Alright this is a rather short chapter, mostly because not much happens between Sabaody Park and Canon. Like I've said in all of this week's updates, I'll only be updating at the beginning of the month and the end of the month to reduce stress for myself. Also, heh, today is technically ASL Friday Update Day because I'm throwing Decisions Over Tea onto Friday's Update schedule. I say technically because the pairing for DOT is Ace/Sabo/Luffy. I'm not that far into it but I have four chapters ready anyways. Hopefully you enjoy this update!

Disclaimer: Don't own One Piece.

To Save A Brother's Life

The months after they visited Sabaody Park, Luffy and his burgeoning crew got to know Brook and Perona. For one, despite Brook's apparent age and wisdom as a member of the Generation of the Pirate King he could act pretty childish. In fact, he encouraged Luffy's occasional childish acts. On top of that, the man could occasionally be a bit perverted but that attitude seemed to be diminishing as they got to know each other. They also learned of the man's dream which was to see an island whale that he knew when he sailed with the Rumbar Pirates, Laboon. Of course he said he wouldn't mind waiting until Luffy himself crossed Reverse Mountain.

One of the things Luffy talked about with Brook was regenerating his skin and muscles, as his Devil Fruit can reverse the decay of things, since it was much easier than reversing the age of something. In fact, it used about half the life force that a gem had. However, Brook had kindly declined Luffy's offer, saying he had gotten used to how his body was and changing it back would take a long while to get used to it. Speaking of that ability, Luffy had been slowly learning how to apply the ability in different ways. One of those ways was reversing injuries on a person's body or even removing scars and tattoos rather than their age. This of course took a lot of effort because the inherent nature of the life force was to reverse the person's age, not just certain parts of their bodies. Also, extremely severe injuries and diseases were out of Luffy's healing range. This was because the more severe the injury the more life force it ate up because it pushed the person's own life force closer to death. Think of it like this, a person who is on their deathbed due to a severe injury would have the life force equivalent of a person nearing the end of their natural lifespan. Disease-wise, it didn't work because diseases fought the process of reversion, certain diseases that is. Diseases that fought the process were extremely malignant diseases like stage three and four cancers, AIDs and HIV, and Ebola, aka the diseases that even with normal means you weren't likely to survive. However, thankfully Torao was doing his best to learn how to cure those diseases with his Devil Fruit. Any other disease, Luffy could easily reverse but the closer it got to those malignant diseases, the more life force was needed to heal the person. For example, a person with Stage 2 Leukemia bordering on Stage 3 required almost sixty years of life force to heal it, despite the fact that the person was only seventeen. A person of the same age but with Stage 1 Leukemia only needed about ten years of life force. It was rather interesting experimenting with the ability, even more interesting when relatives of the victims were donating their life force to see their relative live. Nothing's more intimate than sharing your life force after all.

Back to getting to know the new crew members, Perona was interesting enough as well. The woman, despite her age seemed to have an obsession for all things cute. This prompted her turning her bedroom into a stuffed animal filled room. Of course, a suggestion by her actually pushed on an experiment between Luffy and Brook. You see, Perona had requested to see if Brook and Luffy could 'bring to life' her stuffed bear that she owned. She theorized that since Brook's Devil Fruit was based on the soul and Luffy's on the life force part, they could possibly bring it to life. That interested everybody for different reasons. Robin was interested because it'd be a brilliant research topic, Brook because he always thought that his devil fruit was merely for resurrection, Luffy because he liked experimenting, and everyone else cause it was cool. This process of course took the better part of the year as Brook had to dig deep with his Devil Fruit. That however, turned out to be for the better because about halfway through the year, Brook had found out that his Devil Fruit allowed a connection to the underworld. This enabled him to do quite a lot of things combat wise. First of all, Brook could freely detach his soul from his body to more or less gather information. It was quite like Perona's Horo Horo no Mi but to a lesser degree. Secondly, Brook could imbue his sword with the chill of the underworld, which gave it the ability to manipulate ice. Lastly, the result that they were looking for, Brook could ask the souls of the underworld if they'd be up to helping him, this allowed him to, more or less, summon souls from beyond the veil. Brook however, took that ability and went beyond it. With Luffy's help, Brook could use the life force in a gem to create a brand new soul. This soul was used to animate Perona's stuffed bear and the result was rather immediate. The soul seemed to take on the qualities of the medium it was put in, acting like a baby bear, which Perona loved a lot.

One of the things Robin theorized, was that Luffy and Brook could possibly bring a person back to life. However, she also theorized that something like that would need untold amounts of life force because a soul once dead does not belong on the plane of the living. It would also probably drain Brook and Luffy to the max to the point of being exhausted for weeks. Of course, that brought up questions as to how Brook's Devil Fruit kept him alive then. Robin simply explained that more than likely, what the Yomi Yomi no Mi did, was enhance a person's own soul way beyond normal qualities in order to make their soul anchored to the world of living. So, when the person died, they would have one foot in the underworld and the other in the living world.

Of course, Luffy and Brook weren't the only one experimenting with their powers. Perona got ideas on what to do with her powers after Brook learned to move his soul out of his body. She could do just the same, in fact it was almost the exact same but instead it was an astral projection of her 'ghost' and it couldn't really affect anything. While in Astral Projection, she could float and go through walls. What Perona wanted to see, is if she could apply the powers to herself while not astral projecting. It took her quite a while but she was able to do it pretty well. She couldn't phase through walls yet but she could float, which would be rather helpful if she was ever thrown off the ship by an enemy or something.

About a year before Luffy turned seventeen, Robin had finally got fed up with Ace and Sabo and Luffy and Law. The two duos were dancing around each other. Well, Ace and Sabo were dancing around each other whereas Luffy wanted to be with Law but Law still hadn't buckled under the pressure yet. So, the first thing she did was lock Law and Luffy in a closet. Now, one may be wondering as to why Luffy and Law just didn't escape the closet, well that would have to be because for one, she took Law's sword. Without his sword, Law couldn't cut the door open. Two, the close that she locked them in was at the bottom of the ship and if Law were to swap them wrong with Room, they'd end up in the ocean and while Luffy could swim, Law couldn't. Next, Luffy couldn't knock down the door with enhanced Haki strength because Robin had Marco standing by the door and reinforcing it with Haki. Lastly, Luffy couldn't drag them into the shadows because the closet had a window that filtered a lot of light into the room, eliminating any shadows in the closet. So, they effectively were locked in there.

"I told you that she was going to get fed up one day." Luffy said awkwardly.

Law was currently glaring at the wall in the closet. It wasn't that he was mad at Luffy, the opposite really. He was really only mad at Robin for forcing this scenario. For one, it was way too cliché and spoke of romance novelesque situations. For two, he had been wanting to avoid this situation as long as possible. Luffy had grown on him in the years that he had known the boy and an attraction was there. He just didn't want to set himself up for loss even though he knew that Luffy would never hurt him. It was just an added effect of having grown up in the situation he did as a kid, having lost all his friends and family to a disease. With that said, he gave a sigh before turning to Luffy.

"I know, I just wish she hadn't gotten fed up now." He said.

They stood there awkwardly, not really knowing what to say.

"So…. You know we're not getting out of here unless we accept this relationship we have." Luffy said.

Law rolled his eyes at that statement. He knew that and he also knew he was being rather childish about it. To be honest, to most outsiders it would seem as if Luffy and Law were already in a relationship. For one, they spent a lot of time together, outside of the time that Luffy spent hanging out with his crew members and brothers. Add to that, the fact that Luffy and Law practically cuddled when they slept, most would assume that the two were already together. They however, hadn't taken the step forward and declared it a relationship yet.

"I know, but I'm just worried, what happens if you die?" Law asked honestly.

Luffy rose an eyebrow at that.

"I mean, life is unpredictable, but I don't plan on dying until I'm the Pirate King. Plus, both of us are as equally likely to die. I mean, I'm the son of the Revolutionary Dragon which is going to lead to me being attacked by Marines and you're an enemy of Doflamingo Donquixote, a Shichibukai." Luffy added.

Inwardly, Law admitted Luffy had a point. With Luffy's status as the son of a globally wanted criminal, he was likely to be hunted by Marines when it was revealed to the world. And Doflamingo Donquixote was a dangerous man in his own right. Add on top of that the fact that Law was planning on hunting the man down to make the man pay for killing Cora-san.

"So what would change if we did pursue a relationship?" Law asked.

Luffy smiled at that, happy to see that Law was changing his mind.

"Well, we'd be more intimate for one… but maybe nothing extremely intimate for a while. We don't want to dive into the deep end after all." Luffy said.

Law liked the sound of that and he admitted that the sexual parts he would rather wait for. Especially since he was like seven years older than Luffy. Although, Law had a question.

"What will we do when Robin forces Ace and Sabo together?" Law asked.

Luffy chuckled at that because he knew that Robin would be doing just that immediately after he and Law got together. The question, however was completely valid as Luffy, Law, Sabo, Ace, and Bepo all shared a room.

"Well, we could still share a room but if we want alone time we could have separate rooms." Luffy said.

That could work, especially since Blenheim was planning on constructing them a ship to sail in. Blenheim had planned on giving each of the crew members Luffy had their own rooms as well as plan on extra rooms, just in case Luffy recruited other people. Accepting Luffy's response Law finally gave Luffy a kiss on the mouth. Of course, Luffy was rather surprised by the kiss and didn't respond for a few seconds. However after those few seconds were up, Luffy eagerly responded to the kiss, pushing back. The kiss was wonderful on both sides of it, the two thoroughly enjoying it. The kiss was broken up however when Marco opened the door, smiling at them, causing the two to blush.

"Well you two took your time, yoi." He said with a chuckle, causing Luffy and Law to promptly walk away.

About a few months later, Robin did the same thing with Ace and Sabo but instead of Marco guarding the door, it was Kuzan who used his strongest ice to prevent Ace from melting or burning the door down. They seemed to take much longer than Luffy and Law did. According to Kuzan a lot of it was spent in silence. It wasn't until Ace had gotten fed up with the silence that it went anywhere. Ace confessed to Sabo who confessed back and it descended into them finally accepting their relationship and finally kissing. Of course, Robin was happy that they finally got together and there wouldn't be any awkward tension between them all.

When Luffy finally turned seventeen, the Whitebeard Pirates threw a party to celebrate. Luffy and his crew were to set out the next day and Kuzan the day after to make his way to Reverse Mountain. Of course, the Moby Dick would be guiding them through the Calm Belt into the East Blue where they'd then head back to the New World after dropping off Luffy, his crew, and his ship. Marco and the other commanders were sad to see Luffy and the others go but they knew that it was time for them to make their own memories. So, the day that they set out for Dawn Island was a sad day for everyone. However, they knew that Luffy and everyone else would be making some waves.

Alrighty, so at the next update we'll be starting the canon timeline. Canon will be different-ish because of the fact that they grew up with the WB Pirates, obviously. This is actually another one of the reasons that I'm spacing out updates. Because, most of my stories are finally nearing canon so I have to make each instance different. Anyways, suggestions are always welcome!