soooo... this had been lying around unposted for like- 2 years now? decided to dust it off (edit it so it's legible) and see how people react to it, might continue it if people ask for it.

The calm morning of Foosha was disturbed by a pain-filled scream coming from the galleon currently docked at its port.

Makino, the resident barwoman, recognized the childlike voice "Luf?-"

Her voice was cut off by a collective "YOU IDIOT" by the owners of the galleon.

A half-hour later, a red-haired captain entered the bar, carrying a sniffling, black-haired 7-year-old on the verge of tears on his shoulders, his crew of pirates following the two cheering about a party, in honor of 'Luffy's idiocy and their greatness'.

The lead, on the other hand, sat down on the bar quietly, letting the boy off of his shoulders to sit down next to him.

With a sheepish smile, the captain looked at the fretting Barwoman. "Sorry about the scream earlier, this anchor-" he ruffled boys hair, "decided to 'show his mettle'." He pulled his hand back, pointing at the fresh stitching under the boy's left eye.

Makino almost vaulted over the bar at to get in front of the boy, kneeling to get a better look at his face; her speed might have left Soru users gaping. "Luffy… are you ok?" she asked as a mother would to a child with a scraped knee.

"It di-" he paused for a sniffle, "it didn't even hurt," Luffy answered with tears almost escaping his eyes, which earned him a tight hug from Makino.

The captain looked at the duo with a small smile. She will b- she is a good mother .

He felt a shiver run down his spine as Makino shifted her gaze to him. Is that Conquerors Haki?

"What. Happened ."

Shanks, the captain of the Red-Hair pirates, might have sailed under the great Gol D. Roger. his crew might've bested the Grand Line and reached the 'New World'.

But at that moment, in a bar full of his crew in East Blue, the weakest sea, he was genuinely scared for his life under the gaze of a barwoman.

Raising both of his hands defensively, he sputtered out "hestabbedhimselfwecouldn'tstopit."

He didn't know he could speak that fast.

Shanks sighed in relief as Makino shifted her attention back to Luffy and checked his wound over.

"There was no real damage, he should be fine other than the scar," Shanks parroted. The doctor of his crew was quite clear on that.

He saw Makino's shoulders relax at the news as she got up and kissed Luffy's forehead. "Don't do anything that stupid again," she whispered to the kid as she walked back to her post behind the bar, picking up the glass she had slammed down earlier and continued to clean it.

"But Makino, I had to do it to prove I wasn't scared of pain!" Luffy exclaimed, snapping back to his hard-headed stubbornness. He locked gazes with Shanks "Bring me out to sea with you next time," he commanded, as much as a 7-year-old could. "I wanna be a pirate, too."

Shanks chuckled at the child's demands he had to hand it to Luffy, the kid knew how to bounce back even after something like that. "No can do, Anchor . Not being able to swim is almost certainly a death sentence out at sea"

Luffy was having none of that. "It's fine as long as I stay on the ship," he retorted, pouting slightly. He started to punch the air, "and I can fight too, my punches are as strong as a pistol!" Makino smiled at the child's boasts; seeing Luffy get along with people was always fun.

" Wow, a pistol? " Shanks rested his head on his hand as he whispered in the most unimpressed voice anyone on East Blue had heard.

Truth be told, he could feel that Luffy was probably stronger than most adults in the village; his observation Haki could tell that much. But dammit, teasing the child was too much fun to pass up.

His goading worked like a charm.

Luffy's lower jaw almost detached as he screamed as hard as he could at his tone-

The moment was cut short when his crew began blabbering about how grand it was to go on adventures and be free on the wide-open sea. "Don't give him ideas," Shanks grumbled- he could practically see Luffy's eyes sparkling with excitement. "He is too young for the sea and we all know-"

He was cut off. "Oi, Shanks I am not a kid anymore!" Shanks looked back at him and blinked twice. "My apologies. Here, have some juice," he mumbled, passing a glass of apple juice to the not-kid. Luffy thanked him and gulped down half of the contents.

That cracked Shanks, his calm demeanor breaking down as he started to chuckle, which quickly turned into full-blown belly-aching laughter, his crew, who had been watching the interaction, were laughing their asses off too. "You a-are such a kid!" Shanks managed to say between fits of laughter.

Luffy looked like he was about to burst at the seams with anger, but just when he was about to scream again, Benn, the first mate, spoke up, causing Luffy to look back at one of the tables. "Luffy, excuse our Captain" he said in a calm tone, a smile on his face as he lit the cigar between his lips. "He knows how dangerous being a pirate is." He crushed the match he had used to light the cigar in his hand. "He doesn't tease you without reason."

Before Luffy could argue, Makino spoke up, deciding to defuse the situation for now. "Hey Luffy, want something to eat?"

Benn swore the kid should have broken something with how fast he turned back to the bar. "YES!" Luffy practically screamed, "put it on my treasure tab!"

This pulled Shank's attention back onto Luffy. "What treasure?"

Luffy couldn't answer, as he was stuffing his face at the moment, so Makino answered in his stead. "He's going to pay me back with the treasures he finds when he becomes a pirate," she repeated what the lovable idiot had told her so many times.

"Yeah, right... " Shanks said teasingly, trying to get another rise out of Luffy, who, much to his dismay, didn't take the bait this time.

Shanks was about to try his luck again when he sensed a particularly weak bunch brimming with malicious intent walking over to the bar. Lazily glancing at the door over his shoulder, he watched it get kicked in. Everyone save for Luffy immediately turned their attention on the rather rowdy newcomers.

"So these are the pirates I've heard so much about, eh?" the leader of the bandits spat out, walking in with so much pompousness that Shanks thought he was a celestial Dragon for a few seconds. "They don't look like the brightest bunch, do they, boys?"

He walked over to the bar, attempting to look as intimidating as possible. "We're bandits," he announced.

Luffy looked up, a weird half-eaten fruit hanging out of the side of his mouth.

"-we don't want to cause any trouble, just give us 10 barrels of sake." Shanks was really struggling to not laugh at this point. These guys? Causing trouble? They couldn't give Anchor over there indigestion if they tried.

"Sorry, we're all out of sake," Makino said with the sweetest smile she could muster. Any other man, especially any that knew the wrath of a woman- including Whitebeard- would have had the good sense to slowly walk away from the aura she was producing-

"That so? Then what are these guys drinking?" Higuma, the bandit leader, said, gesturing at the Red Hair pirates.

The plate Makino was holding started to crack "it's-"

"Water," Luffy cut her off. Higuma glared at the smart-ass at the counter. "These idiots don't know the difference between alcohol and water."

There was a few seconds of silence.

The bandits started to chuckle, and their snickering soon grew into roaring laughter. "As expected of worthless pirates. Even a little kid doesn't respect them!" Higuma choked out between his howling laughter. "Let's go, guys, this bar is out of booze," he wheezed out, rolling out with his group in search of alcohol elsewhere.

When the bandits left the silence returned.

The residents of the bar turned and looked at Luffy with wide eyes. Shanks, who had picked up a bottle of sake to give to the bandits, dropped it in his shock; the jarring thud shattered the tension in the room, causing everyone to start laughing. Even Makino was giggling at the event.

Benn, who was one of the more reserved ones, managed to calm down faster than the rest."Oi Luffy, what was all that ab- wait. What's that you're eating?"

"The weird fruit that was in this chest," he said, picking up the box on the counter and showing it to Benn.

The laughter stopped; more accurately, everything in the bar except him and Makino stopped.

Shanks looked like his eyeballs were gonna pop out with shock.

Luffy was too focused on the box to notice the change in atmosphere, Makino stopped giggling and gulped after seeing Shanks's face.

"It tasted weird too, kinda like- I don't know, like I had stuffed everything edible in my mouth," Luffy stuck his tongue out, "bleh- and some in edible stuff, too."

"O-oi Shanks," Makino broke the silence, worrying about Luffy's safety, "w-what was in that box?"

A few seconds passed in silence, causing Luffy to finally look around and see the frozen pirate crew. He started to get worried himself, "was it poisono- "

"I - it- he ate a Devil fruit" Shanks sputtered dumbly, his gaze still on Luffy.

"A devil wha-" Luffy and Makino started at the same time but were cut off when Shanks almost blurred in front of Luffy, punching him softly in the head.

"OI! DO YOU KNOW WHAT YOU'VE DONE?!" he screamed.

"No?" Luffy said, looking up at the man towering above him. Did I eat something expensive?

"NOW YOU'LL NEVER BE ABLE TO SWIM, YOU IDIOT!" Shanks grabbed the sides of Luffy's head, only to let go when he felt killing intent coming from Makino. He slumped down, stumbling back into his seat.

"Shanks, what're you talking about?" asked the shaken kid. It was a first, seeing his idol this shocked, and what was he talking about, not being able to swim?

Benn answered his question, as Shank was still trying to process what had happened. "Luffy, do you know what Devil Fruits are?" This earned him a small shake of Luffy's head and his curious gaze. Benn sighed, "they are fruit that give people superhuman abilities." He took a drag of his cigar.

"Like super strength?" Luffy asked, tilting his head to the side like a confused puppy.

"A little more than that," Benn continued " they grant abilities like creating tremors, changing bodies to that of animals, or even substances."

Luffy was awestruck. He couldn't believe things like that could exist; he wouldn't have believed if it was coming from Shanks, it might have been one of his elaborate pranks. But Benn sounded serious and Luffy knew he never joked around with that to- wait then.

"But in exchange, I lose my ability to swim?" The bar was silent again- the pirates were not used to the newfound intellect Luffy was displaying. It is going to take a while to get used to the new him.

"Yeah," Shanks answered, finally out of his stupor. "Those that eat a Devil Fruit are 'hated' by the sea, they lose all their power while in contact with it..." He stared straight into Luffy's eyes."...making them sink like a hammer in the water."

"Oh…" Luffy muttered, dumbly looking at the boxhe was still holding. He turned up to Shanks again, trying to find a silver lining in all of this. "So..."

There was a moment of silence.

"Do you know what power I got? … I don't feel that different," he finished.

Shanks would have rolled his eyes if he wasn't still a little shocked about the whole thing.

Sighing, he looked at Lucky-Roo who was sweating slightly. Yep bringing the fruit here was a bad idea.

Lucky-Roo took a few seconds to pull out an identification booklet, flipping to a bookmarked page. "Kaibō-Kaibō fruit-"

Luffy looked slightly confused, that's a weird naming structure. "Autopsy fruit? What does tha-"

"Let him finish, Luffy," Shanks said, patting his shoulder to get him to calm down.

Roo cleared his throat. "The user can alter their anatomy to great extents, being able to form many different structures out of their bodies."he flipped a page; this was one long power list compared to the other fruits. "The most prevalent feature is the ability to copy characteristics of animals that the user has either consumed or knows the anatomy of."

"Dracule-tap-dancing-Mihawk, that's like a Zoan on steroids!" Shanks gasped.

Luffy was practically sparkling due to how awesome it all sounded, while Benn smirked, deciding to break the stiff atmosphere. "Oi Roo, does it say anything about making the user smarter?"

Luffy's head snapped to him, his face pouting. "What kind of friend are you?" he mumbled as the pirates started laughing again.

Luffy crossed his arms and turned back to Makino, deep in thought. "Theoretically, if I have full control of my anatomy wouldn't that mean I could cause my organs and brain to work much more efficiently?" he postulated quietly, playing around with one of the shells of the crab he had eaten.

The bar froze again.

The fruit had made him smarter beyond expectations.

at the shell in his hand, Luffy tried to activate his new-found powers.

Normally, this was a hard thing to accomplish for a Devil Fruit eater, as it was hard to adapt into the new powers they gained.

But for Luffy, it was apparently a different story.

His brain was in first gear his whole life, and now suddenly it had shifted into 7th.

And the combustion engine switched out for a jet engine.

He was always a quick learner, at least when it came to kinetic things, but this was something else.

His knuckles were slowly covered with a thick carapace, a plate extending over the back of his hand, his fingers connecting and morphing into the pincer of a crab. He almost fell over in surprise, staring at the transformation he had urged his body to go through.

Makino took a few steps back in shock, then rushed closer again, softly grasping his carapace-clad hand/pincer. "Did it hurt?" she mumbled, Luffy shook his head in response as the rest of the red hair crew nearly fell over.

Even the simplest skill took at least some time to perfect, but this kid, after just learning what a Devil Fruit even is, was already able to transform his hand.

"Guys, we are heading out, I need more Sake," Shanks muttered as they waved goodbye to the bar owner and the kid with the crab gauntlet.

A few days had passed after the Red Hair pirates left town, Luffy was pretty sure they were depleting the whole alcohol stockpile in the East Blue. He chuckled to himself at the mental image of Shanks aggressively drinking sake to try and calm down.

While the crew was missing, he had taken the opportunity to get better at using his new powers. He had quickly learned that just seeing an animal was not enough to copy its characteristics.

No matter how much he stared intently at beetles, he couldn't form a exoskeleton like they had, and he was not about to eat an insect.

He was, however, able to turn his whole skin into crab carapace, covering most of his body with a thick plates of armor, albeit not as cool-looking as a beetle's, not to mention too heavy to move in.

He ended up picking up multiple natural philosophy books from the library to test the 'knowing anatomy' aspect of his powers. The books were severely outdated, only having information on the simplest and most common creatures found on the East Blue. But he wasn't deterred.

He was currently reading up on the Atlas Beetle under a tree and trying to summon its shell.

"Damn, it's hard to visualize without pictures," he muttered, closing his eyes and trying to imagine a cross section of the beetle, only to have his vision return suddenly. "Wha-"

His eyelids were gone, his whole eye structure was changed into an insect's, compound and unblinking.

He was having trouble adjusting to how unique the sensation was; it was hard to come to terms with his new field of view and the new weight on his neck from the new horn atop his head. His hands, he noticed as he pulled them up, looked jointed like a bugs', covered in black chitin that shined in a blue hue.

He blinked, or rather, attempted to blink and failed, as he didn't have eyelids anymore.

"Awesome!" he screamed jumping up, only to hit a branch of the tree he was reading under and falling onto his pile of books, knocking one of them open.

"I guess the beetle's muscle power is scaled up to my size," he muttered, rubbing his horn as he sat back up. then did a once over of himself, trying to see if there was any nicks on the exoskeleton that covered his body. And, to his great pleasure he found out that the armor that covered him had sustained none. Probably could shrug off one of Gramp's punches now...

He grumbled, getting up as the armor faded away, eyes catching a weird name in the open book.

"Mantis Shrimp?"

Higuma was having a bad day. As it turned out, there was a sake outage all around the East Blue because a pirate crew was consuming it all.

"Damn pirates," he spat out as he kicked down the door to the bar in Foosha again.

"Oi wench, me and my boys are quite parched," he had a sleazy look at his face, "please give us some sake or we will make sure to entertain ourselves with something," he licked his lips, "or someone else"

"Didn't you hear about the sake shortage?" asked a kid at the who was currently stuffing his face. "Also, I am pretty sure the STD you have is terminal, make sure to get that checked out before making moves on anyone."

Once again, the bar was silent. Makino was slightly worried about what Luffy had gotten himself into, but that worry dried up when she saw the wide shit-eating grin that he had stretched on his face.

"You brat!" Higuma screeched drawing a sword and stopping it in front of Luffy's neck.

"Oh no, call the navy. Did I hurt your feelings?" Luffy asked with a tone so unimpressed that it would have made Shanks proud.

Higuma was practically steaming with anger "I'll kill you!" he screeched and thrust the sword only to stumble forward onto Luffy as it snapped at the hilt, the blade clattering to the floor harmlessly.

Before he realized what was going on he heard the boy whisper something softly.

"Ever been punched by a shrimp before?"

Higuma felt his blood go cold. It was something primal within him- this kid was far from normal.

His train of thought was derailed as he felt something round impact his stomach with speeds he couldn't even comprehend, the force almost dislocating some of his vertebra. He only got to see the arm of the kid for a fraction of a second as he flew back into the wall.

The boy's arm was green, and was bending the wrong way, the tip was bulbous like a boxer's glove and colored bright red.

Higuma's vision went black as he spewed blood from his mouth, the internal damage causing him unbearable pain. He was unconscious by the time he collided with his men

The few of the bandits that were still conscious after the impact heard the kid giggle. "I told you it was strong as a pistol!" and they too succumbed to the dark.

"LUFFY! WE HEARD YOU HAD SOME TROU-" the Red Hair crew bellowed, Shanks kicking the door open and freezing at the sight of Luffy tying up the bandit crew with some white silk. The captain's sudden stop caused the rest of his crew to collide with his back, sending all of them sprawling to the ground.

"Oh, hey guys, how was the sake?" Luffy asked nonchalantly. He finished tying up the knocked-out bandits with the silk he had created from his fingertips; he knew learning the anatomy of spinnerets would come in handy.

Letting the tips of his fingers return to their original structure, he waved at the Red Hair crew, who were slowly getting up from the ground. "Luffy... HOW THE ACTUAL FUCK?!" Shanks yelled as Roo got off him

Luffy shrugged. "I just punched him."

OK- Shanks did not have enough alcohol in his bloodstream to deal with this. A seven-year-old defeating a bandit with an 8,000,000 beri bounty! Not unheard of, but in East blue out of all places? Inconceivable.

"Yeah guys, I think," Shanks got up from the floor, "I think I need more booze, something strong, we'll be returning to the Grand Line" He was not ready for this. What's next? Was Luffy gonna start blasting waves of conqueror's haki?

"Do you think I can get the bounty off this guy?" Luffy asked Makino, who was giggling as the Red Hair crew that stumbled out of the bar.

Luffy ran to the bay to catch up to the pirates who were packing up to leave for the Grand Line again. "Oi, Shanks!" Luffy yelled, breaking the unusual silence of the normally rowdy Crew.

"Ah Luffy," Shanks said from the sidelines, walking up to the child. "Here to see us off?" he said as he ruffled his spiky hair

"Yeah..." Luffy muttered, looking down on the floor; he couldn't help but feel responsible for the crew's departure.

His thoughts were stopped when he felt a straw hat drop onto his head. Luffy looked up to a kneeling and grinning Shanks. "Don't worry, we're leaving mostly cause we stuck around here too long; wouldn't want the Marines to freak out and send out a buster call, now would we?" He stood up to his full height.

"A buster ca-" Luffy managed to whisper before Shanks continued with a dreamy look on his face.

"You remind me a lot of how I was, Anchor; sometimes even how my old captain was" he grinned cheekily, looking back at him. "So, wanna come along?"

It took Luffy a few seconds to start breathing again. Is he serious? Is he finally offering a spot on his ship?

No.

Luffy did want to go on adventures, and the books he read during the time the Red Hair crew was gone had only caused him to be even more excited him more at the prospect. For once in his life, he had some sense of how big the world was... and even if he had wanted to experience it with Shanks it felt…

He didn't want to be under anyone's command.

"No," he muttered weakly, but eyes resolute even with the unshed tears. "I'm gonna have my own adventure," he continued, rubbing his tears away with his forearm. "I'm gonna surpass you." He looked up with a steel gaze to Shanks who was grinning down at him. "I AM GOING TO BE THE KING OF PIRATES!" he bellowed, the sound echoing throughout the town.

Mayor Woop Slap shivered somewhere in his home.

Shank's grin spread further, and was joined by some of his crew's own smiles.. "You're gonna be better than us, eh?" he teased, pushing the hat down on Luffy so it covered his eyes. "Well then, keep this hat safe for me".

There as a sniffle from Luffy

"It's my greatest treasure."

With that, the crew started to board their ship, Shanks following suit. He gazed fondly at the open seas.

"SHANKS!" The captain turned his gaze back to the kid he had high hopes for. "I'LL RETURN THIS WHEN WE MEET AT THE TOP!"

Grinning like his late captain Shanks yelled back "I'LL BE COUNTING ON IT, LUFFY!"

and before you ask- No I didn't know about Sun eater's quirk before I wrote this whole mess- weird how it popped up on BNHA a year later.

That being said- see you on the next one(?)

Also, the discord link to my server if you wanna scream at me there: 5pjUyUt

just add the discord gg and slash to the start and you are golden