Chapter Text
Rain wets his loafers as Sanji runs out from under the cover of the tangerine trees, ripe fruit gathered plump in his arms, almost rolling out as he rushes to get back inside. The sky has been pregnant with it all morning, gray and rumbling. Heat in the air and moisture beading thick in his lungs, around the smoke warming him from the inside out. By the time he gets back inside the galley the rain’s put his cigarette out, fat drops turning it limp like paper between his lips. He spits it out onto the countertop ashtray and sets the tangerines down beside it.
24. A decent harvest for now, more than enough to fill out their fruit stores along with all the rest of the harvest from Wano. Now he has to double check their cured meats, take inventory of their grains, and plan out what vegetables he’ll pick up inland once this incessant rain stops. They’ll set off from Wano bright and early tomorrow, and he needs to be prepared before then. They need more leafy greens for sure, because Robin’s been a little anemic lately and—
“Sanji,” Robin calls, something playful in her voice, and a delighted shiver runs up his spine. What’s the occasion, he thinks, spinning on his heel, already grinning at her. “Could we have a snack, please?”
Sanji just about short circuits. For a second he doesn’t think anything at all, as he sees Robin enter the galley and shake off an umbrella with one hand, the other holding tight to a tiny palm attached to a thin arm attached to a particularly short and narrow body. When he’s finally able to gather up a stray thought, it’s in the vicinity of, Robin has a kid? Followed by, ROBIN HAS A KID?????
In his defense, it’s an easy mistake to make. The boy looks remarkably like her, with the same tawny skin, thickly lashed eyes, and jet-black hair. Then Sanji catches sight of the straw hat hanging from a thread around his neck, like the edge of a golden halo behind his head, and the thin scar curved under one eye, and he comes to a very abrupt realization.
“Luffy?” he chokes out, gripping the countertop for stability.
“That’s me!” Luffy says, voice frail and high-pitched with youth. Then he looks up at Sanji and asks, devastatingly, “Who’re you?”
Sanji gets the story from Robin as tiny-Luffy kicks his feet on a barstool, eating and eating and eating every bit of food Sanji sets on the countertop in front of him. Even as a 12 year old, their captain’s appetite has no end.
Shinobu, in a fit of despair over seeing her poor young king stumble around in his new adult body, staring longingly at the other children playing on the streets of Wano, tried desperately to find a way to reverse the effects of her Ripe Ripe fruit. Aside from trying to awaken her Devil Fruit there was little she could try on her own, and so she enlisted the help of both one Doctor Trafalgar Law for consultation via Op Op fruit, and Raizou. Raizou’s own ninjutsu and Scroll Scroll fruit were invaluable in finding a long ago stored reversal effect from a decade old— now three decades old in the current timeline— Devil Fruit encounter with another ninja.
Only, just as he released that scroll in tandem with Shinobu’s own Ripe Ripe fruit, Luffy and Kid came bursting into the castle courtyard calling for Law to referee their own match, because they were in an argument about who was stronger.
The powers merged and did not, in fact, strike the unjustly 28 year old Kozuki Momonosuke before them. Instead, the three captains to their right tumbled over each other in a heap of limbs and squabbling, and rolled right into the ray— causing them all to de-age instead.
Robin, who was observing all this from a distance out of curiosity, wrangled the now thoroughly confused captains before them. They had no memories from after the age they were reverted to, she found out, and were all exactly seven years younger from the date. That left them with one young adult Law, one teenage Kid, and one bubbly child in Luffy.
Shinobu tried to use her Ripe Ripe fruit again, of course, but the effects of the previous reversal ray were still lingering. The captains would become their appropriate ages again, certainly, but when that would happen was uncertain. Best to have them all extend their stay on Wano for longer, so the ninja responsible for this effect could monitor them and see if there was a better way to fix this than just waiting.
And so, Robin explains, she went around the castle dropping the other two captains off with their crews, and brought Luffy back to the Sunny just as the rain started.
“I knew he’d be hungry,” she says, wiping the child’s cheeks from the cream he managed to smear all over them. Sanji, setting another pastry in front of Luffy and barely extricating his fingers in time to avoid being bitten, watches her watch their captain with so much fondness that it’s foreign. “You like Sanji’s food, don’t you?”
“Mn-mm,” Luffy says, which might have sounded something Uh-huh, if his mouth wasn’t stuffed full.
“Isn’t he just adorable?” Robin asks Sanji, setting her hand on her cheek and sighing.
“He’s eating me out of house and home,” Sanji grumbles, grabbing those beautiful tangerines he just harvested, already resigning himself to having to redo his inventory and preparation all over again. He starts peeling them and placing one segment at a time on Luffy’s plate, watching them disappear just as quickly.
“Ahnk oo,” Luffy gets out. Thank you, probably. And what sort of cook would Sanji be if was actually upset at this display of hunger? How much energy must that transformation into a child taken, if Luffy is so ravenous right now?
“‘Course, Captain. Anytime you’re hungry just come to me, okay?”
Luffy looks up at him, eyes sparkling, cheeks still stuffed like a chipmunk’s. He swallows down hard and finally speaks with a clear voice, grinning so wide it’s infectious. “You call me Captain?”
“What else am I supposed to call you?”
Luffy just grins impossibly wider, somehow. He looks up at Robin, absolutely preening, and she laughs. “I told you, didn’t?” she says. “You’re not just a pirate now, you’re our captain too.”
“Ace is gonna be so jealous,” Luffy exclaims, rocking back in his chair. Robin sprouts a few extra arms to stabilize it before it can fall, her fond smile still perfectly in place, giving nothing away. Sanji does his best to follow her lead, but can’t undo the awful knot in his stomach.
Later, when Franky and Usopp return to the Sunny with restocked supplies for their own workshops, Sanji asks Robin about it. She still watches Luffy go starry-eyed over Franky’s robot body with that same smile, seemingly unbothered.
“We don’t know how long he’ll be stuck like this,” she explains, voice quiet. “But for now, he looks at his future and sees his dreams come to life. The world is so perfect to him. Why ruin that?”
They sit there in silence for a moment, the two of them listening to the sounds of rain thrumming heavily against the windows outside, overlaid by Luffy’s excited giggles as he climbs all over Franky and directs the laser pointer in his arm to swing all over the place. Then, Robin leans her shoulder against Sanji’s and says, “If I ever had the opportunity to tell myself one thing as a child, it would be that things turn out okay. That little girl has so much to look forward to in the future, like adventure on the high seas, and working towards her dream each day… and a family she loves to share it with.”
Robin glances at Sanji when she says that, and something more than just her gorgeous smile catches his breath in his throat.
If Sanji could ever tell his child self one thing, it’d probably be that as well.
He thinks of Ace, who Luffy has not mentioned with sadness to them once since they reunited, even though they all know the pain he must have been in— must still be in, no matter the day— because he hates to see his crew worry over him, and knows the child before them deserves to be treated by them the way adult Luffy would treat him.
Once the rain has stopped, they all make their way back inland. There are still festivities all around Wano, its people celebrating their freedom every evening without fail, feasts and music to go around. Normally they all mingle with the people, citizens and pirates alike streaming in and out of the castle freely, laughing together and serving each other. Today, however, the castle doors are closed. Outside, the city rages with joy. Inside, the three pirate crews engage in a more muted feast, still filled with music and celebration, but quieted as they all discuss the logistics of what happened.
They must stay in Wano for longer; how does that work for you? Is your crew heading out next week? Next month? No, I don’t know about mine— wait, where did you hear that? And oh, wait Captain, no, don’t get into that! That’s not—!
Sanji lets Robin explain the situation to the rest of their crew and makes his way into the kitchens, because he wouldn’t be himself if he didn’t have an itch for control, to see how things are going. He needs to see if there’s anything he can do to help. As he heads in, he passes Luffy playing with Momo and Tama, who are both bewildered at not being remembered. He sees Kid surrounded by a ring of his own crewmates, glaring at anyone else for approaching, clutching his arm as though he can just tell it should be missing. The last of the affected trio, Law, sits on table and holds court with his own crewmates, chatting and smiling lazily. He doesn’t look one bit out of place, compared to the others.
Sanji accidentally catches his eye on the way into the castle, that golden gaze bright in the dim twilight. Law holds the moment for a long, intense few seconds before his attentions are diverted elsewhere.
Sanji heads into the kitchens and ignores the flutter in his stomach. That’s not the Law he knows. For all intents and purposes, that’s a stranger.
When Sanji reemerges into the courtyard with a steaming hot tray of white rice, he almost trips right over Luffy. Him and his duo of new-old friends follow Sanji like ducklings to the tables where the rest of the food is arranged, waiting for him to set the rice down.
“Sanji! I’m hungry!” Luffy announces, which is so familiar it almost makes him laugh.
“Aye, aye, Captain.” Sanji sets about fixing him and the other children plates of dinner.
“Hey,” Luffy whispers while Sanji works, cupping his hands around his mouth as though to prevent the other children from listening. It works poorly, considering how loud his whispering voice is. “This old guy is following us around and saying he’s a kid. Is he okay?”
“Luffy!” Momo whines, teary eyed and flushed with embarrassment. “Stop that! I told you already, you know who I am!”
“Are you okay, mister?” Tama asks, looking up at him in concern. The term of respect only makes Momo sniffle louder.
“He’s not lying,” Sanji says, handing Luffy his plate. Dinner is piled so high on it that the mound of rice and meat is as big as his head. “Momo’s your friend, Luffy. He’s like your little brother.”
Luffy pouts. “That doesn’t make sense. I’m the little brother!”
Sanji has to bite back a smile. “Come on, Cap, it’ll be good practice for when you’re big again. You’re really the one who’s older than him.” He dishes out plates of dinner to Momo and Tama too, and watches them all wander away, Luffy with a determined expression on his face. He looks like he’s thinking so incredibly hard, with all the brain power in his tiny little head. Robin would find it adorable.
Sanji’s lighting up a smoke when Law breaks free of his group from across the courtyard, coming near. While Luffy is almost unrecognizable, save for that beautifully consistent personality, and Kid looks a couple of heads shorter and about half as wide as he is normally, Law is only changed enough to look a little uncanny. He’s still taller than Sanji, ears pierced twice over with those same golden hoops, and the hat set upon his head is the same as always. If he didn’t know any better, Sanji would assume the only thing different was that Law got a full night’s rest for once, with the noticeable lack of dark under-eyes, and that he decided to go clean-shaven today.
“Sanji,” Law greets.
“And here I thought you weren’t supposed to remember me.”
“I might have asked around.”
Sanji tongues the cigarette to the other corner of his mouth, watching Law’s seemingly perpetual lazy smirk. It’s an odd look on him. 26 year old Law smirks more than he smiles too, but more often than both, he simply moderates a resting bitch face. This is somehow more intimidating.
“You need me to fix you a plate too?” Sanji finally asks, settling on a tone that’s more teasing than hostile.
“I was hoping to borrow a smoke, actually.”
Then, before he can even reach into his pocket for his box of cigs, Law steals the lit cigarette from right between Sanji’s lips and places it into his own mouth, cherry flaring bright as he takes a drag, lips twisted up in amusement.
There is a moment where indignation flares in Sanji, blustering right through his defenses, but he tamps it down. Law watches him out of the corner of his eye, clearly hoping for a reaction. Sanji realizes he’s been unwittingly invited into a game, one that he is probably expected to lose, and his competitive streak gets the better of him. He ignores the provocation. Then, because he refuses to give in, he doesn’t light a new cigarette. He simply waits for Law to take the stick out of his mouth again and holds his hand out primly to demand it back, and watches as Law watches him with continued amusement, fingers dragging over each other’s as the cigarette changes hands. Sanji places it between his own lips and tries not to wonder if it’s possible to taste someone else’s mouth on a paper filter.
Chopper runs over to them just as Sanji’s passing the cigarette back, almost tripping over himself in his haste.
“Sanji!” he gasps. “Stop that! Don’t pass your bad habits onto him too, Traffy’s too young to die!”
“He asked for it,” Sanji defends. He immediately regrets his childlike petulance, though Law only smirks down at Chopper and agrees.
“I did. Don’t go worrying about me, little racoon. I’m here for a good time, not a long time.”
Chopper gets so distracted at being called a racoon again that he completely forgets to scold Law for the rest of what he said. Sanji is no place to be the one to do it, he lets it slide as well. Law’s a doctor too; he can handle himself.
Sanji reaches for the cigarette again, but Law doesn’t hand it over. He looks at Sanji’s outstretched, gently beckoning hand, then back up to his face, and his smirk sharpens. Law takes one last drag of the cigarette then bends a little, lifting his foot up behind him to put the cindering cherry out on the heel of his shoe. Then he takes the rest of that doused, barely smoked stick and tucks it away into his pocket to save for later. “Thanks for the smoke,” he says, already turning to go, nodding at Sanji over his shoulder. “I’ll keep it safe.”
Sanji is left watching him blankly as he leaves, Chopper confused beside him.
Whatever that was, it shouldn’t be attractive— it isn’t. Being jerked around isn’t fun, and Law isn’t hot enough right now to pull it off anyway. His clunky work boots are caked in mud, his jeans are ripped in a manner that is not by design, and his shoulders are so scrawny that his hoodie hangs shapelessly off them, the sleeves needing to be rolled up past his bare, inkless forearms to be functional. And yet. Something about the deliberate teasing gets to Sanji. Law at 19 is much more playful than Law at 26, and now Sanji is left reeling, flustered and fighting on the toes of his feet.
“Huh!” Chopper says. “I guess he really did listen!” He smiles proudly, as though he’s successfully gotten Law to save himself, and not that Law took that as an excuse to steal Sanji’s cigarette for no good reason but to piss him off.
“Yeah,” Sanji says, already digging out another stick, almost too stunned to be riled up. “Good job, Doc. Maybe one day you’ll get me too.”
“Oh stop it, you bastard,” Chopper giggles, wriggling around happily at the praise.
When Sanji places his new cigarette between his lips, he swears there’s a difference; this one is missing the taste of Law’s mouth wrapped around it.
The next morning Sanji is back in the galley, a notebook laid out before him, tallying inventory again.
So. There is no set date for them to sail off now. It could be as soon as a few hours, if Luffy somehow magically turned back into himself between breakfast and dinner, or it could be next week. Sanji needs to be prepared for both possibilities, which means he has to play a balancing act of renewing their stores while also not overfilling them with ingredients that could go bad before they reach another island, if they get delayed on Wano any longer. He’s on his third attempt to figure out how many pounds of vegetables he needs to pickle to preserve, and close to tearing his hair out over it, when the galley door swings open. A little strange since there should be no one else on the ship.
“Leftovers from breakfast are in the fridge,” he mutters, assuming it’s a hungry crewmate coming back for seconds.
“You feed your guests leftovers? I heard you were more polite than that.”
Sanji whips around, finding Law standing at the doorway. He lets the door swing shut behind him as he walks forward, gaze dragging tactile down Sanji’s body. He’s so obvious it’s almost tacky.
Sanji sighs and goes back to his planning, flipping between pages to double check his pickling calculations. “What’re you doing here?”
“Can’t I come say hi?”
“Nope. You can, however, return my cigarette you stole.”
“I don’t know,” Law murmurs, coming closer, looking over his shoulder to watch what Sanji’s doing. “I’m pretty sure you gave it to me.”
“I’m pretty sure I let you share it with me, actually. So?” Sanji turns around, arms crossed, leaning back against the counter. They’re closer than he thought, Law having come right into his reach. No concept of personal space. “What’ll it be?”
Law’s smirk widens, just the slightest. His gaze flickers down to Sanji’s mouth before he hums, pretending to think about it before he says, “I’ll trade it back to you.”
Sanji bites back a laugh. He’s not trading his own stolen cigarette for a kiss. He doesn’t even want it back at all. But he still has a sore spot from losing their little game yesterday, and he’s not about to let this go without evening the score.
“You want a snack? I’ve got a shoe with your name on it.” He taps his shiny loafer against the floor, a faint flicker of blue flame wrapping around it for a second, and Law’s expression flickers too. Surprise overtakes his features before he gets it under control, curiosity sharpening his gaze instead.
“They didn’t tell me you ate a Devil Fruit.”
“I didn’t.”
Sanji smiles. There— now this is a familiar Law-like expression, that bit of frustration furrowing his brows and marring his full mouth with that angry frown. Confusion looks good on him. Rather, losing looks good on him, because it satisfies Sanji to no end.
“Who are you asking around about me, anyway?” Sanji asks, pushing past him to head behind the counter, shoulders burning where they brush. He flicks on Franky’s coffee machine as he goes and finds beans to grind.
Law gets his feet back under himself, wiping the frustration away. “Why? You don’t want me asking anyone in particular?”
The other Straw Hats, for one. Some of them would catch on too quickly, and Sanji suspects that Robin in particular already knew what was going on behind closed doors last month anyway, on the way to Dressrosa.
“There might be people you wouldn’t want to ask about me. Don’t do something you’ll regret when you’re back to normal.”
“Are you something I’d regret?”
Yes, the Law that Sanji knows would say, older and wiser by a good seven years. Don’t fuck your allies when things going sour could ruin anything important, and especially don’t go chasing after them after just one interaction. Wait another four at least. That’s how long it’d taken Law at 26 to approach Sanji after Punk Hazard, bravery and general brazenness cut in half from the sort of person he is at 19. He’d regretted it too. Neither of them brought it up since, which is a good enough sign to Sanji that a repeat would be disastrous.
He tries not to laugh, now, because it might come across just a touch too bitter. Instead, he tamps down the ground coffee powder into the machine and calls over his shoulder, asking Law to grab a mug for him. After a moment of silence, Law asks, “…Where is that?”
Shit. That’s right, he doesn’t know anymore. How crazy is it, that Law knows nothing at all about Sanji right now, not one thing that went down between them, but still came to bother him again like a moth to a flame. Just like before.
“I forgot you don’t know your way around the ship anymore,” Sanji says, grabbing the mug himself. “You travelled with us for a little while, you know—“
“On the way to Dressrosa. I was told. Now, that , I wish I could remember.” Something about the tone of his voice prompts Sanji to look back.. Law’s smile is chilly, his eyes dark, the furthest thing from amused. “Seems like a fun time. Would’ve been more fun if I’d gotten the killing blow on Doflamingo, instead of your toddler captain, but I guess that’s fine.” There it is again. This sense of danger that intimidates Sanji far more than the older Law ever did, even though he knows right now that he could beat the scrawny man before him into the ground quicker than he could blink. Sanji doesn’t have the courage to tell Law that Doflamingo is not even dead, that he’s just been locked away by the marines apparently, so instead he mixes sugar and cream into the fresh cup of coffee he just brewed and hands it over.
Law stares at it blankly for a moment. “I thought this was for you.”
“I try not to drink coffee in the middle of the day,” Sanji says, already cleaning the used grounds from the machine.
There is another moment of silence before Law takes a cautious sip of the drink, then looks up Sanji with narrowed eyes and something positively wicked slashed across his mouth. Sanji’s stomach flips as Law settles beside him so close that their elbows brush and jokes, “You know how I like my coffee? What are we?”
“Get out of my kitchen.” Sanji elbows him away, cheeks warming.
“Don’t you want your cigarette back?”
“Law—“
“Finally, someone in your crew that doesn’t call me by that stupid nickname.”
Sanji falters. He looks up at Law, stomach twisting, that familiar smirk breaking him down all over again, and can’t help but think, it’s just not fair.
Sanji’s supposed to be over it by now. It doesn’t matter. What happened before Dressrosa is over with, lost to the past, and they’ve both moved on from it, only… only Sanji’s stupid and overly sensitive and gets attached too easy, and fine, fuck it, he’s still not over it. And now a different version of Law is here to churn all those silly emotions up again, and he’s just suffering all the more for it.
“I’m not fucking you,” he finally says, turning back to his notes. Might as well be direct and get it over with.
“Fine by me. I was hoping I would fuck you instead.”
“That’s not happening either. If it did, you’d go back to normal soon and regret it.”
“But you wouldn’t?”
Sanji goes back to his notes and hopes that if he ignores Law enough, he’ll give up. There’s one pound of cabbage in the pantry that needs to be pickled, and he only has two bottles of fish sauce left—
“So you’re interested, you just don’t want to disrespect older-me?” Law asks. He catches Sanji’s hand and the pen slides across the page, the ‘e’ in soy sauce wobbling away from the rest of its brethren. “Because I’m him,” Law continues, smirking down at him. “You have to remember that we’re the same person, and I’m telling you, he won’t regret it. He seems pretty interested in you too.”
Sanji is tired. The cabbage is wasting. This conversation has gone from fun and harmlessly flirty to downright irritating.
He twists his wrist out of Law’s grip and yanks that same hand around instead, Law buckling against the counter top, catching himself on it as his thin forearm bends.
Sanji looks down at him and tells his dumb, wide-eyed expression, “You were cuter when you were still pigtail pulling,” without any satisfaction. Then he lets Law go and heads out the galley, the door slamming just a tad bit too hard behind him, and skywalks off the ship and back inland. He’ll need to visit the royal kitchens again, but first, he needs to run a lap through the air to cool off. Or at least run until his heart stops hurting.
Sanji’s just being dramatic about it. Really, it’s nothing. It’s not like he had his whole heart shattered into pieces or anything. It’s just—
The night before they landed at Dressrosa, Law approached him after a few days of cautious interest and helped him clean the fridge. It’s the sort of mind-numbingly laborious task that takes hours, and he really shouldn’t have started doing it so late into the night before an important mission when he should’ve been getting sleep instead, but Sanji’s been doing this for years. It’s a sort of pre-battle ritual he started doing in Alabasta, the night before they set about crossing the desert. His logic is thus: if the fridge is all clean and gorgeous and ready for use the second he comes back to cook a feast for them all, then surely, everyone will come back at ease and ready to eat.
So what if it doesn’t make sense? It’s stupid, sue him, but it settles his mind.
Dressrosa was no different, only their fridge had gotten twice as big since they moved into the Sunny, and the task had become twice as laborious to go with that. So Sanji sat on the floor and wiped down the shelves, organized all the jars and bottles, and made sure the freezer didn’t have any ice frosted over the sides.
Law found him like that when he came in for a late night cup of coffee, equally unable to sleep, and even though Sanji doesn’t normally let other people into his fridge he made an exception.
It went by much faster with the two of them working together. Law was a surprisingly diligent little worker bee, listening to Sanji’s orders and placing everything back neatly into his militaristic organization system without complaint. When they were done, Sanji forbade him the coffee and got out a bottle of half-finished wine instead. Law, watching Sanji run his fingers through his hair and tap his feet in a rough rhythm against the ground, offered to go down on him.
Sanji was startled, of course. But he was also warm with wine and the feeling of Law’s fingers brushing his as they handed off condiments to each other just minutes ago, and Law said something about stress relief, as though that was as good an excuse as any, so…
Sanji still remembers the feeling of Law’s hair in his hands, as he bent over him, fingers twisted tight into that thick hair. Those inky black waves curled softly over his pale fingers, slightly oily from not being taken care of for a while, and deliriously, Sanji hunched over that head and rubbed soothingly at that scalp as though he wasn’t the one having his soul sucked right out of him. As though there was anything he could do to comfort Law right then.
Law fell back on his heels when he was done, working his jaw with a grimace, rubbing at the aching hinge with the heel of his palm. Sanji wiped a bit of drool off the corner of his mouth carefully and realized with a start that he really, really wanted to kiss him.
Somehow he knew that would be a bad idea. Instead, because he could never leave a favor unreciprocated, he got down on his knees too. Sanji had never gone down on a man before this, even though he’d known he liked boys for just as long as he knew he liked girls, and that must’ve meant he was downright terrible at it. Why else would Law have stared at him like that afterwards, expression shuttering, closing up just like that? Why else did he act like nothing had happened the very next day, and every single day after that when they reunited again at Wano?
So, yes. Sanji is pretty sure Law would regret it if Sanji slept with his 19 year old self, because he certainly hadn’t wanted to at 26. Sanji is also sure he’ll regret it himself too, if he has to live through that embarrassment all over again.
By the time Sanji returns to the Sunny, it’s time to get started on lunch. He intends to drop his haul of groceries off first then pick up his stockpot before bringing it back to the castle, when he notices it’s missing.
…That’s strange. In fact, all of the pots and pans he normally stores in this cabinet are missing. He checks the one beside it, and this is also completely empty. The one beside that, too, and the one across the kitchen, and even the trays that he normally stores in the oven when it’s not in use. When he opens the drawers, all the utensils have vanished without a trace too.
What the fuck.
Sanji finds his notebook on the countertop, a single fork spared as a bookmark. He flips it open to that page and finds, written on it in poor handwriting, AM I PULLING YOUR PIGTAILS HARD ENOUGH?
Sanji is going to kill him.
He marches off the ship, wielding that single fork like it’s a weapon, and skywalks across the beach back to the polar tang. Surely, Law couldn’t have brought all those cooking instruments further than that, even with those powers of his.
Sanji kicks the side of the ship so hard he almost dents it, a harsh, echoing sound ringing out. “Get the fuck out of there, dipshit, or I’ll sink your stupid tin can!”
A moment later, the hatch unlocks and Law sticks his head out of it, smirking. “I thought you didn’t like the thrill of the chase?”
“I’d like the thrill of sticking my foot up your ass,” Sanji snarls. “Give me back my kitchen.”
“I’ll trade you for it.”
“Sure! How about you give my shit back, and in exchange I don’t punt you into the ocean and leave you to drown.”
“Romantic.”
Sanji is going to have an aneurysm. He misses his Law, the 26 year old, so very much. “Why are you doing this?” he asks, and to his chagrin he almost sounds like he’s begging. “Don’t you have someone else you’d like to go bother? You don’t even know me yet!”
“But you know me. I find you intriguing,” Law says, climbing out of the hatch to sit properly atop the edge of it, still blocking the entrance.
“I’m not,” Sanji tells him. “I’m just a cook who wants his stuff back.”
“You know, I would have left you alone back on your ship if you hadn’t thrown a tantrum. But now I know you’re hiding something, because you wouldn’t have gotten so pissed off otherwise.”
“I’m not hiding anything,” Sanji says, choking out a laugh. His heart twists tightly in his chest, miserable. Don’t make him say it, Law. Don’t humiliate him like this.
“You are, and I want to know what. So, trade me. A secret in exchange for your kitchen back.”
So this is what it’s come to: Sanji’s precious kitchen held hostage in exchange for admitting something both pirates should already know. The choice here is obvious. He hates to lose, but he would hate to lose his kitchen more. In the end, this version of Law will cease to exist after who knows how long, and Sanji has faith that the older Law is a decent enough person to not hold any of this over his head.
“Fine,” Sanji finally says, and Law’s eyes light up as he leans forward, eager to listen. “The truth is that my Law and I messed around before, but it was a while ago and I don’t want things to be weird when he comes back.”
Sanji waits for a reaction. For some amount of surprise, or skepticism, or even teasing at how he misspoke— his Law, how could he say that out loud! His face warms, embarrassed by this whole situation— but Law does nothing. His grin only gets marginally wider and he sits back, looking almost pleased, as though he somehow expected this. “Okay,” he says.
“‘Okay’? That’s it?”
“You can go back to whatever you were doing before. I’ll bring your stuff back to your ship, as promised.”
“But— you—” Sanji reels himself back in. This isn’t worth getting worked up over. As unsettling of a reaction as this is, it’s better than having to put up a fight for his kitchen. “Thanks,” he says lamely, and turns to go. He’s about to kick off into the air again when Law calls out to him.
“Sanji,” Law says, digging something out of his pocket to hold it up. It’s his half-used cigarette stick. “In for a berry…?”
Sanji shouldn’t. He really, really shouldn’t. But he looks at the cigarette being waved in Law’s nimble fingers and the lazy smirk across his face, and thinks, fuck it. This is it anyway, isn’t it? It ends here, and he does feel a little bad for Law, for spending so much effort on him when Sanji knows he won’t put out— and even though that’s something he definitely shouldn’t be feeling guilty about at all, he still does, because he actually does like Law, and putting all those pots and pans and utensils back is going to be such a pain for him even with his powers— so he figures it wouldn’t hurt to at least do this for him.
Sanji skywalks up just one pace, high enough to be level with where Law’s sitting up on the hatch, and leans forward. He gets his fingers under Law’s jaw, cradling his face with that stupid fork still clutched in one hand, and presses his first and last kiss into that beautiful mouth as farewell. Maybe he is a little dramatic, and a little too much of a romantic to boot.
He pulls back all flushed and warm, licking his lips, and Law’s eyes glance down to follow that movement.
Sanji takes the cigarette back.
“Pleasure doing business with you,” Law says, and if Sanji didn’t know better he’d almost mistake that for an affected rasp in his voice.
Sanji skywalks away and tries not to wish for more. It’s only once he’s shaken himself out of his horrendously lovesick state and made it back to the royal kitchens that he realizes, shit, he never did what he came there to do. He forgot his stockpot.