There was no ignoring the threat that now dangled over each and every one of their heads now, and there was also no ignoring that Sanji had seemed oddly confident that no one he loved would be put in harms way. He knew his friends, and there was no doubting their strength and ability to survive against all odds. That, and he had the one dearest to him with him in this very hell hole. He was sure, at least, that she wouldn’t come to harm as long as they were together.
So when he stepped out of his room that morning, he wasn’t expecting to step on something. The slight crunch caught his attention, eyes turning down. The cook stepped back, squinted —— then he felt it.
Cold, sweeping dread.
He didn’t need to give the line of gifts a good look to know who the items belonged to.
Another step back was taken, as if trying to distance himself from the truth. It couldn’t have happened, it shouldn’t have happened. They were the Straw Hats, they could get through damn near anything! But there they lay, the relics of a crew that no longer existed save for their cook and navigator.
Sanji dropped to his knees and reached out with shaking hands towards the remains. They were pulled close, loose pieces of glass falling free of the sniper’s goggles. The red tint to them did nothing to hide the even deeper crimson that was, no doubt, Usopp’s blood. The hat, the sacred afro, the arm — oh, God, the arm.
“R—Robin-chan?” He choked on a sob but didn’t dare touch the limbs. Doing so would only make him sick, and he already thought he could taste bile on his tongue.
Stomach knotting, he picked up the two pieces that hurt the most; the hat and the single bundle of gold earrings. For the first time since meeting him, Sanji wished he hadn’t been such an ass to their swordsman. Or that he had, at least, told him that he thought of him as a brother.
Fury and the utter pain of loss turned the once level-headed cook into a weeping mess, sloping shoulders shaking as he brought the hat to his chest and tossed the earrings down. It bounced once and joined the rest of the debris.
“You bastards. . . You were supposed to be strong enough! What the hell were you doing, sittin’ on our asses?!”
Or was it his fault?
He had been trapped here for quite a while now. Had they been unable to fight because he was there to do his job and properly feed them? Sanji couldn’t imagine them starving. They couldn’t get what they needed without his help, but they were all capable of cooking something.
No. He couldn’t blame himself or them. If there was blame to fall on anyone, it was that junk-heap with a hook.
His pain would linger and nothing, not even the reassurance that Nami was still alive, would dismiss that. But it would remain under the growing rage trapped in his chest. There would be time for other emotions later. He had cried enough, though he wasn’t sure wet eyes really counted. They dried soon enough, anyway, thanks to the intense, burning hate bubbling inside him.
The remains of his friends were pushed into his room and tucked under his shame of a bed before he stood, twisted and kicked a worrying dent in the wall beside him.
That wasn’t good enough, sadly. He could take his anger out on the building as much as he liked, but he would have loved to cave in that fox’s ugly maw.
[ Handunit ] ' It seems that you had some trouble with the keypad. I see what you were trying to type and I will autocorrect it for you. One moment. Welcome, Hyde Yourself '
[ Handunit ] ' It seems that you had some trouble with the keypad. I see what you were trying to type and I will autocorrect it for you. One moment. Welcome, Widdle Baby '
... He can’t type very well, but that wasn’t close to what he was going to put! Kitty4 was a much better name in his opinion! He wasn’t a baby! He was this many years old, and he was SURE that he was a big boy!
[ Handunit ] ' It seems that you had some trouble with the keypad. I see what you were trying to type and I will autocorrect it for you. One moment. Welcome, Hello Printer '
༺｡*☆*｡༻ ┃ ┃ ‘ Printer ? ! Gee, what do I look like one ? ! ’
