Warnings: Fluff

Disclaimer: Eiichiro Oda owns One Piece, but I own my words!

"My fortune is yours for the taking, but you have to find it first! I left everything I own in One Piece."

Ace was three years old when his father died. He couldn't remember much about him except for strong arms, a wide smile, a booming laugh, and a huge mustache.

When his father died, Ace was left with Garp. The very first thing Garp did was drop him off to live with a woman named Dadan. He didn't really like Dadan at first. She kept saying that Roger was bad, and Ace denied it with everything he had. That is, until he heard, more and more often, people bad mouthing him. It made the young child second guess, and he was a little ball of confusion for about a year.

That is, until Luffy entered the picture.

He was playing outside on a sunny day, poking a bug around, when he saw the huge, hulking mass of grandpa walking towards Dadan's hut. Ace hadn't seen his familiar face in a year. A smile lit up his freckled cheeks as he ran forward, latching onto the old man's leg. He laughed and lifted Ace up into one of his arms, and it was then that Ace saw the smaller form Garp held.

"Grampa, was that?" Ace asked, squirming in Garp's grip as he tried to get closer to the small bundle.

"This here is Luffy, Ace. He's going to be your brother from now on."

"Brother?" Ace asked, looking down at the smaller form with a pinched, confused expression. Garp chuckled.

"Yes, brother."

Ace stared at the infant, at the small pudgy face. Luffy squirmed a little in Garp's arms and cooed a little, turning his eyes up to the four year old. He flailed his hands around a little bit. Ace reached out a finger to poke the baby's cheeks and then blinked, confused, when he gripped Ace's finger with his own tiny fingers. Luffy gurgled, content when Ace didn't try to pull away.

"He seems to like you," Garp said softly to the older child, smiling gently at his two grandsons.

"Cans I hold 'im?" Ace asked as he turned his head up to his Grandpa. Garp blinked, slightly surprised because he had thought Ace wouldn't welcome Luffy, before saying, "Once we get inside." Maybe things would turn out better than he at first thought they would turn out.

Ace blocked out the sound of Garp and Dadan shouting at each other. They did this the first time Garp visited, and Ace knew that Dadan didn't like Garp all too much. She was always complaining about him and how he made her take care of Ace. In the end, he decided to ignore their arguing. Luffy was much more interesting.

Garp had told Ace that Luffy was four months old (Ace didn't really understand what that meant, but he figured it was a weird way of saying that Luffy was really little). He squirmed around a lot and made loud noises and occasionally he would smile, as if he had just learned how to do so. Whenever Ace brought his hand close, he would grab it in an iron grip.

"You're tiny," Ace mumbled and then poked the baby's cheek. He still didn't understand how anything could be so squishy. Luffy cooed at the gente touch and reached out, grasping his finger again. This time, instead of just holding it, he brought it to his mouth and began to suck on the appendage.

Ace grimaced at the feel of drool and whined a little in the back of his throat. Luffy was extremely clingy, he realized that, but why did he have to suck on his finger?

Luffy, right then, sent a large, gummy smile in Ace's direction. It made Ace's heart all warm inside, but he didn't know why.

(Maybe it was because here, in his new home, smiles were rarely directed at him. He was always left to his own devices. They only truly interacted when he wanted food. Aside from that, he was companionless.)

"How am I going to afford feeding two D's?" Dadan suddenly boomed, shocking Ace with the intensity of volume in her voice. He looked at Luffy and saw that his eyes were watering and he looked really upset. Ace tensed at the beginnings of whimpering, looking around for help because Garp and Dadan were still yelling and he didn't know what to do.

But alas, he was the only one there.

Ace turned back to the baby and waved his hands frantically, trying to stop him. "Don't cry!" Ace exclaimed and then, when it was futile and he had no other ideas, he scooped the baby up from the blanket he was on and into his arms. Luffy let out a few more whimpers but then the sounds died off and his squirming ceased. To Ace's relief, he let out a contented coo and then snuggled into the older boy.

"You can't separate them when they're like that! If you try, I'll arrest you and all your bandits!"

"Eh?! No way!" Dadan gaped, stuck in place as Garp laughed victoriously.

The old man then walked over to Ace and Luffy. He knelt down to their eye level and smiled when Ace grinned at him, the boy's eyes happy and shining.

"He's stayin', right?" Ace asked, wiggling a little where he sat. Garp let out another boisterous laugh and reached ot a large, calloused hand to ruffle Ace's hair.

"He's going to stay here with you. You better not complain about it."

Minutes later, Garp was gone on the white capped waves, hoping that the world could wait for those two boys with what the government considered to be damned blood lines. Even if it was just for a few years, he didn't want them to be hurt at such a young age.

They didn't have a crib. Ace was pretty sure they weren't going to get one. They had made a makeshift crib instead, from an old box and with a couple of spare blankets. It was in the same room Ace slept in, next to his worn futon on the ground.

The only light in their room came from the moon shining outside of their window. Ace was glad it was there. He had just woken up from a nightmare and this whole year, whenever he had a nightmare, he had great difficulty with it. He no longer had his Daddy to run to for comfort, and the bandits weren't the comforting type.

So he curled up by the window instead ,wiping tears from his freckled cheeks as he remembered his Daddy's stories about the moon, how she was there even when you couldn't see her, how she would always provide comfort after a nightmare.

He sniffled a little and looked down at his hands, at the wetness now covering them. He frowned. Ace hated crying. It made him feel weak, and he didn't want to be weak. He wanted to be strong.

A whimper broke the silence and Ace looked back to the box, blinking before crawling the short distance to the wooden object.

He looked down and his eyes met Luffy's. The baby's eyes were large and wet as he stared up at Ace. Ace brought up one of his hands and ran it through Luffy's hair. It calmed Luffy down for a second, but then the baby sneezed. Some snot got on Ace's hand and Luffy's face. Ace made a disgusted whine as he retracted his hand and reached for a stray blanket, wiping his hand on it. He then lifted it to Luffy's face to wipe it off. Luffy smiled up at him once the blanket was pulled away, making a loud happy sound. Ace smiled back, which got a happy squeal from the baby.

"Babies are weird," Ace whispered to no one as he moved to lay down next to the box. He got under the covers of his futon and then reached his hand out, putting it in the box Luffy was in.

He was asleep in seconds, but Luffy wasn't. The baby gripped Ace's fingers first, and then allowed his eyes to shut. That was how they would sleep every night for at least a year.

AN: I'm sorry that this is so late! I'm gonna say this too - it'll start a little slow like A Brother's Secret, but after that it's gonna be BAM after BAM.

alesfan: Thank you so much! I'm really happy that you liked A Brother's Secret :) I hope you end up liking this one just as much!

Guest: Thanks! :)

seikens: I know, I feel like I took a long time trying to get this up. I hope that this ends up just as good as A Brother's Secret!

MegDBrew: Sorry the update took so long! I hope you liked it :)

Trafalgar-Sev: If you're up to date with the manga, then you were right! :D Don't worry, they'll interact a lot more in the future. For now though, back to the bandits!

FlightWulf: I'm so glad I finally got to posting this sequel! It's in the works and hopefully, it'll turn out just as good as A Brother's Secret! I have big ideas for this story. I'm glad you're liking it so far! Thank you very much!

I'm sorry that I updated this later than I said I would! Also, thank you so very much for reading! :D