Irkalla Island

By: Ellipsis the Great

DISCLAIMER: One Piece and everything affiliated with it belongs to Eiichiro Oda Shonen Jump, etc. All I own is the plot…

Summary: The Straw Hats are forced to leave their chef behind on an island after breaking an ancient artifact…when they return, they find that their chef may not be their chef, anymore…future ZoSan.

Rated: M.

Warnings: Angst, mentions of torture and non-con, slash (in the distant future). More warnings later if needed.

Chapter Four: Physiological Responses

"Sanji? Sanji?"

His eyes opened blearily, but quickly zeroed in on Chopper's feet, which he could see were on the other side of the bed from where he was sitting. And Chopper, bless his heart, was too short to see over the bed.

"'M over here." He said, straightening himself.

"Did you fall out of bed?" Chopper asked as he hurried over to Sanji's side. "Are you okay? Are you hurt? What happened?"

"I…couldn't sleep in the bed." Sanji admitted with a smile that was more like a grimace.

Chopper's eyes softened, his mouth opening like he wanted to say something or cry, but he closed it again—sucked his bottom lip in so that Sanji wouldn't see it trembling—and nodded. Then he grabbed a Rumble Ball and ate it, going into strong point. "Well, here. Let's get you back in the bed so I can check everything."

"Nonono, Chopper, don't, don't, don't touch me!" He said, trying to scramble back only to find that he was already as far in the corner as he could get.

"Sanji, you're too weak to get yourself back in the bed, and I have to examine you." Chopper spoke slowly, like he was trying to reason with a cornered animal.

"No." Sanji groaned, even as Chopper scooped him up. "Chopper you can't touch me, you can't, I'm dirty…"

"You are not!" Chopper said. "I've been giving you sponge baths. And Zoro threw you into the ocean yesterday, and even though saltwater isn't exactly the cleanest—"

"That's not what I mean." He said, frustrated. "I'm dirty, Chopper, I'm dirty, and I can still feel her touching me, and you're too clean to touch me, dammit, I—"

"Sanji!" Chopper cut him off, setting him on the bed gently. "I've been touching you since we got you off of that island—fixing your wounds, changing your bandages, and bathing you. Am I dirty?"

"No. No, Chopper, you're clean, and…"

"And touching you a little more won't hurt me." Chopper said firmly, patting his head with a gentleness that seemed rather unnatural when he was in this form. "I know you feel dirty right now, Sanji—of course you must, after all of the things that terrible woman did to you—but you aren't. None of the things that happened to you are your fault, okay? You aren't dirty. You're hurt, and maybe a little broken, but you aren't dirty."

He shook his head; how could he get Chopper to understand?

"Chopper…" He squeezed his eyes shut, cheeks burning with shame. "Chopper, I am dirty, because…because when she…Chopper, I always…she always made sure that I…"

"Ejaculated?" Chopper offered quietly.

He gulped and nodded, not daring to open his eyes.

"I figured as much." Chopper said, his voice still so quiet Sanji had to strain to hear it.

The words made him shiver. Oh, God, Chopper knew how dirty he was. Had guessed, even!

"Sanji…I've been doing some reading over the past week." Chopper said, growing more confident in his speech as he began talking with his 'doctor voice'. "About other men in…similar situations. And I think you need to know that just because you became physically aroused and ejaculated, doesn't mean that what happened was something you were a willing party in, and it doesn't mean that you weren't raped. Arousal and ejaculation are physiological responses to being stimulated, not something that you decide will happen."

"But I—"

"Sanji, I could stimulate your penis or prostrate right now and get you to ejaculate. So could anyone else. Does that mean you want to have sex with me? With Luffy?"

"Of course not!" He balked at the very thought of it.

"Exactly. Arousal is not a conscious decision, and whatever she told you or did to you, you have to understand that what she did to you was wrong and against your will. It…it was rape."

"I had sex with her willingly, though. At first, I—"

"At first, Sanji. At first you had sex with her willingly. The moment you said that you no longer wanted to engage in sexual intercourse with her, it stopped being a willing sexual encounter and became rape." Chopper sighed and put a gentle, hesitant hand on Sanji's arm. "Sanji, people in actual relationships get raped by their spouses. They had sex willingly, at one point in time, just like you did. But if a man holds a woman down and forces himself on her, it's still rape, regardless of their previous sexual encounters. The same holds true for a woman who forces herself on a man, or a man who forces himself on another man, or a woman who forces herself on another woman. If you said no, and didn't want to have sex, then you were not a willing participant in what happened." The little reindeer-turned-doctor paused for a moment. "Do you understand, Sanji?"

"I guess." He sighed, more because (to be quite honest) he was too tired to argue than because he actually understood. Looking away so that Chopper wouldn't see the skeptical expression that still dominated his features, he said, "Who's cooking? You told Zoro to go eat, right?"

"Mhm." Chopper said. "We were taking turns for a while, but Usopp, Robin, and Franky have been doing all of the cooking lately. Nami charges, Luffy…is Luffy, Zoro refuses to do anything but barbecue, Brook somehow managed to cook Nami's panties into a loaf of bread, and I won't make anything with meat, so Luffy won't let me cook anymore."

He laughed a little. "Captain needs his meat."

Chopper smiled and nodded. "Yeah. Are you hungry?"

"Can I go eat with everyone else?" He asked. "Please? I haven't…I mean, it's been five months. And I can't stay in this room for three weeks, Chopper, I just can't."

"I don't know…" Chopper bit his lip. "I don't think it's a good idea."

"Just for dinner." He said. "Chopper, please. I want to be with everyone else again."

"I think it would be better for them to come down here." Chopper said.

"This room is so similar to ones back…back there…I keep half-thinking it's a dream or a cruel joke or something." His voice dropped into a borderline desperate whisper. "Please?"

Chopper sighed. "Alright, alright…but I'm carrying you up there and back here once you've finished eating. And…" He paused. "Since you have…issues with touching people…what will make you the most comfortable?"

Sanji flinched at the reminder and leaned back, trying to imagine the dining room. God, had it really been five months since he was last in the Thousand Sunny's dining room? "You and Zoro have to sit on either side of me. You've both…you've both touched me already, so…so I think it'll be okay. Otherwise…I don't think it'll matter."

"If someone needs to move to make you more comfortable, you'll tell me." Chopper said, sticking him with a firm look that made him nod his head. "Immediately, got that?"

He started to nod.

"Because the second you start to look uncomfortable and don't say anything, you'll be back down here before you've even realized I moved you. And I will be able to tell if you try to fake it, so don't."

Shoulders slumping a little, he nodded. "You've got it, Chopper."

Chopper glared at him for a moment longer, then nodded to himself, seeming satisfied. Since he hadn't changed out of strong point, yet, he grabbed Sanji's IV and put it in his mouth, scooping Sanji up like he weighed nothing (well, at this point he practically did weigh nothing). Chopper paused when Sanji stiffened in his arms, but the headstrong chef relaxed a moment later and nodded. Though he was still a bit dubious about the endeavor, he carried Sanji upstairs.

(YOURPAGEBREAKSDON'TMAKEMEHAPPY,ASSHOLE!)

"SANJI!" Luffy practically screamed when they entered the dining room, everyone standing with expressions varying from shocked to relieved to enthusiastically happy.

"Luffy." Sanji said with a forced smile that he couldn't hold for long. "I, um…I thought I'd try eating with you guys."

"You're acting like you need permission, Curly Brow!" Franky laughed, stepping forward like he wanted to touch Sanji, who tensed up.

Chopper moved himself so that Franky got the idea not to touch Sanji, and carefully put the IV down. "No one is going to touch Sanji. He's very uncomfortable with it right now, but he wants to eat dinner with everyone."

"Of…of course." Franky said, shrinking back a little with a wounded expression on his face.

"You can sit beside me, Sanji." Nami offered with a smile. "I won't touch you, I promise."

"Sanji wants to sit between Zoro and I." Chopper interrupted before Sanji could reply.

"What? Why?" Luffy asked, cheeks puffing out. "You guys got to see him all day! I wanna sit next to Sanji!"

"That's what Sanji said would make him the most comfortable." Chopper said.

"He hates Zoro!" Luffy argued.

"Well, for whatever reason, he thinks that sitting next to Zoro won't upset him." Chopper said. "And if he gets upset, I'm going to take him back to the infirmary. So for now we're going to let him sit in between Zoro and I, and we'll see what happens from there."

Silence fell for a moment.

"I'm sorry, Luffy." Sanji rasped out. "This was a bad idea. Chopper—"

"Nonononono!" Luffy said. "You can sit where you want to, but you gotta eat dinner with us, Sanji! You haven't eaten with us in ages!"

A strained silence as everyone was reminded of why Sanji hadn't eaten with them in so long.

"Here." Zoro said, plopping down into a seat and indicating the one next to him. "Sit down before Chopper changes his mind, Dart Brow."

Chopper let out a huffy sniff and gently set Sanji into the proffered seat.

"I've been researching healthy foods that are easiest for emaciated people to eat, Mr. Cook." Robin said as she set a bowl of soup down in front of him. "I hope you enjoy it."

"I'm sure I'll enjoy anything you made, Ms. Robin." Sanji said, wishing that he could summon up the strength and will to add in some of his usual flowery prose. All he could manage was a smile that felt (and probably looked) more like a grimace.

Robin returned the smile as she went to her seat between Nami and Franky. "I was actually just about to take it down for you and offer to relieve Mr. Doctor for a while." She said.

"Thanks." Sanji said.

Everyone was quiet for a while, obviously waiting on Sanji to try the soup. Sanji, for his part, just stared at the bowl as though it were about to reach up and bite him. It seemed to dawn on the other members of the crew all at once why he wasn't eating, but not even Chopper felt brave enough to say anything about it.

"Here." Zoro said finally, picking up a spoon. He practically stabbed it into the soup, but brought it back up slowly, leaning forward to blow on it gently before taking it to Sanji's lips. "We're stupid, y'know, so you have to tell us when you need help, idiot."

Sanji felt his cheeks heat up, refusing to meet anyone's eyes as he opened his mouth and ate. He had expected everyone to relax once the first bite had been taken, but they just kept staring at him. So, with a much more believable smile, he said, "It's good. Chicken?"

"Turkey." Robin said.

"Oh." He said, looking down at it again.

"I'm sorry…you don't like turkey?" She asked, biting her lip.

"She does." He heard himself blurt out, even though he really hadn't wanted to; he didn't ever want to talk about that woman again. Especially not after Robin had been so nice as to cook for him. And it really was good soup. "She had her own flock of them, and every other day she'd have one trussed up for dinner. Her chefs had more recipes for turkey than I do for fish, and, shit, why am I still talking about this? Chopper I think I'm gonna be sick. I think I—" And then he turned around and vomited up what little he had eaten, which was quickly followed by whatever Chopper had pumped into his stomach while he was sleeping, and when that was gone he just dry-heaved until his body finally didn't have the energy to do even that, anymore.

He flinched a little as Chopper (who had finally gone out of strong point) put a hand on his back. "Come on, Sanji. Let's go back to the infirmary. You can tell me what other foods you think you can't—"

"No." Sanji said as he forced himself to sit back up again and dragged his arm across his mouth to clean it as best as he could. "I'm not letting her ruin an entire fucking poultry for me." Then, screwing his jaw up determinedly, he put his arms to either side of the bowl, picked it up, and—ignoring the way his arms and mouth burned—gulped down the entire contents of the bowl in a way reminiscent of Luffy at breakfast. When he had finished he dropped it and went for the glass of water sitting next to his plate, but it had perspired too much for his arms to get any sort of grip on it.

"Stubborn ass." He heard Zoro mutter beside him, then the green-haired swordsman grabbed the glass for him and held it to his lips with surprising patience until he pulled away.

"Thanks." He tried to say, but had to squeeze his mouth and eyes shut and will himself not to throw up again. When finally the danger seemed to have passed, he looked up at Robin with as genuine a smile as he could possibly manage. "It was perfect, Miss Robin. Thank you very much for taking the time to make it for me."

The brilliant smile she bestowed on him was completely worth the throwing up. "You are quite welcome, Mr. Cook."

He was vaguely aware of Franky in the background getting rid of the vomit, but decided it was probably best for everyone that he didn't comment on that. "What…I mean, what all did you guys get up to while…while you were gone?"

It took a moment, but everyone else started smiling, too.

Maybe…just maybe…things were starting to look up.

TBC…

A/N: I'm so sorry I've been gone for so long, you guys! I kind of lost my inspiration for this story for a while…and I still don't know where I'm going with it, which is never good. I don't know when I'll have time/inspiration to get the next chapter up, but we'll see what happens!

Comments, suggestions, and critiques are welcome! 8D

I hope everyone enjoyed this chapter!

Love you guys! See ya next!

-EtheG