Maldoror (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} maldoror_gw) wrote,@ 2007-02-06 11:36:00 |
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One Piece Fic: Like Steel for Chocolate, Chapter 1
Title: Like Steel for Chocolate
Author: Maldoror
Rating: Up to light R
Pairing: SanZo principally, as well as a secondary Luffy/Usopp (there's no particular significance to the direction of those slashes.) A third pairing crops up briefly, but I'llscar surprise you with that when it appears ^_^
Warning: Big fat massive SPOILERS for various episodes up to manga ep. 440. I also play fast and loose with the OP-verse physics, introducing something that may or may not be alchemy or faint sympathetic magic.
Summary: Sanji's cooking has reached a whole new level. It's almost uncanny. Especially when his thoughts and emotions somehow get into the mix along with the rest of the ingredients.
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters from One Piece, and I make no money off of this fic.
AN: The vote being overwhelmingly for 'we want it NOW', I'm posting as I revise. This will leave me ficced out for a few weeks afterwards, as my other OP fic presently in the works is only in its first stages and will take a couple of months to develop, at the least ^^; Ah, apart from this long-ish one-shot CP9 fic which is almost done and eating my head. On toast. With jam.
For those who do know 'Like Water for Chocolate', Sanji's food works differently than Tita's, it's not as 'strong' and it affects each individual a little differently and depending on circumstances, as we'll see. This chapter gets a bit more serious than the zombie lobster prologue, as we dig into the problems on board - but the bizarre humor still lurks.
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Chapter 1: Clarified Soup
The Thousand Sunny was a sleek, well-built vessel, much larger than their old Going Merry. Theoretically. It was larger if you used a measuring tape and calculated the tonnage, certainly. But right now, it felt a whole lot smaller. It felt tiny, and full of marimos wandering around, frequently shirtless and positioned in such a way that Sanji would inevitably bump into one. Sanji could feel his temper fraying a little bit further each time, and he didn't know why; they were only a week out of Water 7, way too soon to be coming down with cabin fever, yet he was feeling increasingly trapped...
The weather wasn't helping his growing sense of claustrophobia. Sanji shook his head, and a cascade of water fell from his hood and spattered the crow's nest. The sky was like the lid of a tin box, and he hadn't seen the sun since yesterday. It could be early morning shortly after dawn, or it could be high noon, for all he could tell, though Sanji knew full well the time was exactly twenty-five minutes after he should have been relieved of duty.
"I'm sorry I'm late," came a small voice from behind him.
Instead of making a pair of fur gloves out of their tardy doctor, Sanji just rolled his shoulders beneath his sailor's mack. "S'okay, I was enjoying the fresh air."
He waited. Chopper didn't say anything, just made his way to the railing without looking at him, a small figure in the yellow rubber raingear Usopp had made for him. He looked like a traffic cone with antlers.
"So...why are you late?" Sanji asked, and immediately regretted it when the cone cringed. "Not that I mind. Just curious."
"I was working in the infirmary," was the quiet answer.
"You know, I could swear that's what you told me last time I asked you where you were. And the time before that, too. And the-"
Chopper had picked up the looking glass and was dutifully studying the ocean through the rain squalls. Sanji put his hands in his pockets, which were as damp as the rest of him despite his waterproof outerwear.
"Did you eat okay at lunch? Did everybody find their bento boxes?"
Chopper nodded; this was visible from the way the antlers tilted backwards and forwards.
"Good. Did Luffy eat anybody else's this time?"
The antlers shook left to right. "Zoro and Usopp made sure everybody had their share," Chopper said, after a few seconds.
"That's good. I would have made something warm, but I was on watch."
"It was fine. Thanks, Sanji."
"Okay," said Sanji, turning away. It was just too cold and wet to dig into this now. He swung a leg over the railing and grabbed a yardline. "I'll be in the men's quarters. You know, if there's a problem, or if you want to talk later."
Smooth, Sanji, real smooth, he thought, heading down...Then again, he wasn't the one who was good at this. He was the suave cook and gentleman on board, not the shoulder to cry on (though of course the girls were always welcome to use his shoulder or any other part of his anatomy for any purpose they pleased). The problem was, he was damn sure Chopper wasn't confiding whatever seemed to be bugging him to Zoro, Luffy or Usopp, either, and Sanji just couldn't figure out what to say or do or feed the critter to get him to open up.
The rain had chased the girls to their cabin. Nami-san would be napping, since she'd had night-watch, so he couldn’t go there to bring them tea and search for sweet relief. Sanji headed towards the men's quarters, dragging his feet.
Men. There were just too many men on board. They'd only picked up one more male crewmember on Water 7, but he was an overly loud and vibrant specimen, who would not shut up about the man-handling (hmm, bad word choice) - about the method Robin-chan had used to shanghai him. Franky seemed to find it hilarious, and kept making crude comments about it. 'Hey babe, you know you can grab my boys again any time you want- just be nicer to 'em this time!' Sanji had repeatedly told him to shut up about it, and kicked him twice already, only to discover that a lot of Franky's skull was made of metal.
Raucous laughter could be heard through the hatch. Sanji cracked it open reluctantly. Franky and Usopp were playing a game of chess, and Luffy was watching. Now, chess was normally a quiet affair, involving two old geezers in a park snoozing off between moves; that sort of level of excitement. This game was louder than a riot.
...But however crude and loud Franky was, Sanji was glad he was there, because with Chopper being so quiet, there'd just be this whole lot of weirdness between Luffy and Usopp otherwise. Franky defused that. He'd invent stuff for the Sunny, and Luffy and Usopp would watch and cheer and be loud idiots, and it was only rarely that Sanji would glimpse Usopp out of the corner of his eye and swear he'd seen a mask...
It'd take time. That was all. Usopp and Luffy had a strong friendship, and Luffy was oblivious to there being anything wrong, and as for Usopp, he'd get over what had happened on Water 7. In time, he'd even start lying to them again, those big bold fantastic lies of his. Sanji wouldn't admit it out loud, but he was actually starting to miss those a little. Chopper was currently the sole recipient of those glorious fabrications, tall tales and splendid boasts, and Sanji suspected it was only because Usopp had also noticed how quiet their doctor was. Yeah, they'd both been morose since leaving Water 7, but it was probably-
Sanji realized that he was crouched before the hatch in the rain and about to blame the weather again. Yeah, the weather...in which he was standing. Why, again?
Instead of going down the ladder and telling the idiots they were too loud, he craned his neck. A pair of boots was visible just beyond Luffy. Sanji leaned over a bit more, with increasing reluctance. A trickle of rain spilled down his neck. He barely noticed. Zoro was slumped against the wall, deep in his post-lunch pre-training nap, his mouth a little open and Sanji decided right then and there that he could not deal with Zoro right now. He carefully lowered the hatch, cutting the noise levels to acceptable limits, and headed towards the forecastle to make something elaborate for dinner, because a whole afternoon in the galley was better than an hour packed in with that lot. Men. Too many shitty men aboard this shitty boat, and not enought women.
Sanji dried himself off as well he could with a kitchen towel and set to work. Ingredients lined themselves up on the counter by rote. With the rain starting to spatter to a gloomy halt outside, Sanji made the first soup the shitty old geezer ever fed him on the Baratie, and thought about women.
Ahhh, women. Women were like butterflies. They made the world a better, prettier place just by existing. They spent a lot of time enhancing the gifts nature had given them, delighting the eye of weary travelers, and they deserved his thanks and flattery in return. Sanji had been raised and constantly surrounded by men. There was nothing like waking up in a hammock day after day alongside a pack of grunting, stinking, ball-scratching, nose-picking beasts to make a man worship the sweet feminine. By contrast, the pretty little birds who landed on the Baratie to dazzle and delight and be amazed by the reputation of the fighting cooks were a joy to behold, and Sanji beheld them for all he was worth. He did more than behold them, too, when they graciously let him, but even if it was almost guaranteed he'd never get to touch them, he was always the gentleman. It wouldn't be true worship if it required something in return.
Speaking of worship...
"Nami-swaaaaan! You are so beautiful when you're yawning! Can I get you anything to eat? Drink? Nibble on? My lips are free!"
"No thanks, Sanji-kun," Nami said without missing a beat. She rubbed her eyes tiredly, grabbed the cup of coffee he eagerly handed her, glanced at the log pose at her wrist and left again. Sanji continued to cut and chop, listening to her sweet voice as she rounded up a few idle hands to take care of the rigging while she corrected their course.
Sanji dropped the meat and bones in the large saucepan and lit the fire. His thoughts drifted in time with the first slow bubbles rising from the gradually heating water, daydreams of his conquests, the real ones and the ones which had remained a sweet, sweet fantasy.
He loved every one of them, though of course he didn’t fall in love with any in particular. The distinction between those two states was as fine as the difference between an East Blue tangerine and a North Blue one, but women - and cooks - got it instantly; that was what was so great about them.
Sanji had always known that he would find Her one day. The one he'd be in love with, the girl who'd get right under his skin and stay there. When he was a lot younger, he used to think that he'd save her from some terrible danger, after which she'd stay forever by his side, agreeing with everything he said and fawning over him and his cooking. But that was childish. Sanji had matured a lot since then, especially these past few months of sailing the Grand Line and meeting a lot of different women. No, she'd be stronger and a lot more independent than that. In fact, he was ready to bet she'd be quite the challenge, she'd not hesitate to stand up to him and argue, and that was fine; there was nothing sweeter than clashing and then overcoming that. But still, at the core, there would be...a connection. A single glance across the room, all that jazz. Of one mind on what mattered, even something as goofy as capping off each other's sentences. Sanji grinned a bit ruefully as he reached for the carrots, because those were all such old tropes...but damn, that's what it'd be like, he was sure! He was, after all, a self-confessed romantic as well as a gentleman.
He didn’t know what she’d be like (aside from pretty, of course, that went without saying), but she had to like fish. That was kind of a must. He was finding the All Blue for himself, and for that shitty old bastard back on the Baratie, but the crowning glory of the moment would be sharing it with her, because she would know just what it meant to him. Yeah, that was important; she'd have to understand the strength of a dream, and why an otherwise smart guy like Sanji would risk his life sailing around the world for a goal most people didn't believe existed. And when he found it, because he would, then she'd be there to give him a slow grin and say 'Of course I knew you could do it. Now, how about something to eat?' Yeah...someone special...
...Why it clicked at that particular moment in time, Sanji would never be able to say. Was it coincidence? A series of thoughts accidentally adding up? Or was it the result of a long, slow boil at the back of his mind, and inevitable?
Whatever the reason, it was right there, at 2:37 on a cloudy Wednesday afternoon somewhere on the Grand Line between the moment the knife swung down and the instant before it sliced the third carrot, that Sanji had the revelation that he had found Her months ago and that She was a Him.
He spent the next fifteen minutes in the crow’s nest shaking his fist at the stormy sky and shouting invectives that would appall a drunken sailor. Chopper was cowering beneath his yellow rubber outfit, hooves trembling around a rumble ball, but Sanji barely noticed and went on roundly cursing all the higher powers he could think of. It was only when Nami-san’s sweet voice (with the slightest hint of a bellow) reached him, that Sanji remembered his manners and went back down to first beg her and Robin-chan’s forgiveness - ignoring the stares from his other crewmates - and then finish cutting his carrot with a bit more vehemence than he usually applied. But Zeff had always told him that a chef should be serene in the kitchen, and it was bad form to cook when angry, so Sanji put aside his dish for a moment, stood out in the rain, chain-smoked three cigarettes and eventually went back to the stove with the beginnings of heartburn and depression brewing.
Because now that he'd had his shitty epiphany, he couldn't deny it. It was there. It'd be like denying the counter, or the chopping board.
He was in love with Zoro.
Holy fucking mackerels, what the fuck was wrong with him?!
Sanji went back to cutting and stirring, and thought about men.
Men. Crude, bull-headed bastards who had the natural beauty of a road accident and spent no time enhancing whatever nature felt sorry enough to give them. For the most part. Then again, there were those who spent too much time primping, and couldn’t fight their way out of a paper bag. Sanji hadn't met many guys who'd figured out - like he had - that well-kept and kick-ass were not mutually exclusive. Morons.
Sanji knew he swung both ways; it hadn't been that hard to figure out when the sight of a strong set of shoulders had made his heart flutter just as much as cleavage back when he was, oh, thirteen. But he'd never thought it'd be a problem. It had never been before. Yes, his head might be wired in a way that he might find men sexually attractive, but that didn't matter because he didn't like them. Or those he liked were either butt-ugly or just...well, just good mates, buddies. He'd never - okay, maybe there'd been that young Marines cadet once- but feh, the kid hadn't been that good-looking, and Sanji had been fifteen and full of hormones, he'd have been attracted to linoleum if it had had the right shape. Young Sanji had handled the matter with finesse and class: he'd gotten into a rip-roaring fight with the cadet, and by the time Zeff had tendered band-aids, iodine and his apologies to the cadet's officer - and a few kicks to Sanji's backside- the two young men had become friends. Dubious attractions had been relegated to the Will Never Happen category. Now he couldn't even remember the kid's name.
So why Zoro...? Why was he so certain he had feelings - disturbing, unnatural and wholly stupid feelings - for that hunk of useless muscle? Just didn't make sense...
Sanji concentrated on his cooking. He wrapped the spices up in cheesecloth and tied it with twine; a bit of this, a bit of that...Rosemary for remembrance, Sanji thought distantly, as he added the bouquet garni along with the mirepoix to the pan.
"The day I decided to become the world's greatest swordsman, I gave myself up for dead," the green-haired man said with the serenity of ultimate freedom, talking to a cook he'd barely just met. Idiotic bastard, thought Sanji, as he stayed nailed to the Baratie by a life debt. Fucking stupid...suicidal...lucky bastard...
The stock simmered slowly. Sanji watched it carefully, skimming off the fat and foam as it rose to the surface
Sanji's foot thudded against a raised sword. The shithead's arm barely twitched. Roronoa Zoro, as good as his legend, Sanji thought, before gearing up to really kick the son-of-a-bitch's ass.
The stock was a rich tint when he withdrew the herbs, vegetables, meat and bones. More cheesecloth filtered out fibers and the rest of the fat. He saved some of the clarified liquid to freeze for stock, and put a kettle aside for tonight's consommé.
Flat on his back at the bottom of the boat, Sanji stared up at gigantic trees floating by above his head. He was sailing a river of clouds through a jungle in the sky. Common sense had gone bye-bye. A bruise was a bruise, though. Ooooowww..."Damn, I hope Nami-swan and Robin-chwan are okay. I'll gut that marimo if these blasted sky priests have touched a hair on their heads." But at the back of his mind, he knew damn well no harm would come to them. Not because Zoro would go out of his way to defend the girls, like Sanji would, but because Roronoa Zoro trusted everyone to fight to their full strength and beyond, and somehow, they did...Sanji dismissed that line of thought as stupid and somehow unchivalrous, and told himself that the reason nobody came to harm when Zoro was around was because the worst bruisers always gravitated towards the idiot anyway, like to like...
He kept the yolks for a mayonnaise, while the egg whites further clarified the soup. He'd been preparing other dishes on the side; tonight's spread would be lavish.
"Gomorrah, stop! There's a dead end up ahead!" cried Franky's buddy.
"Dead end?" Zoro lazily drew two swords. "Do you see a dead end?"
Sanji's answer was as ready as his kick. "Nope, don't see any," he said to the looming wall. And then the two of them moved as one.
As the bowls warmed, Sanji looked down into the depth of his concoction and could have counted the etches on the bottom of the saucepan, had there been any. The consommé was crystal clear and purer than a maiden's heart.
"Well, I can still cook some decent grub, even if my life's gone to shit," Sanji wearily concluded. Then he went to ring the bell.
When Nami saw that soup was on the menu, she decided that even the man on watch - Franky in this instance - could take a little time to get out of the rain and eat a warm meal. The wild variations in the Grand Line's climate they were sailing through meant there was no land nearby on which to run aground, and they hadn't seen another ship in days. Sailors did their damnedest to avoid approaching the Florian Triangle which the Straw Hats were eagerly sailing to.
The kitchen was all the brighter for the bitter weather outside. Sanji laid out plates and carefully avoided looking at Zoro. Between cooking and having his entire life flipped over like a crêpe, he'd not had time to consider how he was going to react to the sight of the bloody marimo strolling in and sitting down at the foot of the galley table. But Sanji was good at hiding his feelings behind an air of indifference. He was going to have to think about this horrible thing that had happened to him, but in the meantime, Zoro would notice absolutely nothing.
There were many appreciative noises for the consommé in the pretty red bowls, the cut and fried omelet with bonito shavings, the delicately sculpted veg and rich mayonnaise, the baked breadsticks with ham wrapped around the tips, and the inevitable salted pork joints for Luffy. Sanji gave his shipmates the usual 'of course I know how good I am' grin, covering the pleasure he always felt. And who cared about seaweed sitting at the table. Not him. This ship's cook was cool and composed, and about to enjoy a good dinner.
Zoro lifted his bowl and swallowed half the contents in one gulp. Then he looked down into the soup and licked his lips. "Hm. Not bad."
Sanji tensed as if he'd been plugged into an electric current. "What?! What are you trying to say? Are you looking for a fight?!"
Zoro had been about to have another swallow; he lowered his bowl abruptly and gave Sanji a narrow-eyed look. "Huh? I just said it wasn't bad. What the hell's wrong with you? Dumbass." Which was a perfectly normal Zoro response. It was the looks from the rest of his nakama that informed Sanji that his reaction had been a tad, well, excessive, perhaps...
Zoro shrugged and shot back the second half of his soup, finishing in five seconds what had taken five hours to prepare. He grabbed a couple of the breadsticks and stuck them in his mouth. He'd obviously dismissed crazy cooks and their crazy reactions. To his consternation, Sanji realized his fingers were squeezing his spoon hard enough to bend it. He forced himself to relax.
"This is bodacious grub, bud." Franky licked his lips. He'd not had that much of the soup, the flavor pretty much lost on him, but he was enjoying the omelet slices and meat. "I wish we'd had a bro like you back at Franky House. You wouldn't believe some of the stuff we had to eat during the lean times. More of those than I'd like...but still, damn, I miss those idiots."
"Of course you do. They're always your buddies." Having summarized the pain of separation and the eternal value of friendship in eight words, Luffy took a huge bite out of his pork joint.
Usopp put down his soup bowl, a weird look on his face as he scrutinized his captain out of the corner of his eye.
"Yeah...still, no regrets." Franky was giving the galley around him a contented look, though he seemed to have something on his mind, too. "Those guys'll be okay. They're happier back at Water 7, and I'm happier with my ship. It's not those goons I miss the most, that's the weird part...I guess...That bloody goody-two-shoes...he's annoying, of course, but I guess deep down, I always thought...when I built this ship and sailed her, he'd be here with me, and that's sort of hard to-"
There was a small silence.
"And you're all gonna forget I just said that," Franky declared, glaring at the galley's finishings. If eyes could drill holes, that Adam wood would be getting quite a challenge to its supposed indestructibility.
"Forget what?" Luffy asked.
Usopp went "Heh", a brief, oddly mature sound like the first half of a chuckle that had died a mirthless death. Then he yelped and jumped when a soup bowl thudded near his elbow. Chopper's consommé was splashing around the circumference, and Chopper himself was hurtling out of the galley.
"Sorry just thought of something-" then the door crashed shut behind him, cutting off the hyper, excited burble.
Everybody stared at door. Well, nearly everybody. Actually, not that many people, Sanji realized as he turned to share a surprised look with the rest of the table, to find that Robin was the only one doing the same. Franky was still staring at the same spot on the wall; Nami was staring into her soup as if she'd found something unexpected in its clear depths; Usopp was staring at Luffy who was busy stealing Chopper's share of food; Zoro was- Zoro was staring at Sanji, and the expression on his face was totally unreadable, which was downright unnerving.
"What's come over him?" Sanji asked, still nailing his usual nonchalant drawl despite the odd jittery feeling crawling up his spine like a bug. He didn't want to address the question to Zoro, but the marimo was the only one paying attention to him.
Okay, enough weirdness. Sanji shook himself, stood up and grabbed Chopper's plate before Luffy could eat its entire contents.
"I thought I made the rules clear, to fuzzbutt and everyone else: nobody leaves my table without finishing their meal. I’ll go stuff this down his throat-"
A hand landed on his shoulder. Sanji did not need to look to know who it was and nearly sent the plate to hit the ceiling when he jolted in shock at the contact. He shook the hand off rather too quickly and turned around.
Zoro stared at him, a distinctly searching look as if he were reading Sanji's thoughts off the back of his skull- which wasn't possible, Sanji told himself frantically, while quickly building up his favorite highly-unimpressed-with-you expression.
"What do you want?"
"I'll take it down to him. I'm done eating." No surprise there. Zoro always ate his food with neat, quick motions that made it disappear at speed, like he thought someone might make a grab for it - which might be due to his long association with Luffy, or simply that Zoro was only interested in getting fuel into his body and thought that enjoying the act was for pansies. He downed booze like paint-thinner in much the same way.
He took the plate from Sanji and headed towards the door without another word. Since the object of the exercise was to see if Chopper was okay as well as to get him to eat, Zoro was the better candidate anyway; Chopper always seemed bolstered by the swordsman's presence, if his habit of clinging to Zoro's face during stressful situations was any indication. Sanji turned back towards the table, just relieved that Zoro was going to be out of his immediate vicinity until Sanji could regain his composure.
"So I was wondering, were you ever going to tell us about it?"
"What was that, Nami-swan?" Sanji cooed, glad of the distraction - no, more than a distraction! The center of his affections! The direction of his compass! The girl-...the girl who was currently staring at Robin as if she'd never seen her nakama before. Robin was looking back, clearly as perplexed as Sanji.
"Tell you about what, Navigator-san?"
"About being hunted for twenty years, causing the destruction of everybody who crossed your path."
Talk about a mood-killer, not that the mood hadn't already been moribund.
It was rare to see Robin startled, and she recovered fast. "I did. Tell you about it. I-"
"You had a few details dragged out of you at Enies Lobby, yeah, just enough to let us know that you wanted to die rather than have us save you, but I got more actual information from Iceburg and from that freak in a mask." Nami's voice had a fine snap to it.
Robin was silent. Everybody was.
Nami lifted her chin defiantly. "You're just like my sister. I can't believe I never saw it before. Yes, we all know what happened, you don't deny it, but then you just put on that lazy smile and hide everything else behind it. Pretend you don't care, not really."
Robin tilted her head, the smile Nami referred to tipping dangerously close to capsizing. "Navigator-san-"
"Stop calling me that! You know our names by now! That's what I'm talking about! You're just like Nojiko! She was only eight when- she never admitted she was hurting too, just smiled at me and made sure she was there to support me. Then who supports you?! You both put on that game face and keep a distance around your feelings so as to not burden us with them. And don't tell me it's over and that you're fine now, because stuff like that is never over, you'll carry it with you for ages, and we could help you but you won't let us all over again-"
Nami ended up making frustrated gestures. Robin had gone very still.
"You know this from experience, do you?" she finally asked. "I find it interesting that you want me to cry on your shoulder, Navi-...Nami, when the only time I hear Arlong Park mentioned is by others, never in your presence and very little at that." Robin's voice was its usual gentle murmur. But what she actually said...That was the kind of deadly precision with which Sanji kicked people.
Nami's eyes widened and her mouth opened in soundless shock, though anger was rallying fast.
"Ah, girls, let's not get too heated up-" Franky started to say, but stopped when Sanji put a hand on his shoulder.
"Ooooooh..." That sound would normally send Nami's crewmates running towards the nearest shelter. Robin didn't bat an eye, of course.
"Hey, Sanji." Franky's hushed whisper went unnoticed in the growing atmospheric pressure at the other end of the table. "I like a good catfight same as the next guy, but don't you think we should break this up before something ugly gets said?"
Sanji squeezed his shoulder, silencing him. Usopp and Luffy were both frozen in mid-motion, Luffy with a hambone in his mouth, watching their crewmates.
The ladies stared at each other. The tension reached a peak...then broke as they both looked away. A truce. Maybe more. Robin reached for their plates. "Cook-...Sanji-san...if you don't mind, we would like to finish dinner in our cabin."
"Yeah, you guys don't want to listen to a bunch of girl-talk, right?" Nami said, already marching to the door, which she opened for Robin and closed behind them with a determined click.
The four men stayed frozen for a few more seconds, then relaxed. Sanji rubbed his face. He felt like crossing his fingers. He felt like a cigarette. He felt like this meal had lasted forever already. But hopefully...hopefully something necessary had just happened. Something that would really bring Robin back to them, for good and for ever this time. And if lancing old wounds was going to be the order of the evening, then it probably wouldn't hurt Nami either, come to think of it...
"Chicks." Franky raked back his hair. "I got two sisters and I still don't get them."
Luffy started chewing again as if nothing had happened. Usopp stared at his plate, and then quickly stuffed its contents into his face and got up. He mumbled something and walked out without another sound.
"Well...I'm going back on watch," Franky muttered, once he'd finished as well.
A minute later, the galley was silent except for the noise of Luffy hoovering up all the remains. Sanji sat down bonelessly on a bench, elbows on the table, and stared at an empty plate.
"That was great food! Thanks Sanji!"
"...You're welcome, Luffy. You're welcome..."
The sky was dense with clouds, obstructing all view of the stars. Bloody weather, Sanji thought. It had become something of a mantra.
He tapped the tray against his thigh, then spun it on his finger absently.The girls had still been talking when he'd brought them some coffee and a small dessert, so he'd not lingered longer than was necessary. But he had the feeling the discussion was going in the right direction. When he'd looked back through the porthole, Nami had been smiling at Robin like he'd seen her smile at Nojiko, and Robin had been smiling like he'd never seen her smile before, ever. A less chivalrous part of Sanji was regretting the very sisterly direction this was all taking. Since it was tragically obvious that neither Nami-san nor Robin-chan were interested in him, he might have enjoyed the opportunity for some steamy on-board romance between the two ladies, and the way that'd fuel his night-time imagination..Oh well.
Of course, Sanji had a problem of his own to deal with. And what a problem it was, big and ugly and green and mean. What had Sanji ever done, in this life or a previous one, to deserve this?
Whatever it was, it must have been something truly terrible and karma had it in for him with a vengeance, because instead of hanging around outside the girls' cabin in the remotest hope of anything hot happening, his footsteps had taken him to the foredeck where a slow, delicate noise indicated that Zoro was doing one of his all-time favorite activity: tending his swords. His other favorite activities being boozing, sleeping and bleeding over things.
Good. Sanji had regained his composure in the past two hours, so now was the time to deal with this and put this whole 'feelings for Zoro' back into its rightful place, i.e. so far at the back of Sanji's mind it'd drop out the next time a pretty girl smiled at him.
He stuck the tray beneath his arm, lit a cigarette and sauntered over to where Zoro was propped against the railing. Sanji sat down at a distance which indicated he was enjoying the deck on his own terms, and only sitting a few feet away from the dumbass because there weren't that many good spots to choose from.
"If you're going to hang around, cook, move downwind," Zoro said without looking up from where he was rubbing the red lacquered scabbard with some kind of polish.
Option A - comply. Option B- blow the smoke in his face. Nah, Sanji was here to talk. On the surface, having a bloody good fight with the moron should get this out of Sanji's system, but they'd been fighting for months and...the sharp parry of insults, the quick, growled comebacks, the rivalry, the reluctant admiration when Zoro parried a kick that would put anybody else in traction...yeah, in retrospect, Sanji didn't think fighting was helping matters. At all. He had to talk to the uncultured swine, and remember why the swordsman annoyed him so much. Option A it was then.
"So, have we finally figured out what's up with our doctor?" he asked, after relocating to where the wet, rain-scented breeze dragged his smoke out to sea.
"Yeah." Zoro didn't smile, but something in his eyes did. "Turns out, he's been working hard on his rumble balls."
"His rumble balls?" Sanji echoed, surprised.
"Hm-hm. He wants to harness the effects better; 'power them up' is what he said. But without making it dangerous for him and everybody else. He was so excited I couldn't make out what he was going on about, not that I know shit about chemistry anyway. From what I gather, he was at a dead end in his research since Enies Lobby, and suddenly tonight he had this flash of inspiration. He said it all became suddenly clear and he figured out what he was missing. Something about a binding agent and a...a gastric release mechanism, I think he said. You ask him if you're that curious. Be prepared to kick him a little to stop him talking once he's started."
"Is that what's been getting him down these past few days?" Sanji had expected something a bit more drastic, like Chopper suddenly discovering both puberty and the dearth of women/animal hybrids all in one go.
"Yeah. He wants to keep up with us. It's important to him not to hold us back." Zoro showed every sign of approval, of course. "But he's worried about what happens when he takes too many rumble balls, or if he makes them too strong. I think Franky harping on the subject wasn't helping."
"I can see that." Franky had been going on and on about Monster Deer! and Super Fuzz! and how he'd had to risk life and limb just to calm Chopper down enough where he wouldn't kill his own buddies back at Enies Lobby. Yeah, come to think of it, that would get a little depressing for a sensitive kid like Chopper...He wouldn't understand that Franky was talking in honest admiration, fascinated by anything that could boost a guy's power and make him bigger and stronger and much more dangerous.
Sanji let his smoke drift into the faint wind, which was pushing them steadily on towards the Florian Triangle. "Sheesh, no wonder Chopper's been so quiet...Franky's got a big mouth, it's taking some getting used to."
"The way he talks about Robin, I'm surprised you've not kicked his head off yet."
"Well-"
"You'd have decked me for a tenth of what he's said."
There was a lag halfway through that sentence, as if Zoro had suddenly changed his mind about saying that out loud, but was too stubborn to hesitate or break off.
"Feh, that's different. Franky's all mouth. When you say something, you mean it."
Sanji was absolutely certain that had sounded more insulting in his head before he said it.
An odd little moment followed, neither of them saying anything or looking at each other. Zoro put aside the scabbard with an abrupt gesture and picked up the blade. Finally Sanji rallied. "Of course, if you ever talk about either of our ladies like that-"
"Yeah yeah, lemme guess, you'll throw some pathetic kick at me and then I'll have to mop the deck with you."
Whew, back to a familiar register.
Sanji focused on the reason he was sitting out here in the damp. He had a plan. Step one: talk to Zoro. Find out why this was Not Going To Happen. Step two: kick Zoro's ass. Just because. Step three: nurse a bottle of good wine to get over whatever stupid piece of Sanji's stupid heart might actually break a little over this worthless hunk of seaweed. Step four: forget about it and go back to being nakama and rivals tomorrow. Yeah, good plan.
"You know, that's something I've noticed. Franky's crude about it, but what he and every other guy on this ship shares is a true appreciation for our two beautiful crewmates."
"Is that what you call it when you stick to them like a tick?"
With some effort, Sanji ignored that. "We're men. We notice. We admire. All of us, that is, but not you."
Had there been the slightest hitch in the movements of the cloth on the blade?
"I bet I've figured you out, you know," Sanji drawled, tipping his head up to stare at the inky sky but keeping Zoro's movements in his peripheral vision. "You're like Usopp. You've got a girl already, and you're being faithful to her. Except Usopp has the willpower of melted cheese, so at least he'll get a good look when Nami-swan wears her bikini, while you're made of sterner stuff and so you just go and train a whole lot harder. Am I right or am I right?"
There was a silence that probably felt longer than it was.
"You're not wrong," Zoro finally said.
Sanji had been fishing, but it looked like he'd caught the truth on his first cast. He'd known it was impossible from the start; he'd just been trying to figure out why. "Yeah. I'm not surprised. You're the kind that's big, dumb and loyal." He took a drag of his cigarette, turning the tip to cherry red. The smoke tasted a little bitter against his tongue. Sanji glared at the white stick; the pack must have gotten dampened with sea water again, that was the problem of being on a ship.
"So what's she like? Blonde? Brunette? Too pretty for you, or is that a given? Doesn't she mind that you left her behind to go get cut up in distant lands? How do you know she's not married with ten kids by now?" Why, Sanji wondered, was he so pissed off all of a sudden?
There was a faint whisper, like a steely sigh, and Sanji realized that if he swallowed, he'd be able to shave on the blade pressed under his chin.
"Uh...but I'm sure she'll wait for you..." he said very carefully and somehow without moving his mouth or head.
"Since you're so damn curious about her, cook, I thought you'd like to meet her. Here she is then. But she doesn't seem to like you a whole lot." The white-hilted katana - non-cutting edge up, Sanji now realized - tapped him gently under the jaw. "She thinks you talk too much."
The blade withdrew, and Sanji gave its owner a baleful look. "You're a sick and twisted man."
"Coming from a pervert cook who'll jump through hoops of fire bellowing Mellow-whatever each time a chick bats her eyelashes, I'll take that as a good thing."
"So maybe it's not girls who rock your boat? Gotta thing for men, marimo?"
Sanji looked around carefully for the utter idiot who'd said that, because surely, surely it couldn't have been him.
"Oh, not just any man. One in particular."
Deep in his chest, Sanji's heart picked up a pair of castanets and rapped out a rapid ba-ba-bump.
"Er...what? You- you're serious?" That had acutely lacked the quality of smooth and indifferent that Sanji had been trying to maintain. Ba-da-ra-thump-thump.
"Dead serious." Zoro sighted along the cutting edge of his katana in the foredeck's lantern light. "To tell you the truth, I can't stop thinking about him."
Ta-ga-dump-bump-bump. Sanji pretended to cough around some smoke so he could reach up and slam a fist into his chest.
"It's gotten to the point where I dream about him, and I sometimes even see him when I just close my eyes. He's what I aspire to."
Ta-ga-da-ba-bumpity-bump- thud. That last being Sanji's head thumping back into the rail. "You're talking about that psycho Hawk-eyes, aren't you," he said wearily. "And you're yanking my chain."
"Got it in one," said Zoro, tightening one of the holding pegs on the hilt with a precise gesture that still managed to look entirely smug. Bastard.
"Fuck, you really are an idiot." Sanji said it with some relish. Yeah, the guy was an unsophisticated, brainless, piss-poor excuse for a human being, and Sanji would be crazy to feel anything for him. "Do reassure me on one point, numbnuts; girl or guy, you've at least slept with someone before, right?"
"No," Zoro answered simply, angling the sword.
Sanji took a deep pull on his cigarette, only to find that his fingers had pinched and ground it shut at the filter. Zoro's straightforward and unembarrassed admission had strangely impressed him, but a lot of Sanji's mind was running around screaming, in both amazement and lascivious wonder, holy crap - a virgin!
Down boy. Sanji flicked his cigarette over the railing and drew another one with deliberation and without a glance at the man by his side.
"I see. So, did that sword cut of Mihawk's go down a bit further below the belt than I first thought?" he asked.
That finally got him a glare that put him back on the scoreboard. Zoro opened his mouth to defend the integrity of the tackle, then shut it again with a scowl as he realized that'd be playing Sanji's game.
"I've got more important things to put my energies in, cook. I don't need to go all gooey over chicks like a certain ass-hat I know."
The lighter snuffed out the flame with a sardonic clink. "Huh-uh. So, let me see if I got this straight. You don't have a honey already, you've never had one - you poor, poor bastard - and you're not looking for one either?"
"That's right. You're quite smart tonight."
"Coming from you, that'd be an insult, but I'll make allowances because I feel so very sorry for you. Better to have loved and lost than-" the rest of that old saw got cut off by the harsh noise of a katana getting sheathed. Zoro looked uninterested.
Sanji examined him out of the corner of his eye, a bit nonplussed despite his better instincts telling him to take this information and run with it. "You know...you've got brains of marble, and resolve that's even harder, but I still can't believe you feel nothing. Even if you don't let yourself act on it, there has to be someone somewhere who's managed to catch your fancy at some point."
"Why the hell are you so goddamned curious all of a sudden?"
Oooh, that had sounded defensive! From the look on Zoro's face, he knew it, too.
"Ahhhhh, so someone has caught your attention?" Sanji smirked. "I thought as much. And in hindsight, it's pretty obvious who, right?"
Zoro stood up. "I'm not having this conversation. Keep your fantasies to yourself," he said tightly.
"No no no, I bet I'm right. It's that dark-haired girl with the glasses, hm?"
From the way Zoro stopped abruptly mid-stride, Sanji had struck gold.
"Yes, that pretty Marine ensign, the one who gives you the wiggins each time you see her. Right? That'd explain a lot."
Instead of getting all pissy and defensive, Zoro gave him the oddest look over his shoulder, and then he laughed. Sanji was officially blown out of the water, because he could count Zoro's real smiles, the warm, kind ones, on his fingers and still have room left over for the occasions where the man had actually laughed out loud instead of snickering murderously or whatever passed for humor in the savage East Blue species of marimo.
"Yeah, sure, I'm attracted to some crazy chick who is trying to arrest me and steal my sword. That makes sense."
"It does if it's you," Sanji said, nettled at being on the receiving end of sarcasm from Zoro, of all people. "You have a thing for pain."
"I sure do, Sanji, I sure do. Goodnight, idiot-cook." He was already halfway to the stairs down to the main deck, strides long and easy, hands resting casually on either side of the swords slung straight across his shoulders.
...So it wasn't the Marine ensign. Sanji finished his cigarette, uncharacteristically unsure of himself and what that had been about. But finally he decided to get mad.
Bloody Zoro. Stupid, brainless- laughing at him as if Sanji was the idiot, when the muscle-head was the one who was too fucking dumb to realize that fighting for someone was what mattered. That's where the strength came from, protecting a girl- well, okay, Sanji might be in a bit of a spin on that subject right now, but anyway, protecting someone.
The mass of dough spun and slapped the counter with unusual venom, and Sanji started to knead again. Zeff had always told him that a chef shouldn't cook when he was angry or distracted, but Zeff had never had to deal with an infuriating baits-for-brains like Zoro before. Sanji's fingers attacked the dough like he was trying to strangle it. He had to get this done so it would be risen for tomorrow's breakfast.
Moronic marimo. If he wanted to be lonely, if he wanted his life to be as hard and sharp and short as his fucking swords, fine! Who cared? Some day Mihawk was going to chop him into fish food and good fucking riddance.
Sanji shoved down on the dough with the heel of his hand like he was kicking in a stupid head with the heel of his foot. The counter creaked.
- and he was angry at himself, too, because fuck it, he did care, it hurt a bit, more than it should, and it hadn't gotten any better and fuck it all, what a stupid thing for him to do, falling for that-...
The dough was satiny beneath his fingers. Sanji should probably stop crucifying it now. He felt a bit calmer. He'd get over the stupid hunk of junk, it was just a matter of time, and at least he was sufficiently annoyed at Zoro that it would cover any other emotions that might otherwise show. The last thing he needed was for the swordsman to figure out what Sanji was going through. But Zoro wouldn't, why should he? He probably thought everybody was as obsessed with fighting as he was. Or if he did not, then he had every reason to believe that Sanji was obsessed with girls...Yeah, it'd take a miracle of intuition for anyone to guess what Sanji had been feeling over dinner tonight. He was safe from that humiliation, at least.
He dropped the dough in a pan, covered it with a cloth and put it in the pantry. Time for bed. He was still tired from that all-nighter he'd pulled at the start of the week with the lobsters. He'd deal with the bread, with his idiotic feelings and with Zoro tomorrow.
TBC...
Link to Chapter 2
No Nami/Robin here; I do love that pairing, but I wanted a non-romantic relationship blossoming on board as well as a few romantic ones, and Robin desperately needed a sister-friend to confide in, I thought.
Obviously, we're seeing everything interpreted through Sanji's POV...what Zoro is feeling should be nonetheless decipherable, and if not, it should be clearer in the next chapter.
Title: Like Steel for Chocolate
Author: Maldoror
Rating: Up to light R
Pairing: SanZo principally, as well as a secondary Luffy/Usopp (there's no particular significance to the direction of those slashes.) A third pairing crops up briefly, but I'll
Warning: Big fat massive SPOILERS for various episodes up to manga ep. 440. I also play fast and loose with the OP-verse physics, introducing something that may or may not be alchemy or faint sympathetic magic.
Summary: Sanji's cooking has reached a whole new level. It's almost uncanny. Especially when his thoughts and emotions somehow get into the mix along with the rest of the ingredients.
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters from One Piece, and I make no money off of this fic.
AN: The vote being overwhelmingly for 'we want it NOW', I'm posting as I revise. This will leave me ficced out for a few weeks afterwards, as my other OP fic presently in the works is only in its first stages and will take a couple of months to develop, at the least ^^; Ah, apart from this long-ish one-shot CP9 fic which is almost done and eating my head. On toast. With jam.
For those who do know 'Like Water for Chocolate', Sanji's food works differently than Tita's, it's not as 'strong' and it affects each individual a little differently and depending on circumstances, as we'll see. This chapter gets a bit more serious than the zombie lobster prologue, as we dig into the problems on board - but the bizarre humor still lurks.
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Chapter 1: Clarified Soup
The Thousand Sunny was a sleek, well-built vessel, much larger than their old Going Merry. Theoretically. It was larger if you used a measuring tape and calculated the tonnage, certainly. But right now, it felt a whole lot smaller. It felt tiny, and full of marimos wandering around, frequently shirtless and positioned in such a way that Sanji would inevitably bump into one. Sanji could feel his temper fraying a little bit further each time, and he didn't know why; they were only a week out of Water 7, way too soon to be coming down with cabin fever, yet he was feeling increasingly trapped...
The weather wasn't helping his growing sense of claustrophobia. Sanji shook his head, and a cascade of water fell from his hood and spattered the crow's nest. The sky was like the lid of a tin box, and he hadn't seen the sun since yesterday. It could be early morning shortly after dawn, or it could be high noon, for all he could tell, though Sanji knew full well the time was exactly twenty-five minutes after he should have been relieved of duty.
"I'm sorry I'm late," came a small voice from behind him.
Instead of making a pair of fur gloves out of their tardy doctor, Sanji just rolled his shoulders beneath his sailor's mack. "S'okay, I was enjoying the fresh air."
He waited. Chopper didn't say anything, just made his way to the railing without looking at him, a small figure in the yellow rubber raingear Usopp had made for him. He looked like a traffic cone with antlers.
"So...why are you late?" Sanji asked, and immediately regretted it when the cone cringed. "Not that I mind. Just curious."
"I was working in the infirmary," was the quiet answer.
"You know, I could swear that's what you told me last time I asked you where you were. And the time before that, too. And the-"
Chopper had picked up the looking glass and was dutifully studying the ocean through the rain squalls. Sanji put his hands in his pockets, which were as damp as the rest of him despite his waterproof outerwear.
"Did you eat okay at lunch? Did everybody find their bento boxes?"
Chopper nodded; this was visible from the way the antlers tilted backwards and forwards.
"Good. Did Luffy eat anybody else's this time?"
The antlers shook left to right. "Zoro and Usopp made sure everybody had their share," Chopper said, after a few seconds.
"That's good. I would have made something warm, but I was on watch."
"It was fine. Thanks, Sanji."
"Okay," said Sanji, turning away. It was just too cold and wet to dig into this now. He swung a leg over the railing and grabbed a yardline. "I'll be in the men's quarters. You know, if there's a problem, or if you want to talk later."
Smooth, Sanji, real smooth, he thought, heading down...Then again, he wasn't the one who was good at this. He was the suave cook and gentleman on board, not the shoulder to cry on (though of course the girls were always welcome to use his shoulder or any other part of his anatomy for any purpose they pleased). The problem was, he was damn sure Chopper wasn't confiding whatever seemed to be bugging him to Zoro, Luffy or Usopp, either, and Sanji just couldn't figure out what to say or do or feed the critter to get him to open up.
The rain had chased the girls to their cabin. Nami-san would be napping, since she'd had night-watch, so he couldn’t go there to bring them tea and search for sweet relief. Sanji headed towards the men's quarters, dragging his feet.
Men. There were just too many men on board. They'd only picked up one more male crewmember on Water 7, but he was an overly loud and vibrant specimen, who would not shut up about the man-handling (hmm, bad word choice) - about the method Robin-chan had used to shanghai him. Franky seemed to find it hilarious, and kept making crude comments about it. 'Hey babe, you know you can grab my boys again any time you want- just be nicer to 'em this time!' Sanji had repeatedly told him to shut up about it, and kicked him twice already, only to discover that a lot of Franky's skull was made of metal.
Raucous laughter could be heard through the hatch. Sanji cracked it open reluctantly. Franky and Usopp were playing a game of chess, and Luffy was watching. Now, chess was normally a quiet affair, involving two old geezers in a park snoozing off between moves; that sort of level of excitement. This game was louder than a riot.
...But however crude and loud Franky was, Sanji was glad he was there, because with Chopper being so quiet, there'd just be this whole lot of weirdness between Luffy and Usopp otherwise. Franky defused that. He'd invent stuff for the Sunny, and Luffy and Usopp would watch and cheer and be loud idiots, and it was only rarely that Sanji would glimpse Usopp out of the corner of his eye and swear he'd seen a mask...
It'd take time. That was all. Usopp and Luffy had a strong friendship, and Luffy was oblivious to there being anything wrong, and as for Usopp, he'd get over what had happened on Water 7. In time, he'd even start lying to them again, those big bold fantastic lies of his. Sanji wouldn't admit it out loud, but he was actually starting to miss those a little. Chopper was currently the sole recipient of those glorious fabrications, tall tales and splendid boasts, and Sanji suspected it was only because Usopp had also noticed how quiet their doctor was. Yeah, they'd both been morose since leaving Water 7, but it was probably-
Sanji realized that he was crouched before the hatch in the rain and about to blame the weather again. Yeah, the weather...in which he was standing. Why, again?
Instead of going down the ladder and telling the idiots they were too loud, he craned his neck. A pair of boots was visible just beyond Luffy. Sanji leaned over a bit more, with increasing reluctance. A trickle of rain spilled down his neck. He barely noticed. Zoro was slumped against the wall, deep in his post-lunch pre-training nap, his mouth a little open and Sanji decided right then and there that he could not deal with Zoro right now. He carefully lowered the hatch, cutting the noise levels to acceptable limits, and headed towards the forecastle to make something elaborate for dinner, because a whole afternoon in the galley was better than an hour packed in with that lot. Men. Too many shitty men aboard this shitty boat, and not enought women.
Sanji dried himself off as well he could with a kitchen towel and set to work. Ingredients lined themselves up on the counter by rote. With the rain starting to spatter to a gloomy halt outside, Sanji made the first soup the shitty old geezer ever fed him on the Baratie, and thought about women.
Ahhh, women. Women were like butterflies. They made the world a better, prettier place just by existing. They spent a lot of time enhancing the gifts nature had given them, delighting the eye of weary travelers, and they deserved his thanks and flattery in return. Sanji had been raised and constantly surrounded by men. There was nothing like waking up in a hammock day after day alongside a pack of grunting, stinking, ball-scratching, nose-picking beasts to make a man worship the sweet feminine. By contrast, the pretty little birds who landed on the Baratie to dazzle and delight and be amazed by the reputation of the fighting cooks were a joy to behold, and Sanji beheld them for all he was worth. He did more than behold them, too, when they graciously let him, but even if it was almost guaranteed he'd never get to touch them, he was always the gentleman. It wouldn't be true worship if it required something in return.
Speaking of worship...
"Nami-swaaaaan! You are so beautiful when you're yawning! Can I get you anything to eat? Drink? Nibble on? My lips are free!"
"No thanks, Sanji-kun," Nami said without missing a beat. She rubbed her eyes tiredly, grabbed the cup of coffee he eagerly handed her, glanced at the log pose at her wrist and left again. Sanji continued to cut and chop, listening to her sweet voice as she rounded up a few idle hands to take care of the rigging while she corrected their course.
Sanji dropped the meat and bones in the large saucepan and lit the fire. His thoughts drifted in time with the first slow bubbles rising from the gradually heating water, daydreams of his conquests, the real ones and the ones which had remained a sweet, sweet fantasy.
He loved every one of them, though of course he didn’t fall in love with any in particular. The distinction between those two states was as fine as the difference between an East Blue tangerine and a North Blue one, but women - and cooks - got it instantly; that was what was so great about them.
Sanji had always known that he would find Her one day. The one he'd be in love with, the girl who'd get right under his skin and stay there. When he was a lot younger, he used to think that he'd save her from some terrible danger, after which she'd stay forever by his side, agreeing with everything he said and fawning over him and his cooking. But that was childish. Sanji had matured a lot since then, especially these past few months of sailing the Grand Line and meeting a lot of different women. No, she'd be stronger and a lot more independent than that. In fact, he was ready to bet she'd be quite the challenge, she'd not hesitate to stand up to him and argue, and that was fine; there was nothing sweeter than clashing and then overcoming that. But still, at the core, there would be...a connection. A single glance across the room, all that jazz. Of one mind on what mattered, even something as goofy as capping off each other's sentences. Sanji grinned a bit ruefully as he reached for the carrots, because those were all such old tropes...but damn, that's what it'd be like, he was sure! He was, after all, a self-confessed romantic as well as a gentleman.
He didn’t know what she’d be like (aside from pretty, of course, that went without saying), but she had to like fish. That was kind of a must. He was finding the All Blue for himself, and for that shitty old bastard back on the Baratie, but the crowning glory of the moment would be sharing it with her, because she would know just what it meant to him. Yeah, that was important; she'd have to understand the strength of a dream, and why an otherwise smart guy like Sanji would risk his life sailing around the world for a goal most people didn't believe existed. And when he found it, because he would, then she'd be there to give him a slow grin and say 'Of course I knew you could do it. Now, how about something to eat?' Yeah...someone special...
...Why it clicked at that particular moment in time, Sanji would never be able to say. Was it coincidence? A series of thoughts accidentally adding up? Or was it the result of a long, slow boil at the back of his mind, and inevitable?
Whatever the reason, it was right there, at 2:37 on a cloudy Wednesday afternoon somewhere on the Grand Line between the moment the knife swung down and the instant before it sliced the third carrot, that Sanji had the revelation that he had found Her months ago and that She was a Him.
He spent the next fifteen minutes in the crow’s nest shaking his fist at the stormy sky and shouting invectives that would appall a drunken sailor. Chopper was cowering beneath his yellow rubber outfit, hooves trembling around a rumble ball, but Sanji barely noticed and went on roundly cursing all the higher powers he could think of. It was only when Nami-san’s sweet voice (with the slightest hint of a bellow) reached him, that Sanji remembered his manners and went back down to first beg her and Robin-chan’s forgiveness - ignoring the stares from his other crewmates - and then finish cutting his carrot with a bit more vehemence than he usually applied. But Zeff had always told him that a chef should be serene in the kitchen, and it was bad form to cook when angry, so Sanji put aside his dish for a moment, stood out in the rain, chain-smoked three cigarettes and eventually went back to the stove with the beginnings of heartburn and depression brewing.
Because now that he'd had his shitty epiphany, he couldn't deny it. It was there. It'd be like denying the counter, or the chopping board.
He was in love with Zoro.
Holy fucking mackerels, what the fuck was wrong with him?!
Sanji went back to cutting and stirring, and thought about men.
Men. Crude, bull-headed bastards who had the natural beauty of a road accident and spent no time enhancing whatever nature felt sorry enough to give them. For the most part. Then again, there were those who spent too much time primping, and couldn’t fight their way out of a paper bag. Sanji hadn't met many guys who'd figured out - like he had - that well-kept and kick-ass were not mutually exclusive. Morons.
Sanji knew he swung both ways; it hadn't been that hard to figure out when the sight of a strong set of shoulders had made his heart flutter just as much as cleavage back when he was, oh, thirteen. But he'd never thought it'd be a problem. It had never been before. Yes, his head might be wired in a way that he might find men sexually attractive, but that didn't matter because he didn't like them. Or those he liked were either butt-ugly or just...well, just good mates, buddies. He'd never - okay, maybe there'd been that young Marines cadet once- but feh, the kid hadn't been that good-looking, and Sanji had been fifteen and full of hormones, he'd have been attracted to linoleum if it had had the right shape. Young Sanji had handled the matter with finesse and class: he'd gotten into a rip-roaring fight with the cadet, and by the time Zeff had tendered band-aids, iodine and his apologies to the cadet's officer - and a few kicks to Sanji's backside- the two young men had become friends. Dubious attractions had been relegated to the Will Never Happen category. Now he couldn't even remember the kid's name.
So why Zoro...? Why was he so certain he had feelings - disturbing, unnatural and wholly stupid feelings - for that hunk of useless muscle? Just didn't make sense...
Sanji concentrated on his cooking. He wrapped the spices up in cheesecloth and tied it with twine; a bit of this, a bit of that...Rosemary for remembrance, Sanji thought distantly, as he added the bouquet garni along with the mirepoix to the pan.
"The day I decided to become the world's greatest swordsman, I gave myself up for dead," the green-haired man said with the serenity of ultimate freedom, talking to a cook he'd barely just met. Idiotic bastard, thought Sanji, as he stayed nailed to the Baratie by a life debt. Fucking stupid...suicidal...lucky bastard...
The stock simmered slowly. Sanji watched it carefully, skimming off the fat and foam as it rose to the surface
Sanji's foot thudded against a raised sword. The shithead's arm barely twitched. Roronoa Zoro, as good as his legend, Sanji thought, before gearing up to really kick the son-of-a-bitch's ass.
The stock was a rich tint when he withdrew the herbs, vegetables, meat and bones. More cheesecloth filtered out fibers and the rest of the fat. He saved some of the clarified liquid to freeze for stock, and put a kettle aside for tonight's consommé.
Flat on his back at the bottom of the boat, Sanji stared up at gigantic trees floating by above his head. He was sailing a river of clouds through a jungle in the sky. Common sense had gone bye-bye. A bruise was a bruise, though. Ooooowww..."Damn, I hope Nami-swan and Robin-chwan are okay. I'll gut that marimo if these blasted sky priests have touched a hair on their heads." But at the back of his mind, he knew damn well no harm would come to them. Not because Zoro would go out of his way to defend the girls, like Sanji would, but because Roronoa Zoro trusted everyone to fight to their full strength and beyond, and somehow, they did...Sanji dismissed that line of thought as stupid and somehow unchivalrous, and told himself that the reason nobody came to harm when Zoro was around was because the worst bruisers always gravitated towards the idiot anyway, like to like...
He kept the yolks for a mayonnaise, while the egg whites further clarified the soup. He'd been preparing other dishes on the side; tonight's spread would be lavish.
"Gomorrah, stop! There's a dead end up ahead!" cried Franky's buddy.
"Dead end?" Zoro lazily drew two swords. "Do you see a dead end?"
Sanji's answer was as ready as his kick. "Nope, don't see any," he said to the looming wall. And then the two of them moved as one.
As the bowls warmed, Sanji looked down into the depth of his concoction and could have counted the etches on the bottom of the saucepan, had there been any. The consommé was crystal clear and purer than a maiden's heart.
"Well, I can still cook some decent grub, even if my life's gone to shit," Sanji wearily concluded. Then he went to ring the bell.
When Nami saw that soup was on the menu, she decided that even the man on watch - Franky in this instance - could take a little time to get out of the rain and eat a warm meal. The wild variations in the Grand Line's climate they were sailing through meant there was no land nearby on which to run aground, and they hadn't seen another ship in days. Sailors did their damnedest to avoid approaching the Florian Triangle which the Straw Hats were eagerly sailing to.
The kitchen was all the brighter for the bitter weather outside. Sanji laid out plates and carefully avoided looking at Zoro. Between cooking and having his entire life flipped over like a crêpe, he'd not had time to consider how he was going to react to the sight of the bloody marimo strolling in and sitting down at the foot of the galley table. But Sanji was good at hiding his feelings behind an air of indifference. He was going to have to think about this horrible thing that had happened to him, but in the meantime, Zoro would notice absolutely nothing.
There were many appreciative noises for the consommé in the pretty red bowls, the cut and fried omelet with bonito shavings, the delicately sculpted veg and rich mayonnaise, the baked breadsticks with ham wrapped around the tips, and the inevitable salted pork joints for Luffy. Sanji gave his shipmates the usual 'of course I know how good I am' grin, covering the pleasure he always felt. And who cared about seaweed sitting at the table. Not him. This ship's cook was cool and composed, and about to enjoy a good dinner.
Zoro lifted his bowl and swallowed half the contents in one gulp. Then he looked down into the soup and licked his lips. "Hm. Not bad."
Sanji tensed as if he'd been plugged into an electric current. "What?! What are you trying to say? Are you looking for a fight?!"
Zoro had been about to have another swallow; he lowered his bowl abruptly and gave Sanji a narrow-eyed look. "Huh? I just said it wasn't bad. What the hell's wrong with you? Dumbass." Which was a perfectly normal Zoro response. It was the looks from the rest of his nakama that informed Sanji that his reaction had been a tad, well, excessive, perhaps...
Zoro shrugged and shot back the second half of his soup, finishing in five seconds what had taken five hours to prepare. He grabbed a couple of the breadsticks and stuck them in his mouth. He'd obviously dismissed crazy cooks and their crazy reactions. To his consternation, Sanji realized his fingers were squeezing his spoon hard enough to bend it. He forced himself to relax.
"This is bodacious grub, bud." Franky licked his lips. He'd not had that much of the soup, the flavor pretty much lost on him, but he was enjoying the omelet slices and meat. "I wish we'd had a bro like you back at Franky House. You wouldn't believe some of the stuff we had to eat during the lean times. More of those than I'd like...but still, damn, I miss those idiots."
"Of course you do. They're always your buddies." Having summarized the pain of separation and the eternal value of friendship in eight words, Luffy took a huge bite out of his pork joint.
Usopp put down his soup bowl, a weird look on his face as he scrutinized his captain out of the corner of his eye.
"Yeah...still, no regrets." Franky was giving the galley around him a contented look, though he seemed to have something on his mind, too. "Those guys'll be okay. They're happier back at Water 7, and I'm happier with my ship. It's not those goons I miss the most, that's the weird part...I guess...That bloody goody-two-shoes...he's annoying, of course, but I guess deep down, I always thought...when I built this ship and sailed her, he'd be here with me, and that's sort of hard to-"
There was a small silence.
"And you're all gonna forget I just said that," Franky declared, glaring at the galley's finishings. If eyes could drill holes, that Adam wood would be getting quite a challenge to its supposed indestructibility.
"Forget what?" Luffy asked.
Usopp went "Heh", a brief, oddly mature sound like the first half of a chuckle that had died a mirthless death. Then he yelped and jumped when a soup bowl thudded near his elbow. Chopper's consommé was splashing around the circumference, and Chopper himself was hurtling out of the galley.
"Sorry just thought of something-" then the door crashed shut behind him, cutting off the hyper, excited burble.
Everybody stared at door. Well, nearly everybody. Actually, not that many people, Sanji realized as he turned to share a surprised look with the rest of the table, to find that Robin was the only one doing the same. Franky was still staring at the same spot on the wall; Nami was staring into her soup as if she'd found something unexpected in its clear depths; Usopp was staring at Luffy who was busy stealing Chopper's share of food; Zoro was- Zoro was staring at Sanji, and the expression on his face was totally unreadable, which was downright unnerving.
"What's come over him?" Sanji asked, still nailing his usual nonchalant drawl despite the odd jittery feeling crawling up his spine like a bug. He didn't want to address the question to Zoro, but the marimo was the only one paying attention to him.
Okay, enough weirdness. Sanji shook himself, stood up and grabbed Chopper's plate before Luffy could eat its entire contents.
"I thought I made the rules clear, to fuzzbutt and everyone else: nobody leaves my table without finishing their meal. I’ll go stuff this down his throat-"
A hand landed on his shoulder. Sanji did not need to look to know who it was and nearly sent the plate to hit the ceiling when he jolted in shock at the contact. He shook the hand off rather too quickly and turned around.
Zoro stared at him, a distinctly searching look as if he were reading Sanji's thoughts off the back of his skull- which wasn't possible, Sanji told himself frantically, while quickly building up his favorite highly-unimpressed-with-you expression.
"What do you want?"
"I'll take it down to him. I'm done eating." No surprise there. Zoro always ate his food with neat, quick motions that made it disappear at speed, like he thought someone might make a grab for it - which might be due to his long association with Luffy, or simply that Zoro was only interested in getting fuel into his body and thought that enjoying the act was for pansies. He downed booze like paint-thinner in much the same way.
He took the plate from Sanji and headed towards the door without another word. Since the object of the exercise was to see if Chopper was okay as well as to get him to eat, Zoro was the better candidate anyway; Chopper always seemed bolstered by the swordsman's presence, if his habit of clinging to Zoro's face during stressful situations was any indication. Sanji turned back towards the table, just relieved that Zoro was going to be out of his immediate vicinity until Sanji could regain his composure.
"So I was wondering, were you ever going to tell us about it?"
"What was that, Nami-swan?" Sanji cooed, glad of the distraction - no, more than a distraction! The center of his affections! The direction of his compass! The girl-...the girl who was currently staring at Robin as if she'd never seen her nakama before. Robin was looking back, clearly as perplexed as Sanji.
"Tell you about what, Navigator-san?"
"About being hunted for twenty years, causing the destruction of everybody who crossed your path."
Talk about a mood-killer, not that the mood hadn't already been moribund.
It was rare to see Robin startled, and she recovered fast. "I did. Tell you about it. I-"
"You had a few details dragged out of you at Enies Lobby, yeah, just enough to let us know that you wanted to die rather than have us save you, but I got more actual information from Iceburg and from that freak in a mask." Nami's voice had a fine snap to it.
Robin was silent. Everybody was.
Nami lifted her chin defiantly. "You're just like my sister. I can't believe I never saw it before. Yes, we all know what happened, you don't deny it, but then you just put on that lazy smile and hide everything else behind it. Pretend you don't care, not really."
Robin tilted her head, the smile Nami referred to tipping dangerously close to capsizing. "Navigator-san-"
"Stop calling me that! You know our names by now! That's what I'm talking about! You're just like Nojiko! She was only eight when- she never admitted she was hurting too, just smiled at me and made sure she was there to support me. Then who supports you?! You both put on that game face and keep a distance around your feelings so as to not burden us with them. And don't tell me it's over and that you're fine now, because stuff like that is never over, you'll carry it with you for ages, and we could help you but you won't let us all over again-"
Nami ended up making frustrated gestures. Robin had gone very still.
"You know this from experience, do you?" she finally asked. "I find it interesting that you want me to cry on your shoulder, Navi-...Nami, when the only time I hear Arlong Park mentioned is by others, never in your presence and very little at that." Robin's voice was its usual gentle murmur. But what she actually said...That was the kind of deadly precision with which Sanji kicked people.
Nami's eyes widened and her mouth opened in soundless shock, though anger was rallying fast.
"Ah, girls, let's not get too heated up-" Franky started to say, but stopped when Sanji put a hand on his shoulder.
"Ooooooh..." That sound would normally send Nami's crewmates running towards the nearest shelter. Robin didn't bat an eye, of course.
"Hey, Sanji." Franky's hushed whisper went unnoticed in the growing atmospheric pressure at the other end of the table. "I like a good catfight same as the next guy, but don't you think we should break this up before something ugly gets said?"
Sanji squeezed his shoulder, silencing him. Usopp and Luffy were both frozen in mid-motion, Luffy with a hambone in his mouth, watching their crewmates.
The ladies stared at each other. The tension reached a peak...then broke as they both looked away. A truce. Maybe more. Robin reached for their plates. "Cook-...Sanji-san...if you don't mind, we would like to finish dinner in our cabin."
"Yeah, you guys don't want to listen to a bunch of girl-talk, right?" Nami said, already marching to the door, which she opened for Robin and closed behind them with a determined click.
The four men stayed frozen for a few more seconds, then relaxed. Sanji rubbed his face. He felt like crossing his fingers. He felt like a cigarette. He felt like this meal had lasted forever already. But hopefully...hopefully something necessary had just happened. Something that would really bring Robin back to them, for good and for ever this time. And if lancing old wounds was going to be the order of the evening, then it probably wouldn't hurt Nami either, come to think of it...
"Chicks." Franky raked back his hair. "I got two sisters and I still don't get them."
Luffy started chewing again as if nothing had happened. Usopp stared at his plate, and then quickly stuffed its contents into his face and got up. He mumbled something and walked out without another sound.
"Well...I'm going back on watch," Franky muttered, once he'd finished as well.
A minute later, the galley was silent except for the noise of Luffy hoovering up all the remains. Sanji sat down bonelessly on a bench, elbows on the table, and stared at an empty plate.
"That was great food! Thanks Sanji!"
"...You're welcome, Luffy. You're welcome..."
The sky was dense with clouds, obstructing all view of the stars. Bloody weather, Sanji thought. It had become something of a mantra.
He tapped the tray against his thigh, then spun it on his finger absently.The girls had still been talking when he'd brought them some coffee and a small dessert, so he'd not lingered longer than was necessary. But he had the feeling the discussion was going in the right direction. When he'd looked back through the porthole, Nami had been smiling at Robin like he'd seen her smile at Nojiko, and Robin had been smiling like he'd never seen her smile before, ever. A less chivalrous part of Sanji was regretting the very sisterly direction this was all taking. Since it was tragically obvious that neither Nami-san nor Robin-chan were interested in him, he might have enjoyed the opportunity for some steamy on-board romance between the two ladies, and the way that'd fuel his night-time imagination..Oh well.
Of course, Sanji had a problem of his own to deal with. And what a problem it was, big and ugly and green and mean. What had Sanji ever done, in this life or a previous one, to deserve this?
Whatever it was, it must have been something truly terrible and karma had it in for him with a vengeance, because instead of hanging around outside the girls' cabin in the remotest hope of anything hot happening, his footsteps had taken him to the foredeck where a slow, delicate noise indicated that Zoro was doing one of his all-time favorite activity: tending his swords. His other favorite activities being boozing, sleeping and bleeding over things.
Good. Sanji had regained his composure in the past two hours, so now was the time to deal with this and put this whole 'feelings for Zoro' back into its rightful place, i.e. so far at the back of Sanji's mind it'd drop out the next time a pretty girl smiled at him.
He stuck the tray beneath his arm, lit a cigarette and sauntered over to where Zoro was propped against the railing. Sanji sat down at a distance which indicated he was enjoying the deck on his own terms, and only sitting a few feet away from the dumbass because there weren't that many good spots to choose from.
"If you're going to hang around, cook, move downwind," Zoro said without looking up from where he was rubbing the red lacquered scabbard with some kind of polish.
Option A - comply. Option B- blow the smoke in his face. Nah, Sanji was here to talk. On the surface, having a bloody good fight with the moron should get this out of Sanji's system, but they'd been fighting for months and...the sharp parry of insults, the quick, growled comebacks, the rivalry, the reluctant admiration when Zoro parried a kick that would put anybody else in traction...yeah, in retrospect, Sanji didn't think fighting was helping matters. At all. He had to talk to the uncultured swine, and remember why the swordsman annoyed him so much. Option A it was then.
"So, have we finally figured out what's up with our doctor?" he asked, after relocating to where the wet, rain-scented breeze dragged his smoke out to sea.
"Yeah." Zoro didn't smile, but something in his eyes did. "Turns out, he's been working hard on his rumble balls."
"His rumble balls?" Sanji echoed, surprised.
"Hm-hm. He wants to harness the effects better; 'power them up' is what he said. But without making it dangerous for him and everybody else. He was so excited I couldn't make out what he was going on about, not that I know shit about chemistry anyway. From what I gather, he was at a dead end in his research since Enies Lobby, and suddenly tonight he had this flash of inspiration. He said it all became suddenly clear and he figured out what he was missing. Something about a binding agent and a...a gastric release mechanism, I think he said. You ask him if you're that curious. Be prepared to kick him a little to stop him talking once he's started."
"Is that what's been getting him down these past few days?" Sanji had expected something a bit more drastic, like Chopper suddenly discovering both puberty and the dearth of women/animal hybrids all in one go.
"Yeah. He wants to keep up with us. It's important to him not to hold us back." Zoro showed every sign of approval, of course. "But he's worried about what happens when he takes too many rumble balls, or if he makes them too strong. I think Franky harping on the subject wasn't helping."
"I can see that." Franky had been going on and on about Monster Deer! and Super Fuzz! and how he'd had to risk life and limb just to calm Chopper down enough where he wouldn't kill his own buddies back at Enies Lobby. Yeah, come to think of it, that would get a little depressing for a sensitive kid like Chopper...He wouldn't understand that Franky was talking in honest admiration, fascinated by anything that could boost a guy's power and make him bigger and stronger and much more dangerous.
Sanji let his smoke drift into the faint wind, which was pushing them steadily on towards the Florian Triangle. "Sheesh, no wonder Chopper's been so quiet...Franky's got a big mouth, it's taking some getting used to."
"The way he talks about Robin, I'm surprised you've not kicked his head off yet."
"Well-"
"You'd have decked me for a tenth of what he's said."
There was a lag halfway through that sentence, as if Zoro had suddenly changed his mind about saying that out loud, but was too stubborn to hesitate or break off.
"Feh, that's different. Franky's all mouth. When you say something, you mean it."
Sanji was absolutely certain that had sounded more insulting in his head before he said it.
An odd little moment followed, neither of them saying anything or looking at each other. Zoro put aside the scabbard with an abrupt gesture and picked up the blade. Finally Sanji rallied. "Of course, if you ever talk about either of our ladies like that-"
"Yeah yeah, lemme guess, you'll throw some pathetic kick at me and then I'll have to mop the deck with you."
Whew, back to a familiar register.
Sanji focused on the reason he was sitting out here in the damp. He had a plan. Step one: talk to Zoro. Find out why this was Not Going To Happen. Step two: kick Zoro's ass. Just because. Step three: nurse a bottle of good wine to get over whatever stupid piece of Sanji's stupid heart might actually break a little over this worthless hunk of seaweed. Step four: forget about it and go back to being nakama and rivals tomorrow. Yeah, good plan.
"You know, that's something I've noticed. Franky's crude about it, but what he and every other guy on this ship shares is a true appreciation for our two beautiful crewmates."
"Is that what you call it when you stick to them like a tick?"
With some effort, Sanji ignored that. "We're men. We notice. We admire. All of us, that is, but not you."
Had there been the slightest hitch in the movements of the cloth on the blade?
"I bet I've figured you out, you know," Sanji drawled, tipping his head up to stare at the inky sky but keeping Zoro's movements in his peripheral vision. "You're like Usopp. You've got a girl already, and you're being faithful to her. Except Usopp has the willpower of melted cheese, so at least he'll get a good look when Nami-swan wears her bikini, while you're made of sterner stuff and so you just go and train a whole lot harder. Am I right or am I right?"
There was a silence that probably felt longer than it was.
"You're not wrong," Zoro finally said.
Sanji had been fishing, but it looked like he'd caught the truth on his first cast. He'd known it was impossible from the start; he'd just been trying to figure out why. "Yeah. I'm not surprised. You're the kind that's big, dumb and loyal." He took a drag of his cigarette, turning the tip to cherry red. The smoke tasted a little bitter against his tongue. Sanji glared at the white stick; the pack must have gotten dampened with sea water again, that was the problem of being on a ship.
"So what's she like? Blonde? Brunette? Too pretty for you, or is that a given? Doesn't she mind that you left her behind to go get cut up in distant lands? How do you know she's not married with ten kids by now?" Why, Sanji wondered, was he so pissed off all of a sudden?
There was a faint whisper, like a steely sigh, and Sanji realized that if he swallowed, he'd be able to shave on the blade pressed under his chin.
"Uh...but I'm sure she'll wait for you..." he said very carefully and somehow without moving his mouth or head.
"Since you're so damn curious about her, cook, I thought you'd like to meet her. Here she is then. But she doesn't seem to like you a whole lot." The white-hilted katana - non-cutting edge up, Sanji now realized - tapped him gently under the jaw. "She thinks you talk too much."
The blade withdrew, and Sanji gave its owner a baleful look. "You're a sick and twisted man."
"Coming from a pervert cook who'll jump through hoops of fire bellowing Mellow-whatever each time a chick bats her eyelashes, I'll take that as a good thing."
"So maybe it's not girls who rock your boat? Gotta thing for men, marimo?"
Sanji looked around carefully for the utter idiot who'd said that, because surely, surely it couldn't have been him.
"Oh, not just any man. One in particular."
Deep in his chest, Sanji's heart picked up a pair of castanets and rapped out a rapid ba-ba-bump.
"Er...what? You- you're serious?" That had acutely lacked the quality of smooth and indifferent that Sanji had been trying to maintain. Ba-da-ra-thump-thump.
"Dead serious." Zoro sighted along the cutting edge of his katana in the foredeck's lantern light. "To tell you the truth, I can't stop thinking about him."
Ta-ga-dump-bump-bump. Sanji pretended to cough around some smoke so he could reach up and slam a fist into his chest.
"It's gotten to the point where I dream about him, and I sometimes even see him when I just close my eyes. He's what I aspire to."
Ta-ga-da-ba-bumpity-bump- thud. That last being Sanji's head thumping back into the rail. "You're talking about that psycho Hawk-eyes, aren't you," he said wearily. "And you're yanking my chain."
"Got it in one," said Zoro, tightening one of the holding pegs on the hilt with a precise gesture that still managed to look entirely smug. Bastard.
"Fuck, you really are an idiot." Sanji said it with some relish. Yeah, the guy was an unsophisticated, brainless, piss-poor excuse for a human being, and Sanji would be crazy to feel anything for him. "Do reassure me on one point, numbnuts; girl or guy, you've at least slept with someone before, right?"
"No," Zoro answered simply, angling the sword.
Sanji took a deep pull on his cigarette, only to find that his fingers had pinched and ground it shut at the filter. Zoro's straightforward and unembarrassed admission had strangely impressed him, but a lot of Sanji's mind was running around screaming, in both amazement and lascivious wonder, holy crap - a virgin!
Down boy. Sanji flicked his cigarette over the railing and drew another one with deliberation and without a glance at the man by his side.
"I see. So, did that sword cut of Mihawk's go down a bit further below the belt than I first thought?" he asked.
That finally got him a glare that put him back on the scoreboard. Zoro opened his mouth to defend the integrity of the tackle, then shut it again with a scowl as he realized that'd be playing Sanji's game.
"I've got more important things to put my energies in, cook. I don't need to go all gooey over chicks like a certain ass-hat I know."
The lighter snuffed out the flame with a sardonic clink. "Huh-uh. So, let me see if I got this straight. You don't have a honey already, you've never had one - you poor, poor bastard - and you're not looking for one either?"
"That's right. You're quite smart tonight."
"Coming from you, that'd be an insult, but I'll make allowances because I feel so very sorry for you. Better to have loved and lost than-" the rest of that old saw got cut off by the harsh noise of a katana getting sheathed. Zoro looked uninterested.
Sanji examined him out of the corner of his eye, a bit nonplussed despite his better instincts telling him to take this information and run with it. "You know...you've got brains of marble, and resolve that's even harder, but I still can't believe you feel nothing. Even if you don't let yourself act on it, there has to be someone somewhere who's managed to catch your fancy at some point."
"Why the hell are you so goddamned curious all of a sudden?"
Oooh, that had sounded defensive! From the look on Zoro's face, he knew it, too.
"Ahhhhh, so someone has caught your attention?" Sanji smirked. "I thought as much. And in hindsight, it's pretty obvious who, right?"
Zoro stood up. "I'm not having this conversation. Keep your fantasies to yourself," he said tightly.
"No no no, I bet I'm right. It's that dark-haired girl with the glasses, hm?"
From the way Zoro stopped abruptly mid-stride, Sanji had struck gold.
"Yes, that pretty Marine ensign, the one who gives you the wiggins each time you see her. Right? That'd explain a lot."
Instead of getting all pissy and defensive, Zoro gave him the oddest look over his shoulder, and then he laughed. Sanji was officially blown out of the water, because he could count Zoro's real smiles, the warm, kind ones, on his fingers and still have room left over for the occasions where the man had actually laughed out loud instead of snickering murderously or whatever passed for humor in the savage East Blue species of marimo.
"Yeah, sure, I'm attracted to some crazy chick who is trying to arrest me and steal my sword. That makes sense."
"It does if it's you," Sanji said, nettled at being on the receiving end of sarcasm from Zoro, of all people. "You have a thing for pain."
"I sure do, Sanji, I sure do. Goodnight, idiot-cook." He was already halfway to the stairs down to the main deck, strides long and easy, hands resting casually on either side of the swords slung straight across his shoulders.
...So it wasn't the Marine ensign. Sanji finished his cigarette, uncharacteristically unsure of himself and what that had been about. But finally he decided to get mad.
Bloody Zoro. Stupid, brainless- laughing at him as if Sanji was the idiot, when the muscle-head was the one who was too fucking dumb to realize that fighting for someone was what mattered. That's where the strength came from, protecting a girl- well, okay, Sanji might be in a bit of a spin on that subject right now, but anyway, protecting someone.
The mass of dough spun and slapped the counter with unusual venom, and Sanji started to knead again. Zeff had always told him that a chef shouldn't cook when he was angry or distracted, but Zeff had never had to deal with an infuriating baits-for-brains like Zoro before. Sanji's fingers attacked the dough like he was trying to strangle it. He had to get this done so it would be risen for tomorrow's breakfast.
Moronic marimo. If he wanted to be lonely, if he wanted his life to be as hard and sharp and short as his fucking swords, fine! Who cared? Some day Mihawk was going to chop him into fish food and good fucking riddance.
Sanji shoved down on the dough with the heel of his hand like he was kicking in a stupid head with the heel of his foot. The counter creaked.
- and he was angry at himself, too, because fuck it, he did care, it hurt a bit, more than it should, and it hadn't gotten any better and fuck it all, what a stupid thing for him to do, falling for that-...
The dough was satiny beneath his fingers. Sanji should probably stop crucifying it now. He felt a bit calmer. He'd get over the stupid hunk of junk, it was just a matter of time, and at least he was sufficiently annoyed at Zoro that it would cover any other emotions that might otherwise show. The last thing he needed was for the swordsman to figure out what Sanji was going through. But Zoro wouldn't, why should he? He probably thought everybody was as obsessed with fighting as he was. Or if he did not, then he had every reason to believe that Sanji was obsessed with girls...Yeah, it'd take a miracle of intuition for anyone to guess what Sanji had been feeling over dinner tonight. He was safe from that humiliation, at least.
He dropped the dough in a pan, covered it with a cloth and put it in the pantry. Time for bed. He was still tired from that all-nighter he'd pulled at the start of the week with the lobsters. He'd deal with the bread, with his idiotic feelings and with Zoro tomorrow.
TBC...
Link to Chapter 2
No Nami/Robin here; I do love that pairing, but I wanted a non-romantic relationship blossoming on board as well as a few romantic ones, and Robin desperately needed a sister-friend to confide in, I thought.
Obviously, we're seeing everything interpreted through Sanji's POV...what Zoro is feeling should be nonetheless decipherable, and if not, it should be clearer in the next chapter.
