Morning After
Written for a promt by cereal-murder on Tumblr.
Zoro woke up with a pounding headache. As the swordsman yawned at the deck of the Sunny, straining his eyes against the sun with a frown. After the barrelful of alcohol he'd ingested the night before, a normal man would have written off the thudding discomfort in his head as a hangover.
Zoro wasn't normal. He didn't get hung-over.
"ZORO! WAKE UP!" Chopper's shriek and almost pleading voice had the swordsman at full attention. Zoro sat up and reached out for the small doctor that was currently beating on his green head with his little hooves. The source of the headache.
"Oi, Chopper, relax." Zoro yawned, holding the reindeer man at stubby and fuzzy arm's length. "What's going on? are we under attack?" Chopper flailed helplessly in his grip, round eyes glistening with unshed tears. The headache faded.
"It's LUFFY!" Snot dribbled from the littler doctor's blue nose. It was adorable, that strange blue color. "He's gone!"
"gone?" Zoro echoed, it wasn't unlike the captain to set off on and adventure all on his own, but he would have told someone. Right? They were in the middle of the Grand Line anyway. There really weren't any places to go beyond the Sunny.
"He was gone when we woke up!" Chopper sniffled, wiping at his eyes in a feeble attempt to stop the tears from flowing. Trying to be a man, like always. He was getting better at holding face.
"There's nowhere for him to go." Zoro conceded, standing up and putting the little reindeer man down on the deck. Chopper's sad expression was burning itself into Zoro's soul as the youngest of the crew clung to Zoro's knees.
Usopp's wild curly hair appeared in the kitchen doorway, the sniper seemed to be deep in thought as he rubbed his chin, brown furrowed until he saw Zoro on the deck. "AH! ZORO!" The sniper waved Zoro from the top deck, running for the stairs and causing Zoro's hand to jolt slightly on instinct.
Stairs. Fucking stairs.
"Just calm down, Usopp." Zoro groaned, walking over to the staircase and mentally begging the sniper to be careful on the top steps. Chopper was hitching a ride on his leg, clinging to Zoro's calf and sobbing as he made his way to the bottom of the staircase.
"Just tell me what's going on and make it short and true."
Usopp slowed down his walking, descending the stairs slowly as he flailed his arms around. "We were hoping YOU could tell us what happened!" the younger man's face was a little worried, lips pursed as he stopped two steps from the deck, leveling their height. "We all drunk so much last night no one remembers a thing!"
It was true, they had found a shipwreck fully stocked with some high quality alcohol. Zoro hadn't managed to get drunk, even if he'd gotten a whole barrel to himself, but the rest of the weren't as lucky.
"Zoro! You need to tell us. We can't find Luffy anywhere!" Usopp begged, whining slightly as he tugged on Zoro's shirt. "We know you don't get drunk, so you must at least know SOMETHING."
Zoro hummed, deep sound emerging from the back of his throat as he contemplated his answer. "There wasn't anything special about last night." Zoro confessed, going over the things he could remember. "You got up to verse 251 of ' great Captain Usopp's adventures' and then you passed out face down on the deck."
Usopp cringed slightly at that, sending Zoro an awkward grimace as Franky and Robin joined them. Franky had been drinking quite a lot last night. The usually bouncing blue pompadour was laying flat against the cyborg's head. They had a lot of fun last night seeing what difference drinks made to the cyborg's personality, Zoro's favorite was the iced tea one.
Zoro suspected that Robin had been reading in the library the whole time. She usually was. She might have seen something though, that woman seemed to know everything.
"He's not in the machine room. None of the docks or the Shark Submerge have been touched." Franky concluded, patting Usopp on the shoulder with a massive robot hand. "-Any luck with you bro?"
Usopp shook his head, thick black curls bouncing around his shoulders. "No. The crow's nest, Usopp workshop and bathrooms are all empty. Nami said he wasn't in the girl's rooms either." The sharpshooter was growing more and more distressed by the second. "It's like he disappeared!"
"It would be nice if he didn't fall overboard and drown." Robin mused helpfully, same morbid smile in place as usually. Scary woman.
"ROBIN!" Franky chastised, earning nothing but a soft chuckle from the archaeologist of the crew.
Zoro was starting to get concerned, where could Luffy have gone? He would have woken up to a splash of water. On a ship where half its crew are devil-fruit users, even just hearing water put Zoro on edge.
"Oi, bastards. oh! -and Robin-swan~" Sanji appeared in the doorway to the kitchen, curled brow furrowed as he leant over the railing. "He's not in the storage room nor locked in the fridge. Where ever he is, he's not inside my kitchen."
"Yo-ho-hoho!" Brook's sing song voice sounded from below deck as the musician ascended the stairs. giant black afro filling out the entrance just like Laboon had done at Reverse mountain. "The captain isn't in the aquarium room either."
"My tangerine grove is empty too!" Nami said from the top floor of the deck, orange head blending in nicely with the tangerines of the groove as she stuck her head out from between bushels.
"He's not dangling off any edges either." Robin said as she opened her eyes, uncrossing her arms as flower petals scattered in the breeze. She looked a little more serious now, troubled expression on her face. "If the captain hasn't had breakfast yet, something is wrong."
"Robin-swan is right. Something is very wrong." Sanji agreed, lighting himself a cigarette. "Breakfast is almost ready, yet there's been no shitty rubber whining all morning." At this piece of information, the crew paused in contemplation, collective brows and brow bones furrowed.
"I'll take the shark-submerge and scour the ocean, just in case." Franky said with a slightly worried grimace. The others of the crew looked anxious at the prospect. Zoro shook his head, arms crossed over his chest.
"I didn't hear any water at all. Even if Luffy was drunk, he'd scream or something if he fell overboard." The swordsman mused and the expressions on his crewmates eased slightly. "He likes to make noise. He even makes it when he's supposed to sneak around, remember?"
The crew all nodded at that, expressions changing from worried to confused. Sanji's lighter flared when he lit himself a cigarette, capturing the attention of the group.
"We'll put some food out. If he's on the ship, he'll come." The blond grinned around his cigarette, the image of confidence. The others nodded at that, watching as the blond made his way up to the kitchen for some Captain-bait.
Eggs, toast, fruit and naturally, the most important ingredient for Luffy-bait; meat. The breakfast tray Sanji brought down to the deck had the rest of the crew salivating. Well most of them. Apparently Brook doesn't have salivary glands. Skull Joke.
The cook placed the tray on the middle of the Sunny's lawn. The wafting smell of a well balanced and perfectly cooked breakfast tickling the Strawhat crew's noses. Except for Brook; he doesn't have a nose. Skull joke.
"It's too early for your damn skull jokes Brook." Sanji grumbled, sitting down at the mast and looking at the food from a distance, admiring his handiwork. Zoro also took a seat, watching the food glistening in the morning sun like some sort of bizarre dewdrop.
"Oi... Sanji..." Chopper whined, making his way from Zoro to the blond cook. Sanji arched a curled brow at the reindeer that tugged cutely at his sleeve. "I'm hungry. Can we eat breakfast too?"
The rest of the crew looked up at the cook at that, Chopper had asked the question they had all been thinking. The cook seemed to notice all the extra attention, since he squirmed slightly in his seat.
"Luffy will probably be here in a second, I'd prefer if we all ate together." Sanji said slightly apologetic, stubbing out his cigarette. "Unless you are hungry my darling delicate flowers~"
"SANJI!" Usopp objected, frowning at the blond with a hurt expression. "If you're going to let Nami and Robin eat, we should all get to eat!"
"Well you guys can just suck it up!" Sanji hissed, rummaging for another cigarette. "Be a man, haven't you ever heard of ladies first?"
The food had been standing there without being ravaged for a whole minute. The nervousness was starting to resurface in the crew, it had even begun to stir in Zoro. Unprotected food getting cold? What was going on here?
"Maybe..." Nami said softly, hesitating as she cupped her chin thoughtfully. "Maybe Luffy was... kidnapped?" The idea travelled through the crew like a lightning current. Zoro's hair stood on ends, his fingers automatically resting on his swords.
The crewmembers exchanged looks, glancing at the rapidly cooling food on the deck. This wasn't normal. This wasn't Luffy. Something was wrong.
"Who could have kidnapped him?" Usopp's voice trembled slightly. "Marines?"
"Do you really think the marines would be able to sneak up on us in the middle of the night and kidnap Luffy?" Nami questioned Usopp, bonking him on the head impatiently. "This was clearly the work of some sort of professional bounty hunter!"
At that, everyone's attention was turned to Zoro. The swordsman grimaced awkwardly, rubbing the back at his neck at the sudden spotlight on him. "I'm not a bounty hunter anymore! Why would I-"
"No no." Usopp waved off the idea, crawling over to rest a hand on Zoro's shoulder. "-Know anyone in the business that could have pulled off something like this?"
"I TOLD you!" Zoro huffed, glaring at Usopp and the others. "I wasn't really a "bounty hunter". I simply hunted pirates for their bounties!"
"Sounds like a bounty hunter to me." Brook mused, sipping a tea from a skull-afro patterned cup. "Might a friend of yours be out to get our captain?"
"The only bounty hunter friends I have are Johnny and Yosaku!" Zoro frowned, looking from Nami to Sanji. "Even if they somehow had entered the Grand Line, do you really think they have the ability and will to kidnap Luffy?"
All three members of the crew that had the pleasure of meeting the dysfunctional bounty hunter duo shook their heads in unison.
"It'll do no good to think on an empty stomach." Sanji stood up, breathing smoke out into the sunrise. "I guess we'll be having a quiet breakfast today."
The rest of the crew exchanged slightly sad looks. The idea of eating without Luffy felt a little strange.
Franky's stomach grumbled loudly, prompting the others to pat their own in agreement and get to their feet, heading for the kitchen.
"Oi." Franky said as softly as he was capable of, which wasn't very softly. Actually it was rather loud and caught the attention of everyone on the deck. The cyborg was still sitting on the grass, expression grim and slightly disturbed. "I know where Luffy is."
The crew were at full attention at that, Chopper and Usopp ran to the shipwright, pulling on his palm-tree patterned shirt to encourage him to share his information. Robin chuckled into her hand, apparently she had figured it out as well. Strange woman.
"My stomach is made of metal." Franky said simply, pushing in the strange 'door' on his stomach-fridge until it clicked out of its lock. "It doesn't make any sounds."
The tiny refrigerator door on Franky's stomach swung open, reavealing a blizzfully ignorant face they all knew very well. Luffy was sleeping inside Franky's mini-fridge. As soon as the captain was exposed to the lingering scent of breakfast, the rubber man's eyes pinned open; wide awake.
"YAY! BREAKFAST!" Luffy laughed, struggling for a few seconds to get out of the tiny compartment. His body stretched out with a POP, momentarily keeping it's disturbing cube shape before the captain sprung to his normal self.
How Luffy had managed to get inside such a tiny little box was going to haunt the crew forever. Zoro wished he'd stayed awake that night; just so he could put all these questions to rest.
END
Full promt by cereal-murder: the boys get drunk, shenanigans happen, the following morning no one can find luffy, he was sleeping inside Franky's stomach fridge.
I laughed so hard when I read that. Really made my day.
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