Hope you all enjoy!
TW for torture and a panic attack.
The first thing he is really aware of is the wind tickling a little at his bare toes. The second is the solidness of a bunk underneath him and the third is the slightly stiff sheet covering him from chest to calves.
The fourth? The fourth thing he notices is that he is really, really thirsty. He manages to pry his tongue from the roof of his mouth, frowning lightly and then opens his mouth, grimacing a little at the way his lips stick together a little.
He tries to shift a little and the fifth thing he abruptly notices is the pain. He groans low in the back of his throat and hears a small clatter.
"Sanji!" a voice says.
Chopper.
The little reindeer is at his side in a second and carefully shifts him back the way he'd been before. His body throbs but then the pain ebbs back into background noise.
"Don't move!" Chopper admonishes gently. "You're really hurt."
"Don't feel much," Sanji says. It's true. He's definitely had worse.
"That's because you're on the really good stuff," Chopper tells him, still fussing a little with how he's positioned and where the blanket settles on him.
"Can I have some water?" Sanji rasps. His mouth is perfectly dry and his throat feels a little raw.
"Of course!" Chopper says. He hops down and Sanji hears the familiar clop of his hooves over the floor, before he pops back up, cup in hand with a straw. He tucks the straw into Sanji's mouth and if he wasn't so thirsty, Sanji would be miffed at that. But once the cool water hits his mouth all he can think of is drinking more and more.
"Easy," Chopper says after he's sucked down half the glass in two seconds flat. "I don't want you to feel sick."
"Too late," Sanji mumbles. "I already feel like crap." But he releases the straw and leans back on his pillow.
He hears the sound of Chopper resting the glass on the little side table and asks, "What the hell happened to me?"
The air in the room goes extremely still. Then Chopper, voice very tentative, asks, "You…you don't remember? You don't remember anything?"
Sanji thinks about that for a moment.
"I…I think so. We docked on the island. I..I went to get groceries I think. There were some guys…." He frowns again, fingers twitching, ignores the dull pain the movement causes. "There was a thing…in a syringe, stabbed me with it."
His eyes close automatically. "I…I must have blacked out."
"Nothing else?" Chopper's voice sounds very small.
But he does remember more. He remembers waking up. He remembers the questions, the cell, the chains, his own damn cigarettes burning into his skin, the blade they'd used on his right hand, cutting into the same cut over and over, each time a little bit deeper. Three times they'd done that. A thousand cuts contained in three wounds.
He remembers headbutting one, managing to kick out and snap the ankle of another. Remembers laughing at them, when they tried to pry his captain's weaknesses out of him. As if he'd ever betray Luffy.
He remembers…he remembers them turning their attention to his other arm. Starting the same way, with a single cut. Only this time, they'd gone across, instead of along, his forearm. He remembers screaming, when they'd started sawing slowly through the bone.
He remembers when it was over, how it hurt almost as bad when they'd wrapped his belt around what was left of him and cinched it tight so that he wouldn't bleed out. His only consolation then had been that he hadn't said anything.
He moves, sitting up in one fluid motion, even though it makes everything scream, and flips the sheet off of his side.
He stares down at the stump of his arm.
"Oh," he says a little numbly. "I was hoping that part was a dream."
"Sanji?" Chopper is watching him wide-eyed and full of concern.
"Sanji?" Chopper says again when he doesn't reply.
"I…I'm fine," he says. He's still staring at the stump. At the way it simply ends. He tries to move his fingers and…and there's nothing there.
"Sanji!" Chopper has his hooves placed on either side of his face now. He sounds really concerned. He looks really blurry.
Oh.
Oh.
He is crying, Sanji realizes as he blinks and his vision wavers.
"I…I…" he stammers. And then Chopper has thrown his arms around his neck and Sanji is sobbing into his nakama's fur. He cries even harder when he tries to wrap his arms around Chopper and the stump bumps against the reindeer's back. He tries and fails to wrap his mind around the fact that he doesn't not have fingers there anymore.
It does not compute.
The difference between his right hand, gripping their small doctor's fur and his left being completely unable to, is almost too much for him to handle.
He is gasping now, more than crying and Chopper is saying something frantically but he can't hear him over the siren sound of his cut off arm.
How the hell is he supposed to cook? How is he supposed to cook for the future pirate king's insatiable appetite like this? How is he supposed to keep their bunch of absolutely ridiculous nakama well-fed and healthy like this??
How…How…??
He isn't breathing, he realises when his chest gets too tight. He isn't breathing and he can't drag in air. He can't do anything.
He feels something cool slide into his neck and then his vision goes fuzzy and he's out.
When he wakes again, he knows it is night by how cool it is. Someone is singing. Brook, he thinks automatically but no. The slightly husky voice is not their musician's and the words are none that he can understand. Robin then. She likes to sing songs in lost and forgotten languages. They always sound beautiful and a little sad.
"Robin-chan," he rasps, opening his eyes. The low, melodic singing cuts off and then there she is, leaning over him, her usually controlled face expressing care and concern.
"Sanji-chan," she says gently. "You're awake again."
"Yeah," he says, still raspy. Then swallows hard. His mouth is dry again. Robin doesn't miss it, leaning out of sight and returning with a cup and straw.
She lifts his head a little so he can drink properly. More mindful this time, he takes it slowly, savouring the cool feel of it slipping down his throat. He finishes the whole glass and leans back in relief. He must still be on the pain meds because it is all a dull ache in the back of his mind, but his abused torso is definitely glad for the rest.
"Did you call me Sanji-chan?" he murmurs, eyes half-closed.
"Yes," Robin says gently. She pushes back the hair on his forehead and his eyes flutter open to meet hers. "I care very much about you, you know."
He should be ecstatic. He's wanted to hear those words from her for a very long time. But they don't make him feel like he thought they might. Instead, a gentle warmth blooms inside, soft and sweet, spreading through him. It makes him think of his mom. It makes him think of being carried to bed by Zeff after he'd fallen asleep in the kitchen. Family.
"Robin-chan," he says, trying not to think of how his voice trembles, "My arm."
Her eyes soften terribly. She stands and then bends over him, pressing her lips to his forehead, her hair a black curtain framing his face, a protective shield between him and the rest of the world.
"I know Sanji-san," she says infinitely gentle. "It is a terrible loss."
He tries and fails to bite back a sob.
"We are here," Robin murmurs, shifting to press her forehead to his. Sanji soaks up the contact like a lifeline. "Whatever comes Sanji-chan, we are here." A pause and then she adds a little more forcefully. "I am here." Another gentle pause, her hands cupping his face now, thumbs swiping at the tears that are leaking down his cheeks. "I am here and I have many, many arms. And no objections to lending you one of them if you ever have need of it."
The offer, the assurance, breaks what's left of his self-control and he clings to her with his one semi-good arm and sobs and sobs, until he can't quite cry anymore.
He doesn't remember falling asleep. Only that Robin-chan hadn't left when he must have finally slipped away.
He wakes up in the morning, feeling distinctly odd. He blinks open his eyes and looks around blearily.
Oh, he thinks after a moment, that's why he was feeling strange. His bandaged legs are lying across Usopp's lap. The sniper is sitting on the bed, back to the wall. He is scribbling something in a notebook, brows knitted together in concentration.
"Usopp," he calls.
His nakama jerks a little and then stares at him before a wide smile spreads across his face.
"Sanji!!!!"
"Don't deafen me," Sanji says, but he can't help but smile back in response as Usopp throws book and pencil up into the air and scrambles up the bed to hug him.
"Ow! Ow!" he says as he is jostled and then lets out a low groan as his nakama collapses onto his chest.
"You're awake!!!"
"I might be unconscious now," Sanji chokes out, thwacking at Usopp's side lightly. Usopp takes pity on him and sits up, scrubbing a forearm furiously over his eyes.
"I'm so glad you're awake!" he says, sniffing. "Do you want some water?"
"I want to piss actually," Sanji says as that particular bodily function suddenly makes itself known.
"Right!" Usopp says, "Of course. Hold on." He scrambles off the bed with far more care this time to Sanji's injuries. Sanji tries to sit up on his own but Usopp hisses at him like a cat which startles him enough to let the sniper help him. Then he barks out a laugh at exactly how ludicrous it was.
It startles him, the laughter. But it feels good.
Usopp is grinning at him again, with something like relieved joy in his eyes. Sanji looks away, not able to process what that makes him feel and starts to slide his legs off the bed.
"Easy," Usopp says. "If you strain something Chopper is going to kill me and death by reindeer isn't how I want to go out."
"That isn't a grand enough death for the great captain Usopp?" Sanji teases, trying to ignore the pain, moving brings. It's definitely sharper this time around. His meds must be wearing off.
"The great captain Usopp wants no death," Usopp informs him primly.
The light mood comes to a halt however when Usopp automatically reaches for his left arm to sling it over his shoulder. He freezes mid-motion and they both stare at his reaching hand for a long moment before Usopp drops it and awkwardly shuffles over to his right side.
Neither of them say anything as Usopp slings Sanji's right hand over his shoulders and helps him stand from the bed, other arm wrapping around his waist for stability.
Going to the bathroom while someone else is propping you up is always a kind of awkward experience and honestly if Sanji had known that this was going be part of the whole experience, he might have rethought this pirate thing. Unfortunately, it's far too late for him now. He'd fallen into Luffy's clutches and hadn't a hope of ever wanting to disengage himself now.
When he's done, it's an awkward shuffling back to the bed. Sanji hates how much effort it takes to get back even with Usopp's help. He feels weak. He feels incomplete.
"I'm sorry!" Usopp blurts.
Sanji blinks up at him in confusion from where he'd been trying to figure out how to get his legs back into the bed without jostling them too much. His confusion had to have been pretty evident because Usopp gestures helplessly at the stump of his arm and says, "I didn't mean to be awkward about it, honest!"
Sanji stares. And then lets out a huff of laughter. He doesn't think anyone can blame him for it sounding bitter.
"I'm awkward about it Usopp," he tries and fails not to snap. "Don't worry about it."
Usopp looks like he wants to cry all over again and Sanji is feeling petty enough to let him because he wants to cry all over again too.
He doesn't expect Usopp to step forward and gather him gently against his chest. Sanji lets him, buries his face in well-worn clothing and closes his eyes. The tears don't fall. But he thinks he cries anyway.
Usopp's fingers are running through his hair, a role reversal, Sanji thinks, of the many times he's ruffled their sniper's hair.
"Well," Usopp breathes into the quiet, "Aren't we dysfunctional?"
There is a pause and then Sanji laughs. It's a choked-up thing, but it's genuine and he can't stop, huffs of laughter shaking his shoulders, making all his wounds protest. Usopp is laughing too, his torso shuddering under Sanji's head. And for the first time since he'd woken up on the ship, Sanji dares to let himself entertain the possibility that things might one day be okay.
Let me know what you think!