Ameliorate ✦ One Piece

23

It was awfully late, and by now Luffy had managed to convince Akira to at least take a seat and a break since she was still rather insistent on not leaving him to deal with the remaining dishes on his own. So, when the door of the kitchen opened again, this time she could be seen drinking a glass of water at the kitchen table, only her and Luffy still left in the space while everyone else had retired for the night.

"Right, are we done yet?" Zeff's loud voice ringing through the air had both Luffy and Akira jumping in surprise. However, unlike Akira, Luffy's hands were full of dishes which met an untimely demise as he dropped them down to the floor. "You're lousy at it. But at least you do as you're told in this kitchen." Zeff said with a small sigh, his pointed words clearly referring to Sanji, which both Akira and Luffy were quick to gather.

"If you think Sanji's gonna give up on his dream because of you, then forget it." Luffy spoke in a ferocious tone as he took a step over the broken dishes and towards Zeff. Akira was quick to jump from her seat and make her way over to them as Zeff questioned the words.

"What he means to say in his... exhausted way," She jumped in, hoping to remedy the situation before Luffy landed himself into any more trouble with the man running this place. "Is that you have an amazing cook in Sanji, and you're... underutilizing him. Just a tip for your business. To make it better, that's all." She rushed out with a friendly smile on her face and panic in her eyes.

"You may have banned him from the line, but you can't stop him from cooking." Luffy said, defending Sanji without any hesitation. "This starving pirate washed up earlier, and you know what Sanji did? He cooked for him! Right here in your kitchen, because your rules matter less to him than making a sure a hungry man got fed."

At first, when Luffy started to tell Zeff what had happened throughout the night, Akira was about to intervene before he could land Sanji in trouble too. But upon seeing the look on the older man's face, she found herself pausing, realizing it wasn't anger that overtook his features at the discovery but something more alike to pride.

"He did that, did he?" The same pride which could be seen in his smile could also be heard in his voice without Zeff even bothering to hide it now. "What a good kid." Somehow, Akira began to suspect that what they'd seen Sanji do tonight might've been something he'd learned from Zeff from the way the man reacted to it.

But before she could even think of whether she should ask about it out loud, the door of the kitchen sprung open again and it was Usopp of all people who rushed inside with a great sense of urgency. "Luffy, we've got a problem." He announced, making Luffy and Akira share concerned looks between themselves, not sparing another moment before both were ripping off their aprons and following after their crew member.

Akira spared just a moment to stop as she passed by Zeff, offering the man an apologetic smile. "We'll be back tomorrow to work, I promise." She rushed out, not really hanging back to wait for his reply before she was running after Luffy and Usopp, out of the kitchen and the Baratie itself as they made their way back to the Going Merry as quickly as possible.

"Maybe you can convince him to call it off." Akira could hear Nami's voice as a part of whatever ongoing conversation she was having with Zoro while the rest of them climbed down below deck to meet with the rest of the crew, all five now coming to stand together around the table in the common area.

"I won't do that." Zoro said simply as he continued to clean all three swords which were set out on the table in front of him.

"Did you see the size of that guy's sword?" Nami questioned in disbelief. "He will slice you into sashimi." Akira's eyes kept jumping between the two of them as the conversation went on, trying to get clues as to what it was actually about, but continuously failing at it.