The car should be filled with awkward silence after that whole fiasco, but Luffy's babbling keeps everything light out of sheer will. Ace finds out that their names are Luffy and Sabo as he settles as well as he can in the backseat. He hesitates a little, but ultimately tells them his real name.

There's a pregnant pause and he braces himself to get kicked out of the car, knowing they'd recognize it immediately.

"I'm an assassin," Sabo tells them comfortably instead, and Ace's eyes go wide. "Well, sort of. I mostly just get sent to get rid of the nasties on my boss' hit list, so it it isn't as glamorous as it sounds. You?"

"Oh, is that what you were doing when I found you? Shit." Luffy veers a hard left into the interstate and the other two give brief yells of alarm when they all tilt to the right. Ace curses under his breath as he rights himself, then turns to Luffy, actually a little curious what the answer is.

"Hmm. I dunno, to be honest?" The youngest taps his fingers against the steering wheel for a second, brow furrowed in concentration, before he suddenly laughs and his face clears of all confusion. "I'm not really anthing, I guess! I just sorta do whatever I want to, y'know?"

Ace would never tell him, but that sounds like the most dangerous profession of all. The concerned look on Sabo's face when they meet eyes in the rearview mirror tells him he's not the only one thinking that.

o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~

As the sky slowly brightened, Luffy pulls in by a sad little gas station, desperate to stretch his cramped legs and get some fresh air. The other two had taken turns napping, but Luffy didn't wanna get caught just yet, especially not after he'd made some new friends.

The car's loss of movement must have woken the other two, because they're up and blinking around barely a minute into his stretches.

He grins at them as he tips himself backwards and lands on all fours with his stomach in the air. "Morning!"

Ace looks a little nauseated, but he manages to reply. "Yeah... sure."

"Hey, Lu, why'd we stop?" Sabo doesn't seem to mind which is a plus in Luffy's book, but he looks annoyed. Maybe because Luffy hadn't asked before stopping?

He tilts his weight back onto his palms and goes into a handstand for a second before flipping himself upright, facing the other two. "I wanted to show you something."

"Yeah, what's that, trees? Oh no wait. Is it... trees?!"

Luffy pouts at Ace and goes to respond with a good comeback, but Sabo's tired scowl stops him. The youngest immediately looks away and whistles to himself, making sure he looked as innocent as possible.

Sabo sighs. "So? What is it you wanted to show us?"

Luffy brightens up immediately. "Oh yeah! C'mere!" He bounces past the both of them until he gets to the car and reaches in from the driver's seat to pop the trunk. The other two exchange looks but go to check the trunk anyway.

The youngest comes up behind them with a gigantic smile on his face but he doesn't even care. The gobsmacked looks on their faces are amazing. "Shishishishi! So. What d'ya think?"

"Holy cactuses and rye bread," Ace murmurs and Sabo nods as if in agreement. "Luffy... what devil did you sell your soul to, to get this?"

Luffy doesn't answer immediately, busy sorting through the dozens of wads of cash easily amounting to over a million dollars stashed in the trunk to get to a dusty yellow beanie at the bottom of the pile. "Hmm? Well, no one? It came with the car."

He doesn't notice Ace and Sabo's disbelief as he pulls the beanie on, pleased to have his hat back where it belongs. He shuts the trunk as the elder two seem to hold a serious debate with just their eyes and studies them quietly for a second.

"Alright! Let's get you both hats!"

o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~

The room is small and there's only one bed, but the dingy motel is better than nothing. They'd been driving for almost a day straight and Sabo is too tired to figure out a fix for their appearances; he'd pushed for the three of them to get a place for the night off the highway and deal with everything else in the morning.

And yet, he sighs to himself. He watches Ace make a disturbingly accurate approximation of a breathing corpse on the other end of the small couch while Luffy fidgets in his spot between them. Sabo's not entirely sure why they're all here, but he's guessing it's a bit of newly made affection and a lot of repressed fear. Whatever the case, none of them are actually watching the dumb sitcom on the tiny TV but none of them are leaving either.

He stifles another sigh and reaches into a pocket for a cigarette. There's a conveniently placed ashtray and lighter on the table next to him and he thanks whatever god is out there for small favors.

"Really?" The older brunette scoffs from across the couch as Sabo finally, finally lights up a stick (he'd luckily had a pack in his pocket when he'd been cleaning up earlier so he hadn't needed to buy anything). "Cigarettes? Those things will kill you, you know."

Sabo almost chokes on his inhale, he starts laughing so hard. He manages to snort between laughs, "'Oh that's just rich coming from you, Mr. I-Guess-I'll-Get-Hit-By-A-Car-For-Fun-Tonight!"

Ace flushes again and Sabo still hasn't stopped laughing. He mutters something that the blonde ignores as he settles in, deciding he could use a shower and a nap after this stick. He was going to ignore Luffy's squirming, too, but the boy suddenly flops into his lap, whining.

"Aceeee. Saboooo. I'm boooooooooooreeeeeeed."

Sabo snorts and runs his fingers through Luffy's hair on instinct, but otherwise doesn't say anything. He only pauses briefly to toss Ace the lighter when he gestures for it, then goes back to petting Luffy's hair. It's only when the smell of the smoke changes that he turns incredulously to the (surprisingly) eldest man in the room.

"Marijuana? Really?"

Ace shrugs with a little grin, then offers the blunt to Luffy. Sabo hisses at him and tries to swipe it from Luffy's reaching fingers. Ace begins to laugh, the vibrations shaking the couch as he obstinately hands the blunt over to Luffy.

"Come on, 'Bo," Ace smirks as Sabo's eyes turn ice cold at the stupid nickname. "It's just a little weed, you gotta loosen up, bro."

The movie remains unnoticed as they bickered into the night.

o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~

"Where'd 'Bo go?" Ace's voice is a little muffled around the chips packets he has hanging from his teeth, hands full with the numerous drinks for all three of them, but he thinks Luffy understood well enough because he makes a vague hand gesture towards the smoking area outside.

Ace nods with a little difficulty then drops his burden on the counter, eyeing it critically. "Did you want anything else, Lu?"

He doesn't notice Luffy's eyes light up in response to the nickname. He only hears Luffy hum a little in response before he's suddenly glomping onto Ace with a sunny laugh, arms wrapped eerily tight around his waist. It could be the alcohol talking, but the elder brunette doesn't do anything except sigh and lean his cheek against the greasy black hair and giggle softly when the strands tickle his nostrils.

That is until a heavy weight lands across his shoulders and a sharp chin digs into his scalp a few moments later, a slurred voice practically purring in his ear. "Mind if I join you boys?" Ace can practically hear the shit-eating grin on Sabo's face.

So, of course, he instantly shoves them both off of him, spluttering indignantly as the tips of his ears turn tomato red in embarassment. Luffy doesn't miss a beat and glomps onto Sabo instead laughing that maniacal laugh while the blond smirks at Ace, heavy lidded eyes soft with affection.

Ace very carefully doesn't direct his small, answering smile at them.

o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~

The club is pulsing from the bass and the lights are seizure-inducing if you áren't the right kind of person. Sabo is definitely not the right kind of person. He didn't really like places like this a lot (although it is a pretty decent place to poison someone), but Luffy looks like he's in his element and Ace seems pretty comfortable, if a little apathetic, so Sabo only really comes with them to keep them out of trouble.

Maybe.

But now he is completely, utterly smashed like the other two and he has no idea how he got to this point except that maybe Luffy kept passing him drinks and the last few nights had been really stressful, and they had a shit ton of money to spend left over, so Sabo just kind of... let it all go. He doesn't regret a single thing now that he's here, although he might in the morning.

One second the blonde is on the dance floor, yelling the lyrics to some pop song he's never heard before with Ace and Luffy as bodies writhed around them, the next he's vomiting on the bathroom floor, then he's back at the counter, yelling for the bartender to hand him their best bottle of whisky. That last one was a little tricky because Sabo'd had to throw a lot of cash at the man before he'd finally given the whole thing to him.

His head is throbbing at this point, and he's lain down completely on one end of the counter to cool his head. All of a sudden there's a familiar laugh in his ear and it makes his head hurt, so he shoves their face away, but they come back, and all Sabo can do is whine, "Luffyyyy."

But the boy is so fucking persistent, and he hauls Sabo upright with Ace supporting him on the other side. Sabo whines at him too but then they set a weird, red shot glass in front of him and Ace is carefully putting some transparent liquid into it from a weird kind of bottle Sabo had never seen before and he really hopes its water because his mouth tastes like cotton now.

The words are muted and he's not sure if he'll even remember this in the morning, but he hears Ace say swear and sake and brothers and Luffy's all excited and asking if its forever and Sabo doesn't let them get any farther than that because he grabs the glass and downs it in one.

He has no plans on asking any questions. His brothers' answering grins are enough for him and all his energy goes towards not throwing up as he watches them down their own share, because he'd made a promise and he damn well plans on keeping it.

o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~

"Holy shit," Ace yells as they dash for the car. "I can't believe this is fucking happening!"

Luffy giggles as he tries to dive for the driver's seat, but fails when Sabo gets there a second faster than him. Then they're all scrambling to shut doors and hold on for dear life as the blonde steps on the gas without hesitation, pulling them out of the parking lot of the empty school and into traffic. The lady who'd protested against their setting off fireworks in the school's backyard stumbles after them, yelling angrily as she holds her phone to her ear.

"Of all the goddamn things," Sabo breathes, but his eyes are bright with adrenaline too as their stolen fireworks continue firing into the sky behind them. Luffy looks behind him to find Ace with the same wide grin on his face, and nods in approval before turning back to keep his eyes on the road.

An hour later and Ace is hanging half out of the backseat window, howling with laughter as he flips the bird repeatedly at the police cars chasing them through the tunnel.

"Sabo," Luffy whines as he gets kept from following Ace's example with Sabo's hand on his collar. He his head at an angle to pout at their current driver. "If you weren't gonna let me do anything fun, you could have at least let me drive!"

Ace slips back into the car only to start laughing again at seeing their positions. "Yeah, 'Bo, maybe we wouldn't be in this mess if you'd let Lu drive."

Luffy can practically hear Sabo grinding his teeth together and decides to plop down into his seat properly for a while. There's a long breath beside him and Luffy shrieks in delight when they're all thrown to one side again as they drive recklessly out of the tunnel.

"Shut the fuck up, Ace," is all Sabo replies to the eldest. They pull onto a bridge and Sabo steps on the gas pedal viciously, cutting off Ace's response as they practically fly over bumps in the road.

This was, apparently, not a good idea because all of a sudden there are lights coming down towards them from the other side of the bridge again, and then they're surrounded. Sabo wrenches the car to a skidding halt by the side of the bridge and the other two tumble out when Luffy gets out all of a sudden.

They're all obviously still a little high because this should be alarming and the loud sirens and the voices telling them to drop to the ground should be overwhelming, but Luffy lives for this kind of energy and he jumps onto the car's hood and begins howling at the moon. After a second, Ace joins him from the ground, and Sabo is laughing as he stumbles to lean back against the bridge's balustrades.

Amidst all this and Luffy gets a great idea.

A police officer signals to someone else at the same time Luffy signals to Ace, and Luffy wonders briefly why there are so many cops here for a bunch of kids who only really got called in for some trespassing and the fireworks—but maybe they were here for him and Ace? He doesn't really care though as he whispers his instructions to Ace.

He ignores what the two are doing as he locks eyes with who he figured was the boss cop here, and grinned big and wide.

"Boss cop guy! Thanks for the fun chase, but we gotta go now. See ya!" Luffy watches their eyes widen as he pulls out the last item the guy at the fireworks place had given him.

"What the—" and then a flash of light turns their words into yells of agony.

Luffy turns and slides over the car's roof and onto the trunk, watching Sabo and Ace stand shoulder to shoulder on the balustrade, arms around each other to support themselves. With a laugh he jumps—

And dives right at them. They're falling now and Ace is screaming curses while Sabo is yelling in another language and Luffy laughs even louder than before. He grins big and wide and sees the answering smiles on his friends' (brothers') faces, and that's enough for him. With a last whoop of delight, the three look up as one and stick theiir tongues out at the policemen looking down at them in complete disbelief.

Then there's a loud splash of water, and the hell trio are finally lost from sight.