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1.
“Oi, Luffy!”
Luffy turns around, his lips stretching into a grin as he catches sight of Sanji approaching him. “Sanji! Is it food time?!”
“Nah, you shitty black hole,” Sanji says, leaning against the railing beside Luffy. After their first few turbulent days on the Grand Line the weather seems to have finally calmed down, and the Going Merry is, for once, not in danger of capsizing. “Had a question for you.”
Luffy screws his face up in confusion. “Sanji has a question for me? Why? Sanji’s smarter.”
It is said so matter-of-factly that it takes a second to register, and when it does, Sanji has to fight down a blush. Luffy is always free with praise for his nakama and it takes a while to get used to it. Usopp and Nami still turn red regularly whenever it happens, but Sanji’s caught even the shitty swordsman looking away with a pleased smile on occasion.
Speaking of…
“I talked to marimo bastard –“
“Oh, did you fight again?”
“Shut up, Luffy. As I said, I talked to marimo bastard and he said some weird things.”
Luffy nods in full understanding. “Zoro is always weird.”
Sanji exhales cigarette smoke in irritation. “He talked about Whiskey Peak.” Well, not exactly talked. More like mentioned. With occasional grunts for emphasis. And while Sanji is still not completely fluent in gorilla, the wonderful Nami-swan was more than willing to fill in the blanks. “You attacked him?”
Zoro didn’t even say it in any kind of negative context – as if Zoro would ever complain to them about anything Luffy does – but Sanji took note of it anyway. It seems almost sacrilegious, somehow, to think that Luffy would ever attack his nakama. Even now, with Nami-san’s confirmation, Sanji can hardly believe it.
“Yeah!” Luffy says cheerily, grin widening to impossible proportions. “It was an awesome fight. You should have seen it, Sanji. Fighting Zoro is so fun!”
“Right,” Sanji exhales. Luffy doesn’t get it. Of course, he doesn’t. “Luffy, this is very important. Why did you attack him?”
Once again, Luffy looks confused. “Huh? But I already told Zoro and Nami.”
The worst thing is, Sanji knows, that he probably did, in his own way. It’s not Nami-san’s problem that Luffy’s mind is crazier than a bag of cats. Shitty marimo has no such excuse – he and the captain practically share a brain these days.
“Then you can tell me too.”
“Sanji!” Luffy whines, sprawling pathetically against the barrel he’s sitting on, rubber limbs flying every which way. “You’re being weird too. Why does it matter?”
“If you don’t tell me, there won’t be any meat for lunch.”
“Meat!” Luffy jumps half a foot into air, a terrified expression suddenly crossing his face. “Sanji, no! I’ll tell you! I’ll tell you everything!”
“So, get on with it already, you shitty rubber captain!”
Luffy tilts his head, as if in thought. It looks like it hurts. “I fought Zoro because he fought with all those nice people.” Nodding, he seems to think the matter’s closed with only that lackluster explanation.
Sanji pinches the bridge of his nose and reminds himself that if he kicks the captain overboard, he’ll never get his answers. “Yeah, I figured. They tried to kill us first. So what if the shitty marimo fought them?”
“But I didn’t know that!” Luffy exclaims. “They gave us food and then Zoro beat them up.”
“Food, huh?” As a cook, Sanji is probably the best person on the ship to appreciate Luffy’s love for food, but even he hasn’t ever thought Luffy would attack a nakama over it. “How’s that a reason?”
Luffy looks at him as if he’s stupid. Sanji hates it. “They gave us food. They offered us… ugh… hospility. It’s not right to beat people up after they offer hospility.”
“Hospility?” Sanji asks, head throbbing over another one of Luffy’s made-up words. “The hell is that?”
“We were guests and they gave us food and drinks, and allowed us to sleep over and play games and all that. They were nice. Hospility.”
“You mean hospitality,” Sanji says in exasperation, taking another puff of his cigarette to calm himself down. “So it’s a bad thing to attack people who offer you hospitality.” Sanji’s still figuring out all the intricacies of Luffy’s fucked-up moral compass, but this seems out of the left field even for him. Where did Luffy even develop this kind of strangely specific taboo? Sanji is half convinced his captain was raised by wolves.
Still, since it’s connected to food, maybe Sanji shouldn’t be surprised.
Luffy nods forcefully. “Yeah, it’s bad.” Then, brightening, he says, “But they attacked us first, so it’s okay that Zoro beat them up. And we met Vivi, so it’s even better.”
Well, Sanji can hardly fault that. Vivi-chan is brilliant, after all.
“Right,” Sanji says, having finally reached a modicum of understanding. Since it’s basically the most understanding one might ever reach when dealing with Luffy’s… everything, Sanji’s basically satisfied. If his captain has to attack his nakama, then food’s better reason than most and easily avoided. Sanji even agrees, to a point; it’s only right to respect hospitality. “I have to go. Lunch will be in an hour.”
“Yosh! Meat!”
Sanji leaves, hiding a smile.
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2.
It takes Zoro a while to notice that Luffy never calls most people by their names.
The biggest reason is, of course, that Luffy never forgets their names. From the very moment any of them decide to join Luffy's crew – or, more accurately, from the moment Luffy decides that they would become his nakama – he's always referred to them by correct names. He doesn't even use nicknames, not really, not like he does to all the other people they meet on their adventures. At first, Zoro chalks it up to the fact that Luffy actually likes them, as opposed to everyone else.
Luffy, for all that he's generally nice, has a strange sort of childish apathy to other people that Zoro sometimes has to admire for its sheer selfishness.
The second reason why Zoro doesn't connect the dots until all the way in Alabasta is directly connected to that same selfishness. He thinks, at first, that the reason Luffy only ever uses nicknames for everyone who's not nakama is that he doesn't care enough or doesn't respect them enough to remember their names. But that theory falls apart when he realizes that Luffy always recognizes when they mention other people by their names. He remembers all of them just fine. He just doesn't use any kind of normal way to refer to them.
Zoro being Zoro, he decides to satisfy his curiosity by simply asking. If Luffy wants to tell him, he will.
"– and then stupid Croc-guy said I'm stupid for fighting for my nakama, because he's a moron, and then I –"
Zoro interrupts his captain in the middle of blow-by-blow – in a manner of speaking – recitation of his fight with Crocodile. Luffy won't mind.
"Why do you do that?"
"Huh?" Luffy tilts his head in confusion. "Do what?"
"Why do you never call people by their names?"
Luffy frowns. "What are you talking about? I call all of you by your names."
Of course, Luffy's first thought would be of their nakama. They're the ones that matter to him, after all. "No, I mean other people. The ones who're not nakama."
"Oooh," Luffy finally smiles in realization. "That. Ace made me promise."
Now Zoro is confused. "Your brother made you promise not to call people by their names?"
"Yeah!" Luffy's grin widens. "He explained when we were kids and made me promise. But I wouldn't have done it anyway, even if I hadn't promised. I don't want any of those guys. And I especially don't want them if they won't be free."
The explanation is completely nonsensical and so very much like Luffy, that Zoro has to smile. "And us? Why do you use our names?"
Luffy looks at him like he's stupid. "Shishishi! Silly, Zoro. You're special. You're my nakama. All of you are already mine, so I can call you whatever I want."
"Yours, huh?" Zoro murmurs.
"Yeah, you're mine. So, stop worrying, Zoro. That's all there is to it."
Zoro lies back on his bed and stops worrying. Anyone else might have been disturbed by the easy possessiveness in Luffy's tone, but Zoro doesn't bother. Even though he doesn't understand most of what Luffy told him, he does know the truth. From the moment they'd decided to follow him, all of the Straw Hats have belonged to Luffy, completely, and all of them are aware of it.
None of them mind. Not really.
That's just what Luffy does to you.
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3.
On Water 7, Usopp tries to leave.
It's the hardest thing he's ever done – harder than beating Kuro, harder than leaving his village behind, harder even than fighting a god. Usopp hates every second of it, cries even as his determination never wavers, but he has to do it. For Merry. For memory of Kaya, who gave her to them. For a nakama who carried them through the Grand Line, to the Sky Island, and Alabasta, and Drum, and who's never let them down.
Usopp feels like he has to.
It hurts, still, to be so far away from his other nakama.
From Luffy.
It's… it's pale, somehow, to be away from Luffy. Lifeless. Ordinary. Traveling with Luffy is never ordinary – it's scary, and fun, and exhilarating, but never ordinary. Even as Franky picks him up, even as Aqua Laguna approaches, the world seems dull and uninteresting in the wake of Luffy's… everything. Usopp wonders if life without Luffy is just like that, if before Usopp met his captain, he lived in such a colorless world and simply never noticed – but this is different, somehow.
It is as if after Luffy, the whole wide world is suddenly not enough.
It is flat-out depressive.
It gets better, somewhat, at Enies Lobby as he fights once again at Luffy's side. The dimness downright explodes with color when Luffy, beaten and broken and tired, looks at him from that tower and hears his words. Acknowledges them. The world seems completely alright once again, even as the Buster Call rages around them, even as the Marines are dying and his nakama fighting, even as their whole surroundings are catching fire – everything is as bright and as brilliant as always, when Luffy hears his words and rises once again to stand against Rob Lucci.
The dullness returns, after.
He can't stand it for long. It takes him mere days to crumble, to admit to himself that he has to get back to his crew. He misses the adventure, his nakama, Luffy, too much to abandon them for real. He has to go back.
When he bends his neck and apologizes, when Luffy finally grabs his outstretched hand, the world brightens.
He talks about it to Nami once, as they get drunk.
"It was like… like without Luffy… like, Luffy is the light, right? That without Luffy everything is no longer real. It's… grey, instead… yes, grey. And boring. And lifeless," Usopp describes, hands waving and words spilling, sprawled atop Sunny's grassy deck, his legs tangling with Nami's. "It's not right without Luffy."
Nami, more sober even though she’s drank twice as much, but just as relaxed, nods. “Yeah,” she says. “I remember.”
“You do?” Usopp turns to look at her, surprised. It takes him a second to register her words. “Right. During the…” Usopp tries to indicate Nami’s betrayal with the flapping of his hands because they don’t talk about Arlong. “Right.”
Nami gives him a soft look. “Right. That.” Taking another swig of her drink, she allows her head to loll onto his shoulder. “Everything seemed grey when I left. I thought it was just that place, but well…”
“Luffy,” Usopp says.
“Yes,” Nami nods, once again. “Luffy.”
They allow the soft silence of the night to settle around them. The sky is starry, and the waves calm, lapping at the hull of the ship with gentle sounds. For once, everything is peaceful.
“We’re never leaving, are we?” Usopp asks.
“I don’t think we can, anymore. Not unless Luffy lets us.”
Usopp hums. He grabs the bottle from Nami’s hand and gulps down the bitter alcohol. “Aaah, never mind. It’s not like any of us would ever want to leave anyway.”
Nami sighs and slumps back against him. She does nothing to refute him, because they both know it’s true.
Leaving Luffy, once he lets you in, is impossible.
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4.
After they reunite, they don’t talk about Marineford.
Nami knows none of them, not even Zoro, would ever talk about it to Luffy unprompted. And Luffy, for all that he’s usually a chatterbox and willing to go along with almost any conversation as long as it doesn’t bore him, never does open up about it. Maybe, it’s because on their ship the past is the past, and Luffy isn’t willing to rock the boat for himself, just as he has been content to leave all of their pasts alone. Possibly, it’s because he’s their captain and therefore doesn’t want to place that burden onto any one of them. With Luffy, sometimes it is hard to tell.
But when she catches Luffy, unusually solemn, leaning against Sunny’s prow, Nami has to ask.
“Are you angry at him?”
“Huh?” Luffy turns, titling his head in confusion. “At who? Sanji? But Sanji never gives me snacks after breakfast. Why would I be angry at him?”
“No, not Sanji,” Nami shakes her head. She steps forward and braces her elbows on the railing, standing close enough to feel Luffy’s warmth. “I mean your grandpa.”
There was an article in the morning newspaper about the hero of the Marines, Monkey D. Garp, and the anniversary of his retirement. The article had gone in some depth about his long career and his current job of training new recruits. Nami doesn’t think Luffy would have ever read it, as he isn’t in the habit of even glancing at the news, but Garp’s front-page picture would have been hard to miss.
Luffy’s been more silent than usual since breakfast.
“Gramps?” Luffy looks even more confused now, his brows furrowing. “Nami, what are you talking about.”
“I mean, about… about that thing two years ago.” They don’t say Ace’s name either, these days. “Are you angry?”
“Oooh, about that?” Luffy says. “Nah.”
A little thrown by the utter ease of the answer, Nami spears him with a suspicious look. “Really? You aren’t?” Surely, even Luffy has lines where his seemingly endless ability to forgive dries out. Surely, Ace’s death crossed more than a few of them.
“Shishishi! Silly Nami. Why would I be angry at gramps?”
“Because of…” Nami doesn’t know how to delicately say that Luffy’s grandfather allowed for one of his grandsons to be killed right in front of his eyes without protest. Nami, who has known a parent’s love all her life, can’t even comprehend Garp’s actions. “Well, he stood by, didn’t he?”
Something like a close cousin of understanding crosses Luffy’s otherwise blank face. “Nah, I’m not angry about that. Gramps made a promise.”
“A promise?”
“Yeah, a promise. When he joined the Marines. It was… uh,” Luffy tries to explain, skin already going red with the effort of thinking. “He promised that he would listen and protect and… I forgot. It was boring when Gramps talked about it.”
Nami parses through Luffy-speak to reach a conclusion. “He gave an oath?” Nami asks, and Luffy nods enthusiastically, his head bouncing unnaturally on his neck. “But… Couldn’t he have broken it for you?”
“No!” Luffy says, suddenly looking strangely aghast. “You can’t break a promise, Nami.”
“Not even if –?”
Luffy interrupts her by twirling on his heel and locking his gaze with hers. His eyes, despite being completely black, shine feverishly. “You can’t break a promise.” His words echo on the wind, as if they’re a law, and demand obedience. As if they just are, and there is no changing them.
Of course, Garp couldn’t have broken a promise. Just like Luffy would have never broken one.
Nami nods. “Okay.”
She never asks again.
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5.
After Punk Hazard, amidst snow and poison and Marines, they have a party.
Brook is in his element, strumming his guitar, performing both for the children and the Marines, and even a little for Caesar’s poor workers, who’ve been betrayed so recently. They’ve certainly done despicable things but even bad people deserve music after a day like this. Most of all, though, he performs for his nakama, who, as always, throw themselves into the party with wild abandon, Luffy first among them.
Brook’s never regretted picking Luffy as his second captain, but it’s moments like these, where they’re dancing among rescued children and good-natured Marines, where revelry takes up after darkness of tragedy, where Luffy makes a bad day a little better with his unending enthusiasm – it’s in moments like these that he finds himself truly satisfied with his choice.
Luffy, Brook has noticed, appreciates the power of music.
And even though his nakama and the children and even the Marines seem to appreciate it too in this very moment, there are some who are not so blessed. Glancing at the Vice-Admiral and a fellow pirate sitting sullenly on their respective sides of by now useless divide, Brook decides that maybe trying to cheer up such a grumpy Marine would lead to his eventual painful arrest. And while he has no doubt that his nakama would leap into his rescue, there is no need to ruin such a wonderful party.
Their fellow pirate, though, is a fair game. If Trafalgar Law is to be their ally, perhaps it would be for the best for him to learn about advantages of unbridled revelry.
With a mission in mind (not that he has a mind anymore, yohoho!), Brook, guitar still in hand, sways towards Law and ignores a wary glare the other pirate aims at him. He looks very lonely, sitting by himself away from the party. Brook doesn’t abide by loneliness, not anymore.
“Bone-ya,” Law says. Such a strange way to refer to people, though Brook takes no offense. He is, after all, made of bones, yohohoho! “Is there something the matter?”
“Torao-san,” Brook says, ignoring the irritable twitch of Law’s eyebrow. “Perhaps you have a request?” He hefts up his guitar as an explanation.
A frown pulls at Law’s lips. Such a melancholy man, though Brook would be remiss not to admit to seeing old hurts in his shadowed gaze. Still, however excusable, there is no need for gloominess during a party.
“No,” Law hisses, grabbing at his hat. The motion, for a brief moment, reminds Brook of Luffy. “We shouldn’t even be doing this. We should leave before Joker gets here and kills us all while we’re unprepared.”
“Aah, Torao-san,” Brook says. “We will be going soon enough, so why not have a party while we can? It is our captain’s policy, after all.”
“Mugiwara-ya is an idiot!” Brook would have been insulted on the behalf of his captain, if he didn’t notice the bewildered stare Law seems to aim at Luffy’s back. That’s how it starts, usually. “Can’t he control himself? Is he always just going by his base instincts?”
“Yohohoho!” Brook laughs, intrigued. “Instincts? Yes, I would say that Luffy-san is a very instinctual man.”
Of course, Brook’s noticed his new captain is different. Dying does give one perspective, and Brook has, if he can say so himself, never been a stupid man. And while he’d gone quite mad during those fifty lonely years, the solitude had done nothing to lower his intelligence.
So, yes, he’s noticed that Luffy is different. Though, having never seen anyone similar, he’s never quite figured out just how different. Now, looking at Trafalgar Law, and the wildness in his eyes that is quite alike to Luffy’s, he wonders.
Law himself seems to have realized he’s said something wrong. He looks away from Luffy’s back. “Mugiwara-ya’s impulsiveness might doom us all. He should learn control.”
“Why should he?” Brook asks, strumming his guitar. “He doesn’t have to control himself. We’re pirates; we can do anything we want.”
That seems to strike something in Law. His eyes widen but he says nothing.
Brook sighs. Alas, it does seem their new ally is too high-strung for now to join the party in earnest. Brook will not force him – prolonged exposure to Luffy will surely do the job in no time. “If Torao-san has no requests, then I shall return to my audience. I will se you when we leave, I’m sure. Though I have no eyes to see with, yohohoho!”
Brook meanders back towards the party and aims an eyeless gaze at a wildly dancing Luffy. Their captain has finished with his feast and is now in the middle of the revelry, children and Marines clutching at his sides, as if feeding on his endless energy. Luffy throws his head back and laughs, the sound, impossibly, harmonizing with the noise of the merry crowd. He looks almost electric, untamed, and if anyone were to ask, Brook would have told them with utmost certainty that his captain will continue like this – wild and partying, amidst the food and the music – for days or even weeks. He looks like he belongs in such festivities and Brook is, once again, touched.
Luffy catches Brook’s gaze and his smile widens.
“Brook! Come here and sing! Bink’s sake!”
The crowd roars at Luffy’s words, drawn inexplicably towards his energy. Brook feels the pull but doesn’t resist. Smiling (even though he doesn’t have lips, yohohoho!), he says, “Of course, captain.”
He plays.
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+1.
Robin doesn’t know for sure, not really, but she’s heard things.
She’d known Saul, of course, the wildness of his laugh, the strangeness of his eyes, the way he’s never asked for her full name, not until that final, fateful day. She’d known he was unable to lie, she’d known just how much promises meant to him, and after…
After, everything had gone grey. She’d known that too.
With time, she started ascribing most of his idiosyncrasies to him being a giant – she’d never met a giant before – and the rest to the destruction of Ohara. But over the years, she’s learnt of Gol D. Roger. Of Monkey D. Garp. She’d even heard of Rocks D. Xebec once, on a particularly nasty pirate crew that seemed to idolize the man. All of them have something in common – they are earthshakers, gamechangers, men who transformed the world. The Will of D does seem to exist. And the rumors about them, when one reaches the impossible core of them, are eerily similar.
So, when Robin meets Luffy, she is armed with knowledge of his predecessors, and of folklore too. She knows what to look for – she notices how he avoids using real names of strangers, how lying seems impossible to him and how promises have to be kept. Luffy observes his rote rituals almost religiously – strangers who offer hospitality must be repaid, those who offer insult (though Luffy’s definition of insult is just as strange as the rest of him) must be made to pay, and there always, always must be a party full of revelry after any kind of victory.
Robin notices and has her suspicions and says nothing.
Considering the loyalty of the crew, the knowledge wouldn’t change anything.
And it doesn’t, not really, not for the crew. It does change things for Robin herself.
There, on a balcony in Enies Lobby, bound and crying and despondent, looking at her nakama, Robin remembers something from all of those legends. Those who are like Luffy, those who are wild and free-spirited and fey, they are known for taking people away and returning them changed. Sometimes, they do not return them at all.
Desperately, Robin wishes such stories are true.
“I want to live!” Robin screams after Luffy orders the flag burnt, knowing exactly the consequences of her next words. “Take me to the sea with you!”
Luffy does.