," He continued.

He turned a corner and spotted a door with a knife and fork sign on it.

"Ah this must be it," Franky said in relief. He straightened his hair up only to have it sag and fall back down.

Franky opened the door which led to another hallway, however, there were far fewer doors in this hallway and Boxes of fresh fruit and vegetables were stacked against the wall. It wasn't the kitchen but Franky knew he had to be close.

Suddenly the big large round CP9 agent with the zipper mouth landed in front of Franky causing him to skid to a stop.

"Chapapapapapapapapapa, I the Fukurou, the gossiping silent owl shall be your opponent," Fukurou announced "Do you want my key? Just try and take it,"

Sanji ran towards the top of the tower, opening every door he thought looked suspicious or that could

Eventually, he saw a door that looked very different from the others. It was painted blue with thin white wooden beams on it. Sanji ran over to it and barged in. He found himself in a large Bathroom, there was a huge marble tub filled with water, a table with two chairs, some cabinets that held various perfumes and other bathing necessities. Along with a cupboard filled with extra towels.

Sanji looked around but did not see anybody in the room.

"Damn there not here either," he cursed "and to make matters worse there isn't even a lady taking a bath that I can ogle,"

Suddenly the door closed behind him, Sanji knew that the door would not do that by itself as there was no breeze to push it shut. That meant there was, in fact, someone in the room with him.

"Hello, there," a female voice said and Sanji froze "welcome to my room, would you like some tea?"

Sanji heard the click of the lock and slowly turned around to see Kalifa standing there with a sweet smile on her face. The cooks' eyes instantly turned to hearts.

"Yes please," Sanji responded happily.

Kalifa smiled again 'this will be too easy,' she thought.

It was amazing how Zoro had managed to find one of the agents so quickly. After splitting up from the rest of the crew, Zoro had run off in a random direction and opened only a few doors he found himself face to face with Kaku. Given the swordsman's poor sense of direction, this could be considered a miracle.

Kaku's room looked more like a study, the walls lined with bookshelves. The long-nosed agent was seated in a plush red armchair with a book in his hand and a sword on either side of him. He was dressed in all black, right down to his black baseball cap. The green-haired swordsman stared down the former shipwright in a chair.

"You pirates are stronger than I gave you credit for," Kaku complimented, as he closed his book and put it to one side. He stood and reached for his swords. "To make it this far and to find me in so little time is very impressive,"

"The others always say I have no sense of direction, I guess I just proved them wrong," Zoro smirked and he drew his own blades.

"Indeed," Kaku agreed "I suppose you want my key. Of course, you know there is only one way I will ever give it up,"

"I hoped you'd say that, but before we do this, tell me one thing," Zoro requested.

"Hmm?" Kaku asked interested.

"Back in Water 7, when you came and evaluated the Merry. You said she would never sail again…was that a lie?"

Kaku stared at Zoro and blinked a couple of times. He had not expected the swordsmen to ask about their doomed ship. However, it made some sense, after all the Straw Hats now knew that Kaku and the others weren't really shipwrights but secret government assassins; it made sense for them to doubt their word.

Kaku let out a sigh and shook his head.

"The Merry was your ship, the one you brought into have repaired was it not?" Kaku asked. Zoro nodded in response. "Given our current circumstance, I do not blame you for doubting the result of my inspection. However, in this case, I'm afraid I was telling the truth,"

Zoro stared at Kaku, saying nothing and allowing the CP9 agent to continue.

"We may be assassins, but we take our jobs very seriously," Kaku explained "the fact is that before we went undercover, we all did our research on ships and even worked with some Marine shipwrights and at a Marine shipyard to give us some experience. Once we were employed, we also underwent the training at the Galley-La company, for the first year it was a mandatory compony policy that we attend lectures on how ships were built and other aspects of being a shipwright of every two days,"

"So…you weren't just screwing us over? To Distract us from you using and taking Robin?" Zoro asked.

"Is that what you thought? There was no lie or intention to mislead your crew simply because you were pirates. If you had gone to another Island, any other shipwright would have told you the same thing. To tell you the truth, at the time of the evaluation we were unaware that Nico Robin was even with you," Kaku claimed "It was only after your captain had reported your money stolen and your crew left the shipyard were, we informed,"

"I see. Lectures every two days you say? You must have found the last five years tedious and boring" Zoro sighed.

"On the contrary, I found them rather interesting," Kaku replied with a smile. "I rather liked being a shipwright. I think I defiantly enjoyed it more than Lucci and the others ever did. Was that all you wanted to know?"

"Yeah, that's it. By the way, I have a message for you from Paulie. I'll give it to you afterward,"

"Very well then," the agent's entire demeanor changed from being pleasant to deadly serious, "shall we begin our fight?"

"Bring it on," Zoro growled, placing his white sword in his mouth.

"Just so you know, I'm the best swordsman out of all the Cipher Pols," In a flash, Kaku had pulled out his blades and was running toward the two pirates. Zoro reacted in kind and met the agent blow for blow. After an intense 30 seconds, the two spun apart to stare each other down.

"Two Sword Style," Zoro noted "You should know I masted that when I was 12, I hope you're not relying on me to be caught off guard by the extra blade like some amateur,"

"Two swords? No, I'm afraid you're wrong," Kaku denied.

He grinned and stabbed his swords into the floor beside him and lifting his feet. Silently, he launched twin-bladed enemy bursts from his legs. Zoro's eyes went wide as he realised his mistake, the pirate swordsman batted them aside with his own blades. The two slashes cut into the bookshelves behind the pirate, causing all the books to fall to the floor. A majority of them were cut in half.

"I use Four Sword Style," Kaku confirmed "That was my signature attack, the Tempest Kick,"

"I guess your whole body is a weapon, isn't it?" Zoro launched forward, Kaku following in his example as the two met for another harsh battle "Good, I was worried this wouldn't be any fun,"

Kaku grinned, it was rare to see someone who not only apricated a good fight but also someone who did not lose their will to fight and beg for mercy when things got tough. Kaku broke away from Zoro and jumped into the air.

"Tempest Kick!"

"72 Pound Phoenix!" The two attacks met in the middle, canceling each other out with a shockwave that shook the room and the very tower itself.

"Moonwalk. Shave," The agent vanished, jumping around the room until he came to rest on his swords stabbed in the wall. "Tempest Kick: Butcher." A hail of flying slashes descended upon the green-haired man. Zoro's eyes narrowed as he concentrated on deflecting the attacks. Though the slashes began destroying the room, neither swordsmen seemed to care.

Once the barrage of attacks ended, Zoro and Kaku faced each other once again, both now had a new respect for the opposing swordsmen. Zoro was thrilled to be fighting someone who was clearly a master of a unique sword style like himself and Kaku was happy to find someone who was able to keep up with him.

"That all you got?" Zoro challenged.

"You know, your stronger than you were back at Water 7," Kaku complimented "Had we fought like this back then it would have been a very enjoyable fight. Sadly, I am now more powerful than before,"

"You mean cockier," Zoro retorted.

"No, I don't, you see upon our return to Enis Lobby I ate a Devil Fruit," Kaku claimed, Zoros eyes went wide and his body tensed up. He was very familiar with exactly what that meant, Devil fruits could turn the weakest fighters into formidable opponents and depending on the fruit and how it was used.

What worried him was that Kaku had spent his life without one, that meant that not only was the agent not going to be relying on using his Devil Fruit power but also Kaku's own techniques could be easily enhanced in a number of ways by his new power and the CP9 agent was now more deadly than ever before. Zoro prayed it wasn't a Logia type like Ace or Smoker.

Kaku began to shift his form and his body started to change. His neck grew to a massive height, and two blunt horns broke out of the top of his hat. Brown spots began forming all over his now-yellow skin and his mouth extended outward. Finally, a tail freed itself from his backside as his whole body grew.

Zoro stared at Kaku's new form in a mixture of shock and awe. He was unsure whether this was an intimidation tactic or a way of trying to make him lose his focus.

"Beware the mighty power of the Giraffe," Kaku declared.

Kaku didn't get to finish his sentence as the weakened floor crumbled under the weight and the two fell into the room below.

Sogeking had been sneaking around, opening and closing every door he passed by in an instant, thanks to his skills as a sniper he really only needed a spilt second to view the rooms and analyse everything in it. He was looking for a CP9 agent and so far all the rooms had been empty, it was odd considering that he was in one of the most defended buildings in the world. But Sokeking was not going to question it, after all, it made his job easier and that meant he only had to focus on one enemy and not a whole army.

He opened and closed another door but the room held nothing of interest.

"It's good that there are no guards but I'm not getting anywhere like this," Sogeking sighed "if I don't find a key soon Robin will be taken away forever,"

He walked to the next door and was about to open it when he spied a large double door at the end of the platform. All the other rooms he had checked so far had single doors, this was the first double door Sogeking had found.

"Huh...that might be a better choice," Sogeking decided and he walked up to the door.

Not expecting anyone to be inside he flung it open.

"MUHAHAHAHAH I SEE YOU ARE ALL AFRAID OF ME!" Soaking announced "NOT THAT I BLAME Y...EEEEEEKKKKKK!"

Sogeking immediately shut the door as there was someone in the room. he leaned against the door and breathed heavily however when nothing happened, he opened the door again.

The room looked like a massive indoor garden, the floor was covered in what Sogeking hoped was fake grass, there were bonsai trees that had been well-tended too, large Rocks that had been placed around, a small red bridge near the back of the room and a small stream with rocks preventing the flowing water from over following. In the center of the room was one of the CP9 agents who was lying on his side with his head resting on his hand sleeping soundly and in front of him lay a key with the number 1 on it.

Sogeking blinked.

"H...H...He's sleeping?" he asked. Sogeking then noticed the key "It's just...sitting there? Is this guy really part of CP9? Am I really that lucky that I get the one guy I don't have to fight?"

Sogeking tip-toed forward, just as he was about to reach out and grab the key a bee flew by and landed in his nose. Sogeking froze and stared at the insect.

'Go away, go away little bumblebee. I'm not a flower…please fly away and don't sting me,' Sogeking prayed. However, as if the bee had heard him, it raised its stinger and jabbed it into the end of Sogekings nose.

Pain flared up in Sogekings face and he immediately ran out the door, slamming it behind him and cried out in pain in the hallway. The bee flew off as Sogeking tried to get the stinger out of him, leaving a large red swollen bump.

"DO THEY TRAIN INSECTS TO BE ASSASSINS TOO!" He yelled out. But very quickly covered his mouth and glanced back towards the door. Remembering the sleeping CP9 agent.

Sogeking waited a few minutes, but nothing happened. There was no sign that the agent inside had heard him. He crept back to the door and re-opened it silently, Sogeking breathed a sigh of relief that the agent inside was still asleep. The only thing that had changed was he had rolled over.

'Okay, you can still do this,' Sogeking thought to himself.

He crept back in and thankfully there were no more bees. About halfway to his target, a small rooster walked in front of him and stopped. It turned to face Sogeking, making eye contact, and Sogeking once again began to panic, praying to whoever was listing that the rooster wouldn't crow.

The bird opened its mouth and let out a small barely audible chirp.

"THAT'S NOT THE SOUND YOUR SUPPOSED TO MAKE!" Sogeking shouted in annoyance.

The agent stirred and looked over his shoulder.

"Oh, you're here already," he said. The CP9 agent let out a big yawn and sat up. He stretched a bit before standing up. Sogeking took a few steps back as the agent bent down and picked up the key.

"I was hoping to sleep some more, I don't suppose you'd be willing to come back in an hour or two, would you?" the man asked.

Sogeking swallowed his fear and stood at the ready.

"I am afraid I cannot, you see I have been entrusted with the important task of retrieving five keys from you dastardly CP9 agents. If you wish me to leave you to your sleep then hand the key over and I will leave peacefully," Sogeking declared "If you do not then I will have to inconvenience you on your nap time,"

"You're a bit overly dramatic for a pirate, are you sure you shouldn't be in theatre?" the agent observed "Ah well, I guess I don't get paid if I don't kill something every now and then,"

His form shifted, growing taller than Sogeking. Grey fur sprouted across his body and his nails sharpened to deadly points and his braided hair now looked like a scorpion tail. Sogeking stumbled back as a large humanoid wolf now towered over him.

"Let me introduce myself, I am Jabra of CP9," Jabra introduced "I ate the Inu-Inu no Mi: Model Wolf. Like wolves, I prefer clean kills, so I will show you mercy and rip out your jugular. You die quickly and with very little pain. So any last words?"

Sogeking stared at the wolf in complete fear, he was too frightened to move or even speak.

"Very well, goodbye overdramatic pirate," Jabra said. He took a step closer but the moment he did the ceiling above the two began to crack.

Both Jabra and Sogeking looked up in confusion and the roof came crumbling down with two figures falling along with it. Forcing the two to back away from each other as dust filled the room.