Hallo and welcome back!
Thank you all so much for your kind words last chapter, I would have never guessed that this fic would have an impact on anyone's life but apparently it did! Not gonna lie, that is a bit creepy, but if I could sweeten your lives just a little I'm happy.
So, Ghost picked up that this fic now has an expiration date. Chapter 52. Thing is, I had a chapter idea that makes for a great end in my opinion and I managed to time it to chapter Z. Nothing is set in stone though, I have plenty ideas to continue or to write a part II, but I also see that this fic really keeps me from my other stuff… as of now I will most likely let you guys choose. Who knows if you're still all interested by the time it ends. Maybe I go all game of thrones on you, writing absolutely amazingly for the majority of the story only to ditch any form of logic and strategy in the later chapters and you won't even want me to continue?
Who knows. If everything goes according to plan chapter Z will be out in December and hopefully I've made up my mind 'til then.
As always a huge thank you to Rexica for betaing this mess! Check out disinhibition, her latest chapter gave me some good laughs (and weird looks on my way to university)!
Last time Zoro came to the realisation that just maybe he wasn't the only one on the ship using observation haki and tried to formulate a plan. Let's go see how that worked out!
It was fine, she could do it. Nobody could see, she was perfectly safe.
"My sweet Robin-chwan, could you come here for a moment and help me choose the wine?"
No. No no no no. She couldn't possibly get up! Her swordsman had kept her on the very edge since lunch! If she got up now, with the rope tied over her clitoris, she wouldn't be able to handle it. Would it be too obvious if she sent a clone? No, but she wasn't allowed to use her ability that way. She could feel his grey stare on her, clear amusement dancing in his eye, could practically hear his rough voice in her ear—what's it going to be, Robin?
She knew the price; she'd gladly pay it if it meant she could stay right where she was.
"Are you alright, Robin? You look kind of pale," Nami asked right next to her. Oh god, please don't…"You think? Seems rather flushed to me. Do you think you might be coming down with a fever?" Usopp asked, and she felt the sudden urge to snap his neck. How could he call her out like that?
"Oh no, we'll need a doctor. We need a doctor!" Had she ever been more grateful for the physician's bashful personality? She used the distraction to send the most pleading and desperate look to the utterly smug man next to her. Forget Usopp, it was his neck she wanted to snap, his fault! He grinned at her, and her eyes widened when he held up three fingers, seemingly uncaring about who would see.
No, she hadn't known the price. Only the currency. She held his gaze as she summoned a stray arm on her inner thigh, hoping that her skirt was loose enough to hide the wayward appendage. With a barely audible whimper, she plunged 3 fingers in her wet opening. Her head dropped in shame and humiliation as all attention focused back on her.
"Just the weather," she mumbled not quite sure if they could even hear her. Nami heard. "The weather? There are no chang-"
"Robin-chwan?" Sanji called again from the hold, unknowingly cutting off the navigator's silent musing. The chair to her left scratched noisily over the floor as the devil himself got up lazily, sending a wave of pleasure through her body. "Stay, Robin," he ordered, and she was sure to the others it sounded just like his normal grouchiness. It did to Sanji, because he entered the kitchen flaming foot first, berating the dodging swordsman for talking to sweet Robin-chwan like the uncultured brute he was. Nami was a different story. "Oh, for fuck's sake, you've got to be kidding me," she breathed, and Robin sincerely hoped that it was just the same exasperation she always voiced when the two started their sparring. Her friend couldn't possibly know what was going on, could she? Why her whole body was drawn tight while the swordsman moved way too much.
"What would a barbarian like you even know about exquisite wine suitable for Robin-chwan's delicate palette? You'd drink from a fucking sewer if I told you there was booze in it!"
"Oh yeah, fuckface? Wh-"
Nami's fists connecting with the tabletop effectively halted the argument, and Robin allowed herself a sigh of relief, relaxing just a bit when the swordsman finally stopped moving. "That's it! If I hear one more foul word from either of you fucking morons in front of the boys, I'll have you on toilet duty for a month!"
Zoro sheathed his sword but didn't budge otherwise, while Sanji swooned, both pouting in their own way about how the navigator apparently was allowed to talk however she wanted around the boys, but neither brave enough to call her for it. Like always.
The awkward silence was just long enough for her to regain her bearings before Zoro broke it. "What's her dinner?"
"Smoked seacow tartar for the first course, and Alabasta lamb chops for the main course. Try your luck, marimo."
Zoro scoffed in response, undid Kitetsu from his belt, and leaned it against his chair, letting all of them know that he didn't think he'd need any luck for this task.
"Honestly, only a marimo grade idiot could keep a cursed sword as a good luck charm. Where are the other two anyway?" Their cook sighed while she fastened her grip around their sheaths up in the crow's nest, and Usopp started to sweat.
"You guys think it's dangerous to leave a cursed sword behind like that?" their sharpshooter asked, trembling.
She bit her tongue. She couldn't tell them to behave lest the sword feast on their animosity and turn them against each other. Couldn't risk getting their attention again. Not when half of her rubbed against rough, scarred skin in the most deliciously agonizing way.
"Say, Robin, are those stories about it really true?"
Both. She wanted to snap both pirates' necks.
"I don't know, Nose-kun, would you like to try it?" She asked him with a smile, fighting back a moan at the sudden pressure against her disembodied nub.
Usopp did nothing to hide his terror from his face. It wasn't like there was anything to worry about even if their brave warrior of the seas was inclined to accept her suggestion. It wasn't hers to offer, after all. Everyone on the crew knew how protective their swordsman was of his blades. Maybe she understood that now better than ever; they seemed to have character. And she could attest that the Sandai Kitetsu was no blade just anyone could handle. It hadn't been threatening per se, but she couldn't deny the chill it had sent through her body. An almost cruel yearning for her blood, she had felt in an instant that if it was this blade's decision, he'd have cut her even before she'd made the suggestion. She respected Zoro immensely for being strong enough to stand up to it. No wonder it had taken control all those months ago, with his lack of sleep and overall lack of concentration. That wasn't quite true though, was it? During his slow recovery after Thriller Bark, he hadn't been in the best set of mind either, had he? No, he had been broken almost. His hope of ever finding his way back to strength had hung on by the thinnest thread imaginable. For the longest time, he had been but a husk of the confident boy he was before Kuma's devil fruit had ripped his body to pieces. The only thing keeping him from giving up had been his captain's unwavering faith in him and their doctor. And yet, he had not gone berserk. Had the sword been lenient due to his injuries? If even half the stories she'd heard about it were true, it would have jumped at the opportunity instead of cutting him slack. According to the sources in the grand library of Alabasta, all the Kitetsu fed from blood and carnage and did not shy away from driving their wielders insane to achieve it. Had he found a way to appease the blade outside of battle? Chopper had told her that he used to smell of blood when he returned from his playdates and that he didn't anymore. That would be an explanation, and it fit perfectly to the alleged curse.
"No, I think they are true," she retracted her earlier statement, cursing herself for getting so lost in thought that she had completely forgotten her predicament. Now though, it all came back with a vengeance.
The slickness of her thighs; the three fingers wedged between them that were just a very disappointing replacement for what she really wanted; the rope that seemed to hug and caress every single inch of her body; the cursed knot above her pearl; the friction against her nipples at his every movement, and the sudden flick of his wet tongue against her nub… She had not hesitated for a second when he had ordered her to bloom some of her most sensitive parts in his robe, but she had never suspected that he would carry them around with the rest of the crew in immediate vicinity. She had almost buckled when he had climbed down from the crow's nest and all her senses had suddenly been assaulted with the most delicious friction.
She bit her lip in a desperate attempt to keep quiet. In her wildest dreams, she had not imagined him being this adept with his tongue even though in hindsight it shouldn't have surprised her that a man capable of clearly articulating with a sword in his mouth had some seriously wicked tongue game. Would he make her cum with the others around? She had dropped his swords, but that was too much, wasn't it? He wouldn't risk that, would he? She clenched her every muscle, trying her best to fight down the pulsing heat between her legs. Her arms hurt, the few up in the crow's nest quivering from the exertion. Digging her toes into her sandals under the table, she fought the urge to rock her hips in a vain attempt to bring her core closer to his mouth that wasn't even in the same room with her. With terror, she realised that she didn't have the will to stop, to suppress her orgasm. After he had denied her again and again, she didn't care if the others saw, would gladly have them watch as she withered in pleasure if only he finally let her cum!
He didn't. She was almost there, insides coiled like a spring, the tickling pressure in her clitoris, the heat enveloping her body, all there promising, beckoning. Just a little more, and she would burst and cry and faint and moan, but his lips and tongue vanished, leaving nothing but a vague wetness on her instead of a mind-splitting orgasm; the cold hardness of disappointment instead of allconsuming liquid heat by which she would gladly been swallowed. She breathed, unclenched her fists, and slowly raised her head to see the rest of the crew in agitated conversation, only every now and then sparing her a frightened or bewildered glance. Had they noticed? Or was that about the sword's curse?
"Are you sure you're alright, Robin?" Nami asked in a whisper next to her, right before a small hand laid itself on her back. Robin froze. Nami gasped, drawing back her hand as if burned. Chancing a careful glance at her friend, she was surprised. She had expected her to be horrified or disgusted, but all she could read on her face was enlightened realisation, her lips drawn to form an "o."
"So that's why his rigging was all fucked up when we started sailing," she muttered as if all her questions had finally been answered.
Before she could even think how to react to that, Zoro entered with an opened bottle of sake in one hand and two closed wines in the other, prompting Sanji to jump to his feet from his lazy recline against the cupboard. "Why you lazy fu- forest head, of course it took you ages. Did you get lost, or is that the second bottle of sake?"
After a deliberately slow sip, the swordsman scoffed, "Shut up." Hiding the two bottles behind his back, he grinned at the cook. "What do you wager?"
"Ha, everything, you uncultured buffoon. I'll even pay your fu-, fine debt. There's no way you got that right!"
He grinned, his stare fixing on Nami next to her. "You know what, cook, I'm quite fucking fine with my debt," he said, and Nami yelped, face turning red in an odd mixture of embarrassment and happiness. If she didn't know that he saw her as his sister, if she were prone to jealousy… "You clean the toilets for me," he finished.
"Fine, if you lose, no alcohol for a month."
When Zoro easily consented to the terms, she was sure she saw a slither of doubt in their cook's features, and when the swordsman revealed the two bottles from behind his back, his mouth fell open in utter befuddlement.
"But… how?"" Sanji asked as he took the bottles from the swordsman in utter defeat, while the latter fell back into his seat next to her, bottle of sake in hand. The boys started to hoot and holler.
"Suck it up, shitcook."
"I will not. Explain yourself, Marimo! How do you know anything about wine?"
"Just accept defeat and quit whining," the swordsman quipped, and Sanji let go, took a deep breath, and started to open the first bottle. "Alright, alright, you've won fair and square… Still, can't believe a man like Mihawk let an uncultured barbarian like you stay with him for two years. Bet he taught you so you didn't empty his wine cellar in one evening. He's said to have quite the coll-" The cook was the first to laugh at the suddenly frozen and bright red swordsman, followed by Franky who spit his coke right across the table, drenching Chopper's fur in sugary liquid. "Are you serious?" the cook asked between bouts of laughter while the rest seemed rather confused by the revelation.
"Are you fuckin serious?" Sanji repeated. "What, did he teach you how to waltz, too?" he asked further, and even though it shouldn't be possible, the fighter turned even redder, grumbling something about footwork.
"What's a waltz? Is that a fighting technique?" Luffy asked, suddenly very interested in the discussion before succumbing to laughter after Brook explained it to him. "Shishishishi, that's so lame, Zoro!"
Now I personally think that that was quite the good idea… was just kinda stupid not to plan for strawhat madness. Let me know what you think!
Next week things are getting sharp!