4/7

The day after that Luffy showed up inside the kitchen just as the restaurant had opened for breakfast with a basket full of colorful eggs. Once he saw them Sanji immediately was itching to make use of an interesting, new ingredient that he hadn't ever used before. Luffy's ham-fisted haggling however had him nearly angry enough to boil. ("I'll let you use these only if you say you'll agree to join my crew!" "I'll kick your teeth in, you shitty straw hat!")

That afternoon there was such a big influx of guests that Zeff deployed the fins of the Baratie to get some extra seating.

The waitstaff at this point were all now getting more than used to the ever lingering Straw Hat Pirates who, once they had learned about the chef and sous chef specials (as well as their cheap pricing) from Ann, had no shame in only ordering those items for their mealtimes. They had been sitting at a table on one of the fins but didn't pay attention to any of the ships coming and going and so missed it when a slightly larger than normal pirate ship approached the Baratie from the opposite fin.

A group disembarked from the ship and entered through the front of the Baratie and a few minutes later they were led outside to a table just beside where the Straw Hat Crew were sitting (minus Luffy, who had just disappeared after eating his lunch in order to go to the kitchen so he could pester Sanji into joining them again).

The leader of the group of other pirates froze in place when his eyes caught sight of Zoro. Then, without any warning, he marched himself over to their table and stood in Zoro's line of sight while glaring viciously at him. He waited for Zoro to acknowledge his presence in some way.

He stood there in silence for a full two minutes (with Ann, Nami, and Medaka following Zoro's unspoken lead in ignoring him) until he finally broke the silence. "So here you sit, not knowing that luck has turned on you this day, Roronoa Zoro. I've been keeping my eyes out for you. That story about you being arrested in the paper a few weeks ago was obviously a hoax."

Now that he had spoken, the Straw Hat crew finally turned as one to look at him. The man had long black hair tied up in a ponytail and a stitched scar across his face, extending from the right forehead to the left cheek, not bisecting his eyes at all. He had a red marking shaped like a four-point star on the right side of his face, and a smaller light blue tear-like design on the left under his eye. He was wearing a black vest with many unnecessary yellow belts and bands over purple clothes that had diamond designs stitched onto them and a very fluffy yellow feathered collar. He honestly looked like an angry jester or a clown of some kind.

"Are you on Captain Buggy's crew?" Medaka had to ask - he certainly looked clownish enough for it to be a possibility.

He glared scornfully down at Medaka and said, "Don't be stupid, little girl. I'm Pin Joker of the mighty Trump Family Pirates. The overlords of Clockwork Island."

"I don't care about that. What do you want?" Zoro gruffly asked.

Pin Joker grinned a wicked smile and said, "I have been keeping my eyes out for you for a rematch. Our meeting here must have been decided by plate itself!"

"...you mean 'fate' itself, right?" Medaka asked.

The emotions that crossed Pin Joker's face included frustration, seething anger, and embarrassment. "There's something wrong with your ears. You must not be fearing me correctly."

"Did you mean to say 'hearing' you correctly? Because I think it's the words you're speaking, not our ears." Nami dryly informed him.

"Shut up you wench! I'm here for a rematch - not to be talked down to some trussed up slag of a woman."

Now that was just rude. Nami almost wanted to teach him a lesson herself but he wanted a fight with Zoro, not with her so she just glared at him.

"What do you mean by a rematch? I've never had a fight with you before." Zoro insisted, completely baffled by this entire encounter. He thought someone who seemed so weird would have been more memorable, but nothing came to mind for him.

Pin Joker was visibly insulted and extremely angry over the fact that Zoro had forgotten him. "It was one year ago Roronoa Zoro when we fought and I received this scar from you that has ruined my wife!"

"I hope he meant to say that you ruined his life," Nami said with a sly smile. "Otherwise it would mean that you beat him AND seduced his wife away."

A furious blush flushed across Zoro's cheeks as he refuted. "I wouldn't do something like THAT, and I don't bother remembering weaklings."

"Weakling!" Pin Joker shouted in outrage.

This had never happened to Zoro before so he tried to explain, "Well if you had been a strong swordsman back then I might've tried to kill you and cashed you in for your bounty to get a bite to eat. I have no desire to kill someone weak on purpose."

"You're so awesome!" Medaka said admiringly, ignoring the clown to smile up at Zoro. "I'm glad it's you teaching me how to use a sword."

It was truly impressive reflexes that had Zoro expertly parrying the flurry of vicious slashes that Pin Joker launched in Medaka's direction while the rest of the group quickly managed to duck away out of the line of fire.

"I'll kill you Roronoa Zoro and that brat appreciate of yours even if it's the last sing I do!" Pin Joker snarled.

"Ann! Keep an eye on Medaka while I deal with this idiot." Zoro snarled as he parried away another slew of slashing and stabbing from the other fighter.

"Right!" Ann acknowledged and pulled Medaka away and began to run in the direction Nami had already vanished off to.

"But Captain! What about lunch?" One of Pin Joker's underlings questioned and fell gurgling to the deck a moment later, his throat slashed from an attack from Pin Joker.

"Shut up! What are you idiots standing around uselessly for!? Join the attack and rally the crew together! I'm killing Zoro even if I have to sink this entire stupid slip to drown him!"

The outdoor fin became a chaotic madhouse with the civilian guests making a loud ruckus by shouting for help to come for them as Pin Joker's men began to swarm out of the flagship to obey their captain's orders.

There was a loud explosion that originated from Pin Joker's ship and both Zoro and the Baratie behind him were pierced by hundreds of needles ranging from five centimeters long to a full meter. (The other guests were mostly shielded by several of the waiters and a few of the cooks, with only a few getting wounded. Ann was back to back with Medaka as they fought to get through the crowded makeshift battlefield while Nani ducked around a table to shield herself from the onslaught.) Nothing important on Zoro had been hit but they felt irritatingly similar to wasp stings.

"Ahahaha! These weevils have been coated in a poison that painfully paralyzes all the muscles in the body!"

"Those are needles, not weevils." Zoro corrected and went back on the offensive against Pin Joker, noticing with irritation that his movements and reflexes really were much less than they were supposed to be. He would still beat this guy, but it was an annoying sensation to feel so numb.

Sanji was in the middle of wrangling the annoying (rubbery, as he had found out the first afternoon of said pirate's continued invasions) Luffy out of the kitchen again when he heard what sounded like hundreds of bullets hitting wood and felt the entire Baratie tilt to one side sharply and then drop back to its original position in the wake of an explosion originating very close by.

"What the hell was that?" Sanji shouted as he nearly instantly steadied himself back to his feet, unlike a few of the other cooks around him.

Luffy, miraculous as it seemed, actually left the kitchen on his own for once. He looked down from the second level kitchen balcony to the bottom level extended fin, where a fight was currently taking place.

Sanji followed right behind him, scowling in fury over the apparent attack on the Baratie. He looked down to the crowded deck below and when he noticed a flash of green near the edge of the fin he asked, "Why is that swordsman of yours fighting a clown down there?"

"Is he fighting Bug!" Luffy nearly shouted as he looked over to where Zoro was fighting with an expression of irritation on his face. When he spotted the clown Zoro was actually fighting though he was just confused. "Is that Bug? Did he change his outfit?"

Sanji was no longer paying attention to Luffy though. He had finally seen what the outside of the Baratie looked like and was already ready to throw down from the damage that he could see. Hundreds and maybe even a thousand long metal needles were scattered all over the outside walls with enough force that they were all the way in up to less than a few centimeters from their ends. It was going to take hours of work for all the waiters to pull them all out.

Sanji noted that while Patty and Carne were being especially rough with manhandling much of the group without much difficulty, some of the other cooks seemed to be struggling to put down some of the mooks that should have been simple for them to thrash around. His eye caught that some of the cooks had needles sticking out of them but others (like Patty and Carne) weren't hit by any.

"Ann! Look out!" Sanji's ears picked up on Medaka's voice in the crowd as distinctly as if he were finding a strawberry in a basket of grapes. When he turned his attention away from the cooks and over to her he spotted Ann standing in front of Medaka with her arms spread wide like a shield to block a volley of needles coming in their direction originating from a spring-loaded launcher carried by one of the attacking pirates.

Sanji moved without thinking about it and within the blink of an eye, he intercepted the attack - allowing the needles to pierce his own body instead of allowing a single one of them to even touch Ann. They stung a bit similarly to wasp or jellyfish stings but he stubbornly decided it wasn't too painful at all once he spotted the astonished expression on Ann's face.

"What are you doing!?" Ann shouted in alarm though as he scooped both her and Medaka up into his arms and rushed the both of them over to where Nami was barricaded against any minor attacks near some overturned tables.

"Pardon me while I get the two of you somewhere safer. You're still recovering from malnutrition and the little rosebud won't be able to protect both of you from getting hurt." Sanji gently explained and easily evaded the kick Medaka aimed at his shin.

"I'm the Red Terror of the Straw Hat pirates - not some flower, you twisty sunflower head!" Medaka scolded in irritation over the nickname he had given her.

"Please stay here Mademoiselles and I will take care of those annoying needle cannons." Within the blink of an eye, he was already kicking the slimeball little-girl-attacking pirate in the gut so hard he could practically feel his spine through the sole of his shoe. Another minute later had him on their ship kicking their needle cannon that had done the damage to the Baratie overboard along with any foolish moron dumb enough to try to attack him.

With the riffraff support successfully halted Sanji stood by to watch the fight between the clown and the green swordsman. If the green swordsman were to be cut down Sanji would step up to finish the job. The two fighters seemed to be evenly matched - at least that's what it looked like superficially. Sanji could see so many needles sticking out from the swordsman that he looked like a cactus.

Sanji grit his teeth together as he watched the swordsman Zoro move seemingly effortlessly. The needles that had pierced his own skin had seemed to burn when they entered his body and his movements now felt like they were only half as responsive as they should have been thanks to the partially paralyzed sensation his muscles seemed to have. Even his breathing was a little more laborious from the poison the needles had been coated in.

Despite all this and being stung by more than ten times as many needles though, Zoro didn't seem to be faltering in his fight at all. Something in the air seemed to shift and Sanji sensed the fight would soon be over.

"Roronoa Zoro, I actually admire you." Pin Joker said with a grim serious expression on his face. "You can still stand after taking all of those poisoned needles during my attack."

He smiled wickedly and then said, "But I can see clearly that merely standing right now is taking up all of your energy."

With a chain clutched in one hand and a sword in his other Zoro lifted up Wado Ichimonji and stuck the hilt in his mouth. "Doesn't matter. I'll tell you upfront. I'll never lose to you because losing to someone at your level is absolutely unacceptable."

He crouched like a tiger prepared to attack his prey and wove like it was effortless as he avoided getting hurt by any of Pin Joker's rapid jabs and thrusts of his rapier. All across the extended fins of the Baratie, they wove up until they were both near the edge, with Zoro's back to the water. A cold sweat had started to grow on Zoro's forehead but it wasn't from the exertion of the fight.

Pin Joker smirked and said, "You seem to be in a great deal of pain. Looks like your moves are getting crusty."

"You mean 'rusty'?" Zoro asked with what was certainly a mocking tone of voice.

Furiously Pin Joker snarled at Zoro and as he began to attack more and more furiously and frantically he shouted, "You wretched fool! Needle Stab!"

Zoro gave a slight turn as he spun his chain and two swords, creating a whirlwind gust strong enough to blow Pin Joker back further away. Pin Joker landed on his two feet and braced against the floor with a hand on the ground and held his sword behind his back with the other to prepare for another attack. "You cur! You should be paralyzed completely by the poison by now. How are you still fighting!?"

"Unfortunately for you, I can't fall here," Zoro said as his aura of determination nearly manifested into reality around him. "Because I'm still searching for one man who lies at the end of the voyage I've chosen. Dying before I even meet him is out of the question!"

Zoro lunged forward and made his attack, slashing quicker than anyone could see and simultaneously shouted his attack, "Rice Ball!"

There was a pained scream from Pin Joker, who clutched the bloody stump of his severed forearm as his hand and sword clattered to the ground.

"You've ruined me! What have you done, you beast? Why didn't you just kill me!" Pin Joker shouted from where he was hunched over in great pain on the ground.

"I told you before. I have no desire to kill someone weak on purpose." Zoro said as he cleaned his blades and sheathed them away. He turned and walked away from his opponent, ignoring the shouts of gratitude from the Baratie guests in favor of returning to Dawn to patch himself up. The needles were no longer itchy, he just couldn't feel them.

After that the rough and tumble chefs of the Baratie were more than enough to make sure that Pin Joker and his crew got sent back on their ship. They were also informed that their pirate emblem was now on a premium service list where they would have to pay five times the normal price if they ever wanted to visit again with a final strike pending that would get them banned if they caused trouble again in the future.

The Baratie didn't come out of the fight without some losses following the fight, though. The fight against Pin Joker and his crew seemed to be the breaking point for the harried and stressed out waiters of the Baratie who quit en masse as soon as Pin Joker's ship vanished from sight.

Pin Joker couldn't say how long he and his crew sailed for once they left the Baratie - it could have been an hour, a day, a week, or even a year. All he knew was that he couldn't go back to Clockwork Island now - not ever. Not like this. What use was a swordsman to his siblings if he couldn't even use a sword anymore?

He barely even noticed when his ship was hailed and boarded by another crew of pirates. "What happened to you, my dear friend?"

Pin Joker looked up to see the man he had initially sailed out from Clockwork Island to visit one last time. He shoved his wounded arm behind his back to hide it but his friend caught his arm at the elbow before he could hide it away completely. Pin Joker tried not to flinch when the other looked at the severed end of his arm.

"Who did this to you?"

"It doesn't matter." Pin Joker insisted. "I paled to win my most important fight."

"You didn't fail to win. If you're the one who walked away from it he must be worse off, right?" His friend said but frowned in concern when Pin Joker flinched violently away from him.

"He didn't even remember who I was and even when I used my brother's most potent poison he was still able to lame me. I'll hate Roronoa Zoro for the rest of my life for what he's done to me, Chandra!"

Captain Chandra Galley's eyes sparked with anger and with a grim expression on his face he said, "Tell me where I can find him, my dear friend Pin."

"Weren't you going to head farther up north to the arctic now that Don Krieg left his old territory for the Grand Line?"

"Not anymore. Now...tell me more about this Roronoa Zoro and those who fought alongside him..."

Zoro ended up getting temporarily banned by the Head Chef Zeff from the Baratie for the rest of the day due to him 'provoking a fight with another customer'. He didn't really mind being banned from ordering food or going into the restaurant since Ann and Medaka didn't mind making up a pot of the tried and true fish and egg stew in Dawn's kitchen for dinner anyway. He spent the rest of the afternoon and evening napping and getting up to eat twice while he slept and sweated off the stiffness of his limbs and body.

Even though two of his crew were now technically in recovery from their fights, Luffy seemed more determined than ever to have Sanji on the crew. He even went as far as to follow Sanji around outside to try to help him and the other cooks patch up the holes that now littered the outside of the Baratie. He ended up making bigger holes instead of patching any, but it was the thought that counted.

Ann also showed up and asked permission from Zeff (instead of risking her nerves around Sanji) to carve a protective spell onto the hull of the Baratie. He granted it and she carved a spell in with one of Balloon's feathers. The resulting energy drain nearly had her faint and she had to deal with Sanji insisting on feeding her some rich, energy filling soup before he gently escorted her off to Dawn to rest up.

The day ended with Sanji booting Luffy back to Dawn and shouting at him to leave already, but deep inside himself, Sanji was really beginning to think Luffy really wasn't going to ever leave him alone.

Later that night found Sanji smoking up on the top level of the Baratie again - this time he was facing the green ship of the straw hat crew and staring down at it with a contemplative expression.

He could see dimly shining golden light coming from the windows of both of the occupied cabins. All seemed quiet on the little ship and he tried to ignore the way the lines and canvas of the sails shifted more than what the slight night breeze could be blamed for. A living ship was certainly one of the more unusual sights to him since he started working at the Baratie, but not the most unusual thing he'd ever seen in his life. Snail ships were much weirder.

Zeff joined him once again, gruff and grumbling about like a bear as always, and lit up his own cigar. This time Sanji started talking without any verbal prompting from Zeff.

"You usually don't tolerate customers getting that far into a brawl like earlier. Any reason why you let those two idiot bastards maim each other instead of stepping in to stop it from getting out of line like you usually do?"

Zeff hummed noncommittally before he said, "For the same reason why I didn't step in when you jumped into the fight to target that needle shooting battalion, you stupid eggplant."

"I only did that to stop them from trying to hurt those ladies again." Sanji groused defensively.

"You think that grass headed swordsman thinks any different? Those girls that you fancy so much are real pirates - even the extra miniature one. A crew like that one is set apart by looking out for each other like that." Zeff puffed at his cigar for a moment's pause and continued. "That captain of yours is annoying but I approve - you have as crappy a taste for people as you do with food, you shitty little eggplant." ("Just go chase your dream, you stubborn brat. I'm sure these people will stick with you the entire time.")

"That isn't my captain and I'm not a pirate. I'll stay here until you die you old bastard!" Sanji said with a stubborn tilt to his chin. ("Don't make me leave, geezer. I still owe you my life.")

"You want to stay here so much? Fine. Then as of now, I'm demoting you from sous chef down to chore boy, you stupid little eggplant! You'll repair the damage to the Baratie without any help from the other cooks and you'll do manual labor here for the rest of your life after that." Zeff growled down at Sanji as he kicked his feet out from under him. ("I'll make your life extremely miserable if you stay here, you stubborn idiot.")