The night sky was beautiful that night and Marco ihaled deeply the air. He loved how the star twinkled, laughing above the ocean. The silence was nearly absolute, just the little groans the ship made here an there, the wood that made her moving. Then, a little light flew towards him, innocent and beautiful.

"A firefly -yoi?" He wondered, looking around. It was impossible to find a firefly in the middle of the ocean. Looking closely, he find out that it was a little ball of fire. Frowning, he looked below, just to see Ace walking in all his glory through the deck with little fire balls dancing around him. Marco jumped down the crew nest, landing a few meters from the young man, making him turn. Like this, Ace was beautiful and ethereal. His grey eyes were reflecting the soft light the little balls made, his black hair seemed like silky waves. He could see the splash of freckle here and there on his cheeks. He looked like some mythical creature from a book, all elegance and grace. It stole his breath away to see how gorgeous the man really was. Ace smiled then, mischief dancing in his eyes.

"Be careful." He said, voice deep and warm. "The prettiest, when handled badly, are really dangerous." He said, extending his hand and creating more fireflies.

"You are not Ace, are you?" Another smile. "Who are you -yoi?"

"Oh, I am nobody, my dear."

"But your warning wasn't just about the fireflies, right?" The little balls of fire grew, nearly blinding him with light.

"Just hope that we won't see each other again, Marco the Phoenix." And like that, he wasn't there anymore.

The next morning Marco approached Tion. She snarled to him, but he ignored her.

"Tion, how many personalities Ace has -yoi?"

"If you can't call him Captain, at least show some respect by calling him by his surname. We're not your friends." She huffed. "Let's see...Ace has six personalities, without counting the host himself. Why?"

"I kind of met one of them? I'm not sure which one...I met it just briefly, but it seemed...regal?"

"It's 'ze', not 'it'! They're personalities, not puppies!" She hissed.

"Ze?"

"It's the gender-neutral pronoun. I've heard it somewhere. Since Ace's personalities are both male and female, we use ze." She smiled fondly. "But I don't know any of Ace's personalities that would act...regally. I've seen him act angry, crazy, depressed, motherly and flirthy. Well, Jack flirts like he will die if he doesn't stick his cock inside of something, Heart flirts in a cuter way, but still."

"Too much informations -yoi."

"By the way, if you see Ace flirt with anyone that have a penis run as fast as you can and come to find me, ok? Thanks." And with a smile, she was gone, leaving Marco more confused.

"Denny? What are you doing here?" Gale asked, looking confused at the cook as he entered the dining hall.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, wasn't your turn to watch over the captain?"

"Nope, it was Derek's"

"No, Derek is here" Gale said, pointing towards the table where all the Spades were sitting, all giving them their undivided attention. Silence followed for a few second before Tion spoke, sounding frightened.

"Are you telling me." She started slowly. "That Ace is out there. Alone."

"Guys, do you realize that no one is going to hurt that little firecracker, don't you?" Asked Thatch, irritated.

"That's not that! Captain is in a delicate position and-" Derek started, but Haruta interrupted him.

"Hey, I just seen Ace. Is he sulking again because of his failed attempt to Pops? He seemed depressed..." He barely ended his sentence that Tion was already up and out the hall. "What the-?" He tried to ask but the spades looked horrified and pale. Charlie was the first one to recover and to sprint after the first mate, wile the others tripped on their own feet to get up.

"What's going on?!" Thatch asked, worried. The spade seemed to answer all in the same time with different answers.

"Ok, I think this has to do with his personalities and that's the only thing I understood." Marco calmly pointed out. He was considering following them when a huge shadow covered him. "Pops -yoi?" Marco asked, turning to watch the man. He looked troubled with his eyebrow knotted together.

"Let's follow them, my sons. I have a bad feeling"

It didn't take much for them to catch up with the Spades, the Whitebeard Pirates were fast and Pop's steps were ten time the steps of a normal man. The trip from the dining hall to the deck was silent, it held a sense of urgency and dread in it. They were almost there when Tion's screech reached them.

"Derek! Derek Derek! DEREK HURRY UP PLEASE! I CAN'T HOLD HIM ANY LONGER!"

Tion was kneeling in front of the riling, face against one of the wooden balustrade and eyes gleaming while her arms disappeared from sight, just after the border of the enormous ship, bent towards the ocean like she was trying to avoid something from falling into it. And just like that it hit Marco. Hard.

And then Tion was screaming and he could see smoke rising from where her arms disappeared and Derek was besides her, bodily lifting his captain and Tion was crying and calling Ace's name over and over again, calling him another name that he never heard before -Diamond- and Paul moved to wrap a neckerchief around her hands that were a bloodied and charred mess -Gods and then every member of the Spades were moving, covering both Ace and Tion from them.

Pops was the first to move, kneeling in front of the wall of flesh and muscles and bones that did little to nothing to hide the two inside the protective circle of people. But they moved, letting the other who followed Whitebeard to see a weeping Tion holding Ace to her chest. Just, it wasn't Ace. His eyes were dead and his body was slumped, lifeless. If it wasn't for the rise and fall of his chest, Marco would have deemed him a corpse.

"Child" Whitebeard started, startling Tion. "What happened?"

"What happened?!" Tion snarled, furious. "You all happened! He was fine before you decided to keep him, like a pet! I've met Diamonds only once and while depressed he didn't try to killed them all!"

Almost as if sensing his first mate's anger, Ace stirred and looked at Tion with big, sweet eyes.

"Tion? What happened? We- oh Gods, your hands!" He took them tenderly, with worried eyes. "We are so sorry, we couldn't block him! Your beautiful hands...Ace is going to-"

"Ace is not going to know what Diamond has done." Tion said, voice rising. "Queen, promise me you won't tell me!"

"I-"

"Promise me! He's going to hate himself and Diamonds will appear again!"

Ace-Queen-'s face crumpled as they stared at their first mate.

"Ok, I promise." Tion smiled.

"Thank you, dearest one. Now let's go." She said, helping Queen to stand. Then, like that, they were gone.

Marco didn't see Ace the next month. At least, not his personality. Queen or King were mostly out. She was a nice woman, always trying to help, acting motherly and gentle. He was a bossy, angry man that sounded like a little brat sometimes. His hit really hurt. However, he somehow missed Ace. How his eyes sparkled when he smiled or when he got angry -and he had to admit, it happened quite a lot-, his fierce nature, how he was the sweetest and most considerate person while with his crewmates. He intrigued him, somehow. Not that the Spades would let him or any other pirate near their captain. They made it quite clear, always snarling and hissing and baring teeth and gripped their weapons whenever someone was near their beloved Ace.

"You're stressing them." Denny had said, knives twirling in his hands. "That's why Diamond got out and almost killed himself and everyone else."

The tension was thicker and thicker as Ace's personalities struggled to hide the fact that he burned his first mate's hands. Until, somethings snapped.

It was a cool night when Tion entered the hall, a smiling Ace behind her. Her hands were finally starting to recover.

"Thanks Spades, Ace really needs his food, but you know how he is" Tion said, smiling, as she and Spades entered the dining hall. The room was spacious and full of voices and laugher. They moved until they reached the table occupied by the Spades and by the Commanders. There was a sort of truce between the two factions and while there wasn't friendship, they saw no reason to be unkind to one another -or, at least, civil.

Two trails were already set for them.

"Oh, thanks to whomever got this from me" Tion said, before giving a push to Spade, whom was already with half of his meat inside his mouth.

"Mh? What? Oh, yeah, thanks"

"Spades! You're not three! Don't speak with your mouth full!"

"Yes mum..." The entire table laughed.

"Don't 'yes mum' me, boy, and don't eat so fast" She said, clearly enjoying herself. Spades mad an annoyed sound but kept his speed.

"Wow, does he always eat like this?" Haruta asked. He was next Thatch, whom was in front of Tion. T his left, Marco and then Izo with a mild disgusted expresion.

"Pretty much yes, it's a bad habit. You know when-"

TONK

Tion turned to find Spades faceplanted into his plate.

"Spades!" She and Gale helped him up. His head lolled to the side, mouth open. Tion took her napkin and started clean him from the pieces of meat and potatoes that littered his face and hair. She was just taking out a big piece of potato when Thatch started laughing like a maniac, followed by Haruta and then the others Commanders. Marco was smirking and Izo snickering from behind his sleeve.

Tion startled, astonished. Then her face grew dark. She cleaned Ace's face with a swift movement before putting the napkin down. Slowly she raised her fist over her head. Then, without a warning, she slammed it into the table, successfully shutting everyone up.

"Is it funny?" She asked, her voice cold as the winter islands under their control.

"Well, yeah, he just faceplanted in his food!" Thatch hollered and that earned him a punch square in the nose, making him fall.

"Of course it's funny! The fact that he doesn't have any control on where or when his attacks may happen is so funny! Let's watch him drop asleep in the middle of a street! Who cares if he can't defend himself from anything! Let's see what happens when he falls asleep in the middle of a battle, that would be so much fun!" She shouted, hands in the air and face blushing in anger. "Let's watch him have Cataplexy and lose the capacity of every muscle of his body! If we tire him enough he may fall from the crow nest!" She gestured to Ace's completely lax body. "Because narcolepsy is so funny! Who cares if his brain will go in the REM phase before he is actually asleep, making him have hallucination with no means of understanding what is real and what is not! Who cares if when he wakes he may or may not be paralysed for minutes before he can take control of his own body! Who cares he is lucky enough not to have to deal with eternal sleepiness! Who cares if he drinks alcohol or tires himself too much he will have more attacks! Who cares he can hardly have a partner in his life because sex is a strenuous activity and he will most likely fell asleep in the middle of it! Who cares that his metabolism is so fast he has to eat like 10 man but if he eats so much he will have a narcoleptic attack every few minutes! Let's have a good laugh because he faceplanted in his food!" She slammed her hands on the table so hard it left dents on it. Her breath was short and her face burning. Next to her, Gale had Ace moved so that he could give his Captain a piggyback and his crewmates were all up with their trays, one in each hand. It took a while to realize that they took the trays from the Commanders that laughed. Tion moved forward and took Haruta and Thatch's trays, hands trembling from rage.

"You really don't deserve any respect from us. You disgust me." And she moved, opened the door and kept it open for her crewmates before following them outside, leaving only silence behind them.

"What happened?" Thatch asked, looking stunned Whitebeard sighed.

"That, my dear sons, it's what stress can do to a person."

"Tion...I'm not saying they were right, but...you were a little harsh maybe." Denny said, looking unsire. Gale sighed, placing a hand on Tion's shoulder.

"I don't care." She said, looking pained, on the verge of tears. "I can't take it anymore." She sniffed. "This is not what I wanted. Why did Ace had to go and challenge Whitebeard?" Tears were streaming on her cheeks now. "I want my home back." She whispered. She was tired, so, so tired. They all where. So, they pressed one against the other, crying both on the inside and on the outside.