Izuku POV:

"Alright. Anyone wanna tell me what the hell happened to have Perona up and disappear!?" I spoke up with everyone from my crew in the class A common area. "I spoke to Perona probably about a good five minutes before Bakugou calls me up screaming at the top of his lungs that she's gone. So what the hell happened? Someone had to have had some knowledge where she was at the time this went down."

"Actually, she was with me at the time." Marguerite raised her hand before explaining. "She was talking to you during a talk we were having and she was saying how clueless you were about women's undergarments before she got a call from someone. I don't know who it was, but the person made her go paler than she was on a normal basis. Not long after that, Perona said she had something to do and left."

"Hey, why are you guys having this conversation in the common space? Don't you have a ship to do this on?" Kirishima walked over while drinking something for us all to look at Hatsume.

"Hatsume said there was a problem and we couldn't use the Maiden. Mind telling us what that problem is now that we're trying to put pieces together?"

"Yeah umm....someone kinda 'stole' the Maiden." There was a silence in the room before all of us shouted.

"SOMEONE STOLE MY/OUR SHIP!?"

"Yeah. Thing is, someone of this crew had to have known the password to unlatch it into the docking bay. Not counting me, there's only four of us that know the password and if they didn't put it in right, it would cause a massive alarm to happen."

"Ok. So who knows the password? I know I'm one, but who's the rest?"

"Well as you said, you, Bakugou, Kendo and Perona."

Suddenly things started to fall into place. "Ok, so Perona is gone as well as the Maiden. She was also one of the few that knew the password to send out the ship without an alarm going off. I'm starting to get the picture and if that's the case, we need to find out where Perona went mainly because of the orders the Marines gave us."

"Does it have anything to do with Moria?" I glanced at Ryukyu who held out a letter. "I have the same."

"Hey, Ryukyu. Something's been bothering me. Would being part of Midoriya's crew mean you're no longer a Warlord?"

"Actually, Nejire. I'm still a holder of the status."

"Wait, that makes no sense. Shouldn't you have your status revoked if you become Midoriya's underling?" Shinso asked for me to explain what it was most likely on my side.

"Underling isn't the word I'd use, but ordinarily. They're probably waiting because if it's shown I'm holding a Warlord as a crew member that's a top pro, that just makes the Marines lose credibility more. They probably also did this as a way to play the ignorance card to the people."

"Be that as it may, what would Perona leaving us and Gecko Moria have in common?" Itsuka asked for Momo to address the relationship.

"From what I've read and heard from the Straw Hats, Perona was actually part of Moria's crew when they were in the Grand Line. It was his second crew that had three other major members consisting of Perona, a body modified man known as Absalon, and a doctor responsible for their undead army known as doctor Hogback."

"Wait, you just said 'undead army'? They have zombies!?" Jirou was a little worried as Momo continued.

"What Nami wrote down was that the zombies were stitched together former living beings that Moria put shadows inside. Due to his Shadow Shadow Fruit, he could pull shadows from people and forcibly put them inside zombies. Since they weren't living anymore, these undead creatures were able to handle pain, use techniques that are natural to the shadow's owner. This is what made the Thriller Bark Pirates a dangerous crew to mess with."

I thought about what we knew thus far to make some form of theory to what's happening. "If Perona was contacted and then acted strangely, it could be that Moria found her and asked her to return. Because of lingering loyalty still present for her former captain."

"But we can't prove this until we find Perona and find out for ourselves." I thought of Todoroki's comment for a moment before making a decision.

"Ok. First thing's first. We need to go find Moria and complete our task of taking him down. If this theory is right, we'll find Perona with him and ask her ourselves if this truly is her decision and no longer wants to be part of our crew. The info we have on him says he's on his ship called Thriller Bark."

"Only one problem with that objective. We have no idea where the ship is or to get to it outside of walking and public transport." Shiozaki pointed this out for me to rethink my plan.

"Good point. We'll need to get the Maiden back before we go any farther. Hatsume. Do you have a way to track the ship?"

"Nope. Not a chance." She started patting her sides to realize something. "Dang it. I think I left my phone on the ship."

"...You just gave us the perfect way to track the Maiden intentional or not." I pulled up on my phone an app to find other phones to place in Hatsume's number. "Since most phones nowadays can be tracked, we can give the exact location of your phone on the ship. As such..."

"We can find the Maiden! Nice going Hatsume!" Togata praised the inventor before I brought up a red flag.

"This can't be right. Says here, the Maiden's out in the ocean not moving."

"Guess we've got no choice. I got a spare ship in case something dumb happens that should fit us all. Tight fit and no weapons were put on it, but it's better than nothing." Everyone got up and started heading towards the launch bay for ships with Hatsume for the thought of Perona still not making much sense to me.

'She asked me herself. Not only that, but she has immunity from the Marines with a bounty on her head now. Why would she throw away a good position in exchange for an old position with less benefits? It doesn't make sense.'

Meanwhile, Perona POV:

"Kishishishishishi! Welcome back to Thriller Bark, Perona! It's hard to believe that you survived all these years."

"Well, I did what I had to. But it's only natural since I am good at handling problems when I need to." I tried to play off Moria's comment for him to laugh even more.

"Well either way, it's good to have you back on my crew. KISHISHISHISHISHI!"

'That laugh is starting to anger me.' I still felt guilty leaving Midoriya and everyone, but I wasn't able to do much since Moria didn't give me much option. Thinking back on the call, I couldn't help but feel a little for my actions.

"Hello Perona. I hope you had fun playing with another crew, but now it's time for you to return to the Thriller Bark Pirates. Come out westwards of where your crew  sets your ship with it alone. You do this, and I'll let the Green Demon Pirates live."

My call with him didn't last longer with the fact I was here angering me even more. "Now that you're here, we can create a network to complete the plan set into motion."

"What are you talking about?" I asked with Moria showing a room full of new zombies with limbs of pro heroes and villains with mutation quirks.

"Our plan is to create an army of perfected beings. Our allegiance with the Emperor Blackbeard has us working to create an army ready for battle. These corpses are thanks to All For One as well as Blackbeard. We work specifically with the later and when things progress even farther, we'll have these zombies become the Nomu that almost killed the Green Demon at the USJ. SOON! NOTHING WILL STOP US FROM KILLING KAIDO AND MAKING HIM THE PERFECT ZOMBIE TO MANIPULATE! KISHISHISHISHISHI!"

I was mortified, but confused at the same time. Moria was taking orders from Blackbeard as well as an alliance being made between this villain AFO and Blackbeard. I wanted to object to this idea, but I'm ashamed to say I didn't. 'Midoriya. Just stay away. If you come here and try to stop Moria now, you'll just be another human corpse he'll add to his collection along with your shadow being stolen from you.'

Izuku POV:

"Stroke! Stroke! Stroke! Stroke!"

"You know something? When you said you had an extra ship, I DIDN'T THINK YOU MEANT A PADDLE BOAT!" I shouted at Hatsume as she constantly shouted for us to paddle with everyone else having a set of oars.

"SHUT UP AND ROW!"

"WHY DON'T YOU HELP!? MIDORIYA'S STILL NOT AT A HUNDRED PERCENT, SO WHAT'S KEEPING YOU FROM TAKING HIS SPOT!?"

"Because someone has to shout at you all. NOW STROKE!" Jirou felt a little irritated by the comment before we came in front of a large set of doors. Their size was large enough that we could barely see the top from right under the gate with Hado being the first to comment.

"So is this Thriller Bark? It's enormous!"

"From what I remember reading, Thriller Bark is a massive ship that is large enough to be mistaken for an island if you were to see it on a foggy night. When the Straw Hats were in the Filorian Triangle in the grand Line, they weren't able to discover this was actually a ship until much later with it holding the record for largest ship known to mankind." Momo's explanation about Thriller Bark made some sense with the opening to the gates being shut.

"So what's the plan inside? Hop the gate?"

"That's a bad idea, Bakugou. On the other side, there's still water used similar as a shallow docking port so to speak. Considering Ochako can't swim, we'd have to find some way to find an lever or a button to unlock this."

I thought of what we should do before standing up. "Ok. We'll have two teams of three go in with Ryukyu carrying us on her back. Momo, Jirou and Marguerite will go in and find an opening to the gate. Ryukyu, Hado and I will handle finding and defeating Gecko Moria. When all of you are in, find Perona and get her side of the story so that we can clarify all this. Any objections?" Nobody answered for those who were part of the infiltration teams to stand. "Good. Let's get going."

Ryukyu turned into her dragon form to carry us over the gate and onto the ship. As we headed onto the ship, I was able to marvel at the size of the ship even more. "Amazing something like this floats."

"I know what you mean, Marguerite. From what I read. The size of the ship doesn't do it justice on paper as opposed to when you look at it in the air."

How does this thing even float? Look. There's a forest on the ship. Is it made around an island?"

There was a silence before Ryukyu spoke up. "Midoriya. Are you certain you can fight well enough? If you truly think you'll not be a hinderance, that's fine. However, I still believe you shouldn't be here through a doctor's perspective."

"Whether I'm able to or not, this is part of my job description of a Warlord. Also, I wanna hear for myself if Perona really is leaving the crew or not. As the captain, I at least deserve to hear it from her mouth myself."

"You may not enjoy your answer if that's the case."

"I know. But even if I don't, it's still my obligation as her captain to find this out." We descended near the edge of the ship's docking area to see the start of a forest. Looking above, I noticed the sun starting to set. "Ok. Our assignment starts as of now. If we can't find the switch to open the gate before the moon is completely up, contact the people outside and tell them to charge in by force. We want to try and do this efficiently, but also not be afraid to play the muscle card if need be. Let's start heading out."

We all separated for Momo's group to go along the shoreline to see if there's any chance to find something, while mine went into the forest towards what looked like a large castle. "So where are we starting our search for Moria?"

"The castle ahead. I'm not certain, but that would most likely be where Moria is hiding. The stupid onion looking idiot."

"Now there's no need for name calling, captain. We may be pirates, but that doesn't mean name calling is ok."

"Whatever." As we continued to walk, we noticed a ghost flying over to us. It held the same image as one of Perona's with it standing directly in front of us. "You're one of Perona's ghosts, right? Where is she?"

"Get out of Thriller Bark, now!" Perona's voice came through for it to confuse us.

"Wait, Perona could talk to people through her ghosts?"

"Oh right, I never told you I could do this. Anyway, that's besides the point. You all need to get off Thriller Bark right now. If this has anything to do with your ship, it's on the west side of the shore. Take it and leave now before it's too late."

Perona seemed uneasy with telling us this for me to push this a little. "And if we refuse? I'm not sure if you're aware of this or not, but the Marines told me and Ryukyu that Gecko Moria has to be taken down. If that is the case, everyone part of his crew will be taken down as well. That includes you if you truly will side with him." The ghost didn't say anything for a moment before continuing.

"Right now, Moria isn't the type of person you should mess with. Leave now and don't come back." The ghost left with the three of us looking somewhat confused.

"Why does she want us to leave so badly? Is Gecko Moria that powerful?"

"I doubt. He did go against Kaido several years ago when the Great Pirate Era started, but he isn't that significant anymore. The only reason I can think with this fear is that he has an alliance with a powerful adversary. Among them, it's either the League of Villains, Big Mom, or Blackbeard. Since Kaido is on his hit radar, I'd doubt he'd form an alliance with him as well as Shanks wouldn't cause as much chaos as Moria would."

'If I think about it, Blackbeard or the League would be two of the more realistic ones. Now what should we do now then?' I started walking towards the castle again paying little mind to Perona's warning. "We're still going. We have a job to do and I can't let this end as is." Ryukyu and Hado followed me with the sun beginning to go down more. 'Something tells me this is gonna be a long night.'

And that finishes this chapter. See what happens next time with Izuku and the Green Demons facing off against the Thriller Bark Pirates. Hope you all enjoyed and thanks for reading.