Imagines III | ZoLu 🥀🔥

Tattletales | 6 💋

"H... Hey, Dad! You alive?" A short boy asked, watching as his father's eyelids fluttered open.

"I feel like something knocked the wind out of me, for a moment. Then I lost my conscious..."

As Dragon woke up and looked around him, he found Ace beside him in another bed with his head bandaged up.

"Never mind, It appears something did knock the wind out of me. How's lumpy holding up over there?"

The long haired man asked, rising up from the bed.

"He's alright, don't worry. We've survived our grandpa's 'fist of love', many times before."

Sabo mentioned, recalling the amount of times that he and his siblings were scolded by their grandfather.

"Gyahahaha! They nearly killed ya', man!!"

Garp shouted, finding his son's accident rather amusing oppose to concerning.

"Old man...."

Dragon sat up from the bed, listening to Luffy and Garp's laughter.

"Nishishi!!"

Seeing the bright smile on his son's face, Dragon couldn't help but want to ruffle his hair.

However, as he reached over to pat is head, he made an unexpected discovery...

"Hmm?"

He leaned closer towards the boy who was sitting a few inches away from him on the bed, attempting to get clearer visual on something that caught his eye.

And the closer he got, the deeper the crease in his eyebrows grew until it was obvious to everyone around the man that something had made him very upset.

Everyone, excluding his youngest who was still unaware of why his father was acting so strange.

"Huh? What?" Luffy asked, maintaining a confident smile on his face.

"Nothing."

The older man replied, pressing his hands against the bed to use his core strength to stand up from it.

"I'm going to give Ivankov a call, I have a pending conversation with him that I never got to finish because of work."

He stated, brushing his clothing.

"Keep an eye on this one. Call me if anything.."

There was a change in the man's demeanor as he walked out of the room and grabbed his car keys.

"See ya'! Have a nice day!! Say hi to Winky for meeeee!!"

The youngest spoke, referring to a nickname he has for Ivankov while waving at his father.

In return, the man simply nodded, keeping his farewell shorter than usual by remaining silent.

This action of his was strange to Luffy, but even more questionable for Sabo.

The moment he noticed Dragon's behavior, he grew suspicious of him, but made no attempt to question him on the matter. Leaving his thoughts as mere speculations.

"Ah... What... What on Earth..?" A dark haired male wondered as he slowly woke up.

"So you've finally come to. Your father left not too long ago but I'll let him know you're awake."

Garp said, looking down at Ace as he squinted his eyes, waiting for his foggy vision to clear up.

"YOOOOO, DRAGON!!! ACE WOKE UP!!"

The brothers each jumped as Garp shouted at the top of his lungs, watching as Dragon rushed back into the house.

"Damn! I shoulda stayed asleep, now I lost half of my hearing..."

Ace groaned in annoyance, covering his left ear.

"How do you feel?" Dragon asked.

"Fine. Low-key feel like a truck named "Luffy" ran me over, though."

The man sarcastically spoke, gritting his teeth at his younger brother.

"Yeah... Believe me, I know the feeling."

Dragon responded, not even bothering to look the young boy in the eye.

"I'm off again. Try to stay alive while I return, and don't break anything else.. Seriously."

He then proceeded to head towards the door again, retrieving the house keys from his pocket to lock the house before leaving.

But on his way out, he felt something wrap around his waist, preventing him from moving any further.

Looking down to his chest, he found Luffy staring back up at him.

"Bye! Hehe!"

His son's facial expressions were tender, but as he raised his head up, Dragon remembered the reason he was acting so cold towards him in the first place and leaned in to discuss something with him.

"Go wait in your room for me until I get back home. And turn your phone off, you're not going to use it anymore for today."

He calmly spoke, causing Luffy to develop a slight amount of anxiety.

"Huuh?? Why not?" Luffy asked with a pout.

"Ever since those things came out, it's all you ever use, from early in the morning until late at night... Just do it, Luffy. Got that?"

The man's voice sounded awfully strange, but his punishment was what had Luffy baffled.

"Uh.. Uh, yeah."

Choosing not to dig deeper into the subject, the boy decided to follow his father's commands and nodded at him.

Afterwards, the man left, leaving Luffy to sit with a few thoughts lingering on his mind.

"No phone means no way to talk to Zoro until we meet up again... Guess I'll just wait. I wonder why he wants me to wait in my room, though."

~~~