A/N: Hello! I know I have other stories to work on and My Boy is halfway to having another chapter but I've sorta been down lately and writing just hasn't happened. So when I got the idea to do this story I jumped on it because honestly I haven't felt like writing in months. I've never written a soulmate AU but I'm going to try. It's been on my to-do list for a while and hopefully I'll be able to cross it off. Please enjoy and leave a review! Thank you!

Ch. 1: Cyan

"Sanji!" The small child stopped in his tracks and slowly turned around to face the voice. "What are you doing out of bed?"

"Zeff!" The child grinned and hid his hands behind his back. "I was...just…taking a walk!"

The older man raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms. "Is that so?" He inquired.

"Yes!" Sanji nodded fervently, agreeing with him.

"Then what's this?" Zeff reached behind Sanji and yanked the bag from out of his hands. He pulled it up above the reach of Sanji and looked through it. "Clothes, food, books. This doesn't look like you're taking a walk, Eggplant."

Zeff wasn't stupid and Sanji knew that. "Fine. You caught me." Sanji huffed and sat down on a stool. "I was running away."

"Now why on earth would you want to do that?" Zeff questioned, setting the bag down on the counter.

"There's nothing here for me. No one's gonna adopt me. I'll be stuck here for the rest of my days, rotting away." Zeff rolled his eyes at the dramatics. "Plus. It's boring. I want to get out there and find my place in society as Miss Stanson says. I want to go out and find my soulmate too! No more of this living in black and white mess!" Sanji looked like he held the stars in his hands and grinned as if he was going to rule the world. "I hate living in the dark. I want to see the colors. So if I leave now, I'll find my soulmate and I'll be able to see them!"

"Well," Zeff snorted. "How do you know your soul mate wont come into the orphanage in the next few days or months? What if you get adopted tomorrow?" He waited for an answer but got none. "You think you have your life planned out, kid, but you don't." The stars went back to hang in the sky and his throne was dragged out from beneath him.

"How do you know, old man?" He countered, pouting. "What do you know of the future and soulmates? I bet you never had one. That's why you're stuck here cooking for brats in a shitty orphanage." He crossed his arms and looked down at the ground.

"I once saw the world in color." Zeff grinned as he remembered. "I saw the blue of the sky and the green of the grass." Sanji's head shot up in interest. "Just so you know, this old man isn't as boring as you thought. I know plenty of the future and more about soulmates than you will ever know."

"How do you know?" Sanji asked, leaping up and standing in front of him, his tiny fists balled up in anticipation. "Tell me!"

"What do I have to tell you, Eggplant?" Zeff scoffed and pushed him back down onto the stool.

"You've had a soulmate! Tell me all about it! What were they like? Were they pretty? How did you know they were the one? And the colors! Tell me about the colors! Are they just as beautiful as everyone says they are?" Sanji shot out questions one by one faster than Zeff could process them.

"Hold it, boy." Zeff held up a hand. "This is my kitchen; I make the rules. You get one question."

Sanji looked down in thought for a few moments before nodding and looking back up to face him. "Tell me about the colors! When you first met your soulmate!" He demanded.

"You want to know about the colors?" Zeff asked and Sanji nodded. "Well, to start off they're the most amazing things you will ever witness. The moment your soulmate touches you the world will erupt in blinding light and colors you didn't even know existed. You have this idea of what the sky will look like but then you see it and the sky looks so different than what you pictured in your head." He laughed lightly and shook his head. "When I first saw the colors I was getting punched. By my wife. I still don't know what I did to piss her off but I was drunk at the time so I must have done something incredibly stupid. She hauled off and punched me and the moment her fist met my face I saw color. I thought she'd just hit me harder than I'd ever been hit and I was gonna have some sort of brain damage. But when I came to she was standing over me apologizing and I stared up at her and her blue eyes and realized it was much more vibrant than I could ever hope for it to be." He looked down at Sanji to find him staring up at him in awe. Was this kid really that infatuated with the colors? "What? No comment? Was my story that much of a disappointment?"

Sanji shook himself out of his dazed phase and huffed. "That's a pretty shitty way to meet your soulmate, old man."

"Well, there's no right or wrong way to meet 'em, kid." Zeff shook his head. "You'll understand when you're older. Now get off to bed."

"But-"Zeff cut him off with a stern look.

"If you want something to do tomorrow come down here and I'll teach you a few things." He said to the child's retreating form. "And you might hear more about the colors."

It had been thirteen years since his conversation with Zeff but he remembered the story like it was yesterday. He remembered the old man's face when he talked about the colors. He remembered all the stories Zeff would tell him as he helped prepare the food for the orphanage. Oh the stories he would tell. And Sanji longed for the moment he could see the colors. If only for a second.

But he was twenty-one. And the world was still dark.

He began to wonder if he'd ever see the colors. Most of his friends from school had already found their soulmates. He begged them to tell him about the colors so much they began to turn him down. They'd tell him to wait until it was his turn but he didn't see when that would ever be.

So he kept himself busy with work.

While he was at the orphanage he helped Zeff out a lot in the kitchen and in the end developed a love for cooking. When he grew out of the orphanage he asked if Zeff wanted to open a restaurant with him and after several weeks of stubborn arguing Zeff agreed. "You just want more stories about the colors." Zeff huffed but inside he was really glad the boy had included him in his endeavors. They got a small restaurant space in a higher class side of town and opened up shop. They named it the Baratie.

Sanji poured ever ounce of himself that wasn't obsessive over the color he couldn't see into the food he prepared. This payed off and soon they had a large crowd of people night after night. A few months after they started their uphill climb to popularity they had to start taking reservations. The Baratie was Sanji's own little world.

But the success of his restaurant wasn't enough for him. He felt guilty but he couldn't help it. He needed the colors. He needed to see the colors. It was like a drug just hearing about them. He often wondered if his soulmate would care about the colors as much as he did. Or if they'd just get tired of hearing about him talk about them. He hoped he never got tired of them. How big of a let down would that be?

So he focused on his little world he'd built. He frequented the dining room as much as he did the kitchen. Zeff and Patty, a cook, would always say he'd die of exhaustion acting both as a sous chef and a waiter. But as Sanji's old orphanage director would say, he found his place in society.

Zeff knew it was because he wanted to meet as many people as he could and he couldn't help but feel sorry for the boy. But he didn't see the whole point of searching out your soulmate. He never cared for that sort of thing until it happened to him. He didn't see why the boy craved his so much. He feared that when he met them Sanji would be disappointed. Even though the brat had been a pain in his ass he couldn't deny he cared and worried for him. But even so, Sanji got to work at five in the morning every day to help prepare the food and set the dining hall up and pray that today he would see his beautiful little world in color.

"You should go out more." Zeff said one night after they'd closed for the day. "Your friend Nami asked you to go out with them the other night right?"

"I don't have time to go out, old man." Sanji shook his head and placed a pot back in the cabinet. "Doesn't matter who it's with. Even beautiful Nami."

"Take a day off." Zeff suggested. "You're gonna kill yourself working like this."

"I won't kill myself by working."

"Don't give me that." Zeff grumbled. "You're completely exhausted. I say take the day off tomorrow. Sleep in. Go out and have fun. You're young, Eggplant, you need to have time to goof off"

"Old man- "

"Do you want to make it two days off?" Zeff threatened and Sanji shut up.

"Fine, I'll take off. But you have to promise nothing bad will happen to the Baratie." He pointed a pair of tongs at him.

"What? Do you think I'm just gonna set the place ablaze and streak off into the night?" Zeff raised an eyebrow at him. "No. So get going. Go home and call up your friends. Tell them you'll be free to do whatever you young people do tomorrow."

"Okay, old man." Sanji laughed and grabbed his coat before making his way to the door. He pulled out his cell phone and sent Nami a text saying he'd be free tomorrow if she wanted to do anything.

'Finally! We were going to go out to Shakky's Bar with Luffy and Ace's new friend! I'm glad you'll be able to go! I'd love to introduce you two!'

A/N: And there you have it! The start to this new thing! Leave a review and let me know what you thought or what you think I could do better on! Thanks for reading!