00018. A bond of brothers.

It was around the middle of summer on one of their days off from training when Ace asked everyone to join him out at their secret base. The base was in the deep forest hidden away in the territory of a group of monkeys. The monkeys were strong and vicious, but after the boys clashed with them many times and brought them some food. The monkeys allowed the boys to set up their base and even protected the area for them.

They mostly used it to store the treasure and belly they've collected. Which was beneath a large tree hidden in its overgrown roots. If you searched through them, you could find a small cave system that could only be accessed from the roots themselves. How they found it in the first place was pure luck, Luffy fell into the place by accident one day.

When he disappeared into the cave system, the others had to go help him out because while the opening was small, it was over ten feet deep, with no real way to climb out. After helping Luffy out, they decided to explore the place and see if they could find any treasures down there. While they didn't find any treasure, they explored the whole place and decided it was the best place to store their treasure.

The boys also made a tree house up above to act as their base and also hid a little treasure there. Marcus came up with the idea, so if someone found the base and decided to search around. They would find that money and most likely think that was all the money they had. Well that was the idea at least, since no one ever came that way because it was in the monkey's territory.

That day the boys hiked up to their base early in the morning and once they settled down inside the base Ace said with a serious tone of voice, "I have something important to tell all of you, well mostly Sabo since he doesn't know."

Marcus and the others turned their full attention to Ace who looked uncomfortable as he said, "We've been living together for a while now and I consider all of you my brothers…"

"Why would you consider us brothers? Aren't we actually brothers since we all have grandpa?" Luffy asked, slightly confused.

Marcus let out a sigh as he said, "Garp told us about Ace's father when we first met, don't you remember?"

"He did?" Luffy asked as he tried to remember.

Ace nodded his head slightly before he said, "Ya he did. Sabo and I aren't actually related to Garp."

Luffy's eyes almost popped out of his head as he looked between Ace and Sabo for a few moments before Marcus asked, "You never noticed that they didn't really look like us?

"But Ace has black hair and Sabo… Has a black hat." Luffy said it, as if it explained why they were all related.

Everyone sweat dropped before Marcus smacked Luffy over the head as he said, "That doesn't make any sense, idiot! How would a black hat make Sabo related to us?"

Luffy rubbed the bruise forming on his head as Ace shook his head before he said, "Like I said, I consider you my brothers. But I need to tell you something important. I want you to know who I really am… Who my father was…"

"Stop acting so serious, I already know who your father was. It's not like the others are going to stop liking you because of who your father was." Marcus said.

The other boys nodded in agreement before Ace lowered his head and said, "My father was Gol D. Roger, the pirate king. I'm the spawn of the devil."

The others were quiet as Luffy asked, "The pirate king? That sounds cool, what was he like?"

"I'm pretty sure he said the same thing last time." Marcus said.

Ace nodded his head in agreement before he looked at Luffy as he asked, "You're not upset?"

"Why would I be?" Luffy asked with his head tilted to the side.

"Because…"

Ace was cut off as Marcus said, "Who gives a shit about who your father was or what he did. Garp told you before, don't believe what people say about your dad. If you wanna find out about him, talk to his former crew."

Ace nodded along slightly as he said, "Gramps did say that…"

Ace turned to look at Sabo as he asked, "What about you?"

Sabo shrugged as he said, "You're my brother, that's all that matters."

Ace smiled before Marcus said, "Well since we're sharing, I guess I should tell you about our parents."

"We have parents?" Luffy asked as his eyes widened.

Marcus shook his head as he said, "I swear it's like you don't have a brain sometimes."

"I do too?" Luffy said, but it sounded more like a question.

Marcus looked directly at Luffy as he asked, "What's two plus two?"

Luffy looked down at his hands and began to count. After almost a minute sweat beaded on his forehead and steam was pouring out his ears before he held up two fingers on each hand as he confidently said, "Twenty two."

All the other boys collapsed onto the floor in utter shock. It took a few moments for them to recover before Marcus jumped up and started to hit Luffy as he asked, "Why doesn't your brain work?!?"

When Marcus finished, Luffy's head was covered in lumps and his lips were swollen as he hissed out, "Two, twos is twenty two." As he held up his fingers again to prove his point.

Marcus pinched the bridge of his nose before he said, "Two, PLUS two equals four. You add the numbers together, not place them side by side!"

"Ohhh… I. I don't get it." Luffy said as he looked at his figures again.

"I… God help me, this brother of mine." Marcus said before he closed his mouth and looked towards the ceiling. His eyes were closed for a few moments as he exhaled a breath before he reached over and dug through the stack of bounty posters the boys kept in their hideout.

After a few moments Marcus pulled out a bounty slip and showed it to the others as he said, "Keep this a secret, but this is our dad."

The poster he held up showed a man with short black hair that looked kinda like Garp. He had sharp eyes and a red tattoo covering the left half of his face. Under the picture was the name Dragon along with a bounty of three point five billion berries. Under info it said he was a very dangerous person and to use extreme caution around him.

Luffy's eyes popped out of his head as he asked, "Numbers can go that high?"

Marcus passed the poster to the other boys before he said, "I just showed you who dad is and you're concerned about how big numbers can get to?"

"But look how many zeros there are!"

Marcus ignored Luffy as he said with a frown, "So that's our dad, as for our mom… I couldn't find a poster because she's dead."

"How do you know that?" Luffy asked.

Marcus reached over and brought his sword in front of himself as he said, "Bogard told me when he gave me my sword. He said it belonged to mom before she died and before that it was her fathers."

The boys quietly looked at the sword for about a minute before Sabo said, "My full name is Demont Sabo, son of Demont Outlook the third. One of the nobles of the Goa kingdom and I am in line to become king."

"You're a noble?!" The other boys asked at the same time in shock.

Sabo nodded his head before he said, "I ran away though because I hated living with those people. They didn't care about me, just what I could do for the family. If I wasn't being useful, they treated me like I was a stranger."

Marcus reached over and patted Sabo's shoulder as he said, "Well we care about you… But since you should be rich, I'm gonna let you foot the bill whenever we go out and eat."

Sabo swatted Marcus's hand away as he said, "Ya right, I ran away. I'm just as poor as you are."

Marcus nodded his head as he said, "Now I understand why you like to dine and ditch so much."

"I do not, Ace is the one who likes to do that."

Ace coughed before he said, "I only came up with the idea because you always talked about how good the food in the city was."

"Are you trying to blame me for your bad habit?" Sabo asked as he stood up.

Ace also stood up with a smile on his face as he said, "What if I am? What are you gonna do about it little brother?"

"I'll show you who's little." Sabo said as he launched into an attack. Ace parried the attack which sent Sabo tumbling into Luffy.

After a moment both boys got up as they glared at Ace. Ace smirked as he asked, "What, you wanna go too Luffy?"

Luffy just charged at Ace in reply while Marcus shook his head. Sabo followed up behind Luffy and as Ace tossed Luffy aside, Sabo caught Ace in the stomach with a solid punch. As Ace doubled over, Luffy slammed into Marcus who didn't move out of the way in time.

As Ace recovered Marcus pushed Luffy off of himself before he jumped at Ace and attacked. Within moments all the boys were fighting each other in a wild melee. Everyone attacked each other with no clear goal in mind and as they fought they started to laugh.

After half an hour all the boys collapsed onto the floor. Each boy was covered in bruises and as they laid there, they would randomly start laughing. After a while they slowly recovered before they sat backup and after seeing each other covered in lumps and bruises, started to laugh again.

Once they finally settled down Ace said, "That was fun."

The other boys nodded in agreement even Marcus before he said, "I think Gramps corrupted us to enjoy fighting."

The other boys nodded as Ace said, "Let's head back to Makino's and eat. Dinner should be done soon."

The other boys agreed and left their base soon afterwards. Walking back to the village as a group, they walked a little closer than they normally would. While they talked and joked with each other. From then on the boys were an even tighter group then before and would always hang out with each other. It also pushed them harder to improve themselves, which showed when Garp came back again.

Almost a year passed by before Garp returned to the island again for an extended vacation. When he entered the bar around lunch time he greeted Makino before he sat at the bar and waited for the boys to show up. When they came in from training Garp couldn't help but smile when he noticed all the boys were using the second level of the training harness.

"Welcome back, grandpa." Sabo said.

"Hi grandpa, it's good to see you." Marcus said.

"Hey old man." Ace said.

"Why are you here, grandpa?" Luffy asked.

Garp was next to the boys a moment later, while Ace and Luffy were kissing the floor. He glanced down at Ace and Luffy as he said, "Why can't both of you show some respect to your grandfather?"

When neither boy responded he picked them up to find them both knocked out. Garp frowned before he slammed their heads together as he said, "Pay attention when I'm scolding you!"

Both boys woke up and yelled out, "What the hell shitty grandpa?!?"

Garp turned both of them so he could look them in the eyes before he said, "Show so respect when I come to visit you, you brats. Be more like Sabo and Marcus, at least they have manners."

Ace and Luffy both glanced at the other boys who smiled back at them before they looked back at Garp and said, "Sorry grandpa."

Garp nodded his head before he dropped the boys on the floor as he said, "That's better. Now let's eat something and after lunch we are going on a training trip."

"A training trip? Are we going into the forest?" Marcus asked.

Garp shook his head as he said, "No, I am taking you over to a new island to train for a while."

Marcus and the other boy's eyes lit up as Garp said, "We'll be gone for a little over three months, so after lunch you all need to go pack."

After eating lunch, the boys rushed upstairs to pack while Garp told Makino about the trip before he headed towards Dadan to let her know he was taking the boys somewhere. When Garp returned from Dadan's, the boys were outside Makino's and ready to go.

Besides clothes and some essentials, the boys brought their weapons and training harnesses which they were currently wearing. Garp led the boys down to the dock where a small navy ship was anchored. When they got close, the first thing Marcus noticed was the ship was in rough shape and had no crew on board.

When they reached the ship Garp said, "Alright boys, get on, remove the harnesses and stash your gear in the cabin. I need to show you the basics of sailing before we start."