Notes: I do not own "One Piece," a most awesome creation of Oda Eiichiro

Summary: Do Straw-hats understand the term, "collateral damage"?

It really should have been easy. After Kidd and Law got their jollies off watching the carnage that would be the Straw-hats' death, the hijacked marine ship would sail back to the archipelago where everyone would ignore the other, get on their respective ship, and leave the fucking marines and their headquarters far far behind.

Eustass was beginning to realize that Monkey D. Luffy's brand of crazy was wildly contagious, and distinctly resembled the End of the World.

Law was using his long sword to poke the pile of only-Davy-Jones-knew-what that had landed on the ship only a few minutes ago. Well, to be precise, it'd bounced off of Urouge's back, pinballed into Capone, was batted away by Hawkins, only to be crushed by a large reptilian foot. It groaned, sighed, moaned, and pulled itself into a seated position. As it came up, ashes and soot drifted off to reveal a tattered straw-hat with a ragged red binding.

"Straw-hat!" Trafalgar Law snarled, his forehead a mass of pulsing blue veins. "How many people have you gotten killed today?"

"Phew! That was a wild one! Shit, I'm not supposed to be out to sea! Oh, hey, you guys were at the auction house. What are you doing out here? Is this a marine battleship? Cool! Hey, are you going to help me get Ace back? He's my brother, and those marines are gonna execute him early. Ah! I ain't got time to be here talking!"

The supernovas were busy trying to process the stream of information, when a number a sickening crunches were heard, as eight projectiles landed on the deck behind the assembled supernova.

Luffy blinked, then ignored them completely to continue his rant, and check his hat.

Killer was a wee bit more traumatized.

"Are they alright?" Capone asked warily.

"Oh don't worry, it's my nakama. They're fine. They're strong."

"You shitty rubber-brained idiot." The unearthly growl came from one of the smoking holes near the aft of the vessel. "

"How many times do we have to tell you this?" came a whiny croak from deep in the hold.

"We are humans, made of flesh, and blood, and bones," puffed a feminine sigh.

"And metal and wood. At any rate, we can't take this sorta damage unscathed," wheezed a low voice from the remains of the deck near the main mast.

"'Cause we ain't made of rubber like you!" erupted eight enraged howls, as the Straw-hat crew burst out of various piles of rubble and holes. Scratched and bruised, they amazingly, and disturbingly, didn't seem to have any more grievous injuries.

"No, you're all strange. Really, really strange," was the dead-panned response of the supernovas.

"Good, get your asses in gear, crew. I gotta get back to the execution platform before they kill Ace."

"And how, exactly, do you think you can do that? You guys are kilometers away. You're basically out of the fight!" Drake snapped irritably. "Ah...hey, are you idiots even listening to me?"

Eustass was looking down on Luffy, who had just strolled up to him as if he were having afternoon tea, not waging war against the marines.

"Kidd, let me borrow this ship."

"Why the fuck would I do that, Straw-hat? I got a crew back in Shabondy waiting for me and I ain't got no interest in helping the competition." Killer drew up behind his captain, and there was no mistaking the sound of steel being drawn as Roronoa stepped up behind Luffy. His counterpart, the massacre man, had re-equipped his scythes, and they were very much at the ready.

Luffy's face looked dead. His eyes were as blank as a calm sea, and his smile was no were to be seen. He looked like the coast before a hurricane. Too calm, too quiet. Roronoa still hadd on his black bandana, and now there was no mistaking the six extra arms, nor the 3 extra heads, that had sprouted on his shadow.

Law was preparing to run. The whole atmosphere bespoke of dreadful violence, particularly since Kidd's grin was growing wider and wider. Luffy's expression was even blanker than the ten seconds before he'd clobbered the Tenryuubito, and his entire crew were eyeing him warily. The fact that Urouge, Apoo, Bonney, and Capone were also sneaking to the remaining lifeboats showed that lesser beings could not expect to stay alive should these two supernovas collide. As if that was not enough, the other, inconsequential pirates were also passing out in large numbers, which could only mean two things.

Poison, and haki. Law's bets were firmly on haki.

Hawkins took to consulting his tarot cards. He frowned. This situation was horribly increasing his chances of dying, something he had no intention of doing anytime soon. Drake had his back to the ocean, ready to fly away at a moment's notice. It may tire him out, and he meant end up plummeting into the sea, but the situation was deteriorating sufficiently enough to make a devil fruit user face the ocean instead of the four demons in the middle of the ship.

So when Luffy and his crew dropped to their knees and bowed their heads, everyone's jaw dropped. Figuratively and literally, in Apoo's case.

"Please! I need to save my brother! He's the only family I know other than grandpa!" Luffy screamed into the deck.

"Oi, oi, what about your dad, Dragon?" Bonney stuttered. This sort of behavior was uncharacteristic of any pirate, far less one with the second highest rookie bounty.

"Never seen him, so I don't care. Ace is my brother though."

"He ain't even that though li'l guy. He's not blood," Urouge mentioned matter-of-factedly.

"I don't care! We drank together and swore to be brothers, and that's all there is to it!"

Luffy turned up his head, and glared at Eustass.

"I ain't worthy to be the Pirate King if I can't even rescue my sworn brother!"

Eustass' grin faltered, then fell. He turned to observe all of the other Straw-hats.

Bonney continued heedlessly, "Roronoa, you ain't got no cause to be bowing for this. What's this matter to you?"

Zoro sat back on his heels, and stared openly at the pink-haired woman.

"The world's greatest swordsman is not going to follow a captain who doesn't care for his own family!" he barked.

"Yeah, plus Ace is a great guy to put up with this shitty idiot for so long, mellorine!" added Blackleg, who was mercifully cigarette free. "We need to pay respects to the guy whose kept rubber brains alive."

"Admirable as these traits might be, we're going to be putting ourselves on the line doing this. We have our own crews looking for us." Law stated.

"There is no way you can stop me from going back to my crew in Shabondy. Dammit, we haven't got time, I need to find them and get to Merman Island," snapped Drake, as he pounded his fist on the deck.

"10, no 8, no, 5 minutes! We only need 5 minutes!" whimpered the sniper. His face was covered in tears and snot, as he bit his lower lip.

The waves crashed against the ship, which was still sailing away from the battle.

"3."

Luffy blinked at the back of Kidd's fur coat.

"I'm giving you three minutes, Straw-hat."

"Kishishishishi," chortled Luffy, who then proceeded to commit the most suicidal act of all time.

He hugged Eustass Kidd.

"For fuck's sake, hurry up and get to hell off this ship, you frigging stupid ape!" roared Kidd, as Apoo and Law almost went overboard from the tricky act of laughing hysterically on a rolling ship. The most wanted rookie's face was as red as his hair, and every other pirate that still remained standing ran screaming to the hold of the ship.

"Thank you, Eustass! I won't ever forget you when we get to the New World!" Luffy crowed, as he stretched out an arm towards the battleship's two larger masts. Roronoa and Blackleg ran up on a mast each, grabbing Luffy's feet as they flew past, and holding them down. Franky and Chopper ran a spare sail up between the masts, which Zoro and Sanji tied around Luffy's feet. Robin used extra legs to carry Nami and Brooke up and into the giant impromptu canvas sack made by the sail.

The only on deck was the cringing sniper.

"Usopp, hurry up!"

"Ah, Luffy, hold on, I've got no charge! I've got unable-to-get-it-charged-up-itis!"

"Shitty ass sniper, by Jones' bones get some!"

"Oi, monk!" shouted Zoro, hailing the largest man on the ship.

"Hm?" he replied, deceptively docile.

"Hit that long-nosed freak till he's dead!" the Straw-hats' yelled in unison.

"Eep!" was the most that Usopp got out before the monk's fist descended on him. A number of bone-crunchingly ominous sounds were being emitted from the spot where the sniper had been, under the Fallen Monks' captain.

"Oi, can't any of you kill him?" goaded Franky, as he and a much smaller Chopper jumped into the sail.

"Hurry up!" yelled Luffy, whose body quivered in the breeze.

Well that just encouraged Capone and Bonney to join in the fracas. They'd had a horrible day so far, and nothing refreshed a pirate like smashing someone's face in.

"Brooke! Let's sing that song!"

"Yohoho, as you wish, my captain!"

The sounds of fighting were broken when a masked man jumped from the middle of the brawling pack, ran up the third mast on the ship to its top arm, and then put Luffy's already extended head into a chokehold. Completely ignoring the way in which his captain was turning purple, the masked man pulled back with all of his strength, the muscles in his left arm bunching mightily as his sinews burst into relief. His right arm reached behind to rest gently against the very tip of the mast.

"Gomu gomu no..."

"Sogeking..."

"Reject Bell Rocket!"

The ship didn't sway. It didn't rock. It didn't roll. For a brief moment, it seemed like nothing had happened at all. The seagulls squawked in the sky above, and the waves continued to boom.

Then there was the sound of dripping. Slowly at first, then with a rapidly increasing frequency, large drops of blood splashed on the deck from far above. There was a ripping, gurgling, hacking cough, then large clots of blood splashed on the wood below, spreading a thick maroon color. It was accompanied by the sound of joints popping, sounding like rapid gunfire, as Roronoa and Blackleg released their tentative grips on the other masts in favor of clutching their captain's legs.

All of which may have meant something to the supernovas, if it weren't for the fact that the ship was now almost vertical, and on the brink of capsizing.

Apoo clutched the ship in sheer panic as it crashed back down onto the ocean, and almost shattered completely. He could hear the ominous sound of the keel cracking below him, and knew it would take a miracle to make it back to the archipelago.

Drake heard the wood below him scream and splinter as he dug four sets of lizard claws into the deck for purchase. He was going into the ocean. He could see it rise up towards him will sickening speed as his head began to spin.

Law dug his sword into the deck, holding on desperately as the wind ripped at him, trying to pick him up and bodily through him into the Grand Line, nothing more than a footnote in the pirates' graveyard.

Urouge pushed through the remains of the third mast as it fell down in a hail of toothpicks. He was doing something that he had not done since he'd left the clouds above, something that strained his tiny wings, and might ultimately be useless in the face of gravity at sea level. He flapped harder, but the wind resisted him at every beat.

Bonney shrank, screaming, as the top of the mast barely avoided where her adult body would have been. She dove into one of the holes in the deck, tumbling roughly in the small storage hold below as the floor of the ship almost became the ceiling.

Hawkins, also known as the human voodoo doll, sank his nails into the second mast as straw flew from his hair. The wind threw debris and jagged wooden spears into his face, as he flapped in the gust, and felt his arms slipping from Capone's added weight.

The accursed famiglia boss' soldiers were weaving the straw on Hawkins' feet through the portholes in Capone's belly, securing the short ship of a man as best as possible given the proximity of the sea.

Kidd held Killer in one hand, his mask irresistibly attracted to the magnetic man, even as Kidd used his other hand to hold onto the metal bracing of the first mast. The red-haired man still had a foot on the deck, and his eyes were locked on the small, rapidly fading dot that was Monkey D. Luffy, insanity incarnate. He knew he was possibly two steps from flying off the ship and drowning, hampered in the end by his own devil fruit power.

But for some reason, that didn't matter, as he and the other supernovas watched the Straw-hats soar through the air, holding on to their captain for dear life, singing "Binks' Sake" at the top of their lungs.

He'd be damned if he knew why he was laughing and singing too.

In the end, the supernovas had to pummel the other pirates into rowing back to the archipelago. Most of scum had passed out when Luffy and Eustass had faced off, with only a few sensible enough to understand the difference between 'row' and 'sea monster bait'. It felt like days had gone by before they finally reached the enormous mangrove, and by some unspoken sense of understanding, the supernovas met in the center of the deck as the ship neared the outlaw groves.

"This never happened."

There were sidelong glances, but no dissent as Kidd continued.

"We never saw them. On the off chance that Luffy survives that war, we don't need the marines to know that we helped them in anyway."

Law growled low, and muttered.

"But wouldn't that increase our fame and bounty?" Capone asked as discreetly as possible.

"Are you typically this slow, Belly?" Bonney grouched. "We admit that we help this kid commit the ultimate act against Mariejois, we won't see dry land till Raftel!"

"The marines will also hunt his crew to all corners of the seas, if any of them survive," Drake confirmed. "They haven't a chance in hell."

Hawkins looked like he wanted to disagree, but stilled his mouth. The others saw it, processed it, and shuddered.

"We got the word. No lookee, no see, no straw-hat. I don't need his ruckus to help make my rumble any louder," Apoo agreed, turning his back on the lot. "Kidd! We've got a fight brewing when we get over the line!"

"Not if he doesn't stop giving me orders, cause I'll keel-haul him first," muttered Law, as he pointedly dispersed in the opposite direction. One by one, the other supernovas followed suit, ignoring the past hours in favor of finding their crew.

"Interesting," Killer stated quietly, once he was sure the others were out of ear-shot. "I want to see them again. Roronoa...that demon will be unbelievably fun to slaughter."

Kidd grinned, laughed, then howled with mirth. He wrapped his arm around his first mate, and strode back to his ship, singing "Binks' Sake" all the way. Nothing made him happier than finding a worthy opponent to kill.

Hawkins quickly found his crew in another inn, and ignored them as he booked his room.

"Aren't we gonna ship out immediately?" asked his first mate. "I don't mean to sound like a chump, but we figured you'd want out of this place before any other admirals could show up."

"Trust me, they are all busy, and those who aren't, will be. Secure the ship to the mangrove. The possibility of severe weather is over 63%."

"For fuck's sake, get me some food!" Bonney roared as her crew entered the restaurant. As her men scampered around the establishment to bully the chefs, she snuck a crumbled piece of tarte aux fruits out of her bosom, and delicately nibbled the delectable pastry.

Honestly, she'd have to beat that man to death, and elope with the cook.

Capone had had enough. This piracy thing was much tougher than he'd ever believed, filled with opponents outside of his imagination, but he refused to be shown up by a snivelling sniper and a robot in panties.

"Cavalry, line up! We are going to do drills from now till tomorrow's sunset. We're getting soft and fat!"

Law was met first by Bebo, who looked immensely happy to have the doctor and captain back.

"Bebo is sorry! Bebo failed you," the bear wailed as he followed Law back to the ship.

"Bebo, shut up. There is a reindeer on this sea who is more of a man that you are. Don't forget that you still need to improve," Law snapped over his shoulder. "Now hurry up! You stink when your fur gets wet."

Despite being back on his safely moored ship, Urouge couldn't forget the siren with the orange hair. Her weather skills were better than anything that he'd seen 10,000 meters above, and she wore the scantiest clothing he'd seen on something that young and ripe.

"Captain, you seem a little...distant...sir," one of his crew timidly asked, his head still bald in the manner of the monks' tonsure.

"You could say that I've fallen a little farther into sin, lad," Urouge answered smartly, as he drained his flagon.

Apoo raced around his ship, throwing instruments helter-skelter across the decks.

"More, I need more! More sounds, more whistles, more bells! Brooke's got so much music in his soul!"

His men ducked as the cymbal crashed into the crow's nest.

Drake knew that people like Nico Robin did not suffer weaklings well. He brooded as he and his crew made their ship fast against foul weather.

'Reptiles are cold-blooded, and practical. She's about as cold-blooded as a viper in the winter.' he thought to himself. 'Why is she bothering with them?"

He ignored the burn as the rope between his jaws slipped. Getting back to his task, he put away the thought of a snake willing to dance to the tunes of a strange, terrible, loveable master.

On a ship with a flowery lion on its stem, a crew of adventurers sang "Binks' Sake" late into the night, and slept in a pile on a lawn open to the sky.

Author says:

Uhm yeah. Now it's done. *sheepishly shuffles off*