Chapter Text
It had been a long day. No scratch that: it had been a long and tiring week. The office where Mihawk worked had been given important projects to complete, and of course, the government had given them a short time to finalize the project. The advantage of having several projects to do was that each member of the office had to work alone on a project to finish it on time, so Mihawk could work quickly and efficiently as he wanted. The downside was therefore obviously that the workload was much greater than when Mihawk worked with his colleagues.
So even though Mihawk was working alone, he had seen his colleagues more than his family. The workload had been too heavy and too urgent for Mihawk to work from home as he was used to.
Even though he felt guilty for leaving his children alone all week, Mihawk knew that Shanks could take care of the three terrors on his own in his absence. He had complete confidence in his partner and knew that the children would be fed, bathed, and done with homework when he came home late at night. Sometimes the kids were already asleep when he came home and Shanks had either managed to stay awake or was asleep waiting for him on the couch. Sure, Shanks' methods were unconventional, or at least he wasn't doing things the way Mihawk usually did, but the results were there and that was the most important thing. Where Mihawk was quiet, earnest, and careful, Shanks was loud, goofy, and messy, but oddly that dynamic was ideal for their family. Opposites attract or something like that.
Besides, Mihawk knew Beckman was around to make sure Shanks didn't accidentally set the house on fire while he was away. There was a fire extinguisher in the kitchen for a good reason. His husband had the ability to went from one task to another without even finishing his first task.
But Mihawk hadn't gotten a call from school this week telling him his kids turned wild kids in a week, and Shanks' daily text messages helped reassure him. Although, if he was honest, seeing Ace, Sabo and Luffy with shaving foam on their faces didn't necessarily help him relax. Okay, the picture was funny because the kids had beards and mustaches made out of shaving foam, but the idea of Shanks getting close to their sons' faces with a razor made him shiver. His husband had steady hands, Mihawk knew from experience, but their children, especially Luffy, couldn't stay still for more than two seconds.
Strangely, the house was still standing when Mihawk came home. They had moved from their apartment in the center of the Shin Sekai metropolis to a suburban area of East Blue when they adopted Ace. The suburban house was welcoming with white picket fences, a patio in front of the house and a large garden behind the house. But the house had become too small since he and Shanks had officially adopted Sabo and Mihawk wanted to move out. Preferably, in a secluded place where they would be really quiet, that is to say far from the prying eyes of their neighbors, where the three boys would have a room each, with a swimming pool, a workshop for Shanks and an office for Mihawk.
What was even stranger was that the house was quiet. Which was weird since their house was never quiet, quite the opposite in fact. And what struck Mihawk, even more, was that the house was as clean as in the decorating magazines. Their house was already in this clean state when Mihawk was there to clean except that he had been away for almost a week. Mihawk wasn't sure because of fatigue but he was pretty sure the house wasn't as clean this morning when he left.
In fact, the house was so clean it smelled of disinfectant like a hospital hallway.
Mihawk wanted to investigate the house a bit to find out what exactly was going on when he heard a noise. Mihawk didn't recognize the noise right away because it was unusual to hear that kind of noise in this house. As if little claws were scratching the floor while running.
Mihawk just had time to put his hat on the coat rack and put down his briefcase when something small and with four legs jumped on him. He looked down to see that the brown-eyed, red-furred, wagging-tailed thing was resting its two front paws on his knees. Mihawk frowned as he heard the little dog bark happily at him.
"Shanks…" Mihawk grumbled tiredly as he walked into the living room. The puppy ran after him, jumping happily everywhere.
He didn't need to shout since Shanks was hiding in the kitchen from where he got out timidly and worriedly, "hey, Hawky, you got home early!"
Mihawk didn't need to see them to hear their three boys in the kitchen, they were trying to be quiet and whisper but Luffy was the opposite of quiet. Nevertheless, for now, Mihawk focused his attention on his husband who had a forced smile on his face, "no, don't even try."
"Try what ?" Shanks replied pretending to pout, "I'm just being nice to my husband who I've missed so badly after not seeing him in a week!"
"No, you want to coax me into saying yes."
"It works ?" Shanks asked excitedly, he had the same smile as a five-year-old on a Christmas morning and even his eyes were shining with joy.
"No," Mihawk replied, rubbing his eyes. He was too tired to handle this kind of situation. All he wanted was to see his children, take a bath and sleep. Instead, he had to explain to his adult husband why they couldn't keep the puppy who was running between their legs. "We had talked about it, Shanks, and you agreed with me: no dogs in this house."
"Well, you want to move out so we'll soon have a new house."
"Don't play with words. I don't want a dog."
"Why ?" Shanks asked moaning like a child, "He's already here and the kids love him. We should keep him."
The thing was, Mihawk didn't want to play the mean parent by denying her kids and husband a pet. Personally, Mihawk had no problem with dogs, although he preferred cats. The problem was that Shanks, Ace, Sabo, and Luffy were easily distracted, and forgot even faster. The four had been begging him for a pet for months and Mihawk had always refused. He already knew what was going to happen: Ace, Sabo, and Luffy were going to promise him that they would take care of the dog, and Shanks was even going to assure him that he would have nothing to do, and in the end, it would be Mihawk who should feed, bathe and walk the animal. The poor beast was going to starve before the end of the month without Mihawk to take care of it and he had neither the time nor the inclination to take care of a dog.
"Come on! We found the poor boy abandoned in the park last night, he just needed food, a bath, and a lot of love to feel better. It would be cruel to be the second family to abandon him in such a short time."
"I'm not telling you to throw it on the street but to drop it off at an association or sell it for good care."
"Who knows if the association or his next family will take really good care of him!" Shanks counter-argued with a pout on his lips, "The house is big enough and we have the money to take care of him. I could take him with me to my work during the day if that's what bothers you. Ace, Sabo, and Luffy can take turns taking care of him. It's you who want to give them more autonomy and responsibility, right? Ace is 10 years old, he's old enough."
Mihawk huffed in exasperation rubbing his temples, he felt like he was negotiating with a stubborn child, "Shanks, you promised so don't force me to be the bad guy here because you broke your promise."
"Alright, alright, you're right," Shanks finally admitted, speaking seriously for the first time. In fact, he had lost his smile and was looking at his partner with concern: Mihawk looked dead tired with dark circles under his eyes and his beautiful golden irises were rimmed in red. Even his hair wasn't as neat as usual. He approached her husband and hugged him to let him lean against him. "I'm sorry," he whispered lovingly kissing Mihawk's forehead, the eldest didn't even try to pull away which was a sign of how exhausted he was, "are you okay?"
Mihawk nodded slowly, he still dared not admit how he felt even though they had been married for far too long. He closed his eyes after resting his forehead on Shanks's shoulder.
"I'll post an ad online, okay? The little guy needs a family that really wants him."
Shanks didn't want to lie to his husband so he would definitely put an ad up but he hoped Mihawk would get attached to the little guy before a buyer was interested. He smiled as he felt Mihawk nod again.
The chaos started right after.
Luffy came out of his hiding place screaming betrayal and crying hot tears. The little boy fell to the living room floor and grabbed the puppy in his arms as if to protect him from his parents. "You promised you'd convince him! You said we could keep him! That's not fair! We're big enough!"
And obviously, with the infernal trio, Sabo and Ace also came out of the kitchen complaining profusely. The three boys were united in the face of this "injustice" since all three wanted to keep the dog.
"We can't sell Tony!"
"Chopper is part of the family!"
Mihawk lifted his head to look at their sons in confusion. Tony? Chopper? He didn't believe it was possible but Mihawk could actually feel his headache getting worse.
"We decided to name the dog Tony Tony Chopper," Shanks informed him. The younger one always had an arm behind Mihawk's back as his love language was one of touch, Mihawk had been caught off guard early in their relationship but was used to being touched by now. "Ace wanted to call him Chopper, Sabo chose Tony and Luffy copied Sabo. They couldn't agree so I chose for them."
Luffy spoke before Mihawk could utter a sarcastic answer -Tony Tony Chopper, seriously? -: "we named him so he's our dog!"
"Luffy… that's not how it works. Naming something doesn't make you its owner."
"But Chopper loves us!"
Mihawk looked over at Shanks while raising an eyebrow and his husband gave him a guilty little smile.
"Come on dad! Give us a chance!" Sabo begged him with puppy eyes.
"Don't be so old fashioned, old man!" added Ace who had started calling them "old men" a few weeks ago. "How do you want us to prove to you that we can take care of Chopper if you don't give us a chance?"
"He's got a point," Shanks whispered in his ear.
Very quickly, Mihawk understood that he was outnumbered since they were four against him. Yes, he had counted the puppy in the equation. The golden retriever, the three children and Shanks looked at him with utterly adorable puppy eyes. And not only was Mihawk tired and therefore didn't have the strength to fight against the four of them, but he didn't really want to become the villain of the family because of a dog.
"Very well," he finally whispered, knowing already that he was going to regret his decision. He was already starting to regret it when Luffy hugged Chopper, Ace and Sabo congratulated each other and Shanks kissed him excitedly on the cheek. "But there are going to be rules, understood?"
The four stopped fooling around and looked at him seriously, at this point they were ready to do whatever Mihawk wanted to keep Chopper home. "The three of you are on probation for a month: if you prove to me that you can take care of Chopper during this trial period then we will keep him permanently. Otherwise, Chopper will have to move to another home. You will make a schedule to take turns taking care of him without fighting, and you will have to feed him, give him water, wash him, and walk him. And Chopper is not allowed to go upstairs or to sleep with you."
Ace, Sabo, and Luffy nodded vigorously with huge smiles on their faces. They were already talking about setting up the schedule when Mihawk turned to Shanks.
"I'm not kidding, Red Hair. No dogs upstairs or in the beds unless you want to clean the whole house up."
"Tu es trop sérieux, Hawky, tout va bien se passer."
Mihawk pointed his finger at Shanks's face, "You're the one who's going to have to supervise them so if they don't take care of Chopper know that you'll be the one to suffer the consequences."
Shanks shivered comically at the threat, "I'll do whatever you want. You'll see having a dog will do us all good! Besides, I can ask Beck to bring us everything we need to take care of Tony tonight. He is used to having dogs and can help us out."
"I hope so because I'm warning you: I won't deal with Chopper. If the boys forget then it will be up to you to deal with it."
"Deal done," Shanks was still grinning like the idiot and big kid that he was when he kissed Mihawk on the mouth to seal their deal.
"Yuck! Stop kissing in front of us, you perverts!"
Shanks stuck his tongue out at Ace, their oldest son was embarrassed every time his parents kissed nowadays, which often happened because of the redhead, and then he kissed his husband even harder.
Very quickly, the three boys went out into the garden with Chopper to give them some privacy.