Setting Sail

On top of a cliff overlooking the sea, a young man with a straw hat stared out at the vast blue ocean. Sitting under a tree across from him, a long nosed man was resting for the day to come. To their right, a grave read:

"SABO."

"A great pirate."

"A better brother."

Usopp got up and poured a glass of sake over the grave and said, "Well Sabo, it looks like it's time for our adventure to start. I wish you were here to see it, Luffy has gotten so strong that I'm not sure if I can beat him anymore. I bet you would be even stronger by now."

Usopp sighed thinking back to Sabo's death, "Don't worry brother, we'll be safe and we will hunt down that bastard when it's time."

Luffy walked over holding his hat over his heart, "Wish us luck Sabo, I'm gonna make my dream of being pirate king a reality SHISHISHISHI."

"Well, you ready captain?" Usopp asked with a smile.

"You got it first mate." Luffy said with a laugh.

The brothers walked down the mountain and made their way to the docks. When they got their, it was surrounded by the townspeople. Dadan and Makino were crying telling the boys to be safe, and the mayor just scoffed about how 'no-good pirates came from his town.' Usopp and Luffy laughed at him, knowing he was just too proud to wish them luck.

With that out of the way, Luffy and Usopp left port. Once they left, Usopp broke the silence, "So what now."

"We go where the wind takes us." Luffy said with a smile.

Usopp knocked him on the head and said, "You idiot, that's a good way to starve at sea. I was wondering if you would mind taking up a bounty and making enough money to buy a proper ship."

Right now the boys were on a ship that was thrown together by the towns people. It was too small for even 4 people to ride in. It would hold up for a couple islands but not for any longer.

Luffy thought for a moment, "Who would we take a bounty on? They can't be good people like us and Ace."

Usopp agreed and said, "I was thinking we would agree on this so I got the bounty and information on a group of pirates that rob civilian ships at The Marine base in Goa Kingdom."

Usopp rolled out a bounty for Luffy to see.

"WANTED"

"DEAD OR ALIVE"

"IRON MACE ALVIDA"

"5,000,000B"

Luffy looked over Alvida's crimes and frowned. She has robbed and killed at least 50 people. Luffy didn't really care about robbing people, pirates aren't the most civil of people. But to kill civilians that can't put up a fight rubbed him the wrong way.

"Alright we will take her down, but we are not bounty hunters!" Luffy said in a serious tone.

"I know Luffy, we just need enough money to buy a small ship to get us to the grand line. What would happen if we picked up 2 more crew mates? We would have no way to have them follow us and we'd be embarrassed." Usopp said with a laugh.

With that decided they set sail to the last known island she visited to pick up any information on where she was going. After couple of days of travel they heard explosions out in the distance. Luffy wanted to check it out so we followed the sound.

When we arrived there was a pirate ship bombarding a passenger ship. Usopp looked up and saw the flag matched the Alvida Pirates Jolly Roger. After telling Luffy they both rushed towards the ship.

"KOBY!" An obese woman yelled on the ship as the boys were climbing up.

"Y-Y-Yes Alvida!" A frail pink haired boy stuttered out.

"Who's the most beautiful women in all of the see." Alvida asked with a maniacal grin.

"Who's this hag?" Luffy said as he climbed on board the ship with Usopp perched on his shoulder in his eagle form

Silence. No one on board could believe the audacity of this straw hat boy. Usopp rolled his eyes at his brothers antics, "Luffy, she is the one from the wanted poster that we are here for."

"EHHH! She's even uglier in person." Luffy said with a shocked look. Not only was the boy not apologizing for what he said, even the bird on his shoulder seemed to agree with him.

Wait...

"WHY IS THAT BIRD TALKING!!" They all yelled in unison.

Usopp looked over in annoyance and said, "Luffy, let's just get this done with so we can begin our adventure as pirates instead of bounty hunters."

After saying that Usopp, half transformed and took his pistol and shot one point blank.

After seeing one of her own fall, Alvida finally regained clarity and was boiling in anger. She shouted out, "Kill these brats for me!"

They all rushed Usopp who simply shot one after the other with the occasional swipe with his claws to throw them back. Luffy took off towards Alvida and was hit in the head with her spiked mace.

The only three remains members of Alvida's crew laughed at their captain putting down the kid, but Usopp laughed even harder. "I think you'll find that normal attacks won't hurt my captain."

Luffy stood straight up and smiled and said, "I ate the Gum-Gum Fruit, I'm a rubber man!"

After that he threw his hand back and yelled, "GOMU GOMU NO: PISTOL". After saying that the arm shrunk back at shocking speed and stretched forward at the same speed hitting Alvida.

Alvida was hit with a punch that threw her off her ship. Usopp cleaned up the rest of the cannon fodder and walked into the scared boy with pink hair. Usopp thought for a second and couldn't help but ask, "How did such a timid boy get on a fierce pirate ship?"

Koby was shocked but answered the bird man. He told him how he was fishing out on the sea outside his island and was kidnapped and made to work as a cabin boy to Alvida's ship.

Usopp sympathized with the boy and asked Luffy, "Oy Luffy, can we bring this kid with us to our next island?"

Luffy was raiding the pirates food storage and yelled out, "Sure."

With that they tied up Alvida and threw her on their small ship and sailed to their next island that had a marine base.

"So Koby, what are you gonna do now that you're free of Alvida." Luffy asked.

"I want to be a great and powerful marine and bring justice to people that were like me." Koby said with stars in his eyes. Usopp snickered at that, and Koby yelled out, "What do you think I'm not good enough to be a marine!"

Usopp stared at Koby, which made him lose the nerve he found, and said in a cold tone, "Not all marines are great, some of them are just as bad as pirates."

Koby was furious, he was someone from a small village who was always told that marines were the good guy and pirates are the bad guys. Usopp noticed he was mad and said, "Look it's not all marines that are bad, in fact it's a small percentage. But they exist just like how there are good pirates, do you think Luffy here is such a bad guy? He doesn't have an evil bone in his stupid body."

Luffy looked offended and yelled, "HEY!"

Usopp ignored him and continued, "I just want to give you my opinion, don't be sheep who follows what everyone else thinks and question what you think is right and do that. If you do that everything else will follow in place."

Koby looked at Usopp and couldn't argue, he naturally knew that some people were good regardless of what they were and some were bad regardless. But he still held out a hope that he hadn't chosen the wrong side.

They were silent for a while after that until Koby brought up an interesting topic, "Hey did you guys hear about the pirate hunter Roronoa Zoro? He's supposed to be captured by the marines and is gonna be executed. Apparently they say he's a demon who wields three swords."

"Is he strong." Luffy asked with excitement. Koby said with a scared tone, "They say any pirate that sees him can kiss the sea goodbye. If they are not killed they'll be locked up by the marines."

"Wow, really." Luffy said like he just got a present.

"Luffy, no. We don't even have a proper ship yet." Usopp said with a pleading tone.

"But if he's strong then I want him. Plus we're gonna need a proper swordsman." Luffy laughed while laughing.

"What are guys talking about?" Koby asked.

Usopp sighed and said, "It seems Luffy wants to try to recruit the pirate hunter."

"THATS CRAZY HE WILL KILL YOU!" Koby yelled. "Plus he's locked up by the marines. He will be dead in a week."

Usopp thought for a while on what to do. He was always the thinker between him and his brothers. Luffy looked at his brother with expectant eyes. Usopp sighed and said, "We will see what happens since it's on the way, but if he's a maniac like the rumors say then we won't recruit him. We don't need someone who will kill anyone we meet."

Luffy smiled happily and said, "Agreed."

And with that the boys made their way too Shells Town to pick up their bounty and maybe a new crewmate.