DISCLAIMER: One Piece and its characters belong to Eiichiro Oda. I do not own anything, nor do I claim to.
AN: Crossposted from ao3. This is essentially my take on the opening to the first Ace novel ft. some domestic pre-tragedy fluff for Roger and Rouge. Very underrated pairing. And the 'Rouge was a pirate' head canon is strong with this one- subtly, of course. Possible trigger warnings include mentions of mass infanticide. The Baterilla infanticide was DARK and like literally no one talks about it. Also, ripping this straight from ao3 because I'm lazy:
'There are a lot of good scenes in the Ace novels but this one is my favorite, hands down. And about the updated scene, Rouge turned down Roger. Who is this man who drunkenly tried to fight her and immediately offered to take her on an adventure after getting his ass handed to him? Who does that? She was a little intrigued by him, sure, but there was no way she was going to join his crew. She had her own adventures! But what the hell did the man's first mate mean when he said "He's got another one" ?!? Good thing she won't see any of them, especially the man, ever again.
Oh poor, poor Rouge.'
Comments are appreciated but remember, don't be an asshole. Now, let's get on with the story!
The father is dead.
The man had always wished for a child of his own— a son — yet when the time came, he was long gone. Allowed himself to be arrested and paraded around like a cow to the slaughterhouse, to be beheaded before a ravenous sea of onlookers. Like vultures, people of all ages and creeds came to see this monster bleed red. And he loved it. He always loved flashy things, after all. And so— despite his looming death which hung in the hanging executioner swords, the man only found it fitting to smile. To tell the world of his treasure, to tell them to find it.
(It would remain unknown as to whether he knew how his final moments would follow his child, still unborn, for the rest of its life.)
Unbeknownst to the onlookers, though, as the man had taken this dirty secret to the grave, was that he had left behind a widow in foreign seas. A woman who, amidst a mass infanticide being conducted on her home island, could only mourn her husband's death in silence. She stands at the edge of a cliffside thousands of miles away, newspaper clenched tightly in weathered hands.
She wants to scream. She wants to tell the world the truth, not the lies that the journalists are feeding the public. She wants to see him again, most of all. She wishes that she had said something the day he had left, wishes that she had hugged him tighter, had convinced him to stay— because she's selfish.
(She's a D., after all.)
But she doesn't. She doesn't scream, doesn't fantasize about what can't be changed. All she can do is let go of the newspaper and watch as it flutters out to the red tinged sea, where her husband's spirit surely lies, and weep. For her lover and her child, who remains hidden under the billowing fabric of her dress. All she can do, in this moment, is brush her hand against the tiny bump underneath and beg her unborn child to wait a little longer.
She is the mother.
It's 20 months in total that the baby remains in her womb. The months are marked by days spent with her hair on end, trying to ignore the screaming of families as she rocked listlessly in the rocking chair, murmuring tales of her adventures to her child, who, for their part, remained silent. At least they're a good listener, she'd thought once, in an attempt to quiet her racing heart as the screaming steadily grew closer and closer.
(The day that they first kicked, she had been torn between tears of happiness and horror, as the marines were then conducting feel tests on women, the bastards.)
She had grown to hate sunsets, their beauty marred after one too many evenings filled with the screeching of newborns. And when the guns were silent and the babies dead, she was plunged into silent nights of split lips and muted groans, as, in a twisted nightly ritual, she allowed herself to double over in pain, letting freckled hands pull at strawberry blond roots as she willed her body to delay the pregnancy for a little longer.
20 months and then the child is born, and she allows herself to cry as they are handed to her. It had taken everything in her power to delay her child-son's - birth, and she was well aware of what that would cost her. But she didn't care. She had accepted it when her husband had left, and she accepted it even as she became hyperaware of her slowing heart, of breath coming short as the wet nurse cried out something she couldn't make out, not with the laughter of her husband ringing in her ears like a nostalgic song.
Wahahaha! Rouge, eh? Say, do you want to go on an adventure?
In her last moments, both in life and as a mother, she would kiss her son's freckled forehead and allow his warmth to bleed into her cooling fingers.
Our son is beautiful.
Then she dies, arms going lax and body still, while her son, unaware and squirming, continues to breathe.
He doesn't know what death is yet, doesn't know that he's orphaned. He doesn't understand that he's regarded as a living sin, nor does he understand how happy others would be if he just dropped dead. But, he doesn't need to know that just yet. For now, in the darkness of a cabin room lit by a single candle, he continues to live, lungs burning as he wails, unaware of what the future holds, outside of these walls.
…
January 1, 1500
Baterilla, South Blue.
What a trick of fate.
For it was on this crimson tinged island, whose lost generation would make it infamous, that the son of the Pirate King was born.
[…]
"Ace?" Rouge questions, face scrunching slightly as she sits on the couch, sinking into her husband's side.
"It's a great name, ain't it, darling? Gol D. Ace, it slips right off the tongue!" Roger booms, laughing as he wraps his arm around the lithe frame of his wife, who only scoffs.
"Gol? Who's to say that our child will go by your last name? I think my surname sounds better. Portgas D. Ace, slips right off the tongue," she mocks, playfulness in her tone as Roger pouts, something that only he, a full grown man, can make cute.
"Gol sounds better to me," he grumbles to himself, and Rouge snickers.
"Fine, you big baby, our child's surname will be Gol," she huffs dramatically, and Roger cheers. But then a second passes and then she's poking at his side, head tilting to meet his eyes as she questions, "But why Ace? Is it because it sounds similar to Anne?"
Roger's expression changes almost immediately. At that, Rouge squints suspiciously, her suspicion only growing as, almost comically, a bead of sweat appears on her spouse's forehead and his lips purse. "J-just thought it sounded nice," he replies, uncharacteristically hesitant.
Now that is even more confusing. She doesn't understand. Why is he acting like a child that's been caught with his hand in the cookie jar? It's just a name, she can't fathom why-
Wait a second.
"Ace," she begins slowly, dragging out the name on her lips, "now that I think about it, I've heard you say that name before."
Roger squawks. "No I have not!" he defends, but the way he's suddenly not meeting her eyes anymore tells her all she needs to know.
"Roger," she starts, and now Roger is panicking, because he knows that tone of voice, and he's afraid, rightfully so. "Husband, love of my life," she continues, "you want to name our child, our firstborn child, after your cutlass?!"
Gol D. Roger, Pirate King, the most powerful man alive and the ruler of the seas- splutters. "Ace is not just a cutlass!"
"I KNEW IT," she gasped indignantly, and pushes herself from Roger's side to punch him in the ribs with a haki coated fist. When he bends over in pain to clutch his side, she pulls at his ear, ignoring his cries of 'Honey please stop' and 'ow ow that hurts' to hiss "A cutlass, Roger. A cutlass!!"
This goes on for another minute before Roger desperately amends, "But it sounds nice, doesn't it?! You said it sounded nice too! CanwekeepthenameandcanyoustopthathurtsOW-" he finishes as Rouge finally lets go of his ear, now an angry shade of red.
Though she let up, Rouge continues to bore holes at her husband. But as she watches him, blue eyes taking in the man that she loves, who challenged her so long ago, when they were young and stupid and had nothing to their names. The same man, now nursing his ear, who broke down her walls and made her feel loved for the first time in her life, who proposed marriage amidst a raging storm, back their days started and ended at sea. As much as she wanted to be irritated, she knew that she couldn't stay upset for long. Not with him.
Eyes softening and mouth quirking, she sighs. "Guess it can't be helped," she says, closing her eyes, and she doesn't need them open to know that Roger is staring at her incredulously. "Ace is a good baby name, and we don't have any other ideas, so it can-," she's cut off when Roger suddenly pulls her into a kiss, eliciting a squeak from the woman.
...
The argument is forgotten as she throws her arms around his neck, pulling away for a brief second to smile, her own signature D. grin spilling from her lips and then they're kissing again, and she never wants this to end.
She wishes that this could last forever.