Luffy was gone. His bed was empty. The door had been picked from the outside.
Thatch had woken up earlier than the rest of his siblings to get started on breakfast. He had intended to check on Luffy, only to find out that the brother Marco had assigned to watch over him was fast asleep outside.
After the long battle Thatch had basically expected that. It wasn't until he tried Luffy's door that his heart began to pound. It stopped altogether when he realized that the kid wasn't there.
He was dead. Thatch had killed him with gross negligence.
Hands trembling Thatch woke up his sleeping brother, who in turn, ran off to get Marco, recognizing the catastrophe for what it was- something for their brother to deal with.
Thatch was searching the kitchen when Marco caught up to him.
"He's dead."
"He's not dead," Marco told him. "He probably just got bored."
"And picked the lock from the outside?"
Marco didn't reply.
"What?"
"Sabo," he said, and Thatch paled, feeling his stomach churn with the very real promise of revisiting last night's dinner.
"No-no-no-no," Thatch muttered as he turned back to the halls, brushing off his brother when he tried to catch him.
"He was locked in too," Marco reasoned as he followed behind.
"You thought Sabo might try to kill Luffy because of his dad," Thatch replied, his words ringing in his own ears. His stomach gave another twist. 'No-no-no-no. Why hadn't he planned ahead. Why hadn't he kept his guard up? Why the hell did he trust guard duty to their clearly exhausted little brother. Why didn't Marco say something!' Thatch's brain was spiraling with worst-case scenarios. Finding Luffy hurt, finding him too late, not finding him at all.
"We'll find him," Marco said.
Unless there was nothing left to find.
Both men fell silent, their thoughts going to the worst-case scenario. So many things could have been done to prevent this. To protect the happy little kid who had trusted them. But after the excitement of the battle, it honestly hadn't really crossed their minds that either of the slaves would go this far to- to- NO!
Thatch whispered what he could remember of a protection prayer under his breath as they went. Asking all the unearthly deities that might be listening to keep Luffy safe.
The ex- slave's door had been picked as well. There were identical scratch marks on the exterior side of the lock. Sabo had jimmied it open and then closed again behind him. Just like with Luffy's door.
Even Marco had nothing to say to that. Both men stared at the door handle in horror. Thatch had expected Sabo to be gone, although he had no clue where to since they were trapped on a boat.
But when Marco unlocked the door, they were surprised to find him right where they left him. Sabo was sleeping on his side with his back to them, his head pillowed on his arm. He didn't so much as stir at the creaking of the door, completely ignorant to the world.
He had been out though. Thatch could tell from his blackened feet and the makeshift lockpick kit on the bedside table.
Thatch could practically see it. The boy slipping out of his room in the darkness, heading to Luffy's room. The kid never had any chance against him. Not when his father had stolen this boy's future, the future of his cellmates. He probably thought the murder was justified if it meant getting back at the captain. After all, Sabo had the stomach to kill. They had seen that yesterday when he took out the captain without so much as flinching. He had hatred for that man, and he wasn't afraid to act on it.
It would have been easy to toss Luffy over the railing. The entire crime would probably take ten minutes tops. Undetectable, unprovable, no one around to hear Luffy's cries for help. Thatch was going to be sick- and then possibly throw himself over the ledge- maybe at the same time.
Besides him Marco was silent, observing the room. The bed first, then the sleeping figure of the kid. Thatch figured he had reached the same conclusion, only he didn't look broken up about it.
Rather Marco waived.
Luffy's messy hair peeked above Sabo's shoulder. He leaned over the other boy to wave back.
Thatch's knee gave out on him about the same time. He hit the floor with an 'umph despite Marco's supporting hand.
"I forgot you couldn't sense him," he said apologetically. Thatch was honestly too relieved to hold a grudge about it.
Sabo stirred at the noise, pressing his face further into his arm with a half whine. His body had shielded the younger boy from sight, at least from Thatch's viewpoint.
Mostly awake now, Luffy was rubbing his eye, one hand on the other boy's shoulder to brace himself. Since when did these two get along?
"Good morning," Marco told him.
"Mm," Luffy agreed, yawning widely. "S' early."
"I know," Marco said. "Thatch was just worried about you. You good buddy?"
"Hm," Luffy nodded.
"How's the head?"
The ice pack had slid off some time in the night. But Luffy did look better now. He didn't look so pale anymore and he seemed a little more responsive. Maybe whatever that man had done to him was wearing off. Marco hoped so.
Luffy nodded with a sleepy acknowledgment. He looked down at Thatch and frowned. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah," Thatch said finding his voice again. "You just scared me when I couldn't find you."
"Oh." Luffy clearly didn't understand Thatch's concern at all. He crawled over the boy, clumsily kicking him in the head in the process, which finally woke him up.
Sabo sat up suddenly, remembering where he was as he looked around. He looked scared, his eyes falling on Luffy who was sitting on the edge of the bed, his legs kicking off the edge.
He slumped back down in relief.
"Morning to you too," Marco said.
Blue eyes fixed on the two men. He didn't say anything, and the silence stretched on uncomfortably.
"What did you get up to last night?"
The boy gestured to the contraband on the bedside table. "You can take it."
Marco followed his gaze but didn't move. Both of them knew it wouldn't matter. Sabo was resourceful, he would replace whatever they confiscated. He probably already had a backup plan.
"You met Luffy then?" Thatch asked, his heart refusing to calm down from the near scare. He was too old for this dammit!
Sabo didn't say anything, and Marco sighed, gesturing for Luffy to join them. When the kid tried to hop down, the blond caught his wrist, pulling him back. His gaze never left the men's faces.
"Come on," Marco said as Luffy pulled his arm free. "I know it's early but you two must be hungry."
"I'll make whatever you want," Thatch promised.
"Second breakfast!" Luffy whispered in wonder. Thatch winked at him.
The blond's face was as cold as it had been since holding the captain at gunpoint. "What do you want with us," he asked.
"What did you want with Luffy?" Marco countered. "You must have gone through a lot of trouble to find him.
"I was making sure he was okay," the teenager said. "I didn't know what you guys were going to do."
"They're nice," Luffy told him happily, then turning to the pirates he said, "Sabo is nice too. Can we eat a bunch of breakfasts?"
Thatch smiled at that. He believed Sabo. There was literally no other reason to spend so much effort picking all those locks and searching dozens of rooms in the dead of night. So apparently, they had misjudged the teen. He had just been trying to look out for the younger boy. And a good thing too, that could have been bad.
Luffy hopped down, coming over at the promise of food. The blond pushed himself to his knees shakily.
"You should rest some more," Marco said eyeing him. "I'll come to bring you food and we can do the check-up then."
"NO!" Sabo said too quickly as he swung his legs over the side of the bed. "If Luffy goes I go."
"What do you think we are going to do?"
"Kill him," Sabo said without a pause. "Or sell him."
"Sell him to who?" Thatch said. "We're in the middle of the ocean."
"If we wanted to hurt either of you, we would have done it already," Marco told them. "We want to help. For Rose."
Sabo seemed to think about that. Luffy leaned over to pull on the boy's sleeve. "Told ya, their nice," he said. "Let's go get triple breakfast."
"I thought it was double," Thatch said.
"Quadruple," Luffy said!
"Whatever you want kid, same to you Sabo. You can stick with the kid if that's what you want. If that's okay with Luffy?"
Luffy nodded. "Yeah! We're friends, right."
Sabo turned to look at him, the hint of a smile on his lips. One Luffy returned wholeheartedly. "Let's go make hexadruple breakfast!"
XXX
"I feel like you shouldn't be eating waffles so soon after starving," Thatch told the boys. "But whatever. You guys earned them. Just try not to overeat…. I'm looking at you Luffy."
"Shishi," Luffy giggled, his tiny fingers never straying far from the pan Thatch was working over." He stayed close to the man's elbow as he cooked, waiting for his opportunity to snatch the food away.
Marco grabbed him, taking him back to the table once again to sit in his seat beside the teenager. Sabo watched them but didn't say anything. In fact, he didn't say anything for a good long moment. He looked completely exhausted, sleep and pain clouding his eyes. Marco would have liked to give him a checkup, but every time he got too close the kid tensed. They would have to wait until he either conceded or passed out from exhaustion. Whichever happened first.
Luffy on the other hand was doing great. He was slowly but steadily shaking off whatever happened to him yesterday. He still felt a little bit hot, and sometimes he wobbled on his feet but mainly he seemed okay and acting more and more like himself by the minute.
These three kids were the single good thing to come out of this sickening mess. They hadn't deserved that- no living creature did, and Marco was glad they got them out. They had been so close to helping so many more.
He sighed, sinking down to his own chair across the table. Sabo was staring at him through his sleepy eyes. Marco met his gaze expecting the boy to turn away but he didn't.
"What?" He asked after a tense moment.
"I'm sorry."
"For which thing?" Behind him, he heard Thatch pause in cooking to look up at them.
"For slamming you into a wall." A moment of silence passed, and the teenager made a noise as if debating if he was really sorry about that. "-I'm sorry for slamming you into a wall when you were distracted with her."
"That wasn't part of your master plan?" Marco asked resting his chin on his palm.
Sabo shook his head. "There was no plan. I saw a chance, and the rest of me just moved. But if someone did that to me-," he looked down at Luffy who was happily kicking his feet on his chair, watching the waffles being made. "Sorry."
"I already said we aren't going to hurt you. That means taking revenge on you."
He shook his head. "I'm not groveling. I am sorry for that, even if you end up killing us."
"It's fine," Marco told him. "You had to do what you had to do to survive. I get that. And I would tell you we aren't going to kill you, but I don't think you would believe me."
"Why would I?" Sabo shot back. "I don't know you.
"Well, what would make you trust us?"
His answer was immediate. "Let us go."
"In the middle of the ocean? There is nowhere to go?"
"Then I guess not," he said.
"This is fun," Thatch said interrupting their tense conservation by putting a waffle ladened plate down in between the two of them. "You're stuck with us kid," he said relocating the top of the stack to Sabo's plate. "-For the foreseeable future, like it or not. So I guess you will just have to decide for yourself what our intentions are. Personally, I'm a chef, so I intend to make things and have people eat them."
Sabo frowned but didn't respond. Besides him, Luffy excitedly tore into his plate like a rabid dog. The sounds of his happy chewing filled the tense silence.
Sabo watched them for a moment longer before picking up his own fork. He broke off the corner of the dish, spearing it underneath the prongs.
How long had it been since he used a fork he wondered? How long since he had eaten hot, un-expired food? Probably not as long as it had been since someone had made him breakfast. Well- he guessed Ace had, before all of this, on the days he overslept and the two of them got hungry. But he didn't think that counted. It felt like a lifetime ago now.
He didn't even know how long they had been on this ship. Was he still fifteen? Was Luffy still twelve?
He twisted the piece of waffle on his plate, deliberating before giving in to his hunger. His mouth watered around it and for a second, he thought he had died back, on that ship for something to taste like heaven. It tasted so good he could cry. How did it taste so good?
Forgetting everything else Sabo abandoned his fork and attacked the slice with his fingers. Hardly noticing his now sticky fingers he tore it in half, finishing off the first piece without really chewing. The second piece was quick to follow. His stomach threatened to revolt but he ignored the sensation. Like hell, he would allow his idiot organs to reject the first real food he had in months.
He ate the second one, and then the third. Thatch was nice enough to slip both him and Luffy a fourth but said that Sabo would have to wait to see if the food sat well in his stomach before he got anymore.
Nobody ever had- he realized.
No one had ever made him breakfast before. At least not like this. Not with a kitchen, and a recipe, and ingredients, and a plate just for him.
Forever ago the kitchen staff at his parent's house would prepare meals, in which he was expected and required to partake with perfect manners, not that he ever really ate with his parents save for special occasions. But somehow it didn't feel like the same as this.
His stomach twisted in warning again, stronger this time. Sabo stubbornly grabbed the last piece shoving it in his mouth, fighting against the wave of nausea. He was Not going to waste this. Not a single bite.
Not when so many people had lost their lives because the guards couldn't spare so much as a table scrap for them. Let alone make them breakfast.
Rose deserved this. She was the one the pirates had wanted to take care of. He swallowed back to wave of bile that threatened to climb back up his throat.
After the guards had taken his last brother away Sabo was left completely on his own, with nothing to distract him from the crushing reality of his situation. Nothing except Rose. She had understood something on his face as he sat in his cell, day in and out, waiting for them to bring Luffy back, slowly losing hope each day he didn't reappear.
Marco was watching him, his expression unreadable. "It's okay," he said, and there was something so understanding in his tone it made Sabo's already upset stomach churn.
He turned his frown to his empty plate. The food had been more than he could have possibly hoped for. But he didn't want to tell them that. He didn't want to be in their debt either.
"More!" Luffy commanded, with all the entitlement of a noble ordering his personal chef around.
"What did I just say bud?" Thatch asked.
Sabo was grateful the pirates seemed to take his brazenness with good humor- for now at least. He couldn't get a read on them.
"I'm hungry!"
"Luffy," Sabo schooled him, his voice soft but the warning was there. Or at least it would have been if Luffy understood or remembered what Sabo's cues were for reigning him in were.
His little brother looked up at him blankly.
"You look exhausted," the pirate told Sabo. "Do you want some coffee?"
He didn't respond but Thatch poured him some, and some for Marco and himself.
Luffy pushed over his now empty juice glass expectantly.
"You too?" Thatch laughed.
Luffy nodded and the man obliged him just a little. The three of them watched with no surprise whatsoever as he swallowed it only to instantly spit it back into the glass.
"It's sour."
"That's how it's supposed to taste," the man snickered.
"He thinks hot chocolate and coffee are the same things," Sabo told them as he grabbed the handle of his cup. It had been a hot minute since Sabo had had coffee as well. Never had he appreciated it more than right now. It quelled his stomach, as well as fighting the exhaustion away.
"Okay kid," Marco said, something in his voice had changed. Sabo looked up at him sharply. "Your it."
"I'm what?"
"Answers. Since the guards were basically useless, and you shot the captain you and your friend are all we have to piece together what the hell happened."
"That's why you saved us," Sabo realized.
Neither man said anything.
"Sorry," Sabo said without missing a beat. "I can't help you."
"And whys that?"
"I don't know anything."
"We both know that's not true," Marco said.
"Why would I lie?" Sabo put the mug down, meeting their look head-on. After what he had been through, these two didn't scare him.
"That's a good question," Marco said. "Just tell us something Sabo- anything."
"Who are you," Thatch cut in not unkindly. "Can you start with that?"
"I'm nobody," Sabo said. "Just some orphan from the East Blue."
"Any family?"
"No one worth mentioning."
"Which island?'
Sabo looked down at his mug. He could hardly tell them that. Now when he was still holding out hope of going home one day.
"And him," Marco gestured to Luffy. "Who is he?" Sabo didn't say anything, and the man continued. "Now I'm thinking you know him. Yesterday, did you come down there for revenge or for Luffy?"
Sabo had slipped up with the hot chocolate line. He was still too tired to think straight. He shrugged. He didn't want to talk about this.
Neither did Luffy. "I don't know him," Luffy answered for Sabo. "I'm bored. Let's go."
"One sec, bud," Thatch said.
Luffy pushed his chair back so he could hop down, immediately starting to explore the kitchen. He had always been terrible at sitting still. Sabo watched him, wondering if he had been allowed to explore at all after the captain took him. He hoped so.
Marco followed his gaze. "Do you know what the captain actually did to him?"
Sabo shook his head. "He had a devil fruit or something."
"Yeah, we know," Thatch said rubbing his own forehead. "Does it mess with someone's head or their memories? When I found Luffy he could hardly tell me his own name."
That got Sabo's attention. His eyes flashed as he looked up sharply. Remembering himself he looked back at the table again. He clenched his hands. "I don't know."
Marco and Thatch shared a look, and Marco pushed a little bit further. "Thatch said that Luffy was chained to the bed so he couldn't run away. Do you know why his father would do that?"
"He's not his damn father!" Sabo snapped, hitting the table with his fist before remembering himself. He sat back in his chair, staring down at his lap. "…sorry."
"Is there something you want to tell us?" Thatch asked, not unkindly.
Sabo just shook his head. "No, sir."
Marco hid a sigh as Thatch shrugged, they had tried. "Okay, I guess that's that then."
Sabo nodded without looking up. He rose from the table, motioning for Luffy to follow him, then paused.
"Thanks… for the food."
Thatch smiled at him and there was no pity or disgust in his look. "Of course, buddy. Whenever you want."
XXXX
Colibri 84: Thank you! I will.
Lucille Ann Bolonia: Of course! I am really glad you like it. And I will update Defenders as well! Thank you to you too for reading.
Eloise: Why thank you.
Oranganeh: Yes! This one isn't supposed to be too long (maybe 20 chapters), so there is a bit to go still.
Aquarica: Luffy will be well fed and watered now! And with all of his new friends so he will be happy boi. The other two not so much haha, but they are working on it.
Wishfull-star: Thank you! Stay safe too.
Royiah: Poor Sabo indeed. He is in desperate need of some Luffy hugs.
Irene Sharda: Poor kids. But they are doing better. And the Whitebeards are very curiouse about what they know. They do need each other.
More on the WB's next time. But they will pick up on their relationship soon. And yes! Happier kids and more hugs to go around: )