Mini tsunamis licked the edges of the beach like overly enthusiastic dogs. Somewhere, Raizo screamed.

“I gave them clear instructions not to use haki-enhanced strikes over open water,” you muttered into your tea, before taking a bracing sip. “And yet here we are.”

Toki smiled, utterly unbothered. “They are men.”

“Ah. That explains everything.”

Nearby, Yamato waddled across the grass with a headband tied crooked over her white hair, shouting “To arms!” before tripping over her own wooden sword. Momonosuke squealed with delight at the splash and promptly followed, despite Hiyori’s cautious protests. You barely managed to catch the youngest as he veered dangerously toward the koi pond.

From the corner, Kawamatsu sighed deeply.

"Shall I intervene?" he called, already standing with a towel in one hand and a baby sling across his chest.

"Not unless they summon the Sea Kings!" you called back.

“Or the giant carp again,” Toki added gently, sipping her tea as Hiyori toddled into her lap and clutched her sleeve like it was a life rope in stormy seas.

The wind carried a shout that sounded like "You cheated!" followed by a thunderous crack and another wave that drenched the lower cliffside. In the distance, Denjiro could be seen sprinting across the shoreline, waving a rake like a battlefield standard.

"…Five minutes until they remember they're married men and not teenagers," you guessed, watching a massive splash arc over the rocks.

Toki glanced up thoughtfully. "Seven, if no one breaks a rib."

You both raised your teacups again.

“Mamaaa,” Hiyori cooed, now chewing on a rice cracker shaped like a crane. You gently wiped her sticky fingers with a napkin and tried not to think about the fact your husband had definitely just shoulder-slammed his brother-in-law into a coral formation.

“They’ll be fine,” Toki murmured. “Eventually.”

“Are we talking about the babies or the men?”

She tilted her head, amused. “Yes.”

You heard them before you saw them.

The crunch of gravel. The squelch of muddy footprints. The unmistakable sound of two extremely large men limping with the pride of victorious fools.

Kaido appeared first, shirtless and singed, sporting a spectacular bruise across one side of his jaw and a large sea urchin stuck to his shoulder like a fashion accessory. Oden limped beside him, hair full of seaweed, grinning like he’d just discovered a new sword technique instead of nearly drowning. Again.

“WE HAVE RETURNED!” Oden bellowed, arms raised triumphantly as though returning from war, not a glorified splash fight. “AND IT WAS GLORIOUS!”

Kaido gave a thumbs up, eye already swelling shut. “Best fight in weeks,” he wheezed.

Behind them, Shinobu walked by with a broom and a dead stare. “There’s a crab in your pants,” she said without breaking stride.

Kaido looked down. “...Oh. So there is.”

You stared at them over the rim of your teacup. Toki did not even blink.

“Are you bleeding?” you asked blandly.

“Yes!” they answered together, far too cheerfully.

Toki looked up from adjusting Hiyori’s hair. “Did you resolve whatever it was you were fighting over?”

Oden beamed. “We forgot what it was halfway through and just started testing how far we could blast each other across the bay!”

“It was epic,” Kaido added, wiping blood from his nose with a piece of kelp. “We made a geyser!”

Toki turned to you. “Should we be impressed?”

You glanced down at the babies now playing with a soggy piece of Kaido’s sash. “Not even slightly.”

Momonosuke, in a show of support, smacked Kaido in the shin with his toy hammer and screamed “Boom!”

“Ha! You raise them well!” Kaido laughed, nearly falling over. Oden clapped him on the back, which somehow set off a chain reaction that landed both men flat on the mat with a grunt.

You leaned over slightly and offered one of the unused towels from the basket. “Here. You may cry into this.”

Kaido took it solemnly. “You mock me, but your husband is missing an eyebrow.”

Oden blinked. “Oh. Huh. So I am.”

Toki poured more tea. “You may both sit quietly in the sun and contemplate your choices.”

Kaido sulked, pulling Yamato into his lap as a distraction. She immediately tugged on his hair and began recounting, with impressive sound effects, exactly how the wave knocked him into a tree.

Oden, meanwhile, tried to get Hiyori to forgive him for being gone an entire hour, only to be snubbed for your shoulder instead.

They both looked at their wives, muddy, bruised, and radiant with pride.

And received nothing but unimpressed silence.

“...Still worth it,” Kaido muttered under his breath, grinning as he wiped a smudge off Yamato’s cheek.

“Absolutely,” Oden agreed, as Toki handed him a bandage without looking up from her tea.

Imao, what Oden and Kaido see when their wives get mad:

“Mako! Mako! Look!” She exclaimed, pointing at a few figures sitting in the distance, various drinks placed around them.

“Hm?” The Zoan piped up, spotting three familiar figures sitting on a low, lying mushroom.

“Oh! It’s Pops.”

“P-ops?” She questioned, glancing up at the blonde.

“That’s our father-yoi, and our Captain,” He clarified, gesturing to the towering figure of Whitebeard

“Mr.Monkey is?”

“Mr Monkey?” He gaped, stopping his flight, throwing the girl up into the air so he could position her on his back, ignoring the small ‘wee’ the girl let out during the quick switch.

“Shans says Monkeys jump on trees, just like Mr.Monkey was before!” she nodded

“Pff- Then yeah, Mr.Monkey is our Captain,” he cackled, rolling with it; he couldn’t wait to tell his brothers about this one.

“Makko! I want to go see Capi!”

“Ya want me to drop you off-yoi?”

“Ya!”

“Alright, brace yourself,” he called, shimming her all the way to his talons once again and beginning his glide, circling the mushroom from above before dropping down and releasing the child.

“Wee!”

“Whoa there!” A voice laughed before catching her, pulling them to his lap, Dokucha letting out a giggle, looking up at Roger.

“Capi~” she cheered, hugging the man, or at least doing the best she could to envelop her small arms around the much bigger form of the Captain; leaning back at the familiar voice of the phoenix calling out to her with a joyful laugh.

“Bye-bye, little Flower! I’m sure I will see ya soon-yoi!” He boomed before giving one last flap of his wings and shooting away, leaving behind a trail of azure and golden flames as Dokucha clapped excitedly at the display!

“Wahahah! Up to no good, I see!” Roger Roared digging his fingers into her, causing her to flinch back with a shriek and a trail of giggles.

“I ‘m guessing that fella was yours?” Roger questioned, and at that moment, Dokucha spun around, finally noticing that Roger was not alone on the mushroom.

“Oh..” she realized, nuzzling closer to the man, any previous energy slowly dissipating in a bundle of nerves.

“Don’t worry, lad! These are good men! Good friends of mine!”Roger exclaimed, ignoring the sour look the blond giant had sent his way at the statement.

Roger, despite his jolly and what might look like naivety at first glance, was not an idiot and was actually more in tune with his emotions than others gave him credit for. He had long since known that, although doing much better, Dokucha was still recovering from a very dark childhood, a trauma that lingered and made itself apparent when certain unknown men approached her. He could easily see the way she shut herself off, the slight tremble of her body, and how their presence brought back the tumultuous memories of her previous ‘caretaker’. He was, however, incredibly grateful that her fear targeted very specific criteria in men; unfortunately, the men in front of her checked all the boxes for those criteria.

“Wahahaha! I am right here, am I not, lad?!” Roger cackled as he knew that the one thing that could inch Dokucha out of their current headspace was support. As long as she knew that she had people at her side able to step in if anything went wrong, then she would slowly but surely let herself go.

“Huh?” She mumbled, looking at the Wanese man, who seemed to have realized this, mirroring her surprise as he repeated the slight noise she had just made.

“Oden, you know this brat?” Whitebeard grunted, glancing at his brother, knowing him, he would not be surprised if the young child was part of his extended entourage of followers, not to mention that, after Roger’s request and, much to his dismay, Oden’s agreement, he was already in quite an awful mood.

“It’s Mr. Kidnapper,” Dokucha concluded, pointing at the man from Roger’s Lap.

At the words, Whitebeard fully turned to the man, a judging look on his face at the implication. Roger too glanced at the man, but he, knowing Dokucha, simply looked at him with an amused look as if waiting for a drama to unfold in front of his eyes.

“W-Wait, it’s not like that, White Kishi!l

In an effort to clear his name, Oden hurriedly explained what had happened when he had encountered the child and the invitation he had extended to them upon meeting her. This gained him another disgruntled look from the devil-fruit user. Taking pity on the man and the hole he kept digging for himself , Roger turned to Dokucha, who, in turn, cleared his suspicions, concluding that the whole accusation stemmed from something his apprentices had blown out of proportion in an attempt to ‘save her’. He had figured as much. As the child's primary caretakers, the duo had become quite protective of her, especially given what they had saved her from that fateful day.

However, as to be expected from a three-year-old, no moment ever grew dull with her around, as soon as the matter was concluded, she had unknowingly started yet another small uproar with her following words.

“You’re Mr. monkey!

Needless to say Dokucha was able to witness first hand Whitebeard’s fabled anger as his annoyance finally reached a boiling point as he for the second time that day lost control of his devil-fruit something that simply threw the Pirate King into a fit of laughter as the crews looked up at their superiors with confused expressions, not knowing how to properly take in the events that had taken place in front of them.

Not only had they witnessed Roger bowing his head to an adversary, but they were also now witnessing the blond Captain blowing a new one over a child’s impression of him. A good portion of them were quite shocked but the members who knew the captains for longer periods of time could on let out a sigh and amused chuckles at the scene, without a thought this would be an event that no one on that island would forget any time soon as It was this day that the future ‘strongest man in the world’ would gain his most hated epithet as the ‘Monkey of the seas’.

“Capi?” Dokucha called, once the man had calmed down, though grumbles still escaped the devil-fruit user.

“Don’t tell Rayleigh” she pleaded

Please ask me more about dokucha!

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