Work Text:
Sanji is always careful when it comes to laundry. She keeps a careful eye on the rota, making sure she knows exactly when her turn was. She waits patiently for days like this, when the sun is high in the sky leaving the crew lethargic and lazy. It’s the calmest that life on board the Sunny could get, and therefore the least likely for things to go wrong.
With calm waters, sun beating down on the deck, and the entire crew relaxing for once, today is the perfect day to do her own personal laundry. Nothing could possibly go wrong.
This, of course, is when disaster strikes.
Luffy’s boundless energy is at least tempered by the heat, but not completely stopped. Sanji hasn’t been paying attention to whatever dumb game her captain has managed to rope Usopp and Brook into, so she’s resoundingly caught off guard by the stray ball flying towards her. She starts as the colourful ball careens towards her face, ducking just in time.
She manages to twist her body out of the way just in time to save her face, but her laundry basket doesn’t get so lucky. It slips out of her fingers and tumbles to the ground before she has time to react, its contents spilling all over the deck.
Sanji feels her heart stop for a second. Except Luffy just laughs, apparently not noticing her burgeoning horror. Maybe no one will notice? Yeah, if she doesn’t make a big deal out of it and just quickly picks everything up, no one will have to know.
“Idiot captain, watch where you’re throwing that shit,” she growls, dropping to pick up her spilled clothes. Her hands desperately gather lace and silk, so focused on their task that Sanji completely misses someone else coming over to help out.
“Sanji-kun?” Sanji flinches; Nami’s voice is far closer than she expected. Still, she seems to have gathered up all the incriminating pieces, so she’s in the clear.
“Yes, my dear?” She croons, looking up with a goofy smile. The smile quickly drops when she clocks the stern look on Nami’s face and worse — the garment in her hands.
“Are you seriously stealing my panties?”
Sanji pales, staring wide eyed at the pants in Nami’s hands. They’re a pretty lilac pair that came with a matching bralet which is thankfully hidden in the basket. It’s one of her favourite sets, really; the pale purple suits her skin well and the lacy design gives the illusion of curves at her hips. They’re a particularly expensive pair of panties, too — the sort that Nami would definitely buy for herself.
Sanji has two choices here — either pretend to be more of a pervert than usual, crossing a boundary and potentially ruining a friendship, or admit these panties are hers and come out. Basically, she’s fucked.
“Uhh,” Sanji stalls, glancing about with wide eyes as she tries to think. Fuck, her mind can’t focus with so many judging eyes on her. Everyone’s outside for once and they’re all staring.
Her eyes dart from the disappointed looks of Robin and Franky by the sun loungers, to the anger radiating from Zoro and Chopper where they were napping by the galley door, to the shock from the trio playing so close by. Nami’s close, too close, and her glare is freezing cold. Sanji feels like scum, she has to tell the truth, but—
“Nami-san, those are—” the words taste like poison on her tongue, and she starts choking on the things she can’t say. “I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?” Nami says indignantly, scowling. There’s a dark look in her eyes, the sort of look she gets whilst talking about her time as a slave to the Arlong pirates. Sanji starts to feel lower than dirt. “Sorry? Sanji, there are lines you can’t cross. How could you betray my trust like this?”
“I’m sorry,” Sanji whimpers again, because what else can she say? Her hands tangle in her hair, tugging at the blonde strands desperately. Even the sharp pain at the roots can’t alleviate how low she feels.
“This is serious, Sanji! What were you even stealing them for anyway? Have you… You haven’t been getting off to my laundry, have you?” Nami sounds disgusted and hurt, and Sanji can’t fucking take it.
“I’m sorry!” She yells, scrambling back. The disappointment weighs heavy on her shoulders as she tries to put distance between her and her attackers. She curls in on herself a safe distance away, barely hearing a soft thud over the rushing of blood in her ears. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”
She can’t do it. It’s like there’s a dark void pressing heavy on her shoulders and chest, constricting her and pressing her into nothing. She wants to melt into the floorboards, to rip her own hair out, to scratch and claw at herself until there’s nothing left. It’s all too much, too much, too mu—
“Sanji.”
There’s a soft hand on her shoulder, gentle but firm. Sanji realises she’s been muttering apologies under her breath and wills herself to stop speaking.
“Sanji-san, can you hear me?”
A soft voice. Familiar. Motherly. Robin. Sanji nods sharply, but can’t bring herself to speak now that she's stopped. She feels like if she opens her mouth again she’ll be sick, she’ll throw up her guts along with her lies.
“I need you to take a deep breath with me, Sanji. Can you do that for me? Just follow my breathing.”
A deep, steady breath in. A long, slow exhale. A slender finger traces the breath pattern onto her arm, and Sanji tries to follow. Her own breath comes out shaky and dissolves into panicked little inhales every so often, but eventually she gets her traitorous lungs to obey her. Before too long, they’re breathing in tandem, and Sanji’s body starts to calm down on the shakes as her brain fog begins to lift.
“Are you coming back to us, Sanji-san?” Robin’s voice is clearer now, no longer filtered through a thick layer of panic. Sanji takes another deep breath, then nods.
“I’ll be alright, yes,” she says, uncurling her fingers from her hair. Did she just have a mini panic attack in front of her whole crew? How embarrassing.
They won’t be crew for long, she thinks darkly, frowning. No way Luffy’s letting a pervert stay as nakama. Doubt he’ll let me stay no matter what, now.
“Can you look up from your arms? Look at me please, Sanji-san.”
She obeys, slowly lifting her head. It’s not just Robin beside her, but Franky and Luffy crowding in close too. Both of them look more concerned than angry, at least.
“I’m sorry, Robin-chan. Everyone. I— I can explain, I promise, I just—”
“It’s okay. I think I understand,” Luffy says softly, in one of his rare serious moods. Sanji’s heart swoops to the pits of her stomach in dread; this is it, it’s all over now, Luffy is going to say— “Sanji’s trans, right?”
She sort of knew he must know, but hearing it still hurts. She flinches minutely and nods, tears welling up in her eyes all over again.
“Yeah, I’m a woman,” she says quietly, mentally cataloging all her possessions. She idly wonders if she’ll be allowed to keep the fancy set of knives, or if she’ll have to leave them for her replacement. “I’m sorry, as soon as we get to the next port I can lea—”
“Shishishi, me too!” Luffy says, grinning brightly. Sanji’s brain promptly stops dead in its tracks.
“I’m sorry, what?”
“Yeah, I’m nonbee— notbi— I don’t have a gender!” He (they?) says casually, as if Sanji’s entire world isn’t collapsing in on itself. “That stuff never made sense to me, anyway.”
“I wasn’t aware of that, Captain,” Robin says calmly, as if this isn’t groundbreaking. Seriously, why does everyone except Sanji seem so chill about this? “May I ask what your pronouns are?”
“I just use whatever!” Luffy starts picking his nose, inspecting a bogie casually. Same gross captain as ever, it seems.
“Fascinating,” Robin says, smiling. She turns that serene smile to Sanji, making her heart flutter nervously. “Would you like to use a different name, dear?”
Sanji blinks up at her incredulously. “You’re okay with this? With me?”
Robin smiles that secretive smile that she usually wears whilst talking about dead things. “It would be rather hypocritical of me if I wasn't, wouldn't it?”
Before Sanji can make heads or tails of that statement, Zoro lets out a derisive snort. Sanji's heart stops dead again as her best friend rival gets to his feet and stretches. “I think you’re all makin’ a big deal out of nothin’. Everyone’s known I’m trans for years and no one’s made a fuss about of it.”
Sanji stares at him. The whole crew barring Luffy, it seems, stare at him.
“I’m sorry,” Nami says, sounding more frustrated than sorry, “since fucking when have you been out as trans?”
“This whole time,” he says, looking at Nami like she’s the crazy one. “S’not like I hide it. I have my tits out all the time.”
“I knew!” Luffy calls cheerfully, and Zoro smirks smugly as if that proves anything. Sanji feels a migraine coming on.
“You think I would’ve been so stressed about hiding this if I knew, dumbass marimo?” She growls, scowling. Zoro sneers, evidently about to say something so stupid that Sanji can’t help but kick his ass, but Nami cuts him off with a frustrated noise.
“You mean to tell me there have been not one, not two, but four other trans people on board and I had no idea?” Sanji thinks she can actually see a vein begin to pop on Nami’s forehead. The redhead suddenly sends Robin a betrayed look. “Wait, I’ve been hiding my E shots from you when we could have been sharing? We could have saved so much money!”
“I’m afraid I prefer to take it as pills, Nami-san,” Robin says calmly as if she’s completely unsurprised by Nami coming out as trans too. If she wasn’t so delighted by her sweet angels, Sanji thinks she’d be starting to get irritated right now.
“Wait, hold on a minute,” Sanji calls, holding up a hand. She releases a breath and scans the crew. “Just how many of us are trans?”
Immediately, six hands raise. Sanji does a headcount, then double checks it, then stares at the two new hands. Well, she says hands — one of the new hands is just bones, and the other is made of metal.
She thinks she might be having a brain aneurysm right now.
“Seriously?”
“Yeah, I’m super trans too, sis!” Franky yells proudly, striking a pose. He’s far too close for this, his bulge right in Sanji’s face. “I built my new body from the ground up to be super manl— OW!”
Sanji, rightfully, just kicked him in the nuts. No way is she dealing with his artificial dick that close to her face whilst she’s this close to another mental breakdown. “Get your goddamn balls out of my face, Franky. Brook, explain.”
“Fifty years is a long time to think about things,” Brook says, tilting his skull to one side. Wait, shit, are they saying they’re a man or a woman? Or neither? Being a fucking skeleton, it’s impossible to tell. “Though my transition was rather easy, considering I’m just bones, yohoho!”
“I think I’m having a mental break,” Sanji mutters, resting her head in her hands.
Why is everyone being so damn casual about this? Is Sanji seriously the only one who went through two years of hell changing her entire worldview until she realised? Is she really the only one who took painstaking measures to hide who she is out of fear of her nakama’s reactions?
But seriously, seven out of nine crewmates are like her and she had no idea? This can’t get any weirder.
“Um—” Usopp squeaks out, and Sanji levels him with a glare. He’s raising a hand nervously, unsure in a way he doesn’t often get anymore. “I’m sort of trans too?”
“You too?” Nami says, sounding just as shocked as Sanji. At least she’s just as confused by everything as Sanji is. What an angel, Sanji thinks, being on the exact same wavelength as her.
“I mean, I wasn’t really out out even to myself before I joined the crew, but you all assumed I was a guy so I just rolled with it,” he says, scratching the back of his neck. “I got more confident in it after those two years apart, though.”
“Oh my god this is crazy,” Nami says, laughing to herself. “Are we seriously all trans except Chopper?”
“I mean. I’m a reindeer,” Chopper says, frowning. “We don’t exactly have a concept of gender. Biologically I’m male, but I’m not attached to that. It’s all a bit confusing, but I’ve been trying to read up on it! You can come to me about anything related to transitioning, medical or not!”
Sanji doesn’t want to think he’s adorable. He sort of is anyway.
“I don’t know why everyone’s making such a big deal out of this!” Luffy says casually, still picking his nose. Robin ruffles their hair fondly.
“I think the crew is just a little shocked to find out so many of us are trans. I must admit I was a little taken aback by some of the revelations, too. This many of us on one crew is rather… unusual, to say the least.”
“Yow, we’re all a bunch of super weirdos, right babe?” Franky cries, one hand still cradling his balls. Sanji distantly wonders why he even set them up to feel pain if he built them from scratch.
“Indeed,” Robin agrees with a small smile. Usopp stares at them like they’ve lost the plot and honestly? Sanji’s inclined to feel the same.
“This is insane though! This changes everything, right?”
“Why?” Luffy asks, tilting his head to one side like a puppy. “We’re still the same people, right?”
“I’m with Luffy. Who gives a shit anyway?” Zoro pipes up, and Sanji sends him a scowl.
“Don’t be so blunt, idiot Marimo!” She yells, getting to her feet. Zoro snarls, sizing Sanji up as if she’s the unreasonable one here.
“Hah? You wanna go, shit cook?”
At least nothing has changed on that front, Sanji muses as she ignites her leg and leaps forward to launch a flying kick at Zoro. He blocks the attack with two swords and a grimace and Sanji has to hold back a grin. She’s attacking Zoro for it, so she can’t openly agree, but maybe the two idiots are right.
Nothing has changed at all, has it?
[ ++ ]
Sanji’s staring. She knows she’s staring, but she can’t look away. She has nothing else to distract herself with — she’s finished changing into a more comfortably feminine suit, all the food is prepared or in the oven, and all the washing up is done. Besides, Zoro’s sitting right there. Shirtless.
She analyses his chest carefully, eyes roaming over huge pecs. She can’t see any scars barring the obvious one bisecting his entire chest. She’s heard of different surgeries, ones that surround the nipple rather than cut underneath the breast tissue. The thing is, Sanji can’t see any there either.
“You tryna set me on fire with yer brain or somethin’?” Zoro grunts out, one eyebrow raised. Sanji doesn’t take the tone to heart, continuing her search.
“I was just looking for your top scars,” she explains unthinkingly, squinting at his chest. There’s nothing on the side either, not that she knows if that sort of surgery is even possible.
Zoro just snorts, crossing his arms under his pecs. “You’re not gonna find any, idiot. I never got any surgeries.”
“You… haven’t?”
Zoro shrugs. “Couldn’t afford ’em.”
Like a woman possessed, Sanji steps closer. She reaches out a hand and pokes Zoro’s left pec. It’s softer and bouncier than expected. “So these are…?”
“Yeah, they’re my tits. I just worked out enough for ’em to look like pecs so no one questioned it.”
Blood immediately gushes from Sanji’s nose. The last thing she hears before blacking out is Zoro calling for Chopper.