It's past midnight here, which means today is my birthday :DDD (I feel kind of old now) And, as it's my birthday, I'm updating most of my stories to celebrate ^^

Also, next Monday I'm starting exams, so I can't make any promises in regards to updates until at least mid-June. I might update something, but 'might' is the key word here.

Anyway, can you believe I'm updating so soon? xD This isn't a very good chapter, I'll admit, but it's a necessary one, so I hope you don't mind.

Beta-read by Aerle :)

Chapter 7

Ace's prediction turns out to be correct. He has to camp that first night after walking the whole day, of course, but by the time he stops he is close enough to town that he reaches it in less than two hours the next morning. He could have pushed it and arrive late the previous night, but he decided it would be best to camp than to spend some money to sleep in a bed somewhere. He enters the town at around the time most shops open, he is going a little short on sleep, and heads straight for the closest bus stop he located in the map, from which he knows he can reach a shopping mall. He has already put in an inner pocket of his pants the money he will spend on food, but he will leave that for last because that is the heaviest out of everything he wants to buy. Marco's clothes come first.

The bus is mostly empty by the time he boards it, because rush hour is over and most people who works in the morning are already at their job places. It is when he notices this that he realizes he has been very lucky, because for all his planning Ace hadn't even thought of checking the day of the week, and he would have been forced to wait an entire day had it been Sunday. As it turns out, it is only Thursday.

He chats with a nice old lady on the bus who so happens to be heading for the mall just like he is, and receives from her some recommendations on where he can find books for children. She at first looks at him a little strangely when Ace asks —because Ace doesn't know anything about those books, and he doesn't feel like running around libraries looking blindly for whatever might work— but when he spins a tale on how he has this little nephew he wants to buy the books for —and damn, it's hard not to laugh at the thought of Marco as his little nephew— she smiles at him and, not only tells him some good places to find children's books near the mall, she even recommends good teaching ones. Ace thanks her profusely when they step out of the bus.

But, as he has said, clothes go first, and it isn't long before he finds himself browsing piles of pants in search of something that will fit Marco. His idea is to buy him a pair of shorts like the ones Ace lends him, and another of jeans because the weather is bound to get a little colder at some point, even if they have been lucky so far and —aside from that day it rained— they have had very nice weather.

There is a man browsing pants nearby, and he gives Ace a weird look when he pulls out the measuring tape and checks the waist of the dark blue shorts he has chosen. He has the paper with Marco's measurements held in one hand and looks at it. They are too loose, he decides, and throws them back on the pile, looking for a smaller size. Once he has the model in a size that will fit Marco well, he decides to measure their length only because he can. He frowns, because they will reach right to Marco's knees, and Ace doesn't quite like the idea, so he puts them back on the pile.

He moves to the next one, and a pair of somewhat longer pants catches his eye. They are a blue color, though it could also be called greenish or grey depending on the light. They seem longer, and he thinks they should reach past Marco's knees, and they will fit Marco way better. Ace likes the idea, tighter pants means he will get a much nicer view of Marco's ass, and, with that thought in mind, he starts his measuring again in search of what he thinks will be the perfect size. By now, the guy who is also browsing clothes next to him is giving him a disgusted glare, as if he thinks Ace is some kind of weirdo —probably related to his sexual orientation— for everything he is doing before choosing the clothes.

Ace makes a point of sending him his most threatening glare.

Ace has never been great at combining colors. It is no secret, and he is perfectly willing to admit it himself: he has certainly had it pointed out to him often enough to accept the fact. Still, he thinks the blue jeans he chose for Marco as a second pair of pants would fit with almost anything, and that, he believes, gives him more freedom to choose Marco's shirts.

It's been a debate, really, deciding between shirts and tees, but finally Ace has settled on two shirts and no tee for now. It may be because he likes how his own shirt looks on Marco, and it may also be because Marco has a thing for walking around with said shirt open, and he can't do that with a tee. He has found a purple one. It's a bit of a strange color, but he thinks it would look good on Marco. At least, he wants to see it on him. Now he has the help of a clerk, who very obviously checked him out before offering her assistance. She found strange that he wanted to measure the shirt, until Ace explained it is a present and he wants to get it right. Now she is doing the measuring herself, which Ace is very thankful for, because she is much less likely to mess up than he is. She has also recommended him to buy the second shirt of a beige color, because it's a much more neutral one than the purple one, and she assures him it fits with the two pairs of pants he has chosen.

Ace is willing to accept any advice on fashion he is given, and he smiles and thanks her once he has both shirts in his shopping basket.

Now Ace has a little problem. Should he get Marco underwear? Marco has been going commando the past three weeks, and Ace can't say he minds too much, because it has made certain things easier. There is also the fact that Ace has absolutely no idea of how to explain the purpose of underwear, and he can already imagine any attempt at it would most likely end with a complete lack of clothes on them both. And, honestly, Ace himself has a thing for going commando more often than not, he only avoids it when he has to go to class or somewhere at the very least mildly formal. He has barely touched his own underwear in this trip, and not at all since Marco joined him.

He decided he can always buy Marco underwear later, when they leave the forest.

That leaves the issue of shoes.

Choosing shoes, Ace decides, is harder than he had expected.

The first choice, given that they are staying in a forest, would be a good pair of boots, but Ace can't see Marco accepting to wear something so restrictive when he is so obviously comfortable walking barefoot. Still, he needs shoes, because he will have to wear them when they come back to town, and it would be best if he got used to them before that moment. It leaves Ace with the option of buying a pair of sandals, but not just any pair will work. He needs ones that won't slip out easily during either training or whenever Marco goes hunting —because Ace is sure he runs, then, and he can't be distracted by lost shoes— but they can't be too complicated to put in place, either, or Marco won't be too amenable to the idea of wearing them.

That means Ace is now checking every single pair of sandals available, discarding most of them for one little detail or another. The few he likes, he asks the clerk for a pair of a size larger than the one he would need, though sometimes the one that would fit Marco is two sizes larger instead of one. So far, he has measured five pairs of sandals, both in length and width of the two feet, in search of the ones he thinks will fit best. The clerk is glaring in a very annoyed way at him right now.

"Can I help you?" asks a timid female voice next to him.

Ace turns to see a slightly nervous looking clerk looking up at him. She has a light blush on her cheeks, and is looking more at his forehead than at his eyes. Ace can't blame her for being nervous, as he has been staring at the display before him for way over twenty minutes now. He smiles.

"Nah, I'm just trying to figure out my boyfriend's size," he tells her, and she blushes to the roots of her hair, mutters something and scurries away. Ace chuckles and turns back to the display of condoms.

He hadn't even thought about it, but he really should have¸ because of course having condoms would solve their little no sex problem very nicely. Ace can imagine very easily Marco's smirk if he had measured his cock, though, but that is beside the point. The point is not so much the size as he has told the girl —he has held Marco's cock in his hand often enough that he can make a good guess— but the fact that he will have to explain condoms to Marco if he wants to use them.

That would be the most awkward conversation of his life, even more because it wouldn't be so much a conversation as a combination of mimicry and a few words, and Ace can't even come up with a combination that would actually work to explain the concept. He could always wait until Marco has a broader vocabulary and common knowledge, but who knows how long that could be and it would mean no sex in the meantime —unless Ace can have him tested, but that is an entirely different can of worms, because who knows what the fuck is in the blood of a bird-man, and how that would go over. He isn't thinking about that, nope. He will forget about blood samples, and how even getting the needle near Marco would be impossible, much less to have him agree to let someone poke him with it.

The condoms conversation seems a lot easier all of a sudden.

He is going to try, Ace decides, because he really wants to have sex with Marco. He grabs two different sizes he thinks might fit Marco, one of which also happens to be Ace's own size. He hopes Marco is fine with bottoming, because Ace really wants to be able to fuck that ass, not just the other way around. Which will be great, if everything else he has done with Marco is any indication.

As they have a month ahead and Ace likes to be an optimist, he takes far more than a single box of each size. Selecting the lube is easier, because Ace has decided it will be best to stay away from flavored ones for now —simpler, at the very least. Again, due to optimism and the belief that it will probably take Marco some practice before he gets an idea of how much to use, he takes a generous amount of it.

The cashier gives him a mix of a horrified and astounded look that has Ace convinced the guy thinks he is some sort of sexual deviant. Ace just grins.

Ace has never before stopped to think about how many books for children there are to choose from in any bookstore, and during all his planning he has not even once realized that he would have to actually choose what books he is going to buy.

And it turns out the advice from the lady of the bus doesn't work for him because, from the three titles he remembers, two books are accompanied by a CD and the other has too much text.

Which means Ace has to start searching from scratch.

After a look at the vast selection —there is an entire hallway of the store to choose from— he has tried the obvious option: ask a clerk. Of course, that is not as helpful as he had hoped it would be. Ace has told the guy that the books are for a kid who doesn't know how to read, and that way the clerk has been able to point him to a smaller area where the books either have no text or are limited to a few words per page. Then, however, Ace realized he can't exactly say he needs books that have as few references to modern technology as possible, because even the youngest of children know a good deal about technology by the time they learn to walk. There is this neighbor of his who has a three year old girl who can use a phone almost as well as her mother does, only impeded by her still too clumsy fingers that don't allow her to do certain movements.

Ace has been forced to thank the clerk and say he can continue from here alone, and now is opening each of the smaller books —he has discarded a good deal of them because they are too big and would take up too much space from the bag— browsing them and discarding any that has too much technology in them. The less complicated the books are, the less things he can't really explain to Marco with what they have that there is in them, the better it will be for their lessons.

So far, Ace has a collection of little books that are just a bit too large to fit in the palm of his hand, each book dedicated to a color, twenty pages with a picture each of an object of said color and its name written on top of it, and a similar collection dedicated to types of animals: fluffy animals, scaly animals, spotted animals… They are a start, and they remind Ace of some books he and his brothers had when they were little. Luffy ripped out most of their pages when he was three years old.

He is looking at stories now, fairy tales and simple day to day stories, hoping that there is something in them that can help him explain actions and words to Marco.

His eyes slide to a book of Beauty and the Beast, but Ace shakes his head and turns his back on it. Marco may be sort of an animal —Ace isn't thinking about it, not really— but he is no prince in need of true love to break a curse.

Ace makes a point of ignoring that book for the remainder half an hour that he spends at the store still.

Ace has said many times that Sabo worries too much. It's usually an annoying trait of his brother, but there are some times, like right now, when he is grateful for it. Ace had scoffed, a month ago, at the amount of money Sabo had demanded he bring for the trip, but now he is grateful that Sabo insisted so much on it.

He won't spend everything, he is not that irresponsible, but Ace has done some math and decided that if he relies on Marco for meat and only buys canned vegetables, fruit and soups —and sweets, never forget the sweets— he could buy a cheap camera and spare battery —which so happens to fit his solar charger. Ace has the camera of his phone, of course, but he isn't going to risk Marco reacting badly and destroying it, and he thinks a camera could be a harmless enough way to introduce Marco to technology and society.

The one he has chosen records videos as well, and Ace plans on recording anything he believes might be of use —cars, especially, he has realized may be a very serious issue, and he wants to get Marco as used to them as possible before bringing him anywhere near them.

Ace will have to be careful with his budget from now on, but he believes this is a very good purchase.

He harasses the clerk into giving him an already charged battery, and as soon as he is outside of the shop, he starts recording the street.

Ace barely refrains from throwing the book across the room in sheer frustration. He has completed all his shopping in less time than he had expected and, as he still has over a day to spare of the four he told Marco, he has decided to fit in a short trip to the library before going to buy groceries and leaving town later today.

He hoped to discover something about humans that turn into fire birds. Oh, he isn't an idiot, he knows if such an occurrence was commonly known he would most likely have heard about it —or, more precisely, Luffy would, because Luffy hears about all sorts of crazy stuff and then tells his brothers a butchered version of it— but he would have been satisfied with an urban legend or two.

So far, the only things he has found about fire birds are references to the very known fantastical phoenixes —no mentions of them transforming into humans— and a couple of mentions of obscure, ancient gods of which barely anything —in most cases not even the names— is known.

He has wasted two hours of his time before giving up.

It has been three days and a half by the time Ace makes it back to the camp. Before leaving town, he decided to buy a new backpack, because everything he had bought didn't fit inside the one he had brought with him and a new backpack was a much more practical choice than carrying some plastic bags around. It holds all of Marco's things, now, because it is his, too, Ace has decided.

When Ace steps into the clearing, it becomes evident that Marco has heard him approach, because he is standing in the middle of it, looking straight at him.

"Hey, I'm back," Ace greets him with a smile.

He doesn't have time to even bend down and leave the bags on the ground, because in less than a second Marco is there with his arms wrapped around Ace. He is kissing Ace in a way that can only be defined as desperate. Ace drops the bags, the one that is filled almost to bursting with food and Marco's one, and wraps his arms around him.

"Missed me?" he asks when they part. Marco tilts his head, obviously not understanding. He shrugs and kisses Ace again, which is more than enough of an answer even if he doesn't know what Ace has asked. "I missed you too," Ace says the next time they part.

He places his hands on Marco's shoulders and tries to push him backwards to the ground. He knows that he can't move Marco if he doesn't want to be moved, but Marco gladly complies with his request and allows himself to be pushed on his back. Ace climbs on top of him.

He had been planning to talk as much as they can, maybe eat something and start with a lesson, but Marco's reaction has told him that he is still unsure about where they stand, and they can't communicate enough for Ace to reassure him that everything is alright in any other way but this.

They will speak later, but first Ace has a point to get across.

To be continued

And now, I'm back to studying for my exams. Wish me luck, because I will need it.