1. Restaurant of Dreams (1/2)
the seventh guest
by kurokame
in the second age of the pirates, there is a restaurant sailing the grand line and the four oceans. it is known as the sagatie, famous for the first-class chefs working there. for one man, it is also a symbol for a dream coming true. but when a man finally reaches his life-long dream, what else is there for him to long for?
disclaimer: i don't own one piece or any of the characters; i'm just playing with them for fun.
akatani kaji and the non-oda-ish characters are my own creations, please do not use without permission (not that i think anyone would want to, but just in case...)
the eastern ocean lay almost perfectly still as the sun slowly moved across the sky towards the horizon. even as the skies shifted color from
ight blue to a fiery red, one particular place in the middle of the ocean was as busy as if night was nowhere near falling. ships and boats of all sizes had been flocking to sagatie, the carp-shaped sea restaurant, since the
eak of dawn, and very few seemed to be planning on leaving before sunset.
a loud crash suddenly disturbed the calm that had settled over the area, echoing over the ocean as the restaurant shook violently. fainter crashes and thumps followed, accompanied by cheering and applauses before the large double-doors on the portside were shattered as a man was flung out from the restaurant out onto the outer terrace deck to which the many ships were moored.
the man skidded over the deck and came to a stop somewhere near the middle. he moaned lightly as he slowly crawled to his feet while staring back towards the restaurant. one hand moved up to his
uised and bleeding face to sweep some stray locks of red hair out of his slanted eyes while the other searched along his sash for a weapon that wasn't there. he took a deep, trembling
eath as he glared at the one responsible for his injuries. akatani kaji was a well-known lone pirate, only eighteen and already with a bounty of 50 million belli on his head. there was no way some low-life cook was going to make a fool out of him that easy.
in the doorway to the restaurant stood a middle-aged man with graying mint green hair and a steel grey beard, his muscular, tattooed arms folded across his chest. the man's already ugly features didn't improve as his face was twisted into an expression of outmost annoyance.
"and stay out!" he said gruffly, waving a fist the size of a cannonball at the young pirate.
"pati …"
the calm voice caused kaji and the older man to look up towards the second floor of the ship, where a lanky blond man dressed in a black suit was leaning against the ornamented railing with his back turned against them, a cigarette casually hanging from the corner of his mouth.
"you're not kicking out a hungry customer again, are you, pati?" the blond man asked, idly puffing out rings of smoke, almost as if he had no real interest in having the conversation. "you're being awfully noisy."
"that's no customer, and he sure ain't hungry," the green-haired man named pati growled, thrusting his thumb towards the young pirate on the terrace. "he has no money to pay for all the food he just ate."
at first, the man on the second floor didn't seem to have heard the accusations aimed at kaji, because he didn't reply or even turn around. then he tapped the ashes off his cigarette and put out the last embers by rubbing it against the railing before he turned to look down at the men below him. he stuck his hand into the inner pocket of his suit jacket and withdrew a small, black leather bag in which he deposited what was left of his cigarette. sliding the bag back into his jacket, he put his hands in the pockets of his pants and made a leap over the railing down to the lower deck. he landed as silent and softly as a cat on the deck next to pati, turning to look directly at kaji as he slowly started walking out onto the outer deck.
the young pirate straightened his back as much as he could without wincing from the pain in his
uised ribs, watching the suit-clad man warily. he found the blond man's calm and clean-cut appearance unnerving. what could a man with that kind of air about him possibly be doing aboard a ship with
utes like that 'pati'-character? still, in the back of his mind, kaji knew that he had seen the man before.
the blond hair framing the pointy face while covering most of its left side; the sharp look in the almost half-shut eyes; the thin beard
istle along the line of his jaw and the strange, curled eye
ows lead kaji's thoughts to a wanted-poster he had seen when he was younger. but this man couldn't possibly be the person on the poster – why would the marines put a bounty of 697 million belli on a seemingly harmless man?
suddenly, kaji was thrown to the deck, an excruciating pain in his ribs spreading to the rest of his torso. the world spun before his eyes as he curled up on the deck, carefully lifting his head to see what had happened. in front of him stood the suit-clad man, one leg still lifted from the deck after delivering a bone-shattering kick to kaji's body. his face was still carrying the same calm, almost bored expression from before, but the glare in the only visible eye seemed to be able to pierce through steel.
"don't think that i don't know who you are and how much you're worth, you shitty little eggplant," the blond man said with an eerily calm voice. "but not even the king of pirates would eat for free in my restaurant. now get the hell away from my ship if you don't want me to kick you all the way to whatever little island you came from."