Drabbles: The Morbid Curiosity Series
Feb. 5th, 2006 12:59 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
mettathron.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
onepieceyaoi100Since I'm judging this week's theme, I can't really offer anything of my own on topic; however, I do have a the remaining drabbles from the series of which "The Custom of the Sea" is a part. So, here is the complete series, "Custom" included, if anyone is interested.
All of them are around the PG 13 level for the boys' language.
The Custom of the Sea
It doesn’t happen too often, but the frequency is still too high for Zoro’s comfort. Still, they are pirates, and in the end they are at the mercy of the sea. Rationing works most of the time, but there come days when they’ve been away from land a long time and that look comes to Sanji’s face. It’s a vulnerable, worried look, calculating and cautious, withdrawn from the exuberance of the rest of the crew. It means they’re almost out of food. Again.
Zoro takes to fishing while napping, but too often the things edible swim too deep and are too large to be caught so easily. Sometimes he goes after something with his swords, but often it comes to this.
They have an unspoken arrangement. When Sanji gets that look, he wakes up during Zoro’s watch and comes out to the deck, the largest of his kitchen knives in hand and old ghosts in his eye. He salutes, and dives below the waves.
Zoro’s a strong swimmer, but Sanji can dive deeper and, surprisingly, can hold his breath longer than anyone in the crew. His eyes are more adjusted to the salt in the sea; he moves through the water like a fast and deadly fish. And when he surfaces, the waves are tinted red with blood.
Zoro helps him bring the fish on board before anything else is drawn to the blood in the water and is rewarded with a bottle of rum for his aid and silence. He’ll never say it, but sometimes the swordsman sees the scarlet ocean under the silver moon and wonders if this will be the time Sanji doesn’t surface.
***
Sleep
Zoro had a thing about sleeping. He liked to, as anyone who spent any time with him could attest. For one thing, it was peaceful, and peace was a valuable and rare commodity aboard the Going Merry. But beyond that, it was real.
People lied when they were awake, both vocally, of which Usopp was a prime example, and physically. Zoro was good at reading body language. He could anticipate a hostile reaction from a mere twitch of a hand or eye and thereby react accordingly. But bodies could be just as deceptive as words. The shitty-cook, for example, was deceptively thin and frail looking, but had surprising strength in his skinny legs.
Yes, it was only in sleep that people showed themselves as they really were. Sleep made everyone vulnerable.
Luffy slept exactly like he was awake, an ever-shifting coil of tightly wound energy channeled into tossing and incoherent mumbling.
Usopp was the opposite, boneless confidence borne of his subconscious, inner strength that showed through the cowardice he usually displayed.
Chopper would toss and turn a little at first, gradually calming down, relaxing, and, quite often, giggling about cherry blossoms in his sleep.
He had only seen Nami sleep once, when he went to ask her a question and found her dozing at her desk. She looked peaceful and truly happy, so he hadn’t bothered her.
Sanji, on the other hand, genuinely surprised him. In sleep, the cook huddled in on himself, drawing his legs up and cradling his arms. Depending on the blond man’s dreams, he either reached out for whatever beautiful woman was haunting his subconscious, or he continued curl up until he was in a fetal position.
Zoro wondered what Sanji was hiding, if he was that vulnerable in his sleep.
***
Slow
Sanji is a fast runner; his long, slender legs hold almost as most power as Zoro’s arms, something that both annoys and intrigues the swordsman. Sanji is as fast, if not faster, than Zoro. They have yet to put this to a test, but probably will, someday, when they get the time and space.
What confuses Zoro is that, when the crew is running along without particular stress on the need to escape and/or save someone, Sanji is always last. The cook’s long strides always keep pace with the others, only occasionally leaping forward when the swordsman yells that they’ll leave his skinny ass on the island. Sanji will yell some insult back, but almost never runs up to kick him.
At first Zoro thinks the cook may be hanging back to “admire the view” of Nami’s backside, but the third time he turns around to snap at the cook to hurry up and finds the blond man’s gaze on someone else, that idea is shot to hell. Sanji watches all of them, and the expression on his face is part amusement, part wonderment, and part possessive. The proportions vary, but the look remains.
Sometimes, just sometimes, Zoro thinks Sanji realizes what a precious gift their remarkable little crew is, and that the reason the cook slows down is to appreciate that gift. Then Sanji yells at Luffy for trying to sneak a snack, and the threats of violence dispel that favorable train of thought before Zoro has time to even realize he was thinking positively about the chef.
***
One Week
(Inspired by a mini challenge starting with: "On Monday, Sanji disappeared")
On Monday, Sanji disappeared. Sometime during dinner he looked at the calendar, swore, and stalked off.
On Tuesday, Sanji was still gone. Breakfast was laid out on the table – eggs, bacon, and a mountain of pancakes that almost touched the ceiling.
On Wednesday, Chopper reported seeing Sanji briefly when he switched off for his watch. There was a large kettle of stew with a note: “For Dinner” attached.
On Thursday, there was a bowl of apples for breakfast and still no Sanji. A thorough investigation of the ship revealed that he was in the shower... probably.
On Friday, the kitchen was locked and there was a picnic basket on deck. Zoro was tempted to break the door down to get booze, but was talked out of it by Nami, who said he’d have to pay for the replacement.
On Saturday, Zoro did break down the door, because he heard a crash during his morning workout and Sanji never dropped kitchen utensils. He found Sanji with his head on the table by what looked like the sorriest looking cupcake he’d ever seen, surrounded by the empty remains of the wine cupboard’s contents.
“Shit, crap-cook, what the fuck?” He skirted the broken glass from the earlier crash and nudged the blond chef.
“Shhh.” Sanji slurred, waving inarticulately in his general direction. “’S my birthday. Don’t want them to know. ‘specially not marimo. He’ll laugh.” Except he was very, very drunk, and it came out all in one blurred word of “Shhh’sm’birshday’donwanemt’know’shpeshly’na’marmoheelaf.” It took Zoro a minute to process that and another to decide that he could wait until Sanji sobered up to get the story out of him. He settled the broken door against its empty frame, found one of the not-quite empty bottles of rum, and sat down to wait.
***
Q and A
There are some things that are never brought up between the two of them without first emptying several bottles of rum, or wine, in Sanji’s case. When the alcohol has made them drowsy and they are draped across the kitchen table in boneless, graceless sprawls, their usual insults slow to a halt. They break the oppressive silence with questions, sometimes hurtful, sometimes thoughtful, but the arrangement is the same. By this point in the evening, neither of them is in much of a state to take offense to the other’s questions.
“Hey, asshole.” Zoro prods the cook, proud that he only slightly slurs. There are a dozen questions he’s been saving up for this night; curiosity has latched firm claws into him through the observations he’s made over the weeks.
“What?” Sanji’s face is flushed, and he pushes Zoro in retaliation, except he’s too drunk to put any real effort in it so his hand ends up resting on the swordsman’s shoulder. The green-haired man doesn’t know which question to ask first, and when he sighs Sanji’s hand slips down the curve between his shoulder and neck and brushes against his face. Zoro takes a minute to examine the long, slender hands that are so deft in their craft. He’s seen Sanji use knives before, and he imagines the cook using those same sharp blades in a fight. Graceful, effortless cuts, no wasted movement, just precisely the stroke that was needed in the exact location…
But Sanji doesn’t use his knives, or his hands, in a fight, and Zoro can’t ask all the questions he wants to before he passes out. So he settles for saying, “You’re really weird,” and when the cook leans over the table to kiss him, he just accepts that answer, because Sanji is really weird.
Hope you enjoyed...
All of them are around the PG 13 level for the boys' language.
The Custom of the Sea
It doesn’t happen too often, but the frequency is still too high for Zoro’s comfort. Still, they are pirates, and in the end they are at the mercy of the sea. Rationing works most of the time, but there come days when they’ve been away from land a long time and that look comes to Sanji’s face. It’s a vulnerable, worried look, calculating and cautious, withdrawn from the exuberance of the rest of the crew. It means they’re almost out of food. Again.
Zoro takes to fishing while napping, but too often the things edible swim too deep and are too large to be caught so easily. Sometimes he goes after something with his swords, but often it comes to this.
They have an unspoken arrangement. When Sanji gets that look, he wakes up during Zoro’s watch and comes out to the deck, the largest of his kitchen knives in hand and old ghosts in his eye. He salutes, and dives below the waves.
Zoro’s a strong swimmer, but Sanji can dive deeper and, surprisingly, can hold his breath longer than anyone in the crew. His eyes are more adjusted to the salt in the sea; he moves through the water like a fast and deadly fish. And when he surfaces, the waves are tinted red with blood.
Zoro helps him bring the fish on board before anything else is drawn to the blood in the water and is rewarded with a bottle of rum for his aid and silence. He’ll never say it, but sometimes the swordsman sees the scarlet ocean under the silver moon and wonders if this will be the time Sanji doesn’t surface.
***
Sleep
Zoro had a thing about sleeping. He liked to, as anyone who spent any time with him could attest. For one thing, it was peaceful, and peace was a valuable and rare commodity aboard the Going Merry. But beyond that, it was real.
People lied when they were awake, both vocally, of which Usopp was a prime example, and physically. Zoro was good at reading body language. He could anticipate a hostile reaction from a mere twitch of a hand or eye and thereby react accordingly. But bodies could be just as deceptive as words. The shitty-cook, for example, was deceptively thin and frail looking, but had surprising strength in his skinny legs.
Yes, it was only in sleep that people showed themselves as they really were. Sleep made everyone vulnerable.
Luffy slept exactly like he was awake, an ever-shifting coil of tightly wound energy channeled into tossing and incoherent mumbling.
Usopp was the opposite, boneless confidence borne of his subconscious, inner strength that showed through the cowardice he usually displayed.
Chopper would toss and turn a little at first, gradually calming down, relaxing, and, quite often, giggling about cherry blossoms in his sleep.
He had only seen Nami sleep once, when he went to ask her a question and found her dozing at her desk. She looked peaceful and truly happy, so he hadn’t bothered her.
Sanji, on the other hand, genuinely surprised him. In sleep, the cook huddled in on himself, drawing his legs up and cradling his arms. Depending on the blond man’s dreams, he either reached out for whatever beautiful woman was haunting his subconscious, or he continued curl up until he was in a fetal position.
Zoro wondered what Sanji was hiding, if he was that vulnerable in his sleep.
***
Slow
Sanji is a fast runner; his long, slender legs hold almost as most power as Zoro’s arms, something that both annoys and intrigues the swordsman. Sanji is as fast, if not faster, than Zoro. They have yet to put this to a test, but probably will, someday, when they get the time and space.
What confuses Zoro is that, when the crew is running along without particular stress on the need to escape and/or save someone, Sanji is always last. The cook’s long strides always keep pace with the others, only occasionally leaping forward when the swordsman yells that they’ll leave his skinny ass on the island. Sanji will yell some insult back, but almost never runs up to kick him.
At first Zoro thinks the cook may be hanging back to “admire the view” of Nami’s backside, but the third time he turns around to snap at the cook to hurry up and finds the blond man’s gaze on someone else, that idea is shot to hell. Sanji watches all of them, and the expression on his face is part amusement, part wonderment, and part possessive. The proportions vary, but the look remains.
Sometimes, just sometimes, Zoro thinks Sanji realizes what a precious gift their remarkable little crew is, and that the reason the cook slows down is to appreciate that gift. Then Sanji yells at Luffy for trying to sneak a snack, and the threats of violence dispel that favorable train of thought before Zoro has time to even realize he was thinking positively about the chef.
***
One Week
(Inspired by a mini challenge starting with: "On Monday, Sanji disappeared")
On Monday, Sanji disappeared. Sometime during dinner he looked at the calendar, swore, and stalked off.
On Tuesday, Sanji was still gone. Breakfast was laid out on the table – eggs, bacon, and a mountain of pancakes that almost touched the ceiling.
On Wednesday, Chopper reported seeing Sanji briefly when he switched off for his watch. There was a large kettle of stew with a note: “For Dinner” attached.
On Thursday, there was a bowl of apples for breakfast and still no Sanji. A thorough investigation of the ship revealed that he was in the shower... probably.
On Friday, the kitchen was locked and there was a picnic basket on deck. Zoro was tempted to break the door down to get booze, but was talked out of it by Nami, who said he’d have to pay for the replacement.
On Saturday, Zoro did break down the door, because he heard a crash during his morning workout and Sanji never dropped kitchen utensils. He found Sanji with his head on the table by what looked like the sorriest looking cupcake he’d ever seen, surrounded by the empty remains of the wine cupboard’s contents.
“Shit, crap-cook, what the fuck?” He skirted the broken glass from the earlier crash and nudged the blond chef.
“Shhh.” Sanji slurred, waving inarticulately in his general direction. “’S my birthday. Don’t want them to know. ‘specially not marimo. He’ll laugh.” Except he was very, very drunk, and it came out all in one blurred word of “Shhh’sm’birshday’donwanemt’know’shpeshly’na’marmoheelaf.” It took Zoro a minute to process that and another to decide that he could wait until Sanji sobered up to get the story out of him. He settled the broken door against its empty frame, found one of the not-quite empty bottles of rum, and sat down to wait.
***
Q and A
There are some things that are never brought up between the two of them without first emptying several bottles of rum, or wine, in Sanji’s case. When the alcohol has made them drowsy and they are draped across the kitchen table in boneless, graceless sprawls, their usual insults slow to a halt. They break the oppressive silence with questions, sometimes hurtful, sometimes thoughtful, but the arrangement is the same. By this point in the evening, neither of them is in much of a state to take offense to the other’s questions.
“Hey, asshole.” Zoro prods the cook, proud that he only slightly slurs. There are a dozen questions he’s been saving up for this night; curiosity has latched firm claws into him through the observations he’s made over the weeks.
“What?” Sanji’s face is flushed, and he pushes Zoro in retaliation, except he’s too drunk to put any real effort in it so his hand ends up resting on the swordsman’s shoulder. The green-haired man doesn’t know which question to ask first, and when he sighs Sanji’s hand slips down the curve between his shoulder and neck and brushes against his face. Zoro takes a minute to examine the long, slender hands that are so deft in their craft. He’s seen Sanji use knives before, and he imagines the cook using those same sharp blades in a fight. Graceful, effortless cuts, no wasted movement, just precisely the stroke that was needed in the exact location…
But Sanji doesn’t use his knives, or his hands, in a fight, and Zoro can’t ask all the questions he wants to before he passes out. So he settles for saying, “You’re really weird,” and when the cook leans over the table to kiss him, he just accepts that answer, because Sanji is really weird.
Hope you enjoyed...
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no subject
Date: 2006-02-05 08:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-05 04:56 pm (UTC)I'm really glad you enjoyed the series.
no subject
Date: 2006-02-05 07:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-06 12:40 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-02-05 09:39 pm (UTC)Very lovely drabbles. They would so do that.
no subject
Date: 2006-02-06 12:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-26 09:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-04-06 08:50 am (UTC)