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Zoro had seen this look on his captain’s face before. Every aspect deceptively calm until you looked into his eyes or saw the tiny tremor of his hands. But he’d never been on the other end of it. There was a thick, heavy tension in the air between them. It might have been that his captain was so upset he was bleeding haki subconsciously or simply because Zoro knew he’d been found out and the weight of this gaze was more than he could bear. He looked away with a sigh.
“I never meant for you to-“
“Don’t make me repeat myself!” Luffy snapped eyes so full of fury they nearly bulged out of his head “What did you do!?”
The swordsman bit back a curse. Damn Sabo. Or Dragon. Or Ivankov. Or whichever one of those damn revolutionary bastards had tipped him off about Kuma.
Luffy had been unconscious for their whole first encounter with the Warlord. Which Zoro had since taken as a blessing, because it meant he didn’t have the chance to assess his character for himself. So he took the explanation that the warlord assumed he was already dead at face value and never questioned why he’d been able to escape. But now he knew Kuma wouldn’t have made such an oversight.
The cook stepped forward “Luffy.” He tried to put a hand on his shoulder, to calm him even if only a bit. The captain shook him off with a jerk and fixed the blond with the same icy stare as punishment for interfering. He was in no mood. There was no way for Zoro to get out of this.
So he told him.
It was worse than he could have imagined. The desperate anger giving way to horror as his fears were confirmed. His mouth curled down even more as tears pricked his eyes and then opened as he struggled to get in enough oxygen and then was covered by a hand in horror. Not only his hands but his knees were shaking now too. He looked to Sanji, who could only nod sadly and confirm Zoro was telling the truth.
The man who would be Pirate King fell to his knees, crying. His straw hat fell off and rolled away. And his nakama could do was watch in solemn silence.
“Don’t ever!” Luffy weeped “Don’t ever do something like that again!”
Zoro and Sanji looked at each other and immediately knew they were in agreement.
“Apologies, Captain, but that’s not your decision to make.”
“Yes it is!” Luffy screamed in insistence “You are never to do that again!”
His nakama looked over him and this time there was a huff of affection between them as they nodded a shared understanding on what to do. Together, they moved to either side of their captain.
“One.” Zoro said, crouching and lifting one of Luffy’s arms across his shoulders.
“And two.” Sanji did the same on the other side.
Together they stood, their superior height forcing Luffy to stand with them and return him to his feet.
“Chin up, Captain. Don’t go showing your subordinates such a pathetic face.” Zoro said, gently pushing the younger man’s chin higher, ignoring the tears that were dripping off of it.
“He’s right. That’s no way for a king to look.” Sanji added, plopping the straw hat unceremoniously back onto his head.
The two older men turned their back on the sniveling pirate captain and started making their way up the stairs to the deck.
“What’s for dinner, Curly?”
“I’m thinking a Sea King Stew.”
“I’m serious. Promise me you won’t.” Luffy said behind them, so softly it was almost a whisper.
“You’d better have a good booze to go with that.”
“Tsk. All you think about is booze.”
They didn’t look back as they let the door close behind them. They would protect their captain’s dignity whether he liked it or not.