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2024-10-01
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you can take what i have but i grow something better back

Summary:

It's his earliest memory: Ink, needled under skin, proclaiming everything he was and was supposed to live up to: The third prince of Germa.

(Judge branded his children with more than just their names and Sanji carries the burden alone until he doesn't have to.)

Notes:

i have gathered you all here today to gaze with me upon this beautiful beautiful piece that has taken up most of my brain capacity. i saw it, blacked out, and when i came to i was looking at a 4k google doc. everyone say thank you, rose!!

cw for needles, i think!!

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

four. 

 

It’s his earliest memory. He wishes it wasn’t. He wishes it was something else: One of his mother’s soft smiles, the way a maid calls his name, even one of the pinches Niji learned to dole out early would have been better. 

 

But it’s this: His father’s laboratories, always the laboratories, his team of faceless scientists, white coats, white walls. Him and his brothers were brought there all together, which was still quite common in the early days. 

 

When he thinks about it later, he assumes that they weren’t told why they were there. They were too young to understand it, anyways, and even if they weren’t, they wouldn’t have been expected to contest any of their father’s whims. And it must have been one, a sudden whim, or a brilliant new idea for him. Or a gleefully cruel one, because there was no use to it, no scientific enhancement, no mechanical upgrade. Those came later. Now, there is just another manifestation of Judge’s system, of the hierarchy he heralded above anything else. 

 

Sanji remembers the glaring white of the laboratory, he remembers a voice explaining what was happening, though he doesn’t remember the words. He remembers the noise of mechanical whirring as one of his father’s men gets to work on Ichiji. He doesn’t remember if Ichiji made a noise, or if Niji did. They probably did not, just like Yonji did not when it was his turn after Sanji’s. 

 

Sanji also doesn’t know if he made a noise, but he must have, because all he remembers after that is pain, white-hot. At four years old, Sanji didn’t know to bite his tongue yet, to steel his face and endure. He must have cried, and it must not have made a difference, because by the end of it, he was just as branded as his brothers were. 

 

Ink, needled under skin, proclaiming everything he was and was supposed to live up to: The third prince of Germa. 

 

 

seven.  

 

He never told his mother about it. At first, he must not have had a chance to—Maybe Sora had been too sick for a while, maybe he had been too ashamed about the way he cried. 

 

Later, there must have been chances, as his father slowly lost interest in pushing him, and he could escape his brothers more and more. But later, he also noticed how sad his mother would get when she discovered a new bruise on his face or his arms. She would ask him if it hurt, would blow and kiss on his cuts, and it was nice—but he didn’t want to make her sad about something that didn’t even hurt anymore, something that had scabbed and healed a long time ago. 

 

It’s a small blessing, that it is so out of reach. The ink sits on his shoulder blade. He has to contort his little body in the mirror to catch a glimpse of it. He can nearly forget it, when he doesn’t. He never has to try very hard to hide it. 

 

So he never told his mother about it. 

 

Now, Sanji is dead. It’s what they are saying outside, his brothers told him. No one will ever tell anything of him in Germa again. 

 

And Sora is dead. Really dead. As Sanji sits in his cell and the metal on his face weighs him down, he thinks of all the things he will never get to tell her. 

 

 

twelve. 

 

“What the everloving fuck is that?” 

 

For a moment there, Sanji thought he might never have to think about it again. A fresh start. The third prince of Germa died at sea, in a storm, on a sun-bleached rock, while Sanji is here, in the East Blue, with the only father he’s ever known in a floating restaurant. For a moment he thought he was free. 

 

Zeff tries again when he doesn’t immediately reply. “Didn’t peg a prim and proper cruise ship for a place where little brats like you get tattoos.” 

 

There’s a tone to his voice that Sanji has learned well: Something carefully probing under all those layers of gruff and weathered nonchalance. Only he gets to hear it, and only from Zeff, because Zeff is the only person that knows that it hasn’t always been like this. Everyone else, every new hire and patron either doesn’t think to ask or just assumes that Sanji has always been Zeff’s. The blue eyes (shades too light) and the blond hair (shades too dark) help, of course. It also helps that Sanji doesn’t want to correct them, and Zeff doesn’t bother to. 

 

But Zeff knows of the facade that is entirely on his mercy—He knows that there is a before. The first couple of weeks after they were rescued, Sanji was convinced Zeff would never ask, that he would simply up and leave him one day and he would never see the man again, no matter what he promised him on that rock. As weeks turned to months he started to hope and with that, he started to fear: The longer he spent with Zeff, the longer Zeff did not send him away, the likelier it became that he would ask about the before he must know there was. And when he would ask, Sanji would have to answer, because he owed this man everything, including utmost honesty. And that would be when Zeff would send him away. 

 

But Zeff never asked. 

 

Not once did he ask. All he would do is allude, watching Sanji for the moment he decided to take him up on it. The first couple of times it happened, it nearly sent Sanji into cardiac arrest, but it never was the disastrous end to everything. It was just something Zeff offered up: An open ear, somewhere to put everything Sanji was carrying on his little shoulders. 

 

Not once has Sanji taken him up on it, and with time he accepted that this was not a terrible break of trust that he would be punished for. He was quite happy, then, to never have to speak on it, to get to pretend. 

 

So now, he doesn’t know why he doesn’t keep pretending. 

 

It’s a busy afternoon, the floor is brimming with guests, some of them high calibre, two waiters quit just this morning and Carne has a couple of bruised ribs from the week before—It’s the worst thinkable moment to change well worn patterns. 

 

But Sanji would have to help out front of house, and as Zeff informed him of this, he’d lost his standing on his peg leg, and before he could catch himself, the pot of gravy he’d been holding had spilled over, and now they both have about a three minute window to change in Zeff’s crammed back office. 

 

It’s been a while since Sanji tried to catch a glimpse of it in the mirror. He can’t say when he last thought of it. He can’t say why he doesn’t lie. 

 

“I didn’t get it on the Orbit,” He corrects. 

 

Zeff hums and is still for one long moment. Giving him the opportunity to elaborate, Sanji knows. He understands, too, that should he choose this moment, Zeff would lock the door and let him talk for however long he wants, high calibre customers be damned. 

 

He doesn’t say anything more. 

 

Uncharacteristically, after another hum, Zeff murmurs: “Reckon you got it the same place you got your name.” 

 

It’s not a question, and not even loud enough for Sanji to be sure it’s a statement for him to hear. 

 

Very rarely does Sanji hear Zeff truly angry, and it is only now that he realises this. Zeff is pissed off most of the time, cross, gruff and stoic. The notion of Sanji’s before , as vague as it is, made up of just a name and ink that won’t blow out under skin and some flinches Sanji hadn’t managed to hide when he was younger, the nightmares that are getting less and less frequent—Sanji’s before makes something flash in Zeff’s eyes that he thinks he would be scared of on anyone else.

 

Reminded of his mother—of the sadness in her eyes mirroring the rage in Zeff’s, of the way he never had the chance to tell her things he is keeping from Zeff now—he nearly starts talking again. It’s right there, building in the base of his throat, when Zeff cuts him off with a solid hand pushing right over the very spot and right between his scrawny shoulder blades, pulling him into a just as solid chest. It doesn’t last more than a second. They don’t do hugs. (Not in the light of day. Not when Sanji isn’t waking, sobbing, from sleep that comes so much easier after Zeff is with him, warm and solid and safe.)

 

Zeff never asks again. 

 

 

seventeen. 

 

He knows he couldn’t have done as good a job as the girl is swearing up and down he did—no one does. But she is sweet, and so pretty, and her skin is still hot to the touch from previous exertion, even despite the summer breeze that is blowing in through his open bedroom window. 

 

Even without looking, he knows the sky is clear, he knows which constellations are slowly blinking to life. He knows that in a few more minutes, she will have to go back to the ship she came here on, that she’s going to sail away and they might never see each other again. A part of him wants to be dramatic about that. But most of him is still basking in bone deep exhaustion, in a continuous satisfied shudder. 

 

His mattress is barely wide enough to fit them both, but it’s fine, with the way he is stretched out on his stomach and turns his head to look up at her in the waning light. She is propped up on her side, one hand cushioning her head, the other starting to draw lazy patterns on his back. 

 

It catches on his shoulder blade. 

 

The second that it does, something in his chest seizes painfully with the notion of having to lie to her. He knows she’ll ask and he knows he won’t be able to tell her anything real. 

 

So he tries to be quicker: “Makes me look really cool and rugged, huh?” He jokes.

 

She giggles. He prefers to think about the way it harmonises with the waves outside, instead of the questions he’s not letting her ask. “ So rugged,” She confirms, brushing it again. For just a fracture of a second, as the edge of her nail ghosts against the skin, there is a flash of sterile white, of mechanical whirring, burning pain. 

 

He doesn’t give himself the chance to find out whether she noticed his muscles locking up for one breath—As soon as it passes, he rolls to face her (pulls his shoulder from her touch), grasps her free hand (so it can’t wander back) and hopes that pulling her in for a kiss will distract them both. 

 

 

nineteen. 

 

Nami laughs, beautiful and wild and carefree, and not like a person who has anything to hide. Sanji sees her and knows immediately that he would offer up his soul to her, would bear anything that she is willing to offer up in turn. 

 

She doesn’t offer up anything. She leaves, she takes Luffy’s ship, and Luffy sweeps Sanji off his feet and off the Baratie in pursuit of her. 

 

It takes a moment to register, when he sees her again—The sleeveless top she wears as they reach Cocoyashi reveals her tattoo, jagged blue ink and harsh lines. For a moment there, she seems to wear it proudly and something in Sanji’s heart strikes a bitter little note. 

 

Not long after, they find her with bloody knife in her hand, and his heart strikes another note—bitter still, but louder and more familiar. Her swordfish tattoo is cut up, gorey, unrecognisable. He is ashamed when he catches himself wishing that he could carve out the ink from his skin as well. Luffy rounds them up to put an end to the man that laid his claim on Nami—It’s the moment the very last of his doubts leave Sanji. He’s made the right decision. This is where he is supposed to be. 

 

Through no conscious decision on his part, he finds her, after. Her village is caught up in celebration, and he would like to tell himself that it’s that: he’s simply caught up in it too, in the lights and the joy and the music and the laughter and the allure of a beautiful girl. But the second he drops down on a bench beside her, his eyes fall on her bandaged arm. 

 

She misreads his look, lifts a self conscious hand to cover the gauze. “It doesn’t even hurt anymore.” 

 

He nods in agreement, though he’s not quite listening. He pushes her hand down slowly, as if in a trance, and barely lets his thumb brush the jagged edge of one inky line visible above the bandage. The feeling of her skin jerks him back to the moment and there’s already a profuse apology on his lips, but she waves him off. 

 

“Genzo says we might be able to cover it up with something else, once the cuts heal,” She offers up. There’s something giddy in the way she says it, and he can nearly let himself get lost in that joy. Nearly. Her smile turns cheshire as she adds: “We should all get matching tattoos, while I’m at it. As a crew.” 

 

He hopes he can cover the way his voice catches in his throat with a cough. “Lovely suggestion,” he nods, like it had been serious. “But I’m afraid I’m not very fond of needles.” 

 

She laughs, says something about blackmailing Zoro into a tramp stamp, and, wondrously, that is that.

 

Sometime later, during a calm moment in the safety of the galley, Nami will be the first person he ever shows it to, on his own terms. She will look at it, know what ink needled under the tender skin of childhood will look like over a decade down the line, and she will understand. She will look at him with a question in her eyes, and he will shake his head. “I just wanted you to know—that I know,” he will say. And Nami will roll her eyes and call him a sap, but give him an awkward, rough little hug regardless. He will feel giddy with it, giddy with love and trust and the feeling of being seen. They will sail up a mountain and into the Grand Line, and it will be the start of something. 

 

 

twenty. 

 

With the Strawhats, it became so easy to forget, and so easy to brush off—There’s nowhere to hide, really, when he shared all living space with other people. Chopper was curious, and he peddled him off to Nami with his questions. Luffy used to poke his shoulder blade intermittently when Sanji got changed, or when they were in the baths. Franky was ecstatic to have found someone like minded and Sanji had to shoot him down. No one asked more when he made it clear he didn’t intend to answer. Usopp made up a story or five, and that was that—brushed off, forgotten nearly as easily as with Zeff. 

 

So it’s been quite a while, when he hears Ivankov’s sharp intake of breath, when they brush his hair off of one shoulder. “That’s—a choice,” They say without missing a beat. 

 

“It wasn’t mine,” Sanji shoots back just as quickly. He doesn’t even quite know if he feels defensive because of the thinly veiled distaste in Iva’s voice, or safe enough to share. It’s out before he can decide. 

 

Iva tuts. “Well, that just won’t do.” They continue to run the brush through his hair. “It should be yours. Just like this—” they flick a strand of his hair. “Just like everything.” 

 

He thinks about Nami, about a choice that came with desperation, with a blade, with blood and tears, but a choice nonetheless, and he nods in agreement. “And you have a hormone for that?” 

 

Iva laughs. “Don’t be silly.” As if they didn’t have one for this, for his hair, and for everything, should he choose it. He throws them a pointed glare through the mirror and they simply pat his head. “Mimi has a needle and ink, though, and she’s quite proficient with them.” 

 

Humming in acknowledgement, he lets that hang in the air for a moment. The thought of mechanical whirring and hot pain scares him—But it would be his choice this time. He lets his eyes droop as Iva continues their ministrations on his hair, but as they finish with a triumphant little fanfare, he meets their eyes in the mirror again. Not a glare this time: A little nod, that they return with a warm smile. 

 

“So, what’ll it be?” Mimi asks him, a pen poised over paper in Iva’s dining room. 

 

Sanji thinks about looking into the mirror after Iva was done with him, about his hair falling over one eye and over his shoulders in soft blond waves. He thinks about his mother. 

 

“Have you heard about the All Blue?” 

 

 

twenty-one.

 

“You changed it.” 

 

It’s entirely out of context, but instinctively, Sanji knows what Zoro means. It’s like a lot of things with Zoro. Just to be cross, he doesn’t take him up on it though, doesn’t even turn to face him. He continues to scrub a stubborn spot in a pan and says around a puff of nicotine: “I’ve changed a lot of things, Marimo. You’re gonna have to be more specific.” 

 

Zoro scoffs, because he knows that Sanji is being difficult on purpose. It’s a game they’ve loathed to play with each other since they met. 

 

But i seems that Zoro has changed the rules in the last two years. Sanji realises this a beat too late, when Zoro has already stepped up behind him and into his space and there’s a calloused palm pressing to his shoulder blade. He can feel the warmth of it, the minute shift of Zoro’s thumb through the thin fabric of his button down. Smoke burns in his lungs as he forgets to breathe it out for a moment too long. 

 

“You changed it,” Zoro repeats.

 

Slow and measured, Sanji blows out the smoke. He lets the pan sink into the suds. He dries his hands off. And somewhere in between all that, he must have lost his mind, because he asks: “Do you want to see?” 

 

In lieu of a reply, Zoro drops the hand burning into Sanji’s shoulder blade and begins pulling his shirt tails out of his pants. Swallowing around the hysteric laugh at the back of his throat, Sanji stops him. “Careful, you brute.” 

 

Then, he continues what Zoro started. He probably loses a little bit more of his mind irrevocably as he undoes the buttons, really seals his fate as he lets the shirt drop to the floor—He wouldn’t usually. It’s a nice shirt. But he can’t turn around to face the room, to face Zoro. 

 

As soon as he stops moving, Zoro’s hand is back on him, tracing lines that Sanji can’t see, hiding what he never has to see again. It occurs to him that Zoro might ask, and it occurs to him, too, that he might answer, that he might not have a choice in the matter, with the way his head feels cottony and jumbled and he keeps forgetting how to breathe. 

 

He just hopes it won’t be a question that undoes him entirely. 

 

There are a lot that he would be quite happy to answer—a lot that Mimi and Iva had asked in the process. They had been, of course, very thinly veiled attempts to get Sanji out of his head and distracted from the pain, the whirring, to get him into the present. 

 

It surprises him a little, when Zoro chooses the same kind of question. It gets him out of his head, into the present. “What’s this one?” His finger is tracing a line back and forth, at the very top of the motive if Sanji had to guess. 

 

“I don’t know,” He says, his voice a little raspy, like he hasn’t talked in a while. “I can’t see it.” 

 

“Smart-ass,” Zoro scoffs under his breath. It sounds fond. For a second there, Sanji nearly forgot that he was in the process of losing his mind. 

 

“Describe it to me,” He prompts. 

 

And Zoro—does. “It’s spikey. Striped. Looks cool as fuck.” When he traces it again, Sanji can feel the line of every single spike. 

 

“Lionfish,” He breathes, and so Zoro doesn’t have the chance to call him out on it, he adds: “They’re venomous and have close to no natural enemies.” 

 

Possibly, Zoro is going just as insane as him, because he doesn’t, in fact, call him out, not even as Sanji falls silent and doesn’t offer up anything more. He only hums, and his fingers travel lower on Sanji’s shoulder. 

 

“What about this one?” He asks. “Fucked up face, real long. Reminds me of you.” 

 

“Oh, fuck off. Ribbon Sawtail. Deep sea, they all look like that.” 

 

He feels Zoro chuckle by the puff of air against his neck more than he hears it. “That’s where you’re from then, I see.” 

 

Before Sanji can quip anything back, Zoro begins describing another fish, then another one after that. His descriptions are terrible. Sanji’s replies become longer and longer with every one and Zoro never stops him or lets his hand leave Sanji’s back. 

 

By the time he is sure they must have gone through every single species Mimi had put on his back, Sanji still thinks he’s not quite in the clear. Now, surely, Zoro will ask what is glaringly obvious—What it is that Sanji so desperately wanted to drown. 

 

The question never comes. Sanji catches himself thinking that he nearly wishes he could give an answer, even as Zoro’s hand finally, ruinously, leaves his skin and the moment passes. 

 

 

twenty-one.

 

“You changed it.” 

 

Sanji flinches and the poor woman they delegated to helping him dress flinches with him. He tries to throw her an apologetic look in the mirror but she avoids his eyes like she is scared of him. Which she probably is. Everyone here is either scared of him or hates him. 

 

He leaves the maid be and turns to his sister instead. “How would you feel, if I barged into your room while you were changing?” 

 

“Wouldn’t that be terribly mundane,” She drawls as she sits on an ottoman by the bed they gave him. “And terribly rude of you.” 

 

He rolls his eyes. “You don’t say.” 

 

Reiju seems unperturbed. “You changed your tattoo,” She says again. 

 

His chest seizes, once, briefly and he—He’s not in the mood. For anything. He throws a withering look at where the hem of her dress meets her thighs. “You didn’t.” 

 

“Father won’t approve.” She says this easily, like their father’s disapproval doesn’t mean torture, incarceration, and like Sanji isn’t very well aware of this fact. 

 

Something childish and petulant and ugly rears its head. “Why?” He hisses. “Because it damages the wares? Will the Charlottes not want me like this? Whatever will I do?” 

 

“Don’t be silly,” She admonishes and stalks over from her ottoman to stand behind him and watch him through the mirror. The maid shifts imperceptibly out of the way, still meeting neither of their eyes even as Sanji tries to smile at her. Reiju continues in that same easy tone: “Mother would have loved it.” 

 

Sanji’s eyes snap to her, and Reiju keeps them pinned in the mirror. “It’s exactly what she would have wanted.” 

 

Sanji will learn exactly what his sister means by that a few days later, after they have arrived in the Whole Cake Chateau, after he has met Pudding and after Luffy and Nami try to get him back. After Pudding reveals everything to Reiju, and she lies bleeding in a hospital bed, Sanji will refuse to run, and Reiju will tell him what he didn’t know of their mother. 

 

Now, she leaves him wondering about his mother, about the ink under his skin and about the ink under his brothers’. He sees how the number on Ichijis arm is adorned now, and wonders if that was his choice too, and wonders how they found a way to pierce his hardened skin after the fact. Ichiji wears it with pride. He wonders what kind of emotion pride is, to sidestep the best Germa’s science has to offer, and he thinks about what other emotions could do the same. 

 

When he sleeps, he dreams of calloused fingertips tracing against his shoulder, and he knows that these emotions couldn’t have been among the ones his brothers would ever know—Because he knows he would go mad and never come back to himself, should he ever be kept from feeling them. 

 

 

twenty-one.

 

He only meant to nap briefly, during his turn of vigil by Zoro and Luffy’s bedside. It seems to be his turn more often than not, though more often than not, he simply stays, no matter whose turn it is. 

 

It’s dark outside, as dark as it gets, and silent, as silent as it gets. Somewhere, he knows, the citizens of Wano are still celebrating their freedom. At some point soon, Usopp will show up and relieve him to go join Momonosuke’s cooks in the kitchen—Just to make sure that if today is be the day their captain decides to rejoin the living, they could be prepared. 

 

But now, Sanji wakes from his lazy dozing to a familiar sensation. 

 

Chopper had put some ointments on rapidly healing skin and insisted on wrapping his torso up despite everything after confirming that a couple of Sanji’s ribs had been broken at one point during the fight. Just until he’d get a chance to look at him more closely. Until now, he’s been too busy, with Zoro and Luffy and other people far more grievously injured than Sanji would maybe ever be again. 

 

Some of the wrappings must have come loose in his sleep, because where he lays on his stomach on the bare tatami floors, his Kimono tied loosely around his hips in the lingering heat, he feels fingertips, warm and calloused, in between them. 

 

Zoro must know he’s awake, must have heard the shift in his breathing, but doesn’t acknowledge it. His touch is soft, barely there if it weren’t for the way Sanji can feel his own breath catching in his chest at every brush, can feel his skin—harder than it was—catch fire under the pads of Zoro’s fingers. 

 

He thinks that now, maybe, Zoro might ask. They didn’t get a chance to talk after Sanji came back. He thinks, too, that now, maybe, Zoro might finally be angry. He has every right to be—about Zou, about the request Sanji had made in the middle of a fight. A part of him thinks that, at the very least, now, Zoro might agree that Sanji deserves it, that anger. 

 

Zoro doesn’t ask. He isn’t angry. He keeps tracing lines of ink along Sanji’s skin and in the quiet of the room, to the backdrop of Luffy’s soft snoring, he begins a list, an incantation, a lullaby. 

 

“Lionfish, Swordtails, Blacktip reef shark,...”

Notes:

it's been so long since i wrote any sort of tangible romance that this feels like a cheesy steamy romance novel you buy at a gas station to me. this must be what stephanie meyer felt when she put bella in that cargo skirt.