Ace locks eyes with his Grandpa as a new-born baby and the world explodes into colour, yellow suddenly everywhere and Ace squints when the sun's rays blocks his vision.

"Oh," Garp suddenly says with a grin, staring down at Ace with something that is warm, comforting.

(Ace would later learn that it is home).

When he meet's Dadan a few weeks later the world turns orange and laughs at her shrieks.

"YOU'RE TELLING ME THE ONLY COLOUR I HAVEN'T HAD IN MY LIFE IS BECAUSE OF THIS BABY!" Dadan screams and Garp laughs.

"It's the same for me. Though, look at the irony, you're both the orange for each other BWAHAHAHA!"

(and maybe, that's why the bandits don't mind taking care of his wounds, claiming things like he is there orange/red and Ace doesn't really get it. Why is he the orange and red? to them but doesn't get a colour in return?

His answer comes in a year, as a five-year old).

In Grey Terminal, it's not the odd to see someone getting robbed but when it's a kid your age who accidently locked eyes with you everything suddenly becomes blue, and yellow, well, you have no choice but to intervene.

"Sabo," He introduces himself first.

"... Ace," Ace does grudgingly.

Sabo seems to sense his hesitance. "Erm... you're orange and red," He says.

"You're blue and yellow, even though I have a yellow," Ace responds and there is an awkward silence which only effects Sabo who shifts every few minutes and Ace thinks, that if he's a colour-mate then, he shouldn't be too bad.

"I want to be a pirate," Sabo shouts, breaking the silence, staring at Ace with blazing eyes.

Ace blinks, mostly at the coincidence. "So do I... I've started to build a Pirate Fund."

Sabo grins and Ace thinks he could get used to it, even for someone with his blood.

"Explain the colour-mate thing to me," Ace asks, mostly demands but after five years of friendship they got used to each other, living at Dadan's certainly helped.

"Well you know the basics already, a person usually only has one colour-mate but well, we have multiple that's actually unheard of," Sabo comments. "Not to mention we can give people colours-that's a bit weird, too but that's about it. And, well, that's the basics. Obviously if you die then your colour is gone, so don't be an idiot. Not to mention it seems that we have two different colours along with all of this weirdness. I have blue and yellow, well a shade for you, and you orange and red."

Ace nods his head, trying to absorb what he can. "That... explains a lot, guess we're just special, huh?"

Sabo grins. "Yeah!"

Though, when the brother lock eyes with Luffy, colour blossoming in their vision, after a few months Sabo laughs, when he questions Luffy.

"I guess, it's the three of us, not to mention Luffy has yellow and red which is a combination of both of us!" Sabo exclaims and they celebrate for no reason, cheering and laughing.

(This is the days they live with smiles and dreams and colours and brotherhood, a bond that transcends blood itself)

And the blue and shade of yellow faded away in the flickering flames.

Ace screams and Luffy shouts and they both cry and sob but the sky and half the sun isn't coming back and there is a gaping hole in their soul, in their brotherhood.

(and sometimes it flickers, the brothers talk and they decide to search, just in case)

Makino is dark green and motherly and Ace thinks he has three mothers, dreaming of the colour his blood-mother would have.

"I'm setting sail Sabo," Ace whispers, tilting his hat to hide his eyes and creates a crew from scratch along with the orange and red in the fire he could only see.

Occasional flickers of yellow, of sunshine because Sabo is golden and Garp is pale in comparison.

Meeting Shanks is nerve-wracking and the red-haired man raises his eyebrows, for a while, looking through Ace. "You remind me of my Captain," He says, drunk but words sincere. "Even though he is dead, how is it... that you wear his colours again?"

(Ace cannot answer but he knows that something is wrong and once he finds out exactly who the captain is he'll hate himself even more).

"I WON'T LET YOU HURT POPS!" Jimbe screams and Ace locks eyes with him in shock, a navy blue colouring his features and they both stare at each other but start to fight once again because their goals are more important.

It takes five days and wet eyes because though it is not the right shade of blue, but it still makes Ace nostalgic, mind wandering away in battle.

And yet he wins, panting and tired despite all, he is here and he is alive.

"You wished to challenge me?" Whitebeard asks and Ace let's his fire loose, allowing his crewmembers to escape. While he hadn't actively searched for Whitebeard, more preoccupied about Sabo, he didn't miss this chance either. "Oh, are you escaping?"

Ace huffs. "I'm letting my crewmembers escape!" He launches himself at Whitebeard expecting a fight.

And he is utterly dominated, falling to the floor and locks eyes with Whitebeard who's eye widen before grinning. "Become my son and sail the sea free," He offers.

Ace gnaws his lips in anger. "NO WAY!" Before he succumbs to narcolepsy, not being knocked out, totally.

When Ace awakes in a bed, his first time, and spots a light, green plant, he swears, rather violently even for him.

The first division commander struts in with a smirk. "We put that there for people who are colour-mates with pops, he can make you see the colour green-"

It's like electricity, like your whole world is with one person and this one person only.

Light blue floats to life and Ace closes his eyes because despite all sabo's blue is not there and Ace can tell the difference dammit.

"That... was a surprise," Marco comments, eyes wide but Ace is already used to all of this and scoffs.

"Not going to stop me from killing your captain," He promises, eyes dark because now he lost almost everything and he damn well won't go back to Dawn Island and start over.

It's Marco's turn to scoff. "Colour-mate and all, I won't let you hurt pops, not that you can."

Ace growls and shuffles past Marco, entering the stupid deck and ignoring the stupid pirates to try to talk to him and ends up right in front of Whitebeard.

"I will never become your shitty son!" Ace spits and Whitebeard only smiles kindly.

"You know," He begins and everyone immediately quietens, like fucking pets, Ace thinks. "I've met Roger who gave me some colour and he died," Ace suppresses a flinch at the name. "But with all my time at sea... I've never met anyone who's given me full colour like you have, son."

Everyone's stunned into silence and Ace crosses his arms, unimpressed. He and Luffy have been doing on Dawn Island, and as a pirate he's been doing, saving random people or something or crushing an organization of some parts and somehow the king of a country is in his debt and giving the king colour at the same time.

This is normal to Portgas D. Ace.

"Yeah, well you wouldn't be the last person who I gave colour, too," Ace responds flatly and everyone gapes at him while Whitebeard chuckles and Ace slinks away, not like a shadow because everyone's attention is on him, but still escapes nonetheless.

And ends up bumping into someone.

"You alright, bro?" The person asks, pompadour pressed into Ace face and he debates burning it all of off before brushing past them and intending to get the layout of the ship but they grasp his arm. "Hey-"

It happens, electric, soul and gibberish, love whatever.

Ace wants Sabo, he doesn't want this, these people who are colour-mates, colour of the soul.

"I'm Thatch," Thatch introduces himself and Ace pry's the fingers off.

"I. Don't. Care," And he's gone until his latest sneak attack against Whitebeard and this continues until the eighty-fifth day where he is literally kidnapped.

They give him an assessing glance, measuring him and for some reason or another, Ace doesn't want to move, doesn't want to protest and when Izo is done he takes the clothes and thanks them.

Of course the sparkly shit happens and Izo is purple.

"I'm male," Izo clarifies, smile on his face though Ace wouldn't know its rare.

Ace doesn't know how to feel about most of the Whitebeards being his soul-mate but doesn't bother now.

It's not like he can do anything, after all the world's been screwing around with him before he was even born.

On the one-hundredth day, Marco sits next to him as if Ace invited him, setting down plates of steaming food and Ace doesn't want to touch it but Marco has no qualms eating his food.

Ace hesitates. "Why... do you call him 'pops'?"

Marco hums before a wide grin stretches his face, all joy and love and fondness, the way Ace would look at Luffy and Sabo.

"Because he call us his sons," Marco responds, tone all respect and awe. "While the rest of the world sees us as outcasts... it's just a word but it makes us happy, yoi. Pops would take in anyone."

Ace finds himself pursing his lips. "Anyone? That sounds far-fetched."

Marco gives Ace a knowing look. "Trust me, it's not as far-fetched as you think it is."

And soon, Ace finds himself outside Whitebeards door, the words echoing through his mind and knocks, throwing all caution out the window.

When he receives permission to enter, Ace finds Whitebeards gaze. "What would you do if even Gold Roger himself had a child who would want to board your ship?"

Whitebeard sets down his book. "Well, I would call him son and love him as a father," Whitebeard answers easily.

Ace frowns. "Yeah, but isn't Roger your enemy?" He protests and Whitebeard laughs.

"We were more friends, than rivals," Whitebeard reveals with a smile.

"I'm Gold Roger's son," Ace revels with a whisper.

"Gurararara, you know I expected a bigger problem then this!" Whitebeard says and grabs his book, hiding his eyes from Ace's own teary ones. "Goodnight, son."

"Night... pops," Ace whispers, leaving the room.

Years pass with Ace becoming second commander and various things happen but Ace knows the most shocking one is happening right now, like right now but let's backtrack a bit.

"Oi," Ace growls, holding onto a strangers bicep to keep them from moving. "What was that for, it wasn't very nice, was it?"

The stranger scoffs, voice all deep. "Yeah? Well you're pirates, the epitomes of nice, I believe?"

Ace narrows his eyes and the stranger looks up at him but Ace knows whatever he was about to say is stuck in his throat because he can see the raging seas in eyes and golden blonde in hair. "...Sabo?" Ace croaks and the stranger looks as shocked as Ace before closing off their expression, emotions, face hard.

"How do you know my name?" They interrogate and Ace grits his teeth.

"Y-you forgot me? Forgot Luffy?" Ace hisses, hackles rising and skin turning red.

"I don't know who you are," The stranger begins, top-hat hiding eyes from view. "I have amnesia, sorry about that. You're Fire-Fist, right? I'll drop by your ship, I have more important things to do." With that he leaves, wrenching his arm from Ace's slacked grip and trudging away while Ace watches, scream in his voice and blue shining brightly and sun's rays being blocked by his hat.

"Holy shit," Ace whispers, eyes wide but throws his hands into his pocket and doesn't think until he get's to the Moby Dick, steaming from anger and well, it was unfortunate Thatch was the first person who saw him.