Join my crew!
AKA. the real reason Shanks wants Marco to join the Red-hair Pirates.

The Roger Pirates had just landed on an island only to find small-time rival Edward Newgate, or Whitebeard, docked there as well. Shanks was investigating his new crewmembers... if you could call them that.

"Hey! Whitebeard! Who're they?" Shanks asked, gesturing to the teens hiding behind the towering figure that was Whitebeard.

"This is Marco," the giant man pointed to the blond, "Thatch," the one with the over-the-top quiff, "and Vista," the one with the workings of a moustache to rival Newgate's own.

"Hey! Marco! Join my crew!" Marco looked shocked, blushed a little, and hid a little further back behind Whitebeard.

"Guararara! You don't have a crew, you brat! Why do you want Marco anyway?" Whitebeard asked, the humour not at all gone from his eyes. If anything, it was growing.

"Because! He looks like a pineapple and he's so damn cute! I need someone like that on my crew!"

Marco spluttered, and just about got the words, "I am NOT CUTE-YOI! Or a PINEAPPLE-YOI!" Out of his mouth before Thatch turned on him.

"Aww who's a cute little pineapple? You are!"

"Shut the fuck up, Thatch-yoi!"

"See, he's even got the mouth for it!" Shanks proved his point to the openly laughing Newgate, Thatch and Vista. Marco was now drowning of embarrassment behind them.

"Guararara! With such a convincing point, you can have him! Marco!" It was at this point that Marco spontaneously combusted and flew off.

"Oh dear. Guess we triggered the fight-or-flight response. I'll go track him down, see you sometime this week," Vista walked off in the general direction of the blue fireball that was Marco as if it was a weekly occurrence. Shanks stayed where he was, jaw dropped and on the floor.

"What the hell happened there? People should not combust and then fly off!" He yelled, more at the air than anything else.

"That would be Marco's devil fruit. He ate the tori tori fruit*, model phoenix, one of the mythical zoans. He doesn't have much control over it, so he probably ate it quite recently," Whitebeard explained. Shanks' eyes widened and took on a gold, glowing sheen, like his eyes had turned to glowing orbs and were now light sources. (To this day, Thatch swears they were really stars in his eyes)
"SUGOI!** I need him on my crew—"

"Which you still don't have—"

"Shut your face! He's a pineapple, he's cute, he swears like a sailor and he has a cool-as-fuck devil fruit! I neeeeed him!"

"Not in this lifetime, shitty brat. I expect he'll say the same, though it was fun seeing you try! Guararara!"

Vista walked back into view, dragging a still-protesting Marco with him. "I'm back. Didn't take me as long as I thought. Idiot crashed out of the sky."

"Oh! Marco! You're back! Join my crew!"

"No way in hell-yoi!"

It was at that moment that Shanks got whacked around the head by a rather-annoyed Rayleigh. "Stop trying to recruit people into your nonexistent crew, brat!" Shanks walked away despondently. At the same time, Marco breathed a sigh of relief and promptly fainted. Whitebeard laughed again.

-x-

When Shanks next encountered Whitebeard, it was with a new crew. The Red-Hair Pirates. Whitebeard's crew had expanded a lot as well, from three teens to over 500 men.
Shanks' first reaction after boarding was to yell as loudly as he could, "OI! MARCO! JOIN MY CREW!"

"NO WAY IN HELL-YOI!" Came the response.

Needless to say, later that night, many people asked about the story behind that. Thatch and Vista were all-too-happy to oblige, Marco drowning of embarrassment behind them.

*bird bird fruit
**something along the lines of 'so cool!' Don't quote me though.

Thank you to guest who corrected me on my spelling of Rayleigh. It has been fixed.

Based off my headcanon that the reason Marco is always asked to join Shanks' crew is because of one little inside joke. Unless that was someone else's headcanon I headcanoned about... If Ihave stolen the basis of your headcanon I am sorry.

Written at 1 am. Posted around 2 am. Help meeee…

Yes I have other fics I could be doing. I will be doing them and hopefully updating. Me and a friend are working on an SI (blame this bites) and I'm betaing probably too many fics at once. Plus there is school. Ugh. I think I may be overworking myself.

Reviews, favourites and follows always appreciated!