"What the fuck." Wren can't help it that those are her first words out of her mouth so early in the morning spoken not as a question but full of disbelief as her eyes survey the room in front of her and Luffy.

As they take in the torn fabric scattered around the room with select pieces spelling the words 'FUCK OFF' and Wren can feel her blood start to boil.

She had made it a point not to swear around Luffy for as long as she could, and to give herself props she did make it a little over two weeks since she dropped her last verbal bomb.

It was part of her own personal training while on the Red Force surrounded by people who thought she was a sweet and innocent child not realizing that, according to her mama since she had no memory of it, one of her first words was 'dumbass' and wouldn't that has given the crew of the Red Force a collective heart attack should they have learned.

But this, this she was willing to drop her silent oath at the brazen and hate filled action.

"Woah." Luffy's voice was breathless as he padded into the room a few steps ahead of where Wren stood stock still with a puddle of water forming under her from her bath only a handful of moments before. "What happened?"

It wasn't hard to figure that question out.

Ace had been 'asleep' on his cot still covered by the blanket Wren had thrown at him during the night, but she had known better thanks in part to her Observation Haki telling her he was really awake and just laying them pretending to sleep, but she had ignored him in favour of stealing Luffy away to the bathroom so that they could wash off the activities of the day previous from their bodies.

There was dust in her hair, and it bothered her endlessly.

She had expected Ace to have disappeared by the time they got back, made it a point to take extra long washing up even if it annoyed a handful of bandits who wanted to use the only bathroom in the hut but they scurried away when she turned her hardened gaze on them.

She hadn't expected him to tear up the blanket.

"It's nothing." Wren strode forward and made a point of dragging her foot through the fabric spelt words eliminating them from existence. "Come on, let's get dressed then we'll go get some food."

If there was anything to pull Luffy from whatever he was focusing on it was mentioning food, meat in particular he would be at that person's side in a heartbeat with big wide eyes and a mouth going a mile a minute repeating the word 'meat'.

There was a burnt orange colour shirt on the floor, obviously one of Ace's, that she threw on as quickly as she threw her red hair up into a high ponytail and tied her ever present royal purple bandana around her neck in a loose and easily undone knot.

For once, she was the one dragging Luffy from their shared room hoping that she would be able to catch Ace in the living room/dining room area of the hut where everyone sat and ate their meals.

There was an unspoken agreement between Wren and the bandits; she didn't interact with them outside of meals and they provided those meals silently and without question even if it was only the simple bowl of white rice.

So when she strode right up to Dadan, who was both in the middle of a conversation and her meal, and let Luffy go get the food he was still chanting about as all talk ceased as the older woman with the orange coloured hair finally took notice of Wren standing in front of her with what she hoped was serious yet obviously angry look on her face.

"What do you want brat." It was more a statement then a question as Dadan's voice, drenched in the stench of alcohol hit Wren's senses but the girl in questioned never faltered.

There was such a stark difference between this woman and her papa when it came to the morning after drinking most of the night away. Where her papa always made the point of brushing his teeth and washing his mouth out so Wren could never smell the alcohol on his breath, Dadan and her bandits never made the point of doing so.

"Where's Ace." There were three ways she knew Ace wasn't in the building anymore. The first was just from not seeing hide nor hair of him when she walked through the hut, the second being the lack of daggers being burned into her back so he obviously wasn't hidden in the room among the bandits and the third was the fact that with a shirt burst of Observation Haki Wren couldn't find his aura anywhere in the building.

From the corner of her eye Wren could see Luffy plop down on the floor beside her but she never broke eye contact with Dadan even as the woman was obviously trying to intimidate her into backing off.

She never grew up with one Foley Tifa and compared to that woman Dadan was nothing more than a small rat dog barking at anything bigger than it

Dadan shoved a forkful of what looked like bacon and hash browns in her mouth, "Why do you care. You got a crush or something." She didn't wait to be down chewing before speaking, spattering food and spit on the ground with each syllable.

Ignoring the comment about even liking Ace, Wren could feel her expression drop even more if that was possible, where the woman even got that ridiculous notion was beyond even Wren's comprehension. The young red-haired girl could count on one hand the amount of time she and Ace had spent in each others presence outside of sleeping hours where they had to share a room.

"Why do you care." She deadpanned back absentmindedly pushing the offered bowl of food from Luffy back towards the raven-haired boy and continued staring down the much taller woman. "Where did he go." There was an assertive tone in her voice, her anger slipping out even as she tried to reign it in.

Dadan turned away from her, shoving more food in her mouth and taking a swig of her drink, "Out." Was her annoyed response to Wren's own. "Now leave me alone brat."

Turning on her heel, her hair whipping back from the force almost hitting her in the side of the face from just how long it was getting from where it was sitting in the high ponytail she had it in. "Let's go, Lu." She didn't even wait for the younger boy to get up and follow her and was almost at the door by the time he was even up on his feet.

Her own wooden soled foot meeting the front door to force it open and the first obvious evidence of just how angry she was as the black receded from her leg as she strode over the once ventricle standing door that was now lying horizontally on the damp ground.

Closing her eyes and casting out her senses to try and find Ace since he couldn't have gotten far enough to escape her Observation Haki abilities.

There were many animals in the area around them, the most obviously dangerous and should be avoided at all cost animal was the large cat - her money was on it being a tiger from the shape and lack of mane - about a kilometer away to the northwest.

A red human shaped aura dashed its way over to her side and from the shape of it Wren knew it was Luffy catching up to her with one hand holding his - her papa's and the late pirate king's - straw hat to his head so it didn't fly off in his rush to catch up to her.

But there, about three kilometers away to the south, was an orange aura standing underneath a deep blue aura who was crouching on what must of have been a tree branch from the way it was moving up and down and a hand kept being shot out and held against something sturdier.

It wasn't hard for her to guess just who those two were, and her assumption was further solidified by the fact both human shaped auras, boys, were holding staffs on their persons.

"Why are your eyes closed Wren?" Luffy's voice was right in her ear and Wren could feel a flinch travel up the length of her body as her eyes shot open and she had to clench her fist and dig her nails in to her palm to stop herself from shooting Luffy a heated glare not meant for him. His expression lit up, "Are we playing a game!"

A game. That could work in her favor.

Since Luffy liked Ace it wouldn't do her any good to find Ace with Luffy in tow. A game though, if she claimed to be playing a game and Luffy took off in a different direction then where she would be going it would benefit her greatly so she could meet up with Ace, no Luffy around, and deal with the older brat without ruining her relationship with the younger boy.

"Yeah." Her voice was distant as she stared ahead. "We're gonna play a game of hide and seek." She lost that distant tone in her voice as her words came out crisp and to the point. "You go hide and I'll count to one hundred before coming to find you."

"Okay!" Came his exuberant response and she hasn't even gotten to three before he had completely disappeared, swallowed whole by the forest around them.

A quick burst of Observation Haki told her just what she needed to know, he had gone in the complete opposite direction that Ace and Sabo were in, almost in the direction that she knew that large cat was hunting in.

He would be fine. He had survived getting separated from her the day before, had survived the days he spent alone before she showed up and from Charlotte's memories of the Before that she now had, he would survive like he did in the original story.

With fire licking the corners of her eyes, Wren took off in the direction she knew the other two boys were in.

Ace was going to pay for what he did.

For not being that much older than her, those two boys could cover a huge amount of ground just by themselves and every time Wren thought she was getting closer to them they would always be just that bit out of her reach.

By the time she caught up to them, the sun was high in the sky and the heat was beating down on them making her mood significantly worse and increasing both her annoyance and her anger towards Ace.

Sabo would be clear of her wrath; he hadn't done anything wrong and she couldn't go off on him now since Wren didn't know him outside of what Charlotte's memories had supplied over the years.

Both boys were sitting in a large tree, crouching more then sitting, with their backs to her with their two pipes tied to their backs to keep them out of the way when the boys didn't plan on using them.

Untying her bandana and quickly retrying it to keep the stray strands of hair that had fallen from her ponytail up and out of her face, she strode to the base of the tree, coated her foot and her leg just above her knee in Armament Haki, reared her leg back and, with all her might, roundhouse kicked the tree, hearing a mighty crack as she did, and watched as the whole thing shook nearly causing both boys to go tumbling off.

"Ace!" She hollered up the tree, the Armament Haki receding slowly from her leg and starting to form on her right hand even as she tried her best to will in completely away. "Get down here you ungrateful brat!" She narrowed her eyes as she met what Ace thought to be an equally heated gaze, but he was sorely mistaken on that part.

Sabo was smartly inching away from Ace as Wren and the raven-haired boy stared each other down.

"What do you want, creep." He shot at Wren as he stood to his full height, which wasn't much taller than Wren's own height, pulling the staff from his back and jumping down from the thick tree branch both he and Sabo had been on coming to stand just a mere foot away from her with an annoyed look on his face bordering on being angry.

"That blanket." She spat between gritted teeth as she clenched her fist tight and willed the Armament Haki to recede. Now was not the time for them to see someone use Haki. "Why'd you rip it up." She eliminated that distance between them coming to stand with her toes touching his own and her chest touching his, feeling each breath he took.

"Why do you care, creep." His voice was full of venom as he spat his words at Wren.

That got her hackles raised, "Why do I care." She jabbed a finger into his chest with a bit more force than necessary causing Ace tossing stumble back from the force, yet she continued following him with each stubble backwards he took her finger jabbing every few seconds. "Why do I care." Her voice got steadily louder with each word and she wouldn't have been surprised if they could hear her all the way over in Foosha Village but right now she didn't care. "Because, you ungrateful brat, it was a gift to me. And the only reason I gave it to you is because you were so pitiful last night." She seethed feeling her blood still boiling as she pictured the once soft and whole but now ruined blanket. Sure she might have gotten it from some weird woman but it was still a gift and her mama taught her that even if she didn't like a gift from someone she had to use it at least once and with this one she hadn't even gotten the chance.

"I don't need your pity." He screamed back in her face, spit hitting Wren on her cheek and narrowly missing her right eye. "And I don't need no shitty sister, you fucking creep."

Wren knew she was the type of person to be level-headed about ninety percent of the time with only a few outlying situations where her anger would flare, and she would do something rash. One of the first instances of that anger was when she was four and broke that kid's nose back on Volca for insulting her mother. There had been a time about a month or so after that when that kid whose nose she broke found a bigger friend to try and hang up on her with but that encounter ended much the same as the one previous to it.

This was the third time she let her anger fully manifest.

She didn't know one hundred percent what word it was that set her off, if she had to guess it would have been either Ace calling her a 'shitty sister' or a 'fucking creep', but she knew that her blood was boiling and she was seeing red before her mind clouded over and the next thing she knew was Ace was on his side on the ground, one hand held to his face as blood slowly trickled down his chin from his mouth, staring up at her with fire in his eyes as she slowly drew back her hand, she was half surprised there wasn't an Armament Haki coating on it, from the proper follow through position it was in after she obviously, having put the pieces together, punched Ace in his face.

She didn't even try to help him up, she didn't even attempt a half hearted apology, just shot Sabo a look that froze him in place as he stepped on a dry branch and broke it as he attempted to get closer to her and Ace.

Turning on her heel, Wren all but stomped away from the duo, fingers still clenched tight into fist, only turning back to catch the rock thrown at the back of her head by an Ace that was now standing up right with a look of pure surprise on his face as Sabo failed to hold him back from throwing the rock.

She could have retaliated, should have even, but he wasn't even worth it this point so she just dropped the rock, ignoring how it now have five perfect indents from her fingers, to the ground and stalked off into the forest in search of Luffy.

Maybe...maybe she acted too rashly, maybe she should have tried better to reign in her temper. It was only a blanket after all and there was no use getting so mad over Ace ripping it up, she hadn't even used it yet so for all she knew it was terrible at doing its job.

Wren plopped herself down on a tree stump, pulling her hair out of the ponytail it was still in and methodically pulling it back up, so no strains were in her face as she mulled over her thoughts.

It did both her and Luffy no good if Ace was nothing but angry with them, and her punching him did nothing to soften him up to them it only worked to push him farther away, but she had just been so mad and it seemed like the best reaction at the time.

Sighing to herself and wiping away the thin layer of sweat on her brow, Wren angled her head up to look at the sky as she heard a flock of birds flying over head.

How nice it would be to just fly away from her problems like those birds could, how nice would it be to just leave this island whenever she wanted with whoever she wanted to take with her.

Except, she wasn't a bird and she couldn't fly away from any of her problems or her mistakes, she had to stay here and deal with them herself and if that meant swallowing her pride and apologizing to Ace then she would have to do it.

Sometime.

Just, not now.

Pulling her bandana back over her head to cover the top of it, Wren sent out a short burst of Observation Haki to find Luffy only a couple dozen meters behind her in a tree, crouching down and trying to hide himself in the leaves.

An apology to Ace could wait, the boy could use some humbling in her opinion, right now she could focus on Luffy and making sure that the rest of the day with Luffy was better than the first half dealing with Ace.

She also needed to replace the destroyed blanket when she got back to the hut, maybe she'd borrow a jacket or blanket from one of the bandits. What's the worse they could do, hurt her? she's already proven that she can bend metal with he bare hands and they already keep a wide berth from her since then so she can assume no one will question her taking something of theirs.

After all, what is the chance it was even theirs to start with; they were bandits.

Shitty Garp, dropping first Luffy into the bandit's life and probably dropping the Creep on them as well, dropping them into Ace's life.

Ace can't help but grumble as he stalks through the dense forest, his hand tightening and loosening his grip on the shale shape of his pipe as Sabo, smartly, followed behind at a safe distance watching out for the two of them like Ace should have been doing but he was to distracted by the two brats occupying his room back at the hut.

He can already picture the two of them, Luffy all but worshipping the ground the Creep walks on, always there as it's shadow with that big stupid grin on his face as the Creep watches with those freaky eyes it has, watching each move someone made and never backing down even as it was obvious that he was stronger then it.

He can't help but use his free hand to rub at his throbbing cheek, his tongue behind his thin lips slowly brushing over his upper row of teeth and getting caught on the new empty space that had been created when the Creep got a lucky cheap shot it.

If he had been properly prepared, he would have been able to dodge the punch.

Sneering at the mere memory of it, of one second being standing toe to toe with the Creep, staring done those creepy looking soulless eyes and the next second his face being in so much pain and laying on his side on the ground staring up at those creepy eyes.

One of the jungle animals, a small rat like thing that doesn't eat meat, scurries by him out of the way as he wildly swings his metal pipe to knock away a branch hanging low and in his face.

Vaulting over the last hurdle, his muscles and legs burning with the stretch, he breaks through the foliage coming to the top of a cliff overlooking the sea, waves hitting the rocks below and shooting up high enough that he gets hit with the mist from the impact.

It won't be long now until both he and Sabo have amassed enough money to leave this rock, to live by no ones rules but their own, no expectations to love up too, no pressure to be something he's not, and no shitty Garp or his shitty grandson.

But more importantly, no shitty Creep watching his every move and giving him pity presents. Or ruining his day so badly that he didn't even get a chance to go find treasure

Out there, on the high sea, he can just be Portgas D. Ace, son of no one, he can just be known as who he is living under no one's shadow but his own. He can just be the boy who dreams of freedom, of making a name for himself by his own actions and he doesn't need anyone to help him with that.

Except, maybe Sabo.

It was as obvious as the day was long that the blonde-haired boy, coming to sit beside him as they watched the sun start to set over the horizon, was from a background of privilege. The way he knew about certain items Ace would have just called junk and tossed over his shoulder, how was he supposed to know that the fancy paperweight he carelessly overlooked was from some guy who died over a hundred years ago, the way he would hesitate before joining in to search through the trash that the people behind the wall through into Grey Terminal, but the most damning evidence from when Ace first met him was how soft the blonde's hands were, they were the hands of someone who never had to fight to live, to survive in this world.

But the blonde pulled his own weight so Ace was willing to overlook his past and never asked about it, much like how Sabo never asked about his.

"How's the face?" Comes Sabo's question. Its innocent in intent, that much Ace knows about his friend and as such he holds back from hitting his own friend in the face to give him a matching bruise on the opposite cheek. That, and his pride won't let him reveal to the other boy just how much the punch hurt.

He has taken down men four times as height and five times as wide by himself and here he was knocked to the ground by some creep that didn't even come up to his chin and had to look up to stare him down.

So, while holding back as much heat in his voice that he can, he shapely retorts, "'s fine." He pointedly ignored how each time he moves his mouth that shoots another jolt of pain up his face and he has to bite his tongue to stop from crying out.

He'll get the Creep back tenfold one of these days.

"You sure?"

Shooting up to his feet, knuckles white from his grip on the shaft of his pipe, he spins on his heel leaving Sabo to scramble after him. "Let's go." He shoots down Sabo's line of questioning with that short and sharp statement.

There was still enough time in the day to go hunting and possibly bag one of the tigers that prowl the forest around the bandit's but so that he can have some meat in tonight's meal.

Because the stupid crybaby that is Garp's biological grandson can't hunt to save his life and he's never seen the Creep hunt anything since it showed up.

When he gets back to the hut dragging a wild boar behind him for Dadan to skin, cut up, and cook, he kicks open the wooden door, the top half coming undone so it hangs at precarious angle inward and almost hits one of the taller bandits in the forehead.

He had split with Sabo not long ago, the other boy having head for Grey terminal after they finished counting the amount of treasure they amassed so far, it's almost enough for him and Sabo to buy a small ship, just something to get them off this rock before they can start collecting more treasure and gaining a crew of their own.

He can already picture himself and Sabo standing side by side with a faceless crew standing intimidating crew standing behind them, willing to die for them at any moment and holding weapons bigger than they were tall.

What he doesn't expect is the delicious aroma that hits his nose the second he steps over the threshold.

He absentmindedly tosses the boar he caught at the bandit that almost got smacked in the head, his nose leading him further into the hut, into the kitchen to be exact where a simple bowl sat on the large table with the barest hint of steam still rising from whatever was in it.

Eyeing the bandits with fiery glares from the corner of his eyes, Ace stands on the tips of his toe and can just barely get his hands around the still warm bowl, not hot enough that it burns him but just hot enough he can feel it through the clay the bowl is made from.

If there is one thing the bandits have taught him, if one could even call it that, is to take everything from anyone because if they were careless enough to leave it alone then they didn't deserve it.

So even in the bandit's own hut he had no shame in steal from them.

The stew, because he could tell it was one, was littered with various vegetables, gross but he could eat around them, sitting in a brown liquid with mystery meat bobbing up and down as said liquid sloshed around the bowl with each time he moved.

Dipping a finger into the liquid and swirling it around, he pulled it out just to stick it in his mouth.

The explosion of taste almost caused him to drop the bowl.

But the sounds of Garp's crybaby grandson screaming in joy from somewhere in the back of the hut ruined his mood almost instantly.

Pocketing a wooden spoon from the drawer of various spoons, he doesn't look back as the door completely falls over as he heads into the woods around the hut, positioning himself in one of the large trees just outside what was once his own personal room before the other brats showed up.

He watches as both brats come back into the room, Garp's grandson racing ahead as naked as the day he was born with spuds covering small portions of his body and the red haired creep comes in with its hair wrapped up in a towel wearing yet another of his shirts carrying some sort of fabric in its arms.

He shoves another spoonful of food in his mouth, grimacing as he bites into a carrot but swallows it begrudgingly.

Watching as the Creep tries to wrangle the crybaby into some clothes for the night, he pointedly turns the other way when Creep lifts his ruined, because it wore it, off its body to replace it with another of his shifts after getting it soaked while trying to get the crybaby into his clothes for the night.

He goes to shove another spoonful of food in his mouth only to find the bowl now empty, not even half a spoonful left sitting in the bottom so he chucks the bowl somewhere into the forest, not even turning to look when he hears it shatter into a million pieces.

It's not his problem.

"Song. Song. Song. Song." He can hear the crybaby from his spot in the trees and his scowl deepens on his face as he watches the crybaby dance around the room before jumping on Creep and knocking it over. Their laughter coming through even the wooden walls of the hut.

"Okay, Lu." Creep's voice is quiet, and he has to strain his ears, almost falling off the branch he's sitting in from leaning so far forward, to hear it. "I've got a song my mama used to sing me, but you've got to settle in for the night before I'll start singing."

He doesn't hear much out of the room, and with the door being shut by one of the two creatures in the room and the light being shut off leaves with being unable to see what happens either. But it's not long before he hears the most wonderful sounding voice from his once private and peaceful room, his place of solitude.

"Of all the money that e'er I had

I've spent it in good company

And all the harm that e'er I've done

Alas it was to none but me

And all I've done for want of wit

To memory now I can't recall

So fill to me the parting glass

Good night and joy be with you all

"Of all the comrades that e'er I had

They are sorry for my going away

And all the sweethearts that e'er I had

They would wish me one more day to stay

But since it falls unto my lot

That I should rise and you should not

I'll gently rise and I'll softly call

Good night and joy be with you all

"A man may drink and not be drunk

A man may fight and not be slain

A man may court a pretty girl

And perhaps be welcomed back again

But since it has so ought to be

By a time to rise and a time to fall

Come fill to me the parting glass

Good night and joy be with you all

Good night and joy be with you all"

It's almost too soon that the voice stops and all he can hear around him is the eerie silence of the forest as the wind whistles through the branches and it's not long before he starts to feel the full effects of the weather at night on the island and he's shivering, pulling his knees up to his chest and wrapping his arms around them in hopes of staying warm.

He knows there is a perfectly good room only a few jumps away, that keeps out the cold as best it can and perfectly good bedding just waiting for him but he won't set foot in that room while Creep and the crybaby are in there and it's not because he's scared of Creep, he's not, it's just...just...just that he doesn't' want to be in there and the fact Creep hurt him has nothing to do with it.

Yes, that was it. He just didn't want to be in the room, and it wasn't because of Creep being in there with its strong punch and weird sixth sense to be able to turn around and catch a rock thrown at its head without looking. Not because he was scared of it.

Something hits him in the face, smarting his bruised side and causing him to nearly fall out of the tree if he hadn't caught himself in time.

It's a jacket, thick and heavy and definitely belonging to one of the bandits from just how large it was and looking over in the direction it was thrown from he meets the cool stare of Creep with a leveled one of his own.

They say nothing and he doesn't know how much time passes between them before Creep lifts its hands up and pulls the window back down with a thunk and disappears into the darkness of the room.

Part of him wants to rip up the jacket, much like he had the blanket it tossed him the night before, and his hands even get in the position to tear it down the middle and it is only because at that moment mother nature decided to batter him with the coldest wind that night that he finds himself dwarfed by just how large the jacket was and protected from the elements.

The jacket did a great job of keeping him warm and Ace can start to feel his eyes begin to droop as the night drags on but he never leaves his perch, never sets foot in the hut nor the room since he is fine just where he is and would fight anyone who argued differently.

He won't thank Creep in the morning, that much he's sure of, because he doesn't need its pity but he does thank the jacket for being so warm as he finally drifts off to sleep for the night, content even with the two creatures sleeping in his room and that song still playing in his head.

A/N:

Wow, been a second.

So A LOT happened in my life since the last update.

Chief among them all was the fact my father had a sudden cardiac arrest in the middle of the night and, as doctors told us later, was basically dead for twenty five minutes.

He's fine now, no organ or brain damage at all, but it has been tough this last little while and have had no inspiration to write Wren's story.

That being said, I DO plan on continuing this story it will just be slow.

As always, please remember to comment as that does help motivate me to write.