Re-uploaded!


Ever since Ace had saved Luffy from the bunch of adults, Sabo had decided that his friend was officially abnormal.

If you put aside the fact that he was the son of the late Pirate King and had the tendency to pick fights even with people who had only thrown a single lame-assed insult towards Luffy's brain, he had to acknowledge that setting every single shirt he had on fire was definitely not what kids do. Sabo loved wearing clothes, Luffy loved wearing clothes but apparently Ace had something against having clothes. After proclaiming that he wasn't used to wear clothes, which Sabo doubted him greatly because during every minute of his life when Ace was involved, he would wear one. Heck, he was even retaliating when Dadan tried to undress him for a shower though he presumed that anyone would be scared shitless if a huge-ass female were to try to strip them. If Ace weren't being so damn persistent on it, Sabo would choose to never meet Dadan and the bandits.

Back to the topic, aside from strangely being a habit and it looked cool, Sabo had this nagging feeling in his mind that Ace wanted to feel better when Luffy hugged him.

Remind Sabo to keep Luffy from Ace as much as possible although Sabo wouldn't guarantee himself that his life wouldn't be in danger. To encourage that thought, Ace had been speaking about his death solemnly in his sleep that Sabo actually thought that he had done something wrong which made Ace out for his life. He already swore that the time when Luffy had barged in while the blonde was bathing and forcefully made Sabo bathed him too after Ace did was not intentional. It was difficult dealing with a jealous and short-tempered person like Ace.

Speaking of short-tempered, Sabo also found out that Ace rarely threw a temper at Luffy but he would throw one for the sake of Luffy. And that was why, it was quite a sight when he saw them fighting. Sabo would never had dreamt of it happening after losing bets to himself that it would definitely happen in the past. Now, he was dealing with two angry kids who created their own 'country' in badly made doghouses.

"Are you guys serious?" Sabo asked while crossing his arms over his chest.

"Hmph, it's all Ace's fault," Luffy insisted stubbornly. "Sabo can join Luffy's Country if you want."

"Feh. As if he would join yours. If anything, he would rather join mine," the half-naked kid said from his own hut.

Sabo sighed and shook his head at them. Just when he thought that Luffy might be slightly more mature than Ace, they just had to pull a stunt like this. "I think I would rather join Dadan's country. Feel free to drop by when you finally clear your brains."

Which might take quite awhile.

A few crickets had flown by ever since Sabo had returned to Dadan's home and neither of the two had spoken a word to each other. Ace had finally given up and made his way into the forest so that he could cool down. As much as he had changed after puberty hits, some old habits really die-hard. He didn't mean to snap at Luffy after he finished every single meat they had cooked… okay, maybe he did mean to snap at him but somehow, he felt extremely childish. Being responsible and mature was even harder than he thought; if he was ever either one of them, that is.

Luffy glanced at Ace's retreating figure from the corner of his eyes, feeling the urge to follow him out of instinct before he managed to push himself firmly onto the ground. It wasn't his fault that he was too hungry to save some and Ace could afford avoid snapping at him just because of that. He was, of course, sincerely overjoyed that Ace had accepted him as a friend became sworn brother after the painful incident and in exchange, Luffy had worshipped every step the guy took. But emotionally, he often went to Sabo for comfort since the blonde was obviously the more sensible one.

"Stupid Ace…" Luffy grumbled tiredly, he was worn out mostly due to the fight he had with Ace.

Finally, the silence did a nice trick of putting the little one to sleep.

After what it seemed like years in his dreams when it had only been a good hour in reality, Luffy finally snapped himself out of his sleep.

He felt something weird this time. Usually he wouldn't remember what his dreams was about but everyone knew that it would be meat and more meat anyway. However, he could remember every single second of his dream that it was starting to get a little scary. The worst part was that he had even dreamt of Ace dying after becoming a pirate, joining another crew, seeking a fat man named Blackbeard for revenge and getting himself up on the execution platform. Luffy, in his older self, had rushed to a place called Impel Down then Marineford to rescue Ace from his impending doom but had failed because Ace had sacrificed himself in order to save Luffy.

Those 'dreams' had felt so real that they did feel like a part of his memory.

The very last five minutes in his 'dream', he could distinctively see the treasure One Piece in his hand and everything grew bright.

One piece is not a treasure; it is a dimensional object grants it's owner a chance to redeem their treasures, whether if they are already lost or never should be seen again.

The voice had echoed in this head when Pirate King Luffy had picked up One Piece and immediately after words, the image of his friends, Sabo, Ace and everyone that were connected to even his friends appeared in his mind.

He always had the treasure but he had lost it in parts of his life. One Piece had always meant the first piece to start from to gather the rest of the pieces.

"It means that the adventure that I had been just the first chapter," Luffy murmured to himself absent mindedly before he was snapped back to attention.

Outside the 'doghouse', it was raining heavily and probably wouldn't stop until nighttime. Didn't Ace just left his shelter and went into the forest? Luffy's head still felt fuzzy because the memories of his previous, future timeline was in the process of merging with the current timeline. At least he got the basics of him being back in his childhood down or else he would already be wondering why was Ace tiny and not wearing a damned shirt.

As the memories started to catch up, Luffy's eyes widened when he remembered that the more ferocious animals tend to appear during the raining period and it would be difficult for anyone to fight in the rain! Ace also possessed a fire-type devil fruit powers, didn't he (Although Luffy had never thought of going back in time meant Ace had never gotten the devil fruit yet in the first place)? But did common sense still apply to Luffy? No. And that was why Luffy sped out of his doghouse recklessly and into the forest to search for his brother whom would have died again if Luffy didn't manage to get there on time.

After finally being able to have the chance to have Ace back in his life, he'd throw himself into the sea if he were to lose it to an animal!

In the middle of running, a loud roar had caught his attention and he immediately steered his way to his right. His instincts were telling him that this was the right way and he had never thought about questioning them even when his own crew did. At least they had turned out right more than half of the time.

"Ace!" Luffy cried out when he saw Ace's small figure lying against the tree and a bear was hovering over him. He was still conscious as he had only been delivered a single hit after getting caught by surprise from behind. It was still that difficult to listen through the loud splattering of rain and Ace never liked it anyway. "Stop it!" Luffy shouted and immediately activated his Haki which successfully reduced the ferocious bear into a whimpering mess.

"Luffy!" Ace shouted back, stunned that Luffy had mastered his Haki and another important thing.

Luffy did save him from a bear!

Ace had already started planning to wear a paper bag over his head for the rest of his life.

Luffy immediately dove towards Ace and hugged him tightly. God, he had almost lost his brother! Luffy was so worried and scared that he didn't realize Ace was contemplating on hiding his face from the world in pure embarrassment after being saved by Luffy, of all people. And in his child self, no less! And knowing Luffy, he'd probably spill it all out when Sabo asked them what had they been doing all this time. Think of all of his pride crumbling into pieces was enough for Ace to consider returning to the white world in shame.

"Thank god, Ace. I thought that I would lose you the second time," Luffy cried in his chest.

Still a crybaby.

"Idiot! I didn't ask for you to save me-Wait, what do you mean second time?" Ace asked. Sure, he wouldn't remember how many times he almost lost Luffy in this timeline because it was just too many for him to count but he could at least remember as clear as day that this was the first time Ace was almost lost.

"You're the idiot! You died while saving me in Marineford, remember?" Luffy blurted out.

"Marineford… Wait a minute, Lu. Since when did you remember stuffs like that?" Ace demanded.

"After I woke up…?"

Ace looked at him weirdly before deciding to ask more sensible questions which had higher chances of getting sensible answers so that he wouldn't kill his brain. "So let me get this straight. We were adults… probably I was twenty and you were seventeen. After I died saving you in Marineford as you've said you remembered, what happened afterwards?"

"Jinbe brought me somewhere and I started training with Reyleigh for two years to control my Haki. After that I got reunited with my friends and things happened before I became the Pirate King. I found the One Piece and I think that the One Piece brought me back here."

Okay, that kind of made sense judging from the world they had to live in.

"One Piece did?" Ace murmured. It would make sense to bring Luffy's original memories back in time since he had become the true owner of One Piece but why Ace had received the benefits too? "I'm going to have to take a look into that."

"How?"

"We find it, of course."

"Eh, but I already found it when I became the Pirate King!"

"You did? Do you have it with you now?"

"Of course not! I haven't even find it again yet!"

Ace delivered a fine chop onto Luffy's head. "Then we /find/ it!" he snapped.

Which means that they would have to restart everything. It felt a little weird since somewhere halfway through when Ace joined the Whitebeard's crew, he had been so focused on finding that damned Blackbeard and had no interest in the One Piece. Now, everything seemed reversed. Their lives were definitely going to be different but Ace still wanted to be part of Whitebeard's crew in this timeline while he was sure that Luffy would want to find his friends. But at the same time, they couldn't part ways now that they had to stick together to pass on information to each other as often as they could. As easy as it sound, Ace knew it wasn't.

"We have to be pirates again though and I kind of lost interest in being the Pirate King so you can be one."

"Like I would want to," Ace retorted. Leave it to Luffy to not pursue the dream that he had already achieved. At least now he could make Whitebeard the Pirate King without feeling any guilt. "Let's go back and you can tell me about your stories along the way, okay?"

Luffy nodded enthusiastically and stood up. "Go back where?"

"To Dadan's house, of course," Ace replied and started to walk off. A few minutes later when he felt that Luffy was following him, Ace turned around and stared at him.

Luffy tilted his head to the side in confusion. "Ace?"

"Normally, you'd grab me and beg me cutely to stop walking too fast because you're scared that you might lose your way…"

"Eh? But I don't feel like doing that."

"Don't say things like that which will ruin my dreams!" Ace cried out while shaking Luffy by the collar of his shirt.

"Ace is so weird," Luffy remarked casually with a grin.

When Ace and Luffy returned to Dadan's house, Sabo was just sitting casually at the table while looking through a book written by pirates. He wasn't surprised that Ace and Luffy had made up so fast but instead, was getting worried at how they hadn't made up. Sabo gave out a sigh of relief when Ace and Luffy came into view.

Then Sabo noticed something strange about Luffy.

Luffy wasn't grabbing onto Ace like how he would always do so whenever he entered Dadan's hut in fear of getting a scolding for staying out of the rain for too long. Dadan wasn't back in the moment and Sabo was nice enough not to rat them out. Aside from that, Sabo also noticed the look on Luffy's expression. He swore that he had never seen Luffy looking so calm and collected in his life that it was kind of frightening. Did the both of them get into another fight? It seemed very unlikely but Sabo couldn't come up with a reason of Luffy's new change. He couldn't say what for sure but Sabo was certain that the change did happen.

"Oi, what happened to you guys?" Sabo finally decided to ask.

He was taken aback when Luffy suddenly tackled him into a hug.

"Sabo! You're not dead!" Luffy cried out in happiness.

"What the heck?" First Ace and now it was Luffy? Why did his brothers like to randomly speak of his death? Were they plotting to kill him or something? They had to be! "Were you expecting me to die? Which food did you put poison in, huh?"

Instead of replying, Luffy let out waterfalls of tears while continue clinging onto Sabo despite the latter's futile attempt to push him away. Ace just merely stood by and watched the scene with an amused grin. Although Ace hadn't been as melodramatic as Luffy, he could probably relate to the happiness he felt when Sabo was indeed alive in front of them. Everything had changed so drastically which could prove the impact of the cause of Sabo's death. Both Ace and Luffy were so stricken that they hadn't been the same anymore. But now, they would hold the deceased Sabo's words in the past slash future and appreciate his presence now.

Of course, they weren't going to let him die this time.

No matter what means and methods they had to use.

"Okay, that's enough!" Sabo finally exclaimed and managed to pry Luffy off him. "Geez, what really happened to the both of you?"

"S-Sabo… I-I… U-Uuuh…"

"Stop crying or else I can't get what you're trying to say!"

"Nothing much. Luffy is just being weird," Ace replied and hugged Luffy close to him instead. "By the way, we have something important to discuss…"

The look in Ace's eyes really made Sabo wanted to bolt for his life.