Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Benn Beckman wasn’t the kind of man who let himself get cornered.

He’d been a crime boss longer than most could even fathom, and he knew how to cover his tracks better than almost anyone. Every move he made was coldly calculated, every action meticulously planned to preserve his façade of respectability. On paper, Beckman was just the CEO of one of the country’s largest export companies—clean record, taxes paid, diversified investments. Spotless. Too spotless, some might say.

But as he well knew, no veneer was ever enough to silence the right voices. The police—or rather, certain figures within it—remained interested. There was always a lingering doubt, a whispered suspicion, an off-the-record report that landed on the desk of someone important. Still, Beckman always found a way. With sharp lawyers, a well-greased network of influence, and a few million strategically placed, he turned accusations into silence.

That was why the scene that afternoon caught him completely off guard.

He noticed the footsteps before turning the corner: two figures too deliberate to go unnoticed. One, visibly older, wore the exhausted look of a man who’d traded sleep for reports and bitter coffee. The other seemed too young to be wearing a police-issue leather jacket—or maybe it was just his posture, stiff, like someone still learning how to hold his composure around a real suspect.

Beckman kept his stride steady, but he knew it was pointless. They were already on him. When the approach came, it was direct, no pretense:

“Mr. Benn,” the older one said, pulling out a badge. “Just a few quick questions about your operations in Yokohama…”

The tone was polite—professional, almost friendly—but Beckman knew a veiled threat when he saw one. The words might have been polished, but their hands resting too close to their holsters said everything. They were ready to react. They hadn’t come just to talk.

Benn kept his expression calm, unreadable—just as he always did in these situations. Inside, however, his mind was already processing scenarios with the speed and precision of a veteran chess player facing a risky move. He quickly weighed his options, each with its predictable consequences:

1. Kill both cops right there. Quick, efficient… but a long-term disaster. Witnesses, cameras, blood—a messy spectacle that would draw too much attention. Even his contacts couldn’t fully clean up that kind of noise.

2. Try to escape. A viable option, given his skills and the resources he always kept on hand. But fleeing would amount to admitting guilt. It’d play right into his enemies’ hands: putting him at a disadvantage.

3. Improvise. The wild card. The unstable ground where he usually thrived.

It was at that moment—when the silence grew heavier than any spoken word—that the universe, ever so ironic, chose to intervene.** With a gesture bordering on cosmic sarcasm, it tossed into his path what might have been the worst, or perhaps the best, possible solution. He hadn’t decided yet.

Two blocks away, the quiet of the sidewalk was shattered by the sharp slap of sneakers against pavement, followed by childish shouts and nervous laughter. Three boys appeared out of nowhere, vaulting over a low wall into the alley, barely avoiding a face-first collision with the asphalt.

The first—small, scrawny, with messy black hair and eyes alight with adrenaline—stumbled on landing but didn’t stop. He sprinted, a plastic bag swinging wildly in his grip, candy bars and gum packets spilling out behind him.

"RUN, SABO! THE COP’S RIGHT BEHIND US!"** the oldest shrieked, his voice too shrill for the moment, utterly oblivious to the fact they’d just burst onto a busy street.Disheveled, sweaty, eyes sharp and arms clutching the bag of candy to his chest like it was made of gold—or dynamite.

"Ace, shut the hell up!" hissed the second boy, slightly younger, with tousled blond curls and a razor-sharp gaze. Sabo didn’t just run with his feet—he ran with his eyes, scanning for exits, obstacles, opportunities.

When the three of them darted across the street without looking, setting off a chorus of car horns and curses, he took in the scene ahead.

On the other side of the sidewalk stood Benn Beckman—impeccably dressed, motionless, flanked by two men with the stance of authority and faces that said *trouble*. Cops.

And now, every eye was locked onto the trio of pint-sized delinquents.

Sabo didn’t hesitate. In a split second, he sized up the situation and knew exactly what to do. He flashed a dazzling grin, wiped the sweat from his brow with his sleeve, and shouted, pointing straight at Beckman—just as Luffy:

"DAD! WE FOUND YOU!"

The voice was sweet, convincing. Luffy immediately latched onto Benn’s leg with the ease of someone who’d done it before—his small hand slipping into the suit pocket and fishing out the wallet, tucking it into his own clothes before anyone noticed. After all, if "Dad" was rich, he wouldn’t miss it. Ace hung back a few steps, still wary but playing along with the impromptu plan.

Benn exhaled deeply, unmoving. And he felt fate laughing at him—with relish.

Sabo locked eyes with the older cop, his own wide and gleaming with rehearsed innocence—the kind that made adults second-guess themselves. His voice was light, almost casual, as if sharing a fun school fact:

"Did you know over 70% of missing children are found within the first 24 hours? Guess we’re lucky Dad found us first, huh?"

Then he blinked—like he truly believed he’d just done a good deed.

The older cop furrowed his brow. His hand still hovered near his holster, his eyes now darting between Beckman and the three children who clung to the man with the practiced ease of kids who'd rehearsed this in front of a mirror—like long-lost sons finally reunited.

"Are they... your kids?" The younger detective asked, clearly thrown off balance.

Benn didn't answer immediately. He looked down. Luffy was still wrapped around his leg, panting from the chase, his face smudged with dirt and sweat. Ace stood with arms crossed like a stray cat ready to bite if anyone reached out. Sabo beamed like a lawyer in training.

"Of course they are." His reply came crisp, firm—as if it were absurd to even question something so obvious.

The older cop arched an eyebrow, suspicion lingering.

"We weren't aware Mr. Benn had children. And in Yokohama, no less?"

Sabo stepped forward, hands clasped behind his back like a perfectly behaved little boy.

"We were with the nanny, but she got distracted on her phone and we got lost. I tried calling Dad, but... you know how it is. Kids and technology, right?"**

**"I just wanted candy,"** Luffy murmured, convincing as a child soap opera star, his eyes wide with the glimmer of oncoming tears.

Ace rolled his eyes, arms still crossed, his cheeks faintly flushed—refusing to fully participate in the charade. Beckman just sighed, noticing the crowd starting to gather on the sidewalk. Some were snapping pictures. Others whispered among themselves, baffled by the surreal scene: the polished businessman, the detectives, and three grubby kids acting like long-lost heirs to a fortune. His PR team would have *hours* of damage control ahead.

The younger cop opened his mouth to press further—but never got the chance.

Shanks was just passing through. He had a job scheduled for that afternoon—something quick, clean, no witnesses—but the commotion on the corner made him pause. Police trouble, people filming on their phones, and right in the middle of it all, a man dressed *way* too sharply for the occasion. *Probably some rich guy*, he thought.

Shanks narrowed his eyes, intrigued. He observed the detectives' restrained gestures, the way Benn held his unshakable composure... and then he noticed the boys. Three of them. Sweaty, breathless, clearly in trouble—and clearly making it up as they went along.

The whole scene was a disaster waiting to happen. And Shanks could never resist a disaster.

He abandoned whatever he'd been doing and crossed the street without a second thought—quick strides, an easy smile on his face. He wore a plain dark t-shirt, well-fitted jeans, spotless sneakers, and a backpack slung carelessly over one shoulder.

"Darling!" he called out, with a wave as theatrical as it was clumsy. He hopped the curb, tripped over a woman's purse, apologized profusely, and nearly knocked over a yakisoba vendor in the process. The kind of man who clearly couldn’t be trusted with a houseplant—let alone three children.

The distraction was effortless. And to anyone who didn’t know him, harmless. The type who’d forget his own birthday but remember the neighbor’s dog’s. He stopped beside Benn, panting—despite not having run—and flashed the cops a disarming grin, like he’d rehearsed this exact moment in front of a mirror.

"Sorry I'm late! The second I got the alert from the kids' tracking app, I rushed right over. These three love to bolt the moment we look away, don't they?" He had a suspicious ketchup stain on his shirt hem—possibly from lunch, possibly from work.

Luffy squealed "Daaaaaaddy!" and barreled into him like an overexcited puppy. Shanks winked subtly at Sabo—*got the script mid-scene, don't worry*—and scooped Luffy into an awkward hug. The boy was a mess of tangled hair and restless energy, but Shanks kept smiling.

He'd never seen these kids before. Or these cops. But for someone like him, that just made the game more fun.

"These troublemakers gave us quite the scare," he added, shooting Benn a glance that earned him the faintest grunt in response.

The older cop looked between the makeshift "family" and his partner. Neither seemed fully convinced... but they weren't confident enough to push further. Not with the growing crowd filming what could easily become a PR nightmare: two detectives harassing a public figure... in front of "reunited" children.

He tucked the notepad back into his pocket.

**"Let's reschedule this conversation, Mr. Benn."**

Benn simply nodded, placing a firm hand on Sabo's shoulder—the only way to say *"Don't you dare pull this again"* without words. Shanks was already walking off with Luffy in his arms and Ace trailing behind, waving a half-hearted goodbye to the detectives.

As the cops retreated, still muttering under their breaths, Benn finally muttered—to no one but himself:

**"You three are going to pay for this."**

Sabo grinned, counting it as a win. Luffy dug out a crumpled piece of gum from his pocket and offered it up, still cradled in Shanks' arms as they weaved through the crowd toward the parking lot. Ace just scoffed.

**"Hey, honey, how about takeout tonight? I'm starving,"** Shanks chimed in, car keys dangling from his fingers.

Benn felt a nervous tic twitch beneath his left eye. This absurdly convincing charade was shaving more years off his life than ten mafia shootouts combined. He glanced skyward. Somewhere, God must have been laughing. So he decided—he *hated* that scatterbrained redhead. Hatred was easier than admitting the plan was... brilliantly ridiculous.

Shanks' car was... unnervingly clean. It gleamed under the afternoon sun like it had just rolled out of a car wash—and, come to think of it, maybe it had. The seats were pristine, the carpets dust-free, the compartments *too* meticulously organized.

It was the kind of cleanliness that raised red flags for someone like Benn Beckman. He said nothing, but his gaze swept over the light upholstery with silent skepticism. Stains? None. Smell? Just citrus soap and that artificial "new car" scent. *Too* perfect. *Too* convenient.

On the dashboard, a small cluster of colorful stickers stood out against the car's clinical sterility. Three decals carefully placed in the lower corner of the windshield: a grinning fox, a pixelated skull, and a teddy bear clutching a toy sword.

Benn, in the passenger seat, studied the stickers with a fleeting glance, then leveled the same clinical stare at the three kids in the back—a futile attempt to make sense of it all.

Luffy, now sprawled out as if the earlier chaos had just been a warm-up for his day, was devouring a pack of cookies he'd clearly swiped from Shanks' backpack. Criss-cross applesauce, crumbs on his chin, grinning like he'd hit the jackpot.

"This one's double-stuffed!" he announced through a full mouth, offering one to his "fake dad."

Shanks just smiled—one hand on the wheel, the other adjusting the rearview mirror with too much nonchalance. He swerved around a pothole like someone who'd driven these streets for a decade, but the open GPS on his phone told a different story.

Ace and Sabo, meanwhile, seemed physically incapable of relaxing. In the backseat, they bickered in heated whispers, gesturing like bad movie spies:

"If we'd cut through the back alley, no one would've seen us wipe out!" Ace hissed.

"If you hadn't yelled my name mid-chase—" Sabo shot back, buckling his seatbelt with theatrical flair.

"You pushed Luffy off the roof first!"

"He was scared to jump! I motivated him!"

The car jolted slightly as Shanks hit a speed bump without noticing. He laughed—that light, carefree chuckle that seemed to say "my problems are yours now, Benn."

"So, kids... where can I drop you off?" he asked, as if he were a rideshare driver and not a hitman who'd just improvised an entire family.

Luffy pointed out the window, cookie still clutched in his hand:

"There's a park with a seesaw over there! We can stay there!"

Shanks nodded with exaggerated enthusiasm, winking at Benn:
"See? Everything under control."

Benn responded with only a grunt and folded his arms. He was still trying to decide what was more dangerous: the detectives or this trio—now quartet—of lunatics improvising a family sitcom.

With one hand steady on the wheel, Shanks reached over and popped open the glove compartment. Instead of documents or maps, he pulled out a neat stack of business cards—arranged with a precision that completely clashed with his otherwise sloppy demeanor.

With a flick of his wrist, Shanks plucked two cards from the stack and slid them between his fingers. Still keeping his eyes on the road, he spoke with the casual ease of someone offering chewing gum:

"Usually I spend afternoons at this little hole-in-the-wall café... Quiet place, decent apple pie, and nobody asks too many questions."

The tone was breezy, but Benn caught the subtext. There was surgical precision in every word—an offer with multiple layers. Nothing about Shanks was as innocent as it seemed.

With a fluid motion, Shanks sent one card sailing onto Benn's lap with perfect accuracy. The other he held out between the seats until Sabo took it.

"If you want to keep this going..." He finally glanced in the rearview mirror to lock eyes with the blond boy. "...see you there."

Sabo spun the card between his fingers, studying it with a gaze that read far beyond the printed text. He didn't respond, but the half-smirk tugging at his lips said everything.

Benn arched an eyebrow at the address. Dawn coffee.

A hitman, three con artists, and a mobster walk into a café...

This isn't the setup to a joke. It's Tuesday.
Dawn coffee hid at the dead end of a street—the kind GPS hesitates to suggest and even the wind seems wary of blowing through. Not isolated enough to raise eyebrows, yet not visible enough to draw gawkers. It simply existed—always had—unassuming, immovable, like part of the scenery.

The faded beige awning, wrought-iron chairs, and perpetual scent of strong coffee and freshly baked cake gave it a cozy veneer. But that was just the façade. Nothing here happened by accident. Regulars knew the Wi-Fi password, but more importantly, they knew when to shut up. And if someone asked for an order "to go," it usually meant time was short—or the conversation too dirty.

The bell above the door rang sharp, thin, quick. Not a welcome, but a warning: Someone’s entered. Be ready.

Inside, time moved sluggishly, as if the air filtered every spoken word. Baristas with sharp eyes and selective hearing. Small tables, shadowed corners. A crooked painting on the wall everyone pretended not to notice.

Benn paused in front of Dawn Coffee, studying the facade like one might regard an old acquaintance—wary, but with no real choice. His gaze traced the faded awning, the interior's reflection in the glass door, the silent bell he knew would chime too loudly. He took a deep breath, adjusted his collar out of habit, and pushed the door open with the calm of a man who’s never caught off guard—even when he is.

The bell rang, announcing his arrival.

The air inside was warm, deceptively inviting. Soft instrumental music wove between murmured conversations and the clink of porcelain. But Benn knew how to read silence—and in this one, there were too many eyes listening.

In the café’s farthest corner, half-shrouded by the glow of a hanging lamp, sat Shanks. Leaning back with one leg stretched out as if the world revolved around him—and not the other way around—the redhead was enthusiastically gesturing to three small figures across from him.

Luffy his face smeared with frosting—was devouring a generous slice of carrot cake as if he were at a picnic, not an informal meeting with a professional hitman.

Sabo studied the menu with the intensity of a classified dossier—narrowed eyes, straight-backed posture, the gears in his mind spinning far too fast for his age.

Ace, slouched in his chair with arms crossed, rolled his eyes at Shanks' every exaggerated gesture, feigning disinterest—but Benn noticed how he occasionally scanned the café’s exits.

Shanks, meanwhile, spoke with his hands, grinning between sips of coffee and dramatic pauses. He looked utterly at ease, like an uncle entertaining hyperactive nephews. The noise of the world didn’t reach him—or rather, he mastered the art of ignoring it.

Benn approached without hurry. A man like him never rushed. He sat in silence, his jacket perfectly aligned, his eyes flickering over each face at the table like he was checking his cards before the game began.

Luffy shoved another forkful of cake into his mouth, utterly unhurried. Sabo glanced up from the menu, already weighing the moment. Ace didn’t turn, but the stiffening of his shoulders betrayed his awareness.

Shanks shattered the silence with a lazy grin and a wave toward the empty chair across from him.

“Right on time for the grand finale.” His smirk was crooked. “Happy family, heartwarming reunion. Too saccharine, maybe, but prime-time material.”

Benn approached the table without a word. He sat slowly, his jacket still buttoned, his hands resting just above the surface as if the table itself might contaminate him.

“It’s already on the radio.” His voice was low, deliberate. “The local paper called it ‘a tearful reunion between a reclusive tycoon and his long-lost children.’”

Sabo’s mouth quirked in satisfaction.
Luffy, fork still in hand, threw both arms up like he’d won a championship.

"See? We're amazing."

Ace scoffed.

Benn, however, didn't react. His dark gaze swept over the three before settling on Shanks—cold as steel wrapped in velvet. A tense silence fell. The café seemed quieter than it should be, even with the soft background music still playing.

Shanks held his gaze with that half-smirk of someone who knows more than they let on—or pretends to.

"This might work. It'll get me off the front page for the wrong reasons. But I don't like relying on improvisation... or children" Benn stated flatly.

Sabo straightened in his chair. His eyes were unsettlingly sharp for someone so young. "Then don't rely. Make a deal."

Shanks whistled, amused. "Thirteen years old and already negotiating with criminals. Soon he'll be stealing my spot."

"I only steal if it's profitable" Sabo murmured.

Benn leaned forward slightly, hands interlaced on the table.

"You three are in way over your heads. Running from cops, trespassing. I could fix this with one phone call."

"We saved you," Ace shot back, irritated. "It was our idea. And you went along with it."

"And it might work—if no one strays from the script," Benn countered.

Luffy, who'd been distracted by the frosting, glanced between the adults and reached for someone's juice glass (no one protested). Then he declared, firm:

"We'll only agree if there are rules."

Shanks barked out a laugh. Benn blinked, surprised.

"Rules?"

Sabo was already pulling a napkin and pen from his backpack.

"Item one: No ditching us after. No orphanages. No vanishing in the middle of the night."
"Item two," Ace added, chin jutting out, "we get our own space. And decent food."
"Item three!" Luffy yelled. "Cake every Sunday."

Shanks raised his eyebrows, theatrical.

"Ambitious."

"And item four," Sabo said, crossing his arms, "if anyone tries to take us away, you have to fight for us. Even if we're a handful."

Silence. The air grew heavier—the kind of quiet where everything is decided before the answer is even spoken. Benn leaned back, the boy's words turning in his mind. He let out a short exhale, almost a laugh.

"You're good. Annoying. But good."

He reached out slowly, taking the card Shanks had left on the table.

"Fine. Deal struck."

"Happy family until further notice," Shanks declared, toasting with his now-cold coffee.

"Dysfunctional family" Ace corrected.

"Facade family," Sabo muttered.

"FAMILY!" Luffy yelled, brandishing his fork.

Beckman sighed wearily, already regretting his choices.

And for a moment—strange and fleeting—they all almost seemed like part of something. Something almost real.

Chapter Text

The living room door burst open with a sharp crack, slamming against the wall with enough force to send an echo through the newly purchased house. *A bit rude*, Beckman thought, raising his cup to his lips without looking up from the documents in his hands. The bitter aroma of still-warm coffee contrasted sharply with the scent of fresh paint and newly polished wood that hung in the air—the unmistakable smell of a place that was new, empty of history.

Envelopes lay scattered across the kitchen table, some still sealed, others with crumpled corners from hasty handling. In his grasp was the deed to the house—official, legitimate... *more or less*. The gated community was far from the bustling part of the city, surrounded by high walls and meticulously trimmed trees. Isolated enough to keep neighbors at a distance and secrets even farther away.

From the other side of the house, a child’s voice erupted with unrestrained energy:

"Look! There's a HUGE staircase!" Luffy shouted with the kind of enthusiasm that made the windows vibrate, tearing down the hallway like an unguided missile.

A heartbeat later, Sabo and Ace appeared in the kitchen, footsteps hurried and eyes wide with excitement.
“Can we have our own rooms?” they asked in unison, stopping at the kitchen doorway with eager anticipation. Behind them, Shanks appeared—radiant as ever, wearing a crooked red sweater and a wrinkled black shirt underneath. There were crumbs on his shoulder. “God only knew where they’d come from.”

This was the boys’ first time in the house. To them, it was uncharted territory waiting to be explored. To Beckman, it was the result of an entire operation built with clinical precision and a touch of desperation. He’d spent the last two days scrubbing away traces, tweaking public records, discreetly altering official documents, and calling in favors from contacts he’d rather not have involved. A full night without sleep. Three liters of coffee. And a web of lies so tightly woven even *he* was starting to believe them.

All of it for a house. And for a family that only existed because someone—probably Shanks—thought it’d be fun.

“Of course!” Shanks replied with the enthusiasm of someone who’d just been elected picnic captain. “As soon as we’re done here, you and Luffy can go upstairs and pick your rooms!”

He turned to Ace and Sabo with a grin so boyish it bordered on gleeful, his eyes sparkling as if this were some grand adventure—and maybe, for him, it was. Then he slowly pivoted on his heels, surveying the room with a critical eye.

“ Besides… we’ll need to redecorate. And buy things for the kids. His nose wrinkled slightly as he took in the overly white, sterile kitchen, as if every gleaming surface offended him personally.” This place looks like a clinic. You can’t raise proper family chaos in a spot like this.

Beckman just sighed. As much as he hated to admit it, Shanks was right. The place smelled of fresh paint, disinfectant, and *absence*. No pictures on the walls, no clutter. Too much white. Too much silence. Not enough life.

“What are these papers?” Sabo asked, curiosity piqued, stepping closer to the table and leaning in with a furrowed brow.

Luffy appeared right after, still swimming in an oversized hoodie that seemed to have swallowed half of him. Wild-haired and buzzing with energy, he flopped unceremoniously onto Benn’s leg, nearly making him spill his coffee.

“ ‘Morning,” he mumbled, clinging to the man’s leg like it was a pillow. The cool touch of his skin contrasted with the warm ceramic of the cup in Beckman’s hand.

He cast a brief glance at the boy but didn’t push him away. He’d long since learned that Luffy had no grasp of the concept of personal space. For him, a proper greeting required physical contact—preferably the unannounced kind.

“These are your documents” Benn replied matter-of-factly, sliding one of the folders toward Sabo. “Birth certificates, school records, medical history. All stamped. All… functional.”

His voice was clipped, efficient. But beneath it lay the exhaustion of someone who’d spent the night scrutinizing every comma for flaws. Those papers were the foundation of the lie. Proof that, on record, this mess of mismatched names, ages, and crooked smiles was officially a family.

Sabo opened the folder like he was defusing a bomb. His eyes skimmed over the typed lines, the digitized fingerprints, the fabricated yet convincing names. For a moment, he said nothing.

“Why am I French?” Sabo asked suddenly, eyebrows arched and tone perfectly flat — which, coming from him, might as well have been a shout of suspicion.

He flipped calmly through his new birth certificate, fingers tracing the edges of the paper with deliberate care. The adoption record was attached right behind it, and though he’d noticed the date—backdated as if the adoption had happened over a year ago—he chose to ignore it for now.

Benn, seated at the table, slowly lifted his gaze, feeling a faint prickle of anxiety creep up the back of his neck. This had been calculated, planned, and purchased with precision. He knew every digit on that damned document by heart. Before he could respond, Shanks had already chimed in with the casual ease of someone explaining a restaurant menu:

"International adoption is a ghost’s paradise. One: Less domestic red tape. Japan won’t dig through French paperwork. Two: Nobody questions a kid with a European passport entering as a ‘dependent’. They glance at the visa and wave you through. Three: In Europe, you buy a full dossier from a shell orphanage, register it in Paris as a ‘legit adoption’ and… nobody connects the dots. After all, who’s gonna track a kid who ‘always existed’ overseas? And the best part? With the deep web, you can even get photoshopped pics of you at some French orphanage… metadata included. Bureaucracy adores a well-told lie."

He spoke while lazily straightening the pages of an open folder—as if he weren’t casually divulging confidential logistics he theoretically shouldn’t even *know*. Benn gaped at him, a silent storm of disbelief and exasperation flashing across his face. A heavy silence fell for a moment, broken only by the soft *shff* of pages being turned.

“You…” Benn started, then stopped. There were no words polite enough for what he wanted to say.

Shanks just smiled—*that* kind of smile, the one that seemed too genuine to be trustworthy.

"What? I'm smart too, y'know?" He shrugged, as if this were the most obvious fact in the universe.

Benn let out an incredulous huff, jaw clenched, fingers digging into the edge of the table.

"C’est mon charme," Shanks winked at him, teasing, the French rolling off his tongue with startling fluency.

Sabo kept flipping through the folder with careful precision. He paused at the birth certificate, staring at his newly adapted name with silent focus. The surname was different. The birthplace, unfamiliar. The nationality— French.

He released a long, measured exhale, as if mentally weighing the absurdity of it all.

"French, huh," he murmured, voice eerily calm. "Guess that means I’ll have to fake an accent now?"

Ace, passing behind his chair, peered over his shoulder with a smirk.
"Only if you wanna intimidate teachers."

"Not necessarily," Shanks cut in, now thumbing through another folder with the ease of someone who’d never respected boundaries. "Kids can lose or pick up accents based on environment. We’ll just say you moved to Japan young. Unless you *want* to sound smarter in parent-teacher meetings." He flicked his wrist dismissively, like offering a magic trick. "Trust me. It works."

Sabo kept staring at the document.

The words seemed steady. *Finally.* They weren’t swaying or blurring together like they sometimes did when he was tired—or nervous. He blinked slowly, eyes tracing each letter as if testing the solidity of new ground before stepping onto it.

It wasn’t his real name. Or his real history. And somehow, that brought relief.

Maybe it would be easier this way. Starting from zero. Maybe, if he didn’t have to be *that* kid—the one teachers resented for asking too many questions, the one adults avoided because he was "difficult," the one who couldn’t stay still even when his body begged for rest—maybe, as this new French boy with watchful eyes and signed papers, he could *breathe* properly.

He could just be... functional. Like the documents.

Ace broke the silence:

"Luffy and I are Brazilian," he declared, sounding far too pleased with himself, clutching his own papers like a trophy.

"Where's Brazil?" Luffy asked, peering over the edge of the table like an overeager puppy.

"South America," Benn replied, already grabbing the tablet from the corner and swiping to a gallery of vibrant images—golden beaches, emerald rainforests, crowds of laughing people in Carnival costumes.

Luffy's eyes went round with wonder.

"Whoa..."

His chin dropped onto the tabletop as he dragged a finger across the screen, soaking in every color like he could dive straight into them.

"I'm older," Ace announced abruptly, puffing out his chest. He thrust his birth certificate at Sabo, jabbing at the date like it was a challenge.

Sabo arched one eyebrow, the corner of his mouth twitching upward.

"Really? Could've sworn you were the troubled middle child."

Shanks barked out a laugh—loud and utterly gratuitous—right before taking a punch to the arm courtesy of Ace.

"Ow! That was a compliment!" he protested, still grinning. "You can be *both* problematic *and* the oldest. Multitasking!"

Ace launched into a slow-motion attack, delivering slaps that were all sound and no sting, while Shanks defended himself with both arms and half-baked apologies, laughing like this chaos was the most natural thing in the world.

Sabo watched the scene unfold, his fingers still resting on the edge of the document.

Maybe this *was* his new reality now—a house with absurdly large staircases, a room of his own, and a group of people who seemed to redefine "family" based on whatever mood struck them that day.

He could work with this.

Maybe... *functioning* wouldn't be so bad after all.

Shanks, meanwhile, seemed to be having far too much fun.

He raised his hands, holding a laminated document between his fingers like it was some newly conquered trophy.

"Happy anniversary, darling," Shanks announced with a grin that bordered on poisonous, waving the forged marriage certificate in front of Benn's face.

The document was flawless—official stamps, elegant signatures, all dated three years prior. As if this farce had *history*. As if they were a real couple, with memories, with... *traditions*.

Benn looked up slowly, one eyebrow arched in silent challenge.

"Should I buy you flowers... or a will?" he deadpanned, his voice as dry as the bitter coffee he insisted on drinking unsweetened.

Shanks laughed, eyes sparkling with pure mischief.

"Depends." He leaned in, smile sharpening. "Do I get the house?"

Benn didn't flinch, but the corner of his mouth twitched. Before the taunting could escalate, however, the sound of crumpling paper cut through the room.

Ace sat cross-legged on the floor, staring at his new ID with an expression caught between confusion and outrage.

"Why am I ‘Benn Ace’... and not ‘Akagami Ace’ like the others?" He held up the document as if double-checking he wasn’t seeing things. "Sabo’s Akagami. Luffy too. And I’m just...?"

Shanks didn’t miss a beat. His eyes lit up like embers as he leaned forward, propping his chin on his hand.

"Because Beckman wanted a son all to himself," he declared, with the serenity of someone who’d just dropped a live grenade.

The silence that followed was razor-sharp.

Ace froze for a second, his face cycling through shock, disbelief, anger—then something far more complicated.

"YOU’RE LYING!" He hurled a pencil at Shanks, who dodged with fluid ease, laughing like it was the funniest thing he’d ever seen.

"It’s true! Look, he even signed your certificate in bigger letters!" Shanks pressed, tapping the document with a grin full of mischief.

Benn, silent until now, finally reacted. He set his coffee cup down with a soft *click*, fingers lingering around it a second too long. When he spoke, his voice was quiet but steel-edged.

"Seemed unfair for you to claim all three. I had to stake my own claim."

Ace went completely still.

The document trembled slightly in his hands. He stared at the printed name—*Benn Ace*—then back at Benn, as if seeing something entirely new.

"So... does that mean I’m... like... the favorite?"

Shanks let out a dramatic gasp, clutching his chest like he’d been stabbed.

"How *dare* you?!"

Benn didn’t flinch. He held Ace’s gaze, dark eyes locked onto him with rare intensity.

"Not ‘favorite,’" he corrected, voice quieter now. "Just... mine. For real." A deliberate pause, words chosen like stones placed carefully in a wall. "If we’re gonna sell this lie, at least let one piece of it be *mine*."

The air in the room shifted.

Ace didn’t know how to respond. His chest ached strangely, like someone had shoved something hot and heavy behind his ribs. He looked down at the document again, fingers tightening around the edges.

It was all fake. All made up. But...

"Fine..." Ace finally muttered, looking away. "But I want a bigger room than Sabo's."

Shanks burst into laughter, and even Benn let out a sigh that could almost pass for a half-smile.

Benn finished organizing the documents on the table—names now as solid and real as the walls of this house. The kids' papers were sorted into colored folders, each labeled neatly. The house, which just hours ago had been nothing but a staged lie, was starting to gather real marks of life.

"Once we're done moving in, we'll need to visit the doctor for check-ups. I've also scheduled therapy appointments as a precaution," Benn announced without looking up.

Silence dropped like a brick.

Luffy stopped squirming. Ace's brow furrowed. Sabo closed his folder slowly, fingers pressing faint creases into the paper.

"Why?" Ace was the first to speak, his voice edged with defiance.

Benn finally looked at them. There was no hiding it—they were undernourished, with old scars, and Shanks had already noticed Ace fainting at random times. Sabo had dark circles under his eyes, like he'd never slept properly in his life. And Luffy... well, Luffy was in a league of his own.

But spelling it out directly would only make them shut down further.

Fortunately, Shanks intervened before the tension could escalate.

"Ah, it’s totally normal!" he said, lacing his fingers behind his head with an easy grin. "I’m going too. Need to adjust my ADHD meds."

Luffy blinked, confused.

"What’s ADHD?"

"When your brain runs on a different rhythm," Shanks explained, as casually as discussing fruit varieties. "Some folks think faster, some juggle ten thoughts at once, some get distracted by a bird—" He gestured to the window where, indeed, a pigeon was pecking at the ledge. "—and some can’t read unless the letters stop dancing."

Luffy went quiet for a beat.

"Letters dance for you?"

Shanks chuckled. "Nah, but sometimes they scramble. What about you?"

Luffy stared at the documents on the table, brow furrowing. "They flip upside down. Sometimes. Or just... get hard."

Benn and Shanks exchanged a glance. Sabo, who had remained silent until now, tilted his head slightly.

"That has a name?"

"Yes, dyslexia" Benn replied, keeping his tone neutral. "And it’s not a bad thing. Just means your brain processes things in a unique way."

Ace scoffed, crossing his arms. "We don’t need doctors. We’re alive, aren’t we?"

"You can be alive and still feel *better*," Shanks countered, tossing a pen at him. "Me? Without meds, I’d forget to eat entirely."

Luffy giggled, Ace rolled his eyes, and Sabo... Sabo looked like he was processing everything at supercomputer speed.

"And the therapist?" he asked, cautious.

"It's like a coach," Shanks replied. "Only instead of teaching you how to kick a ball, they help you sort through the mess inside your head."

Luffy seemed to consider this.

"Do you have to talk about the past?"

This time, Benn answered before Shanks could.

"Only if you want to."

A silence settled, but it was less tense now. Ace still looked wary, but Sabo seemed intrigued. And Luffy...

"If we go, do we get lollipops after?"

Shanks burst out laughing. "If they don’t give you one, we’ll buy some on the way back."

Benn sighed but didn’t protest.

"Alright," Shanks declared, clapping his hands against his thighs and springing to his feet. "Time to pick out your rooms."

Before anyone could respond, he’d already scooped Luffy into his arms effortlessly. The boy let out a loud giggle, wrapping his limbs around Shanks’ neck like a content little monkey.

Ace and Sabo followed almost instantly—footsteps hurried, eyes gleaming with a mix of curiosity and barely disguised competitiveness.

"I call the biggest one!" Ace declared, already rounding the hallway corner like a rocket.

"The biggest is mine! I'm French now, I have rights!" Sabo shot back, sprinting after him.

Shanks just laughed, adjusting Luffy in his arms as he trailed behind. "If you fight over space, I’ll pick the room with eeny-meeny-miny-moe!"

"Don’t run on the stairs!" Benn’s voice carried up after them.

For a moment, Benn remained seated, watching the chaos vanish upstairs. The sound of footsteps, laughter, and doors swinging open echoed through the still-empty house—filling the rooms with something that oddly resembled... *life*.

The upper floor still smelled of varnish and fresh paint, the wooden floors creaking softly under the stampede of eager feet. The windows were open, letting in the afternoon breeze that tangled through the newly hung curtains—some still dangling price tags.

Shanks climbed the steps with Luffy perched on his shoulders, one hand firmly gripping the boy’s leg to keep him from toppling over in his excitement. Ace and Sabo had already charged ahead, barging into the first room on the left with the fervor of explorers claiming new territory.

"This one's mine!" Ace shouted, throwing his arms wide in the middle of the empty room as if staking claim to uncharted land.

"It's smaller than the last one," Sabo remarked, already at the next doorway. "I'm taking the one with the big window."

They carried on like this—room to room, doors slamming, voices overlapping, hurried footsteps making the entire floor tremble. Five empty rooms waited upstairs, all with pale walls and the scent of a home yet to be built. One was a master suite, which instantly sparked debate.

Shanks laughed as he wandered from door to door, sometimes reminding someone not to jump on the hardwood floors, sometimes just watching like he was witnessing a tiny storm taking shape.

Luffy was the first to break from the frenzy. Without warning, he slid off Shanks' shoulders—nearly making the redhead stumble—and slipped into a quieter room at the end of the hall. The walls were the same as the others, but something about it felt different.

The sunlight poured through the wide window, flooding the space in a golden beam that spilled straight across the wooden floor. The warmth was gentle, inviting. Luffy walked barefoot to the center of the room and stopped there, his feet bathed in light. He smiled.

"Here," he said softly, as if sharing a secret. "It’s warm here."

Shanks leaned against the doorframe, watching the boy sit down and then lie flat on his back, arms spread wide as if offering himself to the sun.

"Want blackout curtains, or do you prefer waking up with light in your face?" he asked, already knowing the answer.

"Sun’s good. Reminds me of the beach," Luffy replied, his eyes drifting shut.

Shanks smiled.

"So this one’s yours?"

"This one’s mine," the boy confirmed, with quiet certainty.

And in that moment, the room ceased to be just an empty space. It gained an owner. It gained a story. And slowly, like the sunlight stretching across the floor, it gained warmth.

Shanks appeared in the doorway of Ace’s room, where the boy leaned against the window, fingers tracing invisible lines on the glass fogged by his breath. The space was cold, the fading evening light staining the walls a pale orange.

"Claiming territory or plotting a crime?" Shanks asked, rapping his knuckles lightly against the frame.

Ace turned his head, too quickly to hide his surprise. "Neither." He crossed his arms but didn’t move. "Just... thinking."

Shanks stepped inside and sat on the floor, his back against the wall. "Thoughts weigh heavier in empty rooms." He looked at the same spot Ace had—where the glass warped the sunset into something liquid. "When I was young, I lived in a place with broken windows. The wind whistled all day. Hated it."

Ace frowned. "Why tell me that?"

"Because you’re staring at that window like it insulted your ancestors."

Ace huffed, but his shoulders relaxed slightly. "...You can see the orphanage from here." He pointed to a distant building nearly hidden among the trees. "We ran away two months ago."

Shanks didn’t pity him. Just nodded. "Now you can curse at it every morning. Progress."

Ace laughed—a rough, startled sound. "You’re a fucking weirdo."

"And you’re stubborn as a rusted door." Shanks stood and tossed him something—a keychain with a tiny metal skull. "For your first house key. Don’t lose it."

Ace caught it mid-air, eyes wide. Before he could reply, Shanks was already leaving. "Gonna check if Sabo’s picked his room or is making a pros-and-cons list."

In the next room over, Sabo crouched in the corner, pressing his palm against the wall as if testing its solidity. His backpack—always stuffed with notebooks and pens—lay open on the floor, a journal visible among his things.

Shanks paused in the doorway, uncharacteristically quiet. Sabo sensed his presence but didn’t turn.

"Water damage?" Shanks asked.

"No." Sabo lowered his hand. "Just... checking."

"Checking what?"

"If it's real." Sabo's voice was quieter than usual. "We've had temporary places before. They never lasted."

Shanks sat beside him, his back against the wall too. "Walls are good for that. Hold you up when you're not sure you can hold yourself." He glanced at the journal in the backpack. "You write what you can't say out loud, huh?"

Sabo zipped the bag shut quickly but didn't deny it. "Words come out wrong when I speak sometimes."

"Then scribble 'em till they straighten out." Shanks pointed to the opposite wall. "Wanna test the paint first? Write whatever you want there. We'll cover it up later."

Sabo eyed him skeptically. "Is that allowed?"

"Beckman doesn’t need to know." Shanks grinned. "Call it... a housewarming ritual."

Sabo pulled a permanent marker from his bag and, after a pause, wrote on the pristine wall:

"We’re not leaving."

Firm, straight letters—nothing crooked. Shanks read it and nodded like it was a binding contract. "Official now. The house has to obey."

Sabo almost smiled. "You’re terrible at lying."

"That’s why I’m good at what I do." Shanks stood and offered his hand. "Come on. Luffy’s starving, and Ace has probably broken something by now."

Sabo took his hand, and for a second, the wall felt sturdier.

Benn drove the kitchen knife into the packing tape of another unmarked box, his fingers smudged with dust. Unlabeled boxes were a gamble—they could hold anything from forged documents to memories he'd rather forget.

Shanks, ever his opposite, rubbed his hands together like a kid facing a birthday present. "Mystery box! Better than Christmas." He poked at a loose flap, making it wobble. "Could be a corpse. Or treasure. Or a treasure corpse."

"Or paint," Benn muttered, spotting the gleam of metal cans in the dim room.

Shanks pulled out the first one, hoisting it like a trophy. "And not just *any* paint—*colors*." He turned the label toward the kids already crowding around him. "Who wants to paint their room from scratch?"

Luffy was already bouncing before the question was finished, eyes sparkling. "I want red! Like Shanks' hat!"

Ace made a face. "Red’s for attention-seekers." He nudged a can with his foot. "Orange. Like fire."

Sabo , ever the tactician, scrutinized the options with a critical eye. "Blue... but with light gray for contrast. Looks professional."

Shanks laughed, tossing a can to each of them. "Professional? You planning to sleep or sign contracts in there?"

"Sleep *and* draft contracts," Sabo corrected, deadpan but with the ghost of a smirk.

Benn watched silently, arms crossed. The colors were random—leftovers from some forgotten project, perhaps—but their enthusiasm was genuine. Shanks caught his gaze and held up a lime-green can with a devilish grin.

"What about you, Beckman? CEO gold? Funeral black?"

"White," Benn replied flatly. "It’s practical."
Shanks made a disgusted face. "Boredom in paint form." He turned to the kids. "Ignore the old man. Colors are for people with souls."

Luffy was already prying open the red can with his bare hands, splattering paint on the floor. Ace growled and grabbed a roller, while Sabo meticulously separated his colors like a general organizing troops.

That’s when Benn noticed the black briefcase at the bottom—different from the others, with a numbered combination lock.

Shanks, of course, saw it too.

"Secrets, Beckman?" He whispered, leaning in with a gleam in his eye.

"Documents," Benn lied, sliding it under the table.

Shanks smiled like he already knew the truth. "Sure."

🔹

The walls were finally done.

In Ace’s room , burnt orange swallowed an entire wall like a sunset trapped in concrete. The rest stayed white—whether from laziness or style, no one was sure. He called the contrast "dramatic," but really, he’d just run out of patience after the first hour.

Luffy, on the other hand, had painted *one* wall a vibrant red. The other three... well, they'd escaped his attention. He seemed genuinely proud of this accomplishment.

As for Sabo —of course it had to be Sabo—he insisted on perfection. After meticulously painting the blue wall, he covered the remaining surfaces in light gray, creating what he called a "mentally stable environment." It took twice as long, required surgical precision with painter's tape, and he nearly refused all help. In the end, Shanks had to distract him so Benn could take over one of the rollers.

"You'll leave bubbles in the paint!" Sabo protested from inside the closet.

"And you'll turn into a real estate agent if you keep this up," Shanks shot back, already bored by the third flawless rectangle.

---

With the walls still damp, the second battle began: furniture assembly.

The boxes arrived early. No one thought to call for help—maybe because Shanks found it amusing, or because Benn, naive as he was, assumed it would be quick.

It wasn’t.

Kneeling before a disassembled child’s bed, Benn faced too many parts, too few instructions, and a steadily growing backache. Luffy watched from a throne of empty cushions, as if observing a NASA scientist at work.

"Will this *actually* turn into a bed?" Luffy asked, holding a plank upside down.

"Maybe if you stop climbing everything," Benn muttered.

Nearby, Ace was wrestling with his desk, misaligning the screws for the third time. Shanks "helped" by naming each screw like a character in a play.

"This one’s the Boss Screw. Orders the others around."

"Stop messing up my system!" Sabo snapped, buried under hand-drawn diagrams and labeled parts.

Benn rubbed his face. He *should’ve* hired professionals. Or an entire crew—complete with uniforms and the patience to handle hyperactive kids and aesthetic chaos.

Too late now.

Amid the chaos, Shanks suddenly paused. He was watching a bird perched on the windowsill. "Look... it’s got a blue feather."

Luffy shuffled over. For a moment, they just stood there in silence, observing.

Nothing matched. Nothing was finished. But the rooms—slowly, unevenly—were beginning to feel *alive*. Crooked in places. Improvised in others. But *living*.

The walls were painted, the furniture half-assembled (some pieces correct, others with "intentional" leftover screws), yet the sharp scent of fresh paint still clung to the air. Despite quick-drying formulas, the fumes pooled in corners and stuck to their clothes like a damp reminder: *This isn’t done yet.*

"No one’s sleeping with that smell," Benn declared, wrenching open the hallway window. "Unless you want to pass out mid-dream."

"Living room sleepover!" Luffy yelled, as if he’d planned it all along.

And so they did.

They built a fortress of pillows and blankets on the floor. The couch became a backpack graveyard. The TV stayed off. Shanks tossed a string of LED star lights into the mix and declared it a "home theater atmosphere," even though no one picked a movie.

"What are we eating?" Ace asked, in the tone of someone already considering chewing off an arm.

"Delivery app," Benn replied, already swiping through his phone. "Pizza, yakisoba, fries... and something green so we can pretend we tried."

Sabo picked the drinks. Ace demanded cheese-loaded fries. Luffy ordered ice cream *before* dinner—and, for some reason, Benn allowed it. Maybe because he was too tired to argue, or because the moment was already too improvised for rigid rules.

They ate on the floor, laughing between bites, trading absurd stories. Luffy recounted dreaming of a floating castle made of watermelons. Sabo reminded them how they’d once fooled a subway guard by pretending Ace was allergic to artificial light.

The living room was bathed in half-darkness, lit only by the string of LED star lights in the corner and the faint glow from the street slipping through the half-drawn curtains.

The makeshift mattresses covered the floor like a patchwork quilt of mismatched blankets and pillows. The faint scent of paint still lingered in the air—subtle but stubborn—mingling with the aroma of cold pizza and forgotten fries left on the corner of the table.

Luffy was already sprawled on his back, arms wide as if ready to dream something absurd and technicolor. He blinked slowly, grinning at nothing, his eyes nearly shut.

"G'night, Shanks..." he mumbled.

"Night, Captain," the redhead replied, tugging the blanket up to the boy's chin. "Dream something less sticky this time."

Luffy chuckled softly and rolled onto his side, curling up like a content kitten.

Ace flopped down nearby, half-wrapped in an orange blanket he *swore* he'd chosen "to match the wall" (but was probably just the first one he grabbed).

"Night, old men," he said through a poorly concealed yawn.

"Night, Drama King," Sabo shot back from across the nest, fluffing his pillow twice before finally settling.

Shanks pressed a light kiss to the top of Sabo’s head—a fleeting gesture, automatic as breathing.

"Night, mini-CEO."

"Night, Shanks…" Sabo whispered back, gaze fixed on the ceiling where the star-shaped lights blinked lazily. "Thanks for today."

The redhead smiled, though no reply came. He just settled into the corner of the couch, draping a blanket over his legs.

Beckman appeared in the doorway moments later, weariness in his eyes but attention sharp. He studied the four of them—a tangle of blankets, messy hair, and slowing breaths. The room felt transformed, every empty corner filled with this makeshift human warmth.

"Night," he said quietly, already turning to leave.

"Night, Beckham," three voices mumbled near-simultaneously. Luffy’s soft snores punctuated the dark.

Benn switched off the last light and let the artificial starlight keep watch.

As the kids slept piled together in the living room, Benn carried the empty pizza boxes to the outdoor trash bin. The night air cut like a blade—and that’s when he saw it. A black car parked across the street, headlights off but with the shadow of someone at the wheel.

The window rolled down an inch. Just enough for a hand to emerge, holding a lit cigarette. The ember traced a slow arc in the air, like a signal. Then the car drove away without hurry.

Benn didn’t need to see the face. He recognized the plates. The same model that had circled his office last week, before the charade began.

Inside, Shanks appeared in the doorway, leaning against the frame with a glass of water. "Everything alright out there, darling?"

Beckman crushed the pizza box one-handed. "Just trash."

The redhead followed his gaze to the empty street. Something in his posture shifted—relaxed shoulders tensed, fingers tightening around the glass. But his voice stayed light:

"Ah, got it. You saw the neighbor’s cat. Gorgeous, but a food thief. Almost as clever as us."

Benn stepped inside and locked the door behind him. The *click* of the bolt echoed too loudly.

The house fell silent.

The roof creaked under Shanks' weight. He hadn't been able to sleep, so he checked on everyone before climbing out through the attic window—third floor, already 3 AM, but he didn't care. He lay on the edge, an unlit cigarette dangling between his fingers (he didn't inhale, never picked up the habit), arms crossed behind his head as if this were any ordinary night. It wasn't.

The cold wind lashed at his face like a sharp blade, but he pretended not to feel it. The scent of unburned tobacco filled his nostrils—an old habit, a dirty trick to fool the brain. Smells like fire. Like home. Like before...

Benn's footsteps echoed behind him, heavy and deliberate, crossing the attic stairs. Shanks heard him step through the window, the sharp click of shoes on roof tiles.

"If you fall, I'm not jumping after you," the brunet announced, stopping half a meter away.

Shanks laughed, eyes still fixed on the stars.

"Is that a promise or a proposition?"

"A warning." Benn crossed his arms. "It's three in the morning.”

"Official existential crisis hours." Shanks twirled the unlit cigarette between his fingers, performing a charm that had long since worn thin. "Want one? You take the filter, I'll keep the part that does nothing."

Beckman didn't take it. Instead, he sat beside him, legs dangling over the edge of nothingness. He studied Shanks' profile—the way he stared at the sky as if he could count every star, as if that alone was enough to keep from jumping. As if this crooked, wordless exchange was the closest they'd ever come to intimacy.

The night wind whistled through the roof tiles as Shanks swayed his dead cigarette like a weary conductor orchestrating the stars. Imaginary smoke dissolved into the cold breeze carrying scents of damp shingles and distant yakisoba from some still-open izakaya.

"What’re you staring at up there?"

Benn’s voice came out rough, as if he’d swallowed a piece of the night along with the words. Shanks didn’t rush to answer. First, he let the cigarette trace a slow path across the sky, its cold tip nearly grazing the constellations.

"See that trio there?" The cigarette paused over three bright points piercing the sky’s black veil. "Lined up neat, like they used a ruler. You could slide a finger between them and never misjudge the space."

Benn followed the gesture, squinting slightly against the starlight. The city’s glow tinted his profile amber, revealing the first silver threads creeping into his temples.

"I see them."

"In Brazil..." Shanks drew a breath as if tasting the word, "they call them the Three Marys. Like three sisters running away from home." The cigarette spun between his fingers, tracing an imaginary circle. "Here, it's Orion's Belt. The eternal hunter."

His smile appeared sideways—that smile Benn knew too well, half-nostalgia, half-inside joke. The kind that always came with stories that started in bars and ended in hospitals.

"They say if you follow their path..." The cigarette slid southeast, "you'll find Sirius. The brightest star in the sky. A beacon for the lost."

Benn made a low noise that could've been a laugh or just the sound of shifting his weight on the cold tiles

"Did you follow them?"

The silence that followed was filled only by the distant hum of a refrigerator in some neighboring house. Shanks stared at the cigarette as if willing it to magically light itself.

"I did." His fingers tightened slightly around the filter. The laugh that escaped was short and airless. "But I don’t think I’ve found what I’m looking for yet, Beckman."

The wind chose that moment to carry away the last traces of unburnt tobacco lingering between them. Benn studied Shanks’ profile, etched in the glow of distant neon, before giving an almost imperceptible nod.

"And that one there?" Benn's index finger lifted lazily, pointing to a blood-red dot pulsing near the horizon.

Shanks turned his head slowly, as if afraid to startle the star. "Betelgeuse." He pronounced the name like one might speak of an old enemy. "A red giant. If you put it where our sun is..." His hands began close together, then exploded outward, "it'd swallow Mercury, Venus, Earth... even Mars would miss the shade."

Benn made a low sound that could've passed for laughter if it weren't so dry. "Comforting."

"She's dying." Shanks let the cigarette sway between his fingers, watching the star like someone expecting it to explode any second. "Any day now—*boom*." His fingers mimed a slow-motion supernova. "Shines brighter than the full moon for months... and then?" A shrug, his hand dropping to his lap. "Stardust. The most glamorous exit a star gets."

Benn turned to face Shanks directly, the city light painting gold stripes across his face as a near-imperceptible smile appeared. His gaze dropped to Shanks' wrist—there, under the streetlamp, a sinuous scar disappeared under the sweater sleeve. It looked like a shooting star or perhaps the trail of a poorly-loved knife. Shanks followed his stare and tugged the fabric to cover it, too quickly to be casual.

"You're chatty tonight."

Silence. The unlit cigarette swayed between Shanks' fingers, a nervous tic disguised as nonchalance. Benn watched him sidelong, eyes narrowed.

"Why did you agree to this?" he asked, blunt.

Shanks raised his brows. "Ah, you know how it is. Boredom, morbid curiosity, the promise of a tax deduction..."

"Try again."

The redhead sighed, overly dramatic.

"Because they're good little thieves. Because Luffy pickpocketed me at first sight and I laughed. Because Sabo lied to my face better than I ever could. Because Ace tried to punch me and I liked it." He leaned back, staring at the sky. "And because... if I hadn't shown up at that café, you'd have shipped all three to an orphanage the next day."

Benn neither confirmed nor denied.

"And now?"

"Now we pretend." Shanks clicked his tongue. "Happy family, proud father, bills paid on time. Until someone slips up."

"You're slipping right now."

"I'm sitting down, Beckman. I won't jump—not today."

Benn almost smiled. *Almost.* "You're seeing the therapist tomorrow."

Shanks clutched his chest in dramatic horror. "Cruel. Abusive. Controlling. Typical businessman." Benn ignored him, turning to climb back inside.

"Hey, Shanks?"

"Hm?"

"I'm putting locks on the windows—for safety. And you’ll pretend you don’t know how to pick them."

Shanks laughed—this time, for real.

He tossed the imaginary cigarette aside, crushing it under his heel. "I’ll try," he said, and for the first time, there was no mockery in his voice. Just something Benn couldn’t name—maybe the weight of a promise, or the fear that the locks might actually be needed.

"Fucking romantic, Beckman."

And as they climbed back inside, the air felt lighter. The house welcomed them back as if it had always been this way.

Chapter Text

Disaster.

It was the only word that could possibly describe Luffy’s morning. The hospital reeked of disinfectant and deceit—a sour, clinging stench that lodged in the back of the throat like stale chewing gum. Overhead, fluorescent lights buzzed like furious bees, while the air conditioning blasted straight down his neck, sending shivers skittering along his spine with every gust. He swung his legs restlessly on the hard waiting-room bench, his heels thumping rhythmically against the chair’s frame— thud, thud, thud —like a ticking clock counting down the seconds until his escape.

"Never again," he muttered, rubbing his empty stomach. "Next time they say it’ll be quick, I’m calling them liars to their faces." The promise of a meat feast after his tests was the only thread of sanity keeping him from declaring open war on the nurse who’d stolen his breakfast. His gaze drifted to Benn, sitting at the reception desk with a pen between his fingers, filling out forms with the grim expression of a man signing death warrants. The paper crackled under his precise handwriting, each letter a soldier falling into perfect formation.

Beside him , Shanks balanced a stack of forms on his knee, alternating between scribbling illegible notes and pulling faces to distract Sabo—who, in turn, was inspecting the hospital ID bracelet around his wrist like it was a shackle. Ace, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, glared at the digital thermometer above the door as if daring it to tick up just one more degree, if only to prove that hospitals were one big scam.

"Dad's a liar," Luffy announced to the empty hallway, his voice bouncing off vaccination campaign posters. "Fasting should be illegal."

Benn didn’t even look up from the paperwork. "Take it up with the scientists," he shot back, flipping a page with a sharp snap. "And stop kicking the chair."

Luffy huffed, folding his arms. "Scientists are worse than villains. At least villains let you eat."

But he stopped kicking the furniture.

The others were busy: Benn buried in bureaucracy, Shanks debating whether he could sign a form with a doodled pirate ship, Ace too deep in his foul mood to see anything beyond the wall in front of him, and Sabo… well, Sabo was reading medical pamphlets as if they were battlefield strategy manuals.

Now or never.

Without a sound, Luffy slid off the bench and vanished down the hallway, his oversized hoodie swallowing his footsteps like a fabric-cloaked ninja fueled by hunger.

His first mission? Find a water fountain.
His second? Get hopelessly lost.

The corridors stretched before him like an endless maze—identical white walls reflecting disembodied voices that crackled from tinny ceiling speakers. The farther he walked, the more the world seemed to shrink, as if the hospital itself were trying to swallow him whole from the inside out.

Luffy clutched at his hoodie, panic rising like bile in his throat. What if they left without him? What if they were like the others—the ones who made promises and then disappeared?

No one noticed.
No one came after him.

"Did they leave me behind?" he whispered, his voice dissolving into the frigid air.

The metallic tang of panic crept up his throat. Then, as if fate were punishing him, he collided with the one man he never wanted to see.

Luffy didn’t think. His heart pounded louder than his empty stomach growled, and his feet moved before his brain could even process why.

The detective.

The same man who had grilled Beckham about their dealings in Yokohama now stood before him, lingering like stubborn smoke that refused to fade. The man was speaking softly now, almost whispering, straining to sound composed. Luffy sniffled, letting his eyes grow damp—not by choice, but by sheer reflex. It worked.

'What do I do? What do I do?' Luffy's thoughts raced, his eyes darting wildly as if searching the ceiling for inspiration. 'Ace would tell me to punch him. Sabo would say to lie. Shanks... well, Shanks would probably just laugh and crack a joke.'

He stumbled slightly—just enough to seem accidental—then shuffled toward the man, clutching the sleeve of his hoodie like an anchor.

"M-mister…?" His voice came out rough, cracked — perfect. "I… I can’t find my dad…"

The detective turned slowly, as if hit by a camera flash. The nurse beside him cut off mid-sentence. An elderly woman lowered her newspaper. A father tightened his grip on his daughter’s hand.

"He… has red hair," Luffy continued, voice trembling ( somewhere in the hospital, Shanks sneezed ). "He was with me, but now…" A sniffle. "Did he leave? Did I do something wrong?"

Silence. Heavy stares settled over them. Judgment seeped from the walls.

The detective looked visibly uncomfortable, caught off guard. His eyes darted toward the security cameras as if hoping for divine intervention. Nearby nurses paused, watching the scene unfold. Sensing hesitation, Luffy seized the moment and dialed up the theatrics.

"He said if I got lost again, he'd trade me for a hamster!"

It worked. The man’s expression shifted—less suspicion, more exasperation. He exhaled, long-suffering.

"We can check the reception desk," he relented. "See if he's there. What’s his name?"

Luffy shrugged, wide-eyed. "I just call him 'Dad'..."

The detective sighed, discomfort prickling the back of his neck. He turned his head slightly, muttering under his breath, "Missing kids are always such a hassle..."

"Fine. Come with me."

Luffy clung to the man’s suit sleeve like it was a lifebuoy in uncharted waters. He let himself be led—but the detective’s steps veered subtly, as if "accidentally" choosing the longest possible route.
"I think... I came this way..." Luffy murmured, tugging the man down a hallway.

The detective hesitated. Luffy tightened his grip on the sleeve with a choked-back sob.

"I just wanted some water..."

For a fleeting second, the detective's expression softened. He relented. Followed the boy. The little lion in an oversized hoodie.

And just like that— Luffy led his prey.

One step at a time. Through endless white corridors. Quietly circling back toward the waiting room.

He stopped just before the doorway. This time, his hiccup was genuine—because suddenly everything felt tight again. Not from hunger, but from something deeper. His body knew there were people here who loved him, even if he couldn't say it in words.

He turned the corner.

"...Dad?"

Benn looked up first. Then Ace, still scowling. Then Sabo—already on his feet before they arrived, as if he'd seen it coming.

And finally, Shanks. His eyes widened—first in relief, then in... rage. The kind of fury that only surfaces when a predator spots a hunter circling their cub.

The detective paused behind Luffy, stepping into the waiting room.

That's when he realized.

Too late.

The air shifted.

Sabo stepped forward swiftly, placing himself between the man and Luffy.

Ace cracked his neck.

Benn rose slowly. Deliberate. Like a coiled spring about to snap. Shanks didn’t need to move.

His glare was weapon enough.

"This man helped me," Luffy said, his voice still small—but now steady.

The detective took half a step back, bewildered.

"I was just trying to—"

"Of course," Benn said. His voice was too gentle —the worst kind of kindness anyone could hear in that tone.

Luffy let go of the detective’s sleeve and walked over to Shanks, pressing against him without a word.

Shanks placed a hand on his head. Warm. Firm.

"Thanks for the help," Shanks said, flashing teeth in a smile that resembled an unsheathed switchblade. The detective stepped back, but it was too late. The message was clear: Leave. Before I decide to add your badge to my collection.

The detective swallowed hard, the weight of their killing intent pressing down on him.

Luffy didn’t even glance back.

The mission was over.

And the den was full of lions.

The room still hummed with tension long after the detective had fled.
Ace let out a loud scoff. Sabo crossed his arms—like he had a million things to say but chose silence instead. Benn stared blankly ahead, but his eyes were working like machines, calculating, distrusting.

And Shanks... just looked at Luffy.

The boy didn’t hold out for long.

"…I really got lost." His voice was steady, but not defiant. "Like… actually lost. I went looking for water and… all the hallways looked the same. I didn’t know where I was. I thought… I thought you’d left."

For a moment, no one spoke. The air in the room turned thick, as if time itself had been bottled up along with their words.

Shanks took half a step forward—then stopped. Luffy raised his hand slightly. Not to push him away. Just… he needed to finish.

"Then I saw him. That guy from before. The one with Benn, remember? Back when we ditched the nanny. He was there again. In cop clothes."

They understood the lie.

Shanks and Benn exchanged a glance—quick, nearly imperceptible. Something tightened inside Beckman. His eyes narrowed. Of course it was the same man. He’d tried getting close before. And now, in the hospital, he’d found an opening.

"He helped me get back," Luffy said—and blinked.

A small, deliberate blink. Almost silly.

But Beckman understood.
So did Sabo.

"We should seek help from the police when we lose, right?" Luffy added, straining for casualness. "Since they're so... hel-p-ful ."

Another blink. Innocent as a chocolate truffle. Complicit as a flashlight signal in a dark window.

Sabo cleared his throat, glancing around with a practiced smile.

"Absolutely. Always good to know they're... keeping an eye out ."

Ace twisted his mouth, still only half-following the conversation but staying silent. And Shanks... Shanks looked at Luffy like someone watching the sun rise where there should only be fog. As if seeing—for the thousandth time—the sheer size of that small, fearless heart that kept trying to protect them .

Shanks took a deep breath, his shoulders easing slightly.

Luffy hesitated. Then lifted his gaze straight to him.

"I just..." He swallowed hard. "I didn’t want anyone getting in trouble because of me."

Benn crouched down to his level. All traces of coldness had vanished from his face—only quiet certainty remained.

"You did the right thing, understand? But if this happens again… don’t try to handle it alone. Even if it feels like a game, you don’t have to win by yourself."

Luffy glanced away, biting the corner of his lip.

Shanks stepped closer, kneeling beside him.

"If anyone deserves blame here, it’s me," he said. "I should’ve noticed you leaving."

Luffy hesitated. Then leaned forward, resting his forehead against the redhead’s shoulder. A small gesture. But heavy with things he still didn’t know how to say.

Shanks pulled him into a tight hug. Solid. Warm. The kind that whispers: "I’m here. You’ll never have to wonder if you’re alone again."

Meanwhile, Sabo tapped at his phone with surgical precision. Benn straightened, his posture rigid now, eyes scanning the hospital’s security cameras, sensors, exits. The building was too clean. Too watchful.

Across the room, Ace still pretended not to care—but his gaze stayed locked on the door.
And Luffy?

Luffy didn’t fully grasp what he’d done—he’d just felt it was right. That man was a wolf in sheep’s clothing. And Beckman—even when silent—needed to know these things.

Even if it took nothing more than a blink.

The tension still clung to the waiting room walls like fine dust—the kind light exposes but no one bothers to wipe away. The detective was gone, yet his scent—cheap cologne and arrogance—lingered in the air like a stain.

Luffy curled into Shanks’ lap, his thin arms wrapped tight around the man’s waist, face buried in the curve of his coat as if it were the one place the world couldn’t reach him. Shanks didn’t speak. Just carded his fingers slowly through the boy’s hair, his touch rhythmic as the tide—patient, constant, inevitable.

"I don’t feel good," Luffy admitted minutes later, voice small. His head had begun to throb faintly.

Sabo sat a few feet ahead, legs crossed and chin propped on his hand. But his eyes—his eyes were everywhere at once. Scanning security cameras. Nurses. The name list on the reception display. Mapping escape routes even as he pretended to skim a dengue fever pamphlet.

His name flashed on the screen with an irritating electronic beep:

"AKAGAMI SABO — LAB WORK - Room 3"

Ace scoffed, slapping the dinosaur sticker onto his own arm with more force than necessary.
"Of course they're taking your blood first. Probably tastes like sugar syrup from all that pent-up stress."

Sabo raised the dengue pamphlet like a shield, but his eyes narrowed with the sharpened edge of his retort:
"If we're comparing, yours probably tastes like expired batteries. Sour and bitter."

A muffled giggle vibrated against Shanks' coat. The redhead smiled without looking down—his fingers were already busy untangling the knots Luffy had tied in his hoodie strings.

Beckman stood in one fluid motion, his leather portfolio snapping shut with crisp finality. As he passed Sabo, his hand hovered midair between them, palm upturned— an offer, not an order.

Sabo hesitated for just one breath. His hands smoothed down his shirt in a futile attempt to iron out the wrinkles of the past before accepting. Ace leaned forward, elbows digging into his thighs, but a single glance from Benn froze his protest in place:

Protection, not prohibition.

Shanks pulled Luffy tighter against his chest, feeling the boy's racing heartbeat echo against his ribs.

"It'll be alright, Captain," he murmured, burying the words in unruly hair. It was a promise—not a guess.

Sabo followed Benn down the sterile white hallway— too white , the kind of white that stung the eyes like winter sun on fresh snow. His sneakers sank slightly into the rubberized flooring, cushioning each step as if trying to muffle even his breathing. The doors they passed bore signs in fonts too generic to feel real: "LABORATORY" in institutional blue, "ULTRASOUND" with a faded soundwave icon, "ACCESS CONTROL" where red paint peeled at the edges. Each one looked less welcoming than the last, like pages from a book Sabo didn't want to read.

The office door clicked shut behind them—the sound lingering a second longer than it should have.

Inside, the air reeked of rubbing alcohol. The vaccination poster on the wall showed smiling children with colorful syringes—none of them with fists clenched like Sabo's, none with that thin line of sweat trickling down their neck beneath the hoodie. The room was too clean, too orderly, like those movie scenes where you know something terrible is coming but everything looks perfect right before.

Sabo stepped onto the linoleum square marked for patients, his footsteps measured to hide the racing pulse beneath. He could fake calm, but Benn knew that posture—shoulders a fraction too high, chin slightly tucked, eyes scanning the room not with curiosity but for exits. It was the same tension Beckman saw in informants about to betray their bosses, or in kids who'd learned that trust was a luxury they couldn't afford.

The nurse smiled—a practiced smile that reached her eyes but not her hands, which remained busy arranging needles and cotton swabs.

"You can sit right here, sweetheart," she said, gesturing to the chair with her pen poised over the clipboard. Her lab coat was immaculate, without a single wrinkle. Sabo wondered how many children had cried in that chair before him.

He moved through the room as if navigating a minefield—arms pressed close to his sides, each step calculated to avoid drawing attention. His sneakers made no sound on the waxed floor, but his eyes betrayed too much: they darted to the stainless steel sink (so easy to wash blood from), the reinforced-lock cabinet (what could they possibly be hiding in there?), the biohazard bin (where would they discard parts of him ?). Then he saw the needle. Sterile. Sealed in its transparent packaging. Even more terrifying in its clinical perfection.

The nurse's smile never reached her eyes. Her lab coat was too pristine, the gloves too freshly snapped on.

"Have a seat here, Sabo," she said, gesturing to the chair with that saccharine tone perfected for words like quick pinch and all done .

Sabo nodded with a motion so slight it barely existed. His approach to the chair mirrored a cat testing bathwater—one tentative foot, then the other, his body perpetually braced to retreat. When he finally sat, his spine stayed arched, refusing contact with the backrest. This wasn’t a place to get comfortable.

The hoodie .three sizes too large. swallowed his slender frame, its frayed sleeves swallowing his hands like shrouds. His fingers vanished into the fabric but couldn’t conceal the near-invisible tremor racing through his knuckles.

Benn didn’t need to move. His mere presence beside the chair shifted the room’s gravity—a monolith of silent certainty. His crossed arms weren’t a barrier but a fortress built solely for Sabo. As the boy stared at the needle, Benn stared at the boy.

And for now, that was more than enough.

The nurse picked up the clipboard with mechanical precision, the click of her pen echoing like a muffled gunshot in the sterile silence. Her gaze darted between the form and Sabo—assessing, cataloging, reducing him to data points.

"Full legal name, sweetheart?"

"Akagami Sabo."

The fabricated name rolled off his tongue with dangerous ease, polished by endless repetition. Sabo fixed his eyes on a nearly invisible smudge on the pale blue wall as he recited his manufactured identity like a hollow prayer.

"Date of birth?"

"March twentieth."

Lie number two. His ribs contracted faintly, as if his body itself rebelled against the deception. But his voice remained smooth as the glass vial waiting on the tray.

The pen scratched against the paper with a high-pitched squeak that made his teeth clench.

"Blood type?"

"A."

A truth, by chance. An ironic coincidence that almost made him smirk. At least his blood was still his own in this entire charade.

The nurse didn’t look up at him, too busy checking boxes with her neat, rounded handwriting.

"Any known allergies?"

"No."

He blinked, surprised he hadn’t lied this time. In his past life, he’d discovered. the hard way. that he was allergic to bee stings. But that child. the real one. was dead on paper now.

When she finally glanced up, Sabo saw the exact moment the nurse registered his posture—shoulders tense, hands hidden in his sleeves, feet that wouldn’t stay still.

"Have you had blood work done before?"

The question hung in the air like the scent of antiseptic. Sabo felt Benn shift almost imperceptibly behind him.

"I... don't remember. Maybe..."

His voice fractured mid-sentence, dwindling to little more than a whisper. It wasn't exactly a lie—how many needles had pierced his skin in dark places, without explanation or care? The memories blurred together like abandoned medical records.

The nurse paused. Her eyes scanned the form before writing, as if deciphering hidden meaning between the lines.

"It's alright," she said, her voice dripping honey over steel. sweet enough not to cut at first. "If you feel anything, just tell me. You don't have to be brave alone."

The invitation sounded almost like a trap. Sabo bit the inside of his cheek as she turned away, the scent of latex gloves flooding the air even before their signature snap . That sound—as familiar as it was threatening—made his stomach clench.

Benn didn’t give speeches. He simply closed the distance between them in one fluid motion, his body now casting a protective shadow over the chair. His shoulder aligned with Sabo’s—not touching, but there —a silent anchor against the tide of bad memories.

The nurse leaned in, her cheap floral perfume clashing with the medicinal sting of alcohol.
"Relax your shoulders," she murmured, her gloved fingers hovering above his arm like vultures circling carrion.

Sabo forced his shoulders down, but his fists clenched in his lap until his knuckles turned white. Every muscle was on high alert, primed to flee or fight—even though he knew he would do neither.

The tourniquet tightened like a serpent. The alcohol-soaked cotton burned for an instant before the cold took over. And then—

The needle.

It pierced without ceremony, without warning, without the lying "one, two, three" adults always seemed to offer. Sabo didn’t flinch. His eyes remained fixed on a spot on the wall where the peeling paint formed a shape that faintly resembled a pirate ship. He focused on it as the tube filled with vivid red—his life trickling away in silent drops.

"All done," the nurse announced, snapping off the tourniquet. "You’re braver than most grown-ups out there."

Sabo didn’t dignify that with a response. He just exhaled slowly, releasing air he hadn’t realized he was holding. His chest ached as if he’d run a marathon, not sat motionless for ninety seconds.

The nurse typed something on the computer, her nails producing an irritating click-clack against the keyboard.
“Now we’ll update your vaccination record. Did you bring it?”

His eyes blinked slowly, as if returning from some faraway place. The card. The physical proof that he existed in this new world of carefully constructed lies.

Benn slid the envelope from his blazer’s inner pocket with practiced precision. The vaccination card emerged pristine—too white, too new, with the name Akagami Sabo printed in official lettering that seemed to scream its falseness. The blank fields waited like tiny judgments.

The nurse tilted her head, eyes narrowing as she compared the document to her system.

“French system…” she murmured, her finger hovering over the keyboard. “Do you remember the hepatitis B vaccine? Three doses?”

Sabo’s fingers twitched slightly against his knees. A murky memory surfaced—high fever, sweat-drenched sheets, someone murmuring "it’s normal" as he shivered under rough blankets.

“Maybe…” His voice sounded distant, as if echoing from somewhere else. “There was a day I got really sick after a shot.”

The nurse entered something into the computer with a decisive click.

"That helps. We’ll check which ones need boosters." Her nimble hands smoothed a sticker onto the card, the adhesive making a satisfying peel-and-stick sound. a small act of bureaucratic complicity.

When she handed back the document, Sabo took it as one might handle a fragile artifact. His eyes traced every line, every stamp, every blank space that now belonged to him. The sticker gleamed under the fluorescent lights—an official seal proving this fiction carried weight in the real world.

"There." The nurse passed him the card with a faint jingle of colorful bracelets. "Now you're official."

Sabo accepted it like a map to uncharted territory. His fingers trembled slightly as they traced each line, each number—as if deciphering a code that might reveal who he truly was, or who he was supposed to be.

Benn crouched down with the telltale rustle of a man unaccustomed to lowering himself for anyone.

Their gazes met at eye level, unhurried.

"The memories aren't yours alone to carry," Benn murmured, low enough that the words existed solely between them. "You can share that weight now."

The vaccination card crumpled slightly in Sabo's grip.

"But if I forget..." His voice fractured mid-sentence, like a branch buckling under snow "...it's as if those parts of me never existed at all."

Benn didn't hesitate:

"I remember. Shanks remembers. Luffy shouts loud enough to wake the dead." His eyes darkened with rare dry amusement. "And Ace? He'll pretend not to care, but he'll be the first to draw steel if anyone dares question you."

A huff of laughter escaped Sabo—so fleeting it might've been mistaken for a poorly disguised sigh. But Benn noticed.

The nurse shattered the moment with the plastic rattle of lollipops being shaken.

"Official reward," she declared, waving a grape-purple and a fire-red one. "Unless the young gentleman prefers... strawberry?"

Her professional smile never reached her eyes as Sabo unhesitatingly took the grape-flavored one.

Sabo squeezed the grape lollipop until the plastic wrapper crackled in protest. His eyes—still shadowed by that fleeting vulnerability—locked onto Benn's in silent plea.

"Can we say... I was first?"

The question carried more weight than it seemed. This wasn't about vaccines—it was about being chosen. About leaving his mark on this new chapter.

Benn rose with the solemn grace of a ship weighing anchor.

“You'll be first in many things," he answered, letting the promise hang in the air like cannon smoke after victory.

Their footsteps echoed in an odd harmony as they exited—Beckman's heavy boots and Sabo's quiet sneakers falling into the same rhythm. The vaccination card, now slightly crumpled at the corner, was pressed against the boy's chest like a war medal.

Benn noticed the absence before they'd taken three steps down the hallway. His neck turned at a precise angle, eyes scanning every corner of the waiting room.

Ace occupied his chair like a stray cat perched on a fence—body leaning forward, elbows propped on his knees, his sneaker tapping an irritated rhythm against the chair leg. Tap. Tap. Tap. Each impact echoed louder than necessary.

"Luffy got called first," he announced without preamble, lifting his head just enough to show one rolled eye. "Shanks went with him, of course. "

As Sabo approached, Ace scrutinized his brother with the razor-sharp gaze of a predator scenting weakness. His lips curled into a half-smirk that promised nothing but trouble.

"Did you die?" he spat, voice laced with a venom only brothers would recognize as disguised affection.

Sabo allowed the corners of his mouth to tense for a fraction of a second. the emotional equivalent of a man raising a drawbridge. He extended the vaccination card like someone presenting credentials at a hostile border.

"Lived." The new sticker gleamed under the fluorescent lights, obnoxiously cheerful. "And got a lollipop."

Ace snorted—a sound that began as derision and ended dangerously close to a stifled laugh. His eyes rolled hard enough to hurt, as if the entire universe had conspired specifically to test his patience.

Benn didn't need to raise his voice. A single look cut across the room and pinned Ace to his chair more effectively than any command.

"Ace. You're up."

The electronic panel emitted a shrill beep , its red lights flashing like demonic eyes before displaying:

BENN ACE — LABORATORY COLLECTION - ROOM 2

The letters flickered with bureaucratic finality, too official to challenge. Ace released a sigh that started at his feet—a hurricane of hot air and resentment. He rose like a condemned man walking to the gallows, his shoulders casting a shadow that swallowed half the waiting room.

As he passed Sabo, his elbow connected with his brother's shoulder with surgical precision—not hard enough to hurt, but not soft enough to ignore. A coded telegram written in controlled violence.

"Good luck," Sabo murmured, rolling the lollipop between his teeth. Sugar laced his voice with poisoned sweetness. "They say the third needle hurts the most."

Ace responded with a universal gesture that needed no translation, his middle finger rising like a battle standard. Benn observed this brotherly ritual with a nasal exhale that might have been resignation—or perhaps the strangled beginnings of a laugh.

Across the room, Luffy dangled from the examination table like a drunken monkey, his legs swinging in chaotic rhythm. The disposable paper sheet beneath him crinkled in plastic protest with every movement. His heels drummed against the metal frame in an irregular clang-clang-clang — the sound of a broken clock counting down to the next disaster.

The nurse wound the tourniquet with ballerina precision, her fingers dancing along the blue elastic before cinching it with professional firmness. Luffy's arm looked too fragile under the constraint—skin nearly translucent, veins resisting exposure as if they knew what awaited them.

"Alright, sweetheart?" Her voice dripped with that particular saccharine quality found only in hospitals and traps. "Just a quick little poke, okay?"

Luffy scrunched his nose, his dark eyes locked on his forearm as if seeing something far beyond those four walls.

"I'm hungry..." The words oozed from his lips like thick syrup, each syllable requiring visible effort.

Shanks leaned forward, his knees cracking with the movement. The exaggerated face he made—tongue lolling, eyes rolling—would have drawn laughter any other time.

"Whole roast chicken after," he promised, his fingers drumming an imaginary military march on Luffy's knee. "With that golden crust that cracks when you cut into it, remember?"

But Luffy just swallowed hard, his eyelids fluttering like hummingbird wings. The needle pierced his skin without ceremony. No flinch. No trembling chin. Just that unnatural stillness that made the hairs on Shanks' arms stand on end.

The blood flowed sluggishly into the tube, darker than expected, as if it too were exhausted. The nurse bit the inside of her cheek but kept her professional mask—just a faint crease between her eyebrows betraying that something wasn't following the usual script.

And then Luffy spoke, his voice barely there:

"Shanks… everything's… spinning..."

It took Shanks half a second too long to react—the exact time his brain needed to recognize this wasn't drama, wasn't charm. It was real.

Luffy's eyes rolled back without warning, his body going limp like a ragdoll.

"Luffy!" Shanks lunged forward, catching him just before he toppled off the exam table.

The nurse let out a startled breath, her deft hands moving the armrest aside in one fluid motion. The instruments on the tray clinked softly as she pushed them away, her movements precise but devoid of panic.

Luffy hung in Shanks' arms like a limp puppet, his damp forehead plastering unruly strands of hair to pale skin. Shanks cradled the boy's weight carefully, one steady hand supporting his neck—not as if handling fragile glass, but like clutching something precious slipping through his fingers.

"He's completely limp..." The observation slipped out in a hushed tone, more to himself than to the nurse. Shanks swallowed hard, trying to ignore how Luffy's body seemed to have forgotten how to hold itself together.

The nurse was already wrapping the blood pressure cuff around Luffy's other arm, her fingers squeezing the bulb in a steady rhythm. The fabric inflated with a soft hiss, the digital display blinking as it calculated. The numbers that appeared made her lips press into a thin line.

"Eighty-four over fifty," she announced, more to the chart than to Shanks. Her movement was precise as she grabbed the lancet device, not hesitating before the quick prick to Luffy's finger.

The first drop of blood was hesitant, barely forming at the tip. A slight extra pressure coaxed out another—small, but enough. The monitor delivered its verdict in glaring red digits:

64 mg/dL

"Hypoglycemia," she said, calmly pressing the emergency call button on the panel. "We'll need the doctor. Low blood pressure and glucose levels far below expected."

Her fingers were already working to prepare an IV line as she spoke, her trained movements leaving no room for error—yet devoid of the urgency that might have shattered what little composure Shanks had left.

The blue ceiling lights began pulsing slowly, casting intermittent shadows across the walls. The sound of hurried footsteps echoed down the hallway—still distant, but approaching with controlled urgency.

Shanks held Luffy firmly against his chest, his chin resting atop the boy's disheveled hair. His hand traced slow circles on Luffy's back—an automatic, comforting gesture, even knowing it might make no difference.

"He only complained about being hungry..." Shanks' voice came out hoarse, laced with pained bewilderment. His fingers tightened slightly around the boy's shoulder, as if to reassure himself Luffy was still there.

The nurse swiftly tore open a glucose packet with practiced movements. The air in the room seemed to have thickened, each breath more labored than the last.

Cradled in Shanks' arms, Luffy's lips moved soundlessly. His eyelashes fluttered like hummingbird wings, struggling to open.

"Hey, Anchor..." Shanks murmured softly, his warm hands framing Luffy's pale face. "We've still got that chicken to devour, remember? The one with the crispy skin you love..."

The corners of Luffy's mouth twitched almost imperceptibly. Not quite a smile, but a response nonetheless. Life returning to those features.

Shanks drew a deep breath, his facial muscles still tense. The worry lines etching his face no longer stemmed from the fainting spell itself, but from the aftershock still reverberating through his chest—that terrifying moment when his brightest star had seemed to simply blink out of existence.

The sliding door opened smoothly, revealing the impeccable figure of Dr. Kinokozawa. His measured footsteps echoed through the room, the non-slip soles of his shoes emitting soft creaks against the floor. The physician balanced a modern tablet and traditional clipboard with natural ease, his fingers moving between the two technologies with practiced familiarity.

"64 mg/dL capillary blood glucose, blood pressure below expected range," he stated, adjusting his glasses with a habitual motion that spoke of decades of repetition. His clinical gaze quickly assessed Shanks, catching the tension in the man's shoulders before settling on Luffy. "When was his last full meal?"

Shanks rubbed the back of his neck, fingers tangling in his own red hair.

"Just had milk this morning..." Luffy's voice escaped weakly before Shanks could answer, surprising everyone by demonstrating he was more conscious than he appeared.

The doctor offered the boy a brief smile before shifting his professional gaze back to Shanks.

"Fasting protocols need to be adjusted for children," he explained while recording the data, his voice striking a perfect balance between medical rigor and understanding. "Especially for patients with accelerated metabolisms like his."

His pen glided smoothly across the paper before he fixed Shanks with a more attentive look:

"We'll stabilize him now and then discuss whether further tests are needed. Sometimes young bodies operate differently than textbooks describe."

The doctor leaned forward, his knees bending with a soft pop until he was at perfect eye level with Luffy. His movement was measured—not so close as to startle, nor so distant as to seem detached.

"Luffy," he called, keeping his tone gentle yet clear, "these fainting spells... do they always happen when you go too long without eating?"

Luffy blinked slowly, as if adjusting his focus. His eyes, still slightly glassy, brightened when they registered the doctor's attentive face. A mischievous expression lit up his pale features:

"Only when Ace hides my food!" His voice gained strength as he accused his absent brother, his arms making weak but animated gestures.

Shanks couldn't suppress a sigh that turned into laughter—a rough sound carrying months of unspoken worries.

"The kid exaggerates, doctor," Shanks interjected, his fingers unconsciously drumming on the edge of the exam table. "But it's true he gets... different when he goes too long without eating. Irritable, slower. We always thought it was just hunger talking louder."

Dr. Kinokozawa nodded slowly, his analytical eyes studying Luffy like a navigator reading stars—seeking patterns in what appeared chaotic.

"It could be as simple as a fast metabolism," he conceded, twirling his pen between fingers with professional ease. "Or perhaps something warranting closer attention, like reactive hypoglycemia." His eyes met Shanks', conveying reassurance without downplaying the situation. "What matters is we now know what to watch for. And we have ways to help."

The doctor gave an almost imperceptible nod, and the nurse immediately approached with the medication cart, her deft hands preparing the IV drip as he spoke:

"We'll need a detailed glycemic curve—fasting basal insulin and postprandial response." His fingers tapped lightly on the tablet as he considered. "In the meantime, maintain the dextrose drip and offer small sips of sweetened fluids."

When he turned to Luffy, his demeanor transformed completely—shoulders relaxed, voice warming with paternal kindness:

"How about we start with some orange juice, champ?"

Luffy rubbed his sleepy eyes before answering, but his face soon brightened:

"The kind with little fruit pieces?"

The nurse couldn't suppress a genuine laugh as she opened the compact refrigerator:

"Today we only have the smooth kind, little adventurer." She shook the juice box, making the liquid slosh invitingly inside. "But it's plenty sweet, I promise!"

When Luffy received the juice, he cradled it like treasure, his fingers still trembling slightly as they guided the straw to his mouth. Each sip seemed to bring more color back to his cheeks.

Shanks finally surrendered to exhaustion, collapsing into the chair beside them. His elbow rested on his knee, hand partially covering his face—though not enough to hide the watchful gaze still tracking Luffy's every movement.

Dr. Kinokozawa closed the medical chart with a definitive snap:

"We'll monitor him closely. If needed, we'll adjust his diet and possibly schedule a specialist consultation." His eyes met Shanks', projecting professional reassurance. "It's manageable. Just requires attention, like any good ship needs maintenance."

Shanks responded with a slow nod, his body still tense but beginning to accept relief. When his gaze found Luffy's—now brighter, more present—he saw in them a reflection of his own worry gradually fading away.

And then, like the sun breaking through after a storm, a genuine smile emerged between them—still fragile, but full of promise.

Ace punched the armrests of his chair, making the leather creak in protest.

"What kind of joke is this?" His voice cut through the air like a saber, too sharp for the confined space of the exam room. "Sabo got checked and that was it. Why do I have to go through this interrogation?"

His entire body was a manifesto of resistance—ribs puffed out like sails against the wind, legs swinging with the rhythm of frustrated escape. The ridiculous sticker on his arm (that punk dinosaur with its neon lightning bolts) seemed to mock the situation, its adhesive irritating skin already sensitized by tests.

Benn didn't even need to look. His breathing was as controlled as a rifle's recoil—exhaling through his mouth in a measured stream that clearly said 'I'm counting to ten... and you won't like what happens at eleven.'

Benn's response came like a coup de grâce, precise and merciless:

"Sabo didn't pass out at lunch." A calculated pause. "Or shake like a newborn pup in the cold for five minutes afterward."

Ace swallowed hard. His chin jutted forward in a defiant gesture that couldn't disguise how his right hand clamped around his left wrist—pressing exactly where his racing pulse jumped against his fingers. The bitter aftertaste of that memory flooded back: the metallic tang of blood when he'd bitten his tongue falling, the sour stench of spilled food, and worst—Shanks' ever-playful eyes wide with genuine terror.

The ensuing silence had texture—thick as air before a storm. Even the fluorescent hum seemed to intensify, vibrating in unison with his exposed nerves. On the shelf, a stuffed bear in a doctor's coat stared at Ace with shiny button eyes, its artificial cuteness an affront to the moment's rawness.

His eyes locked onto the doorknob, anticipating every click of its mechanism. When that door opened, it would deliver a verdict he wasn't ready to hear—yet one he'd secretly suspected for a long time.

Ace dug his nails into the armchair's upholstery, the leather releasing a muffled creak.
"Complete waste of time," he grumbled to the empty space before him, avoiding Benn's reflection in the window glass.

The man merely adjusted his suit sleeve with surgical precision, the fabric folds yielding exactly as intended. When he crossed his legs, the immaculate hem revealed a fleeting metallic glint—the sole of his Oxford slicing through the air like the blade Ace knew was always there, even when unseen.

Footsteps echoed down the hallway like measured sentences. The doorknob turned with the decisive click of a revolver being cocked.

Ace transformed into a drawn bow—vertebra by vertebra straightening, the tendons in his hands standing taut beneath skin as he gripped the seat. An ancestral drumbeat pounded in his ears: run, fight, vanish.

Benn didn't even blink.

"Just hear what he has to say," he murmured, his voice so quiet it nearly dissolved into the fluorescent hum. "Then you can do whatever you want."

The door revealed Dr. Murayama framed in manufactured calm. His thin-framed glasses perched on his nose like justice's scales, reflecting light at calculated angles. The immaculate white lab coat draped over his form like a flag of surrender Ace refused to raise.

"Good morning," The voice was firm yet gentle. "Ace, correct?"

Ace nodded with a curt, wary motion. present but guarded.

The doctor pulled up a swivel chair and sat across the desk. No computer in sight. Just a clipboard, pen, and notepad adorned with subtle cartoon characters—likely left there to soothe younger patients.

He leaned forward, interlaced fingers resting atop the cartoonish notepad. The childish doodles on the pages clashed grotesquely with the gravity of the moment.

"I've reviewed your file noting frequent fainting spells, Ace," he said, making the name sound like an anchor in the sea of the boy's resistance.
"Let's piece this together. Before fainting... what did your senses register?"

Ace pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth. The scent of that lunch came rushing back with painful clarity—garlic sizzling golden in the pan, lemon freshly squeezed by Shanks, steaming rice. Flavors that had turned into traps.

"Everything was..." His voice came out rough, and he had to swallow hard "...normal. Until it wasn't. It's not like sleeping. I just feel tired, and then everything goes dark."

His fingers traced invisible patterns on the armrest, replicating the spiral the world had made before fading to black.

The doctor wrote calmly, giving each word time to settle. When he looked up, there was an understanding in his eyes that made Ace shrink back.

"And when you wake up?" he asked, his pen gliding to the next blank line.

Ace closed his eyes for a beat too long. The memories returned in disjointed flashes:

"Voices. So many voices." His chest tightened. "And... this hollowness. Like they'd drained the marrow from my bones."

Benn, until then a statue at his side, shifted almost imperceptibly. His right index finger extended a millimeter— the physical equivalent of a stifled sigh.

Dr. Murayama nodded, his pen coming to a momentary rest.

"What you're describing..." he chose his words with deliberate care "...isn't laziness, nor weakness. Your body was speaking a language you're still learning to understand."

The window cast shimmering light patterns across the floor, tracing escape routes Ace knew to be illusory. His knees began bouncing again, keeping time with the racing heartbeat no one else seemed to hear.

The doctor tilted his head, light glinting off his glasses as he studied Ace. The office air hung heavy with the subtle sting of hand sanitizer and the oak desk's woody aroma.

"These involuntary blackouts..." he articulated each word carefully, like untangling a delicate thread "do they occur even after a full night's sleep?"

The window frame creaked softly in the outside breeze as Ace's gaze flickered toward Benn. Just for an instant—a silent plea for backup—before he swallowed hard and turned back to face the doctor.

"It's like..." His fingers drummed against his knee. "...when everything gets too quiet, my eyelids turn to lead. I only realize I've been out when someone jabs me awake." His chin lifted in defiance. "But it's not laziness."

Dr. Murayama leaned back slightly from the desk, creating breathing room between them. His hands spread in a broad, neutral gesture.

"Laziness would be choosing not to act. What you're describing is your body demanding what it requires." He opened the drawer with a smooth motion, withdrawing forms that glided across the polished surface until they settled before Ace. "I want to understand these demands better. An EEG to map your brainwaves, a polysomnography to observe your sleep patterns..."

The pen's tip tapped each listed test, small tocks marking the rhythm of his explanation.

"...and possibly a daytime sleep latency test to measure how quickly you doze off. All painless just sensors attached like stickers."

A cloud's shadow passed over the window, momentarily darkening Ace's face as he furrowed his brow:

"So...does this mean I'm defective?" The question came out harsher than intended, his nails pressing faint indentations into the forms.

Dr. Murayama relaxed his shoulders, allowing a smile that softened the worry lines on his face.

"Your brain isn't broken," he soothed, fingers tracing circles in the air. "It simply operates at a different rhythm. Could be narcolepsy, yes." Before Ace could tense up, he continued: "But it might also be your body responding to rapid growth or stress you don't even realize you're carrying."

Ace leaned forward, his elbows meeting his knees with a dull thud.

"And if it is?" he challenged, yet a spark of hope flickered beneath the roughness.

The doctor clasped his hands together on the desk, forming a bridge between them.

"If it is, you gain a superpower: knowing your limits." His eyes shone with genuine understanding. "That doesn't erase a single ounce of your strength. It just teaches you where the steps are so you won't stumble."

The silence that followed was comfortable. Ace studied the carpet pattern, then nodded with a nearly imperceptible motion—but it was enough.

Dr. Murayama filled out the orders in perfect clinical script, handing them to Benn with a professional touch on the shoulder.

"We'll take it step by step. You guide me through what you feel, and I'll explain the path. Deal?"

"Yeah." Ace swallowed the usual reluctance that would typically accompany his agreement.

The air in the office seemed renewed, carrying away some of the built-up tension. Benn tucked away the papers with a practiced motion, his gaze meeting Ace's. As they left the room and began walking down the hallway side by side, Ace's hands involuntarily clutched at Beckman's sleeve, his fingers lightly crumpling the fabric between them.

"Less painful than taking a bullet, wouldn't you say?"

Ace glanced at the ridiculous band-aid they'd placed on his arm after the blood draw. His lips twitched upward before he could stop them.

"Could've at least put a dragon on it. Or a flaming skull."

Beckman let out a sound halfway between a sigh and a muffled laugh—something rare enough to make Ace raise his eyebrows, though he chose not to comment.

As they turned down the hallway, Sabo was still in the waiting room, but now with a handful of medical pamphlets scattered across his lap. Post-Surgical Care, Signs of Dehydration. It was his way of distracting himself, an attempt to make time move faster.

Shanks still hadn't returned.

"You think something happened to them?" Sabo asked, his fingers crimping the paper. His voice was steady, but Beckman noticed how his eyes kept cutting to the wall clock every ten seconds exactly.

"I don't know." Beckman didn't lie. Ace and Sabo both seemed unsettled by Luffy's prolonged absence. "But we'll find out."

At the reception desk, as they waited in a short line, Ace's foot tapped against the floor at an alarming rate, while Sabo kept glancing around as if expecting their youngest brother to materialize at any moment. Beckman remained silent—he'd never quite mastered handling nervous teenagers.

"We need information about Akagami Luffy."

The woman looked over the trio: the impeccably suited man with sniper's eyes, the teenager who looked ready to burn the place down, and the blond boy whose expression clearly said "try lying, I'll laugh at your funeral." She swallowed hard, typing into the computer with trembling fingers.

"Room 4. Third hallway, take the stairs, pediatric wing."

Ace didn't wait. He was already moving before she finished speaking, his footsteps echoing like gunshots down the empty corridor. Sabo and Beckman exchanged a glance.

And then they followed.

The harsh white light of the room no longer bothered him as much—perhaps because Luffy lay half-drowsy with his arm outstretched, the IV drip slowly feeding into his veins. The nurse passed by periodically with a new lancet device, checking his blood sugar from the same sore little finger now dotted with tiny red marks.

He didn't even complain anymore. Just muttered softly when the alcohol-soaked cotton came afterward.

Shanks remained by the bedside, perched on an uncomfortable folding chair, his body hunched forward with elbows on knees. He watched Luffy in silence. A subtle weariness lived in his eyes—not from lack of sleep, but from sustained tension. The kind of vigilance only learned when caring for someone fragile.

Luffy tried to maintain his usual cheer, but his voice came out weaker than normal. Even the lollipop he'd earned earlier lay forgotten by the bed.

The door opened with a soft click, and Dr. Kinokozawa appeared with his lab coat unbuttoned and an expression too calm to be disinterested.

"Mr. Akagami," he said in that diplomatic tone of someone measuring every word, "could you come with me for a moment?"

Shanks rose slowly, his hand automatically smoothing through his own tousled hair as he stood. The chair creaked with the movement.

Luffy lifted his face slightly—his cheeks now held more color, but his eyes remained somewhat glassy.

"Will it take long?" he asked, his voice drowsy, almost childlike.

Shanks stepped closer and carefully rested his hand atop Luffy's head, his fingers sinking gently into the dark, unruly strands.

"Just a minute. I'll be right back," he said, his deceptively soft tone concealing far more than it revealed.

Luffy nodded before turning his face into the pillow, as if to say it was fine—but also that he didn't want to watch the door close.

Shanks followed the doctor out, his steps measured but his shoulders carrying all the weight his voice hadn't betrayed. The silence left behind was punctuated only by the steady beep of monitors—and the sharp chirp of another blood droplet being measured.

Shanks heard the door click shut behind them before they moved further down the hall—clearly meant to ensure Luffy wouldn't overhear. Dr. Kinokozawa turned to face him, clipboard in hand, his expression now markedly more guarded than during the examination.

"I've just received the lab results," he began, his voice steady. "The blood tests for your... children."

Shanks felt his body stiffen. He remained standing, his gaze locked onto the doctor.

"And...?" he asked, struggling to keep his tone neutral.

"I found the data somewhat concerning," the doctor replied, turning the clipboard toward himself to review the notes. "All three children. Ace, Sabo, and Luffy. show lab results consistent with mild to moderate malnutrition. Iron levels below ideal. Declining protein markers. Severely low vitamin D and B12. These findings don't happen by accident."

Shanks clenched his jaw.

"Is there something wrong?" he asked, more pointedly.

The doctor closed the clipboard with a drawn-out sigh.

"That's what you need to tell me," he said, meeting Shanks' gaze directly. "Luffy also bears old marks across his body. Poorly healed scars, scratches in unusual places... For a child his age, these raise red flags."

Shanks felt his stomach twist. Not from guilt—but from recognizing exactly what was being implied.

"What are you suggesting, Doctor?" His voice came out low, strained.

Kinokozawa didn't hesitate.

"I'm not suggesting anything. I'm doing what I must. This is part of my duty as a physician. When I see signs like these, I have both a legal and ethical obligation to inquire. I don't know your story. I don't know the full history of these children. But I need to ask: Are they safe with you?"

A thick silence followed—the kind that couldn't be filled with quick justifications. Shanks dragged a hand down his face, exhausted. When he spoke again, his voice was more measured.

"I understand what you're doing. And... yes, they're safe. But the truth is... they didn't come from safety. None of them did. We've been... gathering the pieces and trying to build something new. Something stable."

Dr. Kinokozawa studied him. Still attentive. But something in his posture began to soften.

"Were they neglected before? Or subjected to violence?"

Shanks hesitated. Then nodded slightly.

"I can't share many details. But I can give you my word: whatever happened to them before... won't happen again. Not while they're with me."

The doctor leaned back in his chair. Drew a deep breath.

"I understand. And I appreciate your cooperation."

Another brief silence. The tension hadn't fully dissipated yet.

"I'm not here to attack you, Mr. Akagami. I'm here to protect those boys. And... if you're doing that too, then we're on the same side."

Shanks exhaled slowly.

"I need to speak with Luffy alone. Please wait here for now." He paused, his sigh carrying what almost sounded like regret. "It's standard procedure."

"Of course," Shanks agreed. There was nothing he could do now but wait.

Shanks leaned against the corridor wall, his shoulders slumped as if bearing an invisible weight. His usual carefree smile had vanished, replaced by an empty expression—hands buried in his coat pockets, eyes fixed on the floor.

He heard footsteps approaching. But he didn't look up, his distant gaze wandering through old memories.

Ace was the first to notice. He stopped abruptly, nearly making Sabo bump into him. He sensed something was wrong—and realized Luffy wasn’t with him.

"Shanks. Where’s Luffy?" His voice came out rough, but there was a crack of worry.

Shanks still didn’t raise his eyes. "He’s in there." He finally met Ace’s gaze before continuing, "He needed some additional tests. Possible hypoglycemia diagnosis. doesn’t seem serious… but—"

Silence. He was searching for the right words, his eyes flickering to Beckman for a few seconds, seeking direction.

"But?" Sabo pressed, his brow furrowing. Something wasn’t right.

Shanks was never this still. Never. Even in the worst situations, he'd crack some stupid joke or wink like a drunken pirate.

"What happened?" Sabo asked, his fingers tightening around the straps of his backpack.

Shanks finally looked at them. His eyes—usually so full of light—had gone dull, as if someone had extinguished the sun inside him.

"The doctor asked to speak with Luffy alone." He didn't beat around the bush, didn't lie or try to soften the blow. "They think we're hurting you." Shanks' voice was hoarse, like he'd swallowed broken glass.

Ace felt something hot and bitter rise in his throat. Anger.

"You're kidding, right?" He took a step forward, fists clenched. "When we were actually getting beaten and starving, nobody gave a damn! Now that we've got food and a roof, they suddenly care?"

Benn, who had remained silent until now, placed a firm hand on Ace's shoulder—not to restrain him, but to remind him: This isn't against us. It's against the system that failed you.

Sabo bit his lip. His mind raced too fast: What if they call child services? What if they separate us? What if—

"And Luffy?" Sabo asked, his voice softer than he'd expected. "He must be scared."

Shanks closed his eyes for a second. When he opened them, there was something dangerous in his gaze—beyond anger, beneath the sorrow. There was determination.

"No one is taking you away." He said it quietly, but with steel. "Not Luffy. Not you. Not Ace. No one. Rule number four." He recited it like a vow, like an unbreakable law.

The examination room door finally opened, the doctor emerging with measured steps. Sabo and Ace didn't waste a second before slipping inside, searching for their youngest brother.

"I'd like to speak with you both," Dr. Kinokozawa said, approaching Shanks and Benn. His voice carried something indecipherable that made Shanks tense. Beckman raised an eyebrow, silently questioning what new development awaited them.

"Yes," Benn replied in that curt, no-nonsense tone of his.

"First, I apologize if I caused any distress. I hope you understand that certain measures are simply hospital protocol." He adjusted his tie—a nervous tic. "Luffy's a good boy. And from what I've seen, he's in capable hands with you."

Shanks lowered his gaze. A relieved sigh escaped him, giving way to a weary smile—it had been an exhaustingly long day. Beckman noted how tension still clung to his shoulders.

"And the diagnosis?" Benn cut straight to the point, unwilling to prolong this conversation any longer than necessary.

"He experienced a hypoglycemic episode," the doctor reported, consulting his clipboard. "Lab tests revealed blood glucose levels below normal range. At rest, his sugar levels dropped to what we consider critical values, which would explain the disorientation and loss of consciousness he displayed."

Beckman furrowed his brow. "Is this serious?"

"Not necessarily," Kinokozawa replied calmly. "This appears to be functional hypoglycemia, also called reactive hypoglycemia. Essentially, his body overproduces insulin after consuming certain foods—particularly those rich in simple sugars or with a high glycemic index. This triggers an abrupt blood sugar crash approximately two to four hours after meals."

The doctor sorted through several pages before continuing: "There's no evidence of diabetes or more serious hormonal imbalances. However, it's crucial he maintains a balanced diet with regular meal intervals, avoiding prolonged fasting periods."

He handed the paperwork to Shanks—a copy of the medical record, prescriptions, and a referral for specialized follow-up. "I recommend consulting a nutritionist. A tailored meal plan will help prevent further episodes. In some cases, we also suggest monitoring by an endocrinologist, purely as a precaution."

Shanks skimmed the first lines of the report. Beside him, Beckman already seemed to be mapping out their next steps.

"Here's my card if you need anything." He held out the card, which Beckman took without breaking eye contact. "He should be ready for discharge within the hour."

"Understood. Thank you for your assistance—have a good day." The doctor gave a slight bow before Beckham shaking Shanks' hand and guiding him back to the room where Sabo and Ace had practically piled onto Luffy, bombarding him with questions.

"How romantic of you, darling," Shanks remarked, his voice deliberately soft as he maintained a sarcastic tone while staring at their intertwined hands—a desperate attempt to pretend everything was fine.

Beckman lifted his gaze to meet Shanks', his expression steady but layered with poorly concealed concern.

"You're still not okay. You should rest for a while."

Shanks held his stare for a few seconds before letting out a laugh. this time genuine, quiet. The tension in his shoulders eased slightly.

"Seriously romantic," he repeated, now with a playful smirk tugging at his lips.

From across the room, a familiar voice sliced through the moment:

"Are you two gonna kiss now?" Ace blurted out with a mischievous grin, squeezing Luffy's hand as he leaned forward slightly.

Sabo made an exaggerated grimace, wrinkling his nose. "Ugh, disgusting..." he muttered, but couldn't even finish before both boys burst into scandalous laughter, thoroughly pleased with the chaos they'd just sown.

Shanks watched the scene with a lopsided smile tugging at his lips. Beckman merely raised an eyebrow, stoic—though the faintest twitch at the corner of his mouth betrayed his amusement.

"Shanks! When are we eating meat?" Luffy yelled, still splayed across the bed but with eyes shining bright.

Chapter Text

The car seat was too soft. Shanks sank his fingers into the synthetic leather, counting the stitches like a man anchoring himself.

"Can we all agree Luffy is Shanks’ favorite son?" Sabo asked, glancing at Shanks, who lounged in the passenger seat as Beckman drove. The car was already nearing the restaurant—supposedly the place with the best meat in the city.

The sharp scent of car cleaner tangled with the lingering hospital antiseptic clinging to their clothes. Luffy was sprawled with his head on Ace’s shoulder, his breathing steady now, though the shadows under his eyes remained stark.

"I’m the favorite?" Luffy mumbled, lifting his head slightly to peer at them all.

"I don’t have a favorite," Shanks replied, genuine indignation roughening his voice more than he’d intended. Favorites mean hierarchy, and hierarchies are just synonyms for suffering , he thought, his own family flashing through his mind.

The restaurant emerged between towering buildings, its marble columns catching the sunset like a gilded invitation. His stomach clenched.

"Really? Because I’m pretty sure Luffy mentioned wanting to eat at a place like this before," Ace shot back, crossing his arms.

"Pure coincidence," Shanks said, twisting to glare at the three of them crammed in the backseat. Ace arched a brow, defiant.

"Hmm. Delicious coincidence, then."

Beckman adjusted the rearview mirror with a precise flick—just enough for the boys to catch their own reflections pinned under that icy stare. "Stop needling Shanks." A calculated pause. "I’m the one who picked the restaurant."

The boys kept arguing, but their words dissolved into a distant hum. The billboard now filled the windshield—too gold, too large, like an altar for people who’d never needed to ask twice. The car glided to a stop in front of the restaurant, its tinted windows mirroring the imposing facade of dark wood and gilded trim.

Beckman killed the engine in one smooth motion and handed the keys to the waiting valet, the metallic jingle making Shanks blink fast, like a man snapping back to reality. His gaze swept the surroundings a fraction longer than necessary—old habits died hard.

"Reservation for Benn Beckman," Beckman said, his voice as polished as the reception’s marble.

The blonde woman in a navy vest scanned her list with a professional smile—one that flickered into recognition the moment her eyes landed on him. "Ah, yes! Right this way, please."

Luffy was already squirming behind them like an overexcited puppy, nose twitching at the air. "Meat smell! Good smell!" His eyes shone with lighthouse intensity, and Sabo had to grip his hood to keep him from bolting before they even reached the table.

"Control, Captain," Shanks laughed, stretching his arms overhead. The motion was cut short by an exaggerated yawn that made Ace roll his eyes.

"You look like a satisfied cat," Beckman observed dryly, adjusting his cuff.

"And you look like a stuffy butler, darling. Relax—we’re out of the hospital now." Shanks slung an arm around Beckman’s shoulders, fingertips still faintly trembling. Beckman just sighed—and didn’t pull away.

The second floor stood empty exactly as Beckman had planned. The fading afternoon light filtered through heavy velvet curtains, bathing everything in amber and creating an intimate atmosphere that clashed with the restaurant's lively buzz below. The widely spaced tables resembled isolated islands in a sea of silence.

Luffy climbed onto the chair at the round table's center like a pirate boarding a ship's deck. His knees knocked against the solid wood surface, making the silverware clink in protest.

"Did you rent out the entire floor?" Sabo asked, running fingers over the glossy leather menu. His sharp gaze swept the room, analyzing every detail - wine bottles lined up like soldiers, crystal glasses gleaming excessively. Beckman recognized that look: the same one Sabo used when planning heists.

"Business," Beckman answered, sitting with the posture of a man who'd never leaned back in a chair. His jacket's fabric barely whispered. "Easier to keep... situations controlled."

Ace hooked a chair with his foot, making it screech against the oak flooring.

"Translation: you don't trust us to behave in public."

Shanks laughed, already holding a water glass—how he'd gotten it so fast remained a mystery worthy of his talents. The ice cubes clinked as he raised it like a champagne flute.

"Beckman's just being cautious, brat. After the sushi bar incident..."

It was then that Beckman noticed the shift: Shanks’ posture, suddenly too upright; the fingers holding the glass with an elegance that felt almost foreign; the aura that now belonged more to an aristocratic parlor than the alleyways where they used to hide. It was as if, in that setting, he’d become someone else—or perhaps remembered someone he used to be.

“IT WASN’T MY FAULT!” Luffy yelled, flailing his arms like an octopus mid-attack. A passing waiter bumped the table, nearly toppling a salt shaker. “The fish was still moving! I was just helping!”

Shanks smiled, and for a brief moment, Beckman saw memory flicker behind his eyes: Luffy plunging his hands into the sushi bar’s aquarium to “rescue” a live snapper, tossing it into the ornamental fountain like buried treasure. Water splashing across all the patrons, and Shanks laughing so hard he cried while footing a tripled bill for damages.

“And how exactly were you helping?” Ace asked, prodding, his grin barely hidden behind the menu.

Beckman closed his eyes for a long second, as if appealing to the heavens for patience, while Sabo hid a chuckle behind his own menu.

The waiter—a middle-aged man with impressively thick eyebrows—approached, his expression carefully neutral.

“Good afternoon, gentlemen. Would you like to start with some appetizers?”

Shanks didn’t hesitate. “Yes. All of them.”

The waiter blinked. “A-all of them, sir?”

“Everything on the menu. Twice.” Shanks smiled—the kind of smile that made people wonder if he was joking and decide it wasn’t worth the risk to ask. “We’re celebrating.”

“Celebrating what?” Ace muttered to Sabo.

“Surviving the hospital, I think,” Sabo murmured back, watching as Luffy leaned across the table, trying to read the menu upside down.

Shanks rested his chin on his interlaced fingers, elbows planted firmly on the pristine white tablecloth. His smile turned razor-sharp as he looked up at the waiter:
“And a bottle of your finest red. Something that makes us forget hospitals ever existed.”

Without lifting his gaze from the menu, Beckman reached out and rotated Luffy’s menu right-side up with a single, practiced motion. His voice sliced through the air like a sheathed dagger:

“Cancel the wine. Fresh juice. For everyone.”

His gaze slid first to Luffy, who was licking his lips at the photo of a bleeding steak, then to Ace, who was pretending not to be impressed by the prices, and finally to Sabo, already calculating the caloric value of each dish. At last, his eyes landed on Shanks—who rolled his eyes with exaggerated exasperation.

“Killjoy.”

Beckman leaned forward, fingertips resting on the table. The chandelier’s light caught on his glasses as he spoke—low enough for only Shanks to hear:
“You took methylphenidate today. Don’t even think about mixing it with alcohol.”

It was less a request and more a reminder—that particular tone that said I counted your pills this morning.

Shanks opened his mouth to protest, but a crash cut him off—Luffy, of course, had fallen off his chair trying to reach the breadbasket at the center of the table. With a theatrical sigh, Shanks bent down, grabbed him by the collar of his coat, and hoisted him back into the seat with a motion as automatic as it was affectionate.

“You’re going to break the table before the food even arrives,” he muttered, smoothing the boy’s messy hair with the flat of his palm.

Luffy laughed, still halfway upside down, and Shanks laughed with him—that open, unguarded laugh that made the world, for a moment, feel simple again. Ace and Sabo exchanged a quick glance—as if, in that moment, they weren’t seeing the red-haired fool who’d agreed to play the role of responsible adult, or the man they called “dad” in public, but their old partner-in-crime.

It was in that lull of laughter that Sabo leaned back in his chair, waiting for the waiter to finish setting down the starters before speaking. His eyes narrowed, carrying that sharp analytical glint that always surfaced when he smelled something beyond the obvious.

“How rich are you, exactly, to book out an entire floor of a restaurant?” he asked, those blue eyes scanning Beckman with the precision of a lie detector.

Beckman didn’t flinch as he folded his napkin across his lap. “Rich enough for this to be a tax nuisance, not an expense.”

Shanks nearly spat out his water. Then he added,
“Translation: ‘rich enough to buy this place ten times over, but prefers not to catch the tax office’s attention.’”
He nudged Sabo under the table with his foot.
“Wrong question, kid. The real one is: how many of these places does he own?”

Luffy chewed at the air, imagining. “As many as the hamburgers I can eat in a day?”

“More,” Beckman replied flatly, but the corner of his mouth twitched. “Though we don’t usually measure wealth in units of restaurants.”

Ace snorted, tossing a piece of bread onto the table. “Okay, but why rent out the whole floor? It’s not like we bite.” A beat. “Well, Luffy bites—but only if the food tries to run.”

That’s when the waiter returned with a pitcher of juice, circling the table to fill their glasses. Beckman waited until he’d walked away before answering, lowering his voice:

“Three reasons.” He counted them off on his fingers. “First: keeps ‘casually curious’ dirty cops from showing up at the next table. Second” another finger “no one sees if Luffy decides to eat the plate with the food.” He shot a look at the boy, who already had half a meatball stuffed into his mouth. “Third” he raised his middle finger “if we need to discuss... family business, there are no witnesses.”

Sabo nibbled on an olive, thoughtful. “Fair enough. Still feels excessive.” His left eye twitched—the one Beckman had come to recognize as his investigative mode switching on. “So... how many zeroes are in your bank account?”

Shanks burst out laughing as Beckman rubbed the bridge of his nose. “He’s not gonna tell you, Sabo. Men like Beckman measure wealth in more... practical terms.” His eyes glinted with mischief. “So tell me, Beckman—how many politicians are in your pocket?”

“Four,” Beckman replied without blinking, then took a sip of water. “This week.”

The entire table went still. Even Luffy froze mid-bite, cheeks stuffed. “You’re joking,” Ace said, leaning forward.

Beckman simply raised an eyebrow—answer enough.

The waiter arrived with the main course, and the sight of roasted ribs made Luffy yell like he'd just found treasure. The talk of money vanished with the first bite—but Sabo kept watching Beckman with new curiosity, like a puzzle he was itching to take apart.

Shanks, meanwhile, raised his glass in a silent toast toward Beckman, his eyes clearly saying: You just got a lot more interesting to these brats.

Beckman responded with the barest lift of his glass—and maybe, just maybe, the hint of a smile.

“Well, since Luffy’s clearly Shanks’ favorite, that leaves Ace and me to fight over Beckman’s inheritance,” Sabo said with calculated cheer, stabbing a piece of meat like he was planting a flag.

Shanks nearly choked on his pineapple juice. “I don’t have favorites! That’s slander!”

Beckman dabbed his mouth with his napkin in a motion so precise it felt surgical. “You three are like a plague—uninvited, uncontrollable, and surprisingly expensive.”

“Inheritance is a basic civil right,” Sabo shot back, eyes gleaming with the unshakable logic of someone who’d absolutely read every property law at the city library.

“I’ve got the last name!” Ace cut in, thumping his chest. “Benn Ace, remember? On paper, stamped and signed. Legal heir.”His grin was pure predator—like a shark catching the scent of blood.

"That was a strategic maneuver to—"

"Protect us!" Sabo cut in, brandishing his fork. "Which proves we’re long-term investments. And investments yield dividends."

Luffy, who’d been busy trying to eat a bone, glanced up confused: "What’s a ‘dividend’? Is it edible?"

"It’s like the fat around a picanha," Shanks lied, picking up his fork as if it were a quill—pinky extended like someone had once taught him this was "elegant." Beckman watched, intrigued, as Shanks piled more food onto Luffy’s plate.

Ace reached for the salt, only for Beckman to snatch the shaker first, holding it just out of reach. The teen glared murder but said nothing, just huffed and returned to eating.

"Then I want lotsa dividends," Luffy declared, shoving an entire meat chunk into his mouth.

Shanks then whispered, as if only Beckman could hear: "Don’t bring it up again—they’re getting clever."

The debate dragged on for twenty minutes and two rounds of pretentiously named dishes. Sabo quoted inheritance statistics, Ace threatened to sue (despite having no idea how), and Beckman countered every argument with a law professor's patience. until finally, with a sigh carrying the weight of all his life's poor decisions, he declared:

"First, for anyone to inherit my empire, they'd need to actually manage it." A pointed look at Sabo, then Ace. "And second, I'd have to be dead."

The silence that followed was broken only by the metallic scrape of Shanks' knife through meat. The redhead eyed Beckman with a smile that didn't reach his eyes: "That could be arranged, darling."

The table froze. Even Luffy stopped chewing.

Beckman didn't blink. "Try." His smile was a blade. "But remember I updated my will this morning."

Shanks tilted his head, genuinely impressed. "Did you actually?"

“Of course not.” Beckman took a sip of wine. “But now you’ll be lying awake at night thinking about it.”

Sabo and Ace exchanged looks—truly impressed, for the first time, by the level their “parents” were playing at.

“So… does that mean we’re disinherited?” Ace asked, disappointed.

The waiter set down the fondants like he was delivering a ransom. Luffy stabbed his with the fork before the plate even touched the marble—the chocolate bled, revealing a filling as artificial as the smiles on Beckman’s pamphlets.

Beckman let out a deep sigh, one that came straight from the bone, and pulled five pamphlets from his jacket with the precision of a grudging origamist. He spread them across the table like tarot cards flipped by fate, the glossy paper shining among silver spoons and crumbs.

“If you really want to fight over my inheritance,” he began, with the patience of someone who’d regretted this whole conversation four sentences ago, “you might want to start by picking a decent school.”

A pause sharp, clean.

“Sabo.” Beckman lifted the pamphlet, finger landing precisely on the word Crime, crossed out in red pen. “I’ve already edited your ‘suggestions.’”
“No. ‘Schools for Delinquents’ is not a valid option, Sabo.”

Sabo, mid-sentence, closed his mouth with a quiet snap. Ace snorted. Luffy licked his spoon.

The pamphlets bore names in serif fonts and crests that looked like they’d belonged to families who’d founded empires. Each brochure was a quiet threat: boys in navy blazers, golf courses in the background, smiles trained for future elections.

“These places have auditoriums bigger than hospitals,” Ace muttered, flipping through one with suspicion. “And for this price… do they include replacement souls with the diploma?”

Beckman didn’t even blink. “You’ll need a new soul, yes. Your current one has too many report cards to be recycled.”

Shanks rested his chin on his hand, watching the scene with a glint in his eye. “You’re really trying to raise elite corporate villains. It’s adorable.”

“Or at the very least, functional heirs,” Beckman shot back, pointing at Luffy, who was currently trying to use his spoon as a strawberry catapult.

Sabo lifted one of the pamphlets like he was analyzing a war contract. “This one offers classes in ‘applied geopolitics for financial markets.’ Is that real or just a disguised spell?”

“Jelly politics?” Luffy looked up.

“It’s real,” Beckman said, arranging his cutlery with surgical precision. “And you’re going. Even pests need pedigree if they want to swim with bigger sharks.”

Luffy raised his hand like they were in school: “Do they teach barbecue?”

“If you pass calculus, I’ll let you start a barbecue club,” Beckman replied without looking up. “But only if it’s properly taxed.”

The silence that followed was as thick as the fondant now melting on their plates. Even Shanks stopped stealing pieces of Beckman’s chocolate—a miracle rivaled only by the day Luffy refused a second helping of meat.

Ace crushed the brochure in his hand, the glossy paper hissing in protest. “This is worse than prison. At least in jail they don’t make you wear a bowtie.”

Beckman leaned forward, elbows on the table with a grace that turned even casual movements into veiled threats. “Prison doesn’t serve wagyu for lunch either. Think of this as... a long-term corporate coup.”

Sabo, always the strategist, was already drawing imaginary lines between brochures with his fork. “If I pick the one with an exchange program, can I negotiate a non-extradition clause as a bonus?”

It was just provocation, really.

“We’ll negotiate once you can conjugate verbs in at least three languages,” Beckman replied, discreetly moving sharp objects out of Luffy’s reach.

Sabo tore the exchange program pamphlet in half — he had no plans of being sent away from his brothers anytime soon.

Shanks watched the scene unfold with a smile that never quite reached his eyes. His fingers tapped against his glass of juice, tracing patterns only he seemed to understand. “Beckman, love, are you trying to raise elite corporate overlords, or are you just recreating your own school trauma in miniature?”

Beckman’s spoon paused mid-air. “I’d rather be murdered by a business partner than by a poorly made spreadsheet.”

“You’ve got an accountant for that, right?” Shanks nudged.

“Three. And one’s a fugitive.”

Luffy, who had been attempting to balance a spoon on his nose, jolted so hard the cutlery rattled. “You’re gonna be murdered?!”

“Eventually,” Beckman and Shanks replied in unison, as casually as if they were discussing the weather.

Then Shanks reached across the table—blatantly ignoring Beckman’s personal space—and plucked the most conservative-looking pamphlet from the pile. “This one. Arabasta Kokusai Gakuin. They offer astrology.”

Beckman raised an eyebrow. “You’re suggesting we send our dyslexic son to one of the most academically rigorous schools in the country?”

“I’m suggesting,” Shanks said, spinning the pamphlet between his fingers, “that you stop pretending this is about education and admit you’re buying access. At least I’m honest about what I’m doing.”

The room seemed to drop several degrees.

Beckman dabbed his lips with his napkin in a motion so slow it bordered on theatrical. When he spoke, his voice was smooth—sharp and controlled like the edge of a drawn blade. “And what exactly are your intentions, Shanks?”

The redhead smiled, showing every one of his teeth. “To give them what we never had. A choice.”

The silence that followed was taut, almost reverent—until it was sliced clean by the wet, unmistakable sound of Luffy swallowing an entire fondant without chewing. “I choose the one with the biggest cafeteria!”

The tension dissolved instantly, like sugar dropped in a hot cup of coffee. Beckman let out a long breath, dragging a hand down his face. “God help me—the one school with an all-you-can-eat buffet just became our top contender.”

Sabo and Ace exchanged a glance. That didn’t sound like such a bad option, actually. Maybe they could even negotiate a few classes in explosives as an extracurricular activity.

As the boys launched into a lively argument over who would be able to modify the school uniform into something less “tragically uncool,” Beckman felt something warm press against his foot beneath the table—Shanks’s shoe, steady, anchoring, like a lighthouse beam cutting through fog.

He didn’t move away.

They never brought it up again.
They let the boys choose for themselves which school they wanted to attend — a small act of trust, a quiet gesture that they too had the right to chart their own course.

Night came slowly, like a quiet tide rising, filling every corner of the house with patient shadows. The mansion felt suspended in time, like a ship anchored in calm waters. Shanks was still awake.

The boys slept in their rooms, still only partially furnished — We need more decorations, he thought, as if trying to paint the deck before the next voyage. He moved through the hallway with footsteps so soft they barely touched the floor, as though honoring the silence of a sleeping sea.

Sabo slept with a book open on his chest, breathing evenly.
He had probably surrendered to the weight of dense pages in the middle of some solitary crossing. Shanks approached, gently removed the book, marked the page, and set it down on the bedside table. Then he pulled the blanket up with the quiet care of someone adjusting a sail in the dark — a simple task, but essential to keep the course steady.

In the adjacent room, Luffy slept soundly, buried under a mountain of blankets. They'd discovered he was sensitive to the cold—a detail almost impossible to imagine in daylight, yet as undeniable as the rhythm of the tides.

Further away, Ace murmured in his sleep. His words came like echoes from a poorly tuned ship's radio: broken phrases, fragments of thought. But every now and then, between grumbles, there was an unexpected tenderness—as if a gentle breeze slipped through the storms he insisted on carrying.

Shanks lingered in the doorway like a captain keeping watch over his crew, anchored in the safe harbor of night. The air held that fragile serenity unique to calm tides. He cast one last glance into the room—brief but full—before turning silently down the hallway, his steps light as a man adrift among constellations. Even with sails furled, he still held the helm.

The door creaked faintly—a sound nearly imperceptible to anyone not awake at 3 AM. Beckman didn't move, but his eyes opened in the darkness, trained to recognize intrusions, even the most subtle ones. Shanks' silhouette stood out against the faint moonlight filtering through the curtains, barefoot, with an old book tucked under his arm and shoulders slightly hunched, as if bearing an invisible weight.

"You awake?" Shanks whispered, his voice hoarse, more a breath than a question.

Beckman didn't answer. He knew the other would notice the shift in his breathing, but he let the lie linger between them, an unspoken agreement. Shanks smiled, the pale light revealing only the outline of that gesture, and slipped into the room with the quiet grace of someone accustomed to forbidden spaces.

The mattress dipped slightly as he lay back, maintaining a careful distance—as if fearing mere contact might unravel a confession. The book—a worn volume of Greek mythology—rested on his chest, its yellowed pages smelling of dust and old ink.

"Ever seen Perseus’ constellation?" Shanks murmured, eyes fixed on the ceiling where shadows could be anything. "They say he carried Medusa’s head as a trophy, but no one mentions the weight. Imagine holding your own monster by the mane, knowing one slip turns you to stone."

Beckman turned his head to look. Shanks was smiling, but his fingers drummed the book’s cover in an erratic rhythm, like a code no one had taught him to decipher.

The silence stretched, comfortable yet charged. Beckman closed his eyes again but let his arm hang loose, knuckles grazing Shanks’ wrist by accident. An invitation. An anchor.

"You've got the wrong room, Your Majesty," Beckman muttered into the darkness.

Shanks huffed a quiet, genuine laugh—muffled as if afraid to scare the night away.

"Came because someone insisted on locking all the windows," he said, setting the book on the nightstand with exaggerated care, like it might shatter after another night exposed. "And I can't sleep."

His tone was light, but the confession lingered there, hidden between words like a splinter in the grain. He tugged at the blankets with studied nonchalance—too deliberate to be natural—and burrowed into fabric still warm from another body.

Now he watched Beckman.

Silence settled again, thick but different—not absence of sound, but a minefield of things left unsaid.

"It's not about turning to stone, with Medusa," Beckman murmured, eyes still closed. "It's about facing your own reflection."

Shanks didn't answer, but his breath hitched—almost imperceptible, almost. He turned his face upward, studying the ceiling cracks like they might spell some answer in the plaster.

"Beck—" he began, and the shortened name sounded more intimate than he'd perhaps intended.

"I know," Beckman answered before he could continue, his voice rough with sleep—or something deeper. "But not now."

Shanks nodded, aware the other couldn't see. Yet the anchor remained. Those knuckles still brushed against his wrist, and he didn't pull away.

Beckman moved with unhurried familiarity, each gesture precise. He opened the nightstand drawer, retrieving a small glass vial and a blister pack of pills. No words were needed—the ritual between them was ancient by now, and Shanks accepted it with the quiet resignation of someone who understands their own chaos.

He swallowed the pills with a sip of water from the half-full glass Beckman handed him—already waiting on the nightstand as if they'd known he'd come.

"Obligation or kindness?" Shanks asked, turning his face toward him, but Beckman was already settling back as if the question had been addressed to the ceiling.

"Logistics," he answered after a beat. "You're easier to handle asleep than anxious at 4 AM talking about constellations."

Shanks smiled slowly, his eyelids already growing heavy. The medication worked fast—especially on days when he was exhausted before even lying down.

"You know me too well," he murmured.

"Someone has to."

Shanks fell silent for a few seconds, his body sinking gradually into the mattress as if surrendering to some inevitable force. They stayed like that for a while. Then, right before slipping under completely, he slurred in a voice almost childlike:

"You think... Luffy really is my favorite?"

Beckman opened his eyes.

"Why ask that now?"

"Because sometimes... I treat him differently. And Ace and Sabo notice. They keep saying I have a 'favorite son.' That he's my 'little hero project.'"

"Because he is," Beckman said, blunt.

Shanks huffed a quiet laugh.

"But I don't want them to feel less," Shanks murmured, words slurring at the edges. "It's not that I love him more... It's just—with Luffy, sometimes it feels like he needs more. Like he's made of glass. He internalizes everything. He's not fiery like Ace or sharp-tongued like Sabo. He just... I don't know."

Beckman studied his profile in the dim light—eyes nearly closed now, thoughts spilling through the cracks between wakefulness and dreams.

"And they only say it to get under your skin," he said. "Ace and Sabo know you'd die for any of the three."

"Still..." Shanks' voice faded as sleep pulled him under. "Hope it never comes to that."

Beckman didn't reply. He simply tugged the blankets back over Shanks' shoulders where they'd slipped, then stayed awake awhile longer, listening to his breathing deepen into silence.

Sabo wasn't enjoying this. It was nine in the morning, and he was being forced to lie on the grass and stare at the sky—or, as he preferred to call it, "confronting the utter uselessness of human photosynthesis." Okay, he wasn't literally looking at the sun, but the rule was clear: fifteen daily minutes outdoors. Apparently, his vitamin D levels were so low they'd nearly become a medical case study.

"At least I'm the only truly healthy one in this family," he grumbled, sprawled on the lawn like a disgruntled cat. "I don't need to eat every three hours or sleep standing up." He shot a dry look at his brothers, who were currently attempting to climb a tree like two hyperactive raccoons.

"Sabo's being annoying!" Luffy yelled from above, clinging to a branch with his face smeared in dirt.

"At least I'm not some plant that needs sunlight to survive," Ace retorted, dangling just below him.

On the porch, Shanks flipped through a book with the serenity of someone who had no intention of intervening. His phone beeped; without even glancing at the screen, he pulled a mermaid bar from his pocket and tossed it to Luffy, who caught it mid-air and immediately started chewing.

"Don't gloat, Sabo," Shanks said, his eyes returning to the ancient myths in his book. "The universe loves playing tricks on smug people."

The next instant, Shanks got smacked squarely on the back of his head. Beckman materialized behind him like a disciplinary shadow, walking past with the elegance of a man never in a hurry—yet making absolutely clear the smack was intentional.

"Stop encouraging them," Beckman chided.

"That was uncalled for," Shanks countered.

Still sprawled on the grass, Sabo narrowed his eyes. Shanks had vanished for two hours that morning and returned with a stupid grin and a suspicious stain on his coat. The most logical explanation? An affair. But this being Shanks... homicide seemed more likely. Yet Beckman hadn't complained or even looked concerned, so Sabo shrugged and let it go.

"I mean, my genes are objectively superior," Sabo declared, reclining with arms folded behind his head and a smugness so punchable—had anyone around mustered the energy for morning violence.

Ace didn't hesitate. "Superiorly annoying, maybe."

"Or su-pe-ri-or-ly full of yourself," Luffy drawled from the treetop, now attempting to balance a branch on his nose like a circus act.

"Or just plain superiorly annoying," Beckman muttered from the porch without looking up from his newspaper, his still-steaming coffee beside him.

Shanks lowered his book just enough to peer over the pages. "Or, I dunno... a fungus. One of those resilient types that survive in hostile environments. Pretty under a microscope, but deadly with prolonged exposure."

Sabo arched an eyebrow. "You're comparing me to mold?"

"Pedigree mold," Shanks shot back, grinning. "If that helps."

"He's not wrong," Beckman added, flipping a page as if discussing the weather. "Even poisonous mushrooms have sophisticated life cycles. You’re just... photophobic and passive-aggressive. The class fungus. A French fungus."

Ace nodded solemnly. "Noble mold."

"Premium mold," Luffy corrected, the branch still dangling from his nose.

Sabo sighed dramatically. "Jealous. I’m the only one here with actual physical and mental discipline."

"Ah yes. The pride of the fungal kingdom," Shanks teased, now closing his book and stretching his legs across the porch railing. "Speaking of problematic bodies—Beck, did you schedule Ace’s checkup?"

"Next week," Beckman replied, now focusing on his coffee. "With the specialist. We’re running a full battery of tests—confirm the narcolepsy and rule out anything else." He shot Ace a look. "No skipped meals this week. And no sleeping in trees."

Ace grumbled. "I only slept on a branch once—"

"Once with a freefall," Beckman countered, raising an eyebrow. "Let’s not repeat that experiment, yeah?"

As if the universe were laughing at his words, Luffy chose that moment to tumble from the tree—a direct plunge into the bushes—only to emerge grinning, leaves stuck in his hair. "We picked a school!"

Shanks and Beckman exchanged a glance. This was news.

"Arabasta Kokusai," Luffy announced with the gravity of a boy who thinks he’s chosen Hogwarts. "Biggest cafeteria."

"And an exchange program," Sabo added, still sprawled on the grass, now with a faint smirk. "Plus a debate club, celestial navigation courses, and a library that looks like a cathedral."

"And the ties are slightly less ridiculous," Ace added with a huff. "Still hideous, but tolerable."

Beckman lowered the newspaper, eyeing the three with an expression caught between pride and suspicion. "You actually discussed this?"

Sabo nodded. "School Selection Committee. Nightly sessions. Presentations. Luffy voted based on dessert quality, Ace on dress code, and I... well, I made a spreadsheet."

Shanks blinked. "You... held an election?"

"More like a bloodless coup," Ace said. "But democratic."

The morning heat had grown heavy when the black car—discreet but expensive enough to make Beckman frown behind his newspaper—glided smoothly down the street and parked with surgical precision in the neighbor’s driveway. The engine shut off with a controlled sigh, no fanfare.

From the passenger door emerged a tall man in a light blazer over a buttoned-up collar. He moved with rehearsed elegance, each step premeditated. His slightly tousled blond hair almost contradicted the rest of his composure— almost .

From the other side stepped out a boy of about fourteen, silent, dressed in a dark hoodie and holding himself with a closed-off posture.He didn’t look bored, or curious. Just... alert. Like someone used to lingering in the background — even when there’s no stage to hide from.
He and the adult exchanged only a few quiet words, barely audible. Then, with practiced movements, they unlocked the front door and stepped inside without once glancing around.

Shanks glanced up from his book and let out a low whistle.

“New neighbor,” he remarked, resting the newspaper on his stomach like a man settling in to watch a play unfold.

“Too quiet,” Beckman muttered without turning his head.

“Maybe they’re just normal,” said Sabo, without much conviction, sprawled back on the grass again with his arm draped over his eyes.

“If they were normal,” Ace replied, balancing a twig between his lips like a makeshift cigar,
“they wouldn’t have moved here in the first place.”

"Maybe they're fugitives. Hiding out," Luffy suggested, dangling upside-down from the lowest tree branch. "Or vampires."

"Vampires don’t move in during the day, Luffy," Sabo countered, arm still draped over his face. "And even if they did, you’d invite them to dinner by day two."

"If they’re vampires and bring candy, it’s fine," Luffy declared with childlike wisdom.

"You’re all unbearable," Ace muttered, the twig still dangling precariously from his mouth.

Five minutes later, a moving truck rounded the corner, gliding smoothly to a stop in front of the newly occupied house. Two movers hopped out and began unloading with near-robotic efficiency. No kicked furniture, no toppling boxes—everything was methodical. Almost choreographed.

Shanks tilted his head as if watching a nature documentary.

"This is unnerving," he said gravely. "They haven’t dropped a single box."

"Shocking," Beckman added, sarcasm dripping. "A move without screaming or swearing. How do they manage?"

Sabo lifted his head. "I bet the boxes are alphabetized. People like that sort their spices by color."

“I already hate them,” Ace muttered.

“You hate anyone who doesn’t throw their shoes onto the roof,” Beckman noted dryly.

Shanks shrugged. “If they’re normal, they’ll move out in three months. If they’re weird, they might actually survive here.”

“Someone should go say hi,” Luffy offered, currently trying to flip himself right-side up on a tree branch without falling.

“Don’t be polite, Luffy. You’ll scare them,” Sabo replied, already draping his arm back over his face.

“Scare them? I’m delightful!”

Ace grunted. “You licked a tree yesterday. The whole thing.”

“It looked edible!”

The sound of moving boxes sliding through the front door next door continued, calm and unhurried — without friction, without fuss.

Shanks stretched in his chair, still watching. "Want to bet how long until they realize they live next to a daycare for sociopaths?"

"We're not a daycare anymore," Beckman said, flipping a newspaper page. "Just problematic."

Eventually, the brothers returned to their self-assigned tasks—Sabo philosophizing about vitamin D, Ace biting his nails in boredom, and Luffy attempting to climb one branch higher.

The neighbors' arrival passed like a breeze: noticed, remarked upon, and promptly filed away in the family’s emotional chaos.

Yet... Shanks kept watching longer than he’d admit. And Sabo, discreetly, noted in his mental ledger: ‘Potentially interesting neighbors. Observe.’

Now, Rosinante had a plan. A simple one — almost boring in its design: settle down in that quiet country with his newly acquired younger brother, Trafalgar Law, carry out his duties with diligence, and above all, keep a low profile. Emphasis on low.

No deep connections. No neighborhood drama. No drawing attention, ever. Just him, the kid, and a functional routine. A clean life. Quiet. Controlled.

On paper, it sounded entirely doable.

What he hadn’t accounted for was the unexpected visit from his new — and aggressively curious — next-door neighbor.

“Are you a giant?” asked the tiny creature standing in his front yard. Big eyes, feral curiosity, and black hair so tangled with twigs and leaves it looked like he’d emerged from a forest, not the flowerbed.

Rosinante stumbled back in surprise, face tightening in alarm, the key still halfway in the lock — as if the mere sound of that question had tripped a silent alarm in his brain. He blinked, then glanced around, half-hoping the question had been meant for someone else. A real giant, maybe. But no — there was no one else. Just the kid. And those eyes, sharp and far too observant.

He crouched down awkwardly, nearly losing his balance, and the rumpled hem of his coat flared out like a white flag of surrender. His posture had all the grace of a giraffe trying to hide behind a lamppost — hopeless, but oddly endearing.

“Careful, Cora-san,” Law muttered beside him, perched with stoic detachment and balancing a box of books in his arms. “He might bite. Worse — he looks like the type to carry something contagious.”

“I’m not infectious!” the gremlin shouted, utterly scandalized, as if that were the worst accusation he’d ever heard — then immediately sneezed so violently that a bird took flight from the tree nearby.

“Exactly what a viral carrier would say,” Law replied under his breath, with the calm authority of someone who’s read at least one medical quarantine handbook cover to cover.

Before Luffy could officially invade someone else's home — and possibly try to open a moving box with his teeth — two silhouettes appeared on the other side of the fence, striding over with an expression far too exhausted for that time of day.

“Seriously, Luffy?” Sabo said, hands on his hips, using the tone of an older brother who had seen this movie three times too many. “You can’t just barge into someone’s yard and interrogate them about their height.”

“But he is a giant!” Luffy protested, dramatically pointing at Rosinante, who instantly raised his hands in a silent, universal gesture of please don’t drag me into this.

Ace arrived moments later, hopping over the fence with the kind of smooth ease that suggested he’d done this before — probably for reasons not entirely legal. He gave Rosinante a once-over, then glanced at Law, and offered a small, respectful nod.

“Sorry about that,” Ace said, giving his younger brother a quick pat on the head — the kind used to calm down an overexcited hunting dog. “He’s harmless. Allegedly.”

"Depends on the time of day," Sabo added, crossing his arms. "Or their sugar intake." He gestured toward the neighboring house with attempted diplomacy. "We live there." His finger then pointed to their own home, his smile that of a prophet foreseeing chaos. "If you need help—or an antidote—just scream."

Law observed the three brothers with the expression of a man who'd just found an instruction manual written in hieroglyphics. His left eye twitched faintly—the only sign that, deep down, he already missed the silence of five minutes ago. Still clutching a box of books, he muttered to Rosinante:

"They definitely reproduce via spores."

Rosinante didn’t reply. He just stared at the sky with the resignation of a man whose life had just been launched into a strange new orbit.

From the porch across the street, Shanks raised a hand in a slow, friendly wave, fingers swaying like poorly folded welcome flags. He watched with quiet amusement as the three boys—his pseudo-sons—traipsed across the lawn like clumsy spies on a reconnaissance mission.

"Should we intervene?" Beckman asked without looking up from his newspaper, his coffee cup balanced precariously in one hand.

Shanks tilted his head slightly, gaze still fixed on the unfolding spectacle beyond the fence. "No. He can handle himself."

Beckman turned a page with the calm of a man who’s insured against all foreseeable disasters. "The kids… or the neighbors?"

Shanks smirked, that infamous sideways grin that usually preceded some chaotic prophecy.

"The neighbors. The kids are... inevitable."

Beckman made a small noise in the back of his throat—almost a laugh. "They didn’t even look scared."

"Of course not. It’s a canon event," Shanks murmured, reclining with the satisfied air of a man who’d planted chaos and was now harvesting entertainment. "He’s about to experience the ASL-Experience™ Premium. And no one comes out the other side the same."

Silence.

Outside, Luffy tripped over his own feet, Sabo attempted diplomacy with the grace of an ambassador surrounded by monkeys, and Ace walked away like a man signing a ceasefire under protest.

Shanks sighed, but it was a light sound—almost affectionate. "I think he held up well."

Beckman finally lowered the newspaper. "You mean the new kid?"

Shanks shrugged. "He hasn’t run screaming yet. That’s progress."

And in the background, standing there with a box of books in his arms and a faint twitch in his left eye, Rosinante looked very much like a man questioning every life choice that had led him to this moment.

"So you’re not a giant?" Luffy asked, head tilted all the way back to stare up at Rosinante’s lanky silhouette against the pale blue sky.

Rosinante blinked. His wrinkled dress shirt bore an ink stain on the hem, and his expression still carried the groggy disorientation of jet lag. He crouched down until he was nearly eye-level with Luffy, hands braced on his knees, and mustered a calm smile.

"No," he answered, with restrained politeness. "Just... very tall."

"Tall," Luffy confirmed thoughtfully. "But not tall enough to be a tower. You need to grow more."

Next to them, a lean, pale boy balanced a box labeled 'BOOKS / FRAGILE' in his arms. His black hair was impeccably disheveled in a way that seemed deliberate. Law watched Luffy with the expression of someone examining an overly curious insect.

"He seems cool," Luffy declared, craning his neck to peer into the box. "You guys new?"

"Yes," Rosinante replied, standing up again with awkward grace. "I'm Donquixote Rosinante. A prosecutor." He hesitated for a second, as if almost apologizing for it. "And this is my brother."

"Trafalgar Law," the boy said without looking up. "I'm fourteen. And I don’t do small talk."

Ace raised an eyebrow and jerked his chin. "You look like someone who reads medicine labels for fun."

Law didn’t even blink. "And you look like someone who doesn’t read at all."

"The hell—?" Ace took a step forward, only to be stopped by Sabo’s casually intercepting hand—cool as a breeze snuffing out a fire.

"Forgive Ace," Sabo said, smiling with the diplomacy of a man who’d survived condo board meetings. "He only knows how to introduce himself after a fight."

Rosinante laughed, more relaxed this time. "And you are?"

"Sabo," he replied with a slight nod. "The responsible one, unfortunately."

"Liar," Luffy and Ace chorused instantly.

"These are Luffy and Ace, my brothers," Sabo added, his tone practical—the voice of someone who’d introduced them far too often. Luffy had already edged so close to Law that he seemed moments away from climbing the box.

Law observed Luffy like a scientist facing a hazardous experiment. His black hair was disheveled in a way that felt almost deliberate, and his narrowed eyes suggested he was already mentally counting down the seconds until chaos erupted.

"What's in there?"

"Books," Law answered flatly.

"You read them?"

"Yes."

"All of them?"

"Most of them."

"Even the dictionary?"

"Especially the dictionary."

Ace narrowed his eyes. "Do you do that by choice or is it a punishment?"

Rosinante stifled another laugh, adjusting his coat collar where it was starting to stick in the afternoon heat.

"Well," he said, wiping his hands on his jeans, "it’s been a pleasure meeting you all. We’re happy to have such... lively neighbors."

"They're always like this," Sabo warned, with the resigned tone of someone who’d tried to stop them and failed. "Sometimes worse."

"But we don’t bite," Luffy assured, flashing a wide grin full of teeth.

"Not often," Ace added thoughtfully.

"Only when provoked," Sabo finished, sighing.

Law stared at the three of them for a moment, expressionless, watching as they wandered back to wherever they’d come from. Then he slowly turned to Rosinante and said, in the flattest voice possible:

"Can we install an electric fence?"

"Law…" Rosinante sighed, though his eyes were smiling.

"With spikes," Law clarified, hauling the box inside like he was retreating from a warzone.

Shanks was still on the porch when he closed his book with a quiet sigh, setting it aside. Beckman put down his newspaper, adjusted himself in his chair, and watched with attentive eyes as the brothers approached.

Luffy came bounding over with the boundless energy of someone who never tires of exploring. His clumsy hops left a trail of carefree laughter—maybe because he’d found an adult less traumatizing than usual, or simply because he’d made "friends" in the neighborhood, which, for him, was more than enough reason to celebrate.

"Have fun?" Shanks asked, his voice tinged with curiosity and that light irony only he could pull off.

Luffy stopped abruptly, as if he needed his full attention to answer. He adjusted his backpack with that wide, childlike grin of someone who’d just discovered something wonderful.

"Definitely!" Luffy replied, with the casualness of someone discussing the latest episode of their favorite cartoon. "The new neighbor is a pros-e-cu-tor , and the grumpy one reads tons of books!"

The word "prosecutor" dropped like a stone into the seemingly calm lake of their lives. Shanks and Beckman exchanged a brief but loaded glance—an entire conversation held in silence.

Meanwhile, Sabo walked a few steps behind, arms crossed with that critical expression only he could make look so natural.

"I give them a month before they move out," he said dryly, his tone sounding more like a prophecy than a simple observation.

Shanks raised an eyebrow, the corner of his mouth quirking into a half-smile. "What? Don’t like our new neighbor?"

"Liking is irrelevant," Sabo countered. "I’m calculating odds. Normal families don’t last long around here."

Beckman made a low noise that could’ve been a stifled laugh or a sigh of resignation. "Are you including us in that definition of 'normal family'?"

"Never," Ace chimed in, arriving last with his hands in his pockets. "We're the gold standard of dysfunction."

Luffy, already distracted, was poking an ant on the ground with his foot. "I'm hungry."

As if triggered by a keyword, Shanks rose in one fluid motion. "Solid point, Captain. Lunchtime—before Luffy starts chewing the rug."

Beckman stood more slowly, gathering the newspaper with precise movements. "We also need to start preparing for the interview," he added, eyeing each of the boys. "If you're serious about that school, you'll need to look presentable."

The groans were nearly unanimous, but Shanks was already steering Luffy inside with a hand on his shoulder, humming something about extra dessert for good behavior. Sabo followed with a stoic face that hid a thousand calculations, while Ace dragged his feet, making sure to enter last—though not without casting one final glance at the neighbors' house, where they were still hauling boxes inside. Strangers , he thought.

The door closed behind them.

Chapter Text

Shanks observed his colleagues with a calm gaze, his fingers drumming faintly against the desk—a nervous habit he’d never quite managed to suppress. The brunette woman across from him smiled, too sweetly, her eyes narrowed like a cat’s just before it sinks its teeth into an unsuspecting mouse.

"I’m sure you wouldn’t mind, would you?" She slid a stack of reports toward him. "I’m swamped, and you… well, you never complain about overtime."

Once, he would have accepted without hesitation. Would have grinned like an obliging fool, pretended everything was fine—as if endless paperwork were merely a trivial nuisance, rather than the soul-crushing tedium it truly was. But back then, he’d desperately needed a solid alibi. And who would suspect the office’s "pack mule," the ever-helpful man who never learned to say no?

The irony was delicious: while other assassins bent over backward to remain invisible, he’d discovered that the more attention he drew to himself as the perfect employee, the easier it became to manipulate perceptions. People saw only what they wanted to see—the eager workaholic, not the predator patiently weaving his web.

The entire office seemed to hold its breath. Shanks kept his smile easy, but his mind was already three moves ahead: refusal would raise suspicion; acceptance, an invitation for further exploitation. So he did the unthinkable.

“Ah, sorry about that.” He leaned back in his chair, lacing his fingers behind his neck. “My kids start at a new school next week. Paperwork, uniforms, parent interviews… you know how it is.”

The silence that followed was so sharp, even the air conditioning seemed to stutter. Several coworkers whipped their heads around so fast, necks audibly creaked.

“You have kids ?!” Someone choked out behind him.

“Three.” He let the word hang in the air, privately savoring the chaos he’d sown. “We adopted the youngest recently. His first time in a Japanese school.”

“But you always said you hated children,” a stammering intern protested.

“Other people’s.” Shanks shrugged, his smile now a honed blade. “Mine are… different .” More resilient. More lethal. With an 80% chance of something exploding.

The brunette colleague didn’t relent. “You’ve never taken time off for them before!”

“My husband handled it.” He gathered his own files and aligned his pens with surgical precision. “But now that he’s back in-office, we’re splitting responsibilities more evenly.” Not entirely a lie—Beckman had been remote lately, either managing the children… or preventing structural collapse.

“You’re married ?!”

“For years.” Shanks didn’t so much as glance at the colleague who’d spent the last three weeks inviting him to drinks—now radiating homicide with a stare.

“You don’t wear a ring.” The observation dripped venom.

He felt the office’s gaze lance through him: some eyes sharp with suspicion, others gleaming like predators scenting blood.

He discreetly tugged the cord around his neck, revealing a golden wedding band - a striking contrast against his crimson shirt. "I dislike the sensation of anything constricting my circulation." His fingers brushed the ring, then lingered just long enough to ensure every colleague registered its weight before he smiled. "As for the reports... if time permits, I'll glance at them. I'll work late tonight to make up for those sick days I took taking my children to their pediatrician."

Ace would loathe being used as an excuse. Shanks bit the inside of his cheek to suppress a laugh - he was genuinely enjoying this far too much.

The questions ceased. They returned to their workstations, some casting pitying glances his way, others wrestling with newfound guilt for burdening a family man with their unfinished work. The irony tasted exquisite: their imagined version of his "waiting family" was far more convincing than any truth could ever be.

By lunchtime, the situation had deteriorated... or perhaps improved, depending on one's perspective. He wove through the maze of office desks, a specter ignoring the whispers trailing in his wake. Shanks could feel the weight of collective stares burning between his shoulder blades - colleagues muttering, twisting his words, filling narrative gaps with increasingly absurd conjectures. His fingers trembled slightly; perhaps from the three liters of coffee consumed that morning, perhaps from forgotten medication.

As he began ascending the stairwell, the carefully maintained smile slipped from his face like a discarded mask. His feet dragged against each step with leaden weariness, while calloused fingers absently traced the handrail's grooves - muscle memory guiding him upward. The rooftop door groaned open.

Outside, steel-wool clouds smothered the sky, and the wind carried the metallic promise of impending rain. Shanks pressed his forehead against the concrete wall's unyielding chill, delivering two light taps - as if testing the structural integrity of his own sanity - followed by two sharper, more insistent knocks this time.

Tap. Tap.

"Hello, common sense? You home?"

He shut his eyes, drawing a breath so deep it might have reached his marrow. The headache wasn't from the self-inflicted knocks - nor from the lies. Those he conducted with the precision of a virtuoso conductor. No, the weight came from everything else : School permission slips swimming in bureaucratic ink; Therapy appointments scheduled just to reschedule; Medication alarms to remember the pills that help him remember; That prosecutor who now lived next door.

And the family.

Not the one that left him kneeling bloody in the courtyard, teaching him too young that survival required blades, not embraces. Not the clan with their ancestral laws that called this love - placing a knife in a child's hands and labeling it "initiation," commanding him to fight for a surname that fit like a guilty verdict, never an inheritance.

A single question hung suspended in the static of his mind:

When did 'family' become Sunday cakes, mismatched socks under the sofa, and flour dusted across the kitchen counter?

A foolish smile tugged at his lips. Perhaps that was the cruelest part - he could still understand their twisted logic.

"Domestic life is just a suicide mission disguised as a sitcom..."

Another light knock against the wall.

Tap.

He couldn't decide whether to scream, sleep for thirty hours straight, or hug all three rascals until emotional exhaustion knocked him out. Maybe all three simultaneously.

"This was easier when I only had to scrub blood out of carpets," he murmured to the empty air.

His mind conjured three grinning faces... no, four.

"What am I even saying-" The realization struck like a physical blow: he wouldn't trade this chaos for anything. Not when the kitchen smelled like burnt cookies, not when Lego pieces stabbed his bare feet at midnight, not even when parenting felt like diffusing bombs with oven mitts.

This is temporary. You shouldn't get attached. The warning echoed through his skull, but his treacherous heart had already chosen its side.

"Behold. Employee of the Month having an existential crisis. Almost poetic—like watching a wolf trip over its own tail."

The acrid scent of overbrewed coffee and the metronomic click of polished shoes on concrete announced Mihawk's arrival. He materialized as he always did: spine straight as a guillotine blade, gaze sharp enough to draw blood, his right hand resting idly near his hip—where a sword should have been, but never was in this corporate purgatory.

He held the mug by its handle with just two fingers, the way one might cradle a fragile artifact... or a weapon too elegant to actually wield.

Shanks' eyes fluttered open. He pushed away from the wall, rubbing his forehead with a wince. A bruise was already flowering beneath his skin. Mihawk leaned against the rooftop railing, casually displaying a mug emblazoned with 'Employee of the Month' in gilded letters—that absurd trophy Shanks won every single month without fail.

With a weary smile, Shanks turned. "Ah, the illustrious Dracule Mihawk. I came here to escape gossipmongers and bloodsuckers, not to receive another lecture on workplace efficiency.”

Mihawk arched one sculpted eyebrow, his gaze dropping to the wedding ring still swaying from Shanks' neck cord. "It appears the gossips have substance. A family man now? You, who can't even keep a houseplant alive?"

Shanks turned with deliberate slowness, bracing his elbows against the parapet. "Ah, so you came specifically to mock me?"

"It would be criminally negligent to waste such an opportunity." Mihawk raised his coffee cup—black, unsweetened, as immutable as the man himself. "Though I'll confess to disappointment. The man who once performed truly inventive miracles with a paperclip is now..." A pause sharper than any blade. "...being psychologically dismantled by three children who discovered how to topple his ego?"

'I killed someone with a paperclip?' The thought flickered through Shanks' mind with surreal detachment.

He blinked, genuinely startled. "I used a paperclip? When did that happen?"—but chose not to press. Mihawk never lied about murders. Only about... other things. Like claiming indifference about losing the Employee of the Month title.

Mihawk took a slow, scalding sip, eyes pinning Shanks like a professor regarding a forgetful student. "Berlin. Two years ago. The clip was rusted.”

Shanks rubbed his chin with theatrical deliberation, feigning recollection. "Ah, was that the fellow who reeked of sauerkraut?" He gave an exaggerated headshake before cutting himself off—"...wait, that's not the point here!"

A gravelly laugh escaped him. "You don't understand. It's... different." He dragged his palms down his face, the words muffled between his fingers. "Before, my only concern was leaving no traces. Now I can't sleep without checking if they're still breathing."

Mihawk took a measured sip, his razor-edged gaze never wavering. "Horrifying. Exhausting. Intoxicating." A blade-sharp pause. "You almost make me want one."

"You? A father?" Shanks' laughter rang genuine now. "The only living creature you tolerate is that damned cat of yours, and only because it has the decency to ignore you.”

"Don’t take Coffin’s name in vain." Shanks rolled his eyes at the absurd name Mihawk had bestowed upon that infernal creature. "If it’s so difficult, why not quit? Drop them at an orphanage."

‘Go back to being the ruthlessly efficient killer I call my rival’ —Shanks could nearly hear the unspoken words hovering between them. But they had an agreement: no mention of their other profession. Moments like these were to be cherished, because in any other circumstance, they’d meet with blades at each other’s throats.

The silence that followed was so razor-edged even the wind seemed to hold its breath. Shanks stared down at his hands—the same hands that had ended lives, now streaked with washable marker and glitter glue.

"...Because they’re mine ." The admission came out softer than he’d intended.

Mihawk studied him for a long, weighted moment before finally scoffing: "Pathetic." Yet something in his tone sounded almost... intrigued. "If it’s that simple for you, perhaps I should try it myself."

Shanks' eyebrow arched sharply toward his hairline. "Excuse me?"

"Perhaps I should adopt a child myself. Mold them properly. Demonstrate how even in this, my edge remains keener than yours." Mihawk set his empty cup on the parapet with a definitive clink - the period at the end of his declaration. "After all, if even you can manage it, the bar can't be particularly high."

Shanks nearly inhaled his own tongue. "Wait—Mihawk, this isn't some fucking competition—"

But the man was already walking away, his long coat swirling behind him like a declaration of war. "I'll be visiting orphanages this afternoon. Research purposes."

"MIHAWK!"

The rooftop door clicked shut with bureaucratic finality. Shanks stood alone in the sudden silence.

"He wouldn't... " The words dissolved in the wind as he stared at the space where Mihawk had been. "He absolutely would."

Meanwhile, across town, Ace officially declared this The Worst Morning in Recorded History™ .

Whether it was due to his sleepless night, or Luffy’s incessant screaming about "Shanks turning into a constellation" —he lacked the mental bandwidth to determine which explanation was more absurd.

The scent of charred coffee permeated the kitchen, mingling with the cacophony of silverware clattering to the floor. The table was technically set—undercooked eggs, charcoal-black toast, orange juice served in Spider-Man cups. But the undisputed epicenter of chaos had a name: Luffy , perched on a chair like it was a makeshift throne, his eyes puffy and his bottom lip quivering at "emotional tsunami" intensity.

"He's not coming back..." Luffy whispered, clutching the Pirates of the Caribbean thermos to his chest like it was the last sacred relic on earth.

Ace shot Sabo a look of pure desperation.

"You're the 'smart' one. Make up something convincing. Tell him the redhead went out for cigarettes and got lost."

Sabo—half a piece of toast forgotten in his mouth—attempted reason:

"Luffy... he just went to work. Remember? Said today was 'grown-up stuff' day. He'll be back."

Luffy shook his head violently, his eyes now shining with lighthouse-intensity despair.

"But he promised he'd never leave! And this morning I woke up and—POOF! Gone! No note! No goodbye kiss! Didn't even take the lunch I made!" He brandished a crumpled package allegedly containing "jelly and french fry sandwich with glitter."

Sabo's face twisted in visceral horror. Ace audibly gulped.

"Maybe that's why he ran away..." Ace muttered, immediately earning a sharp elbow to the ribs.

Luffy slammed his fists on the table with enough force to send silverware airborne.

"HE LEFT JUST LIKE EVERYONE ALWAYS DOES!"

The scream reverberated through the house. Silence followed. Even the refrigerator seemed to observe a moment of respectful pause.

Then, Beckman materialized in the doorway—newspaper still in hand, stubble shadowing his jaw, his entire posture radiating the weary resignation of a man who'd predicted this meltdown from the first sniffle. He surveyed the scene like a sheriff assessing a shootout where he already knew the body count.

"Trouble?"

"Shanks..." Ace grumbled. "Went to work. But the brat here thinks he's defected to become an astronaut."

Luffy sniffled violently, the chair creaking under his convulsive movements. He'd reached the 'meltdown imminent in 3...2...' phase.

Beckman approached the table with tectonic calm. Pulled out a chair. Sat. Selected a toast slice. Buttered it. Chewed. Only then did he speak, with the unshakable certainty of someone announcing sunrise:

"He'll be back for dinner."

Luffy stopped . Froze mid-sob like Beckman had hit the pause button on his entire melodrama.

"...Really?" The words came out half-choked, but already steadier. "You promise?"

Beckman finished his coffee in one measured swallow, locked eyes with the intensity usually reserved for enemy snipers, and declared:

"I promise."

Luffy's gaze darted around the room as if seeking divine confirmation. Then, faster than a heartbeat, he grabbed a jelly-slathered bread crust and started chewing—now grinning like the cosmos itself had realigned just to please him.

Ace blinked. Sabo arched an eyebrow at Beckman.

"...You're like some kind of tantrum exorcist, aren't you?"

"No. Just the only functional adult in this household."

Beckman rose with the weary dignity of a veteran soldier, gathered his newspaper, and departed muttering:

"...And someone inform Shanks he's just forfeited dessert privileges for a week."

From the opposite end of the house, Luffy's fully recovered bellow echoed:

"BUT HE'S COMING BACK FOR DINNER!!!"

And thus, yet another crisis was averted... by the supreme power of Beckman refusing to tolerate dramatics before 9 AM .

As breakfast concluded, Beckman moved down the hallway with the measured stride of a man who knew chaos awaited him regardless. The ground-floor office was his sanctuary—a hallowed space where criminal schemes were orchestrated, finances were laundered with surgical precision, and above all, where children were categorically forbidden .

On the door, a handwritten sign (reinforced with industrial-grade duct tape) proclaimed:

IN MEETING. KNOCK BEFORE ENTERING OR FACE SLOW EXECUTION VIA POWERPOINT PRESENTATION ON PRIVACY ETIQUETTE.

Beckman locked the door with a precise metallic click —the sound of a prison cell sealing shut. The noise reverberated faintly down the silent hallway, fortifying the musty, dimly-lit office like invisible ramparts rising against the chaos beyond. A ghost of relief flickered at the corner of his mouth. For now, at least, sanctuary was his.

On the other side, three pairs of wide eyes stared at the newly-barricaded door with the reverent terror reserved for forbidden shrines—or active minefields.

"What's... Pow-wer-Poi-nt?" Luffy asked, wrinkling his nose as if the word were some ancient curse. He pressed his face against the door, leaving a greasy smudge on the frosted glass.

Sabo crossed his arms, his expression darkening with the weight of sudden wartime flashbacks.

"Worse than punishment," he answered, his voice hushed and heavy with hard-earned wisdom. "Corporate torture in slide format."

"Is that why you stopped eating with your hands?" Ace asked, staring pointedly at Sabo—who pointedly ignored him.

The ensuing silence hung thick, almost viscous enough to touch. A lethargic wind rustled the backyard trees, and even the birds seemed to hush in solemn deference to collective suffering. For one suspended moment, the trio remained frozen, staring at the door as if willing it to swing open on its own and deliver them from impending boredom.

When no such salvation came, they turned in perfect unison and trudged—vanquished soldiers retreating from battle—toward Ace's bedroom. The already chaotic space transformed into a warzone the instant Luffy launched himself onto the rug, rolling side to side with the frenzied energy of a caged animal.

"BORED! BORED! BORED!" he bellowed, his voice oscillating between theatrical despair and full-blown hysteria.

Ace observed the scene from his perch on the bed, chewing something that might have been a cookie or possibly a screw.

"Sounds like someone's dying," he remarked with the calm of a veteran who'd witnessed far worse catastrophes.

"Dying... of boredom!" Luffy corrected, seizing his brother's ankles as if attempting to drag him into the abyss of monotony. "We need an urgent mission!"

Sabo—perched on the windowsill with his forehead pressed against the glass—narrowed his eyes. Beyond lay the neighbor's garden, stretching out in suspicious silence, and at its center like a misplaced chess piece sat Law. Reclined on a deck chair, he was engrossed in a book so thick it could have contained humanity's entire history. His eyes never wavered. He didn't even blink.

"Mission acquired," Sabo murmured, a treacherous glint sparking in his eyes. A grin spread across his face like wildfire through dry tinder. "We're investigating the suspicious neighbor."

"Suspicious?" Luffy perked up, smushing his face against the window beside his brother, leaving foggy breath marks on the glass.

"Obviously. Observe:
1. Reads books thicker than his own skull.
2. Has never smiled once in recorded history.
3. Gives off strong 'bodies buried in the basement' vibes."

Ace nodded solemnly. "And his adult is too tall. No one needs that much height. It's unnatural."

"Shanks said something about staying away from the prosecutor..." Ace added halfheartedly.

"Technically Law isn't the prosecutor," Sabo concluded with legalistic precision.

"KIDNAPPING TIME!" Luffy bellowed, already hurtling toward the backyard like a human grenade with the pin pulled.

Operation Blueprint (v4.0) - Drafted in ten chaotic minutes.

1. Luffy : Primary Distraction Unit - Run in circles screaming about whatever his impulse dictates.
2. Ace : Brute Force Division - Transport Law via fireman's carry if necessary.
3. Sabo : Diplomatic Corps - Frame the abduction as "compulsory friendship bonding."

Across the fence, beneath the dense canopy of an ancient oak, Law slowly lifted his gaze as the trio breached his perimeter. His expression blended world-weariness with aristocratic disdain, yet his fingers had already closed around a nearby branch—purely precautionary.

"This is why I advocated for electrified fencing," he remarked just loudly enough to carry.

Sabo advanced with all the gravitas of a community theater revolutionary: "You've been conscripted for a mission of critical importance!"

Law didn't stir, but the stick in his hand rotated ominously. "Sure. Where's the warrant?"

Sabo crossed his arms, striking the pose of a revolutionary statesman: "Warrants are bourgeois constructs designed to institutionalize oppression. I am the State now."

Ace released a long-suffering groan. "And here comes his Marxist phase again..."

Law rolled his eyes and leveled his stick at Sabo like a judge's gavel. "Fantastic. The State here is about to face a property invasion lawsuit. And a thorough thrashing."

Luffy - who'd been crouching behind a shrub with his stick-sword - suddenly erupted: "THIS IS A RESCUE MISSION!"

"Rescuing what ?" Law prodded the bush with his foot, sending Luffy tumbling out.

"You! You're the artifact!" Luffy declared, as though explaining basic arithmetic.

Law took a strategic retreat step, only to find Sabo already blocking the fence line. "Technically, you're standing in the fence's shadow zone. Shared jurisdictional territory."

"That's not a real thing."

"It is now." Sabo spread his arms like a street magician unveiling his greatest trick.

Law had no time to react. Ace - who'd been stealthily circling behind - locked him in a semi-competent bear hug. "Field trip time, Dr. Doom-and-Gloom."

"Release. Me. Now." Law snarled, attempting to land an elbow strike, but the brat was alarmingly strong for a twelve-year-old.

"Nope. Promised you'd join the team. And I don't break promises." Ace began dragging him forward, ignoring the furious kicks slicing through empty air.

"This is felony kidnapping!" Law growled, straining to reach his pocketed phone.

Sabo intercepted his hand with a revolutionary's grin. "It's reeducation . And you're our political prisoner."

"YOU'RE GONNA LOVE US!" Luffy howled, bouncing like an over-caffeinated golden retriever.

Law stopped struggling for one lethal second, inhaled deeply, and pinned all three with a gaze that could dissolve steel. "Mark my words: I'm suing you, your parents, and your family dog."

Ace laughed, hefting his squirming cargo. "Shanks doesn’t own a dog."

"I’ll procure one."

Sabo ignored the threat and pried open a gap in the fence. "Cooperate, and you get juice."

"I demand diplomatic immunity."

"How about boxed juice?"

Law released a disdainful snort—then, in one fluid motion, stomped on Ace’s foot. The boy yowled but held firm. "T-two juices!" Ace bargained, now hobbling.

"And cookies ." Law crossed his arms, the picture of grudging negotiation.

Luffy, already sprinting ahead, trumpeted: "HE SAID YES!"

Law muttered darkly about "human rights violations" and "capital punishment for minors," but allowed himself to be hauled away—primarily because Ace genuinely wouldn’t relent, and he refused to whimper like an infant. Yet he cataloged every detail with prosecutorial precision for the impending lawsuit.

As the ragtag procession trudged back across the lawn toward their "secret base," leaving behind a trail of trampled grass, abandoned books, and thoroughly demolished dignity, a muffled shriek echoed on the horizon.

Inside the office, Beckman narrowed his eyes at the distant commotion—stampeding footsteps, gleeful shrieks, a booming "YOU'LL LOVE US, I SWEAR!" —before exhaling through his nose and returning to his 42-slide presentation on strategic planning. With world-weary finality, he decided whatever chaos was unfolding outside decidedly wasn't his jurisdiction.

Meanwhile, Luffy burst through the front door like a medieval battering ram breaching castle gates. Law was deposited (with some semblance of dignity) onto the sofa, where a dinosaur-print blanket was draped over his shoulders with ceremonial gravitas.

"You are now under our protective custody," Sabo proclaimed, "with all rights guaranteed by the Constitution of the Independent Republic of Anti-Boredom Operations™."

"Article One," Luffy began with unprecedented solemnity, "No one shall remain bored for more than thirty consecutive minutes!"

Law sank deeper into the couch cushions. His tactical scan revealed: A one-eyed teddy bear judging him with its dangling button gaze, The muted television playing an animated musical about tax-paying animals (ironically educational)

"I'm surrounded by deranged creatures," he muttered into his palms.

"You're surrounded by an emotional extraction team," Sabo corrected, launching a throw pillow at his head. "Ace—initiate Code Red emergency protocol."

Ace flung open a cupboard.

In the neighboring house—formerly as immaculate as an architectural digest spread before the child invasion—Law was ceremoniously deposited onto the sofa like a POW being presented to the chaos committee.

He sat ramrod straight, arms locked across his chest, regarding his captors with the same disdain one reserves for a malfunctioning toaster. On the coffee table before him: orange juice in a Spider-Man cup, butter cookies, and a one-eyed stuffed panda.

"If we're proceeding with this farcical abduction," he declared, producing a notepad from his pocket with courtroom gravitas, "I demand my Geneva Convention right to contact the outside world."

"You gonna call the cops?" Ace challenged, eyebrow cocked.

"No." Law adjusted his sleeves. "I need to leave a note for Cora-san. He worries."

Sabo huffed and folded his arms in a theatrical pout.

"Your guardian has a ridiculous name."

"And you three call yourselves the 'Anti-Boredom Task Force.' Apparently irony is elective in this neighborhood."

Law exhaled through his nose, retrieved his notepad with the resignation of a man signing his own death warrant, and extended his palm with eerie calm:

"Procure me a writing instrument."

Luffy returned moments later clutching a fistful of crayons—half bearing clear teeth marks. Law accepted them without protest and began writing with the meticulous precision of someone completing intergalactic tax forms:

Dear Cora-san,

I've been taken hostage by the neighbors. This is not a distress call.
Reason for abduction: "Critical boredom levels" (official captor statement).
Current conditions: Tolerable. Orange juice is provided.
Do not alert authorities—they claim "extensive experience evading law enforcement."

P.S. If I'm not back in two hours, I've likely been recruited into felony activities.
P.P.S. They're calling this "playtime."

Signed,
Trafalgar D. Water Law

"You write disturbingly well," Ace murmured, peering over his shoulder like a nosy scribe.

Law closed the notepad with a snap of wounded dignity.

"Professional correspondence requires proper handling," he stated, folding the paper with near-military precision. "Now, precisely how do you intend to deliver this?"

Ace responded with the calm of a seasoned message runner:

"Easy."

He flung open the window. Bellowed:

"Hey, giant! Catch!"

And launched the note like a paper grenade—arc perfect, spinning through the air with lethal elegance.

Across the yard, Rosinante—who'd been combing the property with frantic, long-legged strides—caught the note with shocking reflexes. His eyes ballooned as he scanned the contents... then immediately:

Tripped over three priceless ceramic planters.
Face-planted onto the deck.
Cracked his skull against the hedge.

Yet he rose with improbable dignity and shouted back:

"All good! But Law—remember your 6 PM meds!"

Law closed his eyes for precisely one measured second. Just long enough to block out the children's cacophonous brainstorming now tumbling over itself in enthusiastic chaos.

"May I leave now?"

"Absolutely not!" Luffy launched himself onto the couch with the unrestrained energy of a malfunctioning fireworks display. "You've been officially drafted into Operation Anti-Boredom™!"

From the hallway came the discordant symphony of clanging cookware—perhaps two pans colliding mid-air—followed by peals of laughter. In his office fortress, barricaded behind soundproofed doors, Beckman merely lifted his gaze. He weighed the disturbance for exactly three seconds... then deliberately chose ignorance.

It was simpler to play deaf. At least until his next conference call with the Russian clients.

🔹

No one could pinpoint the exact moment the chaos erupted. Perhaps it was when Sabo declared controlling Oceania was "purely symbolic, not strategic," or when Ace launched a preemptive strike against the United Kingdom "just to see if anyone would notice."

The undeniable truth was this: they'd approached their game of War with the same naive enthusiasm as tearing into a pack of cookies—innocent, ravenous, and utterly unprepared for the consequences.

At the center of the coffee table, the board now resembled a post-apocalyptic UN war room. Plastic armies amassed along imaginary borders, flanked by cookie crumb fortifications and open juice boxes sweating artificial dye. Each player clutched three cards like state secrets, faces etched with diplomatic suspicion, their arguments rapidly devolving into something far beyond the rulebook's jurisdiction.

Game pieces lay scattered across the jelly-stained world map, with South America's flag speared into a marshmallow mound near the African continent.

At some indefinable moment, Ace and Luffy had formed an unholy alliance against Sabo, somehow convinced that reenacting a Brazil-versus-France conflict would be "peak entertainment." Law remained on the sidelines, conducting a silent existential review of his life choices while methodically decimating Luffy's cookie stockpile—one forensic dissection at a time. With clinical precision, he would: Split each cookie open, Extract the cream filling, Consume the outer shells separately.

This ritualistic consumption drew astonished stares from all present, particularly since the cookie's rightful owner was known to bite first and ask questions never when food thieves approached.

"You can't just invade Australia and then declare it neutral territory!" Law protested, realigning his troops with the manic precision of a diplomat mid-breakdown.

No one batted an eye when Law began arranging cookie crumbs into tactical formations across the board, treating each sugary casualty with the reverence of a general surveying a battlefield.

"Rules are merely capitalist imperialism's arbitrary constructs," Sabo countered, stacking red game pieces over Europe with the serene confidence of someone who'd stormed the Bastille a thousand times before.

Ace let out a derisive whistle. Seated cross-legged on the floor with a half-eaten cookie clamped between his teeth and a plastic toy baton resting beside him like a scepter of power, he drawled:
"And here comes Robespierre Junior with his after-school revolution..."

Sabo lifted his chin, eyes gleaming with that infuriatingly self-assured spark. "Well, I am French. Revolution flows in my veins."

"And in your ego too," Law muttered, rearranging his Central Asian forces like a man simultaneously suppressing civil unrest and an impending migraine.

Ace stretched his legs and slapped the game board, toppling a pawn onto the Amazon. "Luffy and I are Brazilian. We've got a proud history of wars, dictatorships, and coups d'état. Our chaos is seasonal, democratically elected, and sponsored by multinational corporations."

Luffy—who'd been attempting to establish Greenland as a glitter-based sovereignty—finally looked up.

"I won a war once! Against a hornet!"

"Coups d'état aren’t revolutions, Ace. They’re just... underhanded power swaps," Sabo shot back, nose tilted upward with that infuriating aristocratic slant.

"Oh yeah? And the 1930 Revolution? The 1964 one?" Ace fired off like he’d memorized the lines just to needle him.

"Those were coups . Revolutions have people in the streets, guillotines, cries for freedom—"

"GUILLOTINES SUCK!" Luffy cut in, brandishing a cookie like a cutlass. "Can you even slice meat with one? No! So they’re useless!"

Law exhaled through his nose, eyes never leaving the board. His fingers ghosted over a troop advancing through Scandinavia with the precision of a grandmaster—as if this were some world championship chess match, not a battered wartime strategy game.

He didn’t speak, but the silence around him thickened, heavy with the weight of a childhood spent between maps and muted rooms. His eyes—too warm a brown for the ice in his complexion—tracked Sabo’s advance into Germany. Almost ironic.

"You won’t hold that without supply lines," he remarked, dry as dust.

"This is War , not World War II."

“Then why did you quote Clausewitz fifteen minutes ago?”

Sabo’s mouth opened—then snapped shut. Luffy seized the lull to shovel another fistful of cookies into his mouth and, in the process, accidentally declare Greenland’s independence.

Ace crossed his arms.

“You might be French, Sabo, but I’ve got samba, cangaço , and AI-5 in my blood. And I still face inflation and corruption with a grin.”

“And a pão de queijo in your hand,” Luffy added through a mouthful of crumbs.

Sabo huffed, though the ghost of a smirk tugged at his lips. He was just about to fire back with some Haitian revolution trivia or a snappy “Zapata would disagree” when Law cut in.

“None of you have actually read Hobsbawm, have you?”

A silence settled—subtle, almost reverent. Ace arched an eyebrow. “You’ve read him?”

“Of course I have. My mother read him to me. In German.” The boys stared at him for two solid seconds.

"And you think that entitles you to monopolize Europe?" Sabo challenged, his finger hovering over Germany like a tactical nuke waiting for coordinates.

Law realigned his battalions with the precision of a archivist shelving first-edition war crimes. "History already did that for me."

The game concluded fifteen minutes later under terms no self-respecting diplomat would recognize: an unstable Franco-Brazilian alliance sealed by spilled hot chocolate, three rogue battalions left freezing in Antarctica, and a peace treaty written in biscuit crumbs and grudging respect.

While the brothers toppled make-believe empires,
on the other side of town, Shanks pushed through the frosted glass door of a coffee —where, against all logic, real empires crumbled at a whisper. Just one order, and the right sum.

The amber glow of dusk filtered through Shanks entered Dawn Coffee, greeted by the familiar trinity of dark roast, polished mahogany, and old blood barely masked by vanilla. The lighting was amber-soft, the scene perfectly unremarkable—if you ignored the timed glances, the soundtrack playing just a hair too low, and the fact that the city's deadliest killers sat elbow-to-elbow with sleep-deprived grad students and couples whose silence cost extra.

When Shanks claimed this was where he spent his afternoons, he hadn't lied. There was comfort in knowing he topped both the menu's most expensive offering and the establishment's unspoken ranking system.

Exhaustion clung to him—not the physical kind, but the soul-deep weariness of a man who'd spent twelve hours swallowing paperwork, hollow apologies, and kindergarten paste. Stepping inside was like slipping into a scalding bath.

The waitress spotted him immediately. Bronze-skinned, eyes dark and calculating, her posture ballet-perfect but her steps pure viper. Regulars called her Cinnamon. Shanks knew her real name was deadlier than any syndicate surname. She served coffee. And contracts.

"Welcome back, Red Velvet."

Shanks grinned, burying his hands deeper into his trench coat pockets. The leather creaked faintly, whispering secrets only weapons and old bloodstains could tell.

"One more mention of that alias, and I swear I'll start charging royalties."

"You chose it yourself," she countered, polishing a glass with the same care one might clean a scalpel. "Said it matched your... lethal charm."

"I was drunk," he deadpanned, "and bleeding from a knife wound in my ribs."

"And yet you still took out three men with a soup spoon." The glass caught the light as she set it down. "'Red Velvet' stuck."

Her smile was a masterclass in performative warmth—the kind honed in the theater of death-row reprieves and last-meal requests. Shanks found himself almost fond of her. Or at least, trusted her enough to drink whatever she poured without checking for fingerprints on the rim.

He slid onto a barstool. His espresso appeared before his gloves hit the counter: double-shot, tar-black, potent enough to jumpstart a corpse or drown inconvenient memories.

Cinnamon slid a saucer beneath the espresso cup.
On its rim rested a folded paper note tucked between the napkin and a chocolate coin—the kind left as both payment and provocation.

"Cheesecake to go. Anxious client. 48-hour expiration. No frosting. Clean slice."

Shanks took the note like one might pluck a childhood candy from a jar—nostalgia and saccharine danger in equal measure. His eyes scanned the message. A smirk bloomed.

"Sending me after another politician? I'm becoming predictable."

Cinnamon arched one sculpted eyebrow. "VIP client. Paid triple for you specifically. Insists on Red Velvet." Her manicured nail tapped the counter once. "Said your style was..."

A deliberate pause. The kind that lets poison gather on the tip of a blade before the plunge.

"...Elegant."

"Ah, of course." Shanks swirled his espresso. "Nothing more elegant than a corpse in a hotel bathroom."

"You wear leather gloves and Tom Ford cologne." She flicked the chocolate coin toward him. "They mistake aesthetics for morality."

Shanks drained his coffee in one scalding gulp. As he turned, he found the stool beside him already occupied. The man was all edges - gaunt frame, stubble like steel wool, eyes as sharp as the imaginary gun barrel he mentally carried everywhere.

"You're late," Shanks said without glancing over.

"You're early." Yassop's voice was gravel wrapped in silk. "Or maybe you've lost all sense of time now that your schedule's divided between murder and parent-teacher conferences."

He settled onto the barstool with deceptive ease, every muscle relaxed except his eyes - those stayed hunter-alert. Thinner than their last meeting, his beard more unkempt, his posture carrying a new tension like he'd forgotten how to truly rest.

Cinnamon materialized behind the counter with her trademark panther's grace. No greeting, no pleasantries - just a sliding black porcelain cup that stopped precisely before Yassop with cruise missile accuracy, steam curling like a warning signal.

"The two of you together are a disaster waiting for its invitation," Cinnamon murmured without softening the edges of her words. "There. Mr. Latte's fresh order."

Yassop lifted the cup one-handed, his gaze never unlocking from Shanks'. The dark liquid trembled slightly, catching the light like a threat made liquid.

"You're a father now. That worries me."

Shanks' mouth curved into that trademark lopsided grin—the kind that lived permanently on the knife's edge between amusement and provocation.

"That a threat, Yassop?"

"A concern." His thumb traced the rim of the cup. "Family's a death sentence in our line of work. Seen men die for less. A kid who texts too often. A wife who asks about 3 AM bloodstains. A forgotten toy in the glove compartment."

Cinnamon let out a dry chuckle, plucking the chocolate coin from Shanks' saucer with surgical precision.

"And you two are the best we've got. Imagine the carnage when mediocre killers try playing house."

Yassop didn't react. His eyes had taken on that familiar glint of sorrow now—sharp enough to draw blood, quiet enough to pretend it wasn't there.

"That's why I left mine. They never knew. Never will." Shanks swirled the dregs of his coffee, watching the liquid spiral like secrets refusing to settle. "Safer that way."

Yassop's knuckles whitened around his cup.

Then Shanks spoke, his voice featherlight yet carrying that particular weight Yassop recognized instantly—the unshakable certainty of a man who'd already won the argument before opening his mouth.

"How many families do you know," he began, "where the eldest son tried to bomb the grumpy neighbor's garden after being called a 'brat'?"

Yassop's blink lasted a full second.

"Or where the middle child has a PowerPoint-ready world domination plan—complete with custom logo?" Shanks' laughter came now, warm as the café's overhead lights. "And the youngest... Christ, the youngest convinced me ants deserve civil rights and cried when a bird ignored his goodbye wave."

The corner of Yassop's mouth twitched upward—not the sharp smirk of their trade, but something rarer. The quiet, surrendered smile of a man who knew when to holster his arguments.

Shanks didn't mention Beckman—nor how his "husband" happened to be the CEO of the nation's largest export company
(and, perhaps, the shadow kingpin of its most formidable criminal enterprise).

"You've always been terrible at making sense, Shanks."

"Yet somehow," he mused, rotating his empty cup, "I've remained spectacularly good at staying alive."

A silence settled between them, thick as espresso grounds. Somewhere beyond the café's haze: The dying wail of a distant siren, The metallic whisper of a spoon circling porcelain, The bitter perfume of freshly extracted coffee.

Shanks snapped his fingers. The sound cracked through the stillness like a safety being switched off.

"You really think this will break me?"

Yassop's hand closed around his cup—those long, steady fingers that could reassemble a sniper rifle blindfolded now cradling ceramic instead of steel. His gaze had hardened into something approaching pity.

"I think you were never stronger than when you fought alone. And now..." The cup trembled slightly. "Now you're juggling dynamite in a house of glass."

Cinnamon glanced over her shoulder, the edge of her knife catching the light. "How poetic. Should I prepare tissues for your heart-to-heart, or just bleach for the bloodstains?"

Shanks rose, tucking the mission paper into his overcoat pocket. He adjusted the collar with a practiced flick of his wrist—the gesture of a man who’d spent a lifetime vanishing into shadows—then turned toward the door.

“Got a cheesecake to deliver.”

Yassop offered no reply. Only watched as Shanks dissolved into Café Dawn’s amber glow, a study in controlled motion, like ink dispersing in whiskey.

Cinnamon wiped the counter with a black cloth, her eyes never leaving the empty corridor where he’d stood.

“He’s good.”

“He’s the best,” Yassop corrected, voice graveled with something between pride and warning. “And that’s exactly why… he’d better watch his damn back.”

Shanks left the chocolate coin on Café Dawn’s table—an old ritual, like Charon’s payment before ferrying souls across the Styx. Outside, the night swallowed everything whole: the distant neon glare of the Kokuu Hotel, its gilded facade pretending at grandeur while reeking of emptiness. Nothing like Dawn’s bitter espresso and the iron-rich patina of old bloodstains.

Shanks stepped into the hotel lobby like a captain crossing a gleaming deck—knowing the storm always follows the calm.

The Kokuu was all white marble— polished to a sheen that reflected the vanity of every passing sole. The sort of place engineered to stroke fragile egos, with spiral staircases leading nowhere and staff trained to deliver theatrical "sirs" with saccharine reverence.

Facade luxury. He wore, A black turtleneck, pressed to knife-edge perfection, A charcoal European-cut overcoat where not a single thread dared stray, Tailored trousers that whispered rather than announced

Everything subdued. Everything expensive. Everything strategically forgettable. A man like him could be mistaken for an executive assistant, a consultant, or some minor functionary trailing behind actual importance.

The long, slender case hanging at his shoulder might have held a violin—the kind carried by musicians en route to unremarkable gigs. Nothing about it warranted a second glance. Nothing about him ever did.

But within that rigid case lay his sabre — Gryphon , he called it in quieter moments. A blade honed to surgical sharpness, balanced with the impossible lightness of feathers plucked from a griffin’s wing.

His gait remained loose, effortless. each step calculated to avoid camera angles that might betray his silhouette or leave digital breadcrumbs.

To every glancing eye: just another musician hauling his instrument. Until the moment he needed to become something far more lethal.

The reception desk dismissed him with preprogrammed politeness. The surveillance system blinked blindly—
compromised twenty minutes prior by a "maintenance update" courtesy of Beckman’s particular genius
for systems… and paranoia.

Not a single guard patrolled the seventh floor. Amateur hour , he mused. Even fallen stars crash when arrogance outweighs caution. 707’s door loomed before him. The keypad accepted Cinnamon’s code
with a silent green blink. He crossed the threshold. and the game began.

The suite sprawled with vulgar opulence. heavy velvet drapes the color of storm-churned midnight, the exact shade the ocean turns when swallowing ships whole.

An open bottle of Bordeaux breathed on the sideboard. The man at the window turned with the oiled smile of a serpent who’d never known hunger.

“Red Velvet.” His tongue caressed the alias like a vintage he couldn’t quite place. “An… eccentric choice for a man with your résumé.”

Shanks’ lips curved—just enough to acknowledge, never enough to engage. The door clicked shut behind him as he moved with the lazy confidence of a predator who fears only the indignity of unchallenging prey.

“I expected someone more… stern. You look… artistic.” the man said, drawing a cigarette from the pack and lighting it with a practiced air, as if rehearsing charm.

“Death is an art,” Shanks replied, his voice quiet, matter-of-fact.

The man — a minister, former banker, or something ambiguous in between — settled into the leather armchair with the kind of arrogance that only comes from never having heard a genuine no in his entire life.

“I’ve heard you’re open to negotiations. That sometimes... you change your mind.”

Shanks exhaled softly. He pulled a small silver pen from his pocket and let it drop carelessly onto the carpet, the gesture so absent-minded it felt unintentional. No one would notice the pen contained a sliver of paper with the target’s handwriting, traced in solvent ink — the kind of thing that could pass as a farewell note.

“Some ideas are worth changing,” he said, his gaze still lowered. “Others...” He looked up, sharp now. “Are mistakes.”

The man chuckled.

“Do you even know what I have? Access. Wealth. People who kill for me. Protection.”

“If someone brought me here,” Shanks said, stepping forward with quiet deliberation, “it’s because none of that is true.”
He moved like a rising tide — silent, unhurried, but unstoppable. Every step precise. Every motion deliberate.

“You signed your sentence the moment you believed luxury could replace loyalty.”

The man stood now, his composure cracking. He grabbed his wine glass and downed it in one gulp, as if bravado still counted for something. He didn’t see Shanks pull a thin strip of paper from his coat pocket — a forged hotel receipt, clumsily scrawled with the target’s own signature.

Another thread for the suicide narrative.

“Are you sure you want this?” the man asked, his voice faltering just slightly.

Shanks picked up the slender blade with movements so delicate they bordered on reverence — like a luthier assembling the final piece of an instrument.

“I don’t know if wanting is the right word,” he said. “But it’s the only thing I know how to do.”

And then he struck — once, clean, final.

Silence.

The saber pierced the side of the neck in one clean arc, swift and unhesitating. The blade passed through like a meteor tearing through the fabric of the night sky—brief, beautiful, lethal. The man shuddered, knees buckling, then collapsed soundlessly onto the ground.

It was quick. As it should be.

Shanks wiped the blade with a white handkerchief, the cloth swallowing the scarlet evidence. He retrieved a dagger, pressed it into the corpse’s stiffening fingers, and arranged the body just so—as if the man had dropped it in his final moments, strength abandoning him. A toppled glass was placed back into the dead man’s grip; papers on the desk were straightened, the "note" left conspicuously visible. A splash of wine stained the floor — a poignant detail, a whisper of emotional context.

He removed his shoes, stepping back with deliberate care to leave no footprints behind, then slipped out through the balcony to the floor below. A calculated leap—honed over decades of rooftop escapes and shadowed alleyways.

Minutes later, safely inside a taxi, Shanks unraveled the night in his mind. One less star in the sky. Not the kind of loss that would make tomorrow’s headlines—just a polite obituary and a murmured note of sympathy in some distant corner of the world.

But the sky?
The sky knew.

And Shanks… he just wanted to make it home in time for dinner.

The taxi driver caught his eye in the rearview mirror. "Everything alright, sir?"

Shanks offered a faint smile. "Perfect. Just eager to get home and see my kids."

The neighbors' gate swung open with a soft, rusty whine—just loud enough to catch the attention of any reasonably observant adult.

But Rosinante was not any adult. He was a man too large for tailored suits, too gentle to be taken seriously by security chiefs. His rumpled black overcoat and wrinkled white shirt hung off his frame like an afterthought, and his smile carried the quiet patience of a man who had raised a child reading legal jurisprudence before the age of fifteen.

The doorbell rang for the third time.

No one seemed to hear—or perhaps they were pretending not to, which was just as likely. Rosinante sighed. He shifted the bag of sweets against his hip and nudged the doorbell again with his elbow.

"I’m counting to five before I invade on diplomatic protocol," he muttered under his breath.

The door swung open at four .

On the other side stood Luffy, wild-haired, chin dusted with glitter, and a suspicious chocolate stain smeared across his shirt. His eyes lit up at the sight of his visitor.

"Mister Giant!" he shouted, as if they’d been separated for years instead of just two fences and half a garden.

"Hello there, little kidnapper," Rosinante replied with a half-smirk. "I've come to retrieve the prisoner of war."

"We didn't torture him! We just decorated him with tape!"

"...That explains a great deal."

Before he could step inside, Law appeared in the hallway behind Luffy, his hair disheveled, his expression caught between restrained teenage disdain and carefully concealed satisfaction. He clutched a one-eyed stuffed panda, with a makeshift badge fashioned from a stapled A4 sheet on his chest:

Anti-Boredom Mission™ — Agent: LAW (Title: Strategist)

Rosinante arched an eyebrow.

"...Impressive credentials."

"I was coerced."

"You're holding a cookie."

Law glanced at his hand. Looked away.

"I was emotionally compromised."

Luffy promptly latched onto Rosinante's leg.

"He can't leave yet! We haven't even raided the kitchen!"

"My God," Rosinante murmured under his breath. "He's developed Stockholm Syndrome in under twenty-four hours."

Before Rosinante could properly process Luffy's dramatic plea—the boy now clinging to his leg like a particularly determined koala—Sabo materialized behind Law with the impeccable bearing of a diplomat at a United Nations summit.

"Interference in the domestic affairs of a sovereign nation clearly violates international conventions, Mr. Rosinante," he declared, his professorial tone hilariously at odds with the glitter still sparkling on his t-shirt.

Rosinante arched one eyebrow, feeling his coat hem gradually stretch under Luffy's dead weight. "Sovereign nation? You were playing geopolitics with rules you made up ten minutes ago."

"Every legal system has to start somewhere," Sabo countered, with the disturbing conviction of someone who'd genuinely considered drafting a backyard constitution.

Ace chose that moment to join the conversation, chewing what might optimistically be called a marshmallow - if one ignored its suspiciously charcoal-like edges.

"Relax, Rosinante. We're considering appointing him Minister of Defense. Or maybe Organized Chaos."

Law, who had been observing the scene with the expression of a caged cat preparing to strike, finally intervened: "What the hell is happening here?" His voice carried the weight of ten years' worth of premature adulthood warring against three seconds of exhausted patience.

"Did you take Law hostage?" Rosinante asked, attempting to shake his leg without dislodging Luffy.

"Voluntary participation," Ace declared, scattering crumbs across the room like a breadcrumb trail to madness.

"Participation under psychological duress," Law corrected, nibbling a cookie with the deliberate precision of someone collecting evidence for future litigation.

Rosinante extended his hand like a lifeline in stormy seas.

"Want to leave?"

Law considered. He looked at Luffy - now attempting to scale Rosinante like an especially tolerant oak tree - then at Ace, cheerfully masticating something of questionable origin, and finally at Sabo, who was observing them all with the expectant air of a diplomat waiting for peace treaty signatures.

"...Yes."

Rosinante released a laugh—a rough, warm sound like coffee spilled on a cold morning. "Very well, gentlemen revolutionaries. I return to you your Minister of Sensible Decisions."

Sabo executed a bow that might have been elegant, were it not for the garish glitter still clinging to his t-shirt.

"May our alliance endure until the next constitutional crisis."

As Rosinante and Law retreated toward the relative safety of the garden, the door closed with the resigned sigh of one already intimately acquainted with the chaos left behind.

The gate creaked shut behind them, its metallic complaint muffled by gravel beneath their feet. Evening settled lazily across the neighborhood, the jaundiced glow of the nearest streetlamp staining the road with the sepia tone of a faded photograph.

It was then that Shanks rounded the corner - his footsteps too light for someone carrying grocery bags, his jacket hanging open, hair tousled by the wind, a bread loaf dangling precariously from his elbow, and the faint but persistent aroma of burnt coffee clinging to his clothes like an afterthought.

He'd been humming something under his breath, an indistinct melody, until his gaze lifted and caught the two figures frozen near the house. The tune died on his lips mid-note.

His pace slowed, his posture still relaxed, but the smile that followed came a heartbeat too quick to be entirely genuine.

"Evening, neighbors," he greeted, his voice a touch too smooth, too polished. His eyes traveled from Rosinante before finally settling on Law. "Something happen?"

Law, with his hood pulled askew and shoulders set in barely perceptible tension, answered before his guardian could:

"Your kids kidnapped me."

Shanks released a short laugh - not false exactly, but restrained, as though filtered through layers of careful consideration before escaping his lips.

"Ah, yes. They do have a certain... talent for unconventional diplomacy." He made a vague gesture with his free hand, like someone erasing an invisible sketch in the air. "Hope they didn't cause too much trouble."

Rosinante continued observing him, standing as motionless as a human lighthouse - outwardly placid, inwardly vigilant. His head tilted just slightly, eyes locked with the intensity of someone flipping through an album of long-forgotten faces behind that smiling neighbor's mask.

"You seem familiar to me."

Shanks' smile froze. It was subtle - a fraction of a second, but Law saw. Saw Shanks' fingers tighten around the grocery bag until the bread loaf's packaging crackled in protest. Saw the smile lines around his eyes grow infinitesimally shallower.

"Doubt it," came the reply, unwavering yet too airy to be genuine. "Unless you've frequented the same questionable bars I have."

Rosinante didn't laugh.

"You wouldn't have happened to spend time... in the United Kingdom, by any chance?"

Shanks averted his gaze. For a suspended moment, the only sounds were the whispering leaves in the backyard trees and the distant murmur of a television playing somewhere down the street.

"No," he said, and though the smile remained, his eyes turned glacial - fixed and unblinking. "And even if I had... I don't think digging up the past would be wise, do you?"

Silence.

Law's gaze darted between them. He felt the air shift - that particular quality of quiet that precedes either drawn knives or unearthed memories.

"Cora-san," he murmured, voice hushed, a warning whisper skating along the edge of the words.

Rosinante blinked. The tension in his shoulders eased a fraction - just half an inch of surrendered vigilance. His eyes remained locked on Shanks.

"My apologies. I merely thought—"

"Best left alone." Shanks' interruption came wrapped in velvet, but the steel beneath now glinted unmistakably. "Life's simpler when we stop digging for things we don't wish to find."

The air grew thick enough to taste. The streetlight flickered overhead, as if it too had heard too much.

Rosinante hesitated. Then nodded once, slow as a sinking ship. "Fair enough."

Shanks drew a measured breath. His smile returned - reassembled, steadier now. More authentically his. His eyes found Law again, flickering momentarily over the crayon-scrawled badge that still regarded him like a puzzle missing half its pieces.

"Hey there, Strategist," Shanks called back with deliberate lightness, the grocery bags swinging like pendulum weights in his grip. "You should come around again sometime - but start charging a decent wage."

Law rolled his eyes, but the twitch at the corner of his mouth betrayed something perilously close to amusement. "That would require committee approval."

Shanks executed a small bow, the motion improbably graceful for a man balancing three bags of groceries and a half-crushed loaf of bread. "I'll bring campaign materials."

Then he disappeared inside with footsteps too quiet for a father of three. The garden gate clicked shut behind him with muffled finality - like the punctuation to a conversation that never quite began.

"Strange..." Rosinante murmured, the gears of his mind still visibly turning behind his eyes. Law could almost hear the metallic grind of suspicion settling into place.

"That entire family is strange," Law declared flatly, already striding toward the sidewalk. The words hung in the air like an epitaph.

And as the two walked away, Shanks remained frozen at his doorway, fingers clenched white-knuckled around the doorknob. The past had an irritating habit of never staying properly buried - always clawing its way back to the surface when least convenient, when most dangerous, like shards of glass working their way through skin.

When the door swung open, the aroma of home-cooked meals rushed to greet him - steamed rice, soy sauce, and something faintly charring at the edges. But Shanks had no time to react.

A small, sun-warmed blur of motion launched itself at him with enough force to nearly topple a grown man. Grocery bags swayed precariously, his jacket slipped halfway off one shoulder, yet none of it mattered.

Luffy clung to him with his entire being - arms, legs, soul - the embrace fierce enough to banish every lurking demon. He buried his face in Shanks' rumpled shirt as if trying to physically confirm his father's reality through touch alone.

"Beckman told the truth," came the muffled whisper against Shanks' chest, the words thick with emotion. "You didn't turn into a star."

Shanks froze. For half a heartbeat, the entire world suspended with him - the exhaustion etched behind his eyes, the weight of knowledge pressing between his shoulder blades, the phantom scent of blood he'd scrubbed away but never truly forgotten.

Then, without hesitation, he let the bags drop. They hit the floor with a dull thud as he gathered his son in arms that remembered every lost moment.

One hand pressed firmly between Luffy's shoulder blades, holding him close enough to feel the boy's heartbeat. The other cradled his wild hair, fingers tangling in the unruly strands with a protectiveness that spanned years of unspoken absence.

"Not yet, Captain," Shanks replied, his voice catching slightly at the edges like frayed parchment. "Still got plenty of road to walk before I turn constellation." Luffy sniffled loudly, delivered one deliberately theatrical sob, then grinned through the remnants of his dramatics.

"Beckman left the office about ten minutes ago. Making dinner. You're officially banned from the kitchen."

Sabo's voice rang out with the gravitas of a statesman announcing new legislation. He materialized in the hallway with a dish towel slung over one shoulder, hair in disarray, glasses askew, and the bearing of someone who'd already brokered four peace treaties before lunch.

"Banned?" Shanks arched one eyebrow in mock offense.

"Affirmative. You nearly burned the house down cooking last week." Shanks pressed a dramatic hand to his chest, the picture of scandalized innocence.

"That was culinary reinvention. Subversive art."

"That was poison," Sabo countered dryly. "Ace is assisting. Don't interfere."

Shanks laughed, the sound warm and unbothered. Being kitchen-banned didn't irritate him in the slightest. If anything, it felt like an unexpected gift - one less responsibility in a life already overflowing with them.

"How was your day?" Shanks asked, shrugging off his coat with practiced ease. Luffy crouched nearby, rummaging through grocery bags like a treasure hunter, his quest for the confiscated candy package ("Not before dinner," Shanks had declared) proving fruitless.

"Pretty good," Sabo answered, shifting the grocery bags to balance the notebook tucked under his arm. "Beckman locked himself in the office, so we got bored and kidnapped Law."

Shanks arched one eyebrow but withheld reprimand, simply crossing his arms in silent invitation to continue.

"Wasn't mean!" Luffy interjected, bouncing across the room with boundless energy. "He looked lonely. Sad and stuff."

A thoughtful pause settled over Shanks before he nodded. "That's called empathy, you know."

Sabo shrugged, the motion deliberately casual, clearly uncomfortable with this sudden acknowledgment of emotional intelligence. He drifted toward the living room where Ace stood near the kitchen threshold - apron tied lopsided, hair sticking up in even wilder spikes than usual, forehead glistening with effort. The pungent aroma of garlic clung to his fingers as he diced tomatoes with near-violent precision, each chop of the knife striking the cutting board like a declaration of war against culinary incompetence.

Shanks paused in the doorway, leaning one shoulder against the frame with effortless grace, his smile as light as the evening breeze drifting through the kitchen. Sabo deposited the grocery bags onto the counter with practiced efficiency, simultaneously slipping a stolen chocolate square to the whining Luffy at his side—a covert operation executed with the precision of a seasoned conspirator—before the two vanished in a whirlwind of laughter and pounding footsteps.

Beckman stood sentinel at the stove, stirring a simmering pot with the meditative calm of a Zen master. His simple striped apron, tied neatly at the waist, bore a single defiant stain of tomato sauce in one corner like a battle badge. An unlit cigarette rested between his fingers—more comforting habit than actual vice—while his keen, unwavering focus remained fixed on the cooking contents before him. Yet the subtle quirk at the corner of his mouth betrayed the quiet amusement he could never fully suppress.

Across the counter, Ace wrestled with tomatoes, his knife work oscillating between tentative and aggressive. His tongue poked out in fierce concentration, every movement radiating the desperate energy of someone trying simultaneously to impress and appear utterly nonchalant about it.

"Easy now," Beckman murmured, his gaze never leaving the sauté pan. "You're not fighting the tomatoes. Persuade them."

Ace clicked his tongue in frustration but slowed his knife's rhythm - the motions still clumsy yet marginally more controlled, like a sailor finding his sea legs on turbulent waters.

"That smells criminally good," Shanks remarked from his safe distance, pointedly respecting the kitchen's invisible boundary. Beckman shot him a sidelong glance over one shoulder, the warning in his eyes as sharp as the chef's knife in his hand.

"Set one foot in here and I'll end you."

"I come bearing only compliments," Shanks protested, raising his hands in surrender. "Sabo issued a preemptive ban."

Beckman muttered something unintelligible - likely "with damn good reason" - before returning to his stirring with the focus of a bomb technician.

Shanks leaned against the wall, observing the pair. Ace carried himself with uncharacteristic solemnity, the tension in his shoulders speaking of burdens far heavier than stubborn vegetables.

"So, Ace," Shanks began, tone deliberately light. "Taking up culinary arts?"

Ace shrugged, eyes still locked on the tomato determined to escape his blade. "Someone's gotta learn."

Shanks blinked. Then laughed, pushing off from the wall with easy grace. "You know I'm not actually banned from cooking, right? Just... strongly discouraged."

"You put soy sauce in hot chocolate."

"Cultural exploration."

Beckman sighed, turning off the burner with a decisive click. He lifted the pot lid, releasing a fragrant cloud of steam that curled through the kitchen like an escaping spirit.

"You mistook oregano for laundry detergent. 'Cultural' my ass."

A faint smile flickered across Ace's face before fading into seriousness again. "It's just... you always cook," he said, so quietly the words nearly drowned in the hiss of settling broth.

Beckman stilled for just a heartbeat - long enough for the pause to speak volumes. Then he replaced the lid and turned, leaning back against the counter with arms crossed - a fortress lowering its drawbridge.

"And that's a problem?"

Ace shook his head too quickly, the motion sending shadows dancing across his face.

"No. Just... if someday you couldn't. Or had to leave. Or whatever." The knife trembled slightly in his grip. "I wanna know how too. That's all."

Shanks remained silent. The smile that had graced his features moments earlier faded slightly, leaving behind an expression of unexpected softness in its wake.

Beckman held his gaze for a heartbeat too long - a silent conversation passing between them in the space of that weighted look. Then he pushed away from the counter, grabbed a dish towel which he flung over one shoulder with practiced ease, and crouched down to meet Ace at eye level with the deliberate movements of a man choosing his footing on unstable ground.

"You know you don't have to replace me, right?"

Ace shrugged again, but this time the gesture carried a slight inward curl - as if trying to make himself smaller under the weight of unspoken emotions.

"But I want to. Because I like it. And because you're good at it."

Beckman didn't smile, but something in his eyes kindled warmer, like embers stirred back to life. He dipped his head briefly - a silent acknowledgment that settled between them - before straightening up with the quiet protest of aging knees.

"Then learn it properly."

He pulled out a second cutting board, positioning it beside Ace's with ceremonial precision, and began slicing onions with the flawless technique of a master at work.

"But you'll learn everything. Even washing the dishes afterward. It's part of the package."

Ace made a face, nose wrinkling in exaggerated disgust.

"Even the dishes?"

"Especially the dishes."

Shanks, still leaning against the wall, observed them in quiet contemplation. The weariness of the day hung heavy across his shoulders, yet in this suspended moment, his heart felt inexplicably light.

Then it happened.

Ace blinked slowly. Once. Twice. A third time. The knife hovered motionless in midair. His grip on the tomato slipped just a fraction. His eyes lost focus, the sharp amber fading to dull glass.

"Ace?" Shanks called, already pushing off from the wall.

But he was too late. The boy's body swayed like a candle flame guttering out without warning, then collapsed sideways with the dead weight of someone falling into sudden, involuntary sleep.

Shanks moved before the knife even hit the ground. In one fluid motion, he caught Ace mid-fall, strong arms encircling the boy's limp form just as the cutting board clattered to the side. The blade struck the tile with a muted clink .

Beckman whirled around, spatula still in hand.
"What the—?"

"Narcolepsy," Shanks murmured, his voice softer than usual but steady as bedrock. "He's alright."

Beckman closed the distance in three swift strides, his sharp gaze scanning Ace's face for any flicker of discomfort. But the boy simply breathed deep and even - his features relaxed as if he'd dozed off mid-movie marathon, the kind of peaceful sleep that follows warm blankets and familiar voices.

Shanks sank to his knees with controlled grace, settling onto the kitchen tiles with Ace still cradled against his chest. He adjusted the boy's head carefully against his shoulder, never once glancing away from the wall clock ticking steadily above the stove.

Three minutes and seventeen seconds later, Ace drew a sudden breath. His eyelids fluttered open like window shades admitting morning light. "Huh?"
A subtle shift of limbs, then dawning awareness as he took in his surroundings. "What... happened?"

"You took a nap without filing the proper paperwork," Shanks replied, the smile on his lips belied only by the quiet flood of relief behind his eyes - the kind that leaves minute tremors in its wake.

Ace's gaze jumped from Shanks' face to the floor, to the abandoned knife gleaming several feet away. A furrow appeared between his brows.

"I... dropped again?"
Beckman nodded, the motion tight with restrained concern.

"But I caught you," Shanks murmured, adjusting his grip to emphasize their shared solidity. "Clean landing. No harm done." The unspoken addition hovered in the kitchen's warm air: And I always will.

Ace drew a long breath through clenched teeth, the muscles along his jawline standing rigid. A silent storm of frustration churned behind his eyes - the kind that brews when the body betrays its owner. "Damn it."

"Not your fault."

"But I was fine."

"I know." Shanks pressed his forehead against Ace's for a fleeting moment - an anchor point in turbulent waters. "You still are."

A weighted silence settled between them. Ace nodded eventually, the motion still carrying the sluggishness of interrupted consciousness. Beckman rose to his full height and extended his hand, the offer clear in his steady gaze.

"Want to finish chopping, or call it a night?"

Ace's eyes tracked from the knife on the floor to the abandoned tomatoes on the counter. Another measured breath expanded his chest. "I want to finish."

Shanks allowed him to rise unaided - that small dignity preserved. Beckman retrieved the fallen blade with the care of a swordsmith handling precious steel, scrubbed it under scalding water with military efficiency, and returned it to the cutting board. Ace reclaimed his position with less speed but renewed determination.

Then Shanks moved to the cabinet, sliding open the drawer with practiced ease. He withdrew a leather-bound notebook and pen, flipping to a fresh page where he began writing in precise script:
'Ace - mild episode, no injury. 7:27PM. Dicing tomatoes. Relaxed, no observable stress cues. Lost consciousness in seconds. Awoke after 6min 14sec.'

Shanks' shower lasted exactly eight minutes – just long enough for the scalding water to carry away the lingering scent of blood and the accumulated weight of the day. When he emerged, dressed in an oversized t-shirt and sleep pants, the house was already filled with the aromatic promise of golden garlic and fresh basil.

In the kitchen, Beckman stirred a pot of pasta with methodical precision , while Sabo arranged the silverware on the table with chessboard-perfect alignment – each piece placed as deliberately as a gambit in some grand strategy. Luffy perched on the counter , pilfering cheese slices whenever he thought no one was watching.

And Ace…

Ace was helping set the food on the table, though Beckman had firmly banned him from handling anything hot . Every so often, Ace would take a deep, measured breath, as if consciously reminding himself to stay present.

Luffy had already claimed his seat, his legs swinging restlessly beneath the chair , his gaze locked onto the cooling garlic bread at the center of the table.

"Can I take a piece?"

"Wait for everyone," Sabo replied without looking up, his fingers making one final micrometer adjustment to the last fork's placement.

Luffy emitted a theatrical groan but complied—for the moment—his bottom lip jutting out in exaggerated protest.

Shanks' smile deepened as he approached, his calloused fingers drifting through Luffy's unruly hair in passing, the gesture as natural as breathing.

"Smells incredible," he remarked, leaning against the counter beside Beckman with the easy familiarity of someone who'd shared a thousand such evenings.

Beckman's dark eyes flicked over him in a practiced sweep—scanning Shanks' clothes for any lingering traces of the blood spatter that had marred them earlier. But his gaze caught on something else entirely, something deeper lurking beneath the surface.

"You scrubbed it all off?" he murmured, the words low enough to dissolve beneath the clatter of cutlery and Luffy's impatient fidgeting.

Shanks worried the inside of his cheek—a nearly imperceptible tic—before answering.
"Clean."

Beckman let it lie. Instead, he tilted the saucepan with a practiced wrist, revealing the rich, crimson sauce simmering within, its surface shimmering with rising steam.

"Needs more basil?"

Shanks sampled directly from the spoon Beckman held, their fingers brushing briefly as his lips met the still-warm metal.

"Perfect as always."
Dinner was served in deep ceramic bowls - spaghetti twirled in homemade sauce with tomato chunks left deliberately whole, exactly how Ace preferred it. Luffy already had his fork speared through a mouthful before Beckman even took his seat, though no one bothered to scold him.

Ace chewed methodically, his gaze occasionally drifting into middle distance as if mentally replaying the kitchen incident. Sabo watched him from the corner of his eye but remained silent - opting instead to animatedly recount something he'd read, his storytelling punctuated every few seconds by Luffy's irrelevant interruptions and absurd questions.

Shanks' rough, warm laughter rolled through the dining room in response to one of Sabo's remarks. Beside him, Beckman took an unhurried sip of wine, his dark eyes sweeping across the table with the quiet satisfaction of a general surveying his delightfully unruly troops.

This was how it always went - the beautiful chaos, the overlapping laughter, the weighted glances that carried entire conversations in their silence.

When Luffy - after demolishing his third helping - face-planted into the tabletop asleep, Sabo immediately complained about impending drool contamination of his personal space, while Ace lobbed a napkin at his youngest brother's head in a preemptive "territory defense." Shanks just leaned back in his chair, his easy smile reflected in the wineglass as his fingers absently tapped a rhythm against the crystal.

Beckman's gaze found his, and for one suspended second - just one - something remarkably close to peace passed wordlessly between them.