A/N: Combination of too much life and too little spoons lately. Sorry.
Chapter 8: Together Again! Strawhats Unite!
Robin stared at the scrap of paper. One little sentence caused so much chaos. Everything suddenly went topsy-turvy. A dead shichibukai's flag was flying once again and a long-defeated enemy was back with his sights set on their weak spot. "Fuck."
It was the only word that came out of her mouth. And that single word said more to Franky than a thousand. In all the years, he'd never heard her curse. Not once, regardless of the situation. Crocodile had only heard it once, and he had been stunned stupid by the results that followed, which was how she was promoted to his partner. She pulled her hat down further to shade her eyes and handed Franky the paper.
The large cyborg read the paper, spit the mouthful of cola he'd just taken across the room, read it again, and said, "What?!"
"FRANKY!"
The yell from the door distracted him from his initial shock with another one; standing in the doorway to the Lotus' galley was the captain, now with cola dripping from his enraged features.
"AH! Luffy! Sorry! Have you seen this!?"
"We're going to hunt that bird-brain down and make him sorry for hurting Usopp!" The pirate king growled, shaking himself like a dog, which sprayed the walls with the cola.
Fortunately the shipwright planned for this, and the paper on the walls was designed to absorb the moisture to be sent through the little ship's filtration system to be turned into bathwater. So, it was of no consequence when Luffy stormed in and slammed his own version of the letter down on the table. There was a telling tension in the rubber man's shoulders that spoke of more than just the misfortune with Usopp weighing on his mind. Of course, the fact that he was in Water 7 at all was kind of a give-away that something was seriously wrong.
He plopped himself down on the bench next to Franky and crossed his arms over his chest. "Doflamingo will be sorry he crossed me right now."
Robin and Franky looked at each other before the ebony-haired woman, with no warning, slapped her captain upside the back of his head.
"You're being stupid again, Captain," she replied flatly. "This isn't about a dead Pirate Lord. This is about one of his discarded toys. One so inconsequential everyone forgot about him and he used it to his advantage. Bellamy, not Doflamingo. Honestly, you were getting better about that jumping to conclusions thing." She shook her head at his confused frown. "Now we've got that cleared up, Luffy, what are you doing here? What happened to make you leave Raftel?"
"Ow." The dark haired man rubbed his head, then looked sheepish. "I... I couldn't sit around waiting." The same defeated air came over him again, and he took his hat in his hands, holding the brim and running his thumb through the fibers. "It's too loud without her to yell at me. Everything around me just stares at me, even after Sanji burned the house, and... and... and I heard you talking about bringing her here."
Franky grimaced, tensing his muscles to distract his lady if he needed to. Coming here, after being so seriously reprimanded just weeks ago? He understood what his captain was thinking but he certainly couldn't say he'd have the same bubbles to brave coming to the place where he'd been practically told to avoid.
The archeologist gave him a stern look—stern, not fierce. It soon melted and she sank into a chair. "Yes... the silence can be... maddening," she admitted softly. "But now we've got much worse matters to be concerned with. Bellamy is back and he has a grudge. Somehow he survived Doflamingo. The man's mind must be as twisted as sin. And he's taken Kaya, who was as good as Nakama even before she married Long-nose-kun. How do we get her back and wipe him off the face of the planet? I'm not Nami, Captain, I'm sorry. I can't think of anything better than simply chasing after the bastard's shadow and we may never catch up to him that way."
His wife's name made the Pirate King visibly flinch, though he tried to cover it with one hand rubbing the back of his head again. It'd been so long since they had any kind of situation where Nami hadn't been around to sort out what needed to be done that the brunet was very much at a loss for a course of action. He frowned harder than he had in years, eyebrows knitting together and a small whine, that was evidently his 'thinking noise', emanated from his mouth.
"Oi, Luffy-bro, don't hurt yerself." Franky grasped his captain's shoulder, concerned.
"Mah! Sanji!" Was all Luffy said, making the cyborg even more confused.
Robin raised an eyebrow. "You think Sanji will know what to do?"
She was nearly as lost as her boyfriend. Unlike Zoro, she'd never seen Luffy lost and without his navigator before. It was a fairly unnerving process.
"Dunno. But I'm hungry. So, we need to go to Sanji." Because apparently the food on Water 7 wasn't what he wanted.
As The Strawhat turned on his heel and left the Lotus' galley, the shipwright turned to his other half. He was frozen in disbelief for a moment, before shaking his head in wonder. Only Luffy could be facing potentially the worst threat to his treasure he'd ever faced, and drop absolutely everything because his stomach growled. At the same time though, the blue-haired man had to admit that whatever it was that gave the Pirate King his luck had to be working somehow.
"I'll shove off then, yeah?" He had to ask his lover because truly, he was not following whatever was going through his captain's head.
Robin was massaging the bridge of her nose. "...Do that. I'm sure Bellamy will lay a trap; he's already proven intelligent enough to go for our weakest link. If we have to go charging into what we know is a trap, we should at least be all gathered together. And somehow, somebody's got to get a hold of Chopper!"
"Aye, aye, ma'am." With a direct course of action the mechanical man was much more comfortable.
He also wouldn't say it aloud, but the fact that the captain was now seated on the prow of the Lotus, shouting at the top of his lungs for the cook, seemed to be a sign that the trouble within the Nakama was quite possibly beginning to ease. He wouldn't bet on it, but he certainly hoped with the introduction of a common foe the issues between the king and queen could be forgotten. So, with a considerably lighter heart, he hauled the heavy ropes into coils on the deck, securing the Mini Merry to the Lotus' aft, and eased the flower ship away from the Galley-La harbor.
"SUU-PER!" He crowed, punching the cola-jet's ignition switch in the center of the wheel, sending the trio careening away from Water 7 parallel to the Puffing Tom's tracks.
The archeologist held onto her hat and prepared for a long, bumpy ride with a slight nostalgic smile. It would be... good... to be riding back into battle with familiar friends at her side. Even if the overall situation was more painful than many of the previous ones.
Four days later, the blond head chef of the All-Blue was enjoying his first cigarette of the morning as the sun rose gently to his left when the peace of the early hour was utterly shattered by a rapidly growing call.
"SaaaAAANNNNJIIIII! MEEEESSSSSHHHHHIIIIII!"
"Oh, sweet Geezer's nose hairs." His smoke dropped to the deck and rolled into the water unnoticed as he tore his way back through the private quarters and into the kitchen like a mad man, bellowing, "OI! YA LAZY, SHIT-FER-BRAINS, RISE AND SHINE!" The decibel level dropped significantly when the door to the restaurant proper swung closed behind him. "We have incoming royalty, fuck it all! Stash that roast. No, don't put in the fridge, he'll look there. I don't care what you do with it, Flambé, just don't let him near it. Oodon, get the lead out yer pants and secure those store rooms. What part of my words are you, lazy, good-fer-nothings not understanding!? Keep the..."
He trailed off the further into the kitchen he went, but in the living room of the private quarters it was quite obvious that had the reinforced walls not been between him and the rest of the ship, people would fear for their eardrums.
Zoro was up, having been wrenched from sleep by the first of his beloved's bellowing shouts, and his hair was bristled like the plant for which he was nicknamed, while he tried to still the ringing in his ears.
"Dear God... well, Sniper, it appears the Captain got word and decided to come visit." He was quiet a second before saying, "Heal faster. I'm... I'm going to get the doc and see if he can do anything."
"Uh... what?" Usopp blinked sleepily.
He was sitting up in the bed where he'd first woken up after everything happened. His bruises were mending quite well, already fading to green and yellow. The split in his lip was almost completely gone. Now they were just waiting on his long bones to finish knitting together. Whatever it was that Sanji put in the food that Chopper helped him design was a miracle. Already, the sniper could flex his feet without the muscles pulling or protesting, in spite of the broken places.
"Luffy's here" was all the answer that came out of the other room and another thump. "Goddamnit! We need a doc with a stronger constitution, this is what the fourth time he's fainted on us?!"
"Sixth." Sanji reappeared, bearing a tray with breakfast for the gathered Strawhats, plus two of the three on their way. "There is a footlocker awaiting him when he reaches—"
"SANJI! MESHI!" The crash of a Gomu-Gomu-no-Rocket shook the ship from flag to tiller, causing the cook and the shipwright to glare, though the captain couldn't see either, until he burst through the door from the deck.
The blond just pointed at the open door on the other side of the room. His staff would guide the rubber man to where his bottomless stomach could be filled without much in the way of distraction. Weak-hearted men never survived long under Black Leg Sanji anyway, so he was confident that the ones who could were also able to handle the chef's captain. The locking mechanism that would hold the Lotus and the Mini Merry flush against the All-Blue sounded, and to a roll of the sniper's eyes, a habit he was picking up from his therapy coach, the lithe pirate danced out of his home in a stream of delicate smoke.
"Robin-chwan! How good of you to join us once again!"
The archeologist tipped her hat to him grinning. "I see you prepared for us. Well, Luffy's bullhorn mouth is good for something at least."
Zoro rested his chin in his hand, not moving. For one, he didn't want to watch his lover fawn over Robin, and for two he didn't want to leave Usopp when a stray rubber arm might come whipping in as the captain's limbs were wont to do.
Franky, seeming to have the same mindset as the swordsman, came up immediately behind his lady, and sucked his teeth. "Insatiable idiot."
Two of the Lotus' petals would need to be repaired before she was used for any sort of long voyage again, which meant the shipwright was in no mood for playing games. He wasn't often possessive, but with things the way they were, stress piling on top of stress, he couldn't help himself as unconsciously his left forearm shifted enough to make the sound of a cocking rifle.
Immediately, Sanji righted himself from bending over the lady's hand, and nodded towards the doorway next to the spiral stairs that led to the second floor. "In here."
"H-hey guys." Usopp tried to smile convincingly when the trio joined Zoro in the sniper's infirm room, but it was just as obvious a lie as any that spilled from the long-nosed man's mouth.
"Hello, Long-nose-kun," Robin said quietly as her big, watchful eyes took in all the damage. She, very obviously, did not move out of Franky's arm range and one of hers slipped around his, as she smiled. "I see Sanji's been getting you healed with his miracle food."
Zoro grinned, pride obvious in a way that would never have been possible before Luffy became Pirate King. "That he has."
The sniper puffed out his chest, tossing his head in assumed arrogance, though the glint in his eye was deadly rather than jovial, "Nothing can keep the Great Captain Usopp down for long."
"Yes, well, 'great captain', you've still a long way to go while Chopper is still missing in action." Sanji took a deep drag on his cigarette, his other hand in his pocket.
"Y'don't think something could've happened to the Bonehead, do you?" Franky shifted a little uncomfortably.
Zoro and Robin exchanged a look—rare, but it did happen from time to time. Then they both burst out laughing.
"Chopper? Pitted against something he couldn't beat, outsmart, or outrun?" Zoro snickered. "Not in a million years! Especially not since he can use all his medical knowledge against somebody."
"O-oi!" The cyborg seemed a bit affronted for a moment, but just then Luffy made his appearance once again.
"Whew! Sanji!" The rubber man wrapped his arms around all of his Nakama. "We're back together again! Yosh! Let's kick Don's ass for not keeping a better watch on his flag!"
The archeologist frowned all levity gone abruptly. "This is the second time you've mentioned going after a dead-man, Captain. And I'm now certain it wasn't a fluke. What do you know?"
Zoro stepped back—fuck she was getting that look again.
"Well, Brook came back from the grave, didn't he?" The brunet man's neck twisted his grin upside down, just before the stretched arm that wasn't draped around people's shoulders began to retract, hauling the slight man out the door again with a joyous shout. "Merry II! We'll save you!"
"I-is it just me, or is there something going on I don't know about?" The sniper watched their captain leave as quickly as he came. "He seems almost... manic... which is saying something for him."