Chapter 4
Stuff starts to get a little more serious.
In the end, they dragged Law down to the brig, wherever that happened to be on this monstrosity of a ship. Sanji had always thought that the Sunny was large, especially after having sailed on the Merry to get to the grandline. But now, he really wondered just how large some of the ships in the New World were.
He was still feeling shell shocked.
"Who the hell is Vinsmoke?" Law had asked, his body swaying from fatigue and the effects of the seastone cuffs.
Sanji had felt like someone had just dumped a bucket of cold water on him, and he knew that he'd been opening and closing his mouth ridiculously like a fish.
Bege had responded for him, even as Sanji ran through every scenario in his head for why on earth his birth family wanted him home, and for a wedding of all things. "Vinsmoke is the name of a very notorious family in the North Blue. You may have been somewhat more familiar with the name Germa 66," the Supernova stated.
Law had at least reacted to that, and for the first time since they'd been dragged onto the ship, his eyes had cleared up and he shot Sanji a look that had a lot of questions. "You mean…the villains from Sora, Warrior of the Sea?"
Sanji felt his brain, already going a thousand miles an hour, stutter to a stop.
"What the heck?" he spluttered, shaking his head in confusion. The guy that had shouted at them a welcome when they climbed on board gasped though, going into instant fanboy mode. (That was definitely what it was and in hindsight it was one of the weirdest things in the Sanji had ever seen…)
"Oh, you know the comics?" the strange gray skinned man had gushed. Law shot the man a withering glare.
"Know?" The surgeon scoffed. "I should think so. I have every issue ever released, and two of them are original signed copies."
Sanji had never. Ever. Thought he would attribute fanboying to someone like Law. Granted, he wasn't acting like gray curly-tongue, but still. It was a strange sight to see.
They had digressed from there. Sanji had been mostly irritated, but he was doing a good job holding in his panic for now.
Yeah, right.
His heart was pounding. But the Big Mom pirates surrounding them seemed prepared to welcome him as a guest. He tried to protest as he saw Law hauled away, not enjoying the way the tall man stumbled.
This was his fault. They had come to find Sanji, and disrupted Law's plans. This was going to cause so many issues, and it was his fault.
Sanji had been led to a cabin, well furnished but strange. It was covered in bright colors that hurt his eyes. He preferred soft colors, mostly pastels and blues. The garish pinks and teals and even bright red everywhere made him want to gag.
And then there was the fact that too many inanimate objects kept talking.
That was freaky.
There was no reason why a pillow should have a smiley face on it and say hello to him.
Sanji had changed, and proceeded to gulp down a glass of water. He had then paced the length of the room for several minutes, trying to clear his head. Then he'd gone to the door of the cabin. There was a strange chess piece looking soldier standing there.
At this point he was just rolling with the weirdness, the growing dread over what was going on with his family continually trying to rise up instead.
"I want to go see Trafalgar Law," he stated.
The soldier stared at him. At least, he was pretty sure he was being stared at. The helmet didn't allow for much facial expression to show.
"Well?" he questioned again.
The chess soldier finally spoke. "I am not at liberty to bring you to him."
Sanji ground his teeth in frustration, and again, he longed for the familiar feel of a cigarette between his teeth. "Well, then, bring me to someone that is at liberty."
He thought that the soldier wasn't going to do anything, but then he turned and started to walk down the hallway. Sanji followed after a moment, worry and frustration warring for dominance in his head. He heard voices ahead, and quickly schooled his expression, knowing that being on an enemy ship, no matter how much they were treating him nicely, he couldn't show any weakness.
"Prince Sanji, please join us."
He looked into the room, and realized it was a lounge of some sort. The colors were just as garish here as in his room, and he let out a small sigh as he walked over to an empty seat. Pekoms, Bege, the gray curly tongued guy, and a handful of others were there. Normally, the ladies that were present – one with a rather long neck – would be bringing his romantic side out. But the anxiety thrumming under his skin was a pretty good distraction to that.
"I want to see Law," he stated, shoving his hands in the pockets of his black trousers.
He tried really hard not to think about why they would have clothes in his size. They weren't tailored like what he had, and didn't fit him perfectly. But it was almost like they had someone else give them proper measurements, like they had someone else his size, who looked like him –
Sanji blinked, breathing deeply. He could not fall into that pit right now.
Bege gave him a quizzical look. "Interesting. You're on a first name basis with the Surgeon of Death?"
Shit. He hadn't thought about it. It was hard to say Trafalgar all the time, but he hadn't stooped to calling him Torao like the rest of the crew. He'd seen how much it had irritated the other man, and he'd decided he wanted to be on his good side. There had been a selfish part of him that had been intrigued to talk to someone that had been from the North. Someone that was not his family. Law had given him a strange look the first time he'd been addressed as Law, but he hadn't objected to it.
And now, it was giving an opening for these men, these enemies, to strike.
"Trafalgar is a mouthful," he said, hoping that they would take that and leave it. Bege hummed. "Now, if you please, my request still stands. Where is he?"
Bege studied him, puffing smoke out of his cigar. Sanji resisted the urge to lean forward and sniff at the smoke.
"He is comfortable. For now. I am still intrigued as to why you were treading water in the middle of the ocean with him."
Sanji sighed, and carefully perched himself on the edge of the deep red couch. Bege was across from him, booted feet crossed on the table between them. "We picked him up on Punk Hazard. He was just catching passage with us. His crew was sent elsewhere for a while."
Pekoms spoke up this time. "But he's a warlord. Warlord's shouldn't be doing anything with lowly pirates unless you're subordinates. Are you his subordinate?"
Sanji chewed on his bottom lip. He hadn't thought this through. He knew that it was only a matter of time before someone realized that Law's Warlord status had been revoked. He couldn't imagine that Smoker wouldn't tell someone about Law allying himself with the Straw Hat pirates. He sighed, and hoped that Law would forgive him. "He's no longer a Warlord."
There was a sound of surprise from the long-necked woman perched on the barstool to Sanji's left. He hadn't paid too much attention to the rest of the room, but there was a bar there and she was leaning against it, a glass of some type of alcohol in her hand. "Since when?" she asked, an eyebrow going up.
Sanji shrugged, deciding to play dumb. He didn't want to ruin all of Law's plans. "Beats me," he said. "We showed up, explored the island, and he was there asking if we could take him to the next one. When we brought up his status, he simply told us that it was going to be revoked."
Pekoms reached forward from his spot beside Bege and snagged some type of cuisine from the table. "Ah, so perhaps it will come up in the paper soon then."
Sanji nodded, hoping that he didn't look as nervous as he felt. "Now, about seeing him? We appreciate you pulling us out of the water, but we really don't want to take up space on your ship. If you would be so kind as to lend us a boat, we will be on our way. I'm sure my captain is worried about us and we really ought to get back."
"I don't think that you realize the gravity of the situation," Bege said. "You aren't going to be leaving anytime soon."
Sanji was afraid of that. "So, I'm your prisoner? Why am I not in a cell with Law?"
Bege pulled his cigar out again and Sanji hated that he was craving a cigarette so much. "You don't have to be, but if you continue to cause problems, we can make your life here worse. As it is, you might want to be a little more willing."
Sanji scoffed, and he finally reached forward for the strange food on the table in front of him. His stomach was close to rumbling and he didn't want to embarrass himself with that. He felt fidgety, and he needed to have something for his hands to do as well. "Okay, humor me. Why do I need to be more cooperative? All the information I have so far is that my shitty family wants me to come back and marry some random girl. For what? Power? That's all they ever seem to want."
"An alliance," the lion mink responded. "Germa 66 wishes to form an alliance with Big Mom. They wanted to make sure that they gave us the right son, and when they told us that you were a bit wayward, it was just a matter of a few things to negotiate us looking for you. Knowing that you were the infamous Blackleg Sanji was just icing on the cake for Big Mom. She doesn't like her children to just marry anyone."
Sanji shook his head. "I still don't understand why they wanted me. There are three other princes to pick from."
Pekoms shrugged. "I don't know. I just know what I was told. And, we were told to inform you that if you didn't do what they wanted in coming back with us, we were to use our leverage."
Sanji gave the mink a frown. "What leverage," he asked, afraid of what the answer would be.
"Yes," Bege continued in lieu of Pekoms. "Your father, Vinsmoke Judge. He said that we needed to let you know about hostages in the East Blue. Specifically, an old chef with a peg leg."
And that did it. He was feeling both hot and cold back and forth, and he felt like he couldn't breath.
Zeff?
They freaking had Zeff?
Was he captured?
Were they just watching him?
…
…
Was he already dead?
"I'm not sure that using him as leverage would have been needed in our new circumstances, though," the supernova continued. "After all, I'm not buying this stuff with Trafalgar Law. You hid it well, but for someone that was just getting passage on your ship, you seem a little too worried about him."
"There's nothing wrong with being a decent human being," he said, almost snarling, willing his breathing to calm down.
Bege chuckled. "No, there's nothing wrong with that. I'll tell you what. You cooperate, and I'll let you go see him. If you make problems for us, well, my men could use some stress relief."
Sanji gritted his teeth at the implied threat, but he supposed he should be thankful for small mercies. "Fine," he groused out. "I'd like to see him now though, if you don't mind. He had a head wound. Did your people do anything for that?"
Bege went to stand. "Probably not. But the man's a doctor. You can ask him for his professional opinion when you go talk."
Law couldn't sleep.
He knew he should. The exhaustion was set deep in his bones at this point. His head was still throbbing. His joints ached, and the weariness that was emanating from his wrists was the absolute worst thing. And he was hungry and thirsty, loath as he was to admit it.
They had all but dragged him down the stairs to a lower, damper area of the ship. There were a few cells down here, and they seemingly picked one at random and very unceremoniously tossed him in. He landed badly on his left elbow, and had cursed the chess like guards for their incompetence.
It was colder down here than he would like to. After hours in the sun, the sudden dampness made him shiver.
His eyes were closed when he heard the footsteps approach. He recognized the clanking steps of the chess guard, but there was another set of footsteps. He cracked an eye open, just in time to see Sanji walk up.
He had changed clothes. His pants were still black, but they didn't look as nice as the ones he'd been previously wearing. But it was the shirt that made Law want to bark out a laugh. Gone was the light blue dress shirt. In its place was a white shirt with ruffles.
Ruffles.
Law shook his head.
Holy shit Sanji really was a prince, wasn't he?
Law was…not sure how to feel about that. He didn't care for nobility. Outside of his loathing for Celestial Dragons and the World Government, he had heard stories early on about how the nobility in Flevance had been somehow spirited away before the rest of the city was burned to the ground. Law had thought on that for a very long time, and all the things that had implied had left Law with a sour taste in his mouth for months.
"Law," Sanji said. He sounded relieved.
Huh.
"Are you okay?"
The blond reached up to the bars, peering down at him curled up on the ground. He must look rather pathetic right now.
"Why should you care, your highness," he hissed. And okay, Sanji just flinched like he'd hit him and maybe that was a little uncalled for.
"I just wanted to make sure that you were okay. Did they feed you? Look at your head?"
Law didn't quite get it.
"No and no. But it's fine. I'll just nap and be right as rain," he said dryly. The blond didn't look thrilled to hear that he hadn't eaten. During the few days he'd been on the Sunny, he had discovered that the other man really didn't like it if he missed mealtimes, and he had even gone out of his way to make sure Caesar ate too.
Sanji sighed. "I'll see if someone will send some food down here. Is your head okay though?"
Law studied Sanji. The man was an enigma. "It's fine," he said. "I already knew I had a concussion. If I fall asleep, it could be problematic, but I doubt there's someone here that's willing to do regular wake ups for me. Unless you're offering," he drawled.
Sanji looked at the ground. "I'm not sure they'll let me down here a lot. Things…things are complicated."
Law snorted. "That's an understatement," he said, and stretched his feet out in front of him. He was sufficiently warm at this point and was now just feeling pretty cramped. "Does your crew know? About you being Germa?"
The blond had the ability to light his legs on fire during a fight, and now it almost seemed like he was doing that but with his eyes, the way the fire in him blazed so brightly. Law blinked in surprise at the emotion that seemed to surge through him. "I am not Germa," he spat. "I am not a Vinsmoke. I left that behind twelve years ago, and I had absolutely no reason to go back to them."
Law cocked his head to the side. "And now? Someone arranged a marriage, and the love-cook is head over heels for a girl he's never met?"
Sanji glared at him. "You don't get to call me that. And no. It's more complicated than that."
"Then uncomplicate it."
Sanji ran a hand through his blond locks. "I…I'll send someone with food. I'll try to come check on you later."
And he turned on his heel and hurried away.
Law wasn't stupid. There was a lot going on here that he knew nothing about. And that made him feel wrong footed on too many levels. He was the plan guy. His whole crew liked to tease him about how analytical and controlling he would get, trying to map out everything that happened and all the different possible outcomes.
This though, he hadn't planned on this. The Strawhats were a huge wrench in his plans, but also a welcome one. They were stronger than his crew, and not his crew. He could risk them.
So he had adjusted his plan.
But now, he didn't know what to do. There were too many unknowns, and that left him in a spot he was rarely in.
A vulnerable one.
If anyone can figure out what the name of the gray skinned guy with the curly tongue that was talking to Sanji about Sora Warrior of the Sea, please let me know! I looked it up and he's not in the list of Big Mom pirates that I could see. Unless he's one of Bege's? I couldn't remember and it's driving me nuts.