This is part of a longer outsider POV piece I am working on, but can never seem to finish. It's originally about a poor marine who is stuck on Thousand Sunny for one day and one night It's exam week and I'm not getting enough sleep, thus the snarkiness of this chapter. Oh, and WARNINGS for slightly bad language.
"Ladies sleep on this ship Luffy," A snarl comes from your left and you shuffle away from the source, Black Leg Sanji. "We can't let some marine free on our ship during the night."
He spits the word marine out as if he would like nothing more but fling it to the ground and crush it with the edge of his heel. This is alarmingly similar to the glare he shoots at you.
At this point, self-preservation instincts kick in and you think you should remind these pirates you are only a lowly Petty Officer who's stuck of their ship because he had the bad luck to be caught in Straw Hat Luffy's stretched arm span and be bazooka-ed on board together. You also think that that would be considered as fraternization with the enemy. You do not care.
"Hey, droopy-eyes," The captain startles you out of your pondering and the last shred of your sanity is busy lamenting that you don't get paid enough to deal with this sort of shit.
The rest of you though, snaps to attention and stands straighter because you are a soldier to the core and there was a command in that call. Straw Hat tilts his head as he tells you sternly. "Don't go sneaking around at night, okay?"
There is a childlike seriousness that takes you for surprise. The dangerous movement to your right, the cook having taken your silence as a refusal, is what has you stumbling to answer.
"I won't."
And that's that. The cook still glares at you darkly but it seems the conversation is done; their captain's assurance is absolute. No crew mate argues further and you can't help wonder how these pirates have survived this long when they are this easy to lie to. Now, all you have to do is wait to take cover under the dark and make hostage of just one of them-
Oh. You flinch away from Roronoa Zoro's gaze, the single member who hasn't said a single word throughout the entire exchange-and apparently doesn't need to. You try not to think too hard about the hand that has quite meaningfully dropped to the hilt of the scarlet katana as you realize: that is how they survived this long.