The Ace Up His Coat Sleeve
“I suppose this is when we get Ranpo to come and use his ultra deduction to sort all of this,” Sanji said. The only reason he’d bothered to nod in agreement (as he and many of his peers had the tendency to do) was because he expected that it would be a problem for Ranpo.
“Have you not checked the group chat?” Nekozawa pulled out his phone, the iPhone that hadn’t even been released yet - it was the envy of the common room - and scrolled. He shoved his phone into Sanji’s face.
The photo, which had been taken that same day, showed Kenji in the forefront with a straw hat (Kid Luffy glowered in jealousy in the corner), L squatting with a handful of soil (sans-Death Note), and Ranpo watching over L’s shoulder, eyes screwed shut in concentration. It was clearly a very poorly taken selfie.
Sanji cursed. He had forgotten that Ranpo had briefly left the university to join L at Kenji’s farm, in the hopes that together they could save it from ruin. The farm and subsequently Kenji’s family had been struggling since the day Pokkle caused a famine by replacing the seeds with pebbles and it had never recovered. Sanji hadn’t banked on actively having to do anything for Chopper. He cared - but not THAT much. After all, the students had a lot of syllabus to catch up on after their stint in Knottingham - that commoner Heine was a grossly incompetent teacher, what with actual lessons.
Naruto leant over the bed, staring down at Chopper. “Don’t deer legs grow back?”
Sakura slapped the back of his head, “No, baka-chan, that’s only with spiders!”
Sanji snorted behind his fist, it was clear why him and the smarter students were doing astronomy and all the dumbasses were doing porn studies.
Dazai clicked his fingers, “Yo, Sano! Yosano just turned that steak into Kunikida, surely she could grow Chopper’s legs back!”
Yosano scoffed at the statement. “I am a skilled DOCTOR! How dare you mistake me for a lowly vet, ASSUME i know anything about that one-legged quadurapedal Cervidae! My power is to save HOOMANs and steaks, not antelopes. Nor cows. Nor fish. And certainly not this beast, Chopper.”
Chopper whinnied from his bed.
“What do we do,” Kyoya pushed his glasses up his nose, “Chopper is the medical wing doctor-slash-vet, we don’t have anyone else to treat him. And that’s even if we get the leg back.”
“If we fail to, we could always have Mustang cauterize the wound using his lightning alchemy.”
Fukazawa remained blank-faced, “You do understand how painful this will be for Chopper.”
“If we have no other option,” Yosano shrugged, “I’d like to see Mustang’s acclaimed medical lightening alchemy at work first-hand.”
“Let’s try not to get to that point,” Atsushi winced. “For now we should focus on getting the leg back, and leave the reattaching till the time comes. Who do we think would take the leg?”
“Clearly it was Ace, he was the one that ate them before!” Kaoru barked aggressively. His brother nodded in agreement.
“Twas not me!” said a voice, far away from the group but clearly in the room..
“Where did that voice come from?” Mori asked, spooked. He pulled Honey closer towards him.
“IS OXBRIDGE HAUNTED???” Tamaki turned to Nekozawa, both distraught and accusatory, face pinched (attractively). “WHY WOULDN’T YOU TELL US, GHOST-CHAN!!”
“Tis I! That boy, that sexi sexi boi” at that the curtain for the bed next to them was pulled sexily aside, revealing that shirtless man we all know and love. He wore his classic board shorts, shark-tooth necklace laying between his collar bones. He had been holding a selection of coats, arms spread outwards in a T-pose with all of the clothing draped over his muscled, toned, tanned limbs. The coats very carefully left his chest bare for everyone’s viewing pleasure. And view it with pleasure they did.
“ThIEF!” Atsushi had had his coat stolen once, to be threatened by the exact same thing all over again made his stomach churn. “I DEMAND YEE, SEXI SIR-CHAN, TO RETURN MY JACKET!”
“Potato?” Chopper brayed from the bed.
“So twas it you or not, since you also claimed tis you.” Kyoya asked sullenly.
“Yes,” Ace said.
“Yes you didn’t, or yes you did?” Dazai asked brazenly.
“Yes, why would I lie to you?” Ace replied sexily.
“For Pokkle’s sake, just answer the question! Where is Chopper’s leg?” Kunikida cried. “No-one even cares that my skin melted off, why are you bothered with -”
Yosano smothered Kunikida with a pillow, killing him. He instantly came back to life as per Yosano’s power. From that moment he decided to stay very quiet.
“Right there,” Ace pointed to the hospital bed, an armful of jackets falling to the floor. He pulled his other hand free and bagan munching on a slab of meat.
He was, of course, pointing towards Chopper’s remaining leg.
Nekozawa’s new iPhone pinged. Ranpo had sent a message to the group chat. Sometimes his messages were quite indecipherable, because ofc he sent them with his eyes shut and Fukazawa had recently upgraded him to a larger phone so he was quite a fool when it came to pressing on the correct letters, but this time it seemed as if he had made a keen effort to open his eyes or perhaps have someone proof-read.
“It’s not Ace, he’s only eating Inosuke’s new bacon special, bacon with two sides of bacon,” Nekozawa read aloud.
“Ask him who did it! Ask him goddamnit!!” Sanji shouted - when Nekozawa was too slow to move, Sanji lept towards him and wrestled him for his mobile. “GIVE IT TO MEEEE,” he yelled.
Sanji pressed to call Ranpo. “No WIFI,” the phone read.
Sanji screamed into his fists, knees falling to the floor. “Please. Please, no. No. Don’t - don’t make me! I can’t - I - I -” just the thought of having to do anything himself for the desperate weasel that was Chopper was vomit-inducing, painful. “Fukazawa,” Sanji’s breaths were laboured, “Please improve the WIFI provider, I can't take this madness.”
“I’ll call them,” Fukazawa pulled out his phone.
“Hello, this is Silva from Vodaphone, please state your query.”
“We need better WiFi at Oxbridge University. My students won’t stop bitching, I think they’re struggling to play flappy bird without it.”
“The prestigious University, Oxbridge University?” Silva said boredly.
“In Ace’s words, yes.”
“Unfortunately you have not been making payments toward your wifi, we had been promised weekly visits to the oxbridge brothels but they were shut down ever since your bad inspection.”
“Oh no – my parents died – the brothels have been empty!” Fukazawa cried.
“We don’t have time for customers that can’t pay. My only suggestion is to bring your parents back.” Silva hung up.
Meanwhile, “But if it wasn't Ace, then who was it?!?” Zoro cried.
Everyone stroked their chin and nodded thoughtfully, for they were also at a loss.