Damn, this is the longest chapter I've ever written... When I finally realized that it was 28 pages long, I was going to look for a place to cut it into two shorter chapters. However, I couldn't find a suiting place, so I thought "To Hell with it, people like long chapters... I think." and went to bed. So, here it is. Enjoy this long chapter now, I worked my ass off to write it ;D
The eastern ocean lay almost perfectly still as the sun slowly moved across the sky on its daily trip towards the horizon. It was still long before sundown, but even Mother Sea herself seemed to have fallen silent to make up for all the noise she had been forced to put up with earlier. The large battleship, which had been the cause of most of the noise with the many explosions traveling between the rooms inside it, had finally sunk beneath the waves, leaving only a light shadow in the clear water as it continued towards its final resting place on the bottom of the ocean. In a few years, no one would even remember it, and its treasures would be lost forever. A few planks floating on the surface among the shattered pieces of a wooden terrace were the only things still left at the place the pirates had selected as their battleground.
It was those pieces of wood that took up most of Luffy's attention where he sat cross-legged on the railing outside the entrance to Sanji's restaurant. He wasn't completely sure why he was sitting there, watching the wood bobbing on the small waves, but it felt right to do it, so he didn't move from his spot on the railing, even if he really, really wanted to get up and see what the others were doing. From time to time, his eyes wandered off towards the really interesting-looking ship which was moored to the side of the larger restaurant, but it wasn't just out of pure boredom.
He didn't know why, but he liked that ship a lot. Ever since he had seen her the first time, he had known that there was something special about her, and it wasn't just that she looked like a jigsaw puzzle from which one piece was missing or that her figure-head wasn't carved out yet or that she was flying Usopp's pirate flag with the long-nosed, bandana-clad skull over a slingshot and a paintbrush. The ship's appearance didn't really matter, as long as she had a strong spirit, just like Merry. It was almost as if she spoke to him, just like the Going Merry had spoken to him sometimes during his lonely night-watches over the years.
Luffy wondered if the rest of his nakama had been able to hear their ship speaking to them. He had never brought it up while they were together as a crew, since he was afraid that the others would ask what the ship had told him. The things Merry told him was supposed to be for his ears only - she had told him that herself - so he kept quiet, even though it had been hard sometimes.
It had been hard for him to keep all those truths and secrets to himself, but every time he had been about to reveal something, he had stopped and reminded himself that as long as Merry wasn't telling the rest of the crew what he had told her, he wasn't going to tell anyone about what she had told him.
Luffy had known that the Going Merry had died long before Usopp told him. Seven months earlier, he had been working at a construction site to pay off something he had destroyed (he couldn't remember what he had destroyed, but it had been really expensive and since he always had almost no money at all, the nice villagers had made him choose between working to pay for it or being turned in to the Marines) when he had felt almost as if something had been ripped out of his body.
The very painful feeling had thrown him to the ground and when it faded a few seconds later, he knew that something had happened to Merry. He hadn't been able to explain how he could have known that it was Merry and no one else, and he didn't want to know either. Merry was dead, and he had been able to feel it. That was all that mattered.
The joyful sound of Ace's laughter reached Luffy's ears, and he turned his eyes away from the ship to look over his shoulder towards the entrance to the restaurant. Ace had entered the ship as soon as the brothers reached up to it, and was probably sitting by a table while talking and laughing together with Zoro, Nami, Usopp and Robin. Luffy, on the other hand, had stayed outside.
One part of him had wanted to go inside and talk to the others, but the other part wanted to wait for the rest of his nakama to come before he went inside. So he had climbed up on the railing and sat down to watch the remains of the wooden Fin on which Sanji, Zoro and Usopp had fought Kre-… Kru-… that pirate's nakama and protected Sanji's treasure.
Luffy reached up and poked at the white patch of cloth that was taped to his left shoulder. He knew that he wasn't supposed to touch it until the wound underneath the patch had healed, but it was so hard to resist. The wound knew that he wasn't supposed to touch it as well, and it teased him by throbbing and stinging and itching and obviously doing everything but healing faster, just to annoy him. Turning his head towards the pieces of wood floating on the waves, he decided to ignore the wound.
He could remember a few rare times when the others - and especially Zoro - really hadn't been in the mood to play with him or even talk to him, and had chosen to ignore Luffy, no matter what he did or which tone of voice he used, until Luffy finally decided to give up and tried to find something else to do. So Luffy figured that if he ignored the wound for long enough, it would soon give up and start to heal so that he didn't have to keep himself from poking at it.
Damn pirate and his damn Seastone bullet…
There was a sudden movement behind him, and he turned around, his body instinctively taking a fighting-stance as his thoughts still lingered on the stupid pirate he had fought earlier. He soon relaxed, however, when he noticed that the one coming out from the restaurant was Nami, who was holding his hat in her hands. She shook her head and sighed at his reaction, but then she smiled and walked up next to him by the railing.
"Aren't you going to come inside?" she asked and pressed the hat over his black hair. "Zoro probably wants to know how you managed to find him here."
Luffy shrugged and reached up to move the hat to a more comfortable place on his head. "No, he doesn't," he said, smiling as he gave his treasure a friendly pat to welcome it back to him. "Zoro knows that I just felt that he was here. I felt that all of you were here. You know that too, don't you, Nami?" he added and looked at her questioningly with his wide eyes.
When Nami didn't reply, Luffy took that as a 'yes' and turned his eyes back towards the wooden planks floating in the glittering water. In the corner of his eye, he could see Nami lean against the railing next to him.
"When is Sanji coming back?" he said after a little while.
Nami nodded towards the interesting-looking ship. "Chopper is patching him up in there. When he came back with the children, Usopp told us that Sanji-kun was hurt pretty badly. But he also said that it's nothing he hasn't already gone through before."
She straightened her back and stretched lightly before she turned to walk back inside the restaurant. When she reached the open doors, she turned back to look at Luffy.
"I heard that the chefs are preparing tons of meat for you," she said with a soft voice.
"It's okay, I'm not hungry," Luffy said without turning around, but it took a lot of willpower just to say it; his voice wasn't completely steady when he said it either. Then, a very familiar sound was heard and Nami sighed lightly while shaking her head.
"I can hear your stomach growling from over here, Luffy," she stated, and was just about to try to convince him that it was okay to come inside and wait for Sanji and Chopper when Luffy spoke.
"Nami? Do you think it's still there?" he wondered with a voice that was just as calm as the surrounding water. "One Piece. Do you think it's still at the island where we left it?"
Nami smiled. At first, she had been against the captain's decision to leave the legendary treasure on the island where they finally had found it, and she remembered that she had been very upset about having to leave such an amount of riches behind. But Luffy had got what he needed to prove that he had found it. The word of a Marine admiral and an ornamented golden goblet with Gold Roger's mark engraved on it had been enough to spread the news all over the world.
"Do you want to go and see if it's still there?" she asked, leaning against the doorframe with her arms folded over her chest.
Luffy didn't reply. He simply flashed one of his trademark grins and swung his legs over the railing. Patting his still growling stomach, he let Nami know that he in fact was a bit hungry and followed her into the restaurant.
When he entered, he immediately felt everyone's eyes on him. It was something he was used to, but he still couldn't keep the wide grin off his face as he looked around on the few guests who were inside the restaurant. He thought he could remember seeing a large group of ships leaving the restaurant in a hurry, but that was before he had been hit by the cannonball, and he wondered if they were coming back to finish their meals, since there were still plates with half-eaten or even untouched food on some of the tables. Just the sight of the food made Luffy's stomach give up a loud howl to point out how empty it was.
As if on cue, the silver doors at the other end of the hall were opened and a group of four men in white aprons came out with large trays in their hands, which they carried through the room up to the table near the entrance where Zoro, Robin and Usopp were sitting. Once the delicious smell of the meat reached Luffy, he could no longer restrain himself, and he bounced over to the table and sat down at the head of the table, ready to devour practically everything that came within his reach.
In fact, he barely had the time to notice that his brother wasn't sitting by the table as he had expected. But he figured that Ace had found someone interesting to talk to, and didn't think more of that. He would have time to talk to Ace another time, when there wasn't a mountain of delicious meat in front of him.
– e – e –
When his third attempt to pull it on failed, Sanji dropped his shirt onto the table and turned to Chopper with a pleading look on his bandaged face.
"Don't you think it's a little too much, Chopper?" he asked, spreading out his bandage-covered arms to stress his point. "With all these bandages, I mean."
Chopper turned around from where he was standing on top of a large three-legged stool in front one of his large cabinets and looked at Sanji. The boxes of medicine he had taken from the shelf in front of him wobbled a little as the reindeer moved.
"What do you mean by that?" Chopper asked with a genuinely confused expression on his face.
"What the hell do you mean 'what do I mean by that'?" Sanji asked in return, not quite able to hide his frustration. When the words left his mouth, he felt a bit regretful; Chopper was known for his habit to completely wrap his patients in bandages if he got the chance. He sighed and tugged at the thick layers of bandages covering most of his upper body before he continued, a little less aggressively: "I look like the damn swordsman in a mummy-costume, and I can't even put my shirt on. That's what I mean by that. So won't you please remove some of it?"
Chopper looked at him, and Sanji returned the gaze until the reindeer smiled embarrassedly and put down the boxes of medicine on the shelf in front of him before he jumped down from the tall stool. Sanji waited as patiently as he could as Chopper climbed up on the wooden table and started to remove most of the bandages from his body.
"I'm sorry," Chopper said as he rolled up the bandages and tossed the rolls into a basket on the floor. "But I thought that this would be the best way to keep you from exert yourself before your injuries gets the chance to heal."
"You've tried that once before, Chopper," Sanji said calmly as he felt the pressure against the skin on his right arm easing with every layer of bandage that was removed. "It didn't work back then either."
Chopper simply muttered as a reply and tugged at Sanji's left arm to make him turn around a little so that he could reach the safety pin that held the topmost layer of bandages together. Sanji looked at the growing pile of bandage rolls in the basket on the floor, and wondered where Chopper could possibly be keeping all of it. From the looks of it, Chopper had to have an enormous stash of bandages hidden somewhere, especially when considering how heavily wrapped in the white cloth his chefs had been.
Once Chopper had removed all the bandages except for the last two layers that were wrapped tightly around Sanji's ribs to support the fractures and keep them from separating again, he made sure that the bullet wound on the chef's shoulder hadn't started to bleed again. After that, Sanji reached for his shirt and put it on while he smiled appreciatively at Chopper, who hesitated before he returned the smile.
"Thank you, Chopper. And don't worry," Sanji said as he hung his suit jacket over his arm and turned for the door. "I'll take it as easy as I can this time. Are you coming inside?"
"Yes, I'll just have to put these things where they should be. I'll catch up with you." The reindeer moved to lift up the basket with the rolls of bandages but turned to Sanji again. "And no smoking, Sanji. You nearly got both of your lungs punctured back there, so I don't want to catch you smoking already."
Sanji looked down at the cigarette he just had pulled out and stuffed it back into the pack in his inner pocket with a smirk. Chopper knew him too damn well, that was for sure.
"Fine, if that's what the doctor ordinates," he said with a light smile as he walked out from the cabin.
He knew - and he knew that Chopper knew it as well - that the first signs of withdrawal would start a few hours later, whether he liked it or not. But he thought it best to follow Chopper's order, since he was a doctor who only wanted what was best for his patients. At least until the withdrawal got too bad, because at that point, not even Chopper with his ten forms (he had told Sanji and Zoro about how he had discovered three new forms while he carefully patched up Sanji's broken ribs and face, accompanied by Usopp, who gladly told the stories about Chopper's discoveries) could keep him from doing what he wanted.
When Sanji walked out on Meri Go's main deck, he squinted in the strong sunlight. It had felt as if he had been inside the cabin for hours, but the sun was still high in the sky, and judging by the sounds coming from inside the restaurant, the chefs had just served Luffy his meat.
He heard the splashing sound of ships breaking through water and turned to his left, where he spotted the guests who had left the restaurant before the pirates attacked. It was a great relief to him that the guests hadn't been scared away, not only because the Sagatie's reputation would be severely damaged if someone started talking about the dangerous pirates hanging out there, but because he really didn't want his guests to have the memory of Don Krieg's attack as the only thing they took with them when they left the restaurant.
Walking up next to the figure head of the Meri Go, Sanji jumped down to his restaurant and landed almost as softly as a cat on the terrace. He could feel the bullet wound in his leg protesting quite violently at the impact, but he didn't bother to think about it. It was just a wound like any other, and he didn't want his guests to think that he was hurt worse than he really was. Raising his right hand, he signaled to the ships that it was safe to return and watched them close up on the restaurant.
Once the ships started docking by the terrace, Sanji walked into the restaurant to make sure that the guests wouldn't be met by too much of a mess when they entered the dining hall. He was a bit surprised to see that everything seemed to be in order, and he nodded in greeting as a few of his chefs looked his way.
At a large table on near the entrance Sanji had come through sat the three couples who had stayed aboard the restaurant during the attack. When they spotted Sanji, they all got up and walked up to him to shake his hand. Sanji assured them that they really shouldn't be thanking him, since he hadn't done much to protect them or the restaurant.
"I hope that your children were returned safe and sound," he said, casting a quick glance towards the table on the other side of the room, where his nakama had gathered.
"Oh, yes, thank you," one of the women said, her flushed cheeks taking the same shade as her hair. "They said that they had been having a lot of fun with the pirates."
"I'm glad to hear that," Sanji said, his smile obscured by the bandages covering the left side of his face. "If you excuse me, I need to speak with my staff before the rest of the guests come in."
He nodded and walked away from the guests, headed towards the chefs who were standing near the kitchen. But before he reached even halfway through the room, he could hear the sound of people muttering something about pirates and turned around.
A large crowd of people were standing in the doorway to the restaurant, nervously looking towards the table where Luffy and the rest of the former Straw Hat pirates were sitting. Sanji watched them for a brief moment, and was just about to walk up to the guests and try to convince them that the Pirate King wasn't going to harm anyone, when he felt a hand on his shoulder.
"Why are you standing there like a bunch of scarecrows on a field?" Usopp asked and winked at Sanji as he walked past him.
"Who are you?" One of the guests demanded to know. Usopp didn't let himself get intimidated by the large crowd, but bowed deeply in front of the guests.
"Captain Usopp, at your service. I see that you've noticed that guy in the straw hat over there, but you don't have to worry about him."
"Why? You mean it isn't the Pirate King?" asked another guest.
"What? Oh. No, of course it's him. What I mean is that I've already made him promise not to cause any trouble here today. You see, all the pirates in the world fear Captain Usopp. Even the King of Pirates thinks twice before messing with me. I could tell you about the time I saved him from the cannibalistic Zumbaya Warriors far in the Grand Line…"
Usopp broke off and looked thoughtful for a moment, before he shrugged lightly and turned around towards Sanji. "But I guess you don't want to hear that, since you're too busy doubting the word of Captain Usopp."
At this point, the guests seemed to be more afraid of Usopp than of Luffy, so Sanji stepped forward, giving Usopp a light push towards the other pirates as he walked past him and muttered "Go tell the story to the kids instead, I think they'll appreciate it" under his breath.
Once Usopp turned away and walked back to the pirates and the children, who quickly gathered around him, begging to hear another story, Sanji turned to the guests who were standing in the doorway and nodded instead of bowing due to the sudden flashes of pain spreading from his chest.
"Ladies and gentlemen, please have patience with him," he said calmly, hoping that the painkillers Chopper had forced him to take would start to take effect soon. "None of the pirates here is a threat to you, and I will personally take responsibility for them, if that will make you feel more comfortable."
His words calmed the guests, and he was relieved to see their faces lose the tense and nervous expressions as they entered the restaurant to take their seats again. Sanji sighed with relief and ran his fingers through his hair as he made his way towards the kitchen. Now the stress was coming back again, and he almost wished that he could split himself in two, so that he could take care of everything he had to take care of.
"Sanji! Seconds please!"
Raising his hand to show Luffy that he had heard him, Sanji headed towards the kitchen. He needed to cook something to get his mind off everything else.
– e – e –
"… And believe it or not, as I watched them from my hiding place, the Zumbaya Warriors were actually getting ready to boil the poor sailors in this huge cauldron over an open fire…"
Luffy leaned back in his chair, absentmindedly chewing on a splinter of a bone as he listened to Usopp's story. He glanced over towards the large silver doors at the end of the room where he had seen Sanji disappear, hoping to see his cook coming out again with more meat for him. No, not his cook, he reminded himself, cupping his hands behind his head. Sanji was his own cook now, and Luffy had to try to remember that.
"… and the Chief of the Warriors looked down at me where I was on the ground, still stunned from the paralyzing dart that had hit me. He pointed at me with his spear and said…"
Luffy suppressed a sigh. He really wished that he could listen to Usopp's story, because it sounded really interesting, but there was something that he needed to do before he could settle down properly.
"I want to go back to the Grand Line," he said, looking around the table at his nakama and meeting their eyes before he turned to his first mate. "Zoro, you're coming with me, right?"
"Yeah," Zoro said simply, stifling a yawn as he met Luffy's gaze.
"Huh?" Nami put down her Tact on the table and looked towards Zoro. "So you're going to be a pirate again, then?"
"Again? I never claimed to have stopped being a pirate," Zoro countered as he leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. "I've always said, 'if I'm not in this clan, I have no reason to be a pirate', but with the bounty on my head, I can't just walk around like a normal person, now can I?"
"With hair like that, I'm amazed that you've ever managed to pass as a normal person," Usopp chipped in, grinning at Zoro before he continued with his story. "And speaking of people with weird hair, the strongest Warrior that I mentioned before - the one who the Chief had ordered to finish me off - his hairdo was definitely one of the most strange I've ever seen. He looked like…"
"I should be the one to say that to you and that nose of yours, Usopp," Zoro replied calmly, but his furrowed brow revealed the level of his irritation aimed towards the marksman. However, Usopp wasn't affected by the words. As Luffy watched his sharpshooter, he wasn't entirely sure that Usopp even had heard Zoro at all. Luffy grinned and turned to look at Nami and Robin, who both had put down what they had been reading and were watching the scene played up in front of them.
"What about you two then?" he asked cheerfully. "Wanna go to the Grand Line again?"
"That would be fun," Nami admitted, and glanced at Robin. "But we have some business to take care of here in East Blue first… Right, Robin?"
Robin turned her eyes away from the group of laughing children and looked at Luffy. She adjusted the bookmark at the end of her book and put it down on a fairly clean spot on the table.
"Not quite," she said softly and smiled. "The man I talked to before the pirate incident today had heard of the 'stone cube' in northern East Blue. It turns out that it is not one of the Poneglyphs, after all."
"Yosh," Luffy said, punching the air above his head. "Then you can come to the Grand Line with me!"
As Nami and Robin agreed to come along, Luffy turned around to look towards the silver doors again. This time, he saw Sanji emerging with two large trays loaded with desserts in his hands, and Luffy's mouth watered at once. A little snack while he waited for his meat wouldn't hurt… Would it?
– e – e –
Sanji walked out from the kitchen balancing two trays loaded with desserts in his hands. Close behind him, two of his waiters emerged carrying trays with meat towards the pirates' table. He felt surprisingly cheerful, even as he had started to get annoyed over the fact that he had trouble seeing properly because of the tight bandages that were wrapped around most of his face to keep the broken bones in place until they had the chance to heal. The chef knew that he was supposed to be resting, but while he had been in the kitchen, he had started to feel that he needed to be the one apologizing to the guests for the inconvenience of the pirate attack.
As a hand stretched across the room towards the food, Sanji ducked as quickly as his still throbbing ribs allowed him to and he glared towards the appendage's owner.
"Cut it out, Luffy," he said, catching the innocent-looking gaze in the younger man's eyes as he pointed to the tray he balanced on his head. "You'll get your dessert once you finish your dinner."
Luffy shrugged, drew back his arm almost obediently and turned his gaze towards the waiters carrying the meat towards the table. Sanji smirked and continued towards a table in the far corner of the room, where the placed out seven of the desserts in front of the guests.
"Please accept this," he said politely, smiling at the two girls sitting next to the large, bearded man. "I'm really sorry for the pirate incident. All the food you've had today is on the house, so don't worry about that."
"A ha ha, you're the one who shouldn't worry, young man," replied Mister Mange-Tout and patted Sanji lightly on his bandaged left shoulder. Sanji grimaced a little from the light pain that still lingered in his shoulder while Mister Mange-Tout continued, "I said before that I've never been to a restaurant where pirates entertain the guests, didn't I? Well, I have to say that I've never been saved from other pirates by pirates either. I was very impressed to learn about how these pirates aided you and your staff in the fight. And on top of that, the food and service here is first-class."
He reached inside the inner pocket of his suit jacket and withdrew a pen and a thin folder with papers, which he placed next to his plate on the table.
"I have no other choice but to give you your five stars," he said with a smile as he first made some notes on the first paper and then signed all the pages with his name.
Sanji didn't know what to say. He had, without bragging, known that he was the owner of a world-class restaurant, but he would never have expected to receive five stars within the first year of business.
Mister Mange-Tout laughed his bellowing laugh and slammed his open hand against the table, which made several of the guests turn around towards them.
"A ha ha haaa, look at him, he's speechless! Now, now, my young fellow, don't let us keep you. I see that you have other things to do. We'll discuss the matter of stars later."
Sanji's eyes were drawn to the second tray with desserts that he was still balancing in his right hand, and he smiled politely. He was still a little shocked from hearing the good news.
"Yes," he managed to say once he found his voice again. "Thank you. Enjoy your meal now, and don't hesitate to call if you need anything."
He continued to walk through the room, talking to the guests and serving desserts until he reached up to the table below the stairs, where the woman who had been complaining about basically everything during the day (but since she had returned to the restaurant after Krieg had left, Sanji had the feeling that her comments were just empty words) was sitting together with her older male companion. Placing the last two bowls of fruit salad in front of the couple, he bowed gently out of habit and was for the first time that day thankful for the tight bandages covering most of his upper body under the blue shirt. He managed, however, to keep a straight face and apologized for all the trouble the pirate-attack had caused and explained to the guests that none of the guests would be charged a single Belli for their food.
The pink-haired woman looked at him for a moment before she nodded just as stiffly as he just had bowed.
"I would have refused to pay even if you had asked me to," she said curtly, but Sanji was convinced that he saw a light smile flicker over her pursed lips. "Especially not after that horrible incident. As if one gang of pirates wasn't enough…"
She sighed. "But I suppose we should thank the ones who protected us. So, thank you…"
Sanji smiled and bowed again, mentally kicking himself for doing so.
"I'll make sure to tell everyone who was involved, mademoiselle," he said softly. "Please enjoy the rest of your stay here at the Sagatie. Don't hesitate to call if you need anything."
There was a sudden flash of orange light coming from a table to Sanji's right, and many of the guests gave weak cries of surprise. Sanji looked up just in time to see Ace extinguishing a flame which had attached itself to one of the beams in the high ceiling by making a gesture with his hand and so making the fire soar down towards him and melting together with his arm to the guests' great amusement. Ace caught Sanji's eyes and bowed apologetically.
"I'm sorry," he said with a light grin. "I guess I'm still a little bit fired up and forgot to hold back."
"No worries, Ace," Sanji said calmly. He felt like nothing in the world could upset him, but it could of course be the painkillers Chopper had given him that finally had started to take effect. "You seem to have that under control now, anyway."
He still couldn't help but wonder what could have happened to Kaji, that cocky little pirate rookie and nakama-murderer whom Ace had taken with him away from the restaurant earlier. The kid hadn't followed Ace back to the restaurant, and the fire-powered pirate had refused to say anything about what had happened when he had got the question. Sanji knew that Whitebeard had had the policy that if someone in his pirate clan was killed or hurt in any way, the one responsible would be hunted down and punished in the same fashion, and the chef wondered if Ace used the same ways.
Shrugging lightly (and immediately cursing himself for doing so as his healing shoulder and patched-up ribs all gave a stinging throb at once), Sanji walked across the room towards the table where his nakama were sitting. On the way, he put away the two now empty trays on an unoccupied table.
The only ones who were still eating their dinner were Luffy who just had received what had to be his third or fourth serving, and Zoro and Chopper, who had been able to fend off Luffy's attempts to steal their food. Chopper seemed to be about to choke on his food in his attempt to mimic Luffy's eating technique. Nami was leaning her elbows against the table while she was examining her newly repaired Clima Tacts and reading a small note which seemed to be some kind of instructions. To her right, Robin was once again reading her book, and Sanji could see that she had already reached the last chapters during her stay at the restaurant.
A few steps away from the table, almost right in front of the starboard entrance, surrounded by a group of children and some of the other guests, Usopp was right in the middle of telling them all about his part in the previous fight.
"… so I jumped down from my ship while I pulled out my gun, like this--" He moved his hand to his side, and made the impression of withdrawing an invisible gun from his sash. "-- and then I aimed it directly at the pirate's head and said, 'Bet your life on it…' Of course, he was scared stiff, so it was easy for Sanji to take him out. I could have done it myself at any time, but I didn't want to take all the credit for the save…"
Zoro put down his fork on his plate without putting the food impaled on it in his mouth.
"Usopp, give it a rest," he said irritably. "You've told that story three times already, and--"
He didn't get the time to finish the sentence as Sanji swiftly picked up the fork and stuffed the food into the swordsman's mouth while he walked by on his way to aid the poor choking reindeer.
"Let the kid enjoy himself," he snapped, reaching out to pour a glass of water for Chopper. "The guests all love his stories, so why don't you cut him some slack?"
Zoro choked on the food which was forced into his mouth, but when he finally managed to swallow it, he glared at Sanji.
"What the hell, you idiot?" he roared, making some of the guests turn around to see what was going on. "What are you trying to do? Choke me to death with your damn cooking?"
"You just need to learn how to chew your food, you noisy bastard," Sanji replied and leaned back as Zoro aimed a punch to his face. He had no intention to risk having his broken cheekbone dislocated again - he already looked like some kind of mummified imitation of himself with the cast and bandages covering the left side of his face. He was interrupted just as he was about to deliver another insult to Zoro's enraged face, by the clatter of plates being stacked on top of each other and a voice saying "Seconds, please!" closely followed by a tinier, coughing voice mimicking the first.
"Don't you mean 'fifths', Luffy?" Zoro said and reached out to thump Chopper in the back to ease the coughing. "Jeez, I thought I told you that you still don't have to copy him like that, Chopper…"
"What?" Chopper said with a cough, almost as if it was the first time anyone had ever told him that. "Really? Oi, Luffy, that's my glass!"
The little reindeer seemed to have forgotten all about choking as his glass which was still filled with some of the water Sanji had poured for him ended up in Luffy's hand. Chopper jumped up and tried to take his glass back, but it was too late. Luffy had emptied the whole jug in one gulp. Then he wiped his mouth with a satisfied grin on his face.
"Aah… Sanji, I want more food!"
Sanji nodded. "I know. I've told my chefs to cook all the meat in the restaurant for you. They're working on it as we speak."
Luffy pouted a little as he looked up at Sanji from under the brim of his hat. "But I want to eat your food," he whined in that extra whining voice which Sanji found that he had missed too much to get annoyed over.
"They're using my recipes," he tried to explain. "Besides, Chopper told me that I can't work until I've healed a little bit."
There was a short moment of silence in which all the pirates around the table looked at him.
"Since when do you listen to what Chopper says?" Usopp finally wondered, breaking the silence. "And, weren't you coming out of the kitchen just now?"
Sanji cast a quick glance at Chopper, who looked back at him with a questioning look on his silver-stained face. The chef smiled.
"Good point," he said and leaned over the table to pick up on of the tall stacks of empty plates. "Does anyone else want anything? Nami-san, Robin-chan, can I get you something?"
Nami and Robin both declined and returned to their reading, but there was a loud choir of voices crying "Desserts!" followed by some sort of war dance performed around Usopp, who stood there like a living totem pole while the six children he had brought aboard his ship were circling around him. Sanji rolled his eyes, but kept a smile on his face. He hadn't forgotten that he had promised them desserts after dinner, but the battle against the annoying shitheads had sort of taken his mind off cooking for a few minutes.
"Hai, hai," Sanji said, leaning his chin lightly against a somewhat clean spot on the topmost plate in the stack he held in his hands to keep it from wobbling too much as he started walking away from the table. He could feel Chopper's disapproving gaze burning a hole in his neck, but he didn't turn around to return it. "Calm down, I'll be right back."
When he walked into the kitchen, he barely avoided tripping over his three apprentices, who were standing just inside the silver doors. Stumbling back, he could see the image of the plates falling to the floor before his eyes just as he regained his balance again.
"What the--?" he broke off and steadied himself and the plates in his arms while glaring at the three boys in front of him. "Aren't you three supposed to be doing your chores?"
One of the cyan-haired twins seemed to gather his courage before he spoke.
"Is… Is that really the King of Pirates our there?"
Sanji sighed and adjusted the stack of plates in his arms. His wounded left shoulder had started throbbing a little again, despite the fuzzy feeling the painkillers were giving him. He pushed one of the doors open so that the pirates' table came into view and nodded towards Luffy.
"Yeah, he's the one with the straw hat."
"He doesn't look like a king to me," said the green-haired boy with a frown.
"No, I guess he doesn't," Sanji said simply, moving away from the apprentices. He turned to look over his shoulder at them, his brow somewhat furrowed in irritation. "If you're taking a break, stay in the kitchen or go out there and talk to the pirates. You're going to be in the way if you just stand there."
He could hear the boys hesitate for a moment, but by the time Sanji had put down the stack of plates on a counter in the kitchen, the boys were nowhere to be found. Sanji smiled lightly to himself, almost startling himself by feeling so cheerful all of a sudden.
It was almost as if there had never been a dull pain growing inside his chest, like a black hole eating its way through him and devouring every bit of happiness he had left. In fact, he had already started to forget what it had felt like.
– e – e –
The three apprentices looked at each other and cast quick glances at the Owner. He couldn't possibly have meant that they could just go out there and talk to pirates? Especially not the King of Pirates! The few times the boys had seen pirates up-close, they had always been only seconds from getting killed by them.
Then, the green-haired boy straightened up and looked determinedly at the silver doors in front of him. Just as he was about to push the doors open, he felt someone tugging at the back of his shirt. He turned around and met the eyes of his two friends.
"What are you doing, Jona?" one of the cyan-haired twins asked in a hushed voice.
"What does it look like I'm doing, Bou?" the green-haired asked in return, but his voice was far from steady. "I'm going to go and talk to them. Oh, come on, you guys! If the Owner says that it's okay, they're probably not bad people."
The cyan-haired boy named Bou - who happened to be the older twin by ten minutes - nodded and puffed out his narrow chest as he turned to nudge his twin. "You're right, Jona. Come on, Dorou, it's not everyday you get to see the Pirate King in person!"
The younger twin looked unsure for a short moment, but then he nodded as well. "Alright! Let's go!"
Pushing the silver doors open, the three boys moved out into the dining hall, carefully looking around at the many guests. They were not normally allowed to walk around among the guests, even if they had snuck out there to watch the people on more than one occasion.
To their right, a very tall, muscular man was entertaining a few of the guests by creating tiny dragons made of fire just by waving his hand in the air. The small fire-creations soared through the air under the ceiling and over the tables to the guests' great amusement. To the boys' left, close to the entrance, the rest of the pirates were gathered around a table which was almost completely covered in empty plates. They appeared to be a motley bunch of people who didn't appear to have much in common.
At the far end of the pirates' table sat a man with dark clothes and bright green hair. He looked almost as if he was sleeping, the way he leaned back in his chair with his arms folded over his chest, but as they got closer, the boys could see his lips moving from time to time when he spoke to the other pirates. To the man's right sat two women, one with straight black hair and a very calm and collected appearance, and another with bright orange hair and an annoyed frown on her face. Across the table from them, a small teddybear-like creature with antlers was bouncing up and down on its chair while waving one hoof at the man sitting to his right. However, the man didn't seem to be bothered by this at all. He sat at the head of the table, where the tallest stacks of plates had gathered, talking and laughing like there was no tomorrow.
Jona frowned at the sight of the old, worn and repaired straw hat that the man wore on his head. That man simply couldn't be the King of Pirates, it just didn't make sense. Ever since he was little, Jona had heard stories about this young man who was making his way through the Grand Line, overcoming any hardships as he went and gathering more and more strong members to his crew. But all the stories had told of a man so strong, not even the Marines could catch him, and so ruthless, that he didn't care about innocent people in his quest to become the King of Pirates.
He nodded in the direction of the pirates, and the boys started walking towards them. When they were getting closer to the table, they noticed the man in the brown cloak who was surrounded by a bunch of kids. He was standing with his back to the three apprentices and was gesturing wildly while telling some kind of story.
"…And then, the monstrous hydra reared up with its hundred heads swaying as it fixed its gaze on me, its glowing yellow eyes piercing through the darkness--"
The man actually managed to twist himself into a movement that made it appear as if he had four extra heads and a long snake-like tail. The twins stopped to watch, still holding on to Jona's shirtsleeves.
"-- I raised my slingshot, which was the only weapon I had left--"
The man in the cloak broke off and turned around, spotting the three apprentices, who took a careful step backwards.
"Hey, what have we here?" the pirate said cheerfully, and despite his strange looks (with the unusually long nose and the round, childlike eyes), he looked kind of friendly. "I haven't seen the three of you before. Do you work here? What are your names?"
The three boys nodded in unison, but the twins were still hiding behind their green-haired friend. Jona glanced over his shoulder at the cyan-haired boys, but then he quickly turned his eyes forward again.
"I-- I'm Jona, and this is Bou and Dorou…" He felt as he was being watched, and as he looked up towards the table where the pirates were sitting, he saw the man in the straw hat looking directly at him with a strange look on his face. "Wh-what are you looking at?" he stammered, trying desperately to keep his voice steady.
The straw hat-clad man's face suddenly cracked up in a wide grin, and he turned to his right to catch the attention of the other pirates.
"Look at this!" he said, pointing at Jona. "He looks just like Zoro, isn't that cool?" and he started to laugh in a very friendly way, which made the boys feel a little less intimidated by him.
The orange-haired woman seated next to the supposed-to-be Pirate King looked up from whatever it was she was reading and turned her eyes towards Jona, who could feel that he was blushing heavily.
"Jeez," she said, tapping the tip of her index finger against the laughing pirate's forehead. "They just have the same haircolor, Luffy. Other than that, he looks nothing like Zoro."
"Oh, I don't know…" came a third voice from the other end of the table, where the man with the bright green hair (which really had the exact same color as Jona's) was leaning back in his chair to get a good look at the topic of the conversation. "He kind of looks like I did when I was a kid, but he's clearly a lot weaker than I was at his age."
"Hey!" Jona blurted out before he could stop himself. "I'm not weak!"
This caused the man in the straw hat to laugh even harder, but the laughter was just as warm and friendly as before.
"Ha ha ha, he even sounds like you, Zoro!"
"Now that you mention it, he does remind me of Zoro," said the long-nosed man thoughtfully. "Is there something you've forgotten to tell us, Zoro?"
"Like what?" demanded the man called Zoro.
"Oh, I don't know," said the long-nosed man mockingly. "Any 'escapades' out of marriage in some town in the Grand Line that we don't know about?"
"First: I don't have any kids, if that's what you're asking," Zoro said firmly and reached for a scrap of bread still lying on the table. Then he raised an eyebrow and added: "And second: why the hell would I tell you about something like that?"
Tired of being the topic of the conversation, Jona freed himself from the twins' hands.
"Hey, are you really the Pirate King?" he asked, trying to keep the twins from grabbing hold of his clothes again. The man in the straw hat stopped laughing almost immediately and looked at him with a serious expression in his eyes which almost scared Jona to death. But then he grinned widely again.
"Yup, that's me. I'm Monkey D. Luffy, the King of Pirates. Nice to meet you, Shorty!" Before Jona could protest against being called 'Shorty', Luffy held out his hand towards the two women to his right. "This is Nami and Nico Robin, and that guy over there is Zoro and this one is named Chopper."
"But--" Dorou said carefully, eyeing the fluffy little animal who was sitting on a chair next to the Pirate King carefully. "He's a… a deer!"
"I'm not a deer, I'm a reindeer!" spat the animal and turned around in his chair to look at the boys.
"And he's a really talented doctor," added the orange-haired woman with a wink. "So don't insult him."
The reindeer suddenly started to giggle with embarrassment and shouting things like "Don't think I'll be happy because you say that, Asshole!" until Zoro reached out and covered his mouth to protect the children's sensitive minds. Most of the guests in the dining hall sent him appreciating looks for doing that.
"And I'm Captain Usopp!" said the long-nosed man cheerfully, and was about to say something more when a little boy who was sitting on the floor by his feet suddenly tugged at his brown cloak.
"Usopp-niichan, what happened with the hydra?"
Usopp seemed to be reminded by an old injury as he turned back to the children by his feet, because he grasped at his lower left arm before he continued.
"Yes, as I was saying, the only weapon I had left was my old slingshot, and there were only four pieces of ammunition left in my satchel. Against a hydra with a hundred heads, it didn't seem like the odds were on my side… Hey, you three should sit down if you want to listen. You don't have to stand there."
Jona and the twins all jumped as the pirate spoke to them. Neither one of them had noticed that they had been standing there, watching the storyteller with wide eyes. The three of them hurriedly sat down behind the other kids and looked up at Usopp, who continued his story and showed them the pale circular scars on both sides of his lower left arm, where the hydra was supposed to have bitten him in its attempt to finish him off.
– e – e –
While he was cutting the last strawberries in half, Sanji's attention was partly drawn to the faded noise behind him in the kitchen. His hands moved on their own as he listened to the voices around him.
"Easy, Carne! You're slobbering gravy all over the counter!"
"Hah, I bet he's still shaky from the pirate attack."
"Nah, he's just getting old, that's all. Maybe you should think of getting retired, Carne?"
"Ha ha ha, that's very funny. You guys should be comedians instead of chefs. Is that course done? Then carry it out to the guest."
It was something in Carne's voice as he said the word 'guest' that made Sanji's mind switch off its autopilot. He turned around just as a waiter scooped up a tray loaded with meat on the bone.
"Wait a minute," Sanji said. "Is that for the Pirate King? In that case, I'll take it myself. I have some desserts for that table anyway."
The waiter looked a bit relieved as he heard this, and he put the tray back on the counter before he hurried away to tend to some other guests. Sanji finished the desserts and placed the twelve bowls of fruit salad and ice cream on a large tray. Then he picked up the tray of meat and turned towards the doors.
"That was the last of the red meat," Carne grunted as Sanji walked past his place by the counters. "Just thought you should know."
"I knew that we'd run out if he showed up," Sanji sighed admittedly. "It's alright, I know of an island where we can buy meat of good quality for almost nothing. Just make sure to cross out all meat courses from today's menu."
"Already done, Owner!" came the voice of one of the waiters from the other side of the kitchen, who held up one of the menus in the air.
"Good," Sanji smiled and walked through the silver doors into the dining hall, where a very loud buzz of voices filled the air. As he looked up towards one of the lamps that hung from the ceiling, he noticed a small flock of dragons made of fire that circled around above the guests' heads.
The blond chef caught Ace's eyes as he looked around, and he chuckled as the dragons swooped down to circle around him before they returned to the room, lighting several candles when they passed over the tables. It seemed like Ace had cooled down, because Sanji couldn't see any more burn marks in the ceiling.
"Sanji! Meat, meat, meat!"
The voice gave Sanji the opportunity to step aside just s Luffy reached out for the meat he was balancing in one hand. Turning around quickly, he brought down his foot and nailed the outstretched hand to the floor.
"I've told you this three times everyday for nine years, Luffy. Wait until the food is on the damn table!" he said and pressed down his heel a little harder against Luffy's hand.
"Ooowowowowow oooow!" Luffy whined and tried to pull back his hand, which was hopelessly stuck under Sanji's foot. "Alright, alright! Sorry!"
Sanji doubted that Luffy's apologize was sincere, but since he didn't have the slightest desire to stand there on the pirate's hand all day, he unceremoniously lifted his foot from the floor. Luffy's arm immediately retracted and snapped back in place with such speed that he accidentally ended up punching himself in the face. The Pirate King wobbled back in his chair and fell backwards over the side of the table, which toppled over him as he tumbled to the floor with a loud crash and caused most of the guests in the room to turn around towards the pirates.
There was a moment of silence before all the pirates in the room, including Ace, burst out laughing, shortly followed by the rest of the guests. Robin placed her hand over her mouth as she giggled softly, while Nami and Chopper were leaning against each other for support as they laughed a bit louder. Usopp, Zoro and even Ace on the other side of the room cackled loudly and almost folded themselves double in their attempt to stay on their feet. The pirates had all seen the incident coming and had been able to move away from the table in time.
Chopper was the first one to stop laughing, as he suddenly remembered that he was a doctor who was supposed to check if Luffy -against all odds- had been hurt. When he hurried back to the turned-over table, the pile of furniture and broken porcelain parted, revealing a baffled-looking Pirate King. Luffy rubbed his head and wiped gravy from his eyes as he sat up.
"Haa… that startled me…. Huh?"
He looked up and squinted as he spotted the tiny fire dragons that were circling around his head. When he waved his hand at them, they split up in a swarm of even smaller dragons before they vanished in thin air. The pirates around him were still laughing, so he joined in the laughter while he let Chopper check him for injuries.
Sanji had managed to keep himself from laughing too hard, but he was still chuckling as he placed the trays on an unoccupied table. Once he had made Zoro help him straighten the table and the chairs and defended the meat and the children's desserts from Luffy with a few well-aimed kicks to the face, he could finally serve the Pirate King his last serving.
When he had handed out desserts to Usopp, Chopper, the six children and his three apprentices, who took their bowls with amazement written all over their faces, and advised everyone to protect their desserts with their lives, Sanji could finally sit down for a moment. He placed the last bowl of fruit salad next to Luffy before he walked over to the empty chair next to Zoro and sat down to watch the kids listening to yet another of Usopp's tales. After a while, his eyes started wandering towards the pirates around him.
He wished that they would never leave, he realized that now. Once they were gone, he would go back to All Blue to stock up, and then he restaurant would continue to sail the oceans just like during the past seven months. And he would have nothing to look forward to, except the next time he would see a glimpse of orange hair, ice blue eyes or a tattered straw hat, or hear another annoying tall tale and the tiny voice shouting words (some of which even Sanji wouldn't take in his mouth).
Hell, he'd probably even look forward to see Zoro once in a while, just to get to argue and fight with someone…
Then he thought of something and hesitated before he turned to Luffy.
"Luffy?" he said, catching the Pirate King's attention just as he discarded the empty, carefully licked-clean plate onto one of the tall stacks in front of him.
"Yeah?" Luffy said as he reached for his bowl of fruit salad without taking his eyes off Sanji.
"I didn't think of it before, but weren't you going to try to return that hat of yours again now that you're really the King of Pirates?"
Luffy looked up towards the straw hat on his head while stuffing his mouth full with fruit and ice cream.
"Oh right, Shanks," he said after a while, grinning widely. "Yeah, I was."
"Was?" Nami took her eyes from the note in her hand, to which she seemed to be adding comments of her own.
"Yeah!" Luffy continued, still grinning. "I met him and tried to give it back again, since I've become a great pirate, but he wouldn't take it this time either. But this time, he told me to keep it, since it means a lot to me."
He put down the now empty bowl on the table and cast a glance across the table at Zoro. Sanji turned his head towards Zoro in time to see the swordsman return Luffy's gaze before he shrugged and went back to lazily watching the kids who surrounded Usopp on the floor. Luffy then reached up to pat the straw hat on his head, with a softer smile on his face.
"What is it?" Nami asked after a while, when Luffy had looked at almost everything in the room except his nakama.
"Nothing," the captain said, wincing as he returned to reality. "I was just thinking… if he knew what would happen, and that's why he gave it to me…"
"Wha--?" Usopp turned around to look at Luffy just as he had finished his story. "You mean that the rumor is true, then? That Red-haired Shanks is…"
"Yeah," Zoro said when Luffy didn't reply. "But the rumors are a bit exaggerated. They--"
One cold glare from Luffy shut him up immediately, and the topic was replaced by Usopp, who asked the children if they had ever heard of an island that was located in the sky. Not interested in hearing Usopp's version of their adventures, Sanji leaned back in his chair, wondering what the rumors could have said. He hadn't heard a thing about Shanks and his crew, even if rumors usually reached the Sagatie very fast. But he knew that if Luffy didn't want to talk about it, he wasn't supposed to ask about it, so he didn't.
The sound of the Den Den Mushi by the small reception near the entrance caught his attention instead, and he watched as one of the waiters ran to answer it. He watched with some interest as the waiter made some notes in the black book, bowed to no one in particular and hung up. Then, the waiter came running up to the table, glancing nervously at the pirates before he turned to Sanji.
"Owner, we just got a late reservation. Those blacklisted Marine officers will be coming here in two hours."
Sanji groaned. The two Marine officers who almost always traveled side by side had visited the Sagatie before, both in East Blue and West Blue, and at one time even in the beginning of the Grand Line. The problem was that they - or rather the blond, silly-looking one - never seemed to have any money to pay for their (or his) food. This had annoyed Sanji to no end, and he had finally decided to blacklist them both (even though the pink-haired commander or whatever his title was usually had enough to pay for his own food) until they paid what they owed. However, this had not stopped them from coming back to the restaurant, since one of the conditions Sanji had had to accept to be able to open his restaurant without being arrested had been that no Marine would be denied to visit the ship.
"Right," he said, rubbing a sore point in his right temple. "Thank you, Ryou. Tell Pati and Carne, so that they can prepare for the Marines."
"Well," Luffy said, suddenly pushing back his chair. "I guess we'll be leaving then."
"If you say so, Captain," Zoro said and straightened up in his chair.
"You're leaving so soon?" Sanji heard himself asking, and turned to look at Robin and Nami, even though he already felt that they were going as well.
"And like I said earlier, Luffy, I think the Meri Go would love to have a bigger crew," Usopp chipped in.
"Yosh! We have a ship!" Luffy cheered happily, raising his fist in an overjoyed gesture.
"However," Robin said calmly, surveying the now dancing Luffy with some interest. "A ship cannot have two captains."
"Don't worry!" Usopp assured her with a grin. "I'd be happy to have Luffy as the captain. I mean, he did quite a good job last time, didn't he?"
"Right," Luffy grinned even wider than Usopp and turned to Sanji. "Sanji, can we have some meat?"
Shaking his head, Sanji frowned.
"There is no meat left, but I think there is some fish and chicken you can have." Before he could stop himself, he continued: "Tell me, Usopp, does that ship have any storage room with enough room for a freezer, by the way? The food won't last for long otherwise."
Luffy looked a bit disappointed to hear that there was no more meat he could have, and he pouted a little while he picked up a fork from the table and started to play with it. Usopp on the other hand, nodded happily.
"The storage rooms are a bit bigger than on the Going Merry, and we've already got a really large freezer just waiting to be filled up. So, have you decided to come along after all?"
"No."
Sanji and Usopp both turned their heads to look at Luffy, who was still playing with the fork, balancing it on the tip of his index finger.
"What do you mean 'no', Luffy?" Nami asked. "Aren't you going to let Sanji-kun go with us?"
"Nami-san, it's--" Sanji started. He understood perfectly what Luffy was doing, and he didn't want Nami to get involved. Luffy had all right to act the way he was acting.
"No, Sanji-kun!" Nami said in that certain tone of voice which meant that there was no point in arguing with her. "He can't just do this, it's not right!"
"Cut it out, Nami," Zoro snapped and got up from his chair in a gesture that clearly meant that the discussion was over. "He has his reasons for everything he does, and it is the captain who decides who gets to be in the clan and who doesn't."
"Sanji has his restaurant," Luffy said simply and placed the fork on the table. "He doesn't have the time to be a pirate. Now let's prepare the ship."
He got up, closely followed by Zoro and Chopper. Usopp hurried up to finish the story he had been telling the children, without making it all too short and boring.
"Robin and I have to get our luggage from the family who gave us a lift out here," Nami said and got up from her chair with the repaired Clima Tacts in her hands. "We'll come to the ship when we're done."
"Good," Luffy smiled. Then he snapped his fingers and reached down into one of his pockets. "Right, I almost forgot. Sanji, here!"
Sanji reached out his hand as Luffy tossed a coin to him. He looked down at the 100 Belli coin with an eyebrow raised.
"Not even the King of Pirates eats for free at the Sagatie, everyone knows that," said Luffy and grinned before he turned away again.
Sanji didn't reply, but he dropped the coin onto the table and stood up.
"You were the one who desperately wanted me to join your crew in the first place." He let his hands slide down into the pockets of his pants and tilted his head slightly back as he locked his eyes on the back of Luffy's straw hat-clad head. "I couldn't even try to shut you up. But now you're not even going to ask me to join before you leave me behind?"
Luffy stopped walking just as he reached the entrance and turned his eyes towards Sanji. He looked at the chef for a moment before he grinned.
"Get your things then," he said, walking out through the doors followed by Zoro and Chopper. Nami and Robin walked in the opposite direction, towards the families who had stayed aboard the Sagatie during the pirate attack.
Sanji stood by the table, looking after the pirates for a moment. Then he felt a hand on his right shoulder and turned around.
"You're going as well?" he asked and nodded towards the backpack slung over Ace's shoulder.
"Yes, I do not have any more business to take care of here now that I found Kaji. I should probably try to find my crew in some way or the other. But what about you?"
Sanji smiled.
"I think the order was to get my things," he said. "As often as I've told my staff that I'm going to be a pirate until the day I die, I'd make a fool out of myself if I didn't obey my captain's order."
Ace grinned and adjusted the backpack on his shoulder.
"Spoken like a true pirate," he said, patting Sanji lightly on the shoulder. "Well, I shall go and talk to my brother before I get going. I will see you around, Sanji. And thank you again for the food."
"Speaking of which, did you get to stock up on your supplies?" Sanji asked as Ace walked past him towards the door.
"Yes, I did, I got enough to keep me fed until I get back to the Grand Line." Ace touched the brim of his hat and nodded towards Sanji. "Until we meet again…"
Sanji watched as Ace walked out from the restaurant, and he saw some of his guests turning around in their chairs to get one last glimpse of Fire Fist Ace, the infamous pirate captain. He barely noticed the two men who came up behind him.
"So you're off again, Sanji?" Carne said gruffly.
"Not that we care or anything," Pati added quickly.
"Of course not," Sanji said, smirking as he turned around. "The reason you two were crying your eyes out last time was simply allergies, right? Now listen to me, you two. I need you to take ten large rations of food and take them to that scrappy-looking pirate ship out there. I'll be in my room if you need me."
The two older chefs nodded and turned around to walk back to the kitchen while Sanji made his way towards the stairs to the second floor.
- e - e -
About an hour later, Sanji sat by his desk, just about to seal an envelope with the Sagatie's emblem on it. Pressing the seal against the large drop of red wax, he cast a glance at the clock on the opposite wall. He hadn't thought that it would take such a long time to sign some papers and leave a note for the one he wanted should take over the restaurant. But now, when everything was signed and done, he couldn't help but feel a little empty inside.
He sighed and leaned the sealed envelope against the ashtray on the desk, glanced at the handwritten certificate on top of the pile of signed forms and smiled. Owning a five-star restaurant was something he had dreamed of for many years, even before the day he heard the story about All Blue and became determined to find the fabled ocean. Was he really going to leave everything behind just like that?
"Sanji!"
The door to his room was suddenly slammed wide open and Luffy stepped in, a wide grin all over his face as usual.
"Are you coming soon?" he asked, hopping up to sit on the desk while he eyed the pile of paper interestedly.
"I'm almost done," Sanji assured him. "I don't want to forget anything, that's-- Please don't touch that, Luffy. Those are important papers."
Luffy pulled away his hand from the stack of papers that had caught his attention.
"Sorry!" he said, once again with a grin all over his slightly pointed face. "They just looked so interesting."
He jumped down from the desk and started walking around in Sanji's room, examining everything he saw while Sanji went through the forms and other papers to make sure that they were all signed and accurate. There was a comfortable silence in the room, only broken by the rustle of paper and the slip-slopping sound of Luffy's sandals as he moved across the floor.
Sanji couldn't think of anything in his room that could possibly be interesting enough to capture his captain's interest, considering that he had already packed everything he owned in the two bags that were leaned against the wall by the door.
"I would have left you if you hadn't said anything."
Sanji looked up from the papers at Luffy, who was sitting on the floor by the small bureau where Sanji was keeping his hammock and poking around in one of the drawers.
"You said that this was what you wanted to do, to feed the hungry at sea who aren't me," Luffy continued without looking up from the drawer. "That you were destined to be a chef. And I'm destined to be the Pirate King, right?"
Sanji couldn't help but smile a little. He wasn't the least shocked that Luffy remembered his words even after such a long time. The captain had always had the ability to remember only what was important to him. The names of his nakama never left his memory once he had learnt them, for example, while the names of some of his enemies never seemed to stick in the first place.
"I know," he said, getting up from his chair. "And I know what I said. It's just--"
"Why do you want to go with us?"
Sanji thought of the piercing pain he had experienced for months, and glanced over at his packed bags, that had been thoroughly searched and examined during the short period of time he had let Luffy wander around in his room.
"I don't know," he said honestly. "All I do know is that I'll go insane if I get left here alone."
Luffy grinned. "Good. Now let's go, the Grand Line and One Piece is waiting."
And with that, he bounced out of the room and down the stairs at the end of the hallway. Sanji followed him a little slower and picked up his bags on his way out through the door. As he turned around to get one last look at the room, he thought for a second that he saw old Zeff sitting there by the desk, looking at him with the same facial expression he had worn the day Sanji left the Baratie, the last time Sanji had seen him alive.
"Oi Sanji! Don't catch a cold." The words appeared in Sanji's mind, and he felt a lump forming in his throat, but he still managed a smile.
"I never catch a cold, old shit geezer. You of all people should know that. Ne, take care of my Sagatie, will you?"
There was no answer. The only sound was the short echo of his voice in the empty room. But Sanji was satisfied. He reached out for the door handle and shut the door behind him before he walked through the narrow hallway and down the stairs to the first floor.
When he came down, he was met by all his chefs, waiters and apprentices, who all had gathered around the foot of the stairs. He got a better grip around the straps of the bags he was carrying over his shoulder and raised an eyebrow as he walked down the rest of the steps.
"What's with the sad faces?" he asked. "I thought you'd be overjoyed to be rid of me."
When none of his employees said anything, Sanji turned to Pati and Carne, who both looked as if they were going to break out in tears at any moment.
"Allergies again, huh?" he said teasingly. "Right, now listen up. I'm no longer the owner of this restaurant. From the moment Tajiyo signs the papers I've left for him in my room, he will be your new boss. I expect you to be just as nice to him as you've been to me, you bunch of pain in the ass bastards!"
The chefs and waiters all smiled at this, but the three apprentices looked like they didn't know whether they should laugh or cry. Sanji smiled and ruffled one of the twins' hair as he kneeled in front of them. A muscle in his cheek twitched as the bullet wound in his left thigh gave a sharp throb, but the smile didn't fade from his face.
"Just do your best and show them that you can become the best. I'll come by and test your skill someday. Also, drive these guys crazy for me if you get the time, alright?"
The boys immediately looked happier, and they nodded in unison as a response to the promise Sanji asked them to make. Sanji stood up in one fluid motion, despite the throbbing in his leg and made sure that he was still carrying the two bags over his shoulder before he quietly walked through the crowd towards the entrance to the restaurant.
"Oi, Sanji!" Pati said all of a sudden, making Sanji turn around in the door. "Don't get a cold now."
Sanji grinned as wide as his broken face allowed him to under the bandages.
"Same to you, shitty old farts," he said, raising his free hand. "Now take care of my treasure, I might come back to check up on you someday."
The chefs and waiters cheered, and the guests in the dining hall clapped as Sanji walked out from the restaurant. Once he came out on the portside terrace, he shook his head and looked towards the scrappy, but proud pirate ship.
Aboard the Meri Go, up by the not yet carved out figure head, Luffy was leaning against the railing as he grinned cheerfully down at Sanji.
"It sure seems interesting to live aboard a restaurant," he said, looking up at the Sagatie. "Are you sure you don't wanna stay?"
"No, why would I?" Sanji said, snorting lightly. "Why would I want to be the head chef of a restaurant when I can be the Pirate King's cook? No way, I'm going with you, Pirate King."
When he said this, Luffy just grinned even wider and threw down a rope ladder to Sanji. Then, the captain turned around and called to the rest of the crew to set the sails. The second voyage of the Straw Hat Clan had was about to begin.
-stabs QuickEdit for the run-ons it probably will create- Haa... Well, that's all for now. There's one more chapter coming, just to wrap things up...
Straw Hat pirate Fan - Well, there was rumors about there never being any more Shichibukai, because the Marines started to think that it just wasn't safe to have so strong and unpredictable pirates sailing around without worrying about getting caught. But then they realized that they would lose a whole lot of money if they got rid of the Shichibukai, and decided to accept the applications of seven new strong pirates. But very little is known about these seven outside the Grand Line, since they very rarely enters the four outer seas, and because the people who have had the bad luck to run into one of these pirates never has been heard of again.
FieryKitsune - Thank you. I like writing action scenes, now that I've learned a little about writing them. That goes for writing Luffy as well. He's really fun to write now that I managed to figure out how he works.
Darkday Chaos -Shameless poking always does the trick, doesn't it? -pounces over the glass ofSake- Motto sake o kudasai!
draganviper - Yeah, I think you're right. I should have been more descriptive in Luffy's battle at the end. I just couldn't find the right words to describe the moves... Gomen, I'll do better next time.
Namibean - Heh, it willtake a little more than that to keep me from finishing this story. I was just thrown off balance for a moment, nothing more. I'm glad you liked the chapter, and I hope you liked this one as well. I wasn't sure if I was going to make Sanji let Zoro know about him not being able to breathe, but I decided to let him do that to point out that even Sanji knows when to set his pride aside. His and Zoro's relation is still a bit tricky to write for me, but I'm learning.
I've read up to chapter 378 as it is now, and I'm anxiously waiting for the next scanlation (Thank you, Null)... The Swedish translation is still on book 28, in the beginning of Skypiea... Loong way to go still...
El Jugador - I don't know. Well, you won't be seeing me do that anymore. :D I'd love to write similar stories for the rest of the crew, and I actually have ideas for Usopp, Chopper, Zoro and Luffy that could work... But I'm not sure if that would be a good idea, all stories would end the same way, and I think I'm going to stick with writing stories set pre-Grand Line or Pre-Alabasta for a while... I hope I didn't keep you waiting too long for this chapter.
Mavado - Ha ha, well, it will take a little, little more to break my writing spirit entirely. I'm actually glad that you point out those little things I mess up in my stories, it helps keeping my feeton the ground when my head gets too big. -snerks- Franken-ship... You know, you're pretty dead-on there... I'm actuallyreally curious to see what will happen after Water Seven, and what ship they will have when the whole ordeal is over. No matter what happens, I'll always have my little Going Merry paper model to comfort me...