back of house.
Pairing: OPLA!Vinsmoke Sanji x Fem!Reader
Word Count: 1,113 words
Warnings: Mild swearing
If it weren’t for his principles regarding women, you’re fairly certain Sanji would’ve throttled and strung you up to dry by now.
“I … I’m impressed, sweetheart,” he says with a bright smile, though under the swinging lights of the kitchen it seems more out of pain than pleasure. “You managed to burn water.”
Your cheeks flame as you peer into the blackened pot with him, all traces of the water you’d been tasked with boiling completely gone. Vanished. You have no idea how or why.
“I’m sorry, Sanji.”
“No need to apologize. Everybody makes mistakes –”
“Sanji!” you hear Zeff before you see him round the corner. “Why the hell do I smell something burning in my kitchen?”
“None of your business, old man,” Sanji snaps immediately, murmuring a quiet excuse me, dear to you before taking the pot by the handle and heading to the sink. He twists the faucet open and running water roars like thunder in your ears as he thrusts the pot underneath. “I have it under control.”
“Under control, eh?" Zeff says. He suddenly turns his squinted gaze upon you, and you shrivel. “This your doing, missy?”
“I –”
“Leave her alone,” Sanji interrupts. “I didn’t give clear enough instructions. It was my fault.”
“Oh, there’s no doubt about that.” Eyeing your guilty and defeated figure next to the stove, Zeff shakes his head with a sigh and points you to the door. “[Y/n], go out and wait tables for the rest of your shift.”
Immediately, you make a move to remove your apron. “Oka –”
Sanji makes a noise of dissent and turns the faucet off. “Wait tables? She can still chop the vegetables and help me plate.”
“You’ll do that yourself. Front of house needs the extra person, anyway.”
“I’m her mentor.”
“And I’m the damn boss.”
The rest of the staff roll their eyes and carry on while the two men argue in the middle of the kitchen. You swallow and take your apron off, balling it up in your hands. This isn’t the first time they’ve butted heads over your incompetence, and watching them now cuts at your last shred of dignity.
Clearing your throat, you grimace when Sanji’s head whips around to look at you.
“Zeff’s right,” you tell him. “Dinner rush is coming up soon and I’ll just be in the way, anyway.”
Zeff grunts with satisfaction.
The expression on Sanji’s face reminds you of a kicked puppy. “But …” he begins to protest.
“Oi, you heard what she said. Get back to work! We have customers waiting!”
Sanji blusters about before heading back to his station, casting you one final, forlorn look as he does so. You imagine that your own face looks just the same when you turn to leave.
—
You take orders and serve customers for the remainder of the day, as promised, and help with cleanup after closing time. And then, long after the sun’s dipped below the horizon, Sanji joins you on the upper deck with a steaming bowl of seafood fried rice.
“For the madam,” he says with a smile, offering you the bowl.
You accept it silently and take a bite as he sits down next to you. It’s perfect like it always is – savory and warm on your tongue, happy and gentle in your stomach. You’ve never known a home quite like Sanji’s cooking.
His eyes remain fixed on you as you eat all of the rice, scraping the bowl for every last grain and setting it down beside you once you’re finished.
“Thank you.”
“It’s nothing. I figured it would cheer you up.”
“It did.”
It did, and yet, your lips tremble and your throat closes up. You clench your hands into fists in your lap.
Sanji’s hand immediately presses your shoulder as you sniffle. “Are you alright?” he questions worriedly.
(His attentiveness strikes you like a hot iron sometimes, even now.)
“Why haven’t you given up on me yet?” you whisper.
His brow furrows. As if it’s obvious, he answers, “You want to be a cook. A lady’s wish is my command.” Sanji pauses. “And I can’t call myself the greatest cook in the East Blue if I can’t teach others to be great cooks as well.”
“I think you’d be the greatest regardless.”
You glance at him through watery eyes in time to see his face flush a deep red. He looks away hastily, chuckling with feigned modesty. “I’m flattered that you think so highly of me.”
Your shoulders lift in a shrug as you look back down at your hands. You reach up to blot away your tears.
How could you not think the world of Sanji? Or the world of anyone at the Baratie, for that matter? When you were kicked off the merchant ship you’d stowed away on two years ago, you had been sure that you’d be banned from setting foot in such a fine-looking restaurant. Years of scorn and slammed doors had not given you the chance to think otherwise.
But Sanji spotted you on the docks, called you madam like you really were one, cooked you a meal in the kitchen and talked to you. Zeff gave you a job and a bed of your own. The staff gave you a family.
“We’ll try again tomorrow. I’ll figure out something that’ll make everything click for you, and you’ll be a proper cook in no time.” Sanji leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees, and winks up at you. “I promise.”
As always, your heart skips a beat.
“Okay.”
Maybe, you realize suddenly, you don’t necessarily want to be a cook so much as you want to love the way Sanji does.
“That’s my girl.” Standing up, Sanji takes your empty bowl in one hand and offers the other for you to take. “Now, shall I walk the madam to her room, or does she wish to stay out on the deck for a while?”
You allow yourself to grin, considering. “The madam wishes to stay out here and …” you hesitate but then decide to soldier on, “and possibly chat with a dear friend for a few more minutes?”
Your pulse pounds in your ears.
Sanji’s eyes widen a bit. Then he blinks, and then he smiles, drawing his hand back and quickly sitting down next to you once more.
“A lady’s wish is my command,” he says.
He takes out a cigarette, making a quip about Patty while he lights it, and your combined laughter rings out across the Baratie. It’s perfect like it always is – savory and warm on your tongue, happy and gentle in your stomach.
Indeed, this is home.
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Andrew Minyard mic’d up if aftg took place today and the Foxes did social media promo
Andrew absolutely refuses to be mic’d up for a long time
When he finally agrees to do it it’s during a game against the Jackals
Everyone is sure it’ll be a bust and they won’t get much of Andrew actually talking
But to everyone’s surprise, Andrew turns his inner monologue outwards and doesn’t shut up
He commentates the game from his perspective
‘And there’s the son of Exy Kevin Day running the ball up- and oh yeah no he’s down for the count’ *huffs a laugh through his nose*
‘The other fuckers have the ball now, if my brother dearest let’s them get it to my goal I’ll kill him’
And when the opposing teams striker trips Aaron up and gets past to Andrews goal he shuts them out of course
‘He’s dead. Find a new backliner coach’
When he gets bored of the game and the backliners are keeping the ball away from his goal he starts to sing
He does a full rendition of “Life is a Highway” because Neil and him watched Cars on the bus ride to the game
And he gets into it
He makes the guitar noises with his mouth and everything
He even sings it in the best low, country voice he can do
He interrupts himself in the middle of the song suddenly, feeling the need to give his full synopsis and review of Cars
‘If I was the stupid fucking car and I fell out of my sentient truck/trailers ass I would keep driving in the same fucking direction. Simple’
‘Josten would do the same thing as Lightning McQueen. He would fuck up an entire town, he’s already done it once actually, when he came here.’
‘Stupid junkie, I hate him’ he adds but there’s a fondness in his voice
‘How do the cars reproduce? Are there humans in this universe that build cars and then make them sentient? Do the cars bang?’
Halfway through his rant one of the strikers gets past Matt and Aaron and he doesn’t even stop talking when he smacks the ball halfway across the court
When the other teams strikers start breaking through the backliners more frequently Andrew doesn’t even seem to care
He just swats every attempted goal away, squawking a quite ‘mine’ like the seagulls from Finding Nemo after hitting each one
Mine *smacks* mine *swats* mine *swish*
He keeps his goal almost completely shut down the entire game, spare a few times when the other team can get the ball past him because he’s not paying attention
‘I wonder what coach is buying us for dinner after this. I hope it's good since we’re’ *his goal lights up red* ‘Oops, anyhow it better be good, I’m working my ass off out here,’
‘What if we all started moving in slow motion. Josten and Day would look stupid running up the court like that,’ *a ball flies past his helmet* ‘If we were in slowmo I would’ve stopped that’
He plays the entire game (Renee's out with an injury) and he shuffles through doing all this the entire game
He sings verses of whatever song pops into his head
He reviews the movies he’s watched recently
He commentates the game in his dry manner, listing off every stat he knows about the other team and then explains why they still suck
He makes fun of his Foxes and the other team
He talks about his random hypotheticals
All while keeping the goal almost perfectly defended against the other teams strikers
When the game ends and the Foxes are loaded back up on the bus they listen back to the recording of Andrews mic
And they’re shocked that he doesn’t stop talking once the entire game
They listen to his entire recording on the ride back to campus
All of the Foxes are laughing the entire time
Even Neil is smiling (even though he’s used to this version of Andrew that is weird and likes to ramble)
When they post his mic’d up highlights to their social media it goes viral
It’s their most viewed and liked mic’d up video
Their fans are begging for more of Andrew mic’d up but he refuses to do it again
He got the enjoyment out of doing it once and doesn’t feel a need to do it again
The foxes do start to pay a little more attention to what Andrew’s saying while in goal (and all the time)
Aaron Mic’d up
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Space Lady
When Bruce gets lost in time he sees a common sight between each jump.
A woman in a dress of nebulae, stars studded around her neck, hair a soft silver.
He asks who she is, and she does nothing.
He asks who she is, and she smiles mischievously.
He asks what she's doing. "Watching" is all he gets.
He asks what the purpose of this is, and she looks at him like he's stupid.
He tries to move around, but seems to loop back around. She looks amused at his attempts.
After Vanishing Point, during his last jump, he asks her if she knew what was going to happen.
"Aren't you the world's greatest detective? I'm sure if you put your mind to it, you'll figure it out. Now off you go."
---
It's been 2 years since Damian had been dropped into the family. Even after, Bruce felt like he was being watched sometimes.
He gets a visitor at the door, and standing there is the Lady.
"How have you been, Bruce? Doing well I hope. Be a dear and let me in, would you?"
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Prompt 214
“I did an oopsie.”
Clockwork paused in his work, gaze turning from his work towards his ghostling (it didn’t matter if he was an adult, he’d always be his ghostling) who was smiling nervously, avoiding his eyes.
“Oh?” He kept his tone light, even as he worked on untangling a time knot. Honestly at least Danny was immune to any effect of time, even if he couldn’t look into his timelines in exchange. It came with being the other half of Infinity.
“Yeeah… you know that corner of the multiverse you told me not to go to because you’re working on some time problems? I might have stumbled into one of the worlds in the corner…”
He stopped his machinations, fully turning towards Danny- Space, his Core whispered and quivered in utter delight at having an Equal in power- with a raised eyebrow, leaning on his staff and silently telling him to explain.
Danny poked his fingers together, giving a nervous laugh. “So uh, I was just exploring right? Well me and Ellie, you know how she gets when she can’t wander, and um… I er, we might have messed with some things in the creation of it… I didn’t know it was part of that universe, I swear! It was so far at the fringes and halfway into the Zone and I couldn’t just let a universe die before it began and-”
Oh- Oh! His ghostling (and his grand-ghostlings it sounded like) had claimed his first universe! He could put off these time knots, this was a grand milestone for any Ancient, nevermind such a primordial force as one of theirs.
And this is how a DC world came into being with humans evolving with more avian traits. Like wings. And claws. Look, Dan thought it’d be funny if they gave baby humanity wings and Ellie started rambling about how much farther they could travel if they had them and Danny thought it could be cool. Oh well, time to keep an eye on their itty baby world now…
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