Into the Domes
Part Three
Sanji puffed on his cigarette and released the smoke from his mouth as Pendulum's image faded away from him. Sighing heavily, he let his eyes drop down to the monkey that was still in front of him. The monkey's glowing eyes shifted back to their lifeless stare. "Must you keep staring at me like that? I know you're supposed to be babysitting me, but it's really creepy that you keep doing that."
The monkey's eyes started to glow again. This time it formed a holographic map for the cook. Sanji blinked then studied the map for a few minutes before speaking up again. "Well, this is a strange map. I'm assuming those marks on here are words of some kind? Anyway, it looks like the shard is inside of this city somewhere. I guess you do have a useful side after all. It would have been a serious pain in the butt if I had to look for this thing the traditional way. This place is so huge. And I'll be up a creak without a paddle since I can't fly. I have my Sky Walk but there's no way I'll be able to get everywhere with just that."
Sanji stood up, dropped his cigarette, and smothered it out with his shoe. Shoving his hands in his pockets, he walked back to the edge of the building. Looking down he studied the lack of ladders or staircases on the building. "I know these people can fly, but having no fire escape of any kind can't be a good thing. Surely someone at some point in time won't be able to fly. Losing a wing would be the worst thing of all. Well, we might as well start looking for the shard. We're going to get no where near it by standing around here all day."
He watched as the monkey ran over to him. It jumped up on his shoulder and waited. Sanji's eyebrow twitched in annoyance at the monkey using him for a free ride. "You are extremely luck I need you to get the shard and get back to Neo. Otherwise I'd just leave you right here on top of this building. Well, here we go. Sky Walk."
Sanji jumped from the building. Using his Sky Walk technique, he started making his way down to the streets. Everything was just fine until a group of people flew by him. He lost his balance from the draft they created and plummeted towards the hard ground.
"Hey! Watch it you moron!" someone from the group said.
"Why don't you watch where you're going?!" Sanji snapped back. "You're the one who almost hit me! Sky Walk!" Reactivating his Sky Walk, Sanji hit the air a couple times before landing none to gracefully on the ground. He stumbled forward a few feet before finding his balance. He adjusted his skew tie and put his hands back inside of his pockets. "I hope they're all not that rude here. I won't be able to survive if they are."
"You got a problem with how we fly?" someone asked.
Sanji looked up to see that the group of people had came back and was now surrounding him. His eyes widened in shock to find that these people were actually birds. The majority of them stood several inches taller than he was. Some of the bird species he noticed easily enough. They were birds like falcons, eagles, doves, and other such birds they found on the sea or island. While some of the other birds he couldn't identify at all. Their skins, or feathers, he really wasn't sure what they had, were all different shades of colors found in nature. Some were even unnatural colors that he never saw on birds before. He also noticed that this flock of birds was all wearing the exact same R shaped insignia on their bodies at different places. They looked like they're in a gang or something. I wonder if they're possibly pirates.
"Are you hard of hearing or something?" the falcon bird asked again.
"No, I'm not," Sanji said. "And, yes, as a matter of fact, I do have a problem with how you fly. You could have hurt someone with that kind of wild flying."
The falcon dropped down right in front of the blonde cook. With a cocky grin, he leaned forward and said, "You clearly have no idea who you are messing with. We own this territory. We will fly any way we like."
Sanji forced himself not to gag. The bird's breath smelled like worms and dirt combined with a bad smell that suggested this bird had a very bad cavity, if the bird people here had teeth. Which shouldn't have been so surprising. Since they're birds they probably do eat worms.
"Hey, this guy has no wings," another one said.
"No kidding," a third one said as they all, but the falcon, gathered behind him to see his wingless back.
"Did you lose your wings or something?" a fourth one asked. "Why kind of bird are you?"
"Or something," Sanji replied. "A very…rare one."
The falcon chuckled. "Then no wonder you're in such a bad mood right now and talking out against us like that. I'll let it slide just this once. But don't ever do it again."
"How sweet of you," Sanji said. "But I don't need your kindness. I will continue to tell you what horrible job of flying you're doing."
"What?!" the falcon hissed.
"You heard me. Or do you have a hearing problem?" Sanji said.
"That does it!" The falcon grabbed Sanji by the front of his shirt. "You're going to pay fo-"
Sanji whipped around, kicking the bird right in his beak. He then spun around and kicked the rest of them that was still close to him, sending them flying several feet away from him.
"You're going to pay for that!" the falcon hissed. He spread out his thirteen foot wingspan and took to the air with one powerful stroke.
Sanji follow the bird's ascension until he could no longer see his enemy. Without warning, something flew past him and pain stung his right side. He looked down just as his warm blood leaked out of a cut on his skin. "What the heck was that?"
"Falcons are some of the top fliers here," a gang member said. "You've dug your own grave with your insolence."
"I see," Sanji said, activating his Observation Haki. "So he was just flying really fast and cut me."
"Yeah, and now you're going to die," the gang member said.
"Sorry," Sanji said, spotting the falcon coming back in for another attack. He held his ground until the last possible moment. When the falcon was close enough, he slammed his foot onto the bird's head, smashing him into the ground, causing the ground to crack and rumble at the disturbance. "But I will not be dying today or any time soon. I have a very special young woman waiting for me to return to her."
"Get him!" one of the gang members said.
Sanji braced himself for another fight. But before he could land another blow on another one, he felt his body fly backwards. He expected to hit the ground or a wall, but he just kept on flying. Coming back to his sense, he noticed he was being flown away by a bird with white feathers. "What the heck?"
"I was just about to ask you that same question," the bird said. "What were you thinking? Attacking the Raptor Gang like that?"
"The Raptor Gang?" Sanji asked, the monkey digging his mechanical claws into his shoulder to hang on. He looked back towards the way they had come from to find that the gang was chasing after them.
"Hold on," the bird said.
Sanji gritted his teeth when the bird took a nosedive into the dark hole below them. The light cut out and the next thing he knew, they were back above the hole and hiding behind a building. "What the…how did we get over here so fast?"
"I might not be one of the fastest of the birds, but we all know how to move when it comes to avoiding danger," the bird said.
"Well, uh, thanks for your help," Sanji said. Turning his eyes to his rescuer, he found the bird person looked like a dove. "I guess."
"I take it you're not from this area," the dove said, folding his wings down to his back.
"That obvious, huh?" Sanji asked.
"Completely." The dove nodded. "For starters you picked a fight with the Raptor Gang. And secondly, you have no wings."
"Oh, yeah." Sanji glanced over his shoulder. Crap. I can't think of a single thing cover story for not having any wings. Maybe me being human will help with that.
"You're here to get fitted for prosthetics, aren't you?" the dove asked.
"You guess right," Sanji said, looking back at the dove.
"You picked a good place for it despite the gangs here," the dove said, adjusting the pack he was carrying over his shoulder. "This sector has the best doctors when it comes to artificial wings."
"Glad to hear it," Sanji said, he held out his hand. "I'm Sanji by the way."
"My name is Colman," Colman said. "Sorry I can't stay around any longer, but I have to get to a contest now."
"No problem," Sanji said. "Thanks for your help."
"Sure." Colman spread out his wings and took to the air. "See you around."
"Yeah." Sanji watch the bird fly off before glancing at the monkey who was now standing on the ground. "All right, let's see where that shard is now."
The monkey's eyes lit up once more, showing the map upon the pirate's request.
"Well," Sanji said, "it looks like we actually moved closer to the shard. Thanks a lot, Colman. You saved me some walking."
Sanji stepped out of the alleyway he was in. He turned to his left and started heading in the direction the shard was in. Weaving through the crowds of bird people, he carefully observed the world around him for possibly threats or anything else that might actually be useful to him. He couldn't help but noticed that the majority of the bird people he saw walking or just hanging around at various locations looked like thugs. And they all were wearing the exact same R insignia as the other gang members were. "Geez. This place is literally running over with gang members. How many of them are there?"
Sanji paused to observe the people more. He noticed that every single bird person that passed by a gang member would keep their eyes down and clutch whatever they were carrying, if they were carrying something. Mothers were hurrying their children along, while men, the elderly, and teenagers would step aside for the gang members. They didn't make any eye contact with any of those who looked like they were in a gang.
A frown curled onto his lips when he saw one gang member picked up a stone. The bird tossed the rock up and down a couple of times before tossing it into a near by window. The window shattered, creating a decent size hole in it, the pieces raining down on the ground. A store worker came rushing out and demanded to know who threw the rock. "Who threw that?! Someone's got to pay for it now!"
"I did, Pops. You got a problem with that?" the gang member said. His fellow members gather around him with smirks on their beaks, causing the storeowner to become fearful.
"N-no sir, it was all my fault." The store worker wrung his hands as he back away from the gang. "I should have been more careful with what I was doing. Please excuse me."
"Yeah, sure."
"Get back to work, ol' man."
"Did you see how scared he was?"
"Totally a weakling."
"This is just sickening. Picking on the weak like that." Sanji narrowed his eyebrows, but continued walking. He wanted to fight, but knew he shouldn't. For one, this wasn't his problem. Two, he had his own issue to deal with. Three, he had already made an enemy from this particular gang. He figured they were going to run back to their boss and tell him or her what had happened. If that happened there would be an entire gang on his heels. And from the looks of how many were wearing the Raptor insignia, they had a lot of people. He wouldn't be able to handle them all himself. He would need to have at least Luffy with him.
He hated that he couldn't do anything. But he knew it was the correct decision so he shoved his hands into his pockets and kept on walking. Eventually, the map had led him to a courtyard where a lot of people were gathering around cheering for something. He made his way into the crowd. Weaving in and out of the feathered bodies until he found a place where he could see what was going on. It was a cooking contest. There was a circle platform where ten bird people were cooking up a storm. And one of them was the white dove, Colman, which he had met before.
As he watched the contest and listened to the crowd cheering and jeering, he easily picked out that there were two favorites among the ten bird people cooking. One of them was Colman while the other was a falcon. The falcon was wearing the exact same insignia as the gang members only his was gold. Seeing as how the others were silver, he figured this guy was the leader or at least the right hand, or wing, bird of the leader. The gang members were also throwing out profanities at the dove guy.
"Come on, boss!" a gang member said.
"Yeah! You can defeat these losers easily!"
"You can do it, boss!"
"You're the best, boss!"
"Colman, you suck!"
"You're a horrible cook, Colman!"
Sanji shook his head. His anger was building up in his chest at the shameless display. But was really got his blood boiling was when the gang members started throwing things at the cooks. Gritting his teeth and clenching his hands, he mentally nailed his feet to the ground when the gang's projectiles landed in the food and the cooks threw the food out. "Such morons! Do they not know how precious food is?! If I wasn't alone I'd show them all how to properly handle food!"
The monkey chirped in his ear.
"What do you want?" Sanji said, forcing his voice to go back to normal. The monkey flashed him the map really quickly, reminding him why they were really here. "Yeah, that stupid shard is around here somewhere."
Sanji faded back into the crowd of birds and made his way around the area in search for the shard. A few minutes later, the monkey chirped at him again. He tucked himself behind a tree so the thing could show him the map again. It looked like they were right on top of the sharp. Stepping out from behind the tree, he carefully and slowly ran his eyes over the immediate area. His eyes then landed upon a table were a couple of official looking guards were standing around ten golden bars and a trophy that had an odd shape mirror shard on top of it. Thinking that had to be what he was looking for he made his way over to the object and looked inside of it.
Sanji eyed the guards as he got closer to the table. He saw them tense up a bit, but they didn't make any move to keep him moving along. Leaning a respectful distance closer, he noticed that his reflection didn't appear in the mirror. It was definitely the shard he was looking for. He walked away from the table to make it appear he was only looking at what he assumed was the prize for winning this contest. Wondering back over to the crowd, he positioned himself near a small group of birds that looked to be normal citizens instead of gang members. Casually, he lit a cigarette then he asked, "Excuse me, sir, but this is a cooking contest, isn't that correct?"
"You got it." The bird nodded.
"And that," Sanji nodded towards the table, "is the prize for winning?"
The bird opened his beak to reply, but stopped when a gang member interrupted him. He and a few others ducked their heads and quickly walked off.
"Of course that's the prize for winning. What are you stupid or something?" The gang member looked him up and down. "I see you have no wings. You must be here to get prosthetics. And that means you're not from around here."
"No, I'm not from this place." Sanji blew out some smoke. "So you could say that I'm here for prosthetics. But I'm mostly here on a bit of a vacation."
"Good," the gang member said, crossed his arms. "We don't like having strangers wondering around in our territory. So as long as you're not staying for very long we won't have a problem with you."
"Don't worry. I have no intention on staying here for very long at all. But I'd like to know, is it too late for anyone else to enter the contest?" Sanji asked.
The gang members laughed.
"You are stupid, aren't you?" another gang members said.
"Don't blame him," a third gang member said. "Like he said before, he's not from here so he doesn't know what the rules are in this territory."
"This contest started at the beginning of last month. Hundreds always enter in this thing, but only one will always win. And that one just happens to be our boss. He always wins the contest here," the first gang member who had spoken before spoke again. "And he's always going to win because he's the best at cooking and flying."
"What does flying have to do with cooking?" Sanji asked.
"You really are stupid." The gang member shoved a pamphlet into Sanji's chest.
Sanji, pushing down his anger, glanced down at the pamphlet. While he couldn't understand the words that were on it he could understand the picture. Several birds appeared to be flying around some sort of obstacle course to gather supplies for the item they were going to cook. Well, this is interesting.
"Well, the boss isn't going to win this year if Colman keeps it up," the second gang member jerked his chin at the dove cook. "He's totally into it this year. And he's passed all the preliminaries too. His flying has gotten whole lot better from the previous years as well."
"Shut up!" The third gang member grabbed the second by the front of his shirt and pulled him close to his face. "The boss won't lose to a loser like him! The boss will win!"
"I know the boss is a good cook, but he can't always be on top all of the time!" The bird grabbed his rival's shirt as well. "If you want to fight about it then-"
"Chill out! You two are acting like hatchlings!" the first gang member ordered. The other two released each other and straightened themselves up but maintained the snarls on their faces. "If Colman becomes a real threat then the boss will have it taken care of easily enough. You all know that."
Sanji's eyebrow twitched. He could see the malicious intent growing in their eyes. It was clear that these birds didn't play fair. But then they were gang members after all. He didn't know a single gang member that would play fair.
"Yeah, yeah," the gang grumbled.
"Well, we have things to do now. Find someone else to answer your ridiculous questions if you have anymore." The gang walked off without another glance in the pirate's direction.
Sanji kept his eyes on the gang as they walked away, intimidating as many people as they possibly could as they went. Once they were out of his sight, he looked back over at Colman. While it really wasn't his concern, he was still worried for the bird. There was no way one single person could take on all of these gang members. And he had only seen a couple of them. He had no idea how many there were in the Raptor Gang at all. With nothing better to do he settled in to watch the contest while thinking about the predicament he was in concerning both the shard and the gang and thinking about what Pendulum had said before.
"You all are currently safe for the moment. I, however, cannot say how long that will last since I don't really know all of the areas you are in."
"I've been watching you all for a long time. And I believe you have all the skills necessary to succeed in your missions."
Sure you didn't know anything about these areas. And, yet, here I am the cook of the Straw Hat crew being dumped in, wherever this place is, during a cooking contest. Sanji thought to himself. He took a long drawl on his cigarette as his eyes wondered down to the silent monkey holding onto his shoulder. That guy clearly lied to us about this. So is this guy really after the shards like he said or is Neo his real target and these shards are just a way to keep us busy? No, that can't be it. If he really wanted Neo, then why reveal himself to us at all? Why not just take Neo when she's alone or just with Law? Why bother taking all of us? At least I now know that the others will be in situations that they can handle easily enough. If only I had some way to get that information back to Neo. I guess the best thing for me to do is to figure out a way to either enter into the contest or steal the trophy.
Sanji sighed and let his eyes wondered back over to the table with the rewards sitting on it. The guards surrounding it looked rather beefy to him. And with the situation he got himself into with that flacon earlier, he figured these birds were going to be rather tough opponents. That meant winning the shard was really his only option. But how could he possibly do that when the deadline to enter has already passed? Could he possibly talk the winner into just giving it to him without having to explain why he needed the shard? That would work if he got lucky and the winner of this contest wanted absolutely nothing to do with the trophy.
"Times up!" the announcer said. "Now the judges will sample the dishes and will soon announce those who will be advancing. Please wait patiently until then."
Sanji leaned back against a tree with his arms crossed over his chest as they all waited for the judges to make their decision. About fifteen minutes later the announcer's voice rang out over the crowd once more. He announced the names of the winners moving on to the next and final round of the contest. The only name recognized was Colman. And at the sound of the guy's name, Sanji instantly started searching the crowd for the Raptor gang members he was talking to before. He found them huddled together with more of their group. They straightened up when their boss, who didn't look at all happy with the results from the judges, walked over to them. He watched the boss speak to his underlings. Soon a menacing looks passed through the group then over to Colman who was busy packing up his cooking supplies. Then the gang disappeared into the crowd while their boss headed off in a different direction. "Good grief."
Sanji stayed close to Colman while the crowd started clearing out of the area. Once Colman had his stuff packed up, he followed after the bird since he was obviously unaware of what was about to happen to him. As casually as he possibly could, he followed Colman from a safe distance until some of the crowd spread out their wings and took to the air. Crap. If Colman takes off flying I might not be able to keep up with him, even with my Sky Walk. He dropped his eyes back down and saw Colman's white feathers turn around a corner. He rushed forward, but only got about six feet before a group of birds poured out of a building and took to the air. "Just great."
Shuffling through the crowd of feathers as best he could, he managed to get through and rounded the corner where he had last saw Colman. A string of curses poured out of his mouth when he didn't see anyone down the alleyway. He still walked onward to see if he could locate the bird. The farther he walked down the alleyway he started to hear the all familiar sounds of a fist slamming into someone's body. He rushed forward and rounded another corner to find the Raptors ganging up on Colman. Colman was lying on the ground with blood dripping down his face and from what was obviously a badly broken arm since the bone was sticking out of it.
He dashed forward when one of the gang members brought back his foot in an attempt to kick Colman. Once close enough, he slammed his foot right into the gang member's foot easily shattering the bones. A piercing scream flowed out over the area while the rest of the gang looked on in surprise. Sanji took the moment to roundhouse kick the rest of them away before landing back on his feet. He said, "No matter the species, it's just pathetic to gang up on someone who clearly can't fight back. You gang members are nothing but pathetic lowlifes. If your boss can't handle losing gracefully then he shouldn't be in contests to begin with." He glared sharply at them. "And it really sickness me how you boneheads wasted all of the food by thrown garbage in it!"
"Hey, you're that guy from before that was asking all of those ridiculous questions!" The bird from before pointed at him accusingly. "I don't know who you are exactly, but you shouldn't interfere with our business! Get lost!"
"You're beating up someone who obviously doesn't have the skills to fight back or can no longer fight back because you morons ganged up on him. I'm making it my business." Sanji flicked away his cigarette as the gang charged at him. With a barrage of kicks, he defeated the gang rather easily. "Well, that was a bit easier than I expected considering what happened before with another one of you. But from what I can gather, you all have the advantage when you're in the air while here on the ground you are at a disadvantage. I'll have to remember that for future references." He turned and walked over to Colman. The bird was already struggling to get into a sitting position so he helped him up the rest of the way. "Hey, are you okay?"
"Yeah I'm-Ah!" Colman grabbed his right arm.
"Okay, that really was a stupid question. Of course you're not fine with a broken arm like that. Come on. I'll help you get some help," Sanji said as he helped Colman get up off the ground. He grabbed the bird's bag and started helping him out of the alleyway.
"You're the guy from before. Why are you doing this?" Colman said.
"I owned you one for saving me. But we can talk about that later. Right now we needed to get you some help and get away before anymore gang members show up," Sanji said while hobblingly down the alleyway as fast as he possibly could. "Just guide me on how to get you to the nearest hospital or wherever you go to seek help for this kind of injure."
"The nearest clinic is two blocks that way," Colman said, nodding his head to his right once they got back to the main walkway.
"All right," Sanji said while they moved down the walkway. While they walked, he noticed a lot of people were taking notice of their struggle but no one was offering them any assistance. "Nice place you got here. You're clearly in bad shape yet no one offers to help."
"That's they way it is here," Colman said. "The Raptors are in control. If anyone does something they don't like…well…you can see what the results are."
"Yeah." Sanji nodded. Finally, after several minutes of walking, they finally entered into the clinic. A few nurses walked passed them before one took noticed of their presence. "Hey, he could use some help here."
"Oh dear," a nurse said as she rushed over to them. "Not another one."
Sanji stepped aside to let the nurse do her job. She placed Colman in a wheelchair then and took him through a double door. Not knowing what else to do, he walked over to the waiting room chairs and sat down. The monkey jumped off his shoulder and sat beside him in another chair.
A little over an hour later, Sanji was still waiting patently in the waiting room of the clinic when a dove lady, wearing a simple faded yellow dress and a sling around her neck, came rushing in. "Where is he?! Where's Colman?! Where is my mate?!"
"Calm down, ma'am. Your mate is being looked at by the medico," the attendant said while flipping through some papers. "The one who brought him in is still here, if you wish to speak with him."
"Yes! I want to speak to him! Where is he?!" The attendant pointed over at Sanji and the lady rushed over to him. "What happened?! Who are you?! Why did you help him?!"
"Calm down, ma'am." Sanji waved his hands at her. "I was just-"
"Tell me what happened!" she demanded.
"Leta?" Colman's voice broke in before Sanji could attempt to calm her down again. "What are you doing here?"
"Colman! How dare you ask me that?! I heard you were seriously injured! Where else would I be?!" Leta rushed over to him for a hug but paused upon seeing his arm plastered in a cast and held in a sling. "Your arm!"
"It's not that bad." Colman smiled.
"Not that bad?!" Leta cried, tears streaming down her white cheeks. "Your arm is broken! How are you supposed to cook like that?! You can't! You can't win like that at all! We're never going to be able to move away from here! Our last hope has been taken away! I told you this would happen! I told you they wouldn't like it that you're better than him!"
"Calm down, honey," Colman begged, placing his hand on her shoulder. "I-it's not over just yet. I still have one arm left. I can still cook like this with no problem."
"And win?" Sanji finally said, stepping closer to them. "I mean no disrespect, but you can't win like that. I watched you all during the contest today. With how hostile the crowd was it can't be done."
"Who are you?" Leta asked as if she hadn't seen Sanji just seconds before.
"Leta, this is the man who helped me. His name is, um…" Colman looked to Sanji to fill in his name that he had forgotten apparently.
"Sanji." Sanji nodded at them. "And I might have a solution to your problem if you're willing to listen to it."
"Really?" Colman asked. "Why would you help us? You don't even know who we ever are."
"That's a bit of a complicated issue. Is there somewhere we can talk in private?" Sanji asked, his eyes scanned around the busy hospital.
"Of course," Colman nodded. "We can talk at our home."
Sanji followed the two doves out of the clinic with the monkey once again on his shoulder. Once outside, he said, "That's nice and all, but I hope you have a home on the ground. I've noticed a serious lack of stairs around here."
"We don't need them," Leta said. She and Colman spread out their white wings. With a few flaps, they lifted into the air then each placed a hand underneath Sanji's armpits and lifted him into the air.
Sanji gasped softly when he found they could easily lift him and the monkey up. With in about five minutes they were landing on a slightly rundown balcony outside of a tree. He patiently waited while Leta unlocked the door and helped Colman inside. He followed quietly and took in the small apartment. It was a bit run down as well. There was only one chair and one loveseat in the room, a small uneven table with three different chairs surrounding it in the kitchen, and there were two other doors in the room that he assumed was a bedroom and a bathroom. He noticed easily that the room smelled like leaves, grass, and straw. He wondered if that was used in their beds and seats since they were birds and their apartment was built inside of a tree.
"Here you go, honey," Leta said, helping her mate onto the loveseat. "Easy now."
"I'm fine, Leta," Colman said before turning his attention to Sanji. "Okay, so what did you want to talk about? And despite the fact we brought you into our home and with how you helped me, we're still a bit skeptical of you."
"I can easily understand that," Sanji said. "I'd feel the exact same as you do if I was in your position."
"So what do you want?" Leta asked, sitting down beside her mate.
"Well, I need the trophy that comes with winning this cooking contest that you're in," Sanji stated simple. He looked down at the monkey who was now standing beside his leg. He knew he had to be careful with his words. And he hoped that he would be able to figure out how to word what he needed to say correctly so he didn't break any of the rules Pendulum placed them under.
"But we need that prize gold to move away from here! We can't let our babies be hatched here in this horrible place!" Leta cried, her eyes filling with tears. Her hands pressed snuggling against the sling around her body.
"Babies?" Sanji dropped his eyes down to the sling the bird woman was wearing. Inside of the sling were two light brown spotted eggs. "Those are…"
"I'm sorry, but we can't give you the prize gold," Colman said. "We must have that if we're going to move out of this territory."
"I don't want the prize gold," Sanji said, receiving surprised looks from the two bird people. "All I want is the trophy that comes with the prize gold."
"Why would you want that instead of the money?" Colman said. "It doesn't make sense."
"Well," Sanji said, still unsure of what he should say here. He paused to try and formulate an idea. One eventually came to him, but it was a long shot in the working department. "I need it because it belongs to someone I know. And I can't return to a good friend of mine until I have the shard in my possession."
"It belongs to someone else?" Leta asked.
"I can't say exactly who," Sanji said. "Let's just say that I'm currently working for the person who owns the shard."
"So it's a job?" Colman asked.
"Yeah, you could say that," Sanji said. "I have no need for the prize gold at all. I don't even have a need for the base of the trophy. I just need the decorative shard on top of it. So you all will still have the prize gold when I win."
"When you win?" Leta asked.
"I'm a first class chief where I come from," Sanji said before noticing a strange look passing between the birds. "What?"
"I'm sorry, but there's no possible way you can win," Colman said.
"Of course I can," Sanji said. "I just need you to teach me the locate dishes. I promise you that I can win."
"It's not that," Leta said.
"Then what is it?" Sanji asked.
"You're not a bird," Colman said.
"Yeah, I think we all can see that," Sanji said.
"You don't understand," Colman said. "Part of the competition involves flying around an obstacle course for the ingredients needed for your dish."
"Oh, yeah," Sanji said. "I saw a pamphlet about that."
"So it's impossible," Leta said. "We're going to be stuck here forever."
"Why exactly do you want to move away from here? Is it because of the gang?" Sanji asked.
"That's exactly why." Leta nodded.
"Forgive me, but can't someone just take them down?" Sanji asked. "Don't you all have guards, police, or something?"
"Things don't work that way here," Colman said. "We're birds. We always have a hierarchy. The strongest will always dominate over the weakest."
"Oh," Sanji said. I guess this place is more like the animal kingdom than the human world I'm living in. And despite all the violence and gang activity here, Neo would love this place. "I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking."
"It's fine," Leta said. "It's not your fault. The Raptors are just at the top of the hierarchy right now. They didn't use to be though. Another group use to run this territory and they were a lot nicer but when the Raptors showed up a few years ago, the former leaders of this territory got pushed out."
"The place you're planning on moving," Sanji said. "Is it where the former leaders now live?"
"It is." Leta nodded, rubbing her hands tenderly over their eggs. "We want our hatchlings to grow up in a safer environment and learn how to properly live with each other. Not here where those in power abuse their power to keep control. The Raptors are always taking things away from us. We've lost so much furniture and food. We can only buy a day's worth of food at a time because the Raptors will just come take it."
"Then let me help you," Sanji said. "We're actually helping each other here."
"But how can you fly when you don't have wings?" Colman asked.
"Someone before mentioned prosthetics," Sanji said. "If it doesn't cost too much and doesn't take a lot of healing time to deal with after the surgery, I can do it."
"It still might not work," Colman said. "The procedure is very expensive and will take at least a month to recover from the surgery to be able to fly. Besides with the Falcons in control of this territory you have to get permission from their leader to have the surgery. And after what happened today that's going to be impossible to get."
Sanji gritted his teeth. His only chance of getting the shard was slipping through his fingers like water.
"What if we teamed up?" Leta asked.
"What?" Sanji looked back up at her.
"No!" Colman said, his face set in stone. "You will do no such thing! You know how tough those courses are!"
"Of course I know!" Leta shot back. "But I also know that we can't stay here! You know that too, Colman! You got lucky today! What if Sanji didn't come by today when you were getting beat up on by the Raptors?! They could have killed you! Do you want to take that chance again?! Well?! Do you?!"
"No, I don't," Colman said, cupping her face. "I just don't want you to get hurt."
"I already am hurt, Colman," Leta said, tears running down her cheeks. "It hurts that we're still living here under this threat. And it hurt so much to see you like this now. I could have lost you today. We could have lost you today. I don't want our hatchlings growing up without their father around."
"I'm sorry." Colman pulled Leta into his arm the best he could. "I'm sorry, Leta. I know you feel that way. And I'm sorry I haven't been good enough to get you away from here yet."
"Don't say things like that," Leta said.
"So do we have a deal?" Sanji asked.
"Yes." Colman nodded. "If you can win, the trophy is yours."
"And there's no problems with switching chiefs, is there?" Sanji said. "I wouldn't want to get disqualified."
"No, there's not," Colman said. "Due to the nature of the race they do allow a substitute chief if the current chief gets injured. The only requirements for the change is the judges have to know and the new chief has to cook the dish that's already been declared."
"That sounds easy enough," Sanji said. "When's the final round?"
"In two weeks," Colman said.
"Two weeks, huh?" Sanji hummed. That means it's going to be two weeks before I can reunite with Neo.
"Is that a problem?" Leta asked. "Do you have a deal line to meet or something?"
"Something like that," Sanji mumbled then added in a low voice. "No, it's nothing. I was just thinking about a friend of mine. But it's nothing to worry about." He looked down at the monkey again. Two weeks…I hope someone else shows up before that. Neo's going to go insane and have trouble sleeping. At the very least, I hope she doesn't have a nightmare about anything until someone is with her. Blast you, Pendulum! You're going to pay for this! He took a relaxing breath. "Then show me what I'm suppose to do. We only have less than two weeks for me to get good with your locate cuisines."
"Leta, do we have enough to start today?" Colman asked.
"We do." Leta nodded. "I was just finished up shopping and was putting everything away when I heard about you."
"Let's get started then," Colman said, pushing himself to his feet.
"You sure you want to start right now?" Sanji nodded to the bird's injured arm. "You did just get your arm broken after all."
"I'll be fine," Colman said, walking towards the kitchen. "Despite the Raptors being in control we have a great medical system here. With the herbal pain remedy they put me on I'm feeling great."
"That's good to hear," Sanji said. He waited patiently while Colman started pulling things out of the fridge and cabinets with Leta's help. Slowly, his eyes started to grow round as he stared at the ingredients put on display for him. The majority of the ingredients were live bugs. He swallowed hard. "Oh boy. This is not going to be easy."
"I'm going to run into town to pick up your pain prescription," Leta said, heading for the door. "When I get back I'll start on some training exercises for the course."
"Be careful, honey," Colman said. "Come right back immediately."
"I will," Leta said before disappearing out of the door.
"Is it all right for her to go out on her own?" Sanji said. "I mean you just upset the Raptors."
"She'll be fine," Colman said while placing a pan down on the stove. "She's actually a faster flyer than I am. She'll easily get away from them if they try and attack her."
"Well, if you say it's okay," Sanji said.
"It is." Colman smiled at the blonde man. "Besides, if they wanted to do something they could easily come here. They know where we live after all."
"Man, I really hope you two can get out of here," Sanji said.
"Thanks." Colman nodded. "For now let's just focus on cooking. It might take a while for you to learn how to do this dish since you're not a bird."
"So you noticed?" Sanji scratched the back of his head.
"It wasn't hard," Colman said. "So what are you?"
"Human," Sanji replied with a casual glance at the monkey. It didn't move.
"Ah, I believe I've heard stories of your kind before," Colman said. "Some are good while others are bad."
"I'm not surprised," Sanji said.
"I'm ready," Colman said once everything was out on the counters.
Sanji stood beside Colman as the bird started mixing ingredients together. His stomach spun like one of his love tornados when Colman dumped a cup of live grubs into the sheering hot pan. A hissing came from the pan. He wasn't sure if it was just because live bugs were being cooked alive or if it the bugs were screaming out in pain. After all he was in a world where birds could talk. So it would make sense if other things could as well. He tried to force it out of his mind while he listened to Colman instruct him on how to know when the bugs were ready for the next step.
"Once their insides ooze out and their skin is a nice golden brown, you add in a two thirds cup of dirt and two cups of water," Colman said, pouring in the items when it was ready.
Sanji's stomach lurched at the sight before him. It turned into a brownish green mess while the bird stirred it. He had no idea if he was going to be able to survive these two weeks or not. At the very least, he was happy that Neo wasn't here to witness this. He knew she wouldn't be able to handle it at all. He felt like tossing his cookies and he wasn't even pregnant. With a deep breath he willed all of his professionalism to take over in hopes it would help him survive this.
…
After several hours of trying to sleep, Neo gave up. She adjusted her pillow, sat up, and just stared down at Law's hat and ring. She had no idea what time it was since there was no real moon to judge the time by and the only clock around had numbers on it that she couldn't read. Still, with her mind wherever her lover and friends were, time passed surprisingly fast for her. Before she knew it, the sprites were up and giving her concerned looks. Or at least Velocity and Elian were. Celeste was too busy trying to get herself to fully wake up as she rolled around on the pillow and rubbed her eyes.
"Princess, did you manage to get any sleep at all last night?" Velocity asked.
"Not really," Neo said. "But it doesn't matter. I'll nap through the day. Stress always causes me to sleep. Though I'm not sure how it will affect me now since I'm not around my family. I might not sleep until I'm back with them."
"Well, that's not going to be good," Elian said.
"Yeah." Neo nodded.
"I hungry," Celeste said, sleepily. "I need food."
"Breakfast does sound lovely," Velocity said, clapping her hands together before addressing Neo. "Why don't you get ready for the day and we'll go on down to the kitchen and get breakfast started?"
"Yeah." Neo nodded again. She waited until the sprites flew out of the room before making a move towards the edge of the bed. She placed her bare feet on the floor. It felt cold today. Or maybe she was the one who was cold. Either way she pushed herself off the bed and made her way over to the bathroom. Once done, she shut the water off and stared at herself in the mirror. She almost didn't recognize herself from her sleepy and drained expression. "Come on, Neo. You can hold it together. You might be alone right now but it's only for a short amount of time. They will come back to you. You know they are strong and can handle themselves just fine. You can do this. You can handle this. Law raised you to be able to handle yourself. Okay?"
She nodded despite not feeling much better after her little pep talk. She then left the bathroom and the bedroom. Wondering down the stairs, she wondered if they had a library. Reading would be a good way to keep her mind occupied with something other than worrying. The quietness of the house was soon over taken by the clattering of dishes and the spites gripping at Celeste for one thing or another.
"Celeste! Don't eat that!" Velocity said.
"If you're not going to help, then go sit somewhere else!" Elian said.
"Making breakfast! Making breakfast! I'm helping making breakfast!" Celesta sang just as Neo entered into the kitchen. The little orange sprite was sitting on a spatula and flying around the room with it.
"That's not helping at all!" the twins shouted.
Neo couldn't help but giggle at the sight before her. Her bells rang out into the room, stopping the sprites in their tracks.
Celesta gasped then few over to Neo. "Pretty laughter! Bells rang! Bells rang!"
"Hey, you actually laughed. And your laughter is very pretty," Velocity said.
"Sorry," Neo said. "It just, you three reminded me of Shachi, Penguin, and Luffy just now. Luffy's a real goofball at times and Shachi and Penguin often yell at him like you two did with Celeste."
"I see." Velocity nodded. "Well, I'm glad we at least made you smile once."
"I never heard of someone having bells in their laughter," Elian said.
"I guess I forgot to mention that when I told you about myself yesterday," Neo said, sitting down at the table. "It's also part of my royal heritage."
"You're just full of surprises," Velocity said as she turned back to whatever she was cooking on the stove.
"I guess so," Neo said. "So do you all have a library here?"
"Yeah, we have one," Elian said. "But you won't be able to read the books we have."
"Why not?" Neo asked.
"They're written in an ancient Time Language of the Time Keepers," Elian said. "It's only read here in the Time Stream. No one from your world can read it without learning it. But it's not an easy language to read if you're not born in the Time Stream."
"Time Keepers?" Neo questioned as she continued to fiddle with Law's hat and ring.
"Empress Futura and her royal guards are Time Keepers. Pendulum is also a Time Keeper, but obviously has gone rogue," Elian explained. "They guard the flow of time to make sure nothing happens to it. It's a very delicate string that needs to be protected."
"I'm not sure I really understand what you're saying," Neo said. "I get the whole protecting thing, but the Time Stream I don't get."
"Hey, don't worry," Velocity said. "It's not easy for a lot of people to understand."
"I guess so." Neo lifted her eyes to the girl.
"Well, breakfast is ready anyway," Velocity said, placing a plate of something down on the table that reminded Neo of pancakes then a bowl of something that reminded her of oatmeal.
"Thank you," Neo said, picking up her fork. She cut off a bite of the pancake looking thing and placed it in her mouth. She found she couldn't really taste anything. It was the same with the oatmeal stuff. Her mouth seemed to have lost its sense of taste. She sighed inwardly as the sprites chatted happily with each other. Being strong was going to be harder than she thought it would be.
After she forced herself to eat at least one of the pancakes like thing and half of the oatmeal like stuff, Neo stood up and followed the sprites back into the living room. She felt guilty for leaving food behind, but she couldn't bring herself to finish it. She forced her mind off of it when they lead her over to one of the other doors and opened it. Her heart leaped with joy upon seeing the wall to wall and floor to ceiling books in the place. But then the joy quickly left upon remembering she wasn't going to be able to read any of them herself.
"So what type of books do you like?" Velocity asked. "Romance? I'm quite fond of those."
"I'll say," Elian said as he landed on the arm of one of the two high back chairs in the room. "She's a hopeless romantic. So she's really into the prince saving the princess."
"I'm not that bad!" Velocity snapped.
"You are too," Elian replied. "You're all the time getting lost in your romance books. You don't even notice the silly looks that you get on your face while reading them."
"Oh, you just hush," Velocity said, her cheeks tinting a purplish color.
"I really like anything," Neo said as she wondered if the girl's purplish tint was her way of blushing. After all red and blue did make purple when mixed together. She brushed it aside when Velocity flew up to the books and scanned her eyes over them.
"Sit! Sit! Sit!" Celesta said while doing cartwheels in the air.
Neo walked over to the other high back chair and sat down in it. She waited patiently for Velocity to pick out a book. When the spite did, she used her magic to pull the book off the shelf then laid it down in the chair where her brother was.
"I just love this book. I've literally read it over a hundred times," Velocity said, flipping open the book while Elian clicked on the reading lamp. "Are you ready, Princess?"
"You don't have to call me princess," Neo said, running her hand over Law's hat. "I'm not really use to being called that anyway."
"Apologies," Velocity replied. "It's our customs to address those with a title by their titles. It's mostly a habit, but also respect. Even those who are best friends with those of titles call them by their titles instead of their names."
"Very well then. If you wish to call me princess then feel free to do so," Neo said. She gave Velocity a go ahead nod then settled down in her chair while listening to her sprite friend read. They weren't very far into the book when she started noticing quite a few similarities between the main character's story line and her own life. The main character was rescued by a young prince who took her to live with him in his kingdom. Just as the two characters reached the prince's kingdom, she felt her eyelids grow heavy. She tried to stay awake and listen to the story, but gave in to her drowsiness and fell asleep.
…
Apple Bloom: I know what you mean. She's an easy character to feel for. So sweet and all.