Did Someone Say Anime Trash?

Dracule Mihawk arrives at Grand Line Playgroup ten minutes early every single Tuesday. He has a personalized gothic embroidered bag for both of his children filled with snacks, changes of clothes, water bottles, first aid kits, and a book for him to read while his two children play.

He wears matching nail polish with his daughter, Perona: today, she chose pink with black accents. He has parenting down to a fine art, everything always perfectly planned for any circumstances. Zoro takes out a collection of sporting equipment and begins kicking around a soccer ball as he waits for his friends to join him. 

The next to arrive is Donquixote Rosinante. He always attempts to get there early: set up his variety of bags to ensure his son, Lawrence, has everything he needs to enjoy his time at playgroup. His hair is a blonde, fluffy mess of mopped curls, his clothes disheveled and askew, but his smile is always cheerful despite his constant exhausted exasperated state. 

Law is a quiet child, not really engaging with Perona as she sets up a mock tea-party, nor Zoro as he kicks the ball against the wall. He, instead, opts to sit quietly alone and read a picture book in comfortable silence. 

Mihawk offers Rosinante a moist towelette, gesturing wordlessly to his lips, cheeks and right eye where Law graffitied art with permanent marker on his face as he slept. Rosinante gives him a gratuitous smile, huffing his laughter as he scrubs at his face with the towelette. 

The next to arrive is Rosinante’s old work colleague, Bellemere, with her two daughters in tow. Nami and Nojiko were walking arm in arm before rushing off to join Perona in her tea party. Bellemere gives Rosinante a clap on his shoulder, nodding her acknowledgement to Mihawk before taking her elected seat. 

As the clock ticks over to 10am: a small bundle of nervous, chaotic energy bounces inside the door and over the walls. This flash of black hair was followed immediately by a small blonde child that stares, unblinkingly, at Law. Dadan is exasperated as she carries an older and asleep Ace in her arms, attempting to catch up with Luffy to rein him in and set up. 

Rosinante springs into action, offering to ferry Luffy towards his regular playmate, Zoro. As Luffy nearly joins Zoro, he is instead drawn to the sticker book Law is holding containing bugs, beetles and arachnids. Luffy becomes entranced by the stickers: and he and Law begin cataloging them by shape, size and type over pages of lined paper. 

Dadan sighs, already exhausted although her day has barely begun. Rosinante smiles and fawns over the two dark-haired boys before resuming his seat beside Bellemere, talking about the latest gossip at his old workplace and the shenanigans his colleagues' love lives.

As if on queue, Ace wakes up and immediately springs out of Dadan’s arms, hurrying over to Zoro and joining him by kicking the ball against the wall. Sabo backs into the corner of the room and glares with his pale, blue eyes at Perona’s tea-party with intrigue. 

After Dadan, in comes Benn Beckman with his niece, Uta. Uta bounces on her heels as she runs over to Sabo, doing all in her power to make the small blonde smile instead of glare. She has a cheery disposition, guaranteed to always get a smile out of the quiet boy the longer she sings and pulls faces at him.

Zeff is the next, his young son, Sanji, sprinting towards the soccer ball and easily stealing it away from Zoro. They immediately get into a heated fistfight: legs and limbs flying as they butt heads as to who's turn it is to kick the ball next. Mihawk sighs, immediately rising to his feet to play referee to the match as Beckman places Uta's bag beside Perona's. 

Arriving late, and with his two adoptive sons Koby and Helmeppo, strolls Garp. Dadan glares at him, up turning her lip in a snarl as Garp shepherds his boys into the room. The tension is thick between these two due to Garp's history of dropping off children at Dadan's and not returning to raise them himself. She refuses to help with the latest two additions to his family, although she cares for them greatly. Sabo nods at Koby, Helmeppo scoffs at Uta. 

Another late arrival is a larger gentleman with his quiet and older daughter, Robin. Sir Crocodile is dripping in luxury brands, gold rings and smells of expensive colognes. Robin immediately humors Perona, Nami and Nojiko by playing mother in their tea party adventure. 

“Mihawk,” the larger man gruffy nods in acknowledgement. 

“Crocodile,” Mihawk mirrors his tone, gesturing with his chin to take a seat beside him. Sir Crocodile takes his seat before unrolling the newspaper tucked beneath his arm and beginning to read. 

As the children interact together, the more talkative parents swap parenting advice amongst one another. 

Rosinante asks for support with Law's current food aversion. How does he get this child to eat grained carbohydrates without him gagging about the fact it's bread? Dadan is a seasoned expert in parenting at this stage, still ignoring Garp as Garp speaks to Mihawk about his blonde son’s latest interest in kendo. 

Bellemere joins in the conversation, Mihawk leaving as the topic changes to work and joining beside Beckman who is silently brooding on the chair beside Crocodile. 

“No Shanks today?” Mihawk quips at the larger man. 

“No Shanks today,” Beckman parrotted in return with a disgruntled and gruff growl. 

As if the mere mention of his name summoned his presence, in comes the red-haired Shanks in a lazy and cheerful stupor. His socks are raised to his knees, tucked into some comfortable sandals on his feet. His cargo shorts are tied loosely on his hips by a brown belt, and his patterned shirt is open to expose his bare chest. 

Glasses are lying lazily on his head as he extends an enthusiastic smile at the children before acknowledging the adults. An enthusiastic chorus of “Uncle Shanks!” echoes throughout the playspace, a flash of small bodies immediately moving to tackle and engulf the redhead in a warm embrace. 

Shanks falls on his ass, holding high his coffee cup as he laughs at Luffy, Uta, Ace and Sabo as they enthusiastically clutch at him with grabby hands. Their faces all shine with the utmost adoration at the redhead, who shoots Beckman and Dadan a wink while mouthing: “I'm still the favorite.”

Beckman sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose as Dadan rolls her eyes at him. 

The adults are finally all gathered for their children’s weekly playgroup, the kids settle into playing amongst themselves once again. Shanks offers Beckman a smile before offering him the half-drunk coffee cup. The taller man takes a sip, choking on the liquid as the surprising burn of warmed alcohol scorches his throat so early in the morning. 

As their meeting draws to a soft close, a knock at the door interrupts their close knit conversation. 

“I heard there was a playgroup in here?” a gruff voice rumbled at the door. White hair and the scent of tobacco immediately sprung through the hallway. In arrived a large gentleman, another common associate of Garp, Bellemere and Rosinante who immediately sprung up to greet him. 

Smoker presented ushered a quiet child into the room, her uncertainty was one the children knew well. Immediately, Luffy sprang up from his arachnid archiving with Law and went to introduce himself to the girl. Smoker smiled at the interaction, nodding to Tashigi as an indicator for her to go ahead and play, before joining Bellemere and Rosinante. 

“Finally decided to foster, Smoker?” Bellemere smiled, embracing him into her warm and welcoming arms. Smoker returns her gesture, tapping her on the shoulder and releasing her from the embrace. 

I loved the 2000's, so this was a real treat to design. I was only cognitive for like a couple years of it but i still remember a lot of the fashion from when it was going on. ESPECIALLLY. the short sleeves over the long sleeve shirts. 2000's loved their layers.

So Luffy was pretty easy to design. He was the first one i designed. i love when theres an easy translation for the Sunny and Merry into AU's.

Ace is very heavily inspired by Avril Lavigne. I was having trouble with designing him, but then Complicated by Avril came on the 2000's playlist i was watching/listening to for inspiration, and suddenly i understood everything. It all made sense to me.

Ace was M A D E for this au. I was thinking that as i was drawing him, but then i realized that Ace literally was made in like 2001 so... yeah. he was made for the 2000's.

Sabo was the last one i finished, i wasnt feeling too inspired with him, but i talked with friends who were more cognitive during that time than I, and one of them provided me a very helpful article about fashion trends at the time that included football and basketball jerseys. I put him into each of those, but none of them fit him quite well. I then put him in a baseball jersey, and although it makes him look the 𝓌𝒽𝒾𝓉𝑒𝓈𝓉, it fit him best. So i kept it.

I did get to put Usopp in the basketball jersey though so it wasnt all for naught.