Title: Luffy the Tentacle Monster
Author: Roseveare
Rating: PG-13
Length: 7,600 words
Summary: Luffy takes a bite out of the wrong monster and is incapacitated by a poison that damages his rubber body. The crew must find a cure.
Notes: AKA. "the melted Luffy fic". It's going back a while now, but I believe this fic exists entirely because I was dared to create gen plotfic from the prompt "That's not a tentacle, that's Luffy!" on the op_fanforall anonmeme.
This was supposed to be angstier, but I really didn't feel like writing angsty-immobile-Luffy and solved this with CRACK. One of the weirder things I've written, partly because it keeps cannibalising bits from other fandoms, and mostly Xanth.

1 SANJI

"Augh! There's a thing on deck again! Boys? Boys... shit. Robiiiin!"

Sanji had, as a matter of fact, shot instantly to alert at Nami's not-quite-terror-filled cry. Ever since they'd left that winter island, there had been no shortage of strange sea creatures about, from colonies of giant spider-crabs to the previous day's enormous many-tentacled squid-thing that had actually managed to eat Franky but got indigestion - either from the metal or the cola - and spat him back out again. That shitty thing hadn't even been good eating itself, either.

It had grown almost routine, the 9AM monster; to be followed by the 2PM, the 8PM and whatever snuck aboard under cover of the night. The reason, though, that Sanji was not by Nami's side in seconds was the traumatic memory of two days ago, giant spider crabs being a lot too much like spiders for his liking.

Thankfully, it wasn't those again. Instead, Nami was poking a broom handle at a writhing grey-white tentacle that had stretched across the grass in a wide, untidy arc and finally wound itself several times around the Thousand Sunny's mast. Zoro and Franky were already there, much to Sanji's irritation. It attested to the regularity of the incidents now that Robin, Chopper and Usopp hadn't shifted from their reading and experiments on the grass.

The tentacle pounded the deck hyperactively when the end of the broom left it, and there seemed to be even more of the thing. Extra loops and coils appeared with the movement, spilling over their feet. Zoro pulled a face and leaped backwards, which was entertaining, though not yet adequate return for Sanji's reaction to the spider-crabs.

"Where's Luffy?" Nami asked, long-sufferingly. He was usually the first to come running to see a new exciting creature on deck.

Sanji shrugged. "He had a bellyache last night. Probably from trying to eat that thing yesterday."

"Let's not wait for him." Nami grabbed Franky by the arm. "We'll follow it back and make sure it's not snarled up in anything important on the ship this time, before we start hacking at it and it starts thrashing and breaking things." She glared at Zoro. "The rest of you keep a watch on it here."

Left alone, Zoro and Sanji glared at each other, mostly for the sake of long tradition.

Sanji nudged at the tentacle with his foot. The sweating, oozing flesh gave easily, and when he released it, it thumped the deck again, almost insistently, releasing more flowing coils.

"That's... strange," he muttered.

"It's nasty." Zoro's teeth were clenched in disgust. "It looks like dead flesh. Slimy dead flesh"

"Didn't think you were that squeamish, marimo." Sanji followed the tentacle along to the mast, the opposite direction from Nami and Franky. It seemed to have tied itself in something of a knot there. He cautiously touched it with a fingertip, and when it didn't burn or sting, dug around in its folds for the end. It felt damp and clammy, but fleshy and not slimy, and there was warmth in the coils underneath. It strained into his touch and a bundle of new coils landed in his arms.

"This is really strange."

"Put it down." Zoro shuddered. "You'll catch something, and it's gross just watching." He drew a sword - notably not his favourite one - took a hesitant swing and then held back at the last moment. He looked dubiously at the sword, then drew it back to try again with more gusto.

"What do you think you're doing?!" Sanji demanded. "Nami-swan said leave it alone until they came back! It's not like it's attacking."

"Don't care. It's on the ship, and it shouldn't be. Franky can fix anything that breaks again."

Sanji would have said more, but at that point he uncovered something among the coils around the mast that made him shout with surprise, and then horror - and then panic, at Zoro.

The same time, Franky was pounding back across the grass looking freaked, his hair spiked even more crazily than usual, and howling fit to rupture something, "No, Zoro-bro! Stop! That's not a tentacle, that's Luffy!"

Zoro yelped and dropped his sword.

The hand Sanji had uncovered clutched too-thin, stretching fingers over his. The flesh seemed to ooze, flowing and melting around his like it couldn't keep its own shape. Sanji caught it between both his hands and pressed it back. It seemed if he tried carefully he could mold it back into shape, but press too hard and it just flattened out and distorted all the more.

He blanched, stared at Franky, and felt the hand squirm like it was trying to clasp hold for comfort. "Luffy?"

2 FRANKY

It took a few hours to gather in the limbs strewn like tentacles about the ship, returning them to Luffy's sleeping cabin and squeezing them back into an approximation of their usual shape. After that, the captain didn't look like a tentacle monster any more, but he didn't quite look like he should've either. And while Franky felt it almost went without saying, things weren't looking super at all.

Luffy's body couldn't seem to hold its own shape. Even lying still, everything seemed flattened or stretched just with the force of its own weight. When he did try to move, the further force acting upon the liquid-rubber flesh only distorted his form. Trying desperately to get up on deck for help had resulted in the tentacle monster they'd seen.

Usopp sat at one side of the bed, his chin sunk into his hand, looking deep in thought. Nami sat at the other side, holding Luffy's hand, and Luffy had already made her twice promise not to cry in the painful whisper that was left of his voice. Whatever this was, it was affecting his insides as much as his outsides.

"It must have been that squid thing," Sanji was saying, hands stuffed in pockets and two cigarettes pressed between his lips.

Franky shook his head. "Yeah, bro, but I was covered in that thing's digestive stuff and I must've swallowed a ton of its gunk and slime, and I'm fine today." He tried to look behind him, suddenly caught by the concern that his flesh parts were melting.

"They're fine," Nico Robin said, with strained humour. "But Franky, you're not a devil fruit user. What if this would only affect one of us? And what if it's linked just to Luffy's physiology? None of our bodies have properties anything like his." One of her wandering hands appeared on the head board and smoothed the captain's hair from his face gently. Luffy tried to tip his head to look up at it and his neck bulged outwards. Nami pushed it back in with shaking fingers.

"It must be a chemical that was in the squid's body that's doing this," Chopper said. He was filling a syringe. "It's the simplest solution, and it should be the first place we look!"

"See, shitty captain, I told you not to try and eat that thing." Sanji sighed. "I didn't like the smell of it."

"There's no point in arguing about that now," Zoro grunted. "We need to decide what to do about this."

"It's... not getting any worse," Luffy whispered haltingly. "Not at all since I woke up like this. An'... it feels really funny... but it doesn't really hurt. Maybe we... don't need to do anything. If we can just wait... for it to wear off. It's got t' wear off?" His eyes widened, almost imploringly, fixed on Chopper.

Franky supposed he should have been more surprised that he hadn't seen any sign of fear before now than to finally see it. If his body had turned into a quivering mess, then he'd... well, he'd be a quivering mess, of that he was sure.

"He can't stay like this!" Nami half-sobbed. Luffy gave her an accusing look and she bit her lip.

"No, he can't," Chopper agreed. "Because trying to eat might kill him. Even Luffy might not survive if his insides get stretched to the same degree we saw his limbs stretched earlier."

Luffy gave a squeak more desperate than any other reaction he'd let slip so far, and little bro' Usopp grabbed up his free hand. "Don't worry! I, the Great Captain Usopp! will find a solution... somehow..."

"Yeeee-" said Luffy, with a weak grin.

"Or drink," added Chopper worriedly. "He already hasn't eaten in about 24 hours, and since he was sick last night he probably threw up all his fluids. I'm going to try an intravenous injection to get some nutrients into him, at least." He did. When there was no visibly adverse reaction, he breathed a sigh of relief. "We can keep him alive for a while like this, but we need to find a solution as quickly as possible. This condition seems stable at the moment, but we don't know if things will deteriorate. We need to know what substance was in that creature's body that's affected him this way, and we need to find some way to counter it."

"But we threw that squid thing over the side," Zoro said. "There's nothing left."

"I didn't burn my clothes yet," Franky offered, now glad that he'd thrown them in a pile in the corner of his quarters and forgotten about them till that morning, when the stench had knocked him backwards on approach and he'd conveniently 'forgotten' about them again. "Maybe there's something left on them you can use."

Chopper nodded briskly and Robin picked up the gesture, inclining her head at Franky. "Please, bring them to us in the lab. Usopp-"

"I..." Strangely, little bro' looked reluctant to help. He was pretty familiar with chemicals too, so Franky was puzzled why he'd hold back. "There's another idea I want to try first. I don't know how long Luffy's going to be in this state, but that doesn't mean he has to be stuck like this! Robin, I'll need to use some of your, uh, stuff, can I go in your room?"

"I... yes, of course, longnose-kun..." She faltered, and there were a lot of very confused stares exchanged as Usopp charged out of the room.

Franky took comfort that he wasn't the only one.

3 USOPP

Luffy giggled in his new, quiet way, and reached out with a hand that stayed recognisably a hand to touch Usopp's shoulder. His grin spread a little wider than it ought, and he reached up to push it back into place, now that he could do that. "I feel like that Spandam guy."

"Um," Usopp said. He gave a choked-off cry as Nami hug-tackled him and called him a genius.

"Usopp's a genius!" Luffy yelled, or his best attempt at it. He tottered on his feet in his current best effort at a dance. At least he was on his feet.

The Usopp! Rubber Compression Suit, which they had dialled down to mostly calling 'the suit thing', much to Usopp's chagrin, because Franky kept thinking up other names for it, had involved cutting up a lot of Robin's more interesting clothes, though she'd accepted this with grace. The resulting leather body-suit, shaped and reinforced with shark bones from the kitchen, kept Luffy's almost liquid-state contained as effectively as pouring him into a bucket. It encased him from his feet to his chin, with long gloves over his hands and arms, and the overlapping pieces held together with a complicated assortment of fastenings gave him the ability to move without fear he would flow out of shape again.

He still had to be careful, and Usopp had numerous fears on that score because careful wasn't something Luffy did very well. Usopp had tried to impress on him that his body's practical strength at the moment was limited to the strength of the suit, and though he'd made it as tough as possible, it was still nowhere close to what Luffy was used to. Exceed it and rip it, and he'd be a tentacle monster again.

"Luffy's back!" Nami hug-tackled Luffy as well, but carefully, then backed off awkwardly. "Get some clothes on."

"I am wearing..." He looked down at himself. Well, Usopp supposed that on the one hand, Luffy was nothing but wearing clothes, with only his still grey-tinged face visible, but on the other it wasn't the most dignified or appropriate looking of attire. Especially considering some of the items of Robin's wardrobe it had been made from. "But it's too warm," Luffy whined nasally. Usopp cringed. Fortunately, Luffy grumblingly pulled on his usual shorts and shirt over it. Which still looked odd, but marginally less brain-damaging.

They headed up to the deck. Luffy's steps were lurching and awkward, but at least it was movement. Usopp couldn't imagine not being able to move - and worse, being Luffy, as energetic as he was, and not being able to move. Almost a day of that had been enough. Usopp had no doubts it had been more important to work on this first, before joining Chopper and Robin's study of the squid-gunk.

"Hey!" Luffy burst onto the deck at a shambling run. Zoro, Sanji and Franky looked up from their squid-thing-fishing efforts and grins broke out all around. "Whaddya know, the Usopp! Full Body Bondage Suit works," Franky said. "Nice going, kid."

"Please don't call it that," Usopp mumbled.

Zoro and Sanji picked up Luffy as he stagged, and balanced him on their shoulders. Zoro winced. "You're sloshing inside this thing."

"I know!" Luffy sang out breathlessly. "But I can move! This is better. Now we have to find another of those squid things and kick its ass so that Chopper and Robin can fix me properly."

"Little bro'." Franky tapped Usopp's shoulder, who looked up and blinked with surprise at seeing the shipwright's expression so dark. "You are gonna repair my favourite parts of Nico Robin's wardrobe when this business is all over and done with, understand?"

"Um..." Usopp stuttered helplessly. "Women's clothes... I'm not... b-but I-I'm sure she'll be able to get more!"

"Leave Usopp alone." Luffy's voice cut the air. Though he was left gasping little coughs by the sharpness and the volume, when he recovered enough to raise his eyes, they were serious. "Usopp... Thanks."

Usopp felt oddly hollow. He knew that it must be absolutely terrifying to be in Luffy's situation. Their captain hadn't shown it much, but that was Luffy for you. It hadn't even been in that look just then, but it had been everything behind it.

He mumbled quick excuses, and fled to help Chopper and Robin find a way to fix this.

4 CHOPPER

Chopper turned from the test tubes and jumped down from the chair he'd been standing on, frustrated. The samples from Franky's ruined clothes weren't enough, or had degraded too much or been contaminated by whatever nastiness was accumulating on his messy cabin floor. He didn't know how to help Luffy with his medicine beyond keeping him alive. It all made him feel so useless.

Zoro, Sanji, Franky, and now Luffy in the prosthetic skin device Usopp had made and Franky seemed to find so unaccountably amusing, had been monster-fishing all afternoon, but hadn't yet caught anything that resembled the squid-thing, though they'd restocked the aquarium with all sorts of other strange things that were now busily eating each other to the point of a near-empty tank again.

Robin, leaning over a microscope with opened reference books scattered on the desk about her, sighed, sat back and rubbed her eyes. "We have to keep trying," she said tiredly. "We don't have anything else that we can do."

Usopp, Chopper discovered, had fallen asleep on the floor. But then he'd already exhausted himself today, creating that suit in record time.

With a sigh of his own, Chopper sat down and pounded his forehead with his hooves. "I have to think of something! I'm the only doctor here! It's up to me to help Luffy. After all he's done, I can't let such a terrible thing happen... there has to be some way I can help!"

He froze, as the idea struck. "Of course there is!" He should have thought of it before, but he'd been stuck on a medical track. Dr Hiruluk had always believed that most cures already existed in nature. "Robin, I need to go down to Zoro and Sanji! Please keep looking while I'm gone!" Switching to Heavy Point, he snatched Usopp up under an arm and pelted out of the door at top speed.

That was how he came to be, ten minutes later, dangling from the end of Zoro's fishing line and telling himself over and over that it was all for his captain and that as a real pirate, he really ought to stop shuddering quite so much, damn it! He was also desperately hoping that whatever next came along would allow him to start talking before it tried to eat him.

"Is Chopper all right down there?" asked Luffy's breathy voice from above, and he looked up to see Luffy staring down at him, with Sanji's arms clasped tightly around his captain's waist as he leaned out over the side.

"I'm all right, Luffy!" Chopper squeaked. "Don't fall!" They didn't need to find out what sea water would do to him in his current condition.

"Give Luffy to me," said Franky's voice from out of sight, "And you two can watch reindeer-bro."

Chopper decided it was time for decisive action. He squeezed all his determination and courage to the fore and yelled, in animal language, "Sea monsters, I want to talk! Please!"

A couple of fish bobbed up, and then ducked back down and skittered away hurriedly, their scales shimmering under the surface. Then, something like a cross between a flat yellow octopus and a sea anemone raised its frond-edged head above water and regarded him with its one, huge eye. "What's a tanuki doing this far out at sea?"

"I'm a reindeer!" Chopper yelled, and then frantically tried to backtrack, because the creature wasn't trying to eat him and he did need its help. "I'm looking for information, please." He unfolded and held up Usopp's drawing of the squid-thing, although the paper was a bit damp now from sea spray. "This squid poisoned my friend, and I need to find out if any of the sea creatures around here know of a cure!"

"That bastard?" It was interesting seeing an octopus-anemone monster try to pull a face. It asked, with hopeful tones, "Your crew killed him?"

"Yes!"

Mr Octopus-Anemone became instantly helpful. Chopper discerned that there were other monsters, mostly part-eel or part-jellyfish types, with an odd reaction to the squid's secretions. Theirs didn't sound as bad as Luffy's, but he was sure it must be related. And though it took a long time to wear off on its own - much too long - there was a known cure. On a nearby island too small to register on a log pose, another monster's flesh was known to counteract the effect. Of course, it didn't take too kindly to anyone coming by to take a chomp out of its hide. This was cure such that many creatures simply chose to suffer and wait it out.

Since they had Zoro, Sanji, Franky, Robin, and of course Captain Usopp! on board, Chopper knew they needn't fear having to fight, even with Luffy incapacitated.

"Please, could you guide us to the island?" he asked eagerly.

5 NAMI

A sea creature's 'not far' was not the same as a human's - or human-reindeer's - estimation. They had to follow Chopper's new friend through the night, with the Thousand Sunny's flashlights illuminating the seas ahead to keep track of their guide - though that was also probably responsible for the fact they'd twice had to fight off other creatures trying to eat him.

Nami supposed that taking a bite out of the wrong monster and having to bite another monster to fix it was fair logic for the Grand Line. Her brain was also struggling to take in the other information Chopper had learned; the reason for their recent encounters was because many monsters from the Florian Triangle had fled to this part of the seas rather than stay in that place.

"But I thought we were already in the Florian Triangle," she'd objected.

Chopper had shrugged and hazarded that the monsters didn't know that, but it didn't fill Nami with any delight about what might still lie ahead once they resumed their course deeper into the Triangle.

Nami, with Chopper and Franky, had elected to stay awake through the night. Nami to navigate, Chopper to communicate with their guide, and Franky to work the ship's defences against anything else that came along looking for a fight. The others were sent below to sleep - unwillingly, in most cases - on the understanding they'd be the ones to take on the really big monster in the morning. It spoke volumes about the sanity levels of their crew that this had pacified them neatly. Usopp had immediately tried to make a case for his indispensable help during the night, but was overruled.

Although Luffy had also been told to go below, it wasn't long before he crept back above deck and shuffled to join Nami by the Sunny's figurehead - by, not on, and it registered sharply with Nami that he didn't even try to climb to his usual spot.

"I don't think I can sleep like this," Luffy told her, wide eyes hollow and his body sitting unusually straight in the reinforced suit.

Nami shifted closer to him, one eye still on the seas and Chopper's monster friend, and slipped one arm over his shoulders and one around his waist, tugging him gently in against her. She remembered how they'd all taken care of her when she was sick that time, before they even had a doctor on board. "You'll be all right, Luffy," she said. "Everyone's doing all they can. This time it's our turn to take care of you."

"I know." She heard him laugh, and she knew it was a real laugh even if it was a strained hiss. Luffy didn't fake. "I know everything will be just fine, because all of you are here."

"But in the meantime, it's frustrating," Nami filled in. She felt his head tuck into the crook of her neck, hair tickling, the straps around the base of his skull and his jaw scraping a little against her bare skin, but she didn't mind. "It's frustrating for me too, Luffy," she told him. "Because when you're back to normal, I'm going to hit you for being so stupid to try and eat that squid-thing when Sanji said not to, and it's very frustrating to have to wait."

He laughed at her and she carefully touched his hair, aware that his uncovered face and head would squash out of shape if she applied too much pressure. She remembered the mountain he'd fought his way up with her on his back - though she hadn't been conscious for that part, she'd been awestruck by the height he'd scaled afterwards. She remembered the way he'd fought Arlong for her - usually so strong, and he'd become even stronger since then. She'd definitely make sure he recovered, even if everyone else got knocked out and she had to take the clima-tact down and fight that silly monster herself after a sleepless night.

"It's no fun at all," Luffy said, and his eyes were shut, which either meant he was drifting to sleep after all or he didn't want her to see them. "Not being able to move properly. Not being able to eat."

Nami hugged his middle, because that was safe, even if Zoro was right and he did slosh. It didn't hurt him and the suit would pull him right back into shape. "No fun at all," she agreed. "And your complexion looks like dead fish, so it puts me off my dinner, too. We need to get you back to normal so we can all eat properly again." She smiled. "You didn't hear Sanji talking about the feast he's going to cook up when you're better!"

"Sanji said that?"

Actually, no, but he would have if he'd thought of it, and he definitely would once Nami told him he was going to. "Absolutely."

There was a brief, relatively happy silence, then; "Chopper said I was like a jellyfish."

Nami blinked at the change in subject, and realised she'd been neglecting the navigation as Chopper and Franky's yells cut the air. She carefully released Luffy and propped him up against the base of the figurehead. His eyes were still closed, and his body felt even limper, and she thought he was growing close to sleep after all, which could only be a good thing.

When she'd made the adjustments and returned, he was snoring softly. She pulled him back into a cuddle against her anyway. Right now, Luffy deserved all the comfort any of them could give him.

6 ROBIN

Robin stood with Zoro, Sanji and a quivering Usopp, their four chosen fighters armed and ready, and all currently engaged in a worried contemplation of their captain, who stood with his back stiff and his hands fisted inside leather. Though it still gave her slight pause to think about those being her own gloves that he was wearing. Not to mention all the other things of hers that he was, in essence, also wearing.

"We don't know how strong this creature is! All I need is to take a bite out of it, and I'll be strong again, and then I'll be able to help! I'm going!" Luffy announced, in... well, in a whisper, but it was definitely the most determined whisper that Robin had ever heard.

"That's insane!" Sanji barked. "You can barely even stand up, and if that suit gets ripped, all you'll be is a mess. Again. You can't fight in this state." He turned to Robin, his fiece expression softening into misty-eyed adoration and his voice turning plaintively sing-song, "Tell him, Robin-chwan!"

"I... don't know," she said cautiously. She... was concerned, but she could not be afraid for him. The captain had eradicated all her capacity to doubt him at Enies Lobby. He would survive. "Luffy, I'm not sure if it's as simple as that." She looked to Chopper for assistance.

He scratched his head with a hoof. "Mr Octopus-Anemone said that the creature was really strong, although... it's hard to be exact when you're talking to something with the brain of an octopus. But, Luffy, we can't be sure at all that it will work instantly, or even-" Chopper broke off, and swallowed. They had all tried to avoid any mention of the possibility that a cure for sea creatures wouldn't cure a rubber human.

"It might not work," Luffy said, calm and low as though everyone else hadn't just flinched. "But then... we'll know. And we'll think of something else to try."

"It's an amphibian. He's a devil fruit user in pretty shabby shape," said Franky. "It hauls him into the water with it, and he's dead."

"That's always true," Luffy countered stubbornly. "That's true for Robin, as well."

"Robin is fully able to look after herself right now," Nami corrected, and the captain was notably silent.

Robin shrugged helplessly. "It could be the easiest way. We wouldn't have to stay to finish the creature off, if Luffy has already ingested the substance from it that he needs. If he stays aboard the ship, it would be much more difficult to take pieces of monster to Luffy without having to kill the monster first. If he can stay to the back until he sees his chance..."

"He never stays to the back," Zoro said. "But if he wants to come, he's the captain." He spoke it like it was final, and it was all any of them needed to know.

There was a pause in which silence reined, save for the faint rattling of Usopp's knees as they knocked together.

"Then let's go," said Sanji finally.

"Hang on - " Franky flashed a faintly dangerous grin and scooted off below deck. They all exchanged puzzled stares amid an atmosphere made heavier by Luffy's near-tangible impatience. When Franky reappeared, it was with his huge arms wrapped around a device of an alarmingly familiar kind of shape, that he pressed into Luffy's grasp and guided the captain's hands over, wrapping leather-clad fingers around the mechanisms. "There you go, bro'. A little something I've been toying with, 'case of emergencies. Now you're armed for action with a Franky SU-PER Special!"

"Oh, dear." Robin raised a hand to her lips, unable to hold back a pained gasp. "That's not wise, Franky."

"Why not? It's a one hundred percent Franky original cola powered-"

"It's-" Luffy, Usopp and Chopper's eyes sparked "-a beam gun!"

"SU-PER!" Franky punched the air and slapped a few bottles into the bulge in the gun's middle. He dragged the barrel to point upwards into the sky. "Try it out."

A few moments and a rain of dead seabirds later, all eyes except Luffy's and Franky's were glazed with terror.

"You gave Luffy a beam gun!" Usopp shrieked, for once voicing all of their distress. "You idiot! We're all gonna die!"

"Huh?" The lower half of the captain's face was dripping with the force of his grin and his distorted lips made his voice indistinct, but he was oblivious to it. "What're you talking about? Guys, this is sooo cool. And now I can really help fight!" He bounced on his feet, as awkward as that was in the leather suit, jostling his hands upon the gun.

A blast took out a portion of the Sunny's sail, and Franky's glee had evaporated even before he was buried beneath the rain of punches and kicks from the other three members of the monster-hunting expedition.

"Are you completely insane?!"

"Haven't you learned anything yet?!"

"You DO want us dead!"

Luffy, continuing to look as perplexed as only he was such an expert in looking, shifted the Franky-gun uncertainly in his clumsy, gloved hands. Robin shouted a desperate warning.

Fortunately, everyone hit the deck in time.

7 ZORO

For all the previous talk of keeping back, nobody was very happy having Luffy bring up the rear carrying Franky's new cola gun. In fact, everyone made a distinct effort not to be walking in front of him, until they were walking side-by-side in a perfect line as they approached the cluster of rocks and the gaping dark hole of a cave that was the only feature on the island. Their party still included Usopp despite his argument that since Luffy was going there was really no need for him to be there as well.

Whatever. They'd take this rotten creature on, get Luffy back to normal, and have done with this business. Zoro liked the direct approach.

He didn't know how fierce this monster was supposed to be, but deemed it significant that the frilly yellow octopus had just jabbed a tentacle towards the island then shot off back for the open seas as soon as they came in sight. He was a bit surprised it hadn't come out to investigate the new arrivals already, but maybe it didn't have much of a sense of hearing or smell. Assuming it was in the cave and not about to spring a surprise emergence from the water behind them, anyway. He had a feeling that would turn out to be one of those theories that made the others freak annoyingly if he mentioned it, so he hadn't.

"Oi, Luffy," he muttered as they approached the mouth of the cave.

"Zoro?" The harsh whisper that wasn't anything to do with their current need for quiet made him wince. He really couldn't abide Luffy being like this. It was disgusting to look at, revolting to think about, and he smelled weird - weirder than normal. And maybe when they got him back to normal, Zoro could stop feeling so lousy for almost hacking his captain up as a tentacle monster.

"That moronic gun fires too near me, I cut that suit and leave you in a puddle while the rest of us finish off this thing."

Okay, so there were limits to his feelings of guilt.

It was Luffy. He'd be fine.

Luffy's shoulders slumped, as much as they were able in the reinforced leather. "All right, Zoro." Sanji caught Zoro's eyes in one of those very rare exchanged glances of agreement. Luffy made a visible extra effort to keep his fingers still on the array of buttons, but remained horribly unnerving to watch when his steps were so lurching that he looked liable to fall and blast a hole in whatever was closest at any moment. There wasn't much that instill fear into Roronoa Zoro, but Luffy with firepower was on the list. Franky was a damn lunatic.

Disproving his earlier theory, a sound arose from the cave that was distinctly like, somewhere within, something extremely large had belched. A fishbone skidded out of the cave mouth and tumbled over the rocks. As it slowed to a halt and rolled closer, it became clear it was the bone of a whale or giant shark, four or five times the height of a man where it lay on its side.

"Bye-" Usopp spun on his heel, but was snagged by a dozen of Robin's arms growing out from the rocks.

"Not yet, longnose-kun."

"Well, we have to get its attention somehow." Zoro grimaced. "Luffy, you want to test fire that thing that way?"

"Okay!" Luffy swung the device towards the cave. Even those not in its line of fire along the way ducked.

"Wait-" Sanji paused, then reconsidered, shrugged, and amended, "Eh, go ahead. If the shitty thing gets buried under there, we'll just dig out enough to hack a slice off. It'll be easier."

Usually Zoro might've preferred to fight even a giant monster on fair terms, but with Luffy in this state, getting the job finished easily was just fine with him. Besides, now they were up close to the cave mouth, it was a hell of a lot bigger than it had looked from the ship. And so, potentially, whatever lived in it. He eyed the bone they'd left behind them.

The blast didn't collapse the cave, but judging from the roar that emerged, it had riled up the thing inside. Luffy gave a gleeful hissing laugh and fired again.

"Each shot takes up a lot of power," Robin said, leaning in over Luffy's shoulder to indicate the cola gage. "Be careful you keep enough back to defend yourself if you need to."

"Uh-huh. Hey, Zoro, is the monster coming?"

Zoro, his two swords drawn, could see a pair of vast light-reflecting orange discs closing in through the darkness at a rapid pace. "It's coming. Shit!" He dived aside, not even getting a demon-slash in before the enormous scaled creature ploughed through the spot where he'd been standing. The cola-gun fired again, noisily, and so did one of Usopp's exploding shots. While Zoro was rolling, dragging himself back to his feet, and reclaiming his swords, he saw Sanji leap out of the way, and Robin sprout arms from the creature's neck that lifted her up and over to avoid its attack, placing her down upon its back, where further arms grew to catch her and hold her in place on the smooth scales as it thrashed. Other hands grew from its eyes and clawed at the vulnerable tissue, only to be battered bruisingly away by thick eyelids. Usopp... well, Usopp was fifty feet behind them, firing from cover of a rock.

Luffy... damn it, where was Luffy? He couldn't move quickly. The cola-gun had gone off, and Robin had just told him to save it for self-defence.

"Zoro!" Robin's cry was desperate. More of her hands were trying to drag open the creature's mouth... Luffy was between its teeth...

The cola gun went off again as the creature chomped down. Robin gave another cry, this time of pain, and almost fell as most of her sprouted arms disappeared, but she somehow managed to keep control of the ones holding her in place. Sanji spiralled through the air and rammed both his feet into the side of the monster's jaw.

The gigantic mouth fell open and Luffy rolled out, splashing onto the rocks below. Splashing... ugh. The reinforced suit had been torn in several places. Still, he was rubber, or rubber-goo, and there wasn't much red mixed in with the grey-white, so he'd be all right, probably. The gun, less hardy, smashed to bits.

Zoro darted forward, placing himself between the monster and his captain, and slashed for the huge throat. Two arcs of sizzling sparks screeched across the scaled skin and left it... mostly unmarked. Zoro had a bad feeling that so far only the blast inside its mouth had significantly hurt it. A few black smudges on its scales were the only sign of the earlier shots. Damned armoured things. Damned sword-destroying devil fruit users. He missed Santoryuu.

Sanji smashed another kick into its rump, bounced off, called it a shitty, ugly carcass of third-rate meat, then turned and ran as it charged after him.

Away from Luffy.

"Usopp!" Zoro yelled, running after them. "Get out here and start aiming for the eyes and mouth!"

If Luffy had gotten himself killed for all their efforts, he was going to be annoyed.

8 LUFFY

Luffy hurt, and worse, now he couldn't even move again, because when the monster's tooth had sunk into his side, it had made a huge tear across the suit. Most of his torso was a big, flat, splashy mess on the rocks. There were other rips at his right knee and shoulder, where the other teeth had slashed, but they weren't so large and nor had he been cut deeply in those places. He was grateful the leather encasing his left hand and arm was still whole, so he could at least push his head back into shape.

Stupid... He hadn't come with them to be useless like this. He'd taken a good bite out of that thing's tongue while he was inside its mouth, and chewed at some of the burnt bits that flew off when he shot it, but nothing seemed to be happening, and though Chopper had said it might not happen at once, he couldn't just sit by and wait in the meantime. Everyone else was fighting something really big and dangerous for him.

He tucked his right hand beneath a fastening strap at his waist and ignored how his flesh sagged out of the gap in the shoulder. If he didn't try to move that arm much, then it might be all right. The slash in the leather above his knee was small. He might be able to walk with it. He started trying to scrape together the overstretched, near-liquid ooze of his middle, hoping he could tug the torn ends of the suit over it again once he pushed it all back. After he had, though, he discovered that he only fell apart again if he tried to move much at all.

Damn it, he hated being weak. Why wasn't his body changing back already? All he could feel was his insides twisting, distorted by the passage of the meat he'd swallowed.

Maybe a bite from its tongue or its mouth wouldn't work. But... he clutched his arm against his chest and managed to raise his head enough to watch the fight. Usopp was dashing between rocks trying to make a shot, and Robin was perched on the monster's back, but even Zoro's steel-cutting swords and Sanji's red-hot leg weren't making much impression on the monster's scales. Those things must be really hard. All Zoro's sword-slashes did was to shave off a spray of sparks and scale-chips as fine as sawdust.

And that didn't make sense. No stupid sea creature's teeth could be sharper than Zoro's swords, but Chopper said they'd been able to bite the monster. It must have soft parts somewhere. Of course, a sea creature could only approach it underwater...

Luffy's eyes, blinking slowly, followed the way it slithered with its belly so low to the ground even as it fought.

"Underneath!" Luffy yelled. Yelling hurt, and still wasn't very loud. But Robin noticed he was trying to tell them something, and an ear grew out of the rock next to him. "The monster's belly!" he hissed, feeling like his throat was trying to twist itself inside-out. "They fought it in the sea... when it swims..." But they couldn't fight it in the water. And it didn't reveal its underside on land. "Lure it... over me..."

He could sense Robin's hesitation even over all that distance. But even if his body was weird at the moment, it wouldn't hurt him to be squashed, it would just mean they'd have to put him back together again afterwards. Robin must have agreed, because then she was leaping down, her hands catching her. They were all left hands - she was injured too.

"Hey!" she called to the monster, arm raised. It turned (so did Zoro, Sanji and Usopp, their confused expressions pretty funny), and Robin threw her arm forward. Another arm grew from the centre of her palm, and that one grew another, and so on until the final hand folded into a fist that smacked the monster right in the eye. "Fleur pistol!"

She turned and ran toward Luffy. Three voices behind her screamed warning. The monster was fast.

It slammed into her just before she reached him, but hit a cushioning web of arms sprouting from her back. The force still sent her flying towards the sea, and out of Luffy's field of vision. He heard a splash, then a yell from Sanji and another splash. But he didn't see or hear much else after that, because the creature's bulk skidded over the top of him. Its belly wasn't quite flat to the ground, so he wasn't squashed after all. But that was bad, too, because his teeth couldn't reach its flesh.

He reached up his one useful hand and felt his body start to flow outwards again through the tear he'd let go of, even with that small movement. He scraped his hand along the monster's belly. Through the thick leather of the glove, Luffy could still tell that it was slippery - slimy. The stuff seemed to cover the whole of the monster's underside. Hopeful, he stuck his fingers in his mouth and sucked at the slime. It tasted almost as nasty as the squid-thing had.

This time, he felt the change almost instantly. His throat stopped feeling like it was trying to swallow bits of itself, and the sensation followed the slime down. He scraped off and swallowed more. The creature was moving above him, turning around to attack Zoro and Usopp. He felt the churning wrongness all over his body starting to quieten, replaced by the slow return of strength and a growing feeling that he was very, very hungry.

He got his legs under him and they stayed under him, supported by Usopp's leather suit as well as his solidifying flesh, though he was still liquid enough to sag slightly from the gap in its side. The monster was in the way, so he moved it, feeling the shark-bones in the leather crunch and crackle under the effort. Since it was heavy, once he'd lifted it, he just chucked it back at its cave. They were done with it now.

"Luffy!" Relief in Zoro's voice. Even Zoro had been worried? Hey, that was just weird. Well, they were okay now.

"Yeah, almost normal." He pushed at his ribs, and this time they didn't sag outwards again. They were bleeding a bit from the hole the monster's tooth had made, though. "We can go now!" Sadly, he picked up the bits of the cola-gun.

"Forget that thing." Sanji was trying to sound grumpy, but his wide grin was foiling the effort. He had fished Robin out of the water, just as Luffy had known he would, and she looked damp but unhurt.

And there was Usopp, making a thumbs-up sign from behind a rock!

The monster was shaking itself, having pulled its head out from the pile of rocks where it landed. From the look of it, it hadn't got the message that they weren't interested in fighting anymore.

Grinning, Luffy tugged at the buckles on his arms, pulling off long sections of the leather that detached from the shoulders. Now that he was back to normal, Usopp's suit was just too hot and stopped him from stretching. But he was definitely glad that Usopp had made it for him and he'd had it when he needed it.

"Time to go!" He slung out a lassoo of arm to gather them all in (predictably, everyone else screamed and Zoro swore at him), and stretched the other arm for the Thousand Sunny.

"Gomu gomu no rocket!"

"LUFFY-!"

EPILOGUE

It took another half a day to out-sail the aggravated monster, Franky griping all the way about having to fix the sizeable new hole in the ship whilst on the run.

But once they'd done that, Sanji's Welcome-Back-To-Food-Luffy banquet was just as good as Nami had promised.

END