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It was a quiet morning.
Soft sunrays streamed through the salt-scratched windows, catching dust motes mid-dance. The wind rustled in lazy gusts, slipping through wooden beams and ruffling a few stray Wanted posters. Outside, the waves lapped at the shore like they were catching up with an old friend.
All in all, it was the kind of morning normal people would call peaceful — the kind perfect for resting, reflecting, or napping with a full belly.
Unfortunately, the Red Hair Pirates were anything but normal.
They were chaos in loose shirts and laughing scars, a crew that never stayed still longer than they had to.
(“We’re not that bad,” Shanks had once said. “Speak for yourself,” Benn replied. “We’re not Luffy,” Lucky Roux offered. “Oh thank Oda” Yasopp muttered.)
So, naturally, the stillness of the day was nothing short of agony.
The infamous Emperor’s crew was currently sprawled across the bar in varying degrees of undignified boredom. Empty bottles and tipped-over mugs formed a lazy minefield around them.
Shanks, perhaps the most pitiful of all, was slouched in a chair with a glass balanced on his head like it was some ancient ritual of focus and restraint. His single visible eye was glazed over, staring at the wooden ceiling as if it might suddenly entertain him.
Benn Beckman, ever the second-in-command, watched his captain with a mixture of pity and resignation.
“Three hours,” he said aloud. “Three hours since your last ‘I’m bored’ announcement.”
“That’s personal growth,” Shanks muttered.
Lucky Roo was half-asleep at the table, one cheek pressed to a plate of crumbs. Yasopp sat beside him, cleaning his rifle for the sixth time that morning.
Then-
The door exploded open with the enthusiasm of someone who had never met consequences.
A screech of hinges, a crash of boots, and suddenly the peaceful bar was filled with the sound of terrible decisions being made loudly.
“Make way for greatness!” a voice hollered, shrill and overcompensating.
“The Future Pirate King is here!”
The Red Hair Pirates didn’t move.
They just slowly turned to stare at the spectacle unfolding like a bad play on a drunk stage.
A man strutted into the room wearing a vest that was definitely too small, a straw hat that looked like it had been rescued from a bonfire, and a fake scar drawn across his chest with what might’ve been berry jam. He posed with both fists on his hips, grinning like the world owed him applause.
Demaro Black, self-proclaimed 'Straw Hat Luffy'.
Behind him, a disaster crew followed,
Fake Zoro, a guy with green-dyed hair and a katana so bad in condition that it would send many swordsman crying , immediately challenged a chair to a duel.
Fake Sanji tossed out cheesy lines to a cutout of a lady.
Fake Nami was trying to showoff her non existent beauty.
Fake Chopper was… just a fox in a pink hat. No one was entirely sure how that happened.
Yasopp squinted. “Is that an…actual fox?”
“No,” Lucky Roux said, barely lifting his head, “it’s performance art.”
Benn dragged his cigarette long and sighed. “Should we do something?”
Shanks didn’t answer. He was still balancing the glass. But the eye under his red hair was open now, watching.
Demaro jumped onto a table, arms raised like he expected fireworks.
“I’m Monkey D. Luffy!” he shouted to a confused and mildly disgusted audience. “I’m the man who defeated all my enemies with one punch! I sunk Enies Lobby. I’m so powerful that even the Navy Admiral begs me for mercy!”
A fork clattered to the ground.
Shanks blinked.
Yasopp snorted hard enough to choke.
“I wanna see how deep this man’s delusion goes,” Benn muttered.
Demaro wasn’t finished.
“And the War of the Best?” he bellowed. “Please! I walked into Marineford, punched kizaru, made Akainu cry, I would have even saved the old man Whitebeard but he decided to not follow me and look just where that got him."
The room fell absolutely still.
The fake crew cheered like they hadn’t just insulted half of pirate history.
Shanks stood up, approached slowly, hands in his coat pockets, his hair casting over his eyes.
Demaro didn’t notice him until he was nearly there — too busy acting out an imaginary fight against the Admirals using poorly mimed punches and explosion noises.
“Excuse me,” Shanks said, voice calm, polite. “That was quite the story.”
Demaro grinned, mistaking awe for admiration. “You a fan?”
Shanks chuckled lightly. “Something like that. I knew Whitebeard, you know. I was there during the war. Would you… humor me? Tell me again how it went down?”
Demaro puffed up like a pufferfish on caffeine. “Hah! Of course, old man. Come on, I’ll give you the full rundown.” He slung an arm around Shanks’ shoulder without a shred of hesitation.
Benn didn’t even try to stop the smirk forming on his lips.
Yasopp leaned over to Lucky Roo. “You think we should warn him?”
Roo shook his head solemnly. “Nah. That guy’s about to get his whole world restructured.”
Some Time Later…
The Fake Straw Hats were busy ordering everything on the menu and arguing over whether Nami could charge her own crew interest on their bar tab.
Then a scream echoed from the alley.
Not a dramatic scream.
Not even a painful one.
It was quiet. High-pitched. Shaky. Like it belonged to someone whose mind had just been lightly snapped in half.
They rushed outside.
Demaro Black was kneeling in the dirt. His fake straw hat lay crumpled beside him, like it had abandoned him out of shame. His eyes were wide, glassy, unfocused.
His lips moved slowly, again and again, the same sentence repeated like a prayer scratched into a jail wall:
“Never… look at the son of Red-Haired again… Never… never look at him…”
Fake Zoro took a step back. “What the hell happened to him?!”
Fake Sanji turned pale. “He’s broken!”
From the alley, a bartender quietly flipped the sign to Closed. Inside, the Red Hair Pirates were laughing so hard Yasopp actually dropped his gun.
Beckman leaned against the counter, sipping sake. “That’ll teach ‘em.”
Back in the alley, Demaro continued to shiver.
One Month Later – Somewhere in the New World
The wind was stronger now, pushing the sails of the Red Force as it cruised calmly under a pale-blue sky. The Red Hair Pirates lounged on the deck, basking in the sea breeze and waiting for the next bit of chaos the world would throw at them.
Benn Beckman sat cross-legged near the bow, flipping through a fresh stack of newspapers while Lucky Roo and Yasopp argued over who cheated last in cards.
Shanks, as usual, had a drink in hand and one leg swung lazily over a table.
“Anything interesting today?” he asked, not really looking.
Beckman stopped at a page and blinked. Then he chuckled. Then he burst out laughing.
“What is it?” Yasopp called.
Beckman turned the paper around and tapped the headline with one finger.
“Fake Straw Hats Attempt to Recruit Crew at Sabaody, — Beaten in Seconds.”
Below it, a blurry transponder photo showed Demaro Black mid-scream, mid-flee, with his fake crew in shambles around him.
But what caught their attention was a straw hatted head running in the distance with navy soldiers in toe.
A grin graced the crews face before,
Lucky Roo almost choked on his food.
“Didn’t that guy swear never to look at anchor again?” Yasopp grinned.
Beckman took a long drag of his cigarette. “Apparently he got over it. Or forgot. Or both.”
Shanks finally looked up and smiled.
“Luffy’s gonna love that.”
He took a slow sip and laughed — quiet, genuine.
“World’s finally starting to spin again.”