As devoted as she was to her captain, Nami hadn't taken long, after meeting him, to set up mental filters that told her, according to a few choice keywords, whether what he was saying was worth listening to or not, and she strongly suspected that the rest of the crew (with the possible exception of Chopper) had done the same. Adjusting the filters when Luffy had managed to get himself turned into a kid hadn't been a hard task.

So it was by complete chance, after she'd tuned him out to eat her breakfast in peace, that she caught the words "separate himself in dozens of pieces". Mildly curious about this rather unusual topic, she forced himself to pay attention to what he was saying.

"and he had that big red nose, like a clown but it was his real nose, and"

Frowning, Nami looked at the others. Only Chopper seemed to be paying him any attention, and he apparently hadn't noticed anything strange. But of course, he wouldn't have.

"Luffy," she asked sweetly, "what are you talking about?"

He beamed at her. "I had a COOL dream last night!"

"About a guy with a red nose who could separate his body parts?"

He nodded enthusiastically. "Yup! You were in my dream too, Nami! And there was someone who looked like Zoro, too. But older."

Nami bit her lower lip. She hoped it wasn't what she thought, but how could it not be, if Luffy had dreamt of Zoro's adult form?

"And what happened in your dream?"

"I don't remember," he pouted. "Stuff happened, but I forgot when I woke up. It was cool though."

Nami sighed, and only then realized that everyone else had started paying attention, even Zoro who was very unsubtly pretending not to be listening.

"Nami-san? Is there something wrong?"

She shook her head and smiled up at him. "Nothing," she lied. "But I need to talk to all the grown-ups after breakfast."

"It makes sense," Usopp declared when she was done telling them about her suspicions. "If they're supposed to go back to normal after thirty days, the memories can't have disappeared, right? They've just been locked away, or something, and they're filtering out in their dreams." Nami opened her mouth to shut him up, then closed it. It did make sense. But it made things more complicated, even if at the moment Luffy just took them as Mystery Dreams. That, plus the fact that neither kid remembered getting on Merry... sooner or later they were going to start asking questions.

"Should we tell them the truth?" Robin asked. Sometimes Nami was a bit jealous of how calm the other woman could remain in all circumstances, how she always kept herself distant enough from the problems not to be directly involved in them. She shook her head.

"Luffy already jumps up and down in excitement every time someone mentions the word 'pirate'. Is it really a good idea to tell him that he is technically the captain here?" Gods, she wanted to be done with that whole stupid thing. In less than forty-eight hours she'd taken enough pictures to blackmail Zoro for the rest of his life, not that she really needed to considering how bad he was with numbers, and how easy to manipulate. There was no more profit to be made from the situation, and now it was nothing more than a pain. Captain and first mate, she thought wearily. Trusted nakama, reliable (when it really mattered, at least) friends, and yet a permanent thorn in her side.

"It will certainly answer all the questions they may have," Robin pointed out, "no matter how hard it is to believe."

"And telling them that they are actually grown-ups might increase their sense of responsibility," Chopper offered, then frowned. "Maybe."

"If there's any chance it will make them less annoying..." Sanji-kun trailed off. It amused Nami to no end, how bothered he seemed to be by the whole thing. Sure, even she was mildly put out by the way they always seemed to land themselves in trouble when she wasn't looking, but now all there had to do was wait it out. Yet Sanji-kun kept acting like it was the end of the world. Though maybe it was just that he couldn't kick Zoro anymore because of the unfair advantage.

She looked at Usopp, who shrugged. No support there. Very well.

"Alright," she decided. "Usopp is telling them."

"HEY! Why me?" the sharpshooter asked, grimacing.

"Because Nami-san says so!" Sanji-kun protested. Nami smiled. His constant pampering could get annoying, but the unwavering support could come in handy.

"And what am I?" Zoro asked almost indignantly after some long and tedious explanations. Nami could tell neither of them really believed what they'd been told, but Luffy definitely enjoyed the thought of actually being a badass pirate captain. As expected.

"A moron," Sanji-kun muttered under his breath.

"You're the first mate," Chopper said. "The captain's second," he explained in answer to the blank look Zoro was giving him. That at least the green-haired kid seemed to understand, because his previously sullen face broke into a very familiar, very stupid grin as he looked at Sanji-kun.

"Eh, that means I'm stronger than you," he bragged, and Nami suddenly wondered how everyone was going to survive the rest of the month. But surprisingly, Sanji-kun didn't snap. He seemed to ignore the statement for a moment as he pulled on his cigarette, then finally looked back at Zoro.

"I don't know," he admitted, and Nami knew she wasn't the only one whose eyes widened with surprise at the fact that he hadn't just kicked Zoro for that, unfair advantage be damned. The two of them tended to let their testosterone get the better of them at the worst of times, and it was hard to believe that either would be able to restrain themselves enough to admit that they were more or less equally matched. "But here's what we can do: the moment you're back to normal, we can have it out. You and me, right here on the deck, once and for all."

"Errrr, no," Usopp interfered, "Not on the deck. You're going to kill Merry if you do that." Sanji spared him a glare for interrupting, but shrugged. Nami entirely gave up on the hopeful thought that he had any sort of self-restrain where Zoro was concerned.

"Then on the next island. Doesn't matter. But you're making the choice now, brat. Here and now, you're going to tell me whether you really want to find out. No one will think any less of you if you don't, but I won't have any more of that bullshit about who's stronger than who. Got it?"

Zoro gulped and nodded, his eyes wide as he stared at Sanji. Nami watched him intently. This was the perfect occasion to check which of her two hypotheses about Zoro and common sense was the right one. Had they simply never been acquainted, or...

"So?" Sanji asked, and punctuated by lighting up yet another cigarette, without ever looking away from Zoro's eyes. "Your answer? Yes or no."

It felt like an eternity, with everyone's eyes fixed on the two of the them, but finally Zoro lowered his head, just enough to break the connection. "No," he said - reluctantly, spitefully, but still he said it. Very clearly the Zoro they knew had known common sense at some point, and outgrown it.

Later that day, Sanji was the witness of a show he hadn't expected to enjoy so soon. If there was something that he liked seeing as much as people eating good food, it was people trying to say 'no' to his beautiful, wilful Nami-san. He'd seen it happen more times than he could recall, but no matter how stubborn they were, or how hard they tried, she always got her way in the end. It was infinitely satisfying to watch.

He leaned on the railing and watched the scene under him with no small amount of amusement. The two brats were putting on a pretty good fight, although it soon became clear that in this instance Zoro was the leader and Luffy was only going along with it out of the sort of loyalty that instantly grew between children facing an authority figure. Every now and then, Zoro would glance up at Sanji, his eyes asking for just a moment of distraction, the tiniest chance to get away. Sanji ignored him. There was no way he'd let them escape Nami-san's authority.

"So you're telling me that you're scared of hot water and soap?" she asked sweetly, which surprised Sanji somewhat. Using the s-word was usually her last resort, the joker that worked on Zoro like 'never' worked on Luffy: every single fucking time, without fail, so expectably that it was almost cheating.

Zoro glared harder at her, bit his lower lip, but didn't take the bait. Sanji raised an eyebrow and seriously considered the possibility that the guy had actually become stupider as he grew up.

Nami-san sighed, raised her hands in the air, and for a moment Sanji wondered if her tenacity had finally met its match in a pair of stubborn, idiotic six-years-old. He'd have to beat them up, if that was the case. "Fine," she said, rolling her eyes dramatically. "after all, I'm not the one forfeiting my dinner for a week."

An iron lock clamped on Sanji's stomach. Through a grey mist he saw Luffy's eyes widen in something like horror, and absently wondered if his own face reflected the expression. It probably did.

"But--" Luffy started, whining slightly and pouting up at her in what was probably the cutest expression he could muster.

"No buts. Either the two of you take your bath whenever I tell you to, or you both skip dinner all week. It's your choice." She was not bluffing, Sanji realised. She fully intended to make good on her threat. She intended to make him refuse to give them food.

Between his adoration for Nami-san and his duty to the crew -to every living being on the damn planet, even- the choice was painful, but easy. The real problem was that he didn't want to go up directly against her. But challenging her authority by giving them food secretly was out of the question, and he refused to lie to her anyway.

There wasn't much of a choice. He waited until she'd stomped off before moving from his spot on the railing, and by the time he'd walked down the stairs the brats had scampered off, but they didn't directly matter at the moment. It was with trepidation that he entered the storeroom, where his goddess was sitting and making corrections on a map, her face tight with concentration.

"Nami-san." She glared up at him, then her expression softened into something that was almost a smile. She raised an eyebrow, silently asking what he wanted. She was so beautiful, it almost broke his heart to confront her. But it couldn't be helped.

"I will give them food," he said simply, looking straight at her. She blinked in surprise.

"Of course! They can have breakfast and lunch with everyone. But we can't afford to let them have their way over something like that, or it'll be chaos within a week. We need to have a handy punishment."

He understood that, of course. He'd seen countless kids on the Baratie who just wouldn't listen to their parents, and they had been worse disasters than most pirates. There needed to be something to keep them under control somehow. But--

"Not with food," he told her. "Never with food. I won't allow that."

She frowned slightly. "Sanji-kun, it's not like I intend to make them starve."

Of course not. She would never be so cruel, not to a child, not even if said children happened to be Zoro and Luffy. But if they went to bed on an empty stomach, and there was a storm, or an attack, or something, it could turn out to be the one meal between life and death by starvation. The one fate he would never, ever wish on anyone. He understood that the chance of that happening was so small it was laughable to even consider the possibility, but it was not something about which he could think rationally. Nami-san didn't understand, of course. For her sake, he hoped she never truly would. Even if at the moment it meant that he had to hold her gaze without flinching, to become the prey of the game he'd been watching just minutes earlier. And the two morons he was doing that for would probably never know about it, just like Zoro didn't know how many times Sanji had subtly saved his sorry life by giving him heaps of iron-rich food after a particularly bloody fight.

Such was the way of life. As long as everyone around him was properly fed, it didn't matter.

Finally Nami-san sighed and closed her eyes. "Alright. But you know what that means."

It was enough for the knot inside him to come loose, for the tension to vanish. Just like that, things were back to normal, and he could look lovingly at her again. "Of course, Nami-san! I will go make you a special Love Snack right away to apolog--"

"No," she said, and there was the hint of a smirk on her face. "It means you are in charge of making sure they bathe at least every other day, starting today."

He gaped at her. This couldn't be. He had enough work as it was.

"Nami-sa--"

But she was already looking back at her map. "No excuses, Sanji-kun".

Luffy was whining again. After some careful deliberation with himself, Zoro had decided that he didn't really dislike the other boy, and there had to be a reason why he'd accepted to become his subordinate. He was still not sure what that reason was, and in the meantime the guy he was supposed to think of as his captain talked way too much.

And too loudly, considering the poor protection offered by the mikan grove.

"They say you're their captain," he scolded the boy, "and you're going to let that woman tell you what to do?" It wasn't that the request in itself was completely unreasonable. It was that it hadn't been a request, it had been an order. He didn't like that, just like he didn't like the way she always acted like she was in charge, or the horrible T-shirt she'd forced on him, that was bright yellow with a big red heart and 'HUG ME' on the front.

When all was said and done, he didn't like her, and he'd be damned if he obeyed her orders.

"But Zoro," Luffy pleaded, "it's dinn-" he stopped, and Zoro noticed he wasn't looking at him anymore. Somewhat surprised, he turned around, looked up. Looked further up. Even from this weird angle the cook did not look amused, and Zoro tried not to remember the way the pirates had fallen as he made himself stand up and hold his glare.

"As long as I'm on this ship, everyone gets to eat at every meal." The way he said it sounded like a curse, and Zoro knew better than to share Luffy's happy squeal. "That doesn't mean the two of you can go around doing whatever you like. When you're told to do something, you do it."

Sanji really didn't look amused, and the way he was tapping his right foot on the wood as though checking for its resistance made Zoro a little uneasy, but he scowled anyway.

"We're not kids!" he protested heatedly, partly because he'd never really considered himself a kid and partly because he'd been told a few hours before that he really wasn't one. Sanji's visible eyebrow raised. Now he looked amused, but somehow it wasn't very reassuring. "You're not? Oh, good. Then I don't have to hold back."

Zoro steeled himself in preparation for the kick, and was very surprised when instead Sanji reached for the front of his collar with one hand, Luffy's with the other, and held them both up at arm's length above him. Without a second thought, Zoro kicked him in the face.

Or tried to. By the time his foot was halfway through, Sanji had raised his own leg in a perfect split, and Zoro's naked toes connected with steel-hard muscles. Ouch. And despite having one leg up in the hair and two wriggling people in his hands, the bastard still managed to keep a perfect balance.

"You'll break your toes if you try to kick with that shoddy technique, little egg--" the cook looked horrified for a split second, then the smirk was back. "brat. Now, the two of you gonna be reasonable, or do I have to carry you all the way to the bathroom?"

"Zorooooooo..." Luffy pleaded. Zoro sighed. It would be stupid to keep going. It wasn't like he really cared about taking a bath or not, as long as the instruction didn't come from the witch. He knew enough not to want to make the cook angry at him. Despite all the 'brats' the guy didn't treat him as a kid. And the milk had been good.

"Put me down," he said. Sanji lowered both of them and let go, and Zoro started walking as soon as he touched the ground.

"OI. Where do you think you're going?" Sanji growled behind him. Zoro blinked in disbelief. "To the bathroom!" he protested righteously, turning around to look at the cook. Who, against all expectations, grinned.

"Hint," he said, crouching down to look at Zoro from equal heights and pointing a thumb over his own shoulder. "The bathroom is that way."