Why hello again! I got another chapter done in less than a week. I am quite proud of myself actually. The plot got a little out of hand here, but meh, it was fun so I don't care.
So, the next chapter (the chapter after this one) will reveal what's up with Sanji and why he can't talk! Also, there will probably be sex? I think there will be anyway. I hope so.
Hope you enjoy!
Chapter 11
There were three entrances to the main complex, two of which were on the east side. The west side had one small door above a wooden platform, occupied by a lone guard. Bartolomeo volunteered to take him out, but Hawkins reminded him that the plan was not to kill anyone until they knew what was happening inside. The hilt of Zoro's sword was enough to incapacitate the sentry, and Sanji disposed of the unconscious man beneath the platform.
Inside, Sanji and the others found themselves on the second floor of a large warehouse. It was a labyrinth of metal walkways over great piles of steel. As they made their way towards the east side, Sanji's nose picked up an underlying scent of rot and decay. It was unsettling, but not distracting enough to pull his focus from their goal. Most everywhere smelled of rot and death nowadays.
As they made their way through the shadowed second floor, trying to stay as close to the south wall as possible, a chorus of shouts and cheers rang out, echoing through the rafters.
"What the fuck is that?" Bartolomeo whispered.
Zoro's eyes were dark and narrow in the soft light. "Sounds like the crowd at a sports game."
"What, they take this place over so they can have indoor fucking basketball championships?"
"I don't know," Zoro growled, "I just said what it sounds like."
"Be quiet," Hawkins whispered, "There's movement up ahead."
Sanji slipped past Zoro and Bartolomeo and moved silently down the metal steps and onto another platform. Two men stood at the railing, watching whatever was happening beneath them with such focus, they did not notice Sanji until he tapped the first man on the shoulder.
One swift, lower kick, and both the men's legs flew out from underneath them. Zoro was on the men immediately, knocking them out cold with the hilt of his sword.
"What was your name again?" Bartolomeo asked.
"Zoro. For the third time."
Sanji tried not to react, but the way Bartolomeo was looking at Zoro made the cook want to tear some arms out of their sockets. Why was that? Sanji knew it wasn't like he and Zoro were together, Zoro didn't belong to him. Bartolomeo could make worshipful, googly eyes at whoever he wanted. Sanji had no right to get possessive over someone he hadn't outwardly shown any romantic interest in.
Still, the thought of knocking Bartolomeo out and wiping those stupid looks of his face with the bottom of a shoe sounded really good.
"What is happening down there?" Hawkins murmured.
Sanji turned and looked out over the balcony. Beneath them bleachers were set up in a colosseum style, filled with spectators shouting and cheering as people fought against each other in a central pit. There were maybe one hundred men, possibly more.
"Woa, what the fuck?" Bartolomeo's voice wavered, and Sanji understood why.
The dirt floor was stained dark red, almost black in places. Three mutilated bodies lay strewn across the space, pieces of them splattered across the makeshift walls. In the center of the pit stood two men and one woman, all impossibly thin and standing unbalanced on trembling legs, and armed with nothing but crude weapons of broken pipes or pieces of wood.
Also inside the pit, surrounding them, were at least two dozen Deadies.
"Uh…" Zoro murmured, "what exactly are we looking at right now?"
"This like, a fight club or somethin'?" Bartolomeo asked.
Hawkins pushed away from the railing and continued down the platform. "It looks to me like some kind of torture-death sentence. It is unfortunate, but there's nothing we can do from here except follow the plan."
Sanji's heart raced in his chest and cold dread started to crawl up from his gut. There was something sinister here, something dark and evil, and it had nothing to do with what was happening below. Sanji was certain, he could feel it in his bones.
Checking over his shoulder, Sanji found Zoro's face set in a deep scowl. It was unclear whether the swordsman was feeling the same trepidation as Sanji, or if Zoro was merely disgusted by the display in the pit. In any case, when the swordsman glanced his way, Sanji saluted and mouthed "good luck" as the four split into two groups. Bartolomeo and Zoro headed towards the east side service entrance, while Sanji and Hawkins climbed down a ladder that led to the maintenance office and machinery control room.
The door flew inward from a swift kick and rocked on loose hinges. Hawkins cocked an eyebrow and smirked at Sanji.
"I don't think it was even locked."
Grinning, Sanji merely shrugged.
Inside, the control panels for the heating and cooling units, as well as the older steam and exhaust systems, ran along the farthest wall. Hawkins advanced, looking over the levers and checking the read outs on the display screen.
"The place is self-efficient. All you have to do is keep the fires burning. The steam that's produced by the furnaces runs the mill, which in turn provides the power for the generators." Moving across the room, Hawkins motioned to a map of the piping mounted on the wall. "If we reverse the steam from these two pipelines, it should overload these systems here, and possibly the furnaces as well."
Sanji nodded and moved toward the lever Hawkins indicated.
Across the room, Hawkins gripped another two levers and might have smiled.
"Ready?"
The explosion was unexpected, but then again, Zoro was not really sure what he had been expecting. It probably should not have come as such a surprise, his life had been filled with a lot of explosions in the last few days.
"All right!" Bartolomeo cackled, "Come on, Zoro! Let's get this fucking thing open!"
The "fucking thing" was a fifty foot service door, weighted down by a few hundred pounds of cement blocks and held in place by locks on a banded metal chain. When the explosion hit, the mill went dark for a few seconds. A loud hissing noise sounded from somewhere toward the back where they had come from. Zoro's initial thought had something to do with being impressed with the overkill, but then he immediately thought about Sanji. Was he okay? Where was the source of the explosion? The idiot cook would know how to blow some shit up without killing himself, right?
"Yo! Zoro!" Bartolomeo's voice sounded over the hissing. "Take it out!"
Gripping the sword in his palm, Zoro swallowed his anxiety. Of course Sanji was okay, it would take more than an explosion to take him down.
He swung the sword once, bringing it down on the loop of the lock. Steel screamed as Zoro's blade shattered the loop into countless pieces. Bartolomeo whooped and reached up, pulling the chain down and lifting the giant door. Outside, the half of Luffy's gang not breaking in through the windows and vents at the moment, came rushing in, Luffy at the front.
Zoro helped Bartolomeo secure the door and followed the group back toward the makeshift arena.
Chaos had broken out. The men surrounding the pit had been taken completely by surprise. Luffy's gang had surrounded and overtaken them in just a few short moments. It was a straight up brawl, a confusion of limbs and fists and bodies toppling off of bleachers.
And there was Sanji in the middle of it, defending those three souls in the center of the pit. He had backed the prisoners up against the wall and was fending off each Deadie as it came forward. The cook's eyes were cold and calculated as he felled one rotted walker after the other. Blood soaked his jacket and ran from his hair and down over his temple.
Moving quickly, dodging a flailing arm and a wayward knife, Zoro weaved through the fight and dropped into the ring. There were less than ten Deadies left, and Zoro made quick work of them. Even with only one sword, it was easy enough. Cutting through partially rotten flesh was a little like cutting through old fruit.
As the last Deadie fell, Zoro straightened and turned to meet Sanji's eyes. The cook stood a few feet from him, still shielding the prisoners. His hands rested at his sides, his right still holding his knife tightly clenched in a bloody fist.
To Zoro, time seemed to stop in that moment. Every movement, every breath, every drop of blood as it dripped from the strong line of Sanji's jaw, seemed to last forever, caught in this perfect point of time and space. The fight raged around them, but the swordsman found a certain quiet, a peace he had not expected.
Zoro stood in the eye of the storm, suspended. He hung in the balance, watching cool blue eyes stare back at him with relief, and with trust. In that moment, Sanji fixed him with a look of absolute admiration and longing so powerful, that the swordsman felt himself incapable of anything but mirroring it.
A wild shout from Luffy broke the spell. Zoro blinked, caught off guard, and glanced around at the fight as it started to slow. Luffy's group had either killed or incapacitated almost all of the other gang's men, and Luffy now stood at the top of the bleachers, arms folded over his chest and his face set in a wide, shit-eating grin.
Glancing back at Sanji, the cook smiled at Zoro and wiped the trickle of blood from his own jaw with the heel of his palm.
Zoro just focused on not blushing.
"Okay!" Luffy roared. "Who's your boss! I have a thing I gotta do!"
As if it had been rehearsed, at Luffy's call Kidd dragged a large figure out from the mess of people on the bleachers and tossed them into the pit. The man landed at Zoro's feet and wheezed what sounded like a painful cough as he hit the ground.
The man's face was frightful, long and pale with unnaturally red lips, and his teeth had been filed into points. When he rolled his round body to the side and stood up, Zoro was surprised to hear him actually laugh.
"You have no idea what you're doing, kid," he cackled.
Luffy's grin widened, "Oh yeah?"
The greasy man's grin widened. "You just signed death warrants for you and all your pathetic gang."
Bartolomeo hopped from the edge of the pit to connect his fist with the man's face. A satisfying crunch echoed through the warehouse.
"Yeah well, maybe," Luffy shrugged. "I don't know what you do here, but it can't be anything good. Thought now was as good a time as any to take you out. My friends need supplies."
The man spit blood on the ground and cackled again, his belly jiggling. "Who are you punks?"
Luffy cocked his head to the side, and the straw hat he always seemed to be wearing slid up his forehead, unveiling his eyes.
"I'm Luffy.
"Well, Luffy," the fat man grinned, "I'm Moria, and when my superior finds out about this, he'll bring down everything on you. You're fucking dead! You and all your friends!"
Zoro saw the gun before anyone else because he was so close. When Moria pulled the piece from the inside of his jacket, the swordsman moved, bringing his blade up and around, slicing through leather and flesh. Moria screeched and grabbed at the wound, dropping the gun in the process.
Growling, Zoro moved closer and pointed the tip of his sword at Moria's throat.
"Who's your superior?"
Moria said nothing. He merely gripped his bleeding hand and leveled Zoro with a burning gaze.
"Maybe you didn't hear him?" Kidd barked. "Go ahead, Zoro. He's got enough skin to spare a little."
Zoro huffed a laugh and sneered, pressing the blade against the sweaty, rolled flesh beneath Moria's chin.
"Aaarrg, fine! Fine! Doflamingo! His name's Doflamingo!"
Kidd sighed and turned to Luffy.
"I knew it," Nami muttered from the bleachers.
Moria's face went even paler than it already was. His jaw dropped at the lax attitudes of his captors and he tried to pull himself to his feet. "Wait! Wait, you know him!? How do you know him? Who are you people!?"
Kidd pushed Moria back down with a press of his heel. He put a hand on Zoro's shoulder, letting the swordsman know to step aside, and leaned in close to their trembling prisoner.
"Two words, dipshit," Kidd snarled.
"Trafalgar Law."
Zoro was mildly surprised to hear gasps and curses from the subdued gang. The tension heightened tenfold through the space as everyone who was not with Luffy started to either cower or struggle.
Moria's face grew red. "What!? Don't be stupid! Law is dead! You're supposed to be gone! You're supposed to be down south until the weather got warmer! What the hell are you doing here!?"
Kidd and Bartolomeo lifted Moria by his arms and started to drag him back out of the pit, saying something about medicine and supplies. Zoro sighed, mildly confused and a little disappointed that the takeover had been so easy. When he turned back to Sanji, the cook was wiping the rest of the blood from his face with a blue handkerchief.
"Are you guys famous or something?" Zoro asked.
Sanji grinned and pulled the notepad from his pocket.
Dolfamingo + Law = big underground business before Dead Day. Post Dead Day Dolf's been doing the same job but Law didn't like it so he faked his death so he could live quiet somewhere and take care of people.
Zoro stared at the simple explanation, stunned. Of course he would get himself into something like this.
"So, we didn't really start a war just now, we made a war that was already going on… worse."
Sanji glanced away for a moment, thoughtful, and then turned back to Zoro and nodded.
Zoro sighed, "Okay."
"Excuse me," a soft voice interrupted, "e-excuse me?"
Zoro turned and found one of the prisoners, the woman, reaching out for Sanji's jacket. The cook turned and caught her as she started to collapse.
"Woa, ma'am, are you okay?" Zoro asked.
The woman clung to Sanji's collar, tears streaming down her dirt and blood-stained face. "Please help… please help my son…"
Zoro moved closer. "Your son? Where is he?"
"Behind…" the woman whispered through parched lips, "behind this building… in the containers…"
Sanji looked at Zoro, his eyes intense and urgent.
Zoro turned and spotted Nami at the edge of the pit. "Nami! Come with me! I think there are more prisoners!"
Outside, only a few yards from where Zoro and the others had entered the man building, sat two large, metal containers about thirty feet long. Sanji approached the first one and hovered over the lock with a small flashlight. Zoro drew his sword and gently moved him aside before cutting it off.
When the swordsman opened the door, a rush of putrid air hit him so hard he staggered.
"Oh God!" Nami exclaimed. "What is that!?"
Turning around, Zoro reached out his hand to Sanji, palm up. "Lemme see your flashlight," he said.
Sanji handed him the light and the swordsman aimed the beam inside the container.
What Zoro saw there haunted him for a long time afterward.
Glazed, sunken eyes stared back at him from the darkness. Hollow cheeks and lips as dry as paper stood out starkly against skin as pale as a ghost. They were not Deadies, that much was certain, but for the life of him, Zoro could not figure out how they were still breathing.
"Oh my God…" Nami murmured.
"They're just holding them here until they starve to death?" Zoro growled.
"Wait!" Nami's voice was frantic. "Wait, Sanji don't! You don't want to see that!"
Confused, Zoro turned to the cook, but the look on Sanji's face froze the swordsman's blood.
Sanji was trembling, shaking with fury. His teeth were clenched so hard Zoro could hear his jaw creaking. Lips pulled back into a snarl, breath coming heavy and harsh, Sanji's eyes burned with a rage that Zoro had never encountered before.
"Sanji," Nami said softly, "Sanji, hey, calm down. Don't do anything—"
But Sanji was not listening. He turned away and headed back toward the main building.
"No! Wait! Zoro get him!"
On instinct, Zoro reached out for Sanji, grabbing the sleeve of his jacket. Sanji turned back to him, his blond hair falling into cold, blue eyes that were no longer calm, no longer relieved or trusting. Before Zoro could react, the cook twisted and took out the swordsman's legs. The back of Zoro's head hit the ground and stars danced across his vision.
"Zoro!" Nami dropped to her knees at his side.
"We have to stop him, Zoro! You have to help him!"
TBC