Chapter One: Out At Sea

Luffy's choice of 'the thrill of the unknown' over 'staying here waiting for things to happen' did not surprise anyone. In other circumstances, Sanji would have protested that his captain was not fully aware of the facts when making his decision, but by the time he was done cooing over the concision of Nami-san's exposition skills, the conversation was wrapped up and Luffy had bounced out of the galley, presumably to explore the ship.

Sanji managed, however, to point out that they still needed to buy food on this island lest they all starve to death before reaching the next one, and Nami conceded that it was acceptable to dedicate two hours to emergency shopping.

"For food," she said, "and clothes."

Sanjistared blankly at her. He knew and fully agreed that it was paramount to the well-being of the crew that Nami-san had a large variety of clothes to chose from in the mornings. A large variety in colors, fabrics, length and tightness was truly a delight to the eyes, especially on hot days. Yet if they were going to run away -a decision he didn't feel so good about, but however you saw it it was captain's orders- it was quite possibly not the time to keep up with Grand Line fashion.

Sensing the general feeling of disbelief, Nami pointed out the window towards a very excited-looking Luffy, whose red sleeveless shirt hung on him like a badly-designed dress. It didn't seem to disturb him in the least that it was the only piece of clothing he was wearing.

The horrible image of a miniature Zoro lounging around deck wearing nothing but his oversized haramaki flashed in Sanji's mind.

"Yes," he approved hurriedly, "they need clothes." Everyone else seemed to agree.

"So... I'll go get the clothes with Usopp." Nami decided. "Robin, Chopper, can you get the food?" There was a collective blink.

"Shouldn't cook-san be on the food-shopping team?" Robin asked calmly. Sanji's heart fluttered at the thought that she specifically wanted to go shopping with him. Nami-san shook her head. Sanji's heart fluttered harder at the thought that she did not want him to go shopping alone with Robin-chwan. Finally, finally the two of them were getting to terms with their feelings for him. He only hoped they would agree to share his affections.

"Sanji-kun can make you a list," Nami said, shaking her head, "but I don't want him to go to the market and risk getting caught in a cooking competition or something. We're running on limited time here."

"But, Nami-san..." Sanji tried to plead. He knew there was no making her change her mind when she got that decided, matter-of-fact expression on her face, but he tried anyway. He trusted Robin-chan's judgement, but for all her beauty and intelligence she was not a cook, and he was worried that some shameless shopkeeper would misguide her into buying second- or third-class ingredients.

Nami-san gave him a disappointed, I-expected-better-of-you look. Sanji tried to console himself by thinking that as a first-rate cook, he would be able to make something perfectly acceptable even if the ingredients were not prime quality, and went to look for a piece of paper on which to write down as many detailed instructions as he could.

He was too caught up in his disappointment to notice that he was being left alone on the ship with the two children. One of which was nowhere to be seen when Sanji glanced out to check on his whereabouts.

Luffy had been temporarily distracted from his hopes for food by the more immediate appeal of exploring his new surroundings. He hadn't recognized any of the people in the room when he woke up, but they all looked nice and he wasn't worried. Plus, the girl with the orange hair had told him that they were on an adventure, and he'd always wanted to go on an adventure. So when she asked him if he wanted to leave the island, of course he said yes.

After that, they'd all stopped paying attention to him, and he'd taken the chance to slip out of the room and into paradise.

It was a ship. The flag was a bit weird, but it was still a pirate flag so that meant he was on a pirate ship and the people in that room were pirates.

He'd never met real pirates before. This was cool. And the ship was cool too, with all the rooms and the stairs and the things to climb and the trees and the hammocks, he'd always wanted to sleep in a hammock. Briefly he regretted that Ace wasn't there, but the thought went away as soon as it got there. Ace was mean, and just because he was three years older didn't mean he knew everything better. And Luffy was sure that Ace had never set foot on a pirate ship, so when he came back he could tell him everything about it and his brother would be so jealous--

"LUFFY! LUFFY YOU DAMN BRAT, WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU?"

Woops. Maybe he should have told them he was going out. Makino was never happy with him when he forgot to tell her where he was going. He hoped Makino knew he was going on an adventure. She got worried when she didn't see him for a few days.

After a bout of possibly unnecessary but definitely satisfying shouting, Sanji finally found his captain trying to climb inside one of the hammocks of the boys' quarters. Considering how high they were set, and how short he currently was, this was a rather entertaining sight. It took no more than two minutes for the boy to get hopelessly tangled in the fabric, and Sanji reluctantly went to help.

"Thank you, ossan," Luffy said, smiling brightly up at him when he was freed.

Sanji's teeth clenched so hard that his cigarette was neatly cut off and fell down. He crushed it under his foot without even looking, busy as he was trying to glare Luffy down from the assumption that he was old, dammit. "My name," he said, distantly wondering if whacking his captain over the head would really qualify as fighting with his hands, "is Sanji. And I'm nineteen, and not an old man. Remember that."

He must have been making a scary face, for Luffy blinked at him and nodded silently.

"Right. Now first things first. Here." Sanji held up the crew's symbol in front of Luffy's face. The boy blinked again, then smiled at him.

"Is this for me?"

Oh.

Before departing, Usopp had more or less explained that the kids would have lost all their memories past the age of six. Despite that Sanji had never expected Luffy to forget about his hat. Suddenly the only piece of headgear in the world that a whole pirate crew would have protected with their lives seemed like nothing more than an old piece of junk. It was disturbing. And not a pleasant feeling at all.

"Ah, never mind," Sanji said, letting his hand fall back at his side. He'd store the hat somewhere on the shelves of the galley. It would be the first thing Luffy looked for when he went back to normal. For now, he forced himself to smile. "Weren't you hungry?"

He refused to congratulate himself for the smooth change in topic because really, the promise of food could distract Luffy from just about anything. The boy followed him into the galley in relative silence, and then Sanji was faced with the slight problem posed by Zoro, who was still sleeping peacefully on the table of the galley. It was solved by carefully wrapping him up in the blanket he was covered with -Sanji did not want to know what he was or was not wearing underneath thank you very much- before going back to the boys' quarters and dropping him unceremoniously on the couch.

There was not a stir from the sleeping lump. Yes, this was Zoro alright.

Sanji let Luffy babble happily about all the adventures he intended to have as he struggled to find an acceptable meal to make with the leftover food, and, with a timing that could only be explained by him and Robin-chan being soulmates, had nothing left to do but let the stew simmer for a while when she and Chopper came back.

Nami and Usopp came a bit late on schedule, with big grins on their faces and more clothes in plastic bags than two children could possibly wear in a month. Sanji's confusion as to why Nami-san would want to buy so many clothes for people who were generally unconcerned about their appearance was dissolved when he saw Usopp coming back from the storeroom with a picture dial in his hand.

Ah. Blackmail was such a sweet word when it came from Nami-san.

Leaving dock was not as smooth as usual, considering the absence of the muscle-head and Luffy's constant inquiries as to what they were doing? And now? And now? Ooooh, the anchor, it's so big! SUGEI! The tanuki turned into a gorilla!

They retreated to the galley as soon as Going Merry was finally headed towards the next island, with Chopper doing his best to fit in the currently available space of Luffy's mind the information that he was, in fact, a reindeer-man. By the time the boy seemed to have grasped the concept, he'd been manhandled by Nami into a pair of loose black trousers and a grey sweatshirt that was very obviously a size too big and made him look even smaller than he actually was.

But, Sanji had to admit as he watched Nami-san ruffle her new doll's hair, it also made him rather cute. Which was a word he'd rather not have had to associate with the man he'd chosen to follow to the end of the world and beyond.

Zoro woke up feeling slightly ill. The room around him was moving - not much, but he could still feel it. It was dark, but not exactly pitch black: a ray of greyish light was coming from above, and he could make out a shape that went all the way to what he supposed was an opening.

Well. Maybe he'd feel better if he went outside. Climbing the stepladder didn't prove too hard despite the lack of light, and the hatch opened easily when he pushed it. Good.

It was dawn, and he was at sea.

He was rather sure, however, that he hadn't been at sea when he'd fallen asleep. In fact, he seemed to remember that he'd been propped up against a tree at the time. And certainly not wearing bright red overalls on an equally bright yellow T-shirt. Uh. Strange.

He wandered cautiously around what looked like a very small, very lame ship. Who the hell kept trees--

"Hey!"

Zoro whipped around and stared as a boy who looked about his age waved at him. "Who the hell are you?" he asked defensively.

"Monkey D. Luffy!" the boy answered brightly. "And you're Zoro, right?"

He looked so very happy to have remembered those two syllables that Zoro could only nod in mild bewilderment.

"You're finally awake! You slept all through dinner yesterday, and then the woman with funny hair had to dress you up while you were asleep so you wouldn't catch a cold during the night-- oh, you have funny hair too!" Luffy went on excitedly, almost dancing around Zoro, which did not help with his slightly sick feeling. Zoro was about to push Luffy away when suddenly the boy froze, sniffed the air hopefully, grabbed Zoro's wrist and took off at high speed.

"It's breakfast time! Finally! Come on!"

There wasn't much else to do but follow.

The boy dragged him all the way to the a door that to Zoro looked like all the others, and let go of his wrist to yank the door open.

The next second, he was flying the other way. Zoro blinked as he heard a loud splash, then again as a man dressed all in black ran out of the room and dived after Luffy.

It wasn't more than a minute before they were both back on deck, the tall guy awkwardly patting a coughing Luffy on the back, and Zoro felt mildly disgusted at the display. At his age, couldn't the boy swim? What a weakling.

"Oi, Sanji, what happened?" someone asked from... up. Zoro tilted his head to see that someone with a freaky long nose was leaning down from the top of the mast.

"Accident," the blond guy apparently named Sanji said, shrugging, as the other one climbed down.

"You kicked him off." It wasn't a question. Zoro stared. Kicked? Luffy had flown all the way over the figurehead. Was it even possible to kick that hard? Zoro was strong, and he certainly couldn't.

Yet. If it was possible, he would be able to do it someday.

"Shouldn't have burst in like that," Sanji mumbled, slightly embarrassed. He'd reacted on instinct really, only realising what he'd done after Luffy was overboard. Everyone on the crew knew that entering the galley in the hour or so after dawn was dangerous, because Sanji was usually working on breakfast, or getting a head start on lunch, and it was the only time of day during which he just wouldn't be disturbed. Unless there was a crisis. Or someone was terminally sick. Or had a potentially deadly injury (except for Zoro, for whom potentially deadly injuries were a weekly occurrence anyway).

Everyone but the two brats, one of which had almost drowned and the other was staring at him stupidly from the entrance of the galley.

Well, now they'd know.

"I couldn't move!" Luffy said, looking like a drowned rat in his oversized clothes and sounding slightly panicky. "I tried, but it was too hard and I couldn't..."

The sound was drowned out as Sanji and Usopp looked at each other in dawning comprehension. Usopp's face turned decided, and he walked up to Sanji and Luffy, crouched down, and experimentally pulled at Luffy's cheek.

Which extended far beyond what was normal for anyone who wasn't Luffy. And the kid looked like he had no clue what the whole thing was about. Sanji and Usopp looked back at each other.

"I'm not done with breakfast," Sanji said quickly as Usopp was opening his mouth, and got up and back to the galley, deliberately paying no attention to the stunned Zoro. Usopp glared after him and finally noticed Zoro, who was coming down the stairs with a suspicious look.

He managed not to burst out laughing. A single picture of him, with the clothes Nami had put him in the previous night and that expression on his face, would be enough to blackmail Zoro into being Usopp's personal bodyguard for life. A shame Nami had kept hold of the dial. Probably she wanted Zoro to be her bodyguard. That, or give her even more money.

He looked back at Luffy, who was pulling at his face as experimentally as Usopp had just done and clearly enjoying it very much. Oh well. Usopp was the one who was good with tales.

"Luffy," he said, "do you know what a Devil Fruit is?"