This story follows the Dressrosa arc very closely, so if you forgot what happened, you might get confused on the way, though I tried to clear up everything that happens as much as I could. Please keep in mind that the events happening outside of those noted in the story do not change (so basically everything goes exactly the same where Luffy isn't concerned), though I tried to clear this up as well. I know it seems like a spoiler, but I'd like it better if you retain this information when reading the story at large.

Somehow, in some strange and twisted way, he had found out her backstory. Luffy wasn't sure what he did – because the teen was pretty sure the only thing he really had done was eat and mind his own business – but Rebecca practically burst in moment two and started to tell him everything.

In front of a dozen bloody gladiators – who surely wouldn't have cared nor wanted to hear that – no less. And through it all, the captain could only eat and hope that she would stop for the sake of avoiding the future awkwardness that was sure to appear when she finished spitting it all out.

And it did appear, but Rebecca and the other men did not seem to mind it. Luffy sometimes wondered what was wrong with the world. Then, as it would only have happened in stories with idiot people and about idiots, the girl entered the ring to fight to the death.

Uh-huh. I'm not writing a book about her if she dies.

Now she even started to cry!

Well, the crowd didn't help, but neither her dying would, since Luffy was pretty sure he didn't have the skills to write anything close to a story. But then again, maybe he'll bribe Robin to do it.

Camu looked right then left, but couldn't see any of the Strawhats passing by. The black haired man sighed and crossed his arms, leaning back on the rough stone of the colosseum wall and settled for a long wait. He had decided, after getting lost helping Zoro in his search, that whatever would happen, it was possible that someone from the Strawhat crew would be coming here.

So Camu, without anything better to do and really wanting to complete the mission he was sent to Dressrosa for, decided to wait for them here.

The continuous roar of the people watching the fight was becoming obscenely loud and irritating in his ears, but the man willed himself to stay calm and keep a watchful eye on the crowd. Unfortunately, his current personality was not allowing him to really remain concentrated for more than a few minutes, not to mention stay still.

Just when he was ready to consider hitting his head against the wall from the continuous boredom, something green caught his eye and Camu all but bounced to hug Zoro.

On his part, the swordsman drew back but nodded in greeting to the energetic man. Sometimes the guy really reminded him of Luffy.

"So how do we see Luffy?" The first mate asked, eye assessing the bars in front of him critically.

"I know not..." Kin'emon answered, looking lost.

Neither of them noticed Camu stiffen and take a step back. Whatever these guys wanted with Strawhat himself, Camu would surely not enjoy meeting him. So he did the only sensible thing he could think of: flee while they weren't looking. If he was lucky, the two sword wielders would finish quickly and he'll join them after that, making up some excuse for his sudden disappearance.

The man could only hope they didn't want to bring Strawhat along with them.

Luffy was confused, if a little miffed at the current situation he had found himself in. Besides the downgrade his mood had taken since he had practically forced himself to cheer for Rebecca, hoping in vain that the girl wouldn't die so he won't have to write that blasted book, now he was finding himself with the snot nosed, tear stained face of an ugly being in his face.

The pirate captain almost administered justice, but at the last moment decided to look behind the corporal fluids and was surprised to see Bartolomeo. The man was crying in happiness, if nothing else.

Before the straw hat wearer could ask the guy what happened, if only just to make conversation and wipe the impending death of the pink haired girl from his mind for a moment, Bartolomeo grabbed his arm and dragged him to one of the barred windows of the colosseum. Luffy promptly released a groan when he saw who was down on the street on the other side.

"Zoro! What the hell are you doing here?!" Luffy's yell made both men wave their hands in a sign for him to shush. "Who is that creepy dude next to you? Is he powerful?"

"Keep it down you idiot!" Zoro gritted his teeth, trying in vain to abstain from killing the little bastard on the other side of those bars. Now he was putting their mission at risk with his damn blabbering! Zoro didn't even address the question about Kin'emon because, for all intents and purposes, the Samurai had been present on their boat all the way until here.

Decidedly ignoring the oaf, Luffy continued undeterred. "What the hell are you doing here?"

Zoro gasped. "Why the hell didn't you tell me there was a tournament like this, bastard?!"

"Shut up, the Mera Mera no Mi's mine." The pirate captain stuck out his tongue through the bars.

The green haired swordsman willed himself to calm down and looked at Kin'emon. The man was struggling with a portable Den Den Mushi that will allow them to speak with the others.

"Luffy-dono. We'll be calling Sanji-dono and the others. They want to speak with you." The older man informed the brat above them.

"Oh, I remember you. You're that severed guy!"

Before either of the two down below could make a comment, Sanji and Franky's voices were heard over the phone, shadowed quickly by even more sounds.

Luffy willed himself to listen, hoping against hope that there was something interesting going on. Surprisingly, it was.

"Luffy, you remember that toy you almost flattened when we arrived at the colosseum? He's the guy I met and spoke with."

"Oh."

"They want to launch an all out attack that will effectively transform into a revolution. We have agreed to help them."

What do you know, those people had an army.

"Uh-huh."

"This country is hiding some really deep darkness!" Franky sniveled over the line. He continued with another series of complete bullshit before loudly and dramatically exclaiming. "I cannot just send them off to die!"

"Uh-"

Luffy actually stopped to consider this for a few moments. He didn't really care about this country, but he surely had hit jackpot with the word army. This country's revolutionaries had to be some absurdly powerful bastards if they even considered going against Mingo. So that meant that if Luffy's crew would help win this war, then his fleet was partially ensured. Obviously he won't demand anything now, but when repayment time came – and it will come – the teen will make sure to deduct some absurd number of men in retribution and he won't even have to imagine feeling remorse because the authorities will be grateful to him for helping them. Not to mention a potential war was an insanely good lesson for his inapt crewmates. Who knew, maybe they'd even manage to kill someone and then he won't have to dispose of them because of incompetence. For all he knew, this was a win-win situation.

"Alright, we're heading back!" Sanji's declaration was followed by a chorus of disappointed moans.

Franky's side of the line was still silent, awaiting his confirmation. Luffy smirked.

"Sure, go wild! Make sure you kill some people, too!"

He was happy to hear so many happy cheers at the prospect of uninhibited murder.

Suddenly, a large explosion engulfed both Zoro and Kin'emon. Luffy blinked, confused by what had happened.

When the dust cleared, Doflamingo and a half-dead Law were standing and lying, respectively, in a crater. Luffy twitched at the state the other real pirate – who was at least useful and cunning in comparison to the other idiots – was in and growled.

"What the hell do you think you're doing, Mingo?"

"This brat has pushed his luck too much." The flamboyant pirate happily pushed the trigger repeatedly.

"That was awesome and I'm starting to like you! Join my fleet!"

Several pirates in the plaza, including but not limited to Zoro, Kin'emon and Doflamingo himself, turned around to stare at Luffy. On his part, the teen cleared his throat and tried again.

"Right, I mean- what do you think you're doing to Tra-dude?!"

"At least try to make it believable, Luffy." Zoro snorted, unsheathing his sword.

The rest of Mingo's speech was drowned out by the small army of Marines invading the plaza. As if blind to this, Zoro launched himself forward, intent on kicking some flamingo ass, but the shady old man from the restaurant got in his way.

"Do you want to join my fleet now, old man?" The black haired teen asked, oblivious to the Marine coat uniform the elder was wearing.

Issho ignored the kid and focused his full attention on Roronoa Zoro. How such a violent character decided to bow down to the straw hat kid was still beyond him.

A huge battle broke out in the middle of the square. Blood was flying everywhere and people were screaming. Sounds of steel clashing against steel and the smell of gunpowder permeated the air. It made Luffy inexplicably envious to be caged in that stone ring.

"Ughhhhh, Mingo wait for me, I'm gonna be right there!" The teen glued himself to the bars, only to slide away immediately, with jelly-like muscles. "I wanna fight too..." He pouted from his position on the ground.

"LAW!"

"Law-dono!"

Luffy looked up and promptly cursed. "Mingo, where're you going dammit! Make sure you keep Tra-dude alive. I'll come to pick him up later!"

Doflamingo raised a confused eyebrow but decided to not question anything. That Strawhat kid was clearly insane.

"Luffy," Zoro propelled himself near the Sea Stone bars, "find an exit quickly! We'll be running around here."

"Eh? Why?"

The green oaf had the nerve to look mortally offended. "Because we need to catch up to Doflamingo, you clueless bastard! Didn't you listen to anything we said?!"

"Nope."

Zoro willed his thoughts away from suicide.

"Fine then, we're going to Doflamingo's. Hurry your ass out of there." Zoro had barely finished his sentence when the Den Den Mushi acted up again and Sanji's hectic voice came through.

"It's Big Mom's pirate ship! I don't know what's happening-"

"Just kill them all Sanji!" Luffy bellowed, already tired with their one track mind. Why couldn't these guys realize that the easiest way to solve anything was staring them in the face?

"Yeah, yeah, I'm gonna deal with it. We'll be going to lose them and then return-"

"No, you go to that next island or whatever and search for more people to join my fleet!" Luffy interrupted again. He began running with Zoro and Kin'emon along the stone corridor. "We'll see you there."

"Understood. We'll be waiting at Zou." The blond cook replied.

"Leave the destruction of the factory to us!" Franky gave an almighty roar.

"Fine, don't forget to kill some people." Luffy reminded stubbornly. "I don't want Mingo to think we aren't taking him seriously! Zoro and I are breaking into the palace. Kin'eroll can come with us."

"It's Kin'emon, it is, Luffy-dono!"

"We'll be kicking Mingo's ass!"

Even propelled by that declaration, it took a while for Luffy to actually find an exit. After running about uselessly for a couple of minutes, the black head bumped into Bartolomeo again. The green haired man was carrying a bloody form over his shoulders.

"Woah, you actually killed someone. Congratulations, Barto!"

"T-Thank you Luffy-senpai!" The man looked beyond happy at the praise before his face drew to a blank. "But he's not dead."

He spoke at the same time that Bellamy said, "I'm not dead, you bastard!"

Luffy's face dropped. "Aw man, but you were so close. Anyway, it's great to see you!"

Ignoring his senpai's first sentence, Bartolomeo instead focused on the exclamation which brought him down foaming at the mouth.

"Di-Did you see Zoro-senpai?" The fanboy gasped trough sheer willpower.

"Yeah and now I need an exit. And fast!"

"There is no exit." Bellamy's slurred voice did nothing to deter Luffy.

"Stuff it, Bellymere. I need to get outta this shithole." The black head looked at his future head of public affairs pointedly. Unfortunately, it only resulted in the man almost fainting again.

"I... am getting out of here, though. If... you follow me, you might-"

"Good, then hurry your slow ass. I'm not immortal yet, you know?"

"Shut up!" The blond man rasped. "I'm not doing this for you. I am not going to betray Doflamingo-"

"Yeah, about that. I don't really care and I'm gonna kill his ass anyway so you shouldn't get your hopes up for that promotion."

Bellamy's silence was long enough for Bartolomeo to finally regain his wits and start addressing some valid points.

"But senpai, the Mera Mera no Mi-"

"Dammit! I forgot about that. God fucki-"

"Senpai, don't worry!" Bartolomeo cut the cussing fest to a short. "Leave it to me. I was already planning to give it to you anyway!"

Luffy took a moment to blink. "Are you seriously giving it to me?"

His question was answered in the form of an oath – or something like that anyway.

"Of course it must be in your hands! I'll definitely get the Mera Mera..."

"That's actually freaking helpful." The captain considered. "What do you say you joi-"

"I'm afraid I can't give you the Mera Mera no Mi, Strawhat Luffy." A new voice spoke from a shadowed corner.

Luffy frowned. "How did you get there?"

The man sputtered, but made no attempt to answer his demand. Instead, the form took another few steps towards them, disposing of Bartolomeo effortlessly and grinning smugly up at him.

On his part, Luffy ignored the green haired man's muttering behind their backs and squinted up at the new guy. His appearance spoke oddly familiar volumes, but he couldn't associate the face with anyone he knew. Just as he was about to shove the guy away and resume his business, he took off his top hat and Luffy felt his jaw drop in shock.

"You motherfucker are alive?!"

"The blasted bastard couldn't even send a letter, how the hell were we supposed to keep in contact. Not to mention that he has the guts to even show his damn face right now after..."

Zoro tuned out Luffy's half-tearful, half-livid rant as they made their way towards the palace, dressed in the most ridiculous costumes he's ever had nightmares about wearing. At least the fountain of continuous swear words that Luffy was now would keep him entertained on the way.

"Hmm? You cried?" Koalla grinned at the sniffling on the other side of the line. Yep, that must have been a truly wonderful reunion.

Back in the colosseum, Sabo nursed his bruised eye and bloody lip, wincing at the pain. He surreptitiously wiped his equally bloody nose on his coat's sleeve. That little brother of his had really given him a well deserved ass kicking.

After the initial joy and tearful hugs, Luffy quickly descended into hysterics, swear words and punches that left him quite unsettled, but grateful. He deserved the beating. Something was nagging him that Luffy's behavior was strange, but Sabo pushed that thought to the back of his mind for the moment. He had better things to concentrate on right now.

"Oh, you don't have a bloody clue, Koala."

A/N: I was planning to write something, but then I decided to post this. I still don't know why, tho. I'm still procrastinating with this story... o3o

Updates will definitely go very slow for this from now on, but I won't abandon the plot bunny, don't worry!

Reviews and Feedback is loved! :D