#vivilu

She'd regretted it immediately. Those were the first words out of her mouth. That she'd regretted letting her head win out over her heart and the time she wasted in Alabasta when she could have been with her crew. So she'd come back to them with the help of Crocodile— a man she seemed much closer to now that he wasn't trying to overthrow her father's country.

A whole lot closer. Especially if he'd given her a snail to hold onto 'in case of emergency'.

"Well…" Vivi rubbed her neck with a duck of her head. "I know we didn't keep one on the ship for security reasons, Captain. And Crocodile, he'd given it to me because, well…you know how things are between us now, yeah? He was worried 'just in case'. And it's a pretty secure one, but I was worried you might want me to get rid of it."

She glanced off to the side. "And I'd feel really terrible if he called for help, or to warn me about something and I didn't answer." 

You know how things are between us.

Luffy wasn't sure if he did or didn't know. He had his suspicions. He was pretty sure that over the two years that Vivi had spent with Crocodile that they'd gotten close in a way that people might describe as romantic— intimate.

Luffy understood theoretically at least that people could like each other's company and not be physically or romantically close with one another but it wasn't really something that entered his own world view.

And he knew Vivi well. They were close like that. The whole crew was. So he knew the way that Vivi acted around people she was close to that way. And he'd seen the way Crocodile's hand lingered on Vivi's face when they said goodbye.

"If he called for help, you'd want us to rush to his rescue, huh?" He leaned toward, feeling the distance between them as they sat on opposite couches.

Vivi's head snapped up. Her pale blue hair always seemed to shimmer now, at least with quick motions like that. Starlight trapped in her hair and her eyes as she put her hand to her chest. 

"Of course I would, Luffy! I'd bank on every ounce of goodwill I have with the crew to convince you to go…I…" She flushed. He could see the way her dark cheeks tinted redder, and her body language jumped on high alert. She meant it, the way her shoulders squared as she leaned towards him. "After everything he'd done for me during my trip to rejoin my crew, our crew, I— I couldn't forgive myself if I los–if I didn't help him." 

Crocodile had saved Luffy's life at Marineford. Once that he'd been conscious for, and a second time, Jinbe had told him, after Ace had died and Luffy's spark had temporarily gone out. 

Luffy hadn't asked to be saved either time, but some people might say that he owed Crocodile his life.

Luffy thought about it for a moment. He didn't hate Crocodile.

He HAD hated Crocodile for a while, back in Alabasta, when he was making his friend Vivi's life miserable, and seemed to have done a lot to make other people miserable as well.

But Crocodile had saved his life, twice.

He'd gone out of his way to help Vivi too.

So what was this dark feeling lurching in his stomach?

"You know. You were kinda on Croco's crew a lot longer than you were on our crew, huh, Vivi?"

Oh.

Oh yeah he was pretty sure that was jealousy.

Vivi blinked, her fingers winding through the long strands of her hair as she twisted it in a spiral around the palm of her hand.

"I guess I was huh?" she said with a quiet laugh. "They made a lot of jokes about 'Miss Wednesday' coming back and everything while we were sailing together."

She looked up to meet his eyes with a small smile. "Funny how that turned out, huh? I thought it was just going to be until I got my Devil Fruit, but then I found out you guys were all separated for a while and I stuck with them until I knew I was able to catch back up." She fell silent for a moment before she murmured again. "Still kicking myself for not just leaving with you to begin with, Captain." 

"Sometimes I feel like I should kick your ass about it, you know." Luffy didn't like feeling jealous. He didn't like it when other people were jealous of him, after all. But how was it fair that after everything that Vivi was off having adventures for two whole years with Croco and his crew while they were all split up?

Luffy had had Hancock during that time, and he was glad for that, but it was frustrating to think about this and he knew himself well enough to know that his frustration often turned into anger before it burned out.

Vivi and Crocodile had spent so long together and gotten so close that he had given her a secret transponder snail, and she hadn't told him about it. Wasn't Luffy supposed to be her captain?

Vivi's brow furrowed a little as she held up her hands. 

"Sometimes I want kick my own ass about it, Captain. I've been spending two years trying to make up for— for one stupid, weak-hearted decision." Her shoulders shook a little as she gave him a tight smile. "I'm still trying to make up for it." 

Luffy squirmed on the couch, kicking his feet and pulling his arms across his chest. He didn't want to be mad at Vivi. He didn't want to feel like that.

"It was pretty stupid, Vivi. It made me really sad." He took a deep breath, squirming again. "Come sit with me."

Vivi blinked quickly, maybe to clear her eyes, before she vanished into liquid starlight again and drifted over in a waving arc of shining darkness to pool again beside him. At first she was cool, but quickly the 'pinpricks of light' seemed to warm the area just beside him as she resolidified into her human form quite close to him.

"It made me really sad too, Captain. You know I cried that whole night? And— and for a good portion of the next day. And on and off for weeks after." She murmured to him. "My father thought I was decompressing from 'the trauma of infiltrating Baroque Works', but, that wasn't true. I just missed you and the crew. More than I could stand." 

-

When Vivi came and sat with Luffy he immediately pulled her tightly to his body, wrapping his arms more than once around her as he sometimes did with people when he was feeling especially clingy. He rested his chin on her shoulder, his face next to her.

"You cried that much?"

She could tell he was feeling hurt. She'd known him for a long time, even if she'd been with Crocodile's crew— 'Neo-Baroque Works'--- for a much longer time than she'd been with the Straw Hats.

Her refusal to come with them that first time had really hurt him. She remembered keenly that fight they'd had over it, and the promises that they'd always be a crew no matter what happened. But in the end she'd failed them and failed herself.

She'd chosen the pressure of the country on her shoulders over the people she'd grown to love as her crew— her people. When she'd watched them sail away, she'd cried until her eyes had gotten too swollen and red to see. She'd cried until bruises formed and servants fretted that 'a princess can't be seen in such a state'.

She'd cried until the final straw had been long since laid upon her creaking sense of duty and propriety when her father tried to urge her to marry once more and take firmer control of the monarchy.

Vivi had spent two years making up for the worst mistake of her life. A mistake that was still hurting her captain even now with the way he clung-– the way he seemed to jealously cling tight. And not to mention his frustration with her secret.

She wasn't even sure he knew Crocodile and her had become lovers, love blooming between them as he retrieved a rare and powerful devil fruit to make up for his own mistakes.

She bit her lip, nuzzled the side of her face against the top of his head.

"Yeah. I did. I cried so much that my handmaidens had to order a special makeup just to cover the bruises." 

He squeezed her so tightly it almost hurt, like he was afraid that she was going to disappear.

"That's stupid… I'm sorry your face got hurt though." Luffy was quiet for a moment, but not long enough for her to answer before he spoke again. "I never asked about your time with Croco when you came back to the crew. I was just glad you were back."

"Isn't it dumb? Heh, I couldn't make any public appearances till they got it." her arm looped around him in return and squeezed him tighter.

She wanted to reassure him. Was he scared she was going to leave? Maybe he was afraid she was going to leave to go back to Crocodile's crew. Scared she was going to leave to join them in what turned into that Cross Guild outfit with the swordsman and clown.

Her arms tightened around him as if to say 'I'm still right here'.

"I figured you didn't want to know because you were still upset with him, Luffy," she murmured. "So I wasn't going to raise the issue until you asked. But, you didn't, so I kept it quiet. The snail was…well…part of that I guess." 

"I guess. I don't like secrets…" he murmured back to her. 

Honesty amongst the crew—a core tenant of the Straw Hats since the days she'd first sailed with them. It wasn't exactly something she'd meant to keep secret for long. But the longer she hadn't been asked what happened, the more she'd worried Luffy still held a grudge, and the longer she stalled telling him of the transponder. And with how crazy everything had been lately, through Whole Cake and Wano, and all the horrifying little stops in between, it'd fallen straight out of her mind.

"I know, Luffy. I'm…I'm really sorry for keeping this one from you. I am." she squeezed him tight before resting her cheek against the top of his head again. 

He paused and took a deep breath, nuzzling against her cheek. "Croco saved my life at Marineford."

"He'd mentioned that, a little. Never in detail, but one time when we were talking about getting me back to the crew. I'd—I'd asked him how you were the last time he'd seen you. And he told me a bit about the end of things at Marineford." 

"Did he talk about it?" Luffy asked, nuzzling her. His tight squeeze had lessened just enough to let her breathe more easily. "Did he ever say why he did it?"

Vivi squeezed him tighter in response, even as she caught her breath. 

"Not much, he's—tight lipped about a lot of things, Luffy. Even when you love him, even if he loves you—he doesn't always say what he really feels. The most he ever said about why was that you impressed him—and that you reminded him of himself when he was a younger man."

Before Whitebeard had stripped the spark from him. The thing was, Vivi agreed with him. Getting to know Crocodile and especially getting to know his past, she'd noticed it too. All the various and surprising ways the two men were alike.

Maybe that was one of the reasons she loved them both. One of the many. 

"I reminded him of him," Luffy muttered. He nuzzled her again. "You said love— do you love him, Vivi?"

Most of the tight anger that had been gathering in Luffy's voice when they were on separate couches had drained out, replaced by a more usual sullen petulance, and some curiosity.

Her fingers teased through his hair as she shifted a bit more firmly against him with a flustered and musical laugh. "...w-well." 

There were no secrets on the Straw Hat crew.

She'd already broken that one once, and she wasn't about to do it again. 

"Yeah. I do, Luffy. He and I got very close while we sailed together. I'd kind of—well. I found out his original plan in Alabasta involved marrying me, did you know that? Convincing me that my father's pacifism was going to doom the country and marrying me!" She shook her head against him. "But somewhere in there he charmed me, I guess. Or I charmed him." 

Luffy looked at her with his big, dark eyes, intense, and probing, full of fascination— almost like he was staring at an interesting bug.

"Oh."

There were lots of 'I love yous' between the Straw Hat crew. Some were more open, and some more shy and whispered. But Vivi had been around the crew long enough to hear it said pretty much from every member of the crew to every other one. Luffy certainly wasn't shy about it. He'd said it to her, even.

She'd even said it back. To everyone who'd murmured it at her. She'd meant every word. To Luffy, To Nami, to each of them in turn. And to Crocodile too. 

"What's Crocodile like? Is he really like me?"

Vivi's fingers traced over the side of his face, down his cheek as she stared back at him with a tilt of her head , her hair pooling over them both as she hummed.

"He's a lot like you, honestly. Especially now that you've helped him get his fire back. It's one of the reasons I love him, actually."

She poked his nose playfully with a widening of her smile. 

"Because of the things he had in common with my beloved Captain. Heh. Alabasta was—well. It was maybe his lowest point in a long while. He's determined—passionate and driven when it comes to what he wants. Protective of his men, his crew. Probably why he kept them at arm's length in Alabasta—"

She closed her eyes a moment with a smile. "He's a gentleman, with a rougher edge to him that he's never sanded away. He latches onto things like you do. If he decides to do something, he-– by hell or highwater, he does it. Especially if it's for someone he's attached to. He attaches easily, but don't tell him I told you that. He's surprisingly tender, caring too." 

She felt Luffy rest his head on her shoulder, and nuzzle her. "You make him sound nice. Maybe we can all have a drink together sometime."

The last of the anger and tension had gone out of Luffy's voice.

Vivi scooped him closer , nuzzling back against him with a quiet and happy sigh. She understood, she was pretty sure, exactly what this was all about.

And she was glad to reassure him. 

"Maybe we can, Luffy! Oh he'd love that…I'd love it too. We can share all kinds of stories, together. Maybe at the Uta concert, huh?" She opened her eyes enough to glance down at him with a smile. "Love you, Captain Luffy."