Two Nights and Three Meals
By Dreaming of Everything

Author's Note: Giftfic for Latenightiridescence! Because she is a really amazing person. And I have so much fun talking to her and so I wrote her fic!

Content: Poly relationships, which means Toriko/Komatsu and Komatsu/Zebra but also Toriko/Zebra, and usually all three at once. Implications of all Kings/Komatsu. Kissing. Language. Completed oneshot. Spoilers for the Gourmet Pyramid arc.

Notice 3/13/2014: all further Toriko fics will be posted only on Archive Of Our Own. Look up AO3 for my recent Toriko fics.

Although the brunt of the blow had been taken by Zebra's shield, and although the mellow cola had provided vital and refreshing nutrients, Komatsu had been stabbed. And he had no gourmet cells to agree with the taste of the cola, and therefore there was not—and would never be—any miraculous recovery for him. Toriko could go into a fight and come out looking better than he had when he'd gone in. Komatsu could ride an adrenaline high and imagine that it didn't hurt until it really didn't, very much at least, and ignore most of the rest. But he wasn't used to being stabbed, and he was gritting his teeth against the pain when they arrived, blood still oozing slowly from the wound each time he moved too quickly, roughly, or in the wrong directions. Sand had leaked in despite his best efforts, the gash in the cloth apparently an open invitation, and no doubt the scab was ugly, where it was forming, grit caked onto the edges and in the creases. It would be hell to clean, Komatsu knew, but there was a very real danger of infection. It would need to be cleaned, because he was very human in all the ways that Toriko and Zebra had long-ago surpassed. They were no longer bound by the petty reality that made up most of Komatsu's world, where dirty wounds went septic. It was a part of their particular—beauty, he supposed, although he was suffering from blood loss and continuing dehydration only intensified that, and he was probably in shock as well, and maybe that was why he sounded like Sunny. But it always left him a little awed, that Toriko (or Zebra, or Sunny or Coco) would slow down for him, would let him have a little taste, day-by-day, of what the world offered if you had their kind of strength: physical, but that was only the tool wielded by their indomitable will. Komatsu's partner and his fellow Kings were the greatest people Komatsu had ever known.

They had finally reached the edges of the town, Komatsu's exhaustion deepening as the slow pain and the distance they'd traveled caught up to him. There was only so much that Toriko and Zebra could do. In the end it came down to Komatsu, stretching his limits and stressing his body as much as he could. Mostly he just wanted to sleep now. Drink a lot of water first, maybe.

"Almost there," Toriko said, voice low and tense, although there was no chance that there was a monster in the area that would provide a serious challenge. Komatsu turned his head to look anyway, or at least to look at his partner, try and figure out why he sounded so on edge. It meant that he didn't see the edge of rock poking out of the sand, and he stumbled on it, tripping, not correcting as well as he usually did, slow and numb. Zebra was turning around to grab for Komatsu so quickly that it almost looked like he started moving before Komatsu stumbled.

But Komatsu did catch himself, straightening with a tight grin, trying for reassuring but mostly looking pained, exhausted. Not that Komatsu had let that stop him before.

Zebra stopped dead, halfway to Komatsu, and stiffened and growled, face going murderous for a moment—Komatsu didn't know why, who it was aimed at, or even how serious the expression was; he knew that he could trust Zebra, did trust Zebra the way a compass pointed north, the way he was Toriko's partner, but that didn't mean that he knew the man well, he was still figuring him out, still learning him, and what he liked to eat and how he'd react to certain situations and what Komatsu could push him on and how to get the best reactions out of him and how to be good for him, how to give back whatever he could manage. He didn't think of it in terms of debts owed and repaid, of course not! But he did want to give back to the men who had given him so, so much. This time, his life—again, but it had been even closer than normal. He was used to his life flashing before his eyes, but not while he watched his own blood soak into the dust.

They walked onwards, Toriko and Zebra oddly hyper-aware, and Komatsu trusting them while mechanically placing one foot in front of the other. Everything ached. Exhaustion pounded in his head, turning painful. He kept on catching Toriko and Zebra watching him with something like anger, and he was cognizant enough to know that it wasn't aimed at him, but it still left him confused. He was fine, after all; they'd gotten the cola. What was there to be angry about? Well, he hoped he would be feeling better soon. In the meantime, the sand-colored storefronts of the town went past them, slowly, and Komatsu kept walking, the half-comfortable prickle of Zebra and Toriko's eyes on his back.

They hadn't turned down the street leading to their hotel, Komatsu realized, two blocks too late. Maybe he was more out of it than he thought. He'd lost a lot more blood than he really could afford to. Instead, they were heading towards a dusty building, although everything was dusty here, just slightly dilapidated, also like everything else; it would have looked seedy, except that someone seemed to be making an effort to keep it cared for, like a very carefully patched shirt. The local doctor's clinic, he realized, blinking, as it took him a moment too long to read the sign, and he felt suddenly warm in a way that was pleasant, not a side-effect of the blistering sun.

At some point, Toriko had started keeping track of where the nearest doctor was. It had to be for Komatsu, because anything that could injure Toriko that badly would finish the job or be consumed in turn; if it didn't or wasn't, he'd heal himself given something delicious enough. He hadn't died of a missing arm, and even replacing that—a superhuman feat in and of itself—he'd sought out specialists most people only dreamt of, or didn't even know existed. Doctors were for people like—like Komatsu, who kept up-to-date on his vaccinations and came down with the flu every so often.

People like Komatsu, who couldn't bounce back from being stabbed through the abdomen.

But they'd made it, brought the cola back to prove it, and Komatsu was being watched like a hawk—or rather, it was like he was being watched by a hawk, himself something small and brown and undistinguished that was unarguably prey. Not that he had anything to fear, with these hunters. No matter how many people disagreed, or misunderstood.

So it was probably okay that, this time, he tripped over nothing and his knees buckled and went out from underneath him and everything went very dim and then very dark, then paled to grays-against-grays and wavered, melted into flatness, and he was passing out, he realized, but he managed to smile at the two faces that appeared in front of him, already familiar even though he'd just met Zebra and hadn't known Toriko that much longer, and he didn't feel hands, broad and rough and scarred, four of them, reaching out to catch him as he crumpled but he still knew they were there—

And mostly he felt very sorry for causing, no matter how indirectly, the expressions on their faces, both tinted with anger (which was still, and would always be, strange on Toriko's face) and Zebra's almost a snarl and Toriko's expression somehow anguished, but there was nothing much that he could do about it and so he simply let the world fade away.

There was nowhere he was safer than right here, unless maybe he was between Coco and Sunny as well, no matter that there was still blood trickling down his side, tacky as it dried faster than it oozed out in the dead-bone-dry desert air.

He woke up in a hospital bed, quite peaceful but completely unaware of where he was, which triggered some latent panic lurking in the back of his head—although he really didn't panic that much, anymore; he had fought (and won!) against an Escargot, a capture level 38 beast—which put Komatsu ahead, in terms of dangerousness, with an unnervingly large number of professional bishoku-ya.

But in this situation, fear went swimming through his veins. He tried to pull himself over to the edge of the bed, thrashing his way through suddenly-entangling sheets, yanking on the IV in his arm—extra fluids, he thought, he'd been losing water fast enough that he couldn't have drunk enough to replace it even if they'd had the liquid to start with.

Because he'd been stabbed, in the Gourmet Pyramid, and they'd found—and prepared!-the mellow cola and he had done his part, the way a partnership should be, Toriko and Zebra as perfectly attuned to him as his knife, as perfectly as—

He was calming, at least in part because he knew the hands pressing his shoulder gently, implacably, against the bed, other hand carefully trapping his hand and wrist and forearm, as vastly oversized compared to Komatsu as all the rest of Toriko was, so that he didn't pull the IV free. He knew the scent of Toriko, from this close, could breath it off his shirt, nothing compared to the way that Toriko had to know his scent, but when Komatsu was close enough he could smell his personal scent, and it spoke of—safety, or it had used to, but now it mostly smelled right.

The bed dipped, and Zebra was suddenly right in his face, and wasn't that a sight to wake up to? Komatsu couldn't help a slight yelp as Zebra growled at him, honest-to-God growled, mostly because he'd seen Zebra look angry and he always looked irritated but right now he looked furious and Komatsu had no idea what he'd done.

"Toriko-san," he said, instead, and Toriko backed off, although he remained on the bed, too. Komatsu ached for a hug, ached for him to come back, even though he knew that the memory of Toriko pinning him to a bed would haunt him later, a sort of exquisite torture.

"Komatsu," Toriko said, smiling at him so wide that Komatsu couldn't help but grin back, and he moved his hand—unsure why—and Toriko enveloped it, with that sort of eerie understanding—even Komatsu wasn't sure that he understood himself what he needed—that they'd begun to form. Partners. It defined him, in a way that made him better.

"Zebra-san," Komatsu added, turning to Zebra—not forgotten, never forgotten, even if he wasn't his partner. Zebra was—extraordinary, in a way that was similar to (completely distinct from) what Toriko meant to Komatsu. They just needed to find the right word to define what they were.

Zebra looked, just for a second, incredibly relieved, maybe even grateful, before he turned away.

Zebra turned back when Komatsu tried to tug on the bishoku-ya's sleeve using the arm with the IV in it because Toriko had his other hand, and yelped as a result when that pulled on the needle again. Zebra almost jumped, really, and Komatsu felt a sense of wonder, as delicate and lacy inside of him as ice just beginning to form on a river, that Zebra would care so much, would give him that, and why didn't the world know anything about this side of him?

Because Zebra would hate it, Komatsu answered himself just as immediately, because he didn't know Zebra well but he knew that much. Even here, he was already starting to snap back, fight against the instinct that had Komatsu pinpointed in his hearing: breathing, heartbeat, the small sounds of his working body. "Fucking kid," he snarled, pulling away, but that just meant that Komatsu had to grab for him again, and he covered up the noise of pain better this time, but no matter how soft, Zebra would hear.

This time, Zebra stayed where he was. The honey-colored late-afternoon light bathed them all, syrupy-golden but not quite sunset, and like this, the two men were breathtaking, Komatsu thought. All stillness, entirely unlike them when they were fighting or eating, but the moment was perfectly balanced, at peace, and Zebra's red hair was tinted until it looked more like fire, and the light played in Toriko's eyelashes and—

And that wasn't what he was supposed to be noticing about his partner—

And Toriko sighed softly and Komatsu realized that while he'd been watching the other men, Toriko had been watching him, with something that was hungry but had nothing to do with appetite. Toriko reached out to smooth a hand down his cheek, and Komatsu wondered what he saw: just Komatsu, alive and hurt but he was going to be fine, his own black eyes reflecting golden in the light, hair a hideous mess, blood and dust still smeared down his neck, dabbed on his cheek, sticky patches all over from where the cola had dried—

Toriko moved his hand so it rested against the curve of Komatsu's cheek. Or partially against, because his partner was so big that it would seem like caricature if it wasn't spectacular, beautiful, efficient and deadly and honed, the perfect predator, nothing excessive about what should have been too much, like the rest of Toriko. Toriko's fingers were oddly calloused from his knife and fork and they rasped just a little against Komatsu's skin, the stubble starting to grow in on the chef's cheeks because of course there hadn't been time to shave—what a strange time to think of that, he thought, as he couldn't help but think about kisses, and Toriko, and Zebra—

Zebra looked as anguished as before, but didn't hid it as quickly this time, or as successfully; and Toriko followed Komatsu's eyes, and Komatsu watched as Toriko's eyes widened in understanding, and he felt Zebra tense suddenly beside him.

Then Toriko did something that looked—honestly, a little ridiculous, some sort of signal with his hand, his face all gentle patience, understanding, and, rarely for him, a subtle sort of apology, almost embarrassment. When Zebra didn't move, except to shift so that Komatsu couldn't see his face when the chef shifted around a little to look up at him over his shoulder, Toriko reached out and pulled Zebra's hand, unresisting, to rest in the hollow of Komatsu's throat, scars sliding slick against the thin, soft skin, and no doubt he could feel his heart thumping, not just hear it.

"I told Zebra it's okay," Toriko said. "It is, right?" He was matter-of-fact, just asking another question, but for a moment Komatsu thought that the words resonated oddly, like the question that contained them was echoing, far too big.

What was okay?

"What?" Komatsu asked, honestly baffled. "I'm sure it is, but—oh! Dinner tonight—I need to cook something to go with the mellow cola—strong flavors to fight back, something rich and deep to fight the sugar, but nothing too acidic because of the carbonation—is there a market in town? What season is it?"

"You're in the hospital!" Zebra shouted, like a volcano erupting. But as loud as his voice was, his hand stayed incredibly gentle, no sign of his outburst except the way his fingers curled, just slightly, against the side of Komatsu's neck.

"There has to be a good kitchen somewhere nearby," Komatsu pointed out, blithely cheerful at least partially because of the fact that having the Kings along usually meant that there would be a kitchen made available to them almost anywhere.

Toriko laughed, low and pleased, shaking his head. "Tomorrow," he said, pulling himself a little more onto the bed, which was oversized for Komatsu (almost comically so, he realized with a mental wince) but uncomfortably full with the bulk of Toriko and Zebra there to fill it up. It left Komatsu pressed against part of Zebra's outer thigh, Komatsu's head resting against Zebra's abdomen, Toriko so warm against his side that the rest of him felt bereft, his partner's hand where it had fallen against his hip a burning brand, even better—his partner, what did that mean, exactly, other than what they had made it mean? What sort of intimacy did that imply?—where his hospital-issue shirt, rough white cotton, had slid up, revealing bare skin covering the blade of his hip.

"That'll give us time to get ingredients," Zebra pointed out, and tried to smirk but mostly just smiled. Then it went concerned again, then back into surly, the sort of default unpleasantness and threat he wore around like a coat.

"So I can cook them," Komatsu said, smiling widely. "That's my side of the bargain!"

Toriko laughed, louder than the joke really deserved, and maybe it was because their agreements really had gotten kind of—well, silly, if you could apply that word to Zebra, although Komatsu wasn't sure how you could ever make it fit—but his laugh was full of a sort of breathless joy that Komatsu definitely understood. It shivered down his spine, danced through his ribs, and sometimes he was terribly afraid of it, because it was just—too much. Too much, not enough, they had all ended up mixed together and he was left reeling when he thought about how lucky he was. Not even to be alive, but to be living like he did, to travel hand-in-hand with Toriko and Zebra and—

-to be someone that they could rely on, too. To help them in turn, to be—a partner, to give back, that was a fierce joy as well, something he'd found as much a source of pride as his knives. Komatsu himself was—well. It usually wasn't worth it to stand up for himself, because most of what people could say about him was true. Like Sunny had pointed out, way back when they'd first met—and a lot had changed since then! Mostly in that Sunny was much kinder with him now, which didn't mean that what he'd first said wasn't true—there really wasn't much to Komatsu that was beautiful until he started cooking. But that was okay for him, because cooking was who he was. And the Kings were a part of that. Any beauty he had, they were a part of it.

Part of him felt he should feel—guilty, maybe, or at least a little more strangely than he did, about that fact. But he didn't, and couldn't bring himself to care about that, either. Instead he shifted a little to take some of the pressure off his injured side, and Toriko's broad hand shifted so he was almost grasping Komatsu's leg, blunt fingers curled loosely around the limb, not quite possessive, definitely like it was a sense of comfort, and maybe it was strange but Komatsu let himself luxuriate in the feeling, like an especially rich and unexpected flavor, and nuzzled into Zebra's side, which had the other man running his scarred-and-calloused hand over Komatsu's hair, dirty and filled with sand and sticky-stiff with cola as it was, scraping against the nape of his neck before resting there, a solid weight that was, unexpectedly, not pushy at all as it anchored Komatsu against the warm body he was leaning against.

There were a few moments of stillness, uninterrupted, before Komatsu shifted again, the other two stirring when he did, moving around him so he could sit up more fully. It was funny, no doubt, how they'd move in response to him, with all their power and physical strength and frankly terrifying (it had been, once upon a time, but it was ridiculous to think about now, with Zebra trying to check a smile and Toriko's eyes warm, expression as content, as satiated, as Komatsu had ever seen it) brute force. But they just fit together like that.

"I'll go get you discharged," Toriko said, but he hesitated a second before he actually left, and his smile was perfect, so that Komatsu couldn't help but smile as well.

When he lifted his hand to itch at the IV, Zebra intercepted it mid-air, and wrapped his own hand around it.

Komatsu was ready to sleep again by the time they made it back to the hotel room they'd rented, tired out as his body repaired itself and foggy with pain medications he probably would have refused if he'd been conscious; he supposed Zebra and Toriko hadn't argued against them. The hotel had the feeling of run-down old age, an out-of-place relic, clearly a remnant of wealthier times. The faded corners, the ever-present dust that filtered in through cracks the larger sand grains couldn't penetrate: it was all a little eerie. On the other hand, the former grandeur remained in the architecture if not the furnishings, and their suite of rooms had truly generous proportions. They'd requested the biggest room, and Zebra and Toriko's familiar bickering still filled it up, as restrained (for them) as the bishokuya were being. Komatsu ignored it, feeling wobbly on his feet in a way he'd come to associate with exhaustion, the sort that demanded rest immediately.

Although there were four or five rooms, most importantly a quite reasonable kitchen, there were only two beds, Komatsu realized, standing in front of the two doorways, looking into the rooms. Behind him, a chair tipped over as Zebra tried to wrestle porcupine-pear cactus-fruit away from Toriko. There was a king-sized bed and a twin, probably for a couple traveling with a small child; the king-sized bed failed to live up to its name in that it was probably a little too small even for one of the Kings, at least the ones traveling with him right now, and there was no chance that one of them would fit into the twin, so even calling the desk and getting a cot set up—which Komatsu would fit on just fine—wouldn't help. Because neither of them would fit, maybe Komatsu could just take the small bed and let the two of them brawl over the big one—he could sleep through their fights, now, if I wasn't a really loud one,which it sometimes was, Zebra could be really loud—hopefully they'd find a solution that didn't involve someone sleeping on the floor—

"Come on," Toriko said, stepping around Komatsu and into the master bedroom, peeling out of his dirty shirt—why hadn't he changed? Surely he would have had time to while Komatsu was unconscious—and then stepping out of his jeans, letting them drop to the floor as he reached out a hand to tug softly at Komatsu's wrist. Maybe ordinarily he'd just gesture, Komatsu thought, muzzy-headed, but now his partner's fingers could probably feel his pulse, thrumming underneath his fingertips. He followed. They paused by the big bed and Zebra didn't try to fight it, didn't even argue, just paused in the doorway and watched, inscrutable.

Toriko only let go of Komatsu when Komatsu nudged at him with an elbow, his shirt half-off and unable to go any further with Toriko's hand and arm in the way. Komatsu blushed, just the slightest bit as he pulled off his pants, bending slightly, feeling suddenly exposed. He felt the tiniest bit like prey carefully observed by top predators, the latter part true in its way even if he was safer here than anywhere else. It felt odd, disrobing indoors next to the bed, even though they—well, Toriko at least, and Zebra in the hospital if nowhere else—had seen him in less, at various points. It happened. It still sort of—magnified, in a way, their differences, which sometimes disappeared for Komatsu now, as ludicrous as that seemed. Komatsu's shoulders had the strength to butcher a surprisingly wide variety of animals, but physically he was about as far from Toriko and Zebra as it was possible to be.

When he straightened from folding his clothes, placing them on a chair to be dealt with later—tomorrow! He was doing nothing more today—Toriko grabbed at him again, this time a big hand on either side of his ribcage, carefully avoiding his injury, almost painstakingly so, only that never described Toriko or his actions, at least when it came to things that weren't ingredients, such as people. He was lifted onto the bed, even though he really didn't need the help, and Zebra would hopefully fit on the twin bed next door or at least find some place comfortable and warm to sleep, even he had to be exhausted after the Gourmet Pyramid.

"Good night," Komatsu said, and stifled a yawn. "Zebra-san, do you have a place to sleep...?"

"Don't get to cocky with your questions," Zebra said, in lieu of a real answer."...Good night, kid." He crossed the room in a few quick, long steps, and—not quite ruffled Komatsu's hair, but let his hand rest against Komatsu's head. Komatsu tugged on Zebra's wrist until the hand lifted, then twined his own fingers as best as he could between the oversized fingers, his own palm sheltered in the middle of the larger one, and squeezed. Zebra looked surprised, for some reason.

"I'll see you in the morning," Komatsu murmured, and turned to look at Toriko. Toriko wasn't hiding the way he watched them, which also looked predatory in his own way.

Komatsu put that aside, though. He hardly knew all his partner's secrets, but the trust he held was a force as constant as the pull of the sun. "Good night, Toriko-san," Komatsu muttered, eyes falling shut despite himself. When he pulled them open again, Toriko was scenting the air, which was odd, but he looked deeply satisfied, so it had to be okay.

"Good night, Komatsu," Toriko said back, voice low and intimate, but Komatsu's eyelids had already drifted shut, and he barely shifted when Toriko ghosted a fingertip over his cheek. So Toriko moved a little bit closer, and Toriko let the smell of Komatsu surround him, no longer sharp and jarring—it was the only signal of danger Toriko had ever really reacted to with bone-deep fear—with the smell of his partner's fresh-spilled blood. It was still there, but gone dried and stale, and Komatsu no longer smelled like his own fear, so Toriko buried his head into Komatsu's shoulder, needing to slide a little further down the bed than was really comfortable to reach it—his legs were too long, and folded uncomfortably as a result—and letting an arm flop, heavy and secure, over his partner's middle. He twisted his free hand into Komatsu's hand, and pushed aside every fighting instinct still there, screaming and possessive and panicked, from those moments when he had thought Komatsu dead. Something unknotted in his stomach—he wondered if that was what a stomach-ache felt like—and eventually Toriko fell asleep, curled around Komatsu, his partner's arm looped around his bicep where Komatsu had shifted in his sleep, Komatsu staking his own claim, and it was another perfect moment. There had been more and more of those.

Komatsu awoke to over-bright sunshine and a steady movement he identified as breathing, because there was a body partly-underneath him. He was sprawled over Toriko's chest, one of his hands buried in slightly rough blue hair, legs tucked under a muscular arm, Toriko apparently still deep asleep even as Komatsu stirred. The covers had been pushed and kicked and knotted up, but it was still starting to get too hot, now that the sun had cleared the horizon and banished the harsh chill of the desert night.

It took a few minutes longer for him to start blushing, realizing that he was half-naked and Toriko was half-naked and they were wrapped around each other, he was holding onto Toriko and he—really had no idea how to move without waking Toriko up, because he probably needed the sleep and because Komatsu was on some level worried that things would start falling apart if Toriko woke up to find him holding on like this, no matter how perfect it felt, no matter how Toriko shifted to hold him tighter when he tried to move, smiling into the bare skin of his shoulder and—

Zebra was laughing at him from the doorway, a low sinister chuckle that Komatsu was pretty sure was completely genuine, rough not out of malice but simply because everything about Zebra was kind of rough. Or maybe not everything—people had made enough sweeping generalizations about Zebra already. Komatsu didn't want to add to them.

It still took every ounce of will Komatsu had in him not to make some undignified noise, not to sit up and protest and doubtlessly wake up Toriko. Instead, he wriggled away from his partner, feeling inexplicably cold again and fighting some perverse urge to return.

"Toriko's lazy," Zebra said with a smirk, walking half-purposely to the bed, stopping in a loose, easy posture, hand in a pocket and shoulders looser than Komatsu thought he'd ever seen them. It made him happy, that Zebra could look that at ease, in a way that left him almost breathless, his own returning happiness golden.

"I'm not," Toriko said, eyes still closed but voice clear. Komatsu buried his face in his (also bare—why hadn't he worn his pajamas?) knees, trying not to imagine the shade of red he'd turned. Neo-tomato red, maybe. Or the exact shade of Zebra's hair.

He jumped just a little when Zebra's hand touched his back, unexpectedly, and then stilled unnaturally quickly at the flinch. Before Zebra could finish pulling away, Komatsu felt a word pulled out of him in response.

"Stop!"

His own hand ran over the muscular arm still in front of him, Zebra as still as Komatsu remained, his face still hidden, eyes still shut. It was nothing more than touch, none of the symbolism of a kiss or a hug, but it satisfied something deep, something primal, some instinct Komatsu wasn't sure he should really have. When he finished, his fingertips were trembling slightly for some reason. Zebra ran his hand down Komatsu's back, and Komatsu felt a bone-deep certainty that the patterns of slick-rough scar tissue on Zebra's body would become more familiar than the constantly-changing constellations of burns, scrapes and small cuts on his own hands, the way the permanent scars on Toriko's hands, less obvious than Zebra's but no less present, already were. But he couldn't say why.

"I need some fucking breakfast," Zebra said, almost gently, and Komatsu was a little baffled by how—warm the near-demand left him feeling. Because of how it was said, something hummed. He understood Zebra as well as he knew his knife, understood Toriko—

Toriko had shifted, sitting up Komatsu had assumed, and now he was pressing his face into the base of Komatsu's neck, his body trapping Zebra's hand against Komatsu's back, hair tickling just slightly where a stray strand brushed against the slope of his shoulder. Komatsu could feel Toriko's breath against his bare skin, warm and damp, and it was shivery and intimate. If somewhat inexplicable, which should probably be worrying but wasn't, in its own way. It wasn't like the Kings didn't leave him kind of puzzled regularly anyway.

Then Komatsu's stomach growled, loudly. Looking back, he hadn't eaten dinner.

"Breakfast," Toriko announced, gently shouldering Komatsu aside so he could sit on the edge of the bed, stretching briefly before he stood, endless rough-edged enthusiasm back in his movements, the set of his chin, his wide (toothy) smile. "Come on," he added, nudging at Komatsu's arm with an insistent hand.

"Time to fucking eat," Zebra told Komatsu—demanded? Insisted? Was he talking to Komatsu, or only stating his own need? "Get dressed. I made arrangements."

Toriko laughed, and clapped Zebra on the shoulder as he squeezed through the doorway, ducking his head without thinking about it so he fit. It was a companionable gesture, and Zebra bared his teeth in his rictus-grin snarl, but didn't do anything else.

Komatsu pulled himself to his feet and moved to get his clothes, pretending—largely to himself—that he wasn't hyperaware of Zebra still standing in the doorway. As he pulled out a pair of pants and dug around for a shirt, he reconsidered getting dressed.

Shower first, that made much more sense. The bed sheets would certainly need to be changed, since he hadn't washed before going to sleep the night before, when exhaustion had insisted that he succumb immediately. Now he had no such reason, and warm water—not very warm, considering the weather—sounded heavenly.

"Bath's that way," Zebra informed him suddenly, jerking his head down one side of the hallway. His voice was matter-of-fact, and it wasn't so odd for Zebra to be helpful, but when Komatsu walked past him, the hand that brushed briefly against his arm—Zebra had to have reached out for him—was more unusual, enough to make Komatsu falter. Zebra seemed to take that as encouragement. When, suddenly, he was being held in a half-embrace, backwards, pressed into—well, mostly into Zebra's legs, because of his height—it was an even bigger surprise. But Komatsu loved hugging, loved it too much really, and worried sometimes that he couldn't hold himself back sometimes when he should. To be encouraged? His dirty face spread into a wide grin, and he wriggled in Zebra's grasp—the giant of a man letting go with alacrity as he squirmed, stepping back from Komatsu like he'd burned him—which gave him the room he needed to turn around and wrap Zebra up in an embrace in turn. Or at least get his arms partway around his legs, which was—terribly awkward, but also just right. Was this the first time he'd ever hugged Zebra? He'd have time to get it right.

Zebra leaned far, far over to get his own arms around Komatsu, and his eyes were closed and face blank, filled with intent focus. Komatsu let it be—it looked like Zebra was listening to something. Instead, he focused on the personal smell of Zebra, even if he could only smell the slightest, roughest fraction of what Toriko could. And he concentrated on what it felt like to be so close to this man who was in some ways a monster, in most ways a natural disaster, in all ways extraordinary and already held very close to Komatsu's heart. Or maybe his stomach, which was even more important, after all. You couldn't live without a heartbeat, but there wasn't much reason to live without food. He tried to memorize the feel of Zebra against his skin, and realized that he was more than half-naked, and decided that if Zebra didn't care he didn't either.

"You stink," Zebra said, and Komatsu giggled into his muscled thigh, fingers clutching at the fabric of his pants, until his stomach growled again, and Zebra growled right back, like an angry bass-voiced cat, which made Komatsu giggle harder.

"Don't be so fucking cocky and go get ready," Zebra said, disentangling himself and stomping down the hall.

Komatsu couldn't stop smiling—he looked ridiculous, he knew, but it also didn't matter—all the way to the bathroom, and his wide grin turned into a smaller smile of glowing contentment, radiating happiness, as he quickly, efficiently, scrubbed away dirt and his own blood and the blood of beasts and priceless drips of mellow cola that had dried sugar-tacky and caught the desert sand.

It took three restaurants before Toriko and Zebra were left satisfied, although Komatsu stuck to the local coffee, flavored with spices and a regional variant he'd never heard of or tasted before—after he finished his own, much more moderate meal. Breakfast, all three of them, was a relatively quiet meal, with Zebra and Toriko squabbling a little, mostly just for the sake of the argument itself. Mostly they ate, with an intensity that was normal by now, although the village was halfway between impressed, eager for the extra income, and baffled as to where all the food actually went. It was kind of nostalgic for Komatsu, watching them—but it was far more interesting watching Zebra, seated to his left, and Toriko, sitting on his right.

Komatsu finished his cup of coffee and set it on the table, leaning back in his chair. Toriko leaned into him, pressing against Komatsu's side, to snatch up an untouched dish, some sort of grain cooked into a porridge, flavored with dates and cardamom, dressed up with the inclusion of sunset cinnamon and dried sandnuts. Komatsu had asked one of the hovering grandmother-aged chefs about the ingredients, and she'd cheerfully indulged his questions, chattering about how the cinnamon and nuts were nontraditional and how she thought the change was interesting, she'd been eating it for seventy years now! Toriko ate it with his usual somehow-somewhat-polite speed. And Toriko didn't move away as he devoured his prize and picked up a piece of fruit to follow it with, staying slumped against Komatsu, deceptively boneless.

Zebra looked up, swallowing his mouthful, and glared at Toriko. The porridge had come from his side of the table, with Komatsu serving as the line of demarcation. He reached over Komatsu to push at Toriko's shoulder, and Komatsu sighed. Toriko's heavy, warm weight rocked away from him—Zebra had to have pushed hard—before he moved back into place, still resting against him. Zebra's arm fell across his shoulders, like it was incidental, hand falling loose around Komatsu's upper arm, so they were almost hugging.

Toriko was probably glaring over Komatsu's head, he could almost feel the threat, the way he always could—no different than clinging to Toriko's back as he faced down some sort of monster standing between them and their next meal. The waiters had all paused, were backing up. It felt like a thunderstorm bearing down, as Zebra leaned in over Komatsu, baring his teeth—all of them—and stared down Toriko, or tried to.

Komatsu was about to ask that they please let him get out of the way before they started fighting, when everything—all the tension, all the threat—just... went away. He blinked, confused. He looked up to meet Toriko's eyes, and Toriko smiled at him; looking over and up he could see the side of Zebra's face. Zebra was resolutely ignoring him, but when Komatsu kept looking, not sure what he was looking for at all, Zebra finished chewing, swallowed, turned to look right back, his hand tightening a little around Komatsu's shoulder, not hard, not at all threatening, just—secure.

Toriko backed off a little bit, then, stuck to clearing his own half of the table, and Zebra finished his breakfast one-handed. Komatsu didn't even try to contain the smile spreading across his face, pinned in-between the two men, but not feeling at all hemmed in. It was—comfortable. Warm, in a way that had nothing to do with the temperature, steadily increasing. It helped that nothing would exceed the previous days' hellish heat.

"What do you want for dinner tonight, Toriko-san? Zebra-san?" Komatsu asked, feeling the expected eager pull in the pit of his stomach. Toriko was relatively slow to reply, taking a meditative drink (gulp) of his own coffee. Zebra, not distracted with drinks—he avoided stimulants, even those as mild as caffeine, Komatsu thought, based off of Toriko's teasing—just shrugged, the movement half-seen out of the corner of Komatsu's eye, and definitely felt in the smooth flex of muscle, the shift in pressure along Komatsu's shoulders, the back of his neck.

"Whatever," Zebra said, a little roughly. "It doesn't matter as long as you don't get too fucking cocky. Just making something good."

Komatsu sighed, unable to quite verbalize his frustration. "I want to cook for you," he said simply, because he was pretty sure that that explained it. Customers ordered off the menu, cooking for the Kings really meant just cooking everything, but Komatsu didn't just cook, he was a chef. It meant thinking of how things went together, of balance of flavors and textures and colors not just in a dish but in a meal, and Toriko and Zebra really didn't seem to care about that very much, so it shouldn't matter to Komatsu, but he wanted to—wanted to do his best for them, wanted to do more than his best. Wanted to cook food that they wanted, that they liked, food that was meant for them, because the kings were all mixed up inside of him now.

"Whatever we catch!" Toriko said, with a sort of glee that made Komatsu's own smile stretch even wider, responding helplessly to his partner's happiness.

They would bring him what they wanted to eat, or at least whatever was available. Komatsu wondered if it mattered. A part of him knew that it mattered if he was the one who cooked it or not, not just because of taste but because, because—

It was just how it was. Komatsu wondered how much it mattered that he cook food the Kings had brought him, because that was how it worked, in a partnership, the meals they needed to fight for together, the ones where they complimented each other as perfectly as a carefully-prepared dish and it's accompanying sides, were always best. He thought that Toriko liked to bring him ingredients, even when they hadn't tracked them down together—a second-best option. And Zebra had even looked slightly pleased when Komatsu had laid down his condition that Zebra bring him ingredients.

Maybe it was just an excuse to see each other. He still felt a thrill of—something, whenever one of the Kings was at his restaurant. Or maybe it was because the Kings always brought the highest-quality ingredients, not just the rarest—dawn cherries, like Coco had brought him the last time he'd visited, with a shy smile that shone even more than the fruit, were fairly easy to find for even a chef of Komatsu's ranking, but not perfectly ripe and completely unbruised.

Neither of those were completely right, although they were both important. It was the—the way it balanced out. Komatsu's job, only it was nothing like a duty, and only halfway a gift. There was no obligation, it was just—right. As right as Toriko's leg hooked around his, the way they'd ended up—how had that happened? And Zebra draped around his shoulders, both so close he could feel the body heat radiating off of them.

"How are you feeling today?" Toriko asked, blinking open one eye to look at Komatsu. Komatsu had been so absorbed in his thoughts that he hadn't felt the silence settle in around them, as soft and familiar as a down comforter.

"Fine," Komatsu said, a little surprised, blinking to catch up to the conversation, looking down at the bandages, invisible underneath his shirt but uncomfortable when they were on his mind. "There's nothing wrong, Toriko-san, I didn't see any infection settling in this morning and it's not very painful. I'm lucky you two were there! Thank you, Toriko-san, Zebra-san—"

"We should have done better," Toriko said, flatly, a sort of ugly edge to his voice making Komatsu's words catch in his throat. Zebra's hand tightened around his shoulder.

"I've got a lot of training to do," Toriko said, a few silent seconds later, and he sounded deeply thoughtful, but not nearly as angry, which let Komatsu relax—not because he was afraid, but because he never—ever—wanted Toriko to need to sound anything other than happy, anything other than content— He put his hand on Toriko's knee, pressed gently. His other hand he wrapped around Zebra's blunt, rough-calloused fingers, arm across his chest, the three of them tangled up in each other.

"If we find enough ice, I could make ice cream," Komatsu said, reflectively, when the silence had stretched on long enough. "Do you like sweet things, Zebra-san?"

"Yes!" said Toriko, enthusiastically. He didn't have a particular sweet-tooth, but he was a glutton.

"...If you make them, probably," Zebra said, through half-gritted teeth, like it was a guilty confession. And Komatsu smiled and smiled and smiled.

Komatsu spent all afternoon cooking, snatching a few minutes to himself to eat a quick plate of food—a fillet of fish that had fallen apart, the taste just fine but the presentation ruined, and a cup of soup, the remarkably aromatic and nutty flavor of the natural desert rice the perfect compliment.

"Are you okay?" Toriko asked over his shoulder, sounding a little odd. He stood a little too close to the back of Komatsu's chair, so that the chef was pressed up against him. Komatsu smiled, finished his bite of food, before responding.

"I'm fine!" he insisted again, smiling up at his partner, tilting his head up so he could meet his eyes. It pressed his head into the smooth planes, the dense muscle of Toriko's stomach. Toriko looked like he wanted to argue, but paused instead, eyes looking for something in Komatsu's face, a small frown of concentration on his lips.

"Of course," Toriko said, relaxing, and smiled. He smoothed a hand through Komatsu's hair, and Komatsu couldn't help but laugh.

"Toriko-san!"

"Okay, okay, Komatsu!" Toriko said, laughing in return, and he turned to leave. Komatsu turned back to his meal.

A second later, Toriko was setting another plate in front of him, competently—and carefully—sliced fruits arranged on it. "You need to keep up your strength," Toriko added, by way of explanation, and Komatsu turned around, looking at him, smiling again—he was always smiling, with Toriko—and he stood up on the seat of his chair, to get a better angle for hugging him.

It was almost unbearably hot, and Komatsu smelled strongly of spices and woodsmoke—there weren't enough burners on the stoves in the kitchen he'd been supplied with, and he'd made do with fires—and more faintly of sweat. Toriko smelled of blood and fruit juice and of himself, and his blue hair tickled, and Komatsu relaxed into the feel of the hug. It was perfect. It was always perfect.

Toriko finally stepped away, pausing to look Komatsu over before he left, the smile on his face a little—well, stupid, some part of Komatsu thought. A little giddy. But there was an underlying fierceness to it, the wildness that was always there, sometimes more noticeable to Komatsu now that he knew Toriko better, sometimes easier to miss because he knew Toriko, there was nothing threatening about him now. There was nothing dangerous about Toriko, but he was dangerous.

Zebra was on the other side of the kitchen, watching them, inscrutable. He had left something battered and dead on the floor, bleeding out, and Toriko sniffed at it curiously as he left, putting his hand on Zebra's shoulder for a split-second as he went past. Zebra tried to shrug it off, but not very hard.

"Thank you, Zebra-san!" Komatsu said, smiling widely. "What is it?"

"I don't know," he snapped. "It's just part of our agreement. Don't mess up when you cook it!"

"Of course not," Komatsu said, ignoring how his smile had wavered for a moment, still trying to figure what Zebra meant, and how much he meant it. "I would never waste ingredients you brought me, Zebra-san!"

"Yeah," Zebra said, not quite agreeing, and he turned to go, too.

"Wait, Zebra-san!" Komatsu said suddenly, reaching out, even though he was on the other side of the room. "Come here! Um, please."

"That's pretty fucking cocky of you," Zebra snarled, a few long, aggressive steps bringing him unnervingly close to Komatsu. Nobody had replaced the stitches in his cheek, Komatsu thought, vaguely.

"Okay," Komatsu said, steeling his nerve, and he hugged him.

The speed with which Zebra hugged him back was deeply satisfying, his own arms wrapping around Komatsu with a tightness that should maybe be frightening, considering how much crushing force he was capable of, considering how dangerous he was, but Komatsu couldn't find any fear at all now. "Thank you, Zebra-san," he added, now that his bishokuya was listening.

"Why the hell are you thanking me?" Zebra muttered, the sound slightly muffled in Komatsu's shoulder, although he had to stoop down quite a ways to reach it even with Komatsu standing on the chair.

"Because you're bringing me food," Komatsu said patiently, and had a sudden thought: was this what it was like for people training puppies, trying to get them to really learn something, really listen? Or maybe elementary-aged children, although it—really wasn't right to apply that to Zebra, somehow.

"Part of the deal," Zebra told him again, roughly.

"But you don't have to follow that," Komatsu said. "So thank you, Zebra-san!"

This time when Zebra opened his mouth to speak, Komatsu placed his hand over it, smiling widely. Zebra glared at him but his lips didn't move except to pull into a deep frown. Komatsu laughed again, since really, he couldn't actually hold any sound in if Zebra wanted it to escape. His hand wouldn't even begin to cover Zebra's lips, to start with, completely ignoring the torn-apart cheek. It was—nice of Zebra to indulge him like that, Komatsu thought. Only that wasn't exactly what was happening.

Zebra tugged on Komatsu's wrist, and didn't let go of it as the hand came away from the King's mouth. He used the other arm to pull Komatsu into a hug again. There was nothing to complain about there.

"Finish your dinner," Zebra said, pushing Komatsu away, only he somewhat ruined the effect by doing it very carefully.

"I really am fine, Zebra-san!"

"I don't fucking care." Komatsu had no idea what Zebra didn't care about, what Komatsu had to say or whether or not Komatsu was really fine or not, or maybe something else entirely, but he figured it was one of the things that didn't really matter. Instead, he took another hasty bite of rice and fish—the fish starting to get too cold, which made him frown minutely—and then got back to chopping xeric mushrooms because they'd need to be sauteed briefly before they got added to the tomato-based sauce that would go over the crocodile-mutton.

He couldn't help but hum to himself, little tuneless snatches of whatever he'd heard recently on the radio, not even aware of what he was doing. But all the happiness inside him just kept on growing, until it needed to spill out somehow—the pure joy of cooking, stretching himself to achieve everything he could with the ingredients he was given, working his part, and also the in-and-out presences of Toriko and Zebra, the thought of watching them eat what he'd cooked and was cooking, the lingering success of the Gourmet Pyramid, the thought of more adventures to come. He had never imagined his life taking this turn—he had purposefully tried not to think about making the top hundred chefs, and just focused on cooking the best food he could. But even when his thoughts had gotten away from him, he'd never imagined this—kind of perfection. Mostly because he'd never thought of himself as very brave or adventurous, and he wasn't, not really, just stubborn. But it wasn't braveness, exploring the world and hunting down new tastes with Toriko, it was simply inevitable.

With a small yelp, Komatsu realized that his sauce was about to boil over, and he turned his full attention back to his cooking, moving around with the sort of semi-organized deceptively-chaotic dance that cooking so much in an unfamiliar kitchen on his own required. When he realized that Toriko and Zebra were in a corner, Zebra standing in the doorway with his arms folded, Toriko leaning against the counter, the two of them just watching him, he did pause in his work.

"What are you standing here for? Dinner's ready," Komatsu said, gesturing them towards the emptied-out restaurant, a little curious as to why they weren't already there.

"We're going, we're going!" Toriko said, laughing, and he hurried towards the door, licking his lips in anticipation. But he stopped to hug Komatsu, quick and fierce, before he left the kitchen, leaving the chef surprised in his wake. Zebra smirked at his poleaxed expression as he also swept past, and Komatsu stared at his broad back before he shook it off.

The Kings were a little—odd, today, their behavior a little different from the norm, but it also felt right. And he couldn't bring himself to say anything because it felt so right, like the compass buried deep somewhere in his abdomen had suddenly found true north, and because he thought he'd be heartbroken, maybe just broken period, if he said it wrong, and Toriko and Zebra stopped touching him. If he couldn't feel comfortable pulling them into hugs when they met, clinging to Toriko's broad back, leaning against Zebra whether they needed the support or not.

He still wasn't sure why now, what had changed.

But that didn't matter, when there were plates of food that needed to be brought out, nervous waiters to organize, sizzling pans to monitor and season and stir. This was a lot easier with his own chefs there to deputize, a lot easier with staff who were used to Komatsu, with the Kings. But he'd make do, he always did.

Dinner didn't take as long as it sometimes did. He hadn't had much time to cook, after all, not when it was for the two biggest appetites he'd ever known. Hopefully Zebra and Toriko would still be satisfied.

He was just filling his last batter-sticky bowls with water, leaving them to soak for a little while before he washed them, maybe find another plate of food for himself first if there was anything left, when the door swung open again.

"I already sent out the last tray—" Komatsu said, as he turned around, but it was Toriko, not a waiter, and he paused, looking his partner over. He looked content, well-fed if not stuffed, after-dinner cigar-tree branch in his mouth, a contented smile on his face.

"Come on, Komatsu," Toriko said, walking over to pick up Komatsu bodily, the smaller man making a small squeak of surprise as he was lifted.

"Alright, Toriko-san!" Komatsu shot back, laughing as he gave in, wrapping his arms around Toriko's neck in a sort of hug. "Did you get enough dinner?"

"There's never enough of your cooking," Toriko informed him, voice a low purr, a glint of avarice in his eye. Komatsu laughed again, and moved his arms, somewhat reluctantly, from around his partner as Toriko took his seat again, stretching out in lazy, hedonistic contentment, a wolf resting after an oversized meal.

But Toriko made no move to set Komatsu down, just held him, gentle but firm, as the chef wiggled experimentally. Slowly, Komatsu settled down as well, the beat of Toriko's heart audible as he leaned his head against his partner's chest. Zebra must hear it all the time, he thought vaguely. Did he listen for Komatsu's heart as well?

"Was your meal satisfying, Zebra-san?" he asked, exhaustion starting to settle in now that he was done for the day. There was a dull ache in his healing wound, he'd probably pushed himself a little too far, but he was used to doing that, too, in the kitchen and especially when hunting rare new ingredients. It wasn't information he'd volunteer to Toriko and Zebra—they'd only worry.

"Don't worry about it," Zebra told him, roughly, which wasn't really an answer. Komatsu blinked, sleepily, trying to figure out what that meant. Was Zebra-san saying that he hadn't been? Quite possibly he never would be; his appetite was formidable, and was certainly close to endless. Maybe it actually was. That made feeding him and Toriko a Sisyphean task, but Komatsu didn't mind it. It was just that he didn't want them to feel unfulfilled.

"Come on, Zebra," Toriko said after a moment, sounding like he was prompting him, a little amused on top of that. Komatsu could feel the rumble of his voice, this close.

"It was good," Zebra said in response. "Dinner was good." He looked away from Komatsu, scowling, arms crossed across his chest, so he missed the huge smile that spread, slow and ecstatic, across Komatsu's face.

But there was no way to miss Komatsu jumping on him in a hug, no hesitation at all as he pulled himself close against the mountain of scarred muscle that comprised Zebra, problem child and natural disaster. Zebra looked surprised, not that Komatsu could see it with his face pressed against the heavy fabric of his clothes, but his arms still moved automatically to return the gesture, and something relieved and unbearably happy and grateful-content altered his expression, apparently without Zebra's notice; there were more important things to focus on. He hitched Komatsu up into his lap, a broad hand slowly rubbing Komatsu's back.

"Thank you, Zebra-san!" Komatsu said, not worrying about how his voice was muffled. Zebra would hear it, of course, and that thought left him warm, for some reason, left him feeling full, like after a good meal shared with friends. Hopefully caught and cooked with them, too, if 'friends' was what he could call the Kings. It felt insufficient.

Zebra frowned. "Why are you thanking me?" he demanded, tone confused, and Komatsu smiled, not sure why.

"I'm very happy you liked your food, Zebra-san." There was no way to hide that particular truth.

There was a silence.

"You know how sincere Komatsu is," Toriko said, apparently in reply to something Komatsu couldn't see, his eyes closed, body pleasantly tired from his day's exertion. His partner sounded pleased, matter-of-fact, still slightly amused, all mixed together.

"Yeah," Zebra said, sounding confused, and his arms tightened, on the edge of possessive, around Komatsu.

Komatsu was halfway through stifling a yawn when Toriko leaned down to wrap an arm around Komatsu, his other arm going around Zebra, the three of them not quite fitting together at that angle but something about it made the breath catch in Komatsu's throat. It was the warmth, their skin against his, their breath, the way they matched, complimented each other, like the ingredients in a dish, not the same because that wouldn't—they made each other better, he thought, then blushed because it was a presumptuous thought, but he wouldn't retract it because it was true, the way he knew when a dish was coming together even if it seemed an unlikely combination. Even if it was practically miraculous that the ingredients assembled would meld into something harmonious, not overwhelm each other or clash.

Komatsu wiggled one arm out until he could loop it around Toriko's neck, his other arm going as far around Zebra as he could reach, and they resettled. Komatsu's skin felt prickly-sensitive, hyperaware of the fabric and skin touching his, the puff of breath, the slight shifts of pressure as all three of them breathed, in and out, Toriko with the careful, thorough inhalations that Komatsu had come to associate with his partner scenting the air. Zebra knew it too, apparently.

"You're like a dog," Zebra mumbled, and Komatsu could heat the smile in his voice. When he raised his hand to let it rest against one of Zebra's cheeks, not sure why, he could feel it, and he smiled almost as wide in return.

Zebra gripped his hand and moved it, and Komatsu let him—not that he could really stop him, but he was pretty sure that Zebra wouldn't fight him if he tried to keep his hand still—with only the slightest taste of disappointment. But it all disappeared when something just a little damp, a little ticklish, warm, pressed into his palm. A kiss, he realized, and he leaned back to look at Zebra wide-eyed, not wanting to say anything in case Zebra regretted it because he shouldn't, he shouldn't, it was everything Komatsu had ever tried to keep himself from dreaming about—except for winning the annual Gourmet Cooking Contest—and then he turned, half-guiltily, towards Toriko, but his partner was leaning down, half-resting against Zebra's legs, his strong arms resting against strong thighs, trapping Komatsu in Zebra's lap, and then Komatsu was pushed back into Zebra's chest, Toriko kissing him breathless, all hungry lips tasting him thoroughly, savoring him. And Komatsu testing him back, learning this new flavor. And learning how to make Toriko sigh into his mouth.

"Greedy," Zebra said, amused, and after a second Toriko broke away to kiss him, too, their arms tightening around each other, Komatsu in-between him, both of them careful to keep him close but comfortable, safe. How could it be any different? Komatsu had no fear. Not even any insecurities, for once; maybe he was too tired, but mostly everything was just too perfect.

Watching Toriko kiss Zebra, and Zebra kiss back, was very nice. Something like hunger (desire, more deeply-felt than he'd known possible) had settled in the pit of his stomach, but it wasn't anything like an ache. Everything was right, and that rightness hummed through his veins, like finding the ingredient, figuring out how to get it, the moment of clarity he'd been trying to track down.

Zebra pushed Toriko away, and Toriko was grinning as he went, resisting just enough to show that he was choosing to go. Komatsu couldn't help but huff a laugh, but Zebra was bending down to kiss him, swallowing the sound, and it was not nearly as polite as the first kiss. He realized that Zebra had been hesitant, and his fingers curled in the strands of Zebra's hair, which was feather-fine and soft, much softer than Toriko's.

"I won't let you get hurt like that again," Toriko said, curling his hands possessively around Komatsu's waist, murmuring the words into his shoulder, the curve of his neck. Komatsu made a helplessly pleased noise as Zebra moaned into his mouth when he nipped gently at his lip, as Toriko's fingers rubbed at the thin skin on his hip, still careful of the slightly-swollen stitched-together wound. It took a few moments for his mind to catch the words, but he pulled away to speak, not missing but understanding the way Zebra and Toriko's eyes tracked his tongue as he licked spit-slick lips, flushed and red. He smiled.

Then frowned. "Is this all because—you've been touching me so much, is it because of that thing in the pyramid?"

"I always want to," Toriko said brightly, which relaxed something in Komatsu, who'd always half-worried about how much, how inappropriately, he touched the Kings. Zebra just shrugged.

"I'm fine," Komatsu told them both, insistent but understanding.

"Shouldn't have happened," Zebra told him, eyes narrowing, leaning in too close again. Komatsu considered being intimidated, then pressed a kiss, a little messy, to his mouth instead, and laughed at Zebra's expression, which was almost a pout. He just wasn't very intimidating like this.

"I know there's risks," Komatsu told them again, trying to get them to understand. There was a reason he kept his will up to date; it was partially because there were four more people to figure into it, now, and he didn't have much in terms of material wealth, but there were things like recipes, mementos, stored ingredients to think of. He knew that the Kings would appreciate it. Was pretty sure, at least. His family would understand.

Toriko growled into his shoulder, and Komatsu couldn't help but wonder at how things had changed. Toriko was the one who had told Komatsu to write out his last wishes in the first place. Komatsu was endlessly grateful—endlessly happy—at everything that had changed since then. Even if he was far more likely to die; had almost died. He wasn't even sure that he was convinced he would die, even though rationally it was probable, because Toriko was there for him. Zebra, too, and Zebra was a scary enough person that he had his own warning bulletin on the evening news. Which Komatsu only half-understood; he knew how safe he felt with this man, even when he threatened him. He knew that Zebra would never hurt him, even if he was sometimes worried that he'd upset the man. And Toriko had always felt half-feral, still did in some ways, but Komatsu knew him now, knew him as a person even if sometimes he was only partially human, knew him in a way that was intimate, close, natural and instinctual. Zebra and Toriko, smiling in a way that was just bared teeth, bloody from uncooked meals taken down with brutal, savage efficiency, nothing cruel about it because cruelty was the wrong word, a wild beast devouring its meal still kicking wasn't cruel—he knew them then, too, felt the warmth of them down in his bones, even if it was a little terrifying. He thought that they knew that. He hoped so.

He stifled a yawn, because he didn't want to go sleep. Not now, no matter how tired he was, because he didn't want to leave. Never wanted to leave, if he was honest, but he didn't want to break the perfect comfort settled around them. He ignored the near-silent rumble of his stomach for the same reason. He could eat later, sleep later.

"We saved you some dinner," Zebra muttered. Komatsu smiled—had he heard his stomach growling? Only Zebra—

"You saved me dinner?" he asked then, honestly baffled for a moment. "Zebra-san! Toriko-san! I was cooking for you, and I know you aren't full—"

"Komatsu," Toriko said, and Komatsu couldn't figure out why he said that, but he sounded terribly fond, and his hand stroked over Komatsu's shoulder, Toriko's fingers rubbed the back of his neck. "You were injured—I can still smell the blood in your wound—and you've been on your feet all day cooking and you need to eat more."

"I'm not like you, Toriko-san, eating won't heal my injuries and—oh! This is because I was hurt, isn't it? Again! I'm not hurt badly, it's fine, really, you don't need to worry—"

"What if I want to?" Toriko asked him, smile a little self-satisfied, and Komatsu laughed, slumping against his partner, admitting defeat.

"I can't believe you two finally learned how to leave food on the table," he said, and was a little worried about how transparent the all-consuming love that filled him was, saturating the lines of his body, the tone of his voice, the way he couldn't smiling at the miracle that every moment kept on being.

"Don't expect it to happen again," Zebra said, and flicked him just hard enough to sting a little when that made Komatsu laugh, hard; he shoved Toriko considerably more forcefully.

Komatsu's plate of food was pushed over to him, and he smiled at it before hesitating, scooting off of Zebra's lap, hopping to the floor. He didn't make the first step before Toriko had collared him, literally, then scooped him back up.

"Where are you going?"

"I just need to finish off the dishes," Komatsu told him, patiently. "If I eat first, they'll be all done and—"

"No. There are hired people to do that. You're eating and then sleeping."

Komatsu frowned. "No," he said, not angry but firm, brow wrinkling a little. "It's not right to not do my part of the clean-up if I have the time to—I'm not that tired, and I'm certainly not that badly hurt."

"Please," Toriko said, frowning, and Komatsu froze. That was—unexpected. "Komatsu, you've already worked hard all day."

"I'm not letting you into the kitchen even if you manage to talk the peaceful idiot into letting you go," Zebra snarled, and Komatsu sighed, shaking his head. Only Zebra would think to call Toriko peaceful.

"Fine, fine," he allowed, capitulating only because he really was tired, and Toriko settled him on his knee, arm wrapped around his body, leaving his arms free to eat, Zebra sliding his plate in front of him. Komatsu smiled. "But you're so unreasonable sometimes, Toriko-san, Zebra-san! It's just dishes." Still, he took a bite; it was always odd to eat what he'd cooked for others, but eating with his partner, with Zebra too, was—nice. It always was. As always, he couldn't help but analyze what he ate, the habit especially apparent with his own food. It was always possible to improve.

"Do you think the desert rice would be good with seafood? Something rich and heavy-flavored, maybe. It's strong enough to stand up to it. I think the sand trout is too delicate."

Zebra looked startled for a moment. "It was good!" he said.

"But I want it to be amazing," Komatsu blurted, and Toriko pressed a kiss to his cheek.

When they got back to the room, Komatsu went to shower, eager to wash off the sweat from cooking in a sweltering kitchen, the ovens and burners making the already intense heat hellish. He always showered after work anyway, washing away the spills, soaked-in smells, and whatever lingering stress remained. Although that was less of a problem when he was working on his own, when he didn't need to worry about mistakes from his chefs, or how to handle waiters reluctant to serve one the Kings, or someone who had decided to challenge Komatsu because he was short even compared with normal—average—people, and not very intimidating even with a knife in his hand. Not that he would ever threaten his staff, or customers. He just thought about it once in a while.

When he finished, hair still wet and towel around his bare shoulders, he wandered into the bedroom, the master bedroom. He blinked at the bed—Zebra had taken it, was already under the sheets, his bulk taking up almost all of the available room even though he had positioned himself mostly on the far side.

Komatsu said, "Good night, Zebra-san," and smiled, some tender part of him blossoming. Then he turned to go—if the couch was open, he would sleep there; if the twin bed was free, that would be downright luxurious.

"What the fuck are you doing?" Zebra demanded, sitting up in bed, glaring, apparently not nearly as tired or close to sleep as Komatsu had thought, from how he'd been curled up.

"Going to sleep," Komatsu said, confused, expression saying as much. He wasn't sure if Zebra could see it in the dim light, but of course he'd catch every nuance of Komatsu's tone.

"...Plenty of room here," Zebra said, sounding far more sulky than seductive, and Komatsu blinked at him, surprised. "And Toriko took the small bed. You're not sleeping on the floor when you're still fucking hurt. Any other time I wouldn't care, you can be stupid if you want."

"You don't mind?" Komatsu asked, feeling a little fluttery with something that wasn't quite nerves. It felt a lot like anticipation, but only partially sexual. He wanted to kiss Zebra, wanted to memorize his taste, wanted to have sex with him, but most of all he wanted the closeness. Wanted to stand up to his ridiculous demands, a little nervous, from five inches away, wanted to run his hands over his chest, his face, through his hair, twine their fingers together.

Zebra's face was shadowed, but Komatsu thought that Zebra's heavy brows tightened even a little further. "Zebra-san?" he asked, again, hoping that it was nothing, just more of Zebra's bluster or a trick of the light—

Why was Zebra getting out of the bed?

"What are you doing, Zebra-san?" Komatsu blurted out, not able to even think of censoring himself, of thinking things through. Coco would probably sigh at his bluntness, his rudeness, but he knew that even Coco himself didn't really mind. Hopefully Zebra wouldn't either.

"Oh," Zebra said, and leaned backwards, looking surprised. His expression shifted while Komatsu padded across the room, a little gingerly because of the cut in his side, definitely a little swollen and warm, tender with the stress of his day, then climbed into the bed. When Komatsu looked up at him, he was smiling crookedly. There was a lot of mouth to smile, and Komatsu slid closer, until he was nestled up close to the bigger man, no longer balanced awkwardly at the very edge of the bed. He was smiling himself, wider and wider, which he seemed to be doing a lot. It was just that everything felt so right. It all needed an outlet, the emotions filling him up until they were ready to fizz out of him with the same sweet-prickled exuberance of the mellow cola. So running on instincts he didn't know if he should be trusting, he kissed Zebra's throat, low down, where it was closest, and left his lips against the skin, curling into a smile, his breath slow against the other man.

He shivered as Zebra ran a hand down his spine, then wrapped both his arms around him, until Komatsu was almost caged. But that wasn't it all. He felt protected, and resolved to see what he could do to help return the favor. Komatsu couldn't explain the tight need to defend him against people he didn't need defending against, the half-unreasonable anger that had ignited at some point, that people could be afraid of Zebra, could do the things they'd done to him.

It was a little inexplicable, and unreasonable considering everything Zebra had done to other people, but it put an edge of need on the situation nonetheless. Komatsu wrapped his arms around one of Zebra's forearms, curled up around it, let his eyes drift close.

"Good night, kid," Zebra murmured, voice just barely audible to Komatsu's ears, his breath whispering against the side of his face, shivery and intimate. Zebra sounded like he'd been given a precious gift, but Komatsu was too tired to figure out why, or to think about it at all, before he drifted off to sleep.

It was surprisingly automatic for Komatsu to extricate himself from the tangle of Zebra-and-Komatsu they'd formed over the night, surprisingly normal. He felt that maybe there should be something, some revelation or sticking point or edge of discomfort now that Toriko (Toriko!) and Zebra (Zebra, of all people) were kissing him, but it felt too natural. It was simply an extension of their teamwork, of their partnership, of an emotional intimacy that Komatsu had always refused to be ashamed of. Or of his role in the partnership; he felt ridiculous, walking next to Toriko in the middle of a city, just a little bit, his partner's—his physical perfection only exaggerating how Komatsu was short, and otherwise somewhere on the far side of average. Ugly, Sunny had called him. But out in the wilderness, when Toriko was carrying Komatsu across a river full of venomous water cobras, or when Komatsu was cooking dinner for the two of them, then it only felt right. It felt right in the city, too, even if Komatsu wondered what Toriko saw in him. At first, he'd worried that he was holding Toriko back, but those doubts had been outgrown, in the same way that Komatsu no longer worried about dying on their trips, or about Toriko leaving him behind. Things simply—progressed, he guessed. Like a dish cooked over and over, until it reached perfection, or a soup stock simmering down until the flavors melded into something rich, savory.

His thoughts kept him occupied as he washed his face, brushed his teeth, got dressed, the automatic morning movements as he thought about breakfast. Maybe if Toriko and Zebra got something in town while he cooked...

The hallway smelled steamy-sweet when he stepped out of the bathroom, unexpectedly, and when he walked into the kitchen, Zebra was watching pancakes on a griddle like they had personally offended him, and Toriko was eagerly chopping fruit, just a little too enthusiastic.

"Good morning, Toriko-san. Good morning, Zebra-san, I hope I didn't wake you up—"

"Of course you did," Zebra snorted, but he left his pancakes long enough to cross the kitchen and crouch down by Komatsu, burying his face against Komatsu's neck and shoulder, lips meeting skin in something that was not really a kiss, but had Komatsu melting anyway, his hands automatically reaching up to slide through Zebra's hair, down to his back, feeling the flex of muscle—

Toriko came up behind him, and Komatsu leaned against him, trying to keep from blushing too hard because with his height and Toriko's height, it left him at a very awkward (convenient?) spot. But he still turned his head to press a kiss to his hip. Toriko almost bent double to kiss him properly, then, as he moved, and Zebra shifted minutely so Toriko could hug both of them, Komatsu sighing in perfect happiness.

They kept on holding on, though, until Komatsu wiggled experimentally, and they slowly shifted back a little, leaving Komatsu kiss-dizzy and blushing, hair out of place. It didn't help when they kissed each other. He kept on half-expecting jealousy, but there was nothing, just that overwhelming rightness. And a deep, deep appreciation for how Toriko and Zebra looked together, arms straining maybe a little more than was necessary in a kiss, trying to push the other around even now, but the kiss was unexpectedly gentle, in a way that Komatsu understood. It all still felt tender and new, something to grow into—maybe something for Toriko and Zebra to grow into again—something that could bruise too easily if you pushed at it.

"Breakfast is almost ready," Toriko said, smiling, just a little edge to it, the sparkle in his eye that Komatsu mostly associated with a new ingredient being in sight. "Go have a seat." He gave Komatsu an encouraging push in the direction of the table, hands lingering like he didn't want to let go, protective-possessive.

"I could make muffins," Komatsu started, resisting a little, anxious to—

"We're cooking," Toriko told him, fondly. "You've started beating us to the ingredients, so we need to make sure that things stay even." Then he blinked, looking a little surprised at how wide the smile on Komatsu's face was.

For all he'd eaten, for everywhere he'd been, the meals his grandmother had made for him would always be the most delicious, the most fondly remembered, and Komatsu remembered all his meals. He'd been keeping a diary of things eaten since before he'd entered culinary school. His grandma's meals had been far from gourmet cooking, had used pretty ordinary ingredients, although she'd experimented a lot, for a traditional cook who'd learned from a long line of the same. Really, it was the sort of food that Toriko and Zebra would eat only out of necessity, food that Sunny would turn his nose up at, but Komatsu didn't care. The meals of his childhood, cooked when his grandma had come home to babysit Komatsu—an only child at the time—and cooked just for him. He'd been able to help, had gotten to choose the menu. The food was no less amazing to him now that his palate had changed, been educated and broadened, matured, because the memory was still there and because his grandma would always be the best cook he had ever known, on some instinctual level that was half-emotional.

Cooking could be an act of love.

Zebra dropped Komatsu's plate in front of him, and sat to his right; Toriko wedged himself in to the right. They both had a lot more food than Komatsu, but still not enough. They could always go out after breakfast. Or maybe they'd let him cook. Maybe Komatsu would make them let him cook; he might be able to convince them, today. He smiled as he lifted the first bite of food to his mouth, sighing happily as he chewed, swallowed; it satisfied some hunger Komatsu hadn't even been aware of.

Toriko and Zebra weren't sweet elderly ladies not senile but starting to go soft, sleepy and forgetful around the edges, drifting through their last years. If anything, they were the opposite, but the last time Komatsu had had someone cook like this for him, it had been his grandmother. Cook for him just because, care for him this deeply. ...It was thankfully not as platonic as his grandmother's love had been, because Toriko's hand was sliding up and down his thigh in a way that couldn't help but give Komatsu ideas, and Zebra was eying him like he was something delicious.

"Thank you," he said, trying to make them understand as best as he could when words were failing him, and ate a bite of pancake, took a drink of coffee, his smile glowing as bright as the sun rising outside.

"You're welcome, Komatsu," Toriko told him, and shifted a little closer as Zebra wordlessly agreed. "You always are."

-End-