Il Seraglio

1.

Luffy didn't like their new 'friend'. Not at all. His instincts had been overridden by the offer of food when they were first invited back to the mansion – the guy had said ‘cause he liked swapping tales with passing pirates, though that had been kind of weird because local notables usually weren't that keen to see pirates at all. But once they'd got there it seemed more about the drink and the weird smelly substances and the women than the food, and Luffy was starting to feel fed up. Especially with the way Sanji had gone stupid the minute he set eye on the women. Weird women, Luffy had pointed out, and received a kick and a scowl for his troubles -- but just look at the way they fawned over the fat jerk like that.

He also didn't like the way the fat jerk kept looking at Sanji. It was the same way Nami looked at 100 belli notes. Something to hoard and use, not like a person at all. Similar, after a fashion, to the way he barely looked at all those girls that hung off him -- like things. Sanji was just a more interesting thing. And anybody who looked at people like that instantly rose to the top of Luffy's list for being overdue an ass-kicking. He scowled into his syrupy, nasty drink and felt his hackles continue to rise with Sanji's simpering.

When the fat jerk offered them a job in his service, Luffy's patience snapped. His half finished drink slammed down.

"We don't need to work for you. I'm gonna be Pirate King. Sanji's my cook, and he's gonna find All Blue. We're going." He stood up and brushed his knees off, and turned scowling to the chef.

Sanji's eyes were still full of dopey adoration all focused on the women who pawed at him, trailing their hands over his shoulders and chest and stroking his hair -- as though he hadn't heard any of what Luffy said at all.

"Sanji." He made to grab the cook's arm, but someone else with a lot of bosom was in the way, sighing at him as she seized his hand and pressed it to the cleft between her breasts. He tried to pull back and got his feet twisted up in something someone had been wearing a minute ago, fell over, and before he could pick himself up, her thighs were bearing down across his hips. "Oi, get off, I don't want to be sat on! Get off!" He shoved her away and struggled to get up, shedding teasing hands that curled about him like tentacles.

Mauris – that was the name of fat jerk -- who wasn't really so fat, just big, and so expansive with his booming voice and laughter that he seemed even bigger -- chuckled. He ambled over to the door -- what, he was leaving? "HEY!"

"I'll let you enjoy a taste of the perks of joining me. The harem is available to all my subordinates -- any time."

"Mellorine!" Sanji's voice wavered, distorted and faint, probably 'cause of all the female flesh encasing him.

"Wait -- fat guy -- damn!" Luffy yowled as the door 'snicked' closed. Someone groped him thoroughly from behind and he jumped. "LEAVE THAT ALONE!" He spun and smacked her aside. They had to get out of here. These women were scary and Sanji was...

"Sanjiiii--" he shoved and pulled at lustrous hair, perfumed silks, buxom breasts and shapely legs, ignoring the little screams and the hands trying to shove him back in return, just trying to get a grip on his cook in the middle of the female pile-on. "Sanji, damn it! I know these girls like you, but we gotta get back!" He snarled as one of the stupid women playing with Sanji's hair slammed a delicately slippered foot into his face, knocking him backwards when he'd been almost in touching distance. Others wrapped their hands around his chest from behind, and fingers with sharp nails dug into his throat, snuck in from below to squeeze his crotch -- and in his distraction, started to drag him away.

Desperately he pulled out his trump card and yelled, "Sanji, Nami's waiting!" There was no sign he'd even heard! This was bad! Bad, bad, bad! "Stupid cook! Gyaaaaargh, stop pulling my hair! No, I want my clothes. Give that back! DON'T PUT THAT IN YOUR MOUTH! Sanji, he------lp!" He panted desperately. "Help me, Sanji!"

He didn't want to, but it wasn't like his body was made of stone, even though parts of it were doing a really good impression. For an indeterminate amount of time, the world blurred into soft hands and mouths upon him, and softer breasts coated with sweet stuff that made his head reel. Their bodies slid down onto his, pressing him into the slick warmth inside them. Oiled fingers probed his ass like they thought they might find treasure in there, but since they didn't find any, they just shoved in other things instead.

Then, they left him outside the gates, naked, with his arms laced behind him and his calves strapped to his thighs, for passing islanders to gawp at until he got enough focus together to snap the bindings.

He'd no sooner pulled the vibrating, buzzing thing out of his ass, tugged off all the stupid little clamps, torn out the ribbons braided into his hair, and was about to charge back in to kick their stupid perfumed asses and drag Sanji out, when a bunch of jerks in silly hats came by and arrested him.

***

"Sign here." A form was thrust in front of him. "You can press assault charges but they won't stick. They never do. Sorry."

She didn't sound sorry. She just sounded miserable and jaded and annoying. Luffy was sitting without underwear in the wrap-around robe the island police had provided, still sneezing now and then from the overwhelming reek of the perfume he'd been steeped in. He scowled at the form and grumbled, "I don't care about that. I gotta get my nakama out of there. I gotta get my hat. Stupid women. Stupid Sanji. Damn it." He flopped forward onto the table, mashing his face into the stupid form. He wasn't given to defeatist thoughts, but he had to get Sanji out of a harem. Why couldn't Nami have come with them? But she'd declared that it would take both her and Usopp to keep Zoro from exercising and re-opening his wounds, and since Luffy would be no help at all and Sanji would just start fights, they'd have to go get the supplies. "How 'm I s'posed to get Sanji away from a bunch of women?" He blinked up pleadingly at the lead silly-hat-jerk, who he sort of remembered preferred to be called 'Officer Sparks'.

She sighed, folded her arms and scowled down at him. "For a start, they aren't women."

"Wha--" His eyes popped almost out of his head. "They were men? They had breasts and everything!"

"Shut up. No, they're not men. Mauris Pent is a devil fruit user -- the harem harem fruit. They're not alive or real women, just moving blow-up dolls." She snorted in disgust. "He uses them, among other things, to draw powerful men to him with the promise of constantly filling their sexual desires if they'll serve as his subordinates. That's why one criminal controls half this island and there's not a damn thing we can do about it."

Luffy growled, scratched at his bare head, and tugged at a stray ribbon that’d gone unnoticed thus far. "He can't have Sanji! He's my nakama, not some girly-girly fruit asshole's subordinate!"

"I'm guessing you're a pirate... of some sort," pink-hair said dryly. "Give it up, pirate boy. That's what Pent does best -- poach others' nakama. If your guy stayed there, it's because he'd rather be there. That's base urges for you. And Pent excels in leading men around by... them. I've seen it a dozen times."

Damn it, she was right. Luffy seethed -- Sanji was never going to leave there of his own accord. Aaaaugh! Frustrated, he tore out clumps of his hair with the ribbon and threw it to the floor. This wasn't finished.

Pink-hair was still talking. "Don't go up against him. I've no love for pirates, but you're a little fresh-faced for the brand of humiliation he dishes out."

Like he was giving up on Sanji when he'd just got him! But how could--? "If they're controlled by that one guy, all I have to do is kick his ass," he said with sudden inspiration. "Then they'll all go away and Sanji will come back with me."

Sparks looked down her nose at him and readjusted her pink hair, tucking a loose lock under her cap. "Yeah," she said flatly. "Good luck with that." Her finger stabbed the clipboard on the table. "Sign the assault report form. Then you can go. And I'd tell you to forget about your 'friend', but instead I'll divert my energies to hoping the gangs who troll around for Mauris' leavings don't get to you before I see you again."

***

Last time they'd been invited into the guarded, walled mansion with the promise of food, drink and girls, mostly girls in practice. But this time it wasn't much harder to get in. He just extended his arm above the gate and grabbed the ledge of a window on the fourth floor. There were some shrieks from the streets below as his rotten robe flashed the bypassers. The glass didn't survive the argument with his rocketing body.

Luffy picked himself up and beat all hell out of the angry, naked guys in the room where he'd landed. The three girls that were with them vanished in a puff of air when they took a heavy hit -- pink hair had been right. One of the guys had a devil fruit that tried to drop him into holes in the floor, but he was too pissed off for a lame power like that to slow him down. When he'd done releasing some of his aggression, he padded barefoot down the corridors in the direction they'd said (whimpered) that bastard Mauris could be found.

He beat up the guards outside the room and slammed the doors back. Inside, fat jerk Mauris was sprawled in a padded chair. He was wearing loose and loosened clothes and surrounded by about twenty fawning ladies not wearing very much. Luffy felt the stirring of unease at the sight of so many of them again, remembering how they'd overpowered him last time, but his anger rode over the feeling. His hands clenched into fists at his sides. "I want my cook, girly-girly fruit bastard!"

Mauris leaned forward, adjusting his bulk. "Straw Hat Captain. You came back, I see. Sorry, no -- you can't have him. Your 'cook' is an asset. You've quite plainly proven today that I need stronger men, like him." He scowled towards the guys slumped outside the doorway. "Besides, I think you'll find him resistant to the idea of leaving. But you can serve with him here - and be served, accordingly."

"Like hell I'll work for you! And I don't care what you think of his ass, he's my nakama and you're not keeping him! And while we're about it, I want my hat back too, bastard!" He whipped out his leg, brushing aside the girls who'd been seductively slinking closer from the left. They popped like bubbles, but as he turned to deal with the ones on the right, he found more had appeared behind him. He cursed and struggled as they got their hands on him again.

"I can generate almost a hundred harem girls at any one time," Mauris purred. "Destroy them and I'll just make more." Luffy drove a kick into a pretty face and the other devil fruit user winced as the girl dissolved.

"You feel what they do!" Luffy choked in a moment of eye-popping realisation.

"Shh." Mauris winked. "Only to a degree... if I choose to, or I'm off guard." He didn't react when the next was destroyed.

"Sanji--" Luffy spluttered. "When they -- when Sanji -- with them -- you--" He remembered Mauris' eyes on Sanji at their first meeting and something suddenly struck him about the features of the lackeys he'd been beating up.

Mauris chuckled and licked his lips. "Such a pretty young man." Luffy was aware of his leer as he added, "You were rather diverting yourself, Straw Hat, for such a homely, scarred boy... in fact..."

Without warning, he picked up a glass vial in a large hand and tossed it into the centre of the floor.

Luffy threw himself back, expecting an explosion. Instead the vial just broke… but it stunk. His head reeled, and suddenly all the soft bodies around him were so much more interesting and he couldn't concentrate on something as silly as throwing another punch. There were other things he'd rather do! His arms were caught and slim hands slid down his tenting robe, removing the troublesome fabric from him, easing him onto the floor, closing over his cock.

He'd been here before, naked, panting and spread open amid a sea of flesh, oiled and stimulated and penetrated. He remembered dimly that he'd cared more about it the last time, but now the sickly sweetness of the air seemed to clog chase the hovering wrongness to the very edges of his brain. He reached out for the inviting, thrusting bodies eagerly, willingly parting his lips and his thighs even to the weird fat guy when he came down from his chair to join in.

***

…So he didn't understand it when his playmates dragged him out again and abandoned him. Outside the back gates, this time, in the dark, his hat placed on his head with a parting comment about not giving him any extra excuses to return. But-- they'd been having so much fun! Okay, he'd whined before, but he wasn't complaining now. He wasn't finished yet! He wanted to follow them back, but his legs wouldn't hold him up when he tried, leaving him alone and desperate, tugging at himself with his shaking hands and unable to find relief. When finally some new friends found him, they hadn't even chance to get started before a mean woman with pink hair and a stupid hat marched up waving a pistol and made them all run off.

"Holy... shit," she said, standing with her hands on her hips glaring down at him. He didn't like her, but she was pretty and she'd chased everyone else away. Everyone except those other stupid hat guys behind her, but they hovered a way back offering disgusted looks, and seemed even less fun. He started to climb up her ankles. "They did one hell of a number on you. Damn it, pirate boy, don't start that with me!" She clamped her hand across his lips and broke his fingers' fumbling grip on her uniform pants. When she released him, it was only to slap him across the face with a crack that sounded out like a whip. "Get a hold of yourself! He's still got your cook! "

Something in those words hit home and the wrongness of the situation started to creep back. He reined himself in, and thereafter kept tightly focused upon following the instructions of her voice. The world blurred from a stumbling walk between two other silly-hats, through being poked and prodded by a doctor, who continued the mystifying theme of all the people who'd been fascinated by his ass today. He was stabbed with needles and made to swallow pills, shoved into a shower where his hand shuddered as he tried to close his fingers on the temperature dial -- and as the cold water rinsed over him, the last overwhelming threads of his arousal faded, letting other thoughts start to creep back in. Finally, he got dried off and redressed in another robe-thing, shrugging off the helping hands to do most of the work himself in a kind of slow motion. He was starting to feel a bit weird about the way they were guiding him around and talking to him so carefully.

He slept on a thin, hard little bed in a cell with its door wide open for a fitful few hours; was awoken, confused and muzzy-headed, by the daylight filtering in through a high-up window out in the corridor, with a nasty, nasty taste on his thick and fuzzy tongue. He lurched up to find some food to make the taste go away.

Eventually, he was sitting back at the desk from before, poking his fingers into a hot drink of the strange, bitter local tea, feeling sick and wondering exactly what an afro-dizzy-ack was, because he wasn't wearing an afro but he did feel dizzy, so obviously it had some truth to it somewhere. Officer Sparks slapped another clipboard with a form attached to it in front of him. "Sign that."

"Okay." His signature stumbled drunkenly over the page. "Sorry 'bout trying to get in your pants. I did weird stuff last night."

"You were drugged up to the eyeballs by that pervert. Don't worry about it. The state will press charges this time, the semen and the drugs are solid evidence. I still wouldn't expect it to go anywhere, but with that statement signed, you don't need to worry about it further. We don't even have to mention you by name." She glanced down at the clipboard he slid across to her and nodded sharply. "As a bonus, our doctor says you didn't catch anything. Do the sensible thing now, and move on. Don't go back there again."

Luffy groaned and flopped backwards in the hard wooden chair, which would've tipped and fallen without the wall behind it. He watched the cracks on the ceiling. They were spinning gently. "I don't care about that stuff. I don't care if you mention my name. I gotta get Sanji, and I think I need help. But Zoro's too hurt an'..." His stomach turned nastily. "I can't ask Usopp or Nami to go in there with me." Nami might be able to get Sanji to leave, but if girly-girly-bastard got Nami...

Officer Sparks strode around to set his chair back on four legs with a bump, throwing him forward across the desk. He slumped there, but craned his neck and blinked at her as she clopped around him on her steel-capped boots. "Leave it," she told him, voice hard-edged. "If your friend is too turned by the promise of physical pleasure to get out of there of his own free will for you, he's not worth this."

Luffy whined, "It's not like that." She didn't get it. "It's... it's Sanji. He's special!" He grit his teeth and tapped the side of his head meaningfully.

Officer Sparks said, "Huh."

Luffy flopped back again and hung his legs over the table top, which earned a glare of disapproval but no immediate reprisals. He felt so tired. And his head felt strange and his body felt strange, and after a whole lifetime without any sex except with his hand, he seemed to have had an awful lot of it in just one day whether he wanted to or not.

An idea flitted at the edges of his thoughts and he chased after it grimly until he'd sunk his mental fingers good and deep. It wasn't like it would be easy to come by another idea in his current state. "A girl could rescue Sanji--"

"I'm not going in there," Officer Sparks cut in.

"Of course not." Luffy wasn't going to ask it of Nami, and he wasn't going to risk his new friend either. He pinched his arm and drew the skin out of shape in a big stretchy flap. "I've got a devil fruit too. I'll be the girl. But I don't how to do that, so I do need your help." He looked up hopefully, and slowly took his newly-regained hat from his head and threw it onto the table.

"Get your feet down," she said. But she was watching him thoughtfully now. "...All right, I give. Tell me what that addled brain of yours is thinking."

***

2.

Sanji had been wrong about All Blue. This... this could only be his real dream. To think that he'd found it so quickly! So many lovely ladies, all willing and ready to flower him with their affections and accept his in return. Admittedly, there had been some annoying interruptions. He had dim memories of his idiot rubber captain grumbling and yelling in the background. Then there'd been an interval where Mauris had blathered on about formalising his offer of a job. Of course, with his surrounding lovelies pressing him to accept, what else could he do but to agree to start his new life in Heaven…?

Now, with flowers in his hair and silks and perfumes upon his skin, he knelt at the feet of a statuesque blonde who in her benevolence and grace allowed him to read the most passionate of the great poets to her, and blushed and smouldered at him intelligently in all the proper places, showing her impeccable elegance and breeding.

Other hands tugged at him and other voices cooed his name. They brought him to the shattering realisation that there were lovely women who he was, at that very moment, neglecting! Overcome with guilt, he turned to beg their forgiveness. A red haired lady whose appearance gave him a brief pang, being not quite so alike to a deity of flame as Nami-swan, allowed him to lay her down on the sheets and pay homage to her curves with his trembling fingers. Until a tap on his shoulder turned his head again, and though that... was less dainty and graceful, and would quite possibly bruise, his heart melted at the sight of the diminutive and startlingly cute dark beauty now before his unworthy eyes.

Her buxom cleavage and tiny waist were wrapped in a deep-red corset pulled tight almost to bursting. Little hearts stitched into the cloth climbed the mounds of her breasts and decorated the jut of her hip, beyond where the material dwindled into a slim thong. She crawled toward him over the bed in almost predatory fashion, her smile a fixed twist of perfect white teeth.

"Sanji." She spoke his name as though she knew him, though he was certain he'd never claimed sight of her before. It was, had to be, fate recognising the perfection of their match. His eyes teared at the kindnesses the world was laying upon him today. He caught her hand and proceeded to plant kisses over every inch of it, working up the skin of her arm and fully intending to move from there to the rest of her body. She permitted him to gather her into his lap, his hands upon the soft, rounded curves of her buttocks. Her thighs straddled his, and the position gifted him the full view down her substantial breasts. She curled her hands upon his shoulders, shifted her shapely bottom against his crotch, and leaned forward to whisper against his ear, "Sanji... why aren't you having sex?

"How can it be this hard to get you out of here when you aren't even having sex?"

"Huh?" He blinked into her astonishing wide, heavily-lashed, gold-painted eyes, and it struck him again -- there was definitely something familiar about that tousled ebony hair and the shape of her smooth-skinned face. Had she been there when they'd first arrived in this paradise? And if so, how could he not have remembered? It was all too clear what she wanted, though, and as such, how could he refuse her desires! "Glorious lady, it would only be fulfilling my every wish to humbly pleasure your body with my own..." Fumbling, he loosened his clothes and freed his almost painfully interested cock.

She blinked at him with a wide eyed adoration that made his heart beat even faster. Other unidentified contortions of her smitten need for him crossed her features. She looked down and giggled as her face flushed pink. "Ah, it's pretty big, Sanji!" She hesitated, teasing him so coyly. "You want..." A choked little noise escaped her, overcome by the passion of the moment. Her lips parted and she drew in a breath that Sanji felt curl and tease in the pit of his stomach. Then she seized up a bottle of oil from the bed, upturned it over her fingers and slipped her hand behind her. She rose higher on her knees, pillowing his face with her breasts. Her slick hand closed upon his cock, guiding it as she eased down onto him, fingers slipping the pretty red thong to one side. As her oiled warmth encased him, he certainly didn't care in the least about her choice of entrance.

It felt so much better, somehow, than all the others! She was so alive in his grasp, and her scent, beneath the perfume, so much more right. He lifted her, carrying them both over so she was lain on her back, delighting in her surprised little sound, and watched her face intently as he moved over her, making love to her -- the contortions of her wide mouth, and the small, high moans that escaped affirming the ecstasy that he felt privileged to deliver to her. Other hands tugged and stroked at him, occasionally reminding him that they were not alone, but he no longer had any interest in their dimmer lights.

"Sanji..." She was exceptionally flexible, tugging him forward so she could whisper in his ear again, while her body almost bent in two. "Unnnnngh. Ah! Ah, don't stop what you're doing, but - ah! - when you've finished, we really have to get out of here."

"What, oh most shining of flowers--?" She wanted commitment too? Oh, all his dreams were fluctuating so wildly today he was left breathless from the recoil. "Oh, yes. Yes! Of course, oh--"

"You'll come with me, then?"

The relief in her voice startled him. How could she ever doubt?! "Yes!"

"And you're mine? Not that fat-jerk-bastard-girly-fruit-moron-creep-asshole's?"

"O-of course..."

She panted against his neck. "Then we have to get back to the Merry. 'Cause I don't want to have to have sex with that fat jerk again, but I promise, I promise that you can have sex with me all you want when we're back on Merry, ok?"

"Wha--?" The words barely penetrated in the haze of bliss as he came inside her, hands squeezing her hips against him, hearing her words break off in an almost shocked gasp and an unladylike grunt, whereby he became aware of a warm but cooling dampness against his abdomen.

Sanji pulled back, still breathing hard, and his belle sprawled before him on the sheets with her legs wide, desperately stuffing something back inside her tiny red panties. He glanced between the dampness on his belly and her own, then back to her face, where make-up had begun to smear, revealing the edge of a scar he knew all too well.

His dreams crashed and burned. "Luffy?"

***

3.

"Luffy--" Damn it! He clapped both hands over Sanji's mouth with a yelp, then had a frantic re-think and pulled one back to cover his own. "What the hell?" Sanji spluttered indistinctly.

His eyes bulged above the press of Luffy's hand. He looked a bit upset to discover who he'd just had sex with, but eh, big deal. It wasn't like he'd bargained on doing this to keep his disguise either. Better Sanji than any of the others, though. Yeah. And damn it, he needed to be a girl or the stupid cook wouldn't listen to him, and girly-fruit-bastard's fake women would be all over him, and then... well. That. All over again. He swallowed hard, wriggled closer on the bed, and drew Sanji in with his arms and thighs. The cook's expression took on a sort of frozen horror, but he didn't yell or start kicking him.

"I'm not Luffy!" squeaked Luffy, keeping his voice as quiet and high as he could. "I'm... his sister! That's right! And I really, really like you, Sanji, and I wanna have loads of sex with you, but we have to go do it back at the ship because this place is full of freakin' jerks."

As he spoke, Sanji developed a sort of teeth-bared grimace with his lips drawn back and eyes still bulging in a way that would've looked pretty funny at some other time. "I know you're Luffy."

"Ah." Luffy pondered this dilemma awkwardly as they looked at each other.

The arms that were bracing Sanji's body started to shake and the cook turned his face aside and tried to roll off. Luffy panicked and yanked him back too enthusiastically. They sprawled on the bed side by side.

"Luffy..." He wasn't sure why Sanji's voice sounded so choked but it wasn't anger, or at least, he still wasn't kicking him, and the two usually did go together. "What are you doing here? Mauris... I'm working for him now, you know that. He said he'd told you... He said his people had to throw you out," the cook finished, with irritation.

"Yeah. They threw me out. With ribbons, and a vibrating thing stuck up my butt." Sanji gaped. "But I came back. Twice." He growled and twisted his hand in Sanji's silky shirt collar. "He can't have you! Are you listening to me? I chose you and you're my nakama! If this was really a proper real choice, then--" He heard his voice twist into a muted hiss "--But it's not even honest. You're got your dreams, and they're better than this. All Blue! The cooks' treasure sea! This is just lies and tricks that work 'cause you're stupid." And because he was afraid he might start to look suspicious just lying there, with all those fake ladies around, he edged closer in to Sanji and licked and nipped at his ears.

Sanji stared straight ahead and past him, and in a trance-like fashion brought his hands forward to clasp Luffy's tiny, squashed waist. "Tricks." He flinched as Luffy peeled his silky shirt down and played with his nipples.

"They're not real. Mauris has the... harem harem girly girly devil fruit. And he can feel what they feel," Luffy added maliciously, "So that sorta means you've been having sex with him, too." He suffered a failure of imagination and tried to pick out any single action from the confusing haze of his earlier experiences. Then settled for licking some more, because Sanji tasted interesting, once he'd gotten below the layer of nasty perfumes and body oils.

"I..." Sanji just gave a weird little sob. Luffy paused. Something hard and hot was prodding his belly. He looked down.

"Sanjiiiiiii--------"

"I can't help it," the cook moaned. "You're the one who's all over me."

"I'm trying to act like a fake slut..." He froze, and stared into Sanji's face. It... was still working. Even though Sanji knew it was him, the disguise was still working. Rising anger killed his urge to laugh from relief. If Sanji hadn't been so ridiculously easy to sway with pretty looks, none of this would've happened. "I'm gonna take care of this, and then you've got to come back with me like you promised." Luffy bobbed down, curling over Sanji's legs and reaching between his thighs. "You're supposed to be my nakama and I had to have sex with nearly everyone trying to get you back, 'cause of your stupid love-cook shit." He tongued the thick head and Sanji moaned and jumped.

"Luffy... Oh, God, you had to wha-- ahhh! Nnnngh! - Ah! - Luffy, this is... please, I d--"

"You better mean that!" He swallowed Sanji's cock, squeezing it with his throat, sucking hard with his cheeks and hoping it wasn't going to take too long. He was so startled he almost choked when Sanji bucked and thrust roughly, coming almost at once, panting and sobbing as his body spilled into Luffy's.

***

Sanji was afflicted by feelings of dawning horror from several sides as the situation became clearer around him. His legs kept locking, half paralysed by the thoughts. Luffy dragged on his arm, trying to haul him down the corridor to the stairwell and the huge grand hallway that led out of the mansion. Luffy seemed both harder and more defensive than usual. His every move was infused with uncharacteristic urgency and gravity.

Shit, Luffy -- whenever his captain entered his thoughts it became near-impossible to think at all, with him dressed like that, right there, but -- what the hell? He'd fucked Luffy, twice, and been more turned on than he had with any of the real women who'd been flinging themselves into his loving arms. The second time... what had Luffy said--? It was hellish difficult to drag coherent information out of him at the best of times and Sanji’s own brain was a long way from its best, but he'd known something wasn't right there. Not that the dumbass had given him any chance to pursue it. He felt his face burning with the memory.

They hadn't been real women, though, had they? That was the point. The ones Luffy punched had vanished when his fist connected. Just illusions... Perhaps that was why. Just because he hadn't felt as inclined to screw illusions didn't mean it was because of any unrealised preference he might have.

He remembered Luffy's angry voice firing the marimo's insult at him. Luffy was mad, and that meant he wasn't joking about the other things…

...Damn it! He couldn't be gay. He loved women! Ask anyone to pick a defining characteristic about him, and it'd be how much he loved women!

...Shit.

He planted his feet hard, pulling Luffy to a halt and seizing his shoulders. Tears sprung into his eyes at manhandling that body so roughly! His lips stretched in a tortured grimace at the mental conflict, but he forced the question out. "What happened?"

He got only an intense blink for answer. "We have to go."

Sanji's spine turned to treacle at the very idea of denying the desperate urgency of his newly delectable captain. He covered his eyes and fought it. "Luffy, what you said--"

"Later!"

He gave a strangled cry of surprise as arms seized him around the waist and his eyes flew open as he was tossed over Luffy's shoulder, bounced around roughly as Luffy resumed running. He tried to struggle, but made the mistake of looking down. His attention was instantly snared by the bright glory of the thin red thong, following its descent into the cleft of his captain's buttocks. He couldn't tear his eyes away from the movement of those taut globes as Luffy ran. He whimpered. "Ohhhhhhh. Melloriiiiiine--------!"

Luffy stumbled to a halt against the rail at the top of the massive hallway. No comment came forth on the erection poking into his shoulder. Instead, he slid Sanji to the floor. His thin body shook, with anger or... something else, hands fisting at his sides, and he hissed in a voice almost too quiet to even qualify as a whisper, "Damn, I can't just run away."

"What?" He was trying to keep his eyes averted from any part of Luffy as he picked himself up. "They're not our enemies..." Not really, even if he had been tricked by a shitty devil fruit. His uneasiness flooded back home.

"The lady with the pink hair and stupid hat. She helped me! She's my friend, and she wants to arrest Mauris. If she can't, he'll keep on messing up her island. I owe her." His fists loosened to clench again, fingers clawing and crunching. "And I owe him." That particular note of fury in Luffy's voice was new, and almost as unsettling as the way it faded to the numb conclusion; "I have to beat him up."

"What?" Startled, Sanji's eyes travelled up Luffy's body. His knees responded by melting under him.

"If I don't... it'll always feel this wrong! Dressed like this I could get close enough... all I gotta do is knock him out. Knock him out and the girls vanish, right?" His breaths were almost panting, when there was no reason he'd be struggling to breathe.

Sanji had never heard him sound so unsure. "If it's a devil fruit, yeah." He didn't need to look at Luffy's face to know the reassurance hadn't altered a thing. He'd already known it wasn't about the question. But his gaze travelled upwards again despite himself, and he could only hold his breath as he watched Luffy's expression slowly turn to grim, defiant intent. Fingers crunched more aggressively, and the captain at last turned to where Sanji was crouched against the banister rails.

"Get up, Sanji. I know you ain't gonna help me fight against those girls -- but there's Mauris and maybe his sex-crazed prettyboy goons, and at least like this you won't fight me."

"Oh, I'll fight," Sanji growled. "Don't you worry about that."

"Very stirring."

In the following long seconds of silence only broken by the rhythmic slap, slap, slap of hands clapping, Luffy didn't react at all. When the clapping ceased, his eyes narrowed to slits and he slowly pivoted his body around, spinning almost lazily on the ball of one foot. It must be being rubber that allowed his stance to stay so loosely relaxed while he exuded such tension. "Girly girly bastard." His fingers crunched again.

Sanji rose to his feet. The vantage point of his full height allowed him a clear view past Luffy to Mauris. Ahhh, such a vile man as that didn't deserve to be blessed by the attentions of all those incredible la------dies----!

"SANJIIIIIII!!!!!!!! Snap out of it!" Luffy shrieked, and a desperate fist connected heavily with his jaw, spinning him around and back to the floor. From there, he saw more lovely ladies, closing in from the sides... His mind floated on a pink haze as he happily watched them move, dimly aware of his captain crouched in a fighting stance that had a good proportion of 'cornered animal' to it. "They're not real, Sanji! Damn! Sanji, get up! Get up and help me fight like you said!"

That "help me" echoed inside his brain, pulling a dimly buried memory from the haze of the day... drifting back, back, back, to the beginning of all this. Riding on a wave of bliss and every illicit dream he'd ever had... hearing those very same desperate words... not registering, nor reacting, nor caring at all.

Mauris had paused, mouth agape. "Straw Hat?" he choked. "Oh my word. I can see what a wasteful move it was to toss you out so hastily. You've far more possibilities than I ever realised."

Luffy added sullenly, "If he throws something, hold your breath." His foot shoved against Sanji's ribs. "Sanji, get up."

Mauris chuckled. "That was the last of my stock. More's the pity, since it turned you into quite the little whore. I really didn't expect you to come back for still more when you woke up from that. But I'm sure I can find something else that will have a similar effect. Or perhaps we should make the repeat performance free of any drugs at all. An element of struggle... can be enticing..." He licked his lips.

The pink haze in Sanji's vision was steadily darkening to red.

Luffy's teeth clicked audibly together. Between them he ground out, "Bastard. Last time I lost. This time, I'm gonna beat the hell out of you. I don't care if I have to do it alone. But it won't be for that." He dragged in a breath. "You tried to take Sanji away. You made pink-hair’s police afraid of you. You hurt people all the time and you're gonna stop."

He'd drawn his arm back as he spoke, and at the last growled word, threw his rubber-pistol punch at Mauris' face.

Ladies stepped into its path and popped out of existence until the large man lazily reached up and caught Luffy's slowed fist. Sanji recognised the way Luffy braced to spring arm and enemy back, but more ladies surged in to grasp the stretched limb, swamping him while he tried to fight them off. He smacked the nearest away, then turned to take several running steps before shoving off from a pillar and letting his body rocket back towards his captured arm.

More harem girls vanished and Luffy slammed into Mauris -- but enough force had been dissipated that the other devil fruit user took little damage. Large arms curled around Luffy's tiny waist, and other women materialised to snag his limbs, impeding his efforts to fight. He punched Mauris in the face once, hard, before three sets of delicate hands caught his remaining free arm and he choked and gasped in unwilling arousal at something one of the others was doing, out of sight. He swung his head back, but more hands caught his neck, teeth and tongues attacking his ears, his throat.

"You're strong and you're dangerous," Mauris said, spitting blood from his mashed lip, "But you're a man, despite... current appearances. You've a man's body and lusts. And as long as you do, my power will always defeat you." His teeth showed as a vicious, bloody grin of victory stretched his face.

"Sanji!" Luffy's voice trembled like that high, thin sound was the only resistance left he could muster. But it was strong and solid in one respect - the unshakeable faith that reached out when he said, "You're my nakama. I know you can fight them."

Mauris laughed. "I'm sure we both know how ridiculous a contention that is." His hands shifted the placement of their grip.

"Shitty bastard..." Sanji swung to his feet. The sight of Luffy pinned before that bastard like a toy, held by the false beauties he'd wasted so much time with while his captain... Rage flooded through him.

At a jerk of Mauris' head, they were on him; sweet-smelling, beautiful, begging his attention with their eyes, their demanding hands... and his body as near-dead before them as it had ever been. The gathering fury within him erupted to the surface. In a frenetic explosion of movement, he flipped onto his hands and the women were knocked aside as his legs spun, popping into nothing upon contact with his feet or the walls. He arched through the air and took out those holding Luffy's right arm as he landed, then charged in to kick his way through more. "Get him, Luffy!" Sanji snarled, twisting and turning as still more of the false ladies appeared. "Leave his shitty devil fruit to me."

Luffy shed the others holding him with a cry of triumph, bounced away, rebounded off the wall and barrelled back into Mauris, knocking him flat.

Sanji didn't have too clear a memory of the fight. The next few minutes were all a kind of blur. He only knew that after, all the fake ladies were gone, the corridor walls had been redecorated with a repeating pattern of footprints, and Mauris was slumped in deservedly battered unconsciousness on the floor.

Next to him... well, one fake lady remained. Luffy, uncouthly sitting with his legs apart, breathing heavily and wiping off saliva from his neck. Sanji swallowed uncomfortably. He flinched as a deep, tortured groan rose from Luffy's throat, and rushed forward in alarm to give whatever comfort was needed.

...Only for his captain to flop over on his side and whine, in pure abject misery. "Damn it, now we gotta take him back to pink-hair. An’ she's gonna make me fill out forms again..."

Sanji sighed, covered his eyes with his arm, and nudged the younger man hard with his foot. "Luffy, get up."

There were few places he'd ever wanted to be less than this one, right now.

***

4.

Luffy was tired but happy as they left the police headquarters. Sparksy had been so surprised when he'd walked in and dropped Mauris on her desk! He'd got Sanji back -- finally -- and he'd kicked the ass of a guy who'd sorely been needing an ass-kicking. His annoyance with the cook had dissipated when Sanji helped fight off all the ladies. It was like... being drugged, he'd decided. He'd needed Officer Sparks to snap him out of it, and Sanji had needed someone who was thinking straight to come to his rescue. Maybe it was a little like drowning, too. He'd been engulfed by his weakness enough times, and always needed someone to pull him out. Considering that, he tried not to mind too much the way he'd felt the chef's attitude towards him change as he'd peeled the uncomfortable disguise off.

Sanji was a lot quieter than usual as they headed back to the Going Merry, and on their way picked up the supplies they'd originally left the ship to fetch. But he kept handing Luffy hanks of meat as well as the many boxes and sacks of supplies balanced in a growing stack on his shoulder, so he didn't seem mad. Occasionally he cursed quite rudely at other people, who were staring. When Luffy asked why, he just muttered something about the robe he'd put back on after changing from the borrowed girl-clothes.

Luffy knew that something was still wrong, and that if he waited ‘til they got back to Merry... well, then there'd be lots of other distracting questions and everyone would want the full story, and he'd want to ask Zoro how he was and tell Nami and Usopp that he was really glad they hadn't come with him after all, and even when he finally got chance to talk about things with Sanji again, the others would probably be butting in. He kind of wanted to avoid that, though he'd be pushed to explain in words just why.

"Sanji, wait."

Accordingly, he dropped the sacks and boxes he carried onto the dock next to a pile of empty crates. Flour puffed from the bottom one in a thick cloud.

"Damn it, shithead--!" the cook snarled, eyes shooting to the burst sack. Ah! That was the Sanji he knew. A grin of recognition started to break out on Luffy's face, but it froze as Sanji did. The cook lowered the leg he'd half-raised, and ground the heel of his hand into his forehead, lips visibly peeling back over his teeth in an expression of pain. "Shit. Luffy... Sorry."

Luffy stared unhappily. Sanji just apologised for getting mad when he'd broken things. Something was definitely wrong.

He sat on a crate. "Sanji. Are you upset because you had sex with me when I was a girl?"

Sanji choked and went a funny colour. Yep, thought Luffy -- that was probably it. He watched the cook swallow hard and venture a bit closer. "You weren't a girl, damn it. Just a shitty rubber band in a lot of strapping and make-up. Those fake ladies... half of sexual attraction is scent, right? You were at least real... must be the reason why. Got to be it." Luffy frowned and was about to point out that the girls had even smelled too, beneath the perfume, and that nobody else had seemed to have any trouble being turned on by them, when Sanji scrubbed his hands through his hair, made a funny noise, and choked out "...I think I like men."

"Okay." Luffy nodded. "But that’s just a sex thing, right, and you still really like women in all the other ways, all except for--" He shaped a gesture with his fingers. Sanji looked horrified and kicked him in the face with a roar, making his head bounce around on his neck.

"Sanji!" Luffy sang out happily.

Then he stared as the chef collapsed to his knees, mumbling apologies.

"...It's not the sex-with-men thing," Luffy said slowly. "Why you're being weird. Is it?" He snaked one arm out in a rubbery lassoo, coiling it around Sanji and dragging him closer, so the cook was half-standing between his knees. His arm snapped back to its regular length, and Sanji staggered; caught his balance against Luffy's leg. Then his hand twitched away like the contact with skin had burned him. "You don't have to tell me. I don't care. But you do have to forget it. I wanted Sanji back, not some jerk that apologises for kicking me and doesn't even act like him." He bared his teeth.

"...How can I forget it when I can't forgive myself?" Sanji said, low and quiet.

"Hunh?"

"Because of what I -- you had to -- all those things--"

"That doesn't matter!" Luffy leaned forward and grabbed the other man by the collar as he tried to back off, pressing his forehead into Sanji's. "Like I was going to let that asshole take a nakama away from me! You're mine, damn it, just as I told you. My cook!"

"Luffy... most people... It's not that easy. It can't be that easy."

"Why not?" He huffed at Sanji's sharp jerk of the head. "You talked to Sparksy behind my back."

"She talked to me." Sanji's complexion had turned a bit grey. "That woman... she... Look, maybe you can shrug off all the rest, but, Luffy..."

Luffy felt him draw in a shaky breath, then another, warm brush of air against the side of his jaw as Sanji tried to turn away, inasmuch as he could, then finally he said, "When you... had sex with me, was that... like those fake ladies and Mauris?" He broke off, and corrected himself before Luffy had chance to, which would have involved more yelling. "No. That's not what I mean. It wasn't... I know you could easily have fought me off if you didn't want to do it. But..." A choked sound escaped his teeth. "Was it just one more? After everything else... you can't have wanted it for real. So in a way I really did... do what they did."

"Yeah," Luffy said, after a moment's thought. He pulled back warily, because that had sounded almost like a sob. He touched the tears on his friend's face with confused dismay. "Huh? It's not like you need to cry about it. You weren't bad or anything."

"Luffy." Sanji's voice was a strangled mixture of anger and upset. "Shit! Couldn't you just... be normal? For one conversation, be normal?"

"I--" For some reason, Sanji had grabbed his shoulders and was shaking him.

"--Shit! I don't mean that. If you were normal, you'd be screaming. Hell, I don't want that. Just... don't you understand at all why I'm having trouble with this?"

"But you were right," Luffy told him. "I didn't really want to do that with you right then. I was scared and uncomfortable and I mostly wanted to get out of that place. But I'd already done it with everyone else, and it kept up my disguise, and it let me talk to you. And since I'd had so much sex with people I didn't like, I was kind of curious too to do it with someone I did like -- so I'm glad I did," he concluded fiercely. "Because it was loads better than with those other bastards. And, damn it, those fake-women were obviously doing it wrong, since you were sitting there reading them poetry, and I had to do something to win you back!"

Sanji groaned and covered his face with his hands.

"I don't see what's so wrong!" Luffy's temper was starting to fray. Though it had ended well, it hadn't been the easiest few days, and he'd not expected Sanji to be weird about it once everything was supposed to be solved. "Since you thought I was just another of those stupid women." Which had been the point, and if anyone should be angry, he'd thought it would be Sanji, for getting tricked. In fact, it was pretty fortunate that Sanji had decided he liked guys anyway.

"No," the cook said quietly. "I thought you were special. I still--" He sighed, and pressed Luffy's head against his chest, stroking his hair. Then paused, grip slackening, almost as if he expected he'd want to pull away. But he didn't. It was a bit soppy, but then Sanji was like that, and it was okay. "But you're not a woman. I can't worship your body, or read you poetry--" Luffy made a disgusted noise that summed up his thoughts on that idea "--or any of the things I'd always thought I'd do when I met that person -- and... especially after today, it's not like you'd ever want me to -- want me -- anyway."

"Stupid. Stupid Sanji," Luffy huffed against his chest "I said we could have sex again if you came back to the ship."

Sanji spluttered. "You can't possibly have meant that. Even setting everything else aside, I know that you like girls. I've seen you drooling..." His fists clenched, and a reflex mutter of "shitty barbarian" escaped the corner of his mouth.

Luffy considered. "I think I don't care. I like people. I like fun. I like you. And you're pretty, too. Even if you don't have boobs." He reached up and touched Sanji's bright hair with his fingers, and snickered at the abrupt flare of annoyance in the cook's eyes. "But, um," he licked his lips nervously. "I did lie a bit, back there. 'Cause I don't want to have sex when we get back to the ship."

Sanji's face twisted and he nodded with a glum acceptance.

"I mean, it's right over there." He pointed. "It'll take about two minutes to walk to it. I don't want to have sex again in two minutes, and probably not today, either. I've had it a lot already and I'm tired, and stuff aches, 'cause even if I'm rubber, dressing up like that for so long kinda hurt. And my head's fuzzy. I wanna sleep. I wanna eat meat. I want to think about other things for a while."

Sanji had stopped looking so miserable and was laughing at him. At first, it was a thin sound, but gradually it grew more sure and natural. The heels of the cook's hands dashed damp streaks from his eyes. Luffy didn't quite know what was funny, but Sanji laughing was way better than Sanji crying, and he didn't particularly see this as a reason to halt listing his perfectly reasonable conditions.

"So maybe tomorrow, or the day after, or in a week or two... well, probably not that long, 'cause I'm pretty curious... then we can have sex again. But I'm not wearing girl-clothes. Not unless you ask really nicely and feed me MEAT. And I know you'll still go sparkly-eyed-stupid over women all the time, but that's okay, so long as you just do the poetry and rubbish with them and keep the sex for me."

He ticked the things off on his fingers, and was just getting to the point of seriously wondering where to go once he ran out of space on his hands when Sanji caught him and pulled him again into a needy sort of hug so that he had to break off with a grunt. But Luffy gamely hugged back, curling his arms around the cook, pressing his face into Sanji's chest -- and sneezed, because he still smelled strongly of perfume. There was a crunchy sound and Sanji made a funny whimper.

"...And next time," he finished, with a growl that recalled Sanji's blissful face beneath that pile of women and the way that he'd listen to them because they had breasts and soft hair, but he wouldn't listen to Luffy, his captain, at all. "Next time you think of leaving my crew 'cause of some perverted moron or pretty face, I'm gonna kick your ass so hard--"

"I think you're killing me," Sanji hissed.

"Oh." He loosened his hold.

Not too much, though. He had no intention of letting his cook escape again.

END

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