someone who sold out to the marines wouldn't do anything for nothing. i want my spices, though. i'm not gonna sling shit no matter where i am. get me what i need, and then when you come to collect, come to me. not nami.
why don't you stop focusing on my relationship and start thinking about how to get your own? if you've never cared about beautiful women, then what's your type? ugly idiots who drink cheap liquor?
I only express intrigue in yours because I pity Nami. Even I respect her enough to realize she doesn't deserve some fool orchestrating some relationship with her.
I don't want a relationship.
My, why so interested in my type? Don't tell me you want to see what it's like to be with a man. (He knows that's not true, but he's just being a jerk now.)
When I do seek companionship, it is with men who are beautiful in their own right and who have their own passions.
[ he feels bad for himself... time to bypass this topic. ]
if there was use in it, you'd be one. that's the difference between you and the straw hats.
[ there's a lot he could say about koby right now. and a part of him wants to. but for once, he tries to take a page out of luffy's book and tempers his pissy attitude. ]
he deserves better than you. i just don't know if he knows that yet. but there's no way you don't.
(Mihawk is left staring at his notebook for quite some time. He knows what Sanji is saying and truthfully, he agrees with it too. Though it goes against one thing he believes in through and through.)
The only thing all people deserve is the freedom to choose what they want to do with their own lives.
Right now, Koby is choosing me. One day, he will choose to end this and choose to move on to something else or someone else.
Both you and I must respect his right to choose what he does with his life. Even if we may not like the choices.
[ sanji, similarly, stares long and hard at his notebook, but with the desire to set it on fire. mihawk talks like a damn idealist — like a pirate — which sanji understands but hasn't had the luxury, or maybe the balls, to live by. luffy is the closest he's ever tasted of freedom. and even then, he hasn't been totally honest about who he really is. how miserable and worthless the real sanji is. ]
some choices don't need to be respected. i'm not cosigning your bullshit. piss off, mihawk.
(Mihawk doesn't really regret anything. He just recognizes that they had both been going Through Some Stuff and it didn't seem worth the energy to maintain any sort of genuine frustration toward the cook.
It's more of a gesture of peace above all else. A basket filled with herbs and spices, some nice cuts of meat wrapped carefully, and a well-crafted cutting board. A simple note is attached that reads:)
No need to keep sneaking into my stock. Just come as you will.
[ he means to ask what exactly has been happening, since he knows the absolute shitty nightmare of having his insides and outsides ripped apart to form something... sort of not human. but it might be too soon to have a civilized conversation. if mihawk gained some annoying ass rabbit ears, there might be justice in the world.
still, he recognizes a peace offering when he sees it. he also doesn't see the point in continuing a feud that will lead toward nothing good. when he sends the basket back, there's a bottle of his latest trial batch of wine, this one aged with a little bit of magic, just as mihawk had suggested.
the bottle is nestled among several lavish, white feathers, the long plumes fluffy and bright, meticulously cleaned and carefully placed to minimize damage.
(He has to admit that it's a rather thoughtful gift. Sanji, once again, serves to be a pleasant surprise. His hat had become a bit lacking since arriving in this disgusting world.
Well. He did say he would review the wine properly.
So, Sanji gets a message in his notebook a few days later:)
The wine is better. Now we're talking high quality. Though it still needs something. Perhaps enchant the barrels?
(A genuine suggestion. He had never considered the possibility of creating wine through magic. The possibilities here were endless.
More importantly though...)
I hear that you were also subject to a bodily change. A rabbit, was it?
[ thanking him for his helpful suggestions seems a bit excessive, so he instead writes back in his notebook about the other question — not that he really wants to talk about this either, but nami and zoro are so far unchanged, and as helpful as they're being, it's possible they don't quite... understand the level of change here. ]
if you're here to give me shit about it, i'm not above kicking your ass.
Believe it or not, I'm not. I'm curious about these changes.
A wolf for me. (Sorry, Sanji, but to his credit he has no interest in shoving that in Sanji's face. He already was stronger than Sanji back home so what was the difference with a rabbit versus wolf scenario? He saw no point in gloating over that kind of thing.)
How annoying are your new instincts? (Because his SUCKED.)
[ a wolf. of course a fucking wolf. although a peacock would have been more fitting. ]
my kicks are even stronger than before. i can definitely beat you in a race.
[ that might be, literally, the only good thing that's happened. his aim is still shit because he's not training with anyone, not even himself, and his nerves have been shot since the change, as if he's inherited all the skittishness of a real fucking rabbit. his bloodlust, at least, has been curbed since connecting with nami, though he does find himself tempted by vegetables.
he's not even going to mention his fucking ears. ]
it's easier being alone than around people. that's not who i am though, and everyone thinks something's wrong with me already, so if i say that, it'll make things worse.
(It really would have been. Mihawk wouldn't even deny that.)
Probably.
(Although he was faster now as a wolf, he had gained far more strength than speed. He was fine with that trade-off. He wasn't quite as fine with his own set of ears and tail. Both didn't seem to get the memo about his stoic bullshit. He had zero control over them and life was the worst because of it.
Fuck them ears!)
Why would you think everyone assumes something is wrong with you? I mean besides your less than savory personality.
(WOW.)
I do not need anyone to "take care" of me.
(.........
......................
..................................)
Koby is living with me now. We figured it was a more appropriate arrangement.
(CLEARING HIS THROAT.)
I take it Zoro and Nami are making sure you have what you need?
[ he is sort of wondering about the hat situation if mihawk has sprouted ears like he has. his are not comfortable to touch. or maybe the problem is they're too comfortable to touch. he also has fucking antlers, but that's neither here nor there, and none of this shitbag's business.
he really, genuinely thinks before answering. ]
i killed a bunch of women. the mothers. i know that's nothing to you, but it's not nothing to me. i don't give a shit what you or anyone else thinks of me [ a small lie; there's nami and zoro on the short list, one opinion carrying far more weight than the other ] but the man who raised me taught me to live a certain way. i don't harm women. i don't fight women. and he'd
[ his hand trembles. what would zeff do? toss him on his ass? look at him with hatred? or worse, indifference, like judge vinsmoke had? maybe zeff hadn't been kidding when he said he'd take a knife to his throat if sanji ever fucked up this badly. it's hard to tell; he'd been a shitty little kid at the time, yelling back or crying at everything the old shitbag said. usually both. ]
anyway, i don't want your fucking opinion. i just haven't figured things out yet, and it's not any easier with all the changes.
[ .............. ]
you guys weren't shacked up before?
nami did a ritual. some connection thing. it stops a lot of the bullshit, like the bloodlust and the weird body stuff. you need a witch to do it for you. you found anyone? koby probably would, if you asked. and nami and i are connected now. she can call me anytime and i just feel it. it's like i know where she is and i'm there. she saved me, really.
(He keeps his ears stuffed under the hat with absolute gratitude. However, when he was just at home alone or with Koby, the hat came off. He had discovered a humiliating love for having his ears scratched. It was a new weakness apparently.
Mihawk stares at his notebook and it catches him off guard a bit. Was that how he came off?)
Please. I hardly make a habit out of killing defenseless creatures if it can be helped. There is nothing to be proud of in that. (It posed no challenge to him and he saw no value in shedding that kind of blood. Whether Sanji believed him hardly mattered to him, but it was true. He had never been the sort to be cruel just for the fun of it even if he was often cold. Granted, he had killed an enormous amount of women in his life too, but those women had been far from damsels or innocent, and they either came at him with their own swords and weapons.
He had a feeling that wasn't the kind of bloodshed Sanji was talking about here though. A self-imposed rule then by the only person who had served as a mentor to Sanji. He sighs.)
That man would likely consider your genuine guilt as an obvious sign that the situation was beyond your usual control. If you regret it, then fine, regret it, and promise to do better in the future to pay respect to the women you killed and to the man you admire.
(It's really that easy, Sanji, gosh. Coming from a guy who frankly has no concept of guilt, but he...doesn't like Sanji. He just doesn't like seeing him put out.)
No, we were not. After the change, I decided I wanted him near more often than not.
(Wow, Mihawk. Expose yourself, why don't you. But really, it's the wolfish part of him that now felt viciously loyal and protective.)
I see. So, Nami came back to you. (Despite everything. He's...glad for them.)
You must be thrilled with that. Maybe so. I leave that kind of decision up to him. I try to allow him his autonomy. He may not want to maintain such a connection with me.
(...But Mihawk would love that. It sounded as convenient as it did comforting and there's a mild bubble of jealousy in the pit of his stomach.)
[ so maybe mihawk isn't an indiscriminate killer. zoro had been asking to get himself sliced open, after all — and zoro's still alive, which is a fairly large point of consideration. and now mihawk has taken him under his wing, as if he genuinely wants to see him succeed. these aren't exactly the actions of someone who spills blood for sport.
sanji might actually be worse. he'd... enjoyed the taste of blood, the raw rending of flesh. it only turned his stomach after. by then it was too late.
mihawk's solution seems far too simple, and yet he thinks about it anyway, desperate to latch onto any hope that zeff might not hate him for what he did. that's enough sharing about the old geezer. ]
you can just say you like him.
[ because he already knows that much — especially now, with what he's recently discovered about koby, which isn't... surprising, per se, but it's been oddly difficult to get out of his head. i wanted him near more often than not definitely sounds like like.
it sounds like what he wants with nami, and even with zoro sometimes, but it's becoming more complicated than that. he hesitates again. something about scratching his thoughts down on paper seems easier than voicing them aloud, even if he's generally unthinking about who sees the pages at all times. ]
i don't think it's like that. nami came back because zoro asked her to. because of what i did with the mothers. she knew about the connection ritual. she knew i needed one. she could have kept living the way she wanted to if not for that.
i can tell koby you need a connection, if you're gonna be a little shitty baby about it.
Mister Sanji. This is Bee. I was the child with the rabbit. I have something to tell you and I think you will probably be very displeased with me.
( be brave, bee!!! )
While you were distracted, I stole a knife from you, right up my shirt sleeve. I am sorry. I was scared but that is no excuse for thievery. I have a new knife now and I feel very guilty about having yours. I can bring it back to you, and I accept whatever punishment you think reasonable.
did you stab anything with it? because if you did, you would have noticed it's pretty shitty for stabbing. it's a flexible blade exclusively used for fish.
i've lived at sea my whole life. so yeah, i cook fish that often.
[ """his whole life""" ]
you need a good knife that gets close to the bone so you don't waste any meat. other knives don't bend like a fillet knife does. fish are bendy. you ever gutted a fish before?
( she should go walk into the ocean for taking something so important to him )
No, not with a bendy knife. I traveled on a ship once. You are right, there was a lot of fish. I think the cook had a big knife though, maybe the size of your hand, or the hoof of a horse. I did not like to look at it.
( neither did she have the option to — it wasn't cooked meals and relaxation for bee. it was raw, rotten fish cut open with her teeth, and hard tack, and sucking on fishbones for days before dwalia was pleased enough with her to offer crusts from her bread. even then, she usually got beaten badly enough that eating wasn't possible with a swollen mouth and fractured ribs. )
cooks have a lot of knives, if they're not shitty cooks.
[ but a ship is typically a bad place to be for a kid, especially a little girl. sanji got away with it because he bullied his way into the kitchen with the rest of the cooks and then gave as good as he got. but most kids get stuck doing far less savory work. he was lucky for that storm, lucky for zeff to come along and seize their ship. in hindsight, he can admit that, now that his belly is full and his skills are sharper than ever. ]
i have your punishment for you. you give me back my knife, and then you have to watch me use it to fillet a fish and then grill it over a fire. then you have to eat it.
( she starts anxiety doodles in the corner of the page — little flowers and purring kittens. the doodling only stops for as long as it takes to switch the colors of her ink. )
[ did he know you were a girl? excuse me? do u know who you are talking to. ]
you ever considered taking a bath?
i'm not a shitty marine. i don't arrest people. i'm a pirate, and i'm the best cook in the east blue. if you thought you were gonna be arrested, why'd you tell me you stole my knife?
( so: no, not unless someone is going to make her. )
Oh. ( pirate?? ) If I knew that I probably would not have told you, but maybe left it on your doorstop? I do not think pirates usually have much sense of justice. Anyway, I thought you were kind to me, and most people are not. I did not think you should be punished for that.
we have a tub. you could use it to bathe. every night, even. then more people would know you're a girl. you were covered in dirt when i saw you last.
[ that much he remembers.
he's not going to go around spouting luffy's "i'm different" narrative, but being kind to a child, unfortunately, is different for a pirate. sometimes it's even different for a not-pirate. ]
i don't have any sense of justice, so don't piss me off. that's not your whole punishment. you're gonna have to learn how to catch a fish yourself, and then how to use the knife properly.
I have heard it is safer to be seen as a boy, because little girls can be hurt worse. Please do not tell anyone I am a girl.
( she will show up washed and with shoes, though. it's probably time she remember that she's a lady and a princess, and not someone who should go around with dirty feet and knotted hair. plus, sanji won't like her if she stinks badly. )
Okay. I will do this. Is it difficult to catch fish?
i don't let people hurt girls. but i won't tell anyone if you don't want me to.
[ because his opinions are fully formed around the things whatever female in the nearest vicinity asks of him. ]
no. i'm catching one now. you just need patience. sometimes you get one right away, and sometimes you have to wait hours before anything bites. the difficult part is not letting it slap you in the face when you get it.
because it's a rule of the universe that men aren't meant to mistreat women. if you screw up that badly as a man, then you're just an asshole that deserves to be hated.
[ he would rather die than become someone that zeff despises — though if he knew what he's already done, the blood on his hands from the mothers, he would. he's broken zeff's rules, and maybe whatever love zeff had for him at the same time. ]
as soon as you want to give my knife back. are you hungry? i can cook this for you now.
don't lump me in with the rest of those shitbags. the north blue is a scary place. there's a big military there that can threaten people across all the seas. what are you a princess of?
it's more complicated than that. there are good and bad people everywhere, no matter if they're a pirate or a prince or in a big scary military. they don't teach you how to take a bath in buck?
is it someone good or is it that arseface mihawk? you can always come to me, too. or anyone on the crew i'm on.
That is not true. Sometimes all people are bad. I have never been to Buck, but I would imagine that they bathe. I bathed in Withywoods, but then my mother died, and then I was kidnapped.
( this is bee's attempt to guilt sanji about assuming things about her, just because she smells a little, and hates baths. )
I think Mr. Shanks is very good. He doesn't find me too strange. Your crew is here?
then it's your job to be someone who isn't. mine's dead, too, and then i got locked in a dungeon. i still know how to take a bath. nami has nice things to wash with that'll make you smell like vanilla and tangerines. i'll get you some.
[ he's gonna throw you into a lake himself. ]
shanks, huh? only some of them. nami and zoro and luffy. if you see the one with the green hair, he's a big idiot.
What did you get arrested for? No. They kidnapped me because I am the White Prophet. No one knows I am a princess, really. I did not know until I was eight.
You seem to have a very obvious favorite. I can meet them?
the dad that i was born with decided he didn’t like me very much, so he told the whole kingdom i was dead and hid me in the dungeon so no one would discover his lie. i’m not supposed to be telling you this. it’s the one thing i swore to him when i finally escaped. that i would never tell anyone where i’m really from or what happened to me. my real dad has a floating restaurant in the east blue. he taught me how to cook. he taught me everything. that’s where i’m really from. that’s why i’m gonna teach you how to gut a fish. what the hell’s a white prophet?
sure. do you want me to tell them that you’re a princess? it might get you some perks.
That’s ( very similar to her own father, really, who supposedly died as the traitorous bastard prince in the false king regal’s dungeons. obviously he didn’t though, because he eventually had to grow up and have bee who, despite everything, is very much real. ) awful. What a horrible person. Fathers should always love their children, more than anything else. I am glad you escaped, Mister Sanji, and lived long enough for me to befriend. I won’t tell a soul, I promise. I see that cooking is very important to you. I will be a good student, if your father’s honor.
The Whites can see futures in their dreams, the things that will come true. The White Prophet is someone who will use those dreams to set the world on a better path. At least, that is how it should be, or how it once was. Now the Whites are corrupted with greed, and only seek deepening their pockets with the prophecies of the world. They are the all bad people. Worse than all bad.
Maybe they should just believe I am a boy, for now. I don’t really know anything about being a princess. I was just trying it on when I said as much to you.
my father does love me. that other man isn't my dad. my other family... something happened to them. they're strong in a way that other humans aren't, but they lost their emotions. they don't feel anything when they hurt people. my mom made sure i didn't turn out like that, but it made me weaker than them. that's why they didn't want me. and that's why you can't say all people are bad. you don't know if something happened to them, too. my mom tried to save all my brothers, but she could only save me. it's not their fault.
do you know a lot of whites?
you can be whatever you want, princess. but just know that once you start a lie, you're committing to something. i've lived with mine for ten years now. so think a little harder about what you want to be first.
( they're strong in a way that other humans aren't. she thinks about vindeliar, choking himself on serpent bile and piss, making himself stronger than any other skill user. they don't feel anything when they hurt people. she can still feel his hate when she told him they weren’t brothers. )
I think it is their fault. You are not a difficult person to love. But because you do not blame them, you are probably the better person. I suppose I am vengeful.
I have met many of them. Dwalia and her group who stole me. I toured their keep in Clerres and met the ruling government there. I met, too, a man my father treasured who was tortured at their hands for information about me. He was the White Prophet before me.
Well … maybe I will just be Bee. I do not think anyone you call crew would hurt me.
[ you are not a difficult person to love will burrow in his brain and cause him copious amounts of emotional turmoil, thank u child. ]
i don't want to turn into a shitty asshole that my dad would hate. that's all. i owe him everything, and i want to be the kind of man he can be proud of. you're not vengeful. you're just an idiot kid like i was.
did he give you any advice? the man who was the prophet before you.
they wouldn't. i think they would like you. i know nami would. i'll introduce you to all of them as my assistant fish-gutter.
Your Da will love you no matter what. Even if you make a mistake, or lie.
( bee is only so sure of it because her opinions on the subject of fathers are etched in stone. her father loves her, although he rarely says it and does even less to prove it. she knows it. she knows it, because if he didn't, there would be no one in the world to love her at all — and therefore, he must. it's his burden, the only job she ever cares to give him. it seems a fair trade for being brought into the world — demanding unconditional love in return. )
Some. But we only talked for a few moments before my papa stabbed him. I have not seen either of them since.
Really? ( tentative hope — he might decide bee is too horrific looking to be around his friends, which is an old song she knows the words to. still. being anyone's anything is special, even if it is a fish-gutter. ) I will come now. I want to learn right away.
zeff's not really like that. he'll come slit my throat if i fuck up too badly.
[ is this a joke? unknown. ]
i don't know how much time you'll have to be a prophet anyway. learning how to properly prep a fish will take up most of your time. you can't serve shitty food to people.
fine. dinner will be ready for you soon, then we'll get to work.
( a disarming, disturbing thought. would fitzchivalry ever slit her throat for her many lies and betrayals? the thought makes her want to cower. )
I would not let anyone slit your throat.
( bee u are 4ft tall )
It's okay. I have not had a dream since being here, so I think my prophet days may have been cut short. Learning about fish is much more useful, anyway.
i can't let a woman be my bodyguard. it's my job to protect you.
[ zoro would hate him sm for saying this. ]
i'll see you soon.
[ he's already out by the lake, an array of pots and kitchen utensils set up neatly around him. his slate board has a half-gutted fish resting upon it, surrounded by a few gleaming knives, but none of them as good as the one bee had stolen. a fire burns a few feet away, several fish and roughly chopped vegetables grilling atop planks of smoking wood while sanji dips a spoon into a bowl of viscous red liquid, tasting his latest herb-infused batch of pig's blood. ]
( bee's wardrobe has had to make some considerable changes since her transformation. she's tried, through her connection with shanks, to make the number of eyes on her skin something reasonable — two, ideally, but even a couple more wouldn't be awful — but without them she's in so much excruciating pain it isn't even worth it. so. she arrives with an overlarge shirt on her shoulders ( most shirts are overlarge on bee ), holes cut jaggedly in the back to give her wings room to stretch out. underneath the stretched collar of her shirt are the visible corners of a few eyes, although most stay hidden under her clothes, unbothered by the loose material. on either side of her head, nestled in her unruly white curls there sits a small wing, blending into the alabaster white of her dandelion fluff head.
most notably, is her face — three eyes where once there were two, and the odd glow like a halo coming from behind her head. she is, very impressively, scrubbed pink and clean, the very tips of her feathered wings still dripping water from her quick head dunk in water.
it's easier to see the way bee avoids eye contact, considering how many eyes she's now in ownership of. she stares at sanji's knees instead of his face when she approaches, taking out a bundle from her back pocket. )
Hello, Mister Sanji.
( she holds it out, not looking at him — his special fish knife wrapped in a handkerchief she embroidered with a little antlered bunny pattern in the corner. it smells a little like honeysuckle. once she almost gave a gift like this to a man who was very nice to her, but he died before she could put it in his hands. )
[ it's just as jarring seeing her now as it was the first time, though for wholly different reasons. he can't count how many eyes she has to his one, but all of them steadfastly refuse to look at him. ]
Princess. [ he wipes his hands on his apron and looks down at the little patterned kerchief, feeling very much like a tree next to a dandelion weed. is this what zeff felt like? no wonder he'd been kicked in the head so many times. ] Are you gonna look at me? It's bad manners not to.
[ it also stings at his insecurities, makes him feel a little more like a toy with his button eye ripped out, even if bee can't possibly mean it like that. casually, he takes his knife back, unwrapping it from the fabric and slipping it into his apron pocket. then he looks at the handkerchief, fingering the little antlered rabbit. the corner of his mouth curves up into a smile. ]
You're wet. Go sit by the fire. [ he slips the handkerchief under his apron as he turns, tucking it safely into his pocket where fish guts can't reach it. ] I'm not taking care of a sick kid.
[ all things zeff parroted at him, before taking care of a sick kid (him). after a few moments sanji joins her by the fire, dropping a blanket over her shoulders where it sticks out because of her wings, but at least she's not exposed to the winter chill. he sits cross-legged beside her, setting out an empty plate. ]
Now watch.
[ he proceeds to plate her food for her, creating a little bed of vegetables, slicing her fish horizontally and leaning it upwards so it looks like a tiny tower, painting a colorful swirl of red blood along the side. when he's done, he inspects the plate from all angles before carefully placing it in front of her. ]
Serving someone their food is just as important as cooking it. You can't just throw something on the plate and give it to them. It's disrespectful to the food, and disrespectful to your customer. [ he pours a glass of blood and sets it beside the plate, then holds out a fork. ] Are you gonna steal this, too?
it is rude, she knows that. taking a seat by the fire, she decides to muster up courage enough to look him in the eyes, which is a process made of deep breaths, and closing off new parts of her, freshly opened. it's not that hard — sanji makes it easier because he's nice, which he proves with the blanket on her shoulders. a happy, almost trilling sound rumbles in her throat while she tucks in her shoulders, watching sanji while he works. he's very focused. when bee was younger, she used to sit in the kitchens at withywoods and watch the chefs knead bread and set it to rise — it reminds her of that, of happy memories, before her home was taken from her.
when sanji turns back to look at her, she instinctively looks away, but forces herself to bring up her gaze. she finds — it really isn't hard to make eye contact with sanji. he has nice, warm eyes, not too intense or too emotional like her father's. belatedly, she offers a smile, that seems misplaced on her face. )
I could hardly stab anyone with that. ( she accepts the fork, a little grumbly, and turns to the food. ) Isn't it hard to eat something that looks so pretty?
( it feels like she's never had a meal like this — though it isn't anything too fancy, just prepared in a way that really does seem fitting of a princess. carefully, she breaks off a corner, not letting the tower fall. with a decent bite, she chews happily, looking him again in the eyes once she swallows. )
You shouldn't stab anyone with anything you use in the kitchen. [ he gives her a sidelong look instead of the knock to the head zeff would have given him to drive the point home. ] These are your tools. These are how you make magic. They're for creating things. For helping people. Not for hurting them. You want to stab someone, go talk to Zoro and get a shitty knife from him.
[ sanji's traded plenty of animals, vegetables, and herbs to get a decent knife set here, and he'll be damned if this shitty kid steals anything else from him. but he also remembers shanks' words, and how vengeful the humans can be. he remembers how vengeful humans can be anywhere, long before he came here. ]
If you get caught stealing, someone's gonna kill you. Or worse.
[ he gets the feeling he doesn't have to explain what or worse means.
he looks at the lake, then fishes through his apron pocket and pulls out a slim cigarette, if he can really call something he made himself out of carefully selected herbs that. but he's tired of going without, and even as he speaks to bee, he's planning on sneaking into the human cities to filch a few packs. ]
You're not even good at it, so give it up. If I catch you again, I'm gonna dump you in the lake.
[ he lights up his smoke while bee eats, taking a long drag and expelling a minty breath of cold air. ]
( she makes a mental note to go talk to zoro, and get a shitty knife from him.
anyway — sanji is funny. he's kind of like a much older man in a younger man's body, grumbling about kids and lessons and the all-knowing parental eye. well, he doesn't know what a good liar bee is. fitzchivalry never knew about her exploration of the hidden passageways of withywoods, and he was her actual father. ( he did know, he just never told her. ) )
You didn't catch me. ( she kicks her feet girlishly, really digging in once her meals loses its structural integrity. bee isn't the kind of child disinterested in vegetables — she's been starved often enough that she eats it all without complaint, until her plate is clean. ) I caught me, and told you about it, as a respectable young lady should. Can I try that?
( apparently food has made her more comfortable around him, she shrugs out of the blanket, pressing her hand on sanji's knee and leaning over him, to reach for his cigarette. maybe it's like a pipe? not that her father ever smoked one. )
( along with nami's gift, there is a small bundle of handwritten recipe cards — distinctly not in shanks' handwriting — wrapped with twine, which feature a range of somewhat normal to ... more creative local recipes. did he steal these from a house he was delivering presents to? probably. don't think about it too much. )
[ naturally, having been raised by the school of zeff™, sanji does not know how to react to this bit of unexpected kindness from luffy's... mentor?? dad????? questionable older male figure. he's only heard snatches of shanks' name from random anecdotes that luffy will drop at the most inopportune moments, and generally doesn't know shit about the man beyond seeing his wanted posters littered around the baratie.
any acquaintance of luffy's might be considered a friend to the straw hats, if luffy didn't keep such bad company. (marines??????)
still, the countless number of times he's been dropped on his head hasn't rid him of his manners yet. (they are, however, reserved for Women.)
several days later — ]
was that cottage cheese sausage recipe supposed to be a hint?
( he is, in fact, sweet on someone but he won't offer that information unless asked. and even then, he might still be cagey about it. it's tough pining for a clown. 😔 )
which kid?
( he's been hanging around a Lot of kids recently, you'll have to be more specific. )
carnival food, eh? i can do that for you. i don't know too many who're fond of carnivals since that clown-faced tosser made it his whole brand. you know, the one on the wanted posters. i had to carry his head around in a bag when i first met the straw hats. i think it was hazing, honestly.
she speaks very highly of you. i'm glad you were there to help her. i'm teaching her to fish as punishment for stealing my good fillet knife, so if you're ever in the mood for seafood, ask her.
( the struggle of having a crush on a clown who gets bullied by teenagers (along with everyone else and their dog) ... at least shanks is mostly amused by hearing about buggy's hijinks. )
buggy? you could say i'm ... intimately familiar we sailed on the same crew together a long time ago
( as if that's all it was ... as if that's all it is now. where they stand with each other is complicated, but that's what the hot dogs are for: an olive branch of sorts. )
where was the rest of him?
i'll keep that in mind and, just for the record, she didn't learn to steal from me
( he's a good influence! sometimes. most of the time. he doesn't usually encourage children to steal. unless they start talking about becoming king of the pirates. then it's different. )
the rest of him? oh. strung up in arlong park. now defunct, of course. he got tangled up with arlong just like we did, only he turned tail and ran when we reunited him with his body. he was supposed to help us in exchange, but i guess that was asking for too much. i wasn't there when luffy tangled with him the first time, but the blood was already bad between them.
well, if she's going to learn to steal from anyone, i'd ask nami to teach her. she fessed up to the knife without me asking, so she doesn't really have the makings of a good thief, honestly. but she's a good fish-gutter. the nasty stuff doesn't scare her, which is essential to be in the kitchen. is she staying with you?
( the buggy bomb, as it tends to be, is endlessly amusing to shanks. he may never tire of it. it brings back old memories, anyway, and he's always been a bit of a romantic sap. )
well, he wasn't exactly a clown then we were just children, apprentices to a great pirate captain
( no he will not be naming names. )
but buggy's always been confrontationally challenged, you could say at least when his own self-preservation is under threat he's never shied away from screaming at me for one thing or another
( which is to say: he's not surprised. between the two of them, shanks was always the brave one. still is, it seems. buggy loves a show and equally loves to shout, but when the tide turns against him, he's usually the first one out the door. )
it's better to be a fish-gutter than in the gutter if any human were to ever catch her stealing i won't always be able to keep my eye on her but she does have a room on my ship, however she wishes to use it
can't imagine him as anything other than a clown. but you must know him pretty well.
[ that is fondness he detects in your writing, you old shitty sap. ]
luffy's different. he follows the kind of code that no other pirate does. can't expect buggy, or really anyone, to live up to that, i suppose. i won't forgive him for leaving nami to arlong's mercy, though.
i'll tell her not to steal anymore. but she took my knife because i scared her. can't really blame her for wanting to defend herself.
no need to agonize over the choice. i can make both, or i can blend the two. or all three? i'll do all three. is there anything else you're craving, nami? i still have figs, too.
wow, you can do that? so wanting both is okay right? and liking both is also okay. because you're the best chef on land or sea so everything you make is the best.
you think i'm the best chef on land or sea? coming from you, that means everything. after i'm done making your sweets, can i give you something else? something in private? it'll be sweet, too.
yeah, i do. you were testing out the connection, right? i think it worked pretty well.
nami, about that. zoro brought home a bundle of mistletoe because he thought it was edible, and i put it up all over the house because i didn't want it to go to waste. it had a strange effect on the both of us. it stopped when i had him take it all down. is that what you wanted to know about? it's not going to happen again.
i'm not mad about it. in fact, you probably felt how much i liked you two being together. that's what i wanted to talk about, actually. you could feel me, right? physically? when i was touching myself. i could feel you. sometimes when i was touching, it felt like i was touching you, almost.
yeah. i could feel you. it did feel like you were touching me. all the things you were feeling... the things you feel for zoro, that's also what made me act the way i did. i felt all of that, too. i'm not mad about it, either. you and zoro.
if you liked it, then i could do it again. for you. if it makes you happy.
( very troubling, when you're offered the thing that you want, but for all the wrong reasons. )
could you feel what i felt for you, too? i did like it, but it wouldn't make me happy if you were just doing it for me. i want you to be happy too, sanji. and i kinda thought i mean, i thought i felt something like that from you then, too. like maybe we felt the same sort of way towards zoro, a little. it felt like you wanted me to push you into it, so you could enjoy it. but, i don't know. if that's just me seeing what i want to see i'm gonna feel really bad about encouraging you to do it.
you shouldn't feel bad. none of it was your fault. i don't mind doing things for you, nami.
[ he'd been thinking a lot of things then, and feeling even more, and he doesn't know how much of it reached nami. clearly, some. the hateful lust he harbors for zoro's chiseled body and full lips and dark lashes, at least. if even an ounce of luck is on his side, she hadn't gotten a whiff of his absurd fears or his violent childhood ghosts that circle him like a carcass, all made worse every time he clashes with zoro. ]
i feel you all the time, now that we're connected. you're my whole heartbeat. you're the one i want.
but i think about you and zoro sometimes. i don't know exactly what you shared, but he he probably needs you too.
but you do understand how being with someone you don't want to be with because i want you there is messed up. right?
( we Gotta get this guy some sense of self worth. )
you're in my chest, too. heartbeat is the perfect way to put it.
we just kissed, the once. i think he doesn't want to upset you, after everything. so i'm pretty sure he needs you, too. i already told him i'm not giving you up. now i'm telling you i'm not giving him up either.
[ he tries to affirm her statement. tries to write yes, i understand. no, i don't want to be with him. but his pencil hovers over his notebook for the longest moment, his fingers still.
finally — ]
it's hard to be with him.
[ that's. the stupidest thing he's ever heard. zoro, not wanting to upset him? he would go get permanently lost in the woods if that was actually the case, or not bring home bundles of poisonous, accidentally horny shit. ]
i don't want you to give him up. i don't want you to have to give anything up. you should get everything you want and more. you deserve that. do you want to do more with him than kiss?
the lines got blurry for a number of reasons, but i don't need that anymore. i have you. and if he has you too, he doesn't need that either. you're more than enough.
the two of you being together? no. it wouldn't hurt me. i sort of like the thought of it.
( while the thought of them fighting over nami’s vagina is partially hilarious, the other part is her usual reaction to their bickering — playful annoyance. it’s time to play on the offensive side, she decides. )
what if we both got on our knees for you? whose throat would you fuck? what if you’re the one who needs satisfying?
[ this conversation has become unwieldy, and if it were anyone but nami he would have told them to shut up a long time ago, but — he doesn’t have that option here. ]
nami, i wouldn’t do that to you. it’s degrading. so his.
it is. i’m asking, what if what we want to do together involves you? what if we both want to make you feel good? you were doing a lot for both of us, last time. i want to know what it would be like the other way.
[ there isn't anything he wouldn't do for nami, his loyalty limitless, his love a steady, growing thing even if nami can't say it as freely as he can. but the things she's proposing? being with nami is easy. it's as natural as breathing. to submit himself to zoro in the same way would be like offering up a rabbit to be skinned and butchered. he can't picture himself going down without a fight. ]
( a lull in her writing, while she thinks about what to say, what wouldn’t betray zoro’s confidence. he never outright said there was anything pulpy and soft between the two of them, but it was an impression nami got — between the gaps of his words, and his hasty, almost angrily written script. not something she can necessarily describe without lying or assuming, and she doesn’t think she should, anyway. it’s about them. )
he said he didn’t think there was a you and him without me. but i don’t really think he’s thought about it. and i think you and me were under the influence of that blood gunk when we slept together at the orgy. so we also had outside intervention, like the mistletoe. but you don’t blame that, do you? because you know it would hurt my feelings. well, i think zoro’s feelings are hurt. or maybe just a little bruised. he didn’t say that, i’m assuming things.
[ no, he doesn't blame that. even without the influence of the blood ritual, being with her feels like an inevitability. he's been in love with her since the moment he first saw her sitting in the baratie, after all.
whatever... thing has been building between zoro and him, borne first of his grief over nami, it now exists as something so staunchly real that sanji can no longer pretend it away. he can't just erase the weeks of zoro's gentle hands on his bloody face, his solid presence in their shared bed at night, the brief, accidental brushes of sleep-warmed skin. he can't forget that zoro had been the one to brush his tears away with the grace to never mention his weakness, day after day. and then zoro had gotten nami back, for him, and sanji just —
he really hasn't said much of anything to zoro since. except for berating him about the mistletoe and then getting on his knees for him to put his dick in his mouth. ]
there was a me and him. i just don't really
i need to get started on your tarts. i'm going to fetch the oranges myself.
( it's definitely more than enough progress for one day — if she's honest, it's further than nami thought she would get anyway, so she's happy to let it rest there. in fact, the reasonable thing to do would be to let sanji process alone, and give him the same distance he gave her, when she ran away.
unfortunately, she is not sanji. she is much worse. )
can i come with? we don't have to talk, i just wanna shop. ( see: spend time with you. ) i'll let you carry my baaaaag. and you can teach me how to spot the good fruits from the bad ones.
( she grew up in a tangerine grove. she knows a spoiled orange when she sees it. what she doesn't know is if sanji will spiral or not without distractions. )
[ he wouldn't say no to nami regardless, but especially not after losing her — and he has time, anyway, to wipe his eyes, his notebook balanced on his knees where he sits on the floor of their bedroom, his back against the door. his throat feels tight, his hands unsteady as he writes.
at least this way he can avoid seeing zoro until he's busy in the kitchen, and it'll be easy enough to shoo him into the bedroom, where nami is sure to be dozing by then with a belly full of sweet pastries. nami had mentioned the idea of her and zoro enough times that sanji is comfortable believing it's what she wants, rather than whatever... all of this was. both of them, coming after him. ]
of course you can come with me! fruit-picking with nami 💓 i'll see you soon!
( though the only thing she can think of off the top of her head is how to burn a body so no one knows there was ever a body to begin with, and she knows she can't say that out loud. )
But there are no lakes at Withywoods. Buck is the coastal town.
I have many eyes to spare. ( and, since it's sanji, and she knows he's too nice to agree to it otherwise — she fibs. a little. ) It would be a great relief to be rid of some of them. They are very uncomfortable, under my clothes, and they keep growing. I was going to ask if they might remove some anyway.
i'll teach you how to swim. you can't just not know.
[ yes, anyone with at least one eye has noticed that bee has an excess of eyes. that still doesn't mean that sanji wants a witch to take any of hers, not when he knows what that feels like. maybe these new assholes in town are experts on harvesting body parts, but he doesn't think it'll go any better than when maria had taken his. ]
we can make you new clothes if they're bothering your eyes. you don't have to get rid of them. aren't they useful to have?
Maybe. ( very cagey about it — monstrosity is not new to bee, but that doesn't mean she likes to lay it out in writing, for someone she hopes to be good friends with forever more. ) I do not want to talk about it. I want to give you an eye. It isn't charity, dear Sanji. I have a surplus, and you have a need. That is economics.
[ but she isn't wrong. sanji has somewhat adjusted to his new sense of vision, but with basic tasks. when it comes to setting sail again, he isn't worried about his job as the straw hats' cook. he's worried about protecting his captain and his crew, when his skills as a fighter have been significantly diminished. what will luffy say, when he sees how his value has gone down? ]
bee. when they took my eye, it hurt. a lot. you'll need blood to heal. all changelings do. but you know the cold has made it hard to find any animals. i don't have any reserves for you.
[ nami's bottles had been a horrible idea. and yet. ]
you'll drink my blood to get better. you'll be sick for a long time otherwise, like i was. that's it. that's the deal. agree or piss off.
( at least, he left scrolls out that bee read, when she rifled through his study without him knowing. same thing. )
Once, Dwalia beat me so badly my nose cracked like a twig under foot and I breathed out blood on every exhale. Once too, she dropped me so badly on my shoulder it popped itself from the adjoining bone and hung my arm like dead weight at my side. Pain is no stranger to me. Not to Bee, the Destroyer. At least there is purpose behind this pain. And at least I will have you, which is more than I have ever had before. You are the best friend I have ever had, including the cats.
Okay. ( she imagines sanji will probably make himself sick with trying to help her — and selfishly, childishly, she's more endeared to the attention than worried. ) Do you want to stay on the ship with me and Mister Shanks? Or should I stay with you and your friends?
( distantly bee, who is a Proper lady, finds it pretty scandalous that two men and a woman live together. but she also thinks it's cool, like sanji is some kind of rebel to pompous, stuffy society. )
just because you know what pain is doesn't mean i want you to feel it more.
[ a beat, as his pencil taps against the page. ]
the thing with the nose and the shoulder. both of those happened to me, too. who's dwalia?
you have to stay with me, because i have to stay with my friends. they're not doing so well. i'm taking care of them so they'll get better. i can take care of you, too.
She is the Servant who kidnapped me. ( she knows sanji has morals bee will never understand, belief in the good of people even when they spit in your face and make you bleed. bee does not believe in the good of humans. she's seen too much of the opposite — still, she isn't wholly without pity. she did not feel justified watching dwalia whipped, only sad she'd fallen from so high, and taken bee with her. ) She is heartless and evil. That is the truth.
Who takes care of Sanji?
( she knows the answer: bee, now. )
I have a secret to tell you. But I do not want to tell anyone else, only you.
it's not part of yours anymore. not a big part, anyway. cooking can be painful, but not like getting your nose broken.
[ so dwalia sounds bad. this isn't the time to remind bee that women are mysterious and unknowable, and that she probably had her reasons. she'll realize it with time, just like he can look back now and think of his brothers with more complex emotions than hatred. ]
i don't need anyone to take care of me. i'm a grown man.
what's your secret? i already know you're a princess, and a shitty one.
( it's only fair to ask — and maybe that's why bee is so forthcoming with information, beyond that of a child who likes to hear herself talk. it means fair is fair, and sanji owes her the same. )
I do not need anyone to take care of me, either. But I like it, sometimes. To feel cared for.
The eyes ( an awkward wait in her words ) well they can hypnotize people. Please do not tell anyone. I thought if I might try it on an animal, I might be able to help you hunt better. If we even saw one, I could lure it close. And well I am very strange as you know. I can talk to them too, sometimes. Animals. When they want to talk to me. Some are more friendly. I might be able to locate where more are. Please do not tell anyone. We might feed you and your friends. Make sure you don't tell anyone though.
[ he hasn't told nami or zoro or anyone on his crew. he hasn't even told zeff, though he has the sneaking suspicion that zeff probably figured out some semblance of truth after suffering his erratic behavior for years, and showed him the singular kindness of pretending not to know. ]
my family. my brothers. i have three of them.
that's because you're a little princess, and little princesses are meant to be taken care of.
[ he wouldn't tell anyone even if she hadn't asked. it would only take one asshole to see the value in her abilities in a time when half of them are starving since maria and her witches have closed the doors of the castle. ]
i won't tell anyone. i don't want anyone to think they can use you. if i get your eye, will you teach me how to do it? you don't have to if you don't want to. but if i can feed you and my friends, it'll be good. if i can feed everyone else, it'll be even better.
( bee recalls a dream she had, once, as a little girl just learning to leave her bed for the first time — three candles, three flames burn brighter than the sun / their blaze engulfs an evil done / their angry mourning purpose gives / they do not know their child still lives, and one candle broken in her tiny fist, held together only by the adjoining wick, child, light the fire. burn the future and the past. it’s what you were born to do.
she wonders if sanji is meant to be her tool, her broken candle clenched in her hand. the catalyst, they call it — it makes her sad, because she loves him, and wishes for nothing but his own lasting happiness. )
Do they know you yet live?
You are as precious to me as a prince or princess, and perhaps even more so. I will take care of you.
( it strikes her, the reason why adults so insist on you telling the truth, always — inevitably it comes out, and it only makes you look dumb, and who would want a dumb kid? but she can't tell sanji the outlining facts of her deformity — that she can hypnotize, but the eyes then explode in their sockets, waiting to be refilled — or else he won't agree to her offer. she sees the unfolding events as plainly as a storybook lesson. she'll just have to think of another lie, or at least a way to avoid the truth. )
I will teach you, since you will teach me to swim. It is not difficult.
[ do they know? furthermore, would they even care? not beyond having a laugh or fantasizing about how they might hurt him. he's gotten strong now, thanks to zeff's teachings, but the thought of facing his brothers again sends fear cold as bitter ice running through his veins. his father wouldn't help him. he'd want to watch, to gauge where his abilities lie now after all these years. ]
i think they assume things. they can't know for sure. the world's big. they can't find me.
you really don't understand the proper way of things, do you?
[ but it makes him smile, to think of little bee taking care of him. she is, in a way, with the offer of an eye. the offer to teach him something new. then he can take care of her, and protect her secret, and be her eyes when he needs to be. ]
you know, i've been talking to animals since i was a kid. my first friend was a mouse. he was my first customer too. so if you think you're strange for that, then you'd have to call me strange too.
( she's not sure what would happen if they did. it would just be bad — world endingly bad, even. )
I have six half brothers. Chivalry, Nimble, Swift, Steady, Just, and Hearth. And my foster brother, Hap. And my full sister, Lady Nettle. None of them would ever hurt me. Family should not do that to each other. Your family failed you, I think in unforgivable ways. At the same time, I think everything must have purpose inside itself. Maybe if your family was not so cruel to you, we never would have met, and I would not love you so much. It does not justify what they did, but maybe without their mistreatment of you, your whole life would be completely different.
( for the better? bee can't say that for him. she isn't sure the exchange of an awkward, difficult little girl is equal to that of an entire family — but she will endeavor to make it better. for sanji, who deserves if nothing else, a world class fish gutter. )
Proper way? You sound like my Da.
Did your mouse friend have a name? I was always scared of the mice. Well, rats. I never thought to speak with them. You are truly thoughtful, Chef Sanji.
( since she doodled a seal for koby, she does one for sanji as well — a tiny rat, bangs cast down to its nose to cover one missing eye drawn with an x. it wields a fork in its hand. she takes care in the calligraphy she uses to label it sanji the wise. )
( a concerning thing for a chef: the sound of someone, early in the morning, rooting around in his kitchen, with the distinct impression of not wanting to be heard. far be it from bee to show up uninvited, but today is a special enough occasion that she thinks the oversight in manners could be overlooked in favor of this. this, of course, being a slanted, three-tier cake that seemingly popped up out of nowhere. it's unbecoming in a way that only childlike earnestness can hope to achieve — the color of the cake just a little too brown, peaking through the shellacked yellow frosting that's just a little too melty, making the whole creation structurally questionable. bee is not saved from the mania either, a thick streak of frosting in her hair almost like she used it to gel her hair back — body otherwise a tapestry of little sugary smudges, from her face to her arms, which support a piping bag currently decorating the cake with little blue swirls in several different shades.
it's not especially traditional for writing to be on any cake in the six duchies, if only because mostly older generation bakers don't know how to read or write. so, she didn't think about addressing it — but there is a smudgy painting made on the cake's face with frosting, a bunny curled up on its back, a red heart painted on its chest. along the sides of the cake, and what she's currently piping, are little decorative bees at random places.
yes, the kitchen is a mess. and yes, she does expect to get cuffed for it. but bee has a friend, and that friend has a birthday, so this is the most important thing that has ever and will ever happen to her. )
[ the first time anyone celebrated sanji's birthday had been disastrous. patty had sussed it out of him when he was turning twelve, and sanji had thought nothing of it, having spent far too many birthdays without a birthday to expect one now — but then he'd walked into the kitchen for breakfast prep, and everyone at the baratie jumped out and started singing behind an enormous, flaming cake, and sanji had felt his soul leave his body. he'd been so spooked that he'd instantly burst into uncontrollable sobs, much to zeff's horror, and then when reality scratched the surface and he realized it was his birthday they were all celebrating, he'd been even more inconsolable.
it hadn't been the last birthday of his they'd celebrated together, just the worst one. but after that, zeff learned quickly of sanji's intolerance to surprises, and it had been (relatively) smooth sailing from then on. to this day, sanji doesn't put much importance on his birthday anyway, telling no one, not even nami and zoro, and he's glad for it because he wakes up like every other day as of late — with bile in his throat and an urgent need to piss.
the sun is barely up as he hangs over the toilet, hacking up the little he'd been able to stomach the night before. whatever's happening to his body, he's not a fucking fan. straightening, he plucks his crisp shirt from where it's hanging on the back of the door, pulling it on and cuffing the sleeves, then dragging his trousers up and notching the belt. he looks almost normal, if not for the velveteen ears drooping into his hair. thanks to his renewed connection with nami, his antlers are hidden away because he's tired of hearing zoro complain about the constant threat of losing an eye in his sleep.
speaking of eyes. he brushes his hair down over the gray one, and then hears a noise from the kitchen. his gaze narrows, and then he's striding out, ready to pin an intruder to the wall with his foot, but the sight that greets him is far more horrifying. he's twelve again, facing a room of rambunctious cooks and a flaming cake — except the cake is almost certainly going to sink in the next five minutes, if it's lucky.
normally, he'd start with what she did right (a lot, actually — it's still functionally cake), and then go into why it's about to topple. but his eyes prickle hotly, and something sticky clogs his throat, and his mood tilts far, far to the left.
he slams a hand down on the counter, rattling sugary bowls and sticky spoons. the cake, to its credit, stands tall. ]
( admittedly, while she knew eventually she would be caught and while that is the point of a surprise, bee hadn't considered sanji would be more than passably angry at her wrecking of his kitchen. she isn't going to make him clean it — maybe that's why his eyes are all wet? when people feel intense emotions that they don't bother to hide, it's like they all reach out to bee and slap her, demanding acknowledgement. it had dulled before, when she first came to this village — now it's like the power of the skill is making up for lost time, multiplied tenfold by the intense expression of sanji's emotive eyes. overtime, she's gotten better at looking him in his face when he speaks, but now she steps off the chair she was using to bring herself to a height with the counter, moving to put her back to a wall, and staring at sanji's knees with a dozen eyes. expectantly awaiting her beating. )
It is your birthday. One's second of the third.
( which she heard in a dream, sort of. just not her own, and not the kind that needs to be written down.
apparently lady nettle, bee's some three decades older sister and skillmistress at buckkeep, is quite a skilled dreamwalker. it isn't a talent bee thought she had, and not one she could easily replicate, but something about sanji's dream had dragged her into it, maybe thanks to all of his blood she had drunken lately, like his dream wanted her to acknowledge it. so, she did. it didn't seem like a bad dream exactly, but tense, which she figured was because he didn't know how to tell anyone it was his birthday. now it seems like an invasion she can't exactly admit to, without him getting even more angry, so she keeps her gaze downcast and her mouth sealed, fingers belatedly untying the apron around her waist. )
Are you going to kick me? ( it seems unthinkable to her that sanji would, but maybe if she made him angry enough. along with the skill comes the ghost of a wolf who lives inside her, who reminds her do not seek out trouble, little cub and if he lunges, use your teeth which bee already knows she won't. it had been satisfying to rip out a chunk of dwalia — it wouldn't feel good to do to sanji. embarrassing herself, she reverts back to the child she once was, and makes a whining humming sound in the back of her throat, like sanji's displeasure has wounded her. ) I will clean up your kitchen. I apologize for the mess.
[ the realization hits him suddenly, that bee is sanji cowering against the wall, and sanji is his father. not zeff (not that zeff would be altogether better, because he'd still kick sanji in the head), but judge vinsmoke, berating him for having the audacity to dirty his hands with servants' work in the kitchen, for wanting to serve food to someone at all. princes don't serve others. neither should a princess, which is what bee really is.
he is, truly, destined to be the worst parent to whatever is kicking around inside of him, because of what he has to go on. a man who faked his death and locked him in a dungeon. and zeff, who he'd die for, but still wouldn't subject bee to. the urge to cry intensifies, but he can't, because he's a man and bee's a kid, and that's not the way things are supposed to go. he also shouldn't have something kicking against his bladder at all hours of the day, but shit happens. ]
You'd die if I kicked you. [ bee's so small, and he can break bones with his legs. the thought repulses him, and his throat grows even tighter that she would ask. ] I don't fight women. Keep your apron on.
[ he remembers an earlier argument, that bee's not yet a woman, just a shitty little kid. he doesn't know what bee is actually going to grow up into anymore, with all her eyes and her wings. but whatever it is, she'll remain firmly in the category of people he won't fight.
his eyes drop to the colorfully decorated cake. it's sunken in the middle, and lopsided. most likely, she opened the oven too many times during baking, a mistake only made out of childish excitement. ]
I didn't tell you when my birthday was. [ his mouth tightens in that annoyingly pathetic way it does when he's about to cry, and he starts gathering bowls and spoons to take to the sink, stacking them in neatly dirtied piles with his back to bee. ] Celebrations are for shitty little kids. When's yours?
( she hums, discontent — the sound of a wounded bird putting pressure on a leg, and not knowing where the pain comes from, only that it's there and vibrant and real, unsure why sanji is so displeased with her. well. not so displeased — he said he wouldn't hit her, which is more than she's ever gotten from the servants, so she'll take the win where she can, retying the apron around her, extra string from the belt knotted around her front. she warbles, wondering. sanji has his back to her, like he can't look at her — a little like how bee can't look at him sometimes, when his feelings are too loud. she hesitates. then steps up next to him, taking the cake and the plate she put it on and moving it from his reach, to the dining table. she knows sanji isn't one to waste food, but she'd never forgive him if he took his anger out on her cake.
then again, it is as ugly thing, so maybe it would be better served in the garbage. frowning, bee stares at it critically, trying to find the misstep. maybe it was presumptuous to put bees next to bunnies. it wouldn't be surprising to hear sanji only tolerates her, although that wouldn't stop it from hurting. then again, bee is nothing but one big ball of hurt, convinced no one who has ever been has ever loved her, so maybe it is nothing but poetic justice, for a child as intolerable as her. she doesn't know. )
I was born in the midwinter, the 20th of December. ( near enough to the longest night of the year. she stares at sanji's back hopefully, digging her teeth into her lips before continuing on. ) My mother was pregnant for two and a half years. I remember being in her stomach.
( she's learned, this isn't entirely usual for children to remember — most can't remember their first days alive, but bee remembers it all, every gasp to the ghastly sight of her, every promise she wouldn't live another hour, even an assassination attempt on her part, asleep in her baby's bassinet. )
I had a dream which told me your birthday. I saw a small mouse with a crown of flowers, daffodils and primroses, who was born from a cat who eats little mice when they aren't fast enough. And the mouse said, "I won't get any older, so I won't change, so I will always be quick, and one step ahead." I saw the mouse with a huge feast of fruits, having outsmarted the cat, to say it's birthday would be everyday but the one day it was, which was March the 2nd. But the mouse did not look happy, to be perched among oranges and limes and be without any other mice to share it with. ( she pauses, taking a deep breath. ) Did I misinterpret? Dreams are so sly, so sneaky, sometimes. They can mean so many things. I thought it meant you wanted to be celebrated, to share food with ... um, well, to share with people, I suppose. I thought you would like it.
[ two and a half years. sanji has learned not to be surprised by anything that comes out of bee's mouth, but that's alarming in a way that it wouldn't have been a few weeks ago, because it wouldn't have been relevant to him. it's very relevant now, all things considered. he's chosen not to keep track of everything that's happening, mostly because everything is shitty, and he's discovered that zoro watches him like a goddamn hawk anyway, so if anything else happens to him, the idiot swordsman is sure to let him know.
all sanji wants to do is cook, and even that is getting cumbersome. he needs bee's help more than ever now, because he tires easily, and his back feels eighty years older. something shifts inside of him, and he ignores that, too.
a little mouse. oranges and limes. sanji is not an idiot. he throws a mixing bowl into the sink and wipes his eyes, thinking of the little mouse his father threw from his window when he'd found sanji had cooked a meal for it and made it his friend. ]
Yeah, you misinterpreted.
[ it's complicated to put into words. he doesn't want zoro or nami or bee fussing over him now, when he prefers to be the one presenting them with their favorite dishes. what he wants is impossible. what he wants is to go back in time, when he was five and six and seven, and give himself a birthday that wasn't full of tears and terror and pain. he wants to be the man he is now for the shitty little kid he used to be. impossible.
he leans against the counter, gripping a dishcloth. the cake has moved and so has bee, hovering near the dining table like sanji's the big bad wolf. like he's the mouse-eating cat. ]
You're the mouse. [ sanji swallows back the tightness in his throat, plucking two silver forks from the drawer and moving to the table. maybe it doesn't have to be impossible after all. he made the mistake once of giving up on the all blue. he doesn't intend to do it again. ] If you cut that cake, it'll fall apart.
[ he pulls the bench out and gestures for bee to sit, holding out a fork for her. then he pulls out his lighter and one of his clove-scented cigarettes, because he doesn't have birthday candles, sticking it into the corner of his mouth and scraping out a flame. ]
You're not going to like it. [ he blows out a stream of smoke, then offers her the cigarette. ] Take a little breath. It'll burn your throat otherwise.
( she says, defensively. not that she knows anything about it. still, it's hard to doubt when looking at the thing — an unsightly pile of too much frosting and not enough patience, caving in, slanting sideways. she hates it, and wishes it was better. she hates herself too, for much the same reasons.
hesitating, bee eventually settles on the bench, moving with an effort to seem unbothered, to tug the cake in a tactical position away from sanji like he might forget about it if it isn't immediately next to him. most bets are off when he offers his cigarette though, bee's many eyes wide and imploring as if she's been given some kind of treasure. she accepts it, initially holding the stem of it with the pointer fingers and thumbs of both her hands, before holding it how she's seen sanji do it, between two fingers. bee might've scented the smoke off the stable hand workers in withywoods before, but her core memories of cigarettes are all from sanji — this, then, is some kind of generous sharing, bee thinks. like opening a door and letting her in.
she tries to follow instructions, but very predictably fails at it, almost immediately erupting in a coughing fit. the hand with the cigarette juts out towards sanji to take back, while she coughs into the elbow of her opposite arm, tongue licking at the cloth of her shirtsleeve to get rid of the taste. )
Bleh! You do that for fun?
( she actually has no idea why he does it, or what would ever lead anyone to do something so awful. it's actually — kind of funny, how absolutely terrible it is, and eventually her coughs turn into the turkey gobble that is synonyms with bee's happy laughter. )
Do I look like you?
( a silly question, which bee only realizes after the fact, because bee doesn't look like anyone. not her father or her mother, not other little girls, not even other humans, anymore. still, the question comes out with a desperate twinge of hopefulness she doesn't intend to be there — like being comparable to sanji might be the the single greatest thing anyone could give her. even if she is a little mad he didn't like her cake. )
[ it cracks through some of his casing, taking back the cigarette to watch her hack and complain, which is exactly what he'd done at his first drag, with zeff staring on disapprovingly. he'd been so desperate to prove a point — that he was a man, not some stupid child — that he'd been determined to like it, determined to not give a single shit about zeff's warnings of dulling his sense of taste. addiction had gotten him quickly, easier than breathing. ]
It's how I relax. [ which means he should never, ever be stressed. ] You shouldn't pick up the habit.
[ carefully, he sinks his fork into a rounded corner of the cake, slicing off a neat mouthful. the taste of spun sugar and frosting settles on his tongue, melting away. it doesn't matter to him if the cake topples. he'll eat every last crumb no matter what. he remembers the first time he ever attempted a cake, and it was far worse than this one. ]
We have the same eyes. [ he takes another bite, his empty stomach suddenly ravenous. ] Even if we didn't, who else is gonna look like me? You're the only one.
[ the uncertainty of what lies in his future — specifically, what lies inside of him — notwithstanding. he hasn't had that discussion with bee, or anyone, because thinking about it makes the space behind his eyeballs throb. he's eaten a third of the cake before he even realizes it, turning the plate toward bee. ]
You have any dreams about — [ a faltering pause, when he can't decide how to ask. ] The future?
( hesitating a moment, eventually the corners of bee's mouth curve up in a smile, the muscles in her cheeks unused to moving in such a way, but his acceptance of her is a gift and her smile is the gift she offers in return. privately, she thinks sanji more represents the queen mother kettricken, tall and fair-haired and blue-eyed, but the only memory bee has of her is her pitying look to bee's too large bassinet, not insisting on officially adding her to the royal bloodline and accepting her role as princess, because. well, no one thought bee would live more than a few days, and after her years of life, had never bothered to check back in. she prefers sanji to be her kin, wholly — even if bee knows who she actually resembles, and doesn't much care for the comparison.
in any case, she watches him owlishly while he eats, waiting to see disapproval or disgust on his face, and instead finding herself shyly happy that he seems to like his cake. it's orange flavored, sprinkled with lime zest, a recipe she uncomfortably asked someone in market for, her eyes on their feet, trying not to enunciate her words too oddly. well worth the social effort now to see sanji eat it. her own fork dips into the softer insides sanji unveiled, happily eating the sweet cake — more of a luxury at home than it seems to be here.
at his question, bee perks, staring at him and then pointedly away, as if lying. her several eyes swivel back to him, throat bobbing on a swallow. ) Yes. I only dream of the future.
( the wolf in her is displeased by her offering of information. bee frowns, eyes drooping to the cake, fork scooping up a frosting bee and buzzing it around in a lazy spiral. she's really not used to adults taking her dreams seriously. she's never had to explain them before, because no one, except for villains, have ever wanted to know. )
They are not to be trusted, in how you hope they would be. Mostly, the dreams are there to look back on when something happens, to say, "yes, maybe I did see that coming." Or maybe it hadn't happened yet, and you will say it again when the next thing happens. It is very imprecise. ( blinking back to him, she eats the bee with a babyish suck. ) But I do dream of you often. Or, what I imagine to be you. Sometimes in the shape of a mouse or a fox. Once, you were like a blue ribbon, with one frayed edge, and one whole side — once, too, I saw you like a knife with gilded handle so fine, it looked to be from something of a different age entirely. Once, I saw you like a seed, with a curling sprout from your shell with three dangling drops of dew, and only one fell. ( rambling, she frowns, setting her fork down and gesturing with her hands, like grabbing the words out from the space in front of her, wrestling with herself, before sighing and looking at sanji rather pitifully, hands pressing flat on the table ) I know what it is you want to know, but I do not have much to tell you. If I do not speak my dreams, I get very sick, so I started to write them down in the dirt because I had no paper fine enough to house them, and no one could read them. Like this. ( she writes invisible words on the table with the tip of one food dye colored finger, there and then gone. ) I do not want my dreams to be used to change the world. I could speak them to you, but ... they are tricky, like sifting your fingers through silt and hoping for gold. You might find nothing. You might find something not meant for you, nor what grows inside you. You see? What if I speak a dream and the dream hurt you? Then you would hate me.
( a put upon sigh — the most stressed, responsible nine year old there ever was. ) Maybe I do have something to tell you. If ... if you promise to believe me. And not doubt. And not tell anyone! It is a secret.
[ bee's descriptions all start to run together, slipping through his fingers as he tries to piece them into a finished puzzle. a mouse. a fox. a knife. none of it makes sense, only the seed with the dew drops sends his throat tightening again, like something instinctive within him knows what that means, but he can't voice it or even think about it. there's a lot, lately, that he can't think about, all his changes rushing at him at once.
the best change, at least, is that he can taste bee's cake, zesty and sweet. it's the most he's eaten at once in days, his gratitude softening his edges. he hates skipping meals, not because of a sense of gluttony, but because he's never been able to shake the feeling of not knowing when he might have to go without again. ]
Dreams can't hurt you. [ he forces himself to say it, and to look like he believes it. ] You said it yourself — you can't even trust them. They're one step away from not being real, if you decide they aren't. They're only exactly what you want them to be.
[ he lifts a corner of bee's apron and wipes a smear of frosting from her mouth, then pushes an unruly lock of hair from her cheek. the urge to take her into his lap can be chalked up to all the havoc being wreaked inside his body. ]
What kind of secret? [ he scoops off another forkful of cake, and this time brings it to bee's lips, his other hand lifting his cigarette to his lips for a drag. ] Is it the kind that's gonna piss me off?
( she's learned to listen to sanji when he speaks, to take his word for gospel, because he doesn't like to repeat himself and bee likes the praise for a job well done. thoughtful. dreams can't hurt you, perhaps even when they're true and awful, because they only show what is destined to be, already written in the fabric of the universe. bee gets impressions sometimes, of a dream that is sure to happen versus a dream that is only likely to happen — and sometimes too, a dream so farfetched it seems as impossible as all the rest. what does it mean for a prophet to see the future? a good, potential ending. the steps unfolded to make it come true. being one step away from not being real, means they're also one step away from being the truth.
but, she does like the sentiment. they're only exactly what you want them to be. sanji is very wise, which isn't surprising. )
Mm. ( she shakes her head no, a little happy to be babied but not shameless enough to admit it. leaning forward, she bites off the offering bit of cake with a contemplative air, before shrugging her shoulders, unsure. ) Well, maybe. There is much that pisses you off.
( scooching down the bench with a few effort-ridden tugs, bee fits herself under sanji's spread arm, leaning into his side. she keeps her eyes focused on the table, where she places the pointer fingers of each hand along the rough edge. )
Most people have this many parents. I have this many. ( one of her middle fingers joins the count. wolf father painfully nips at her soul, and she figures telling sanji she has a fourth parent who is a wolf who is a ghost who lives inside her mind might be a bridge too far. the hand with only the pointer finger bends and unfurls repeatedly, to draw attention. ) My mother, Molly, the most wonderful and beautiful woman who ever lived. And my father, FitzChivalry Farseer. ( her other pointer finger scrunches, up and down. he doesn't get as lofty an introduction, because bee is usually quite angry with him and also a little guilty, for starting to think of both shanks and sanji as more parental figures for her. ) They are Buck, through and through. Dark skin and dark hair and dark eyes, tall and built. When I was born, many assumed I was a bastard, that my mother was unfaithful, because I look so very unlike my father, Fitz. I look almost nothing like him.
( mostly, her curls are their only connected feature. her middle finger catches on the edge of the table, the last in the trio. ) My second father, though. I look exactly like him, as he is a White, like me. My two fathers ... ( she stretches her fingers out, before they twist together, the motion of a lying child tucking their hand behind their back. ) Mixed, soulwise. As if my father Fitz was blue, and my father Fool was red, and they became purple together. When it came time to put a baby in my mother, there was only Fitz. In fact, I have only barely met the other man, and he never met my mother.
( she looks up to sanji, her earlike wings flicking back, as if dejected. )
I hope the point of the story is, sometimes children are born in strange circumstances beyond understanding. But they ...
( could be like bee? she's not sure it's a good thing, if sanji will think it's a good thing. forgetting to end the sentence, she tosses her head into him, puppyish and boneless, slumping against his side. glad he isn't angry with her. glad he likes the cake. glad to not feel so alone, sitting beside him, the kitchen smelling like baked cake and the scent of sanji's clove cigarettes. )
[ even if following bee's story is like meandering through the forest without a clue of the direction — which is how he assumes zoro has spent his whole life traveling — he understands the sentiment. she's a sharp child, and even if sanji hasn't spoken to her about why he's harder on her now, why her lessons have taken a faster pace, why she does more of the things he does, she knows. she knows just like he does, just like nami does, just like zoro does. just like everyone does, even if he's avoided saying it. ]
I don't even know what's gonna come out of me.
[ he takes a long drag, bee warm against his side. she isn't as bony as when they first met, not since sanji started feeding her, but her wings and plethora of eyes will always make her look strange to everyone else. sanji doesn't see anything out of the ordinary when he looks at her. just another annoying, shitty kid he has to take care of.
thinking too deeply about bee's two fathers and one mother makes something curl up in his chest, something fragile and gossamer, and then he's pulling bee into his lap, pressing his nose into the top of her hair and holding her like she's a rag doll. his breath soaks her unruly locks as he remembers only distantly the feeling of his mother's arms, the sound of her voice, the soft bell of her laugh. so much has happened in the space of her dying until now, so many bad memories to push out all the good ones of her. ]
Tell me your good memories about your dad. [ he hugs her even tighter, turning his head just slightly so smoke can escape the corner of his mouth. ] The one you know best.
( bee has half a mind to remind sanji she isn't a little baby anymore, but she bites her tongue and tucks into him instead, toeing off her shoes on the opposite side of the bench. why? well, bee has been starved of affection long enough to know there's nothing more fleeting than the presence of someone in your life. she knows what's going to come out of sanji — something small and vulnerable and innocent, waiting to be loved. she knows sanji too. that the call to love something willing and needy is too great to overlook. bee knows it's a nasty, evil thing inside her that makes her hate something that might take sanji away from her, much as she knows she can't very well insist a parent abandon their young just because hers had. the reality of it is, she has no real staked claim on sanji. she has a father — has three, even. sanji is allowed to make his own family, and he's allowed to love them more.
the cuddle is, then, a marker of inevitability. like the world works in cycles, so do people — people always leave her, and so it is probably the last time. bee will treasure it. )
Mm.
( tiny hands lay over sanji's, head thumped back on his chest. she tries to tilt her head back far enough to look at him, but the angle isn't right, so she looks down at his ringed fingers instead, twisting one of them about his knuckle. )
I was born to Withywoods Manor, the place of my youth. It is an old, old castle — much of it I had never seen, as it was closed off, without use. Anyway, once my Da showed me a secret passage in his study, like a den for a bear cub. He gave it to me, to make my own, to watch him while he worked in solitude. It was the best gift I have ever been given. ( she turns her lips up awkwardly in a smile. ) After Ma died, I do believe my father struggled with me. He did not know what he was meant to do, I think, and neglected me for awhile. But when he realized his mistake, he took it upon himself to treat me like a little princess! Ma never would have spoiled me so. We went to market in Oaksbywater for Winterfest, and he bought me all manner of things I never asked for — hot chestnuts and a new saddle for my horse, Prissy, with little bees carved on the flaps, and a leather belt and a bracelet and a cake. He even let me buy gifts for my lady's maid, Careful, and our steward, Revel. Best of all was the seashell seller, as I had never been to the sea before, nor seen something so beautiful. That was the best day I have ever had, truly.
( not because of the gifts, really, but because she was rich with her father's sometimes wayward and unfocused affection. at least — until he left her. fumbling, she reaches into the pocket of her overalls at the center of her chest, and pulls out a handkerchief (this time embroidered with a fox) tied at the crosswise corners, a bounty sitting in the pouch it made. she sets it on the table in front of them, before sinking back into sanji's hug. )
You have probably seen a lot of seashells. I did not consider that. Shanks helped me find them — I was not sure what you would like for your birthday. ( quietly, ) Are all your memories of your father awful?
[ it's hard to tell, from bee's sweetly meandering story, what exactly the deal with her father was. sanji understands being unwanted — it's not that. or not exactly that, at least not in the way sanji knows it. there's love there, and a desire to be loved, along with what he thinks might be a fundamental lack of knowledge on how to raise a child, much less a child like bee.
he might have that in common with her father. after all, his memories of his mother are fading, and everything he learned from zeff, he learned in the same way someone might suffer a traumatic brain injury. he doesn't want his child to turn out to be a shithead like him.
if whatever is inside of him is even... that. he feels more like a freak than anything else, with nothing in this world making sense except for hunger and pain on most days. but then there are the days with nami’s smile and zoro’s warmth — and this. bee, pressed so soft and tight against him that he feels like she’s been his all along. ]
Will you go to the town over with me? A day for just the two of us. [ it’s not anyone’s fault that he feels suffocated by all the careful attention to his health. he just isn’t used to it. ] We can shop for our own chestnuts and jewelry and sweets. And it’s warm enough to look for more shells. We’ll fill up a jar with our best ones.
[ he sifts through the handkerchief, fingering a shell bleached the pale color of bee’s hair. that’s two presents, the cake and the shells. it’s more than he’d ever gotten for too many lonely years of his life. ]
You can learn things even from awful people. [ so, yes — every single memory of his father is awful. the worst part is that they’re etched more starkly in his mind than the hazy ones he has left of his mother. ] I might’ve never discovered my dream if not for him. The All Blue, a place full of exotic fish and plants and spices. A chef’s paradise. I’ll cook you something grand when I get there.
[ he hopes that she’s there with him when he finds it. his cheek rests against her hair as he idly blows smoke, his mismatched eyes half-lidded. ]
You didn’t tell anyone else about my birthday, did you? [ he can’t imagine having to go through more than once today. ] I don’t want Nami or Zoro to know. I like that it’s just our secret.
( it's apparent to bee, as apparent to anyone else who spends time with bee, that the real north of her heart is placed in people who want to spend time with her. she sees the bi-lines, all the connective pieces of tissue to make her who she is — she used to sit in the tress of withywood manor, behind thick walls of stone and inside the secret tunnels of the house, to spy on the other children having fun and playing with each other. children with pink, rosy cheeks, children who didn't need to be taught to laugh — normal kids who weren't difficult to love, who instinctively hated her. the largest parts of bee's life thus far have taken place on the outside of a door, looking in through the window pane. anyone wanting her around for any amount of time is a gift, she's learned. loneliness is more her enemy than dwalia.
leaning back, she shifts in sanji's lap, fumbling around until she's sitting across him, feet tucked into his thigh, knees resting against his chest. she looks up at him for a long while, colorless, pale eyes blinking. )
I will go with you.
( she tries to say it without any inclination of emotion, which isn't hard for her. once he knows she wants it, it'll be all too easy to break her heart.
not that it's a hard thing to do — sanji already knows she loves him, privately thinking his buck name would be a very suitable prince lovely. because he wants it, he gives it, he has it. love pours out of sanji like blood pours from a slain beast. nuzzling under his chin, bee lazily fists a hand in the front of his shirt, letting her eyes fall closed. she woke up early for the cake, and is very notably very cranky first thing in the morning. )
Your dream ... ( she commits the all blue to memory, deciding she'll look for it in her coming dreams. blue is a color that she associates with sanji — blue and yellow. it makes it more of a challenge, and that makes it fun. ) Why did you decide to become a chef in the beginning of all things, Da?
( she doesn't notice her slip up, too tired to check herself. if she did, she'd probably run away, somewhere where no one could find her, where she could be loathsome, hateful daughter in peace. as it is, she just frowns, shaking her head. )
I did not say. ( it's clear from her tone of voice that she thinks his birthday is something everyone should know, that all should celebrate. ) But I always keep your secrets. You can trust Bee.
( it's not like nami didn't tell zoro a while ago that scribbling out his words doesn't stop them from being scrawled across his recipient's page as he writes, but —
it's also very hard to think about anything other than his ... whatever sanji is to him — and his hot, wet cunt.
[ it's actually comforting that zoro is still a complete fucking idiot when it comes to writing in the notebook, especially considering all the changes hitting sanji at a breakneck speed. ]
thought you liked men.
[ where'd his patience go? probably wherever his bladder control has wandered off to. ]
this isn't about nami it's about you and your goddamn insecurities that you take out on me when all i've ever tried to do is
( — what? care? give sanji what he wants, even when it's what zoro wants, too, knowing that he'll have to bear the harsh sting of rejection that follows? he's endured a lot in his life. this will just be another thing for him to choke down and use to toughen himself again. )
but fine
i'll leave you the fuck alone if that's what you want even if i think you're full of shit
but what happens when in two days you decide that you need me and my hands and my mouth and my blood to take care of you again and i'm not fucking there?
[ it's his — condition that's doing this to him, that's making every accusation hurled in his direction sharper than a blade when normally he'd brush off zoro's words like dirt on the bottom of his shoe. fuck this shitty, mossy idiot. fuck him for making him crave his hands and his mouth and his blood, for making him want him so badly that he's afraid every single upheaval in his life will make zoro's eyes turn away from him. that this will be the thing to break them — he will — because no one's meant to actually do what they're doing. to jam three together where there should just be two. ]
you think some shithead not being there when i need them is new to me? you wouldn't be special for doing that.
why do you even want to know about it? it's not normal.
[ he slams the notebook shut before he gets the urge to begin scribbling without thought, tossing it aside and cinching his apron around his waist to bang pots and pans around as he starts cleaning up. zoro doesn't know a goddamn thing. zoro's acting like this doesn't change everything, when it does. how can it not? how can the addition of something as monumental as a cunt between his legs not have any effect on him?
he knows the language of men; he knows how conditional it can be.
somewhere between giving the counters a good scrub and putting the dishes away, his energy flags. he has just enough time to make it to the bedroom, his back aching and his nipples sore, only to find zoro sprawled on the bed taking one of his stupid naps. the worst thing about sanji suddenly needing more bed rest is that he runs into zoro's sleeping schedule far too often when previously it had been the easiest thing in the world to avoid.
he sets down the plate of leftover cake on the nightstand, stripping off his belt and tie, and loosening the buttons of his shirt. he can't tell if zoro is actually asleep or not, and he has half a mind to kick him out of the bed entirely, but sanji eventually just slips in beside him, shifting around to try and find a comfortable position that clearly doesn't exist. his eyelids droop with a long sigh, staring at the line of zoro's shoulders through his lashes. ]
Hey.
[ it's just a rumble of a sound, a hushed whisper. nothing else. ]
( zoro waits and waits and waits for another dumb bullshit response scribbled across the page, fingers practically itching to fight, but an answer never comes — which honestly pisses him off even worse. the desire to throw his notebook into the fucking river is strong, but he just barely resists, claws poking even deeper holes through the cover before he eventually just shoves it into the pocket of his leather jacket.
he should find somewhere else to go, at least for a few days. maybe he can stay with bee and shanks on his boat. maybe he can sleep on the bank of the river with koby floating by. maybe he really should make this shitty fucking cook learn what it's like to live without —
no. zoro can't do that. despite all of the anger that's flooded through him, made his face hot despite the cool air outside, it's the way his chest tightens when he thinks about leaving that hurts the worst. he made a promise to him, to nami, that he would protect them here. the inexplicably heightened protectiveness over sanji since — since he started changing is just another thing that makes his pulse spike, heart thudding in his chest. what if something happened to him when zoro was away? how would nami ever forgive him? how would he ever forgive himself?
he doesn't say anything when he storms back into their cottage, even if his body language — gaze straight forward, pointedly not glancing towards the kitchen, body hunched over, tail thrashing from side to side as he books it towards their bedroom and wordlessly pulls the door closed probably a little too hard — probably says enough. zoro's jacket ends up shrugged off onto the floor somewhere, shoes kicked off lazily, propping his sword up against the wall beside the bed as he lays down with a long huff of a sigh, trying to relax into the mattress.
sleep will help. sleep will keep his thoughts from racing, ricocheting from anger to worry to unbridled longing and hurt and back again.
sleep doesn't come, though — just, eventually, a tired, worn out cook that shambles into their room and climbs into bed beside him. zoro doesn't react, doesn't move, happy to be facing away from sanji, keeping his eyes closed even if he can't see. it's quiet for long enough that he thinks that maybe he's safe, maybe sanji fell asleep. until — hey. )
Mm? ( it's barely anything — barely a question, really, with how flatly it hums from him. his ears betray him, though, twitching against the pillow, like they're waiting eagerly to drink up his response even when part of zoro absolutely dreads it. )
[ he shouldn't have anything to say to him. he should close his eyes and close his mouth and go right to sleep. zoro deserves to be ignored after their last conversation, though he can't remember why because right now all he feels is the uncertain pulse of his own heart, afraid of being a freak and a failure, of being so different that he's become impossible to love — again, though maybe it's never changed from when he was a stupid little kid.
zoro doesn't move except for the twitch of his ears. it makes sanji want to touch them, to run his fingers along their tufted edges, to rub gently at the base of them and see if that makes zoro purr. he likes when nami touches his velveteen ears. it makes him flush just thinking about it, though it isn't hard to do that these days when everything, every brush of fabric and every thought that flies into his head, makes him horny.
he feels the absence of his cock here with zoro in a way he hadn't with nami. maybe it's a male thing, or a zoro thing, or a general cock thing, all of which he doesn't want to think about. but his brand new cunt is throbbing between his legs, and he realizes belatedly that trying to nap with zoro in the bed couldn't have been a worse idea. ]
Did you — [ he swallows, his throat suddenly drier than burnt toast. ] Did you still —
[ his fingers subconsciously rub at the little trail of silken fur leading into his trousers, his cheeks reddening with an annoyed flush as his brows draw together. ]
( zoro suddenly, very desperately, wishes that he actually was asleep. it would mean that he wouldn't have to actively choose whether or not to ignore the dumb bullshit that comes out of sanji's mouth. as it is, without sweet dreams and soft snores to block him out, he's left trying to parse whether the cook is just being an asshole again and making fun of him, or if he actually, maybe ...
he swallows hard, blinking into the darkness, suddenly a hell of a lot less tired than he was. in the quiet of their room, every anxious little squirm against the sheets sounds amplified tenfold, each exhale, even the soft sound of fingers against fur. it's enough to make the hair on the back of his neck stand up, far, far too aware of the warm body beside him, nearly close enough to touch.
maybe zoro gives himself away a little when he stretches out a leg, shifting a little on his side, still facing away because he thinks if he catches a glimpse of sanji, his resolve will utterly crumble. (and it already has, just by virtue of him being here, his threats obviously empty.)
finally, he speaks, voice low, like he's worried about being overheard: ) Not if you're going to use it as another reason to resent me. I can't —
( maybe zoro is worried about being overheard, considering this is probably the first time he's said something ... vulnerable out loud, not scribbled in the confines of their notebooks. it feels too much like being pinned down, soft belly exposed and unprotected. for now, the fact that he's able to peer into the darkness instead of mismatched sky blue and bright grey eyes is his only shield. ) I won't do that again.
[ they've shared this bed too many times to count, with nami, without nami, and still sanji can't help the passage of overwhelming alarm that crawls through him, not from fear that he'll be hurt — he's past that now, and it's hard to imagine zoro hurting anyone with those stupid ears on his head — but from his own misgivings that he shouldn't be here at all. whatever is happening to him, he should go it alone. his crew needed a cook when luffy asked him to join, not the thing he's becoming now.
it was easier with nami. maybe because it feels so natural to be smitten with her, as easy as breathing. he's known since first laying eyes on her that he could love her, and does. his fears with nami are so different from this. he's afraid of her disappearing one day, of leaving again and not having the words to stop her. not being enough to make her stay. with zoro? he's just afraid. afraid to touch, afraid to even look sometimes. he's afraid of what might happen if he really, truly gives in to this.
he lies still for a long moment, focused on the tense lines of zoro's muscled frame. if he says nothing else, does nothing else, zoro will let this lie. zoro won't force him into anything. nothing will happen.
sanji snakes a hand out and snags zoro's hip, shoving downward to force zoro onto his back, so at least he's not facing away from him anymore. ]
You have to see it. [ sanji's fly is already open, his pants low on his lean hips. ] You have to touch it, so you can know if you want this anymore.
( i don't resent you, he says, and all zoro can do is let out a huff of a breath because — yeah fucking right. that's why sanji always inevitably pushes him away every time he lets zoro in more than he expects to, every time zoro thinks they might finally ...
but they don't. maybe he doesn't resent zoro as a person, but he definitely resents what zoro does to him, and that pisses zoro off because it all seems so simple, so easy. two people give a shit about each other. two people want each other. how could there be more to it than that? why fight it — just to fight?
that's what he would argue, anyway, if zoro felt like arguing about it. he half expects sanji to let it go entirely, considering the silence that follows, and maybe that's for the fucking best.
except then there's a warm hand at his hip, pressing against him to lay him on his back. it gets an annoyed grunt out of him as he looks up through the darkness at the ceiling, ears perking at the sound of sanji's voice cutting through the air, firm but tinged with a certain kind of restrained need around the edges that zoro's gotten far too familiar with - almost pavlovian in how it washes over him, makes the inherent need to touch, to taste, to take care and protect kick in, settle low in his gut. with a long, slow exhale, he makes up his mind.
instead of touching him right away, zoro turns towards sanji, slow, all feline grace as he leans over him and presses their mouths together. kissing him is familiar by now, even in its infrequency — the little bit of stubble that tickles his skin, the taste of clove cigarette smoke inhaled as his lips slide slowly against sanji's. it's always rushed and hasty and frantic between them, practically drowning in their desperation, but now ... he takes his time. lets himself follow the syrupy sweet way that nami kisses, luxuriating in it, savoring every second that he can.
his fingers finally reach to feel that soft, golden fur beneath his belly button — softer than zoro had even imagined the first time he saw it, that night when sanji had gotten on his knees for him — and it's a slow thing, too, exploratory. he breaks only to murmur, firmly: ) There's nothing that could make me stop wanting you, stupid.
( it feels important to say before his palm follows the trail of fur beneath the open fly of his pants, fingers dipping between his parted thighs to cup his cunt — fuck, yeah, he definitely has one — already hot and slick with arousal against his palm. it's dizzying, the easy way his two fingers slip inside of him, a hot breath exhaled against his mouth. )
[ panic claws at him, hooks deep in his flesh, but it just makes him hold on like he's braving a storm on the merry. zoro is solid and calm and sweet, kissing deep into his mouth as if he's trying to reach the heart of him. it pulls the breath out of sanji, makes his fingers curl tightly around zoro's bicep, and he has the sudden flash of kissing nami, of her tangerine-sweet lips, and then it melts back into zoro's full, plush heat, like he's surrounded on all sides by devotion and warmth and want.
he can't say anything to zoro's words as they brand something deep inside of him, something hurt and fragile and unwanted. maybe he survived every wretched moment just for this, just to feel zoro's strong arms and scorching mouth and the cascade of his breath sending shivers across his skin. sanji arches into his hand, drawn to him like salt in the ocean, his body already painfully alive at the mere thought of zoro's touch. the real thing has him flushed and panting, still wrapping his mind around the new, unfamiliar kind of arousal that overtakes him.
zoro's fingers breach him, and it's so much better than all the ways he's stuffed his own into his cunt, and maybe nami is onto something with him, or more likely she's taught him a thing or two about pleasure. sanji kicks his pants off and clenches down against him, his hips rolling into zoro's hand. ]
It's not different now?
[ he doesn't usually talk this much — or at all — when he's getting his carnal obsession with zoro out of his system, but he suddenly has to know. what if he wakes up tomorrow and something else has changed? already there's the idea of a presence inside of him, something he doesn't want to name or think about, but it isn't lost on him how possessive and instinctual zoro has been acting, like he just knows sanji is going to have — ]
Didn't you want me because I — [ he shudders, closing his eyes as he fists zoro's collar and shoves, swinging himself up to straddle his hips. he almost loses the fullness of zoro's fingers, so he catches his wrist in a hard grip, urging him to stay wedged inside of him. what would it feel like if it were zoro's cock? the thought threatens to drive him to madness. ] Because I'm a man?
( the thing is — that it really doesn't feel all that different to be with sanji like this. it's still the same mouth, soft and hungry with less and less restraint as he lets zoro kiss him, the same stubble on his chin that zoro, after all is said and done and they go back to pretending like nothing happened between them, can still feel prickling at his skin. he still clutches zoro like his life depends on it, like he can't decide if he wants to hold him tighter or shove him away.
he's wet and he's tight and there's a part of zoro that can't help but think about his fingers coated with lube, stretching sanji's hole, having him clenching around him like he does now, cock twitching at the thought of just — being inside of him. he exhales sharply, flexing his wrist so his fingers can sink just a little bit deeper, heel of his palm pressing up against his clit as he grinds against him, feeling that hypersoft fur against his skin.
— okay, all the talking is different, something zoro has to actively concentrate on instead of falling into their usual haze of frenzied lust, lips otherwise occupied. each word barely makes sense, more difficult still when sanji rolls him onto his back and straddles him, fingers grabbing hold of his wrist, vicelike.
the question baffles him, would maybe make zoro laugh if they were sharing some shitty homemade wine in the kitchen and not in bed with zoro's fingers buried in sanji's new cunt, overwhelmed by the thought of sanji sinking down onto his cock. instead: ) It's not — ( he starts, fingers crooking habitually inside of him, wanting to feel him tremble around him again. ) I don't give a shit about — all of that. I haven't ever.
( which feels obvious to zoro, at least from the way he lived back in their world, maybe, busy fighting instead of fucking. but it feels obvious here, too, from the first night he and nami and sanji's foreheads touched, his fingers tightening around both of their hands as they healed him through their blood ritual. he thought he had an idea of what it felt like to want someone before, but now it feels all-encompassing, nami's fingers carding through his hair, sanji's fingers fisting into his shirt, desire and desperation all-encompassing. )
[ all at once sanji is ferociously jealous of the way zoro thinks, because he wants this too, he wants to want zoro the same way it's easy to want nami, without all the mistrust and fear and anger, and he wants — to not give a shit. how does zoro do it? he's never asked. never asked who taught him about men and women and the proper way to treat each one. but maybe that's just it — maybe no one taught it to him the way it was beaten into sanji's very dna, and no amount of sweating or bleeding or crying will make it come out.
his jaw tightens around a curse, his breath whisking out hard between his teeth as zoro's fingers move almost cruelly, stroking against all the new things inside of him that make him clench and shudder. if zoro didn't want this — want him — then he wouldn't be here. his fingers wouldn't be jammed inside his cunt, keeping him on the brink of orgasm. this wouldn't be happening at all.
sanji bends at the waist, dipping down close enough to feel the heat of zoro's breath skimming across his skin. his shirt hangs open, his nipples rosy and pert and aching, and he takes zoro’s hand and presses it to his chest, his cunt flooding with fresh heat the moment zoro’s fingers pinch him just so. he crushes his mouth against zoro’s sinfully soft lips, a tenderly frustrated groan tipping past the part of his lips. ]
I want it. [ his fingers curl into zoro’s hair, scratching at the soft, sensitive base of his twitching ears. ] The way you would’ve — before.
[ he sinks his sharp teeth into zoro’s bottom lip, then licks at his bruised flesh, his hips moving rhythmically on zoro’s fingers, not a single movement errant or wasted. sanji already knows how to treat nami when it comes to this — queenly, tenderly, so romantically that sometimes she can’t even meet his eyes. if he finds out zoro isn’t treating nami with the same servile attitude, he’ll hang the shitty swordsman from the fucking roof. but he isn’t nami. his cunt doesn’t need the same… tender, loving affection.
he breaks the kiss, fisting a hand in zoro’s collar and lifting him several inches from the bed, nose to nose with him as his eyes flash with the promise of violence. ]
If you don’t give a shit, then don’t treat me any differently. [ he shoves zoro back onto the mattress, towering over him again as he swats zoro’s hand away so he can grind his wet cunt down onto the front of zoro’s bulging erection. ] Fuck me the way you wanted to before. Don’t be a coward.
( zoro gets the reaction he's looking for, at least — the way sanji clenches around his fingers, already impossibly tight, cursing and body practically shuddering against him as he cants his fingers just so —
and it's satisfying to have this brief moment of control over him, over this situation, despite the fact that it's this shitty cook who slunk into bed and whispered to him about his pussy, whose desperate hand gripped zoro's wrist to keep his fingers pressed inside. at the very least, it's enough to lull him into some false sense of security in this, even when his free hand is yanked upwards, palm atop his own guiding him to squeeze one of his tits — and he does, feels how much fuller they are in his hand (since last time, even), eager to feel that same milk beading from his nipple, rolling his thumb over him a few times before pinching the swollen bud.
the low groan sanji tries unsuccessfully to hide against zoro's mouth says almost as much as the way his hips shudder when he does it — almost as much as the wet sounds of their kiss, a trail of saliva between them lingering that zoro licks away, the lewd squelch of his cunt around his fingers as zoro draws them back as much as sanji allows with the way he clutches his wrist and fucks them that little bit back in. he shivers a little, too, when blunt nails drag against the base of his ears, snapping him out of his pussy-drunk haze.
the way you would've before. there are about a thousand ways zoro has thought about fucking sanji in this hellhole, none any more or less viable considering all of his god damn insistence that he's not ... whatever it is that he finds so fucking abhorrent. even after he let zoro fuck roughly into his mouth, after he ground his hips frantically against zoro's thigh until he came, after they kissed and kissed and kissed again, after saving each other's lives a frankly stupid amount of times. there isn't any before, there's just — now.
now, with sanji's fingers fisted in his collar, dragging him upwards, his teeth instinctively gritting together, a low sound rumbling in his chest — a warning or a declaration of his disdain or a combination of both. it'll probably be funny in hindsight to compare how easily, willingly, happily he submits to nami, turns his brain off and lets her use him, compared to how fucking aggravating it is to have sanji in his face, pretty blue gaze steely and sharp and serious, demanding shit from him. equally aggravating is the way he practically melts when his hand is tugged away and sanji grinds his bare cunt against zoro through the fabric of his pants, making him groan, head tipping back against the pillow when he's let go. )
You don't scare me, cook, ( zoro says, matter of fact. this charade of tiptoeing around the cook ever since they figured out what's — maybe happening to him has gone on for too long, even if the human side of him feels at war with the animalistic side of him with ferocious instincts to protect, protect, protect. he's strong-willed, though, toughened by his training.
with a grunt, he rolls on top of sanji, still between his thighs and pinning him down, cunt on display in the flicker of firelight dancing through their room. zoro hastily tugs his pants down over his ass just enough to get his cock out and into his hand, no time for preening or showing off or making him beg for it like he really fucking should because he's suddenly struck with a sharp wave of need, sinking into his tight heat so easily it makes him moan when he bottoms out. fuck. fuck. it's better than he even thought it would be — so good that he barely gives any time for either of them to adjust or even comprehend what they're actually doing, just starts fucking into him again and again, dizzy from how intoxicatingly good it feels, panting as his mouth ghosts over sanji's lips. )
[ he claimed, rather boldly, that he was the same, but fuck if everything doesn't feel different — heightened to a ridiculous degree, so that the pinch of his nipple sends a searing ache straight to his pelvis like a goddamn arrow. normally, he'd fight being forcibly manhandled by zoro like this, but he's paralyzed by pleasure, rolling onto his back with zoro's substantial weight bearing down upon him, his legs spread wide, his cunt glistening and pink and throbbing for attention. he wants to be filled like a chocolate éclair, claimed with zoro’s come in the inherent way he belongs to nami, and that’s how he knows he’s lost whatever was left of his mind after changing and changing and changing, and the thought alarms him into squirming. his fingers clutch his chest, circling his wet nipple, and shit, he could come just like this, from the friction of his own fingertips and the suggestion of zoro's cock, because he can't actually —
he can't. this can't. sanji's heart leaps abruptly into his mouth at the sudden press of hardness at his cunt, stark realization washing over him, that he's — they — they’re about to — ]
Fuck.
[ his fingers dig into zoro's arms as he sinks inside of him in one fluid motion. he's so much bigger than the fingers sanji has stuffed inside himself, reaching so much deeper that he suddenly feels full to bursting. zoro gives him no time at all to adjust, snapping his hips into him as sanji writhes helplessly, only vaguely aware that he's dripping milk from his tits and slick from his cunt, because now zoro's lips are more important than anything, teasing him with their proximity. sanji cranes his neck and captures them in a bruising kiss, his legs hooking around zoro's waist to trap him. ]
Fuck. [ softer now, his cheeks flaring with color, hips rising off the bed to meet zoro’s relentless movements. it’s so different from having sex with a woman, so different from anything, because zoro isn’t like anyone he’s ever met. his feelings for zoro aren’t like anything he understands. he has no comparison. he doesn’t even want to think about them. ] Fuck me. I need you. I need you all the time. I hate it, I hate you —
[ the words spill out of him from a place he can’t control, his breath coming fast, his pleasure so hot and agonizing that tears prickle the corners of his eyes. he slides a hand between them to stroke at his swollen clit, and all it takes is a few nudges before he’s clenching around zoro’s cock, shivering as an orgasm ripples through him. his breaths turn into desperate moans as his cunt abruptly grows ten times more sensitive, zoro’s thrusts arching his back off the bed as tears spill from his eyes. ]
You shitty little shit — [ he breaks off into a string of violent curses that end in whimpering gasps, another orgasm building fast, this one racing through him like fire. his eyes squeeze shut, his thighs clamping around zoro’s hips as he shudders. ] I love — I love you —
( zoro doesn't know how to stop himself now that he's flung them into uncharted waters with no navigator to guide them — he can't tell if he's sinking or swimming as he thrusts into sanji like it's the only thing he knows to do. he can't tell if it's his own deeply human desires, or —
whether his changeling instincts are kicking in, making him even more desperate than he already was, fingers curling tightly into the pillow next to sanji's head, nails piercing through the fabric, palming over one of his leaking tits, groaning as he fucks so hard into him that the sound of skin against skin keeps making his ears twitch on top of his head. the word breed flashes through his mind, making zoro gasp, overwhelmed by the softness of his belly, the fullness of his tits, how easily his cunt is taking him again and again and thinking about filling him with his cum until he has nothing left ...
sanji's mouth brings him back to reality, kisses deep and languid and messy, zoro missing his lips entirely sometimes and not really giving a shit. his taste, his gasped curses, the way his hips roll to meet zoro's — they're all things that have flickered in the back of his mind even back in arlong park or coco village or on the merry if it meant getting the shitty cook to shut the hell up — and he knows that it's not just because of what's happened to both of them here, how they've changed.
it feels so fucking good, with thighs wrapped around his waist, basically begging to keep zoro inside of him as he fucks deeper, those hot, slick walls tightening around him as sanji's orgasm rapidly approaches, each whimpered curse, plea, gasped insistence that he hates him spurning him on even further. it makes him flush, maybe from anger or from pure fucking desire — because this shithead doesn't hate him, sanji needs him, and zoro needs sanji just as badly. the sudden clench of his cunt around him, hips shuddering as he comes, has zoro moaning, hips speeding up as he chases his own orgasm, so close, so close —
i love you.
zoro's mouth hangs open uselessly as he pants, a few more insistent thrusts through sanji's second orgasm before he's coming hard inside of him, filling him up for so long he thinks that maybe he's passed out, maybe he's imagined the whole thing, every single word — but when he blinks his eyes open slowly and the ringing in his ears starts to fade, all he sees is the cook, blonde hair mussed, tear tracks down his cheeks, looking debauched and exhausted and fucking beautiful.
he loves him? )
Don't go, ( comes zoro's abrupt plea, eyes widening, suddenly seized by the thought of being told to go fuck himself, that he didn't mean it, that he didn't mean any of this, to stay the fuck away from him. his heart pounds in his chest, hyperaware of the fact that he's still inside of him even as his cock's softening, like his hips can't fathom the thought of letting even a drop of his cum out. desperately, a hand reaches out to cup his cheek, pad of his thumb ghosting over his lower lip before he leans in to kiss him, a slow, lingering thing before he murmurs so quietly against his mouth that it borders on a whisper: ) I — Sanji, please. Please stay. You know that I — you have to know.
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What staples are you looking for in your cooking arsenal?
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what do you and your shitty mustache know about cooking?
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(Can you even grow facial hair???
Wait, this isn't why he's here.)
I'm not asking for myself. I'm asking for your sake.
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[ sanji, they don't swoon over you, either. ]
there are spices in the markets. the witches use them for their shitty rituals.
i need them all.
why are you offering? nami and i aren't for sale.
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(Does he even look like someone who did? Have you seen his hat?)
How cute that you think you're a little pair like that.
I have my own interests in this world and they involve a more productive relationship with your crew.
Consider this me extending the courtesy to you. I don't really care if you take me up on it, but the offer is there.
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jealous?
someone who sold out to the marines wouldn't do anything for nothing.
i want my spices, though. i'm not gonna sling shit no matter where i am.
get me what i need, and then when you come to collect, come to me. not nami.
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Don't you worry. I'm getting precisely what I want out of this arrangement already.
You are a shameless one, aren't you? Are you happy with your delusion of being something special to her?
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things are different here.
[ how DARE you call his great love delusion???? ]
what nami and i have is beyond what you can understand.
it takes a more refined palate.
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My. Does she know about this rare, incredible bond of yours?
(Poor Sanji. Poor, poor bastard.)
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[ of course she does. doesn't she? ]
why don't you stop focusing on my relationship and start thinking about how to get your own?
if you've never cared about beautiful women, then what's your type? ugly idiots who drink cheap liquor?
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(Mihawk be nice!!)
I only express intrigue in yours because I pity Nami. Even I respect her enough to realize she doesn't deserve some fool orchestrating some relationship with her.
I don't want a relationship.
My, why so interested in my type? Don't tell me you want to see what it's like to be with a man. (He knows that's not true, but he's just being a jerk now.)
When I do seek companionship, it is with men who are beautiful in their own right and who have their own passions.
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you don't know the first thing about what it means to be with nami.
seeing her as another piece on your board isn't respect.
no, you just charm shitty little idiots who don't know any better so you can cut a good deal with them.
[ how DARE you, never in his life has he EVER thought such a thing (yes he has) ]
koby qualifies?
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Please. I highly doubt you treat her any differently than any other woman you have ever wanted to sleep with.
I'm not especially known for being charming, but I'm flattered you think so.
(Oh! Wow! Apparently it does suck having your not!relationship thrown into your face. What the heck. Who would have guessed.)
Anyone with eyes could tell that Koby is beautiful.
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she's the only one i want or ever will want to be with.
[ sorry to make you feel one (1) emotion ]
give me a break, you two-faced marine.
i'll give him credit, though. at least he's not an idiot.
he knows his worth to you.
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A pervert and a romantic. Who would have thought?
(It's disgusting.)
We both know I am no more a marine than you are. There is use in that alliance right now.
Oh? And what exactly is that worth? Since you apparently are so informed of our situation.
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if there was use in it, you'd be one.
that's the difference between you and the straw hats.
[ there's a lot he could say about koby right now. and a part of him wants to. but for once, he tries to take a page out of luffy's book and tempers his pissy attitude. ]
he deserves better than you. i just don't know if he knows that yet.
but there's no way you don't.
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The only thing all people deserve is the freedom to choose what they want to do with their own lives.
Right now, Koby is choosing me. One day, he will choose to end this and choose to move on to something else or someone else.
Both you and I must respect his right to choose what he does with his life. Even if we may not like the choices.
(Long story short: he absolutely knows.)
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some choices don't need to be respected. i'm not cosigning your bullshit.
piss off, mihawk.
delivery
It's more of a gesture of peace above all else. A basket filled with herbs and spices, some nice cuts of meat wrapped carefully, and a well-crafted cutting board. A simple note is attached that reads:)
No need to keep sneaking into my stock. Just come as you will.
-Mihawk
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still, he recognizes a peace offering when he sees it. he also doesn't see the point in continuing a feud that will lead toward nothing good. when he sends the basket back, there's a bottle of his latest trial batch of wine, this one aged with a little bit of magic, just as mihawk had suggested.
the bottle is nestled among several lavish, white feathers, the long plumes fluffy and bright, meticulously cleaned and carefully placed to minimize damage.
on the back of mihawk's original note: ]
for your shitty hat.
-sanji
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Well. He did say he would review the wine properly.
So, Sanji gets a message in his notebook a few days later:)
The wine is better. Now we're talking high quality. Though it still needs something. Perhaps enchant the barrels?
(A genuine suggestion. He had never considered the possibility of creating wine through magic. The possibilities here were endless.
More importantly though...)
I hear that you were also subject to a bodily change. A rabbit, was it?
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if you're here to give me shit about it, i'm not above kicking your ass.
so what happened to you?
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A wolf for me. (Sorry, Sanji, but to his credit he has no interest in shoving that in Sanji's face. He already was stronger than Sanji back home so what was the difference with a rabbit versus wolf scenario? He saw no point in gloating over that kind of thing.)
How annoying are your new instincts? (Because his SUCKED.)
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my kicks are even stronger than before. i can definitely beat you in a race.
[ that might be, literally, the only good thing that's happened. his aim is still shit because he's not training with anyone, not even himself, and his nerves have been shot since the change, as if he's inherited all the skittishness of a real fucking rabbit. his bloodlust, at least, has been curbed since connecting with nami, though he does find himself tempted by vegetables.
he's not even going to mention his fucking ears. ]
it's easier being alone than around people.
that's not who i am though, and everyone thinks something's wrong with me already, so if i say that, it'll make things worse.
is koby taking care of you?
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Probably.
(Although he was faster now as a wolf, he had gained far more strength than speed. He was fine with that trade-off. He wasn't quite as fine with his own set of ears and tail. Both didn't seem to get the memo about his stoic bullshit. He had zero control over them and life was the worst because of it.
Fuck them ears!)
Why would you think everyone assumes something is wrong with you? I mean besides your less than savory personality.
(WOW.)
I do not need anyone to "take care" of me.
(.........
......................
..................................)
Koby is living with me now. We figured it was a more appropriate arrangement.
(CLEARING HIS THROAT.)
I take it Zoro and Nami are making sure you have what you need?
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he really, genuinely thinks before answering. ]
i killed a bunch of women. the mothers.
i know that's nothing to you, but it's not nothing to me.
i don't give a shit what you or anyone else thinks of me [ a small lie; there's nami and zoro on the short list, one opinion carrying far more weight than the other ] but the man who raised me taught me to live a certain way. i don't harm women. i don't fight women. and he'd
[ his hand trembles. what would zeff do? toss him on his ass? look at him with hatred? or worse, indifference, like judge vinsmoke had? maybe zeff hadn't been kidding when he said he'd take a knife to his throat if sanji ever fucked up this badly. it's hard to tell; he'd been a shitty little kid at the time, yelling back or crying at everything the old shitbag said. usually both. ]
anyway, i don't want your fucking opinion.
i just haven't figured things out yet, and it's not any easier with all the changes.
[ .............. ]
you guys weren't shacked up before?
nami did a ritual. some connection thing.
it stops a lot of the bullshit, like the bloodlust and the weird body stuff.
you need a witch to do it for you. you found anyone?
koby probably would, if you asked. and nami and i are connected now. she can call me anytime and i just feel it. it's like i know where she is and i'm there.
she saved me, really.
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Mihawk stares at his notebook and it catches him off guard a bit. Was that how he came off?)
Please. I hardly make a habit out of killing defenseless creatures if it can be helped. There is nothing to be proud of in that. (It posed no challenge to him and he saw no value in shedding that kind of blood. Whether Sanji believed him hardly mattered to him, but it was true. He had never been the sort to be cruel just for the fun of it even if he was often cold. Granted, he had killed an enormous amount of women in his life too, but those women had been far from damsels or innocent, and they either came at him with their own swords and weapons.
He had a feeling that wasn't the kind of bloodshed Sanji was talking about here though. A self-imposed rule then by the only person who had served as a mentor to Sanji. He sighs.)
That man would likely consider your genuine guilt as an obvious sign that the situation was beyond your usual control. If you regret it, then fine, regret it, and promise to do better in the future to pay respect to the women you killed and to the man you admire.
(It's really that easy, Sanji, gosh. Coming from a guy who frankly has no concept of guilt, but he...doesn't like Sanji. He just doesn't like seeing him put out.)
No, we were not. After the change, I decided I wanted him near more often than not.
(Wow, Mihawk. Expose yourself, why don't you. But really, it's the wolfish part of him that now felt viciously loyal and protective.)
I see.
So, Nami came back to you. (Despite everything. He's...glad for them.)
You must be thrilled with that.
Maybe so. I leave that kind of decision up to him. I try to allow him his autonomy. He may not want to maintain such a connection with me.
(...But Mihawk would love that. It sounded as convenient as it did comforting and there's a mild bubble of jealousy in the pit of his stomach.)
Of course she did. She cares deeply for you.
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sanji might actually be worse. he'd... enjoyed the taste of blood, the raw rending of flesh. it only turned his stomach after. by then it was too late.
mihawk's solution seems far too simple, and yet he thinks about it anyway, desperate to latch onto any hope that zeff might not hate him for what he did. that's enough sharing about the old geezer. ]
you can just say you like him.
[ because he already knows that much — especially now, with what he's recently discovered about koby, which isn't... surprising, per se, but it's been oddly difficult to get out of his head. i wanted him near more often than not definitely sounds like like.
it sounds like what he wants with nami, and even with zoro sometimes, but it's becoming more complicated than that. he hesitates again. something about scratching his thoughts down on paper seems easier than voicing them aloud, even if he's generally unthinking about who sees the pages at all times. ]
i don't think it's like that.
nami came back because zoro asked her to. because of what i did with the mothers.
she knew about the connection ritual. she knew i needed one.
she could have kept living the way she wanted to if not for that.
i can tell koby you need a connection, if you're gonna be a little shitty baby about it.
text — un: CUB
( be brave, bee!!! )
While you were distracted, I stole a knife from you, right up my shirt sleeve. I am sorry. I was scared but that is no excuse for thievery. I have a new knife now and I feel very guilty about having yours.
I can bring it back to you, and I accept whatever punishment you think reasonable.
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[ he maybe owes zoro an apology or twelve. ]
what [ the fuck ] were you gonna do with it?
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did you stab anything with it? because if you did, you would have noticed it's pretty shitty for stabbing.
it's a flexible blade exclusively used for fish.
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( she stabbed the air mainly, practicing the moves her father taught her. still, technically not a lie. )
Why would you need a knife just for fish? Do you cook fish that often?
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[ """his whole life""" ]
you need a good knife that gets close to the bone so you don't waste any meat.
other knives don't bend like a fillet knife does. fish are bendy.
you ever gutted a fish before?
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No, not with a bendy knife.
I traveled on a ship once. You are right, there was a lot of fish. I think the cook had a big knife though, maybe the size of your hand, or the hoof of a horse. I did not like to look at it.
( neither did she have the option to — it wasn't cooked meals and relaxation for bee. it was raw, rotten fish cut open with her teeth, and hard tack, and sucking on fishbones for days before dwalia was pleased enough with her to offer crusts from her bread. even then, she usually got beaten badly enough that eating wasn't possible with a swollen mouth and fractured ribs. )
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cooks have a lot of knives, if they're not shitty cooks.
[ but a ship is typically a bad place to be for a kid, especially a little girl. sanji got away with it because he bullied his way into the kitchen with the rest of the cooks and then gave as good as he got. but most kids get stuck doing far less savory work. he was lucky for that storm, lucky for zeff to come along and seize their ship. in hindsight, he can admit that, now that his belly is full and his skills are sharper than ever. ]
i have your punishment for you.
you give me back my knife, and then you have to watch me use it to fillet a fish and then grill it over a fire.
then you have to eat it.
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( she starts anxiety doodles in the corner of the page — little flowers and purring kittens. the doodling only stops for as long as it takes to switch the colors of her ink. )
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i don't fight girls, either.
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( this is the nicest thing anyone has ever said to her!!!!! )
It does not seem like a punishment.
I was expecting to be arrested for my crime.
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you ever considered taking a bath?
i'm not a shitty marine. i don't arrest people.
i'm a pirate, and i'm the best cook in the east blue.
if you thought you were gonna be arrested, why'd you tell me you stole my knife?
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( so: no, not unless someone is going to make her. )
Oh. ( pirate?? ) If I knew that I probably would not have told you, but maybe left it on your doorstop? I do not think pirates usually have much sense of justice.
Anyway, I thought you were kind to me, and most people are not. I did not think you should be punished for that.
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then more people would know you're a girl. you were covered in dirt when i saw you last.
[ that much he remembers.
he's not going to go around spouting luffy's "i'm different" narrative, but being kind to a child, unfortunately, is different for a pirate. sometimes it's even different for a not-pirate. ]
i don't have any sense of justice, so don't piss me off.
that's not your whole punishment. you're gonna have to learn how to catch a fish yourself, and then how to use the knife properly.
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( she will show up washed and with shoes, though. it's probably time she remember that she's a lady and a princess, and not someone who should go around with dirty feet and knotted hair. plus, sanji won't like her if she stinks badly. )
Okay. I will do this.
Is it difficult to catch fish?
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but i won't tell anyone if you don't want me to.
[ because his opinions are fully formed around the things whatever female in the nearest vicinity asks of him. ]
no. i'm catching one now.
you just need patience. sometimes you get one right away, and sometimes you have to wait hours before anything bites.
the difficult part is not letting it slap you in the face when you get it.
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( people were nice enough to her in chalced, as a little beggar boy — at least, until she stole from them. then it was jail time. )
I will hold the fish away from my face, if I should catch one! I don't want to get slapped.
When should we fish?
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if you screw up that badly as a man, then you're just an asshole that deserves to be hated.
[ he would rather die than become someone that zeff despises — though if he knew what he's already done, the blood on his hands from the mothers, he would. he's broken zeff's rules, and maybe whatever love zeff had for him at the same time. ]
as soon as you want to give my knife back.
are you hungry? i can cook this for you now.
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( bee ur nine )
I am always hungry. I will come meet you.
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don't bring women into this, you shitty kid.
i'll have this one ready for you. then you can watch me fillet the next one on a full stomach.
you can't learn anything when you're hungry.
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Okay.
I should warn you, I do look a bit different from the last time we met.
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sure. and i’m a prince of the north blue.
[ will this egregious truth come back to bite him in the ass? unknown. ]
did you change, too?
when?
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What is the north blue?
Yes, a few days ago now.
I do not look like you.
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the north blue is a scary place. there's a big military there that can threaten people across all the seas.
what are you a princess of?
did someone help you, like you helped me?
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Buck. The capital of the Six Duchies.
( a hesitant tap tap tap of her pencil's tip on the page ( she stuck with a blue one ). eventually she picks it back up. )
No.
But someone is helping me now.
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there are good and bad people everywhere, no matter if they're a pirate or a prince or in a big scary military.
they don't teach you how to take a bath in buck?
is it someone good or is it that arseface mihawk?
you can always come to me, too. or anyone on the crew i'm on.
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I have never been to Buck, but I would imagine that they bathe. I bathed in Withywoods, but then my mother died, and then I was kidnapped.
( this is bee's attempt to guilt sanji about assuming things about her, just because she smells a little, and hates baths. )
I think Mr. Shanks is very good. He doesn't find me too strange.
Your crew is here?
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mine's dead, too, and then i got locked in a dungeon. i still know how to take a bath.
nami has nice things to wash with that'll make you smell like vanilla and tangerines. i'll get you some.
[ he's gonna throw you into a lake himself. ]
shanks, huh?
only some of them. nami and zoro and luffy.
if you see the one with the green hair, he's a big idiot.
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They gave you a bath in the dungeon?
( to the tone of: you guys are getting paid? )
Are they ( hmmm ) very scary pirates? Or are they nice like you?
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food. baths. books, now and then. they kept me alive.
did you get kidnapped because you're a princess?
nami's nice. she's the best and smartest person on our crew, and she's also the prettiest.
luffy's a good man too, but he's an acquired taste.
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No. They kidnapped me because I am the White Prophet. No one knows I am a princess, really. I did not know until I was eight.
You seem to have a very obvious favorite. I can meet them?
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my real dad has a floating restaurant in the east blue. he taught me how to cook. he taught me everything. that’s where i’m really from. that’s why i’m gonna teach you how to gut a fish.
what the hell’s a white prophet?
sure. do you want me to tell them that you’re a princess? it might get you some perks.
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I see that cooking is very important to you. I will be a good student, if your father’s honor.
The Whites can see futures in their dreams, the things that will come true. The White Prophet is someone who will use those dreams to set the world on a better path. At least, that is how it should be, or how it once was. Now the Whites are corrupted with greed, and only seek deepening their pockets with the prophecies of the world. They are the all bad people. Worse than all bad.
Maybe they should just believe I am a boy, for now. I don’t really know anything about being a princess. I was just trying it on when I said as much to you.
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my other family... something happened to them. they're strong in a way that other humans aren't, but they lost their emotions. they don't feel anything when they hurt people.
my mom made sure i didn't turn out like that, but it made me weaker than them. that's why they didn't want me.
and that's why you can't say all people are bad. you don't know if something happened to them, too. my mom tried to save all my brothers, but she could only save me.
it's not their fault.
do you know a lot of whites?
you can be whatever you want, princess. but just know that once you start a lie, you're committing to something. i've lived with mine for ten years now. so think a little harder about what you want to be first.
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I think it is their fault. You are not a difficult person to love. But because you do not blame them, you are probably the better person. I suppose I am vengeful.
I have met many of them. Dwalia and her group who stole me. I toured their keep in Clerres and met the ruling government there. I met, too, a man my father treasured who was tortured at their hands for information about me. He was the White Prophet before me.
Well … maybe I will just be Bee. I do not think anyone you call crew would hurt me.
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i don't want to turn into a shitty asshole that my dad would hate.
that's all. i owe him everything, and i want to be the kind of man he can be proud of.
you're not vengeful. you're just an idiot kid like i was.
did he give you any advice? the man who was the prophet before you.
they wouldn't. i think they would like you.
i know nami would.
i'll introduce you to all of them as my assistant fish-gutter.
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( bee is only so sure of it because her opinions on the subject of fathers are etched in stone. her father loves her, although he rarely says it and does even less to prove it. she knows it. she knows it, because if he didn't, there would be no one in the world to love her at all — and therefore, he must. it's his burden, the only job she ever cares to give him. it seems a fair trade for being brought into the world — demanding unconditional love in return. )
Some. But we only talked for a few moments before my papa stabbed him. I have not seen either of them since.
Really? ( tentative hope — he might decide bee is too horrific looking to be around his friends, which is an old song she knows the words to. still. being anyone's anything is special, even if it is a fish-gutter. ) I will come now. I want to learn right away.
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[ is this a joke? unknown. ]
i don't know how much time you'll have to be a prophet anyway. learning how to properly prep a fish will take up most of your time.
you can't serve shitty food to people.
fine. dinner will be ready for you soon, then we'll get to work.
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I would not let anyone slit your throat.
( bee u are 4ft tall )
It's okay. I have not had a dream since being here, so I think my prophet days may have been cut short. Learning about fish is much more useful, anyway.
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it's my job to protect you.
[ zoro would hate him sm for saying this. ]
i'll see you soon.
[ he's already out by the lake, an array of pots and kitchen utensils set up neatly around him. his slate board has a half-gutted fish resting upon it, surrounded by a few gleaming knives, but none of them as good as the one bee had stolen. a fire burns a few feet away, several fish and roughly chopped vegetables grilling atop planks of smoking wood while sanji dips a spoon into a bowl of viscous red liquid, tasting his latest herb-infused batch of pig's blood. ]
» action
most notably, is her face — three eyes where once there were two, and the odd glow like a halo coming from behind her head. she is, very impressively, scrubbed pink and clean, the very tips of her feathered wings still dripping water from her quick head dunk in water.
it's easier to see the way bee avoids eye contact, considering how many eyes she's now in ownership of. she stares at sanji's knees instead of his face when she approaches, taking out a bundle from her back pocket. )
Hello, Mister Sanji.
( she holds it out, not looking at him — his special fish knife wrapped in a handkerchief she embroidered with a little antlered bunny pattern in the corner. it smells a little like honeysuckle. once she almost gave a gift like this to a man who was very nice to her, but he died before she could put it in his hands. )
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Princess. [ he wipes his hands on his apron and looks down at the little patterned kerchief, feeling very much like a tree next to a dandelion weed. is this what zeff felt like? no wonder he'd been kicked in the head so many times. ] Are you gonna look at me? It's bad manners not to.
[ it also stings at his insecurities, makes him feel a little more like a toy with his button eye ripped out, even if bee can't possibly mean it like that. casually, he takes his knife back, unwrapping it from the fabric and slipping it into his apron pocket. then he looks at the handkerchief, fingering the little antlered rabbit. the corner of his mouth curves up into a smile. ]
You're wet. Go sit by the fire. [ he slips the handkerchief under his apron as he turns, tucking it safely into his pocket where fish guts can't reach it. ] I'm not taking care of a sick kid.
[ all things zeff parroted at him, before taking care of a sick kid (him). after a few moments sanji joins her by the fire, dropping a blanket over her shoulders where it sticks out because of her wings, but at least she's not exposed to the winter chill. he sits cross-legged beside her, setting out an empty plate. ]
Now watch.
[ he proceeds to plate her food for her, creating a little bed of vegetables, slicing her fish horizontally and leaning it upwards so it looks like a tiny tower, painting a colorful swirl of red blood along the side. when he's done, he inspects the plate from all angles before carefully placing it in front of her. ]
Serving someone their food is just as important as cooking it. You can't just throw something on the plate and give it to them. It's disrespectful to the food, and disrespectful to your customer. [ he pours a glass of blood and sets it beside the plate, then holds out a fork. ] Are you gonna steal this, too?
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it is rude, she knows that. taking a seat by the fire, she decides to muster up courage enough to look him in the eyes, which is a process made of deep breaths, and closing off new parts of her, freshly opened. it's not that hard — sanji makes it easier because he's nice, which he proves with the blanket on her shoulders. a happy, almost trilling sound rumbles in her throat while she tucks in her shoulders, watching sanji while he works. he's very focused. when bee was younger, she used to sit in the kitchens at withywoods and watch the chefs knead bread and set it to rise — it reminds her of that, of happy memories, before her home was taken from her.
when sanji turns back to look at her, she instinctively looks away, but forces herself to bring up her gaze. she finds — it really isn't hard to make eye contact with sanji. he has nice, warm eyes, not too intense or too emotional like her father's. belatedly, she offers a smile, that seems misplaced on her face. )
I could hardly stab anyone with that. ( she accepts the fork, a little grumbly, and turns to the food. ) Isn't it hard to eat something that looks so pretty?
( it feels like she's never had a meal like this — though it isn't anything too fancy, just prepared in a way that really does seem fitting of a princess. carefully, she breaks off a corner, not letting the tower fall. with a decent bite, she chews happily, looking him again in the eyes once she swallows. )
I can learn to cook as good as you?
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[ sanji's traded plenty of animals, vegetables, and herbs to get a decent knife set here, and he'll be damned if this shitty kid steals anything else from him. but he also remembers shanks' words, and how vengeful the humans can be. he remembers how vengeful humans can be anywhere, long before he came here. ]
If you get caught stealing, someone's gonna kill you. Or worse.
[ he gets the feeling he doesn't have to explain what or worse means.
he looks at the lake, then fishes through his apron pocket and pulls out a slim cigarette, if he can really call something he made himself out of carefully selected herbs that. but he's tired of going without, and even as he speaks to bee, he's planning on sneaking into the human cities to filch a few packs. ]
You're not even good at it, so give it up. If I catch you again, I'm gonna dump you in the lake.
[ he lights up his smoke while bee eats, taking a long drag and expelling a minty breath of cold air. ]
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anyway — sanji is funny. he's kind of like a much older man in a younger man's body, grumbling about kids and lessons and the all-knowing parental eye. well, he doesn't know what a good liar bee is. fitzchivalry never knew about her exploration of the hidden passageways of withywoods, and he was her actual father. ( he did know, he just never told her. ) )
You didn't catch me. ( she kicks her feet girlishly, really digging in once her meals loses its structural integrity. bee isn't the kind of child disinterested in vegetables — she's been starved often enough that she eats it all without complaint, until her plate is clean. ) I caught me, and told you about it, as a respectable young lady should. Can I try that?
( apparently food has made her more comfortable around him, she shrugs out of the blanket, pressing her hand on sanji's knee and leaning over him, to reach for his cigarette. maybe it's like a pipe? not that her father ever smoked one. )
special delivery ✨
If you're ever in need of inspiration.
-S ☠️
text — un: SANJI
any acquaintance of luffy's might be considered a friend to the straw hats, if luffy didn't keep such bad company. (marines??????)
still, the countless number of times he's been dropped on his head hasn't rid him of his manners yet. (they are, however, reserved for Women.)
several days later — ]
was that cottage cheese sausage recipe supposed to be a hint?
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( he didn't even look at half the recipes okay he was in a rush. )
if i wanted to leave a hint, i would've been a wee bit more obvious than that
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i can make anything. and i owe you, for the gift. so tell me what you want.
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a gift is a gift
( but there's a pause as he considers the offer (demand?) nonetheless, and then: )
if you can really make anything ... there is one thing, actually
unless hot dogs are beneath your talents?
( he doesn't mean that in a condescending way. it's just, well. hot dogs aren't exactly gourmet. )
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i can make hot dogs.
[ if there's one thing this place doesn't have a shortage of, it's meat. ]
did luffy get his tastes from you or was it that shitty vice-admiral?
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he was like that well before i met him
( according to makino and everyone else in town. so, yeah, it's garp's fault, probably. )
the hot dogs aren't for me, exactly, anyway
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i wouldn't want him to be, anyway.
[ that's his emotional support rubber man. ]
they're not? that's probably the least romantic food out there, so you can't be sweet on anyone.
are they for the kid?
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( he is, in fact, sweet on someone but he won't offer that information unless asked. and even then, he might still be cagey about it. it's tough pining for a clown. 😔 )
which kid?
( he's been hanging around a Lot of kids recently, you'll have to be more specific. )
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there are ways to make them look fancy if you're trying to impress.
no rule against using a demi-glace for a hot dog. it'll need blood, anyway.
[ he almost says "the one that doesn't take a bath" but. there are a lot of pirates here. ]
little bee told me you helped her.
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no, the greasier the better, trust me
i think he'd probably be offended if it didn't look like it just came from a carnival
( and if that hint wasn't obvious enough, well... )
bee! yes, with all these transformations afflicting the village, she was in something of dire straits
she'll be alright now
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i don't know too many who're fond of carnivals since that clown-faced tosser made it his whole brand. you know, the one on the wanted posters. i had to carry his head around in a bag when i first met the straw hats. i think it was hazing, honestly.
she speaks very highly of you.
i'm glad you were there to help her. i'm teaching her to fish as punishment for stealing my good fillet knife, so if you're ever in the mood for seafood, ask her.
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buggy? you could say i'm ... intimately familiar
we sailed on the same crew together a long time ago
( as if that's all it was ... as if that's all it is now. where they stand with each other is complicated, but that's what the hot dogs are for: an olive branch of sorts. )
where was the rest of him?
i'll keep that in mind
and, just for the record, she didn't learn to steal from me
( he's a good influence! sometimes. most of the time. he doesn't usually encourage children to steal. unless they start talking about becoming king of the pirates. then it's different. )
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[ help ]
the rest of him? oh. strung up in arlong park. now defunct, of course.
he got tangled up with arlong just like we did, only he turned tail and ran when we reunited him with his body. he was supposed to help us in exchange, but i guess that was asking for too much.
i wasn't there when luffy tangled with him the first time, but the blood was already bad between them.
well, if she's going to learn to steal from anyone, i'd ask nami to teach her.
she fessed up to the knife without me asking, so she doesn't really have the makings of a good thief, honestly.
but she's a good fish-gutter. the nasty stuff doesn't scare her, which is essential to be in the kitchen.
is she staying with you?
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well, he wasn't exactly a clown then
we were just children, apprentices to a great pirate captain
( no he will not be naming names. )
but buggy's always been
confrontationally challenged, you could say
at least when his own self-preservation is under threat
he's never shied away from screaming at me for one thing or another
( which is to say: he's not surprised. between the two of them, shanks was always the brave one. still is, it seems. buggy loves a show and equally loves to shout, but when the tide turns against him, he's usually the first one out the door. )
it's better to be a fish-gutter than in the gutter if any human were to ever catch her stealing
i won't always be able to keep my eye on her
but she does have a room on my ship, however she wishes to use it
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can't imagine him as anything other than a clown.
but you must know him pretty well.
[ that is fondness he detects in your writing, you old shitty sap. ]
luffy's different. he follows the kind of code that no other pirate does.
can't expect buggy, or really anyone, to live up to that, i suppose.
i won't forgive him for leaving nami to arlong's mercy, though.
i'll tell her not to steal anymore. but she took my knife because i scared her.
can't really blame her for wanting to defend herself.
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i don't expect you to forgive him
we're still ... working things out ourselves
( "working" "things" "out" — it's complicated. )
i wish i could say i knew him better, but this is the first time we've seen or spoken to each other in 20 years or so
she's a good kid
i'll ask her to show me what she's learned when she gets back :)
text — un: NAMI
maybe ... an orange tart?
text — un: SANJI
someone sweet craving something sweet?
i'll go tell the idiot mosshead to go hunt down some oranges for me while i whip up a flaky crust.
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oh, but actually, strawberries sound really good too ...
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or all three? i'll do all three.
is there anything else you're craving, nami? i still have figs, too.
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so wanting both is okay right?
and liking both is also okay.
because you're the best chef on land or sea so everything you make is the best.
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coming from you, that means everything.
after i'm done making your sweets, can i give you something else?
something in private? it'll be sweet, too.
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of course i do. definitely the best i've ever had.
i mean that in more ways than one. so, yes. i love sweets.
hey, but there was also something i meant to ask you.
do you remember the other day when we were connected?
( and you were sucking zoro dry probably goes unsaid. )
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yeah, i do. you were testing out the connection, right?
i think it worked pretty well.
nami, about that. zoro brought home a bundle of mistletoe because he thought it was edible, and i put it up all over the house because i didn't want it to go to waste.
it had a strange effect on the both of us. it stopped when i had him take it all down.
is that what you wanted to know about? it's not going to happen again.
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that's what i wanted to talk about, actually. you could feel me, right? physically? when i was touching myself.
i could feel you. sometimes when i was touching, it felt like i was touching you, almost.
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it did feel like you were touching me.
all the things you were feeling... the things you feel for zoro, that's also what made me act the way i did. i felt all of that, too.
i'm not mad about it, either. you and zoro.
if you liked it, then i could do it again. for you.
if it makes you happy.
cw: consent talk
could you feel what i felt for you, too?
i did like it, but it wouldn't make me happy if you were just doing it for me. i want you to be happy too, sanji.
and i kinda thought
i mean, i thought i felt something like that from you then, too. like maybe we felt the same sort of way towards zoro, a little.
it felt like you wanted me to push you into it, so you could enjoy it. but, i don't know. if that's just me seeing what i want to see i'm gonna feel really bad about encouraging you to do it.
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i don't mind doing things for you, nami.
[ he'd been thinking a lot of things then, and feeling even more, and he doesn't know how much of it reached nami. clearly, some. the hateful lust he harbors for zoro's chiseled body and full lips and dark lashes, at least. if even an ounce of luck is on his side, she hadn't gotten a whiff of his absurd fears or his violent childhood ghosts that circle him like a carcass, all made worse every time he clashes with zoro. ]
i feel you all the time, now that we're connected.
you're my whole heartbeat. you're the one i want.
but i think about you and zoro sometimes.
i don't know exactly what you shared, but he
he probably needs you too.
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right?
( we Gotta get this guy some sense of self worth. )
you're in my chest, too. heartbeat is the perfect way to put it.
we just kissed, the once. i think he doesn't want to upset you, after everything.
so i'm pretty sure he needs you, too. i already told him i'm not giving you up. now i'm telling you i'm not giving him up either.
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finally — ]
it's hard to be with him.
[ that's. the stupidest thing he's ever heard. zoro, not wanting to upset him? he would go get permanently lost in the woods if that was actually the case, or not bring home bundles of poisonous, accidentally horny shit. ]
i don't want you to give him up. i don't want you to have to give anything up.
you should get everything you want and more. you deserve that.
do you want to do more with him than kiss?
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( well, outside of a normal interaction, in their own specific sanji & zoro way. being sexually compatible is still something. a start. )
yeah, i do.
would that hurt you?
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and if he has you too, he doesn't need that either. you're more than enough.
the two of you being together? no. it wouldn't hurt me.
i sort of
like the thought of it.
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if you wanted more, that would be okay. you should get everything you want too.
and if you joined us?
do you like that?
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i could watch.
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you could join in.
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cw: nsfw
what if we both got on our knees for you? whose throat would you fuck?
what if you’re the one who needs satisfying?
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nami, i wouldn’t do that to you. it’s degrading.
so his.
[ he’s never. done that to anyone. 😔 ]
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so i’d get left out? what if i got lonely?
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my mouth and my hands would be free to do anything you wanted.
i thought this was about you and zoro, though. what the two of you want to do together.
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what if we both want to make you feel good? you were doing a lot for both of us, last time. i want to know what it would be like the other way.
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did zoro say something to you about me?
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i'm not going to be unfair to him.
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( a lull in her writing, while she thinks about what to say, what wouldn’t betray zoro’s confidence. he never outright said there was anything pulpy and soft between the two of them, but it was an impression nami got — between the gaps of his words, and his hasty, almost angrily written script. not something she can necessarily describe without lying or assuming, and she doesn’t think she should, anyway. it’s about them. )
he said he didn’t think there was a you and him without me. but i don’t really think he’s thought about it.
and
i think you and me were under the influence of that blood gunk when we slept together at the orgy. so we also had outside intervention, like the mistletoe. but you don’t blame that, do you? because you know it would hurt my feelings.
well, i think zoro’s feelings are hurt. or maybe just a little bruised.
he didn’t say that, i’m assuming things.
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whatever... thing has been building between zoro and him, borne first of his grief over nami, it now exists as something so staunchly real that sanji can no longer pretend it away. he can't just erase the weeks of zoro's gentle hands on his bloody face, his solid presence in their shared bed at night, the brief, accidental brushes of sleep-warmed skin. he can't forget that zoro had been the one to brush his tears away with the grace to never mention his weakness, day after day. and then zoro had gotten nami back, for him, and sanji just —
he really hasn't said much of anything to zoro since. except for berating him about the mistletoe and then getting on his knees for him to put his dick in his mouth. ]
there was a me and him.
i just don't really
i need to get started on your tarts.
i'm going to fetch the oranges myself.
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unfortunately, she is not sanji. she is much worse. )
can i come with? we don't have to talk, i just wanna shop. ( see: spend time with you. ) i'll let you carry my baaaaag. and you can teach me how to spot the good fruits from the bad ones.
( she grew up in a tangerine grove. she knows a spoiled orange when she sees it. what she doesn't know is if sanji will spiral or not without distractions. )
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at least this way he can avoid seeing zoro until he's busy in the kitchen, and it'll be easy enough to shoo him into the bedroom, where nami is sure to be dozing by then with a belly full of sweet pastries. nami had mentioned the idea of her and zoro enough times that sanji is comfortable believing it's what she wants, rather than whatever... all of this was. both of them, coming after him. ]
of course you can come with me!
fruit-picking with nami 💓
i'll see you soon!
text — un: BEESTING
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They said they can reattach an eye, for you. I have many extra eyes. You might have noticed that, I think.
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you can't just pop out an eye for me. it'll hurt.
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( though the only thing she can think of off the top of her head is how to burn a body so no one knows there was ever a body to begin with, and she knows she can't say that out loud. )
But there are no lakes at Withywoods. Buck is the coastal town.
I have many eyes to spare. ( and, since it's sanji, and she knows he's too nice to agree to it otherwise — she fibs. a little. ) It would be a great relief to be rid of some of them. They are very uncomfortable, under my clothes, and they keep growing. I was going to ask if they might remove some anyway.
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[ yes, anyone with at least one eye has noticed that bee has an excess of eyes. that still doesn't mean that sanji wants a witch to take any of hers, not when he knows what that feels like. maybe these new assholes in town are experts on harvesting body parts, but he doesn't think it'll go any better than when maria had taken his. ]
we can make you new clothes if they're bothering your eyes. you don't have to get rid of them.
aren't they useful to have?
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Maybe. ( very cagey about it — monstrosity is not new to bee, but that doesn't mean she likes to lay it out in writing, for someone she hopes to be good friends with forever more. ) I do not want to talk about it. I want to give you an eye. It isn't charity, dear Sanji. I have a surplus, and you have a need. That is economics.
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[ but she isn't wrong. sanji has somewhat adjusted to his new sense of vision, but with basic tasks. when it comes to setting sail again, he isn't worried about his job as the straw hats' cook. he's worried about protecting his captain and his crew, when his skills as a fighter have been significantly diminished. what will luffy say, when he sees how his value has gone down? ]
bee. when they took my eye, it hurt. a lot.
you'll need blood to heal. all changelings do.
but you know the cold has made it hard to find any animals. i don't have any reserves for you.
[ nami's bottles had been a horrible idea. and yet. ]
you'll drink my blood to get better.
you'll be sick for a long time otherwise, like i was.
that's it. that's the deal. agree or piss off.
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( at least, he left scrolls out that bee read, when she rifled through his study without him knowing. same thing. )
Once, Dwalia beat me so badly my nose cracked like a twig under foot and I breathed out blood on every exhale. Once too, she dropped me so badly on my shoulder it popped itself from the adjoining bone and hung my arm like dead weight at my side.
Pain is no stranger to me. Not to Bee, the Destroyer. At least there is purpose behind this pain. And at least I will have you, which is more than I have ever had before. You are the best friend I have ever had, including the cats.
Okay. ( she imagines sanji will probably make himself sick with trying to help her — and selfishly, childishly, she's more endeared to the attention than worried. ) Do you want to stay on the ship with me and Mister Shanks? Or should I stay with you and your friends?
( distantly bee, who is a Proper lady, finds it pretty scandalous that two men and a woman live together. but she also thinks it's cool, like sanji is some kind of rebel to pompous, stuffy society. )
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[ a beat, as his pencil taps against the page. ]
the thing with the nose and the shoulder. both of those happened to me, too. who's dwalia?
you have to stay with me, because i have to stay with my friends.
they're not doing so well. i'm taking care of them so they'll get better.
i can take care of you, too.
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She is the Servant who kidnapped me. ( she knows sanji has morals bee will never understand, belief in the good of people even when they spit in your face and make you bleed. bee does not believe in the good of humans. she's seen too much of the opposite — still, she isn't wholly without pity. she did not feel justified watching dwalia whipped, only sad she'd fallen from so high, and taken bee with her. ) She is heartless and evil. That is the truth.
Who takes care of Sanji?
( she knows the answer: bee, now. )
I have a secret to tell you. But I do not want to tell anyone else, only you.
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not a big part, anyway.
cooking can be painful, but not like getting your nose broken.
[ so dwalia sounds bad. this isn't the time to remind bee that women are mysterious and unknowable, and that she probably had her reasons. she'll realize it with time, just like he can look back now and think of his brothers with more complex emotions than hatred. ]
i don't need anyone to take care of me. i'm a grown man.
what's your secret? i already know you're a princess, and a shitty one.
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( it's only fair to ask — and maybe that's why bee is so forthcoming with information, beyond that of a child who likes to hear herself talk. it means fair is fair, and sanji owes her the same. )
I do not need anyone to take care of me, either. But I like it, sometimes. To feel cared for.
The eyes ( an awkward wait in her words ) well they can hypnotize people. Please do not tell anyone.
I thought if I might try it on an animal, I might be able to help you hunt better. If we even saw one, I could lure it close.
And well I am very strange as you know. I can talk to them too, sometimes. Animals. When they want to talk to me. Some are more friendly.
I might be able to locate where more are. Please do not tell anyone. We might feed you and your friends.
Make sure you don't tell anyone though.
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my family. my brothers.
i have three of them.
that's because you're a little princess, and little princesses are meant to be taken care of.
[ he wouldn't tell anyone even if she hadn't asked. it would only take one asshole to see the value in her abilities in a time when half of them are starving since maria and her witches have closed the doors of the castle. ]
i won't tell anyone. i don't want anyone to think they can use you.
if i get your eye, will you teach me how to do it? you don't have to if you don't want to.
but if i can feed you and my friends, it'll be good. if i can feed everyone else, it'll be even better.
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she wonders if sanji is meant to be her tool, her broken candle clenched in her hand. the catalyst, they call it — it makes her sad, because she loves him, and wishes for nothing but his own lasting happiness. )
Do they know you yet live?
You are as precious to me as a prince or princess, and perhaps even more so. I will take care of you.
( it strikes her, the reason why adults so insist on you telling the truth, always — inevitably it comes out, and it only makes you look dumb, and who would want a dumb kid? but she can't tell sanji the outlining facts of her deformity — that she can hypnotize, but the eyes then explode in their sockets, waiting to be refilled — or else he won't agree to her offer. she sees the unfolding events as plainly as a storybook lesson. she'll just have to think of another lie, or at least a way to avoid the truth. )
I will teach you, since you will teach me to swim. It is not difficult.
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i think they assume things.
they can't know for sure. the world's big. they can't find me.
you really don't understand the proper way of things, do you?
[ but it makes him smile, to think of little bee taking care of him. she is, in a way, with the offer of an eye. the offer to teach him something new. then he can take care of her, and protect her secret, and be her eyes when he needs to be. ]
you know, i've been talking to animals since i was a kid.
my first friend was a mouse. he was my first customer too.
so if you think you're strange for that, then you'd have to call me strange too.
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( she's not sure what would happen if they did. it would just be bad — world endingly bad, even. )
I have six half brothers. Chivalry, Nimble, Swift, Steady, Just, and Hearth. And my foster brother, Hap. And my full sister, Lady Nettle.
None of them would ever hurt me. Family should not do that to each other. Your family failed you, I think in unforgivable ways. At the same time, I think everything must have purpose inside itself. Maybe if your family was not so cruel to you, we never would have met, and I would not love you so much. It does not justify what they did, but maybe without their mistreatment of you, your whole life would be completely different.
( for the better? bee can't say that for him. she isn't sure the exchange of an awkward, difficult little girl is equal to that of an entire family — but she will endeavor to make it better. for sanji, who deserves if nothing else, a world class fish gutter. )
Proper way? You sound like my Da.
Did your mouse friend have a name? I was always scared of the mice. Well, rats.
I never thought to speak with them. You are truly thoughtful, Chef Sanji.
( since she doodled a seal for koby, she does one for sanji as well — a tiny rat, bangs cast down to its nose to cover one missing eye drawn with an x. it wields a fork in its hand. she takes care in the calligraphy she uses to label it sanji the wise. )
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it's not especially traditional for writing to be on any cake in the six duchies, if only because mostly older generation bakers don't know how to read or write. so, she didn't think about addressing it — but there is a smudgy painting made on the cake's face with frosting, a bunny curled up on its back, a red heart painted on its chest. along the sides of the cake, and what she's currently piping, are little decorative bees at random places.
yes, the kitchen is a mess. and yes, she does expect to get cuffed for it. but bee has a friend, and that friend has a birthday, so this is the most important thing that has ever and will ever happen to her. )
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it hadn't been the last birthday of his they'd celebrated together, just the worst one. but after that, zeff learned quickly of sanji's intolerance to surprises, and it had been (relatively) smooth sailing from then on. to this day, sanji doesn't put much importance on his birthday anyway, telling no one, not even nami and zoro, and he's glad for it because he wakes up like every other day as of late — with bile in his throat and an urgent need to piss.
the sun is barely up as he hangs over the toilet, hacking up the little he'd been able to stomach the night before. whatever's happening to his body, he's not a fucking fan. straightening, he plucks his crisp shirt from where it's hanging on the back of the door, pulling it on and cuffing the sleeves, then dragging his trousers up and notching the belt. he looks almost normal, if not for the velveteen ears drooping into his hair. thanks to his renewed connection with nami, his antlers are hidden away because he's tired of hearing zoro complain about the constant threat of losing an eye in his sleep.
speaking of eyes. he brushes his hair down over the gray one, and then hears a noise from the kitchen. his gaze narrows, and then he's striding out, ready to pin an intruder to the wall with his foot, but the sight that greets him is far more horrifying. he's twelve again, facing a room of rambunctious cooks and a flaming cake — except the cake is almost certainly going to sink in the next five minutes, if it's lucky.
normally, he'd start with what she did right (a lot, actually — it's still functionally cake), and then go into why it's about to topple. but his eyes prickle hotly, and something sticky clogs his throat, and his mood tilts far, far to the left.
he slams a hand down on the counter, rattling sugary bowls and sticky spoons. the cake, to its credit, stands tall. ]
What the hell are you doing in my kitchen?
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It is your birthday. One's second of the third.
( which she heard in a dream, sort of. just not her own, and not the kind that needs to be written down.
apparently lady nettle, bee's some three decades older sister and skillmistress at buckkeep, is quite a skilled dreamwalker. it isn't a talent bee thought she had, and not one she could easily replicate, but something about sanji's dream had dragged her into it, maybe thanks to all of his blood she had drunken lately, like his dream wanted her to acknowledge it. so, she did. it didn't seem like a bad dream exactly, but tense, which she figured was because he didn't know how to tell anyone it was his birthday. now it seems like an invasion she can't exactly admit to, without him getting even more angry, so she keeps her gaze downcast and her mouth sealed, fingers belatedly untying the apron around her waist. )
Are you going to kick me? ( it seems unthinkable to her that sanji would, but maybe if she made him angry enough. along with the skill comes the ghost of a wolf who lives inside her, who reminds her do not seek out trouble, little cub and if he lunges, use your teeth which bee already knows she won't. it had been satisfying to rip out a chunk of dwalia — it wouldn't feel good to do to sanji. embarrassing herself, she reverts back to the child she once was, and makes a whining humming sound in the back of her throat, like sanji's displeasure has wounded her. ) I will clean up your kitchen. I apologize for the mess.
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he is, truly, destined to be the worst parent to whatever is kicking around inside of him, because of what he has to go on. a man who faked his death and locked him in a dungeon. and zeff, who he'd die for, but still wouldn't subject bee to. the urge to cry intensifies, but he can't, because he's a man and bee's a kid, and that's not the way things are supposed to go. he also shouldn't have something kicking against his bladder at all hours of the day, but shit happens. ]
You'd die if I kicked you. [ bee's so small, and he can break bones with his legs. the thought repulses him, and his throat grows even tighter that she would ask. ] I don't fight women. Keep your apron on.
[ he remembers an earlier argument, that bee's not yet a woman, just a shitty little kid. he doesn't know what bee is actually going to grow up into anymore, with all her eyes and her wings. but whatever it is, she'll remain firmly in the category of people he won't fight.
his eyes drop to the colorfully decorated cake. it's sunken in the middle, and lopsided. most likely, she opened the oven too many times during baking, a mistake only made out of childish excitement. ]
I didn't tell you when my birthday was. [ his mouth tightens in that annoyingly pathetic way it does when he's about to cry, and he starts gathering bowls and spoons to take to the sink, stacking them in neatly dirtied piles with his back to bee. ] Celebrations are for shitty little kids. When's yours?
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then again, it is as ugly thing, so maybe it would be better served in the garbage. frowning, bee stares at it critically, trying to find the misstep. maybe it was presumptuous to put bees next to bunnies. it wouldn't be surprising to hear sanji only tolerates her, although that wouldn't stop it from hurting. then again, bee is nothing but one big ball of hurt, convinced no one who has ever been has ever loved her, so maybe it is nothing but poetic justice, for a child as intolerable as her. she doesn't know. )
I was born in the midwinter, the 20th of December. ( near enough to the longest night of the year. she stares at sanji's back hopefully, digging her teeth into her lips before continuing on. ) My mother was pregnant for two and a half years. I remember being in her stomach.
( she's learned, this isn't entirely usual for children to remember — most can't remember their first days alive, but bee remembers it all, every gasp to the ghastly sight of her, every promise she wouldn't live another hour, even an assassination attempt on her part, asleep in her baby's bassinet. )
I had a dream which told me your birthday. I saw a small mouse with a crown of flowers, daffodils and primroses, who was born from a cat who eats little mice when they aren't fast enough. And the mouse said, "I won't get any older, so I won't change, so I will always be quick, and one step ahead." I saw the mouse with a huge feast of fruits, having outsmarted the cat, to say it's birthday would be everyday but the one day it was, which was March the 2nd. But the mouse did not look happy, to be perched among oranges and limes and be without any other mice to share it with. ( she pauses, taking a deep breath. ) Did I misinterpret? Dreams are so sly, so sneaky, sometimes. They can mean so many things. I thought it meant you wanted to be celebrated, to share food with ... um, well, to share with people, I suppose. I thought you would like it.
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all sanji wants to do is cook, and even that is getting cumbersome. he needs bee's help more than ever now, because he tires easily, and his back feels eighty years older. something shifts inside of him, and he ignores that, too.
a little mouse. oranges and limes. sanji is not an idiot. he throws a mixing bowl into the sink and wipes his eyes, thinking of the little mouse his father threw from his window when he'd found sanji had cooked a meal for it and made it his friend. ]
Yeah, you misinterpreted.
[ it's complicated to put into words. he doesn't want zoro or nami or bee fussing over him now, when he prefers to be the one presenting them with their favorite dishes. what he wants is impossible. what he wants is to go back in time, when he was five and six and seven, and give himself a birthday that wasn't full of tears and terror and pain. he wants to be the man he is now for the shitty little kid he used to be. impossible.
he leans against the counter, gripping a dishcloth. the cake has moved and so has bee, hovering near the dining table like sanji's the big bad wolf. like he's the mouse-eating cat. ]
You're the mouse. [ sanji swallows back the tightness in his throat, plucking two silver forks from the drawer and moving to the table. maybe it doesn't have to be impossible after all. he made the mistake once of giving up on the all blue. he doesn't intend to do it again. ] If you cut that cake, it'll fall apart.
[ he pulls the bench out and gestures for bee to sit, holding out a fork for her. then he pulls out his lighter and one of his clove-scented cigarettes, because he doesn't have birthday candles, sticking it into the corner of his mouth and scraping out a flame. ]
You're not going to like it. [ he blows out a stream of smoke, then offers her the cigarette. ] Take a little breath. It'll burn your throat otherwise.
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( she says, defensively. not that she knows anything about it. still, it's hard to doubt when looking at the thing — an unsightly pile of too much frosting and not enough patience, caving in, slanting sideways. she hates it, and wishes it was better. she hates herself too, for much the same reasons.
hesitating, bee eventually settles on the bench, moving with an effort to seem unbothered, to tug the cake in a tactical position away from sanji like he might forget about it if it isn't immediately next to him. most bets are off when he offers his cigarette though, bee's many eyes wide and imploring as if she's been given some kind of treasure. she accepts it, initially holding the stem of it with the pointer fingers and thumbs of both her hands, before holding it how she's seen sanji do it, between two fingers. bee might've scented the smoke off the stable hand workers in withywoods before, but her core memories of cigarettes are all from sanji — this, then, is some kind of generous sharing, bee thinks. like opening a door and letting her in.
she tries to follow instructions, but very predictably fails at it, almost immediately erupting in a coughing fit. the hand with the cigarette juts out towards sanji to take back, while she coughs into the elbow of her opposite arm, tongue licking at the cloth of her shirtsleeve to get rid of the taste. )
Bleh! You do that for fun?
( she actually has no idea why he does it, or what would ever lead anyone to do something so awful. it's actually — kind of funny, how absolutely terrible it is, and eventually her coughs turn into the turkey gobble that is synonyms with bee's happy laughter. )
Do I look like you?
( a silly question, which bee only realizes after the fact, because bee doesn't look like anyone. not her father or her mother, not other little girls, not even other humans, anymore. still, the question comes out with a desperate twinge of hopefulness she doesn't intend to be there — like being comparable to sanji might be the the single greatest thing anyone could give her. even if she is a little mad he didn't like her cake. )
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It's how I relax. [ which means he should never, ever be stressed. ] You shouldn't pick up the habit.
[ carefully, he sinks his fork into a rounded corner of the cake, slicing off a neat mouthful. the taste of spun sugar and frosting settles on his tongue, melting away. it doesn't matter to him if the cake topples. he'll eat every last crumb no matter what. he remembers the first time he ever attempted a cake, and it was far worse than this one. ]
We have the same eyes. [ he takes another bite, his empty stomach suddenly ravenous. ] Even if we didn't, who else is gonna look like me? You're the only one.
[ the uncertainty of what lies in his future — specifically, what lies inside of him — notwithstanding. he hasn't had that discussion with bee, or anyone, because thinking about it makes the space behind his eyeballs throb. he's eaten a third of the cake before he even realizes it, turning the plate toward bee. ]
You have any dreams about — [ a faltering pause, when he can't decide how to ask. ] The future?
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in any case, she watches him owlishly while he eats, waiting to see disapproval or disgust on his face, and instead finding herself shyly happy that he seems to like his cake. it's orange flavored, sprinkled with lime zest, a recipe she uncomfortably asked someone in market for, her eyes on their feet, trying not to enunciate her words too oddly. well worth the social effort now to see sanji eat it. her own fork dips into the softer insides sanji unveiled, happily eating the sweet cake — more of a luxury at home than it seems to be here.
at his question, bee perks, staring at him and then pointedly away, as if lying. her several eyes swivel back to him, throat bobbing on a swallow. ) Yes. I only dream of the future.
( the wolf in her is displeased by her offering of information. bee frowns, eyes drooping to the cake, fork scooping up a frosting bee and buzzing it around in a lazy spiral. she's really not used to adults taking her dreams seriously. she's never had to explain them before, because no one, except for villains, have ever wanted to know. )
They are not to be trusted, in how you hope they would be. Mostly, the dreams are there to look back on when something happens, to say, "yes, maybe I did see that coming." Or maybe it hadn't happened yet, and you will say it again when the next thing happens. It is very imprecise. ( blinking back to him, she eats the bee with a babyish suck. ) But I do dream of you often. Or, what I imagine to be you. Sometimes in the shape of a mouse or a fox. Once, you were like a blue ribbon, with one frayed edge, and one whole side — once, too, I saw you like a knife with gilded handle so fine, it looked to be from something of a different age entirely. Once, I saw you like a seed, with a curling sprout from your shell with three dangling drops of dew, and only one fell. ( rambling, she frowns, setting her fork down and gesturing with her hands, like grabbing the words out from the space in front of her, wrestling with herself, before sighing and looking at sanji rather pitifully, hands pressing flat on the table ) I know what it is you want to know, but I do not have much to tell you. If I do not speak my dreams, I get very sick, so I started to write them down in the dirt because I had no paper fine enough to house them, and no one could read them. Like this. ( she writes invisible words on the table with the tip of one food dye colored finger, there and then gone. ) I do not want my dreams to be used to change the world. I could speak them to you, but ... they are tricky, like sifting your fingers through silt and hoping for gold. You might find nothing. You might find something not meant for you, nor what grows inside you. You see? What if I speak a dream and the dream hurt you? Then you would hate me.
( a put upon sigh — the most stressed, responsible nine year old there ever was. ) Maybe I do have something to tell you. If ... if you promise to believe me. And not doubt. And not tell anyone! It is a secret.
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the best change, at least, is that he can taste bee's cake, zesty and sweet. it's the most he's eaten at once in days, his gratitude softening his edges. he hates skipping meals, not because of a sense of gluttony, but because he's never been able to shake the feeling of not knowing when he might have to go without again. ]
Dreams can't hurt you. [ he forces himself to say it, and to look like he believes it. ] You said it yourself — you can't even trust them. They're one step away from not being real, if you decide they aren't. They're only exactly what you want them to be.
[ he lifts a corner of bee's apron and wipes a smear of frosting from her mouth, then pushes an unruly lock of hair from her cheek. the urge to take her into his lap can be chalked up to all the havoc being wreaked inside his body. ]
What kind of secret? [ he scoops off another forkful of cake, and this time brings it to bee's lips, his other hand lifting his cigarette to his lips for a drag. ] Is it the kind that's gonna piss me off?
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but, she does like the sentiment. they're only exactly what you want them to be. sanji is very wise, which isn't surprising. )
Mm. ( she shakes her head no, a little happy to be babied but not shameless enough to admit it. leaning forward, she bites off the offering bit of cake with a contemplative air, before shrugging her shoulders, unsure. ) Well, maybe. There is much that pisses you off.
( scooching down the bench with a few effort-ridden tugs, bee fits herself under sanji's spread arm, leaning into his side. she keeps her eyes focused on the table, where she places the pointer fingers of each hand along the rough edge. )
Most people have this many parents. I have this many. ( one of her middle fingers joins the count. wolf father painfully nips at her soul, and she figures telling sanji she has a fourth parent who is a wolf who is a ghost who lives inside her mind might be a bridge too far. the hand with only the pointer finger bends and unfurls repeatedly, to draw attention. ) My mother, Molly, the most wonderful and beautiful woman who ever lived. And my father, FitzChivalry Farseer. ( her other pointer finger scrunches, up and down. he doesn't get as lofty an introduction, because bee is usually quite angry with him and also a little guilty, for starting to think of both shanks and sanji as more parental figures for her. ) They are Buck, through and through. Dark skin and dark hair and dark eyes, tall and built. When I was born, many assumed I was a bastard, that my mother was unfaithful, because I look so very unlike my father, Fitz. I look almost nothing like him.
( mostly, her curls are their only connected feature. her middle finger catches on the edge of the table, the last in the trio. ) My second father, though. I look exactly like him, as he is a White, like me. My two fathers ... ( she stretches her fingers out, before they twist together, the motion of a lying child tucking their hand behind their back. ) Mixed, soulwise. As if my father Fitz was blue, and my father Fool was red, and they became purple together. When it came time to put a baby in my mother, there was only Fitz. In fact, I have only barely met the other man, and he never met my mother.
( she looks up to sanji, her earlike wings flicking back, as if dejected. )
I hope the point of the story is, sometimes children are born in strange circumstances beyond understanding. But they ...
( could be like bee? she's not sure it's a good thing, if sanji will think it's a good thing. forgetting to end the sentence, she tosses her head into him, puppyish and boneless, slumping against his side. glad he isn't angry with her. glad he likes the cake. glad to not feel so alone, sitting beside him, the kitchen smelling like baked cake and the scent of sanji's clove cigarettes. )
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I don't even know what's gonna come out of me.
[ he takes a long drag, bee warm against his side. she isn't as bony as when they first met, not since sanji started feeding her, but her wings and plethora of eyes will always make her look strange to everyone else. sanji doesn't see anything out of the ordinary when he looks at her. just another annoying, shitty kid he has to take care of.
thinking too deeply about bee's two fathers and one mother makes something curl up in his chest, something fragile and gossamer, and then he's pulling bee into his lap, pressing his nose into the top of her hair and holding her like she's a rag doll. his breath soaks her unruly locks as he remembers only distantly the feeling of his mother's arms, the sound of her voice, the soft bell of her laugh. so much has happened in the space of her dying until now, so many bad memories to push out all the good ones of her. ]
Tell me your good memories about your dad. [ he hugs her even tighter, turning his head just slightly so smoke can escape the corner of his mouth. ] The one you know best.
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the cuddle is, then, a marker of inevitability. like the world works in cycles, so do people — people always leave her, and so it is probably the last time. bee will treasure it. )
Mm.
( tiny hands lay over sanji's, head thumped back on his chest. she tries to tilt her head back far enough to look at him, but the angle isn't right, so she looks down at his ringed fingers instead, twisting one of them about his knuckle. )
I was born to Withywoods Manor, the place of my youth. It is an old, old castle — much of it I had never seen, as it was closed off, without use. Anyway, once my Da showed me a secret passage in his study, like a den for a bear cub. He gave it to me, to make my own, to watch him while he worked in solitude. It was the best gift I have ever been given. ( she turns her lips up awkwardly in a smile. ) After Ma died, I do believe my father struggled with me. He did not know what he was meant to do, I think, and neglected me for awhile. But when he realized his mistake, he took it upon himself to treat me like a little princess! Ma never would have spoiled me so. We went to market in Oaksbywater for Winterfest, and he bought me all manner of things I never asked for — hot chestnuts and a new saddle for my horse, Prissy, with little bees carved on the flaps, and a leather belt and a bracelet and a cake. He even let me buy gifts for my lady's maid, Careful, and our steward, Revel. Best of all was the seashell seller, as I had never been to the sea before, nor seen something so beautiful. That was the best day I have ever had, truly.
( not because of the gifts, really, but because she was rich with her father's sometimes wayward and unfocused affection. at least — until he left her. fumbling, she reaches into the pocket of her overalls at the center of her chest, and pulls out a handkerchief (this time embroidered with a fox) tied at the crosswise corners, a bounty sitting in the pouch it made. she sets it on the table in front of them, before sinking back into sanji's hug. )
You have probably seen a lot of seashells. I did not consider that. Shanks helped me find them — I was not sure what you would like for your birthday. ( quietly, ) Are all your memories of your father awful?
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he might have that in common with her father. after all, his memories of his mother are fading, and everything he learned from zeff, he learned in the same way someone might suffer a traumatic brain injury. he doesn't want his child to turn out to be a shithead like him.
if whatever is inside of him is even... that. he feels more like a freak than anything else, with nothing in this world making sense except for hunger and pain on most days. but then there are the days with nami’s smile and zoro’s warmth — and this. bee, pressed so soft and tight against him that he feels like she’s been his all along. ]
Will you go to the town over with me? A day for just the two of us. [ it’s not anyone’s fault that he feels suffocated by all the careful attention to his health. he just isn’t used to it. ] We can shop for our own chestnuts and jewelry and sweets. And it’s warm enough to look for more shells. We’ll fill up a jar with our best ones.
[ he sifts through the handkerchief, fingering a shell bleached the pale color of bee’s hair. that’s two presents, the cake and the shells. it’s more than he’d ever gotten for too many lonely years of his life. ]
You can learn things even from awful people. [ so, yes — every single memory of his father is awful. the worst part is that they’re etched more starkly in his mind than the hazy ones he has left of his mother. ] I might’ve never discovered my dream if not for him. The All Blue, a place full of exotic fish and plants and spices. A chef’s paradise. I’ll cook you something grand when I get there.
[ he hopes that she’s there with him when he finds it. his cheek rests against her hair as he idly blows smoke, his mismatched eyes half-lidded. ]
You didn’t tell anyone else about my birthday, did you? [ he can’t imagine having to go through more than once today. ] I don’t want Nami or Zoro to know. I like that it’s just our secret.
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leaning back, she shifts in sanji's lap, fumbling around until she's sitting across him, feet tucked into his thigh, knees resting against his chest. she looks up at him for a long while, colorless, pale eyes blinking. )
I will go with you.
( she tries to say it without any inclination of emotion, which isn't hard for her. once he knows she wants it, it'll be all too easy to break her heart.
not that it's a hard thing to do — sanji already knows she loves him, privately thinking his buck name would be a very suitable prince lovely. because he wants it, he gives it, he has it. love pours out of sanji like blood pours from a slain beast. nuzzling under his chin, bee lazily fists a hand in the front of his shirt, letting her eyes fall closed. she woke up early for the cake, and is very notably very cranky first thing in the morning. )
Your dream ... ( she commits the all blue to memory, deciding she'll look for it in her coming dreams. blue is a color that she associates with sanji — blue and yellow. it makes it more of a challenge, and that makes it fun. ) Why did you decide to become a chef in the beginning of all things, Da?
( she doesn't notice her slip up, too tired to check herself. if she did, she'd probably run away, somewhere where no one could find her, where she could be loathsome, hateful daughter in peace. as it is, she just frowns, shaking her head. )
I did not say. ( it's clear from her tone of voice that she thinks his birthday is something everyone should know, that all should celebrate. ) But I always keep your secrets. You can trust Bee.
text —
do you seriously have a
is it part of a ritual with nami or
let me s
you shouldn't be
can i please
are you getting some rest
( it's not like nami didn't tell zoro a while ago that scribbling out his words doesn't stop them from being scrawled across his recipient's page as he writes, but —
it's also very hard to think about anything other than his ... whatever sanji is to him — and his hot, wet cunt.
so. )
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thought you liked men.
[ where'd his patience go? probably wherever his bladder control has wandered off to. ]
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shitheads like you make me want to change my mind
what the fuck does that have to do with it
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you can't see it.
piss off.
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who says i want to see it anyway
( besides zoro, obviously. )
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you think it's shitty and weird?
fuck you. you can't even boil water.
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stop putting words in my mouth asshole
i don't think it's shitty and weird
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what the hell do you need me for?
don't talk to me until after this is over.
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it's about you and your goddamn insecurities that you take out on me when all i've ever tried to do is
( — what? care? give sanji what he wants, even when it's what zoro wants, too, knowing that he'll have to bear the harsh sting of rejection that follows? he's endured a lot in his life. this will just be another thing for him to choke down and use to toughen himself again. )
but fine
i'll leave you the fuck alone if that's what you want even if i think you're full of shit
but what happens when in two days you decide that you need me and my hands and my mouth and my blood to take care of you again and i'm not fucking there?
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you think some shithead not being there when i need them is new to me?
you wouldn't be special for doing that.
why do you even want to know about it?
it's not normal.
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why would this be any different
i just wanted to see if you were doing okay
i thought maybe since you let me help you last time
obviously i thought wrong. so forget it
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that means i'm fine.
is it still good? bee's helping more. she's cooking now.
[ did he notice? it's not important. ]
there's leftover cake she made if you want some.
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asshole
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he knows the language of men; he knows how conditional it can be.
somewhere between giving the counters a good scrub and putting the dishes away, his energy flags. he has just enough time to make it to the bedroom, his back aching and his nipples sore, only to find zoro sprawled on the bed taking one of his stupid naps. the worst thing about sanji suddenly needing more bed rest is that he runs into zoro's sleeping schedule far too often when previously it had been the easiest thing in the world to avoid.
he sets down the plate of leftover cake on the nightstand, stripping off his belt and tie, and loosening the buttons of his shirt. he can't tell if zoro is actually asleep or not, and he has half a mind to kick him out of the bed entirely, but sanji eventually just slips in beside him, shifting around to try and find a comfortable position that clearly doesn't exist. his eyelids droop with a long sigh, staring at the line of zoro's shoulders through his lashes. ]
Hey.
[ it's just a rumble of a sound, a hushed whisper. nothing else. ]
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he should find somewhere else to go, at least for a few days. maybe he can stay with bee and shanks on his boat. maybe he can sleep on the bank of the river with koby floating by. maybe he really should make this shitty fucking cook learn what it's like to live without —
no. zoro can't do that. despite all of the anger that's flooded through him, made his face hot despite the cool air outside, it's the way his chest tightens when he thinks about leaving that hurts the worst. he made a promise to him, to nami, that he would protect them here. the inexplicably heightened protectiveness over sanji since — since he started changing is just another thing that makes his pulse spike, heart thudding in his chest. what if something happened to him when zoro was away? how would nami ever forgive him? how would he ever forgive himself?
he doesn't say anything when he storms back into their cottage, even if his body language — gaze straight forward, pointedly not glancing towards the kitchen, body hunched over, tail thrashing from side to side as he books it towards their bedroom and wordlessly pulls the door closed probably a little too hard — probably says enough. zoro's jacket ends up shrugged off onto the floor somewhere, shoes kicked off lazily, propping his sword up against the wall beside the bed as he lays down with a long huff of a sigh, trying to relax into the mattress.
sleep will help. sleep will keep his thoughts from racing, ricocheting from anger to worry to unbridled longing and hurt and back again.
sleep doesn't come, though — just, eventually, a tired, worn out cook that shambles into their room and climbs into bed beside him. zoro doesn't react, doesn't move, happy to be facing away from sanji, keeping his eyes closed even if he can't see. it's quiet for long enough that he thinks that maybe he's safe, maybe sanji fell asleep. until — hey. )
Mm? ( it's barely anything — barely a question, really, with how flatly it hums from him. his ears betray him, though, twitching against the pillow, like they're waiting eagerly to drink up his response even when part of zoro absolutely dreads it. )
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zoro doesn't move except for the twitch of his ears. it makes sanji want to touch them, to run his fingers along their tufted edges, to rub gently at the base of them and see if that makes zoro purr. he likes when nami touches his velveteen ears. it makes him flush just thinking about it, though it isn't hard to do that these days when everything, every brush of fabric and every thought that flies into his head, makes him horny.
he feels the absence of his cock here with zoro in a way he hadn't with nami. maybe it's a male thing, or a zoro thing, or a general cock thing, all of which he doesn't want to think about. but his brand new cunt is throbbing between his legs, and he realizes belatedly that trying to nap with zoro in the bed couldn't have been a worse idea. ]
Did you — [ he swallows, his throat suddenly drier than burnt toast. ] Did you still —
[ his fingers subconsciously rub at the little trail of silken fur leading into his trousers, his cheeks reddening with an annoyed flush as his brows draw together. ]
Do you want to — ?
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he swallows hard, blinking into the darkness, suddenly a hell of a lot less tired than he was. in the quiet of their room, every anxious little squirm against the sheets sounds amplified tenfold, each exhale, even the soft sound of fingers against fur. it's enough to make the hair on the back of his neck stand up, far, far too aware of the warm body beside him, nearly close enough to touch.
maybe zoro gives himself away a little when he stretches out a leg, shifting a little on his side, still facing away because he thinks if he catches a glimpse of sanji, his resolve will utterly crumble. (and it already has, just by virtue of him being here, his threats obviously empty.)
finally, he speaks, voice low, like he's worried about being overheard: ) Not if you're going to use it as another reason to resent me. I can't —
( maybe zoro is worried about being overheard, considering this is probably the first time he's said something ... vulnerable out loud, not scribbled in the confines of their notebooks. it feels too much like being pinned down, soft belly exposed and unprotected. for now, the fact that he's able to peer into the darkness instead of mismatched sky blue and bright grey eyes is his only shield. ) I won't do that again.
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[ they've shared this bed too many times to count, with nami, without nami, and still sanji can't help the passage of overwhelming alarm that crawls through him, not from fear that he'll be hurt — he's past that now, and it's hard to imagine zoro hurting anyone with those stupid ears on his head — but from his own misgivings that he shouldn't be here at all. whatever is happening to him, he should go it alone. his crew needed a cook when luffy asked him to join, not the thing he's becoming now.
it was easier with nami. maybe because it feels so natural to be smitten with her, as easy as breathing. he's known since first laying eyes on her that he could love her, and does. his fears with nami are so different from this. he's afraid of her disappearing one day, of leaving again and not having the words to stop her. not being enough to make her stay. with zoro? he's just afraid. afraid to touch, afraid to even look sometimes. he's afraid of what might happen if he really, truly gives in to this.
he lies still for a long moment, focused on the tense lines of zoro's muscled frame. if he says nothing else, does nothing else, zoro will let this lie. zoro won't force him into anything. nothing will happen.
sanji snakes a hand out and snags zoro's hip, shoving downward to force zoro onto his back, so at least he's not facing away from him anymore. ]
You have to see it. [ sanji's fly is already open, his pants low on his lean hips. ] You have to touch it, so you can know if you want this anymore.
[ if you want me. ]
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but they don't. maybe he doesn't resent zoro as a person, but he definitely resents what zoro does to him, and that pisses zoro off because it all seems so simple, so easy. two people give a shit about each other. two people want each other. how could there be more to it than that? why fight it — just to fight?
that's what he would argue, anyway, if zoro felt like arguing about it. he half expects sanji to let it go entirely, considering the silence that follows, and maybe that's for the fucking best.
except then there's a warm hand at his hip, pressing against him to lay him on his back. it gets an annoyed grunt out of him as he looks up through the darkness at the ceiling, ears perking at the sound of sanji's voice cutting through the air, firm but tinged with a certain kind of restrained need around the edges that zoro's gotten far too familiar with - almost pavlovian in how it washes over him, makes the inherent need to touch, to taste, to take care and protect kick in, settle low in his gut. with a long, slow exhale, he makes up his mind.
instead of touching him right away, zoro turns towards sanji, slow, all feline grace as he leans over him and presses their mouths together. kissing him is familiar by now, even in its infrequency — the little bit of stubble that tickles his skin, the taste of clove cigarette smoke inhaled as his lips slide slowly against sanji's. it's always rushed and hasty and frantic between them, practically drowning in their desperation, but now ... he takes his time. lets himself follow the syrupy sweet way that nami kisses, luxuriating in it, savoring every second that he can.
his fingers finally reach to feel that soft, golden fur beneath his belly button — softer than zoro had even imagined the first time he saw it, that night when sanji had gotten on his knees for him — and it's a slow thing, too, exploratory. he breaks only to murmur, firmly: ) There's nothing that could make me stop wanting you, stupid.
( it feels important to say before his palm follows the trail of fur beneath the open fly of his pants, fingers dipping between his parted thighs to cup his cunt — fuck, yeah, he definitely has one — already hot and slick with arousal against his palm. it's dizzying, the easy way his two fingers slip inside of him, a hot breath exhaled against his mouth. )
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he can't say anything to zoro's words as they brand something deep inside of him, something hurt and fragile and unwanted. maybe he survived every wretched moment just for this, just to feel zoro's strong arms and scorching mouth and the cascade of his breath sending shivers across his skin. sanji arches into his hand, drawn to him like salt in the ocean, his body already painfully alive at the mere thought of zoro's touch. the real thing has him flushed and panting, still wrapping his mind around the new, unfamiliar kind of arousal that overtakes him.
zoro's fingers breach him, and it's so much better than all the ways he's stuffed his own into his cunt, and maybe nami is onto something with him, or more likely she's taught him a thing or two about pleasure. sanji kicks his pants off and clenches down against him, his hips rolling into zoro's hand. ]
It's not different now?
[ he doesn't usually talk this much — or at all — when he's getting his carnal obsession with zoro out of his system, but he suddenly has to know. what if he wakes up tomorrow and something else has changed? already there's the idea of a presence inside of him, something he doesn't want to name or think about, but it isn't lost on him how possessive and instinctual zoro has been acting, like he just knows sanji is going to have — ]
Didn't you want me because I — [ he shudders, closing his eyes as he fists zoro's collar and shoves, swinging himself up to straddle his hips. he almost loses the fullness of zoro's fingers, so he catches his wrist in a hard grip, urging him to stay wedged inside of him. what would it feel like if it were zoro's cock? the thought threatens to drive him to madness. ] Because I'm a man?
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he's wet and he's tight and there's a part of zoro that can't help but think about his fingers coated with lube, stretching sanji's hole, having him clenching around him like he does now, cock twitching at the thought of just — being inside of him. he exhales sharply, flexing his wrist so his fingers can sink just a little bit deeper, heel of his palm pressing up against his clit as he grinds against him, feeling that hypersoft fur against his skin.
— okay, all the talking is different, something zoro has to actively concentrate on instead of falling into their usual haze of frenzied lust, lips otherwise occupied. each word barely makes sense, more difficult still when sanji rolls him onto his back and straddles him, fingers grabbing hold of his wrist, vicelike.
the question baffles him, would maybe make zoro laugh if they were sharing some shitty homemade wine in the kitchen and not in bed with zoro's fingers buried in sanji's new cunt, overwhelmed by the thought of sanji sinking down onto his cock. instead: ) It's not — ( he starts, fingers crooking habitually inside of him, wanting to feel him tremble around him again. ) I don't give a shit about — all of that. I haven't ever.
( which feels obvious to zoro, at least from the way he lived back in their world, maybe, busy fighting instead of fucking. but it feels obvious here, too, from the first night he and nami and sanji's foreheads touched, his fingers tightening around both of their hands as they healed him through their blood ritual. he thought he had an idea of what it felt like to want someone before, but now it feels all-encompassing, nami's fingers carding through his hair, sanji's fingers fisting into his shirt, desire and desperation all-encompassing. )
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his jaw tightens around a curse, his breath whisking out hard between his teeth as zoro's fingers move almost cruelly, stroking against all the new things inside of him that make him clench and shudder. if zoro didn't want this — want him — then he wouldn't be here. his fingers wouldn't be jammed inside his cunt, keeping him on the brink of orgasm. this wouldn't be happening at all.
sanji bends at the waist, dipping down close enough to feel the heat of zoro's breath skimming across his skin. his shirt hangs open, his nipples rosy and pert and aching, and he takes zoro’s hand and presses it to his chest, his cunt flooding with fresh heat the moment zoro’s fingers pinch him just so. he crushes his mouth against zoro’s sinfully soft lips, a tenderly frustrated groan tipping past the part of his lips. ]
I want it. [ his fingers curl into zoro’s hair, scratching at the soft, sensitive base of his twitching ears. ] The way you would’ve — before.
[ he sinks his sharp teeth into zoro’s bottom lip, then licks at his bruised flesh, his hips moving rhythmically on zoro’s fingers, not a single movement errant or wasted. sanji already knows how to treat nami when it comes to this — queenly, tenderly, so romantically that sometimes she can’t even meet his eyes. if he finds out zoro isn’t treating nami with the same servile attitude, he’ll hang the shitty swordsman from the fucking roof. but he isn’t nami. his cunt doesn’t need the same… tender, loving affection.
he breaks the kiss, fisting a hand in zoro’s collar and lifting him several inches from the bed, nose to nose with him as his eyes flash with the promise of violence. ]
If you don’t give a shit, then don’t treat me any differently. [ he shoves zoro back onto the mattress, towering over him again as he swats zoro’s hand away so he can grind his wet cunt down onto the front of zoro’s bulging erection. ] Fuck me the way you wanted to before. Don’t be a coward.
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and it's satisfying to have this brief moment of control over him, over this situation, despite the fact that it's this shitty cook who slunk into bed and whispered to him about his pussy, whose desperate hand gripped zoro's wrist to keep his fingers pressed inside. at the very least, it's enough to lull him into some false sense of security in this, even when his free hand is yanked upwards, palm atop his own guiding him to squeeze one of his tits — and he does, feels how much fuller they are in his hand (since last time, even), eager to feel that same milk beading from his nipple, rolling his thumb over him a few times before pinching the swollen bud.
the low groan sanji tries unsuccessfully to hide against zoro's mouth says almost as much as the way his hips shudder when he does it — almost as much as the wet sounds of their kiss, a trail of saliva between them lingering that zoro licks away, the lewd squelch of his cunt around his fingers as zoro draws them back as much as sanji allows with the way he clutches his wrist and fucks them that little bit back in. he shivers a little, too, when blunt nails drag against the base of his ears, snapping him out of his pussy-drunk haze.
the way you would've before. there are about a thousand ways zoro has thought about fucking sanji in this hellhole, none any more or less viable considering all of his god damn insistence that he's not ... whatever it is that he finds so fucking abhorrent. even after he let zoro fuck roughly into his mouth, after he ground his hips frantically against zoro's thigh until he came, after they kissed and kissed and kissed again, after saving each other's lives a frankly stupid amount of times. there isn't any before, there's just — now.
now, with sanji's fingers fisted in his collar, dragging him upwards, his teeth instinctively gritting together, a low sound rumbling in his chest — a warning or a declaration of his disdain or a combination of both. it'll probably be funny in hindsight to compare how easily, willingly, happily he submits to nami, turns his brain off and lets her use him, compared to how fucking aggravating it is to have sanji in his face, pretty blue gaze steely and sharp and serious, demanding shit from him. equally aggravating is the way he practically melts when his hand is tugged away and sanji grinds his bare cunt against zoro through the fabric of his pants, making him groan, head tipping back against the pillow when he's let go. )
You don't scare me, cook, ( zoro says, matter of fact. this charade of tiptoeing around the cook ever since they figured out what's — maybe happening to him has gone on for too long, even if the human side of him feels at war with the animalistic side of him with ferocious instincts to protect, protect, protect. he's strong-willed, though, toughened by his training.
with a grunt, he rolls on top of sanji, still between his thighs and pinning him down, cunt on display in the flicker of firelight dancing through their room. zoro hastily tugs his pants down over his ass just enough to get his cock out and into his hand, no time for preening or showing off or making him beg for it like he really fucking should because he's suddenly struck with a sharp wave of need, sinking into his tight heat so easily it makes him moan when he bottoms out. fuck. fuck. it's better than he even thought it would be — so good that he barely gives any time for either of them to adjust or even comprehend what they're actually doing, just starts fucking into him again and again, dizzy from how intoxicatingly good it feels, panting as his mouth ghosts over sanji's lips. )
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he can't. this can't. sanji's heart leaps abruptly into his mouth at the sudden press of hardness at his cunt, stark realization washing over him, that he's — they — they’re about to — ]
Fuck.
[ his fingers dig into zoro's arms as he sinks inside of him in one fluid motion. he's so much bigger than the fingers sanji has stuffed inside himself, reaching so much deeper that he suddenly feels full to bursting. zoro gives him no time at all to adjust, snapping his hips into him as sanji writhes helplessly, only vaguely aware that he's dripping milk from his tits and slick from his cunt, because now zoro's lips are more important than anything, teasing him with their proximity. sanji cranes his neck and captures them in a bruising kiss, his legs hooking around zoro's waist to trap him. ]
Fuck. [ softer now, his cheeks flaring with color, hips rising off the bed to meet zoro’s relentless movements. it’s so different from having sex with a woman, so different from anything, because zoro isn’t like anyone he’s ever met. his feelings for zoro aren’t like anything he understands. he has no comparison. he doesn’t even want to think about them. ] Fuck me. I need you. I need you all the time. I hate it, I hate you —
[ the words spill out of him from a place he can’t control, his breath coming fast, his pleasure so hot and agonizing that tears prickle the corners of his eyes. he slides a hand between them to stroke at his swollen clit, and all it takes is a few nudges before he’s clenching around zoro’s cock, shivering as an orgasm ripples through him. his breaths turn into desperate moans as his cunt abruptly grows ten times more sensitive, zoro’s thrusts arching his back off the bed as tears spill from his eyes. ]
You shitty little shit — [ he breaks off into a string of violent curses that end in whimpering gasps, another orgasm building fast, this one racing through him like fire. his eyes squeeze shut, his thighs clamping around zoro’s hips as he shudders. ] I love — I love you —
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whether his changeling instincts are kicking in, making him even more desperate than he already was, fingers curling tightly into the pillow next to sanji's head, nails piercing through the fabric, palming over one of his leaking tits, groaning as he fucks so hard into him that the sound of skin against skin keeps making his ears twitch on top of his head. the word breed flashes through his mind, making zoro gasp, overwhelmed by the softness of his belly, the fullness of his tits, how easily his cunt is taking him again and again and thinking about filling him with his cum until he has nothing left ...
sanji's mouth brings him back to reality, kisses deep and languid and messy, zoro missing his lips entirely sometimes and not really giving a shit. his taste, his gasped curses, the way his hips roll to meet zoro's — they're all things that have flickered in the back of his mind even back in arlong park or coco village or on the merry if it meant getting the shitty cook to shut the hell up — and he knows that it's not just because of what's happened to both of them here, how they've changed.
it feels so fucking good, with thighs wrapped around his waist, basically begging to keep zoro inside of him as he fucks deeper, those hot, slick walls tightening around him as sanji's orgasm rapidly approaches, each whimpered curse, plea, gasped insistence that he hates him spurning him on even further. it makes him flush, maybe from anger or from pure fucking desire — because this shithead doesn't hate him, sanji needs him, and zoro needs sanji just as badly. the sudden clench of his cunt around him, hips shuddering as he comes, has zoro moaning, hips speeding up as he chases his own orgasm, so close, so close —
i love you.
zoro's mouth hangs open uselessly as he pants, a few more insistent thrusts through sanji's second orgasm before he's coming hard inside of him, filling him up for so long he thinks that maybe he's passed out, maybe he's imagined the whole thing, every single word — but when he blinks his eyes open slowly and the ringing in his ears starts to fade, all he sees is the cook, blonde hair mussed, tear tracks down his cheeks, looking debauched and exhausted and fucking beautiful.
he loves him? )
Don't go, ( comes zoro's abrupt plea, eyes widening, suddenly seized by the thought of being told to go fuck himself, that he didn't mean it, that he didn't mean any of this, to stay the fuck away from him. his heart pounds in his chest, hyperaware of the fact that he's still inside of him even as his cock's softening, like his hips can't fathom the thought of letting even a drop of his cum out. desperately, a hand reaches out to cup his cheek, pad of his thumb ghosting over his lower lip before he leans in to kiss him, a slow, lingering thing before he murmurs so quietly against his mouth that it borders on a whisper: ) I — Sanji, please. Please stay. You know that I — you have to know.