He was close to a breakthrough. He could feel it in his bones, in his fingers, maybe even in his abnormally long nose that people kept making fun of him for. But they wouldn't make fun of him anymore when he was done with this. When he finally managed to finish his project and publish his findings no one would be laughing at him anymore, be it for his nose or for his theories.

He was really close to that breakthrough.

… And he had been for the last three? Four days, maybe? He'd lost count and he hadn't slept and he was sort of aware of a weird smell in the flat that may or may not have been an abandoned experiment and had then turned out to be himself. He'd misplaced his inkwell at some point and started crying over it, until he'd found it at the top of one of his bookshelves and he could for the life of him not remember putting it there.

He knew he was sleep deprived and he should probably bathe and try to make some effort to become a real human being again. But he felt that if he did that he'd lose this feeling of being close to a breakthrough, maybe miss the entire breakthrough itself and didn't that mean resigning himself to mediocrity his entire life when he could've had so much more? Could've been so much more?

Thing was, he hadn't actually achieved said breakthrough yet, even if the feeling of having it on the tip of his tongue was so persistent.

He kept staring at his notes, at his previous sketches of the table and they just all didn't look quite right but why? Why didn't it mesh? He felt that the answer couldn't be so difficult, not when the breakthrough was lurking right around the corner, so there had to be something he was missing and maybe it was staring him in the face, or maybe it was just trying to from one of the many piles of parchment and paper littering his desk, floor, bookshelves and pretty much any surface in the room. Maybe he should look through the stuff on his floor again maybe the answer was there…

A loud crash interrupted Usopp from his musings and he fell backwards from his chair with an undignified yelp. As he climbed back up and peered over his chair he saw a man enter his flat. Tall blonde in a nicely tailored suit that didn't quite match the fact that he'd just kicked Usopp's door in.

"Please don't steal my research!", Usopp wailed, throwing his hands up in surrender. "It's very important and irreplaceable and I'm trying to revolutionize chemistry here! Oh and please don't kill me, I'm trying to revolutionize chemistry! I have some money… I think… somewhere… take that, just don't destroy my lab!"

"Looks like someone already destroyed it", the would be robber said, raising an unimpressed eyebrow. That in itself was quite impressive, because it had a swirl on its end. Did the other one look like that, too? It wasn't visible with a flop of hair in the way.

"No, this is how it's supposed to be, that's just my system", Usopp declared, disregarding the fact that he'd stopped following the original system around two days ago when he'd gotten so frustrated that he just threw a bunch of papers around the room and then that had felt so cathartic he'd just kept going.

"Quite some system", the man said, putting something he'd been carrying - was that a tray? - down and and taking a drag from the cigarette that had been dangling from the corner of his mouth.

"Well there's not really anything worthy of robbing me for", Usopp said. "Except for my research, but please don't."

"You know, if I really was here to rob you, telling me what's the most valuable thing you have might not be the best strategy", the guy commented.

"Aren't you here to rob me?"

"No, as a matter of fact I'm not."

"But then why did you kick my door down? And who are you anyway?" Feeling a little more at ease with the assurance that he wasn't about to be robbed Usopp got up from his position sprawled behind his chair and looked at the guy head on.

"I've been knocking on your door for five minutes! There was no reaction at all! Your landlady said you hadn't come out in days and she was worried you hadn't been eating so she sent me to get you some food", the guy waved at the thing he'd put on one of Usopp's tables that turned out to be a tray with a large cover on closer inspection.

"When no one answered my knocking for this long I decided to look in to make sure you weren't a smelly corpse by now or something. Turns out, smelly yes, corpse not quite." The man looked Usopp up and down and didn't seem too impressed with the scientist's appearance. Usopp followed his gaze self consciously, taking in his own messed up morning robe he'd put on several days ago. Sitting in this room for so long he was pretty much desensitized to any smell, but he didn't doubt that assessment.

"Miss Kaya was concerned for me?", Usopp asked.

"Yes, she's a lovely lady with a big heart for others", the guy declared with hearts in his visible eye.

"And… who are you then?", Usopp wanted to know.

"The name's Sanji, I work at the Baratie, that's the restaurant down the street. And I take it that you're Usopp, then."

"Yes, nice to meet you. You know, ignoring the fact that you killed my door", Usopp said, holding out his hand. Sanji eyed it disdainfully for a moment and didn't take it.

"Well, anyway, Miss Kaya said you tend to get caught up in your work and forget to take care of yourself, and looking at you now I have no trouble believing that. When's the last time you ate anything?"

"Uh… before I went to bed the last time I slept", Usopp recalled.

"And when was that?"

"On the… 25th… 24th maybe? What day is today?"

"The 30th. Miss Kaya was right to be concerned about you, then. Well I brought food, so eat."

"Well that's very kind of you but I'm kind of in the middle of something right now, I'll eat later…" Usopp said, sitting back down at his desk.

"Did that sound like a suggestion? Because it was not a suggestion", Sanji declared, and in one swift move shoved all the papers from Usopp's desk and replaced them with the tray he'd brought.

"Oi, those were sorted!", Usopp protested.

"Oh really? Well when you sort them again maybe it'll give you an opportunity to see your work in a fresh light", Sanji suggested breezily. He removed the cover, revealing a plate of soup and some break and shoved a spoon into Usopp's hand. "Now, eat!" He had a scary look on his face as he said that, and Usopp would've been scared about being robbed again if the absolutely heavenly smell of the soup hadn't been so distracting.

"Do you work for deliveries at the restaurant or something?", Usopp wanted to know as he scooped a spoonful of the soup and blew on it.

"No, I'm a chef, I just came here as a curtesy to Miss Kaya", Sanji explained. "I made that."

Usopp really had every intention to apologize for his mistake, but when the soup hit his taste buds he forgot about absolutely everything else. It tasted even better than it smelled and he had never ever eaten anything that was even remotely comparable to this. And starting to eat he noticed how hungry he was, his stomach suddenly craving it in full force.

"Not too quickly", Sanji stopped him when he started to shovel the soup in his mouth at record speed.

"You made this?" Usopp asked, taking a bite from the bread which was crunchy and fresh and just as amazing as the soup it accompanied.

"Yes, I just said so."

"Are you an angel?", Usopp asked in all seriousness and Sanji's eye widened at the question. There was a slight blush on his cheeks as he answered.

"I thought scientist types don't believe in the spiritual."

"Well I didn't up until I tasted this! But now…"

"I see what Miss Kaya meant about you having a way with words now. Just eat your soup." Usopp decided he liked the embarrassed look on the cook's face. And he definitely meant all the praise.

Sanji stopped him several times from eating too fast, but even so Usopp finished his meal in record time.

"Good, now you're going to take a bath, because you're probably going to make your own nose wither and fall off if you don't and afterwards you're going to get a good night's sleep, understand?", Sanji instructed, leaning down to where Usopp was sitting and collecting his tray.

"But my work…"

"Will still be there tomorrow. You're not going to accomplish anything when you're five days sleep deprived anyway, I'm sure you'll get a better perspective on things tomorrow."

"But I feel like I'm going to have a breakthrough…"

"Breakdown more likely. Taking care of yourself also takes care of your brain, and I hear you need that sort of thing in your work, don't you?", Sanji asked. "Promise me you'll do those things?"

And for some reason as Usopp was looking into the very blue eye staring imploringly at him he didn't find it in himself to protest anymore. He had a feeling the blond was right. There would still be time to be a genius later. And for some reason after having eaten this soup the wall separating him from his breakthrough didn't seem so dense anymore, like he didn't actually have to force through it to get it.

"I promise", he conceded. "How much do I owe you for the soup?"

"This one's on the house. Feel free to come by the restaurant anytime and get more!", Sanji said with a grin. "Good luck with revolutionizing chemistry!"

Usopp had kind of expected the soup delivery to be a one time only thing, but as it turned out he wasn't quite at his breakthrough yet and forgetting to take care of himself was a habit that was hard to break for him apparently, when he was in the middle of revolutionizing chemistry.

So he'd been very surprised when Sanji had been there with another tray of food two days later grumbling about shitty scientists not eating. He'd been less and less surprised when he'd shown up the following days. Usopp had never eaten this well in his life so he hadn't even thought of complaining when this became a daily occurrence.

And not only was the food great, he also found himself enjoying the company. For a cursing guy that had made his first impression on Usopp by kicking his door down, Sanji was surprisingly nice and easy to talk to. He had this oddly pleased look on his face whenever Usopp was eating and visibly enjoying the food being brought and liked just sitting around the lab while Usopp ate. He'd even started tidying the place a bit, not believing Usopp's claim of a system in any way.

Usopp had a feeling Miss Kaya hadn't asked the cook to come by daily, but he wasn't going to comment on it. Having contact with people again instead of just holing himself up in his study was refreshing. And it was probably the reason for the fluttery feeling he got in his stomach when there was a knock on his slightly bent door, right?

Every time Usopp has asked about paying Sanji had waved him off, saying it was leftovers anyway and feeding the food to some shitty chemist was better than throwing it away.

"So what are you working on, anyway?", Sanji asked curiously on one of those evenings as he looked through some of the papers he'd gotten off the desk.

"Oh, you're interested in science?", Usopp asked, slightly surprised. He was always surprised when someone showed an interest in his work, because most people he talked to about it got glazed over eyes and a bored expression at some point in the conversation. It had gotten to the point that he'd stopped talking about it to people because it just made him feel bad after a while to have his interests dismissed so frequently.

"Well I don't really know much about it, but if you spend so much time with it, it has to be worthwile, doesn't it?", Sanji explained.

"Well you know how in chemistry there are different elements? Like iron or sulphur or oxygen?", Usopp asked. Maybe if he made his explanation short and concise enough he wouldn't bore his friend too much. And having someone be interested in his work other than his colleagues who didn't take him as seriously as they should, anyway, would be a nice thing for Usopp's ego. Maybe Sanji would admire him when he realized how smart he was at stuff that didn't involve remembering to eat at regular times.

"Yeah, I suppose…" Sanji said somewhat doubtfully.

"Well we know things about them, and sometimes people even find new ones, but we don't really have a good system for classifying them. We know how they act and interact with each other and even what they weigh, but it's all an unsorted mess and I'm trying to come up with a system to sort them", Usopp explained.

"Oh, and how are you sorting them, then?"

"Well look here", Usopp said and took out one of the many sketches he had of his system. "It's a table, I sort them by weight, going up, and there's eight groups, based on how they act, like how they react with others and stuff like that."

"Interesting. But then what are you still working on so much? This looks like it's done already", Sanji noted, looking at the sketch with interest.

"Well look here", Usopp explained, pointing at several spots in his chart. "There are gaps in here. It doesn't quite fit and I'm not sure how to rearrange it to make it work."

"Why rearrange it at all, then?"

"What?"

"Just leave it that way", Sanji suggested.

"I can't publish it with gaps, people would laugh at me", Usopp said. It was a ridiculous idea, putting out work that wasn't done yet. He'd get even more crap from his peers for that than he was used to.

"But if you rearrange it doesn't that mess up your groups? Maybe there's still some that haven't been found yet. You just said people are still finding new ones. If your system is right shouldn't those fit into the groups, too? Maybe they're right where you're missing some."

"That's…" Usopp scoffed. What a preposterous idea, leaving gaps in the system. "You should leave the science to the smart people, you obviously don't understand what you're talking about. I'm not gonna publish something that's not done, that's ridiculous."

"The smart people? Like you, the guy hasn't worn matching socks ever in the time I've known you?", Sanji challenged.

"So maybe I'm not that great at mundane things, but when it comes to chemistry I do know what I'm doing, and you should respect that. I didn't spend years of my life at university just to have some cook tell me how I should do my job."

"Some cook?", Sanji repeated and there was something in his tone that Usopp probably should've picked up on, but he just couldn't stop thinking about that absolutely dumb idea of leaving gaps, and how people would react if he did that.

"Not everyone can be smart, don't worry about it", Usopp said distractedly. "Just stick to your cooking things, and don't try to butt in on matters you have no understanding of, that way no one will laugh at you."

"Sorry I didn't realize I'm just some servant who's not elite enough to talk you about things." Usopp didn't hear the venom in his voice, because his attention had already gone back to his draft, looking at the table and where the gaps where, and rearranging had never really made much sense, because it would group elements together that didn't fit, and he'd been trying to shuffle them around…

A hand in front of his face interrupted his musings.

"You still owe me money for the meal. I have a business to run." Something was out of place about that statement, but the long nosed scientist didn't have any capacity to process it, not now when the feeling of being close to a breakthrough had come back with a vengeance, stronger than ever and it was demanding every bit of his brain power.

"Uh…", he managed to stammer out. "Money's on the table over there take whatever you need."

He really couldn't publish the system with gaps, not like that, but what if… what if there were elements to fill them, what would they look like? How would they act? Maybe if he wrote about what might be there, it wouldn't be like leaving it open, maybe…?

There was a slamming of the door and Usopp looked up briefly, but felt a bit disoriented when he couldn't really remember why the door would be slamming at all,

The moment passed and he just looked back at his draft, too caught up in his contemplations to think about any social cues he might've missed.

The soup had turned out really well, today. As Sanji tasted it he had to suppress a groan of satisfaction at his own work. It wouldn't look too professional after all and Zeff would mock him for it.

Usopp would praise it to high heavens…

Ugh.

There he was thinking about the shitty chemist again. It had been over a week since he'd realized what the long nosed guy really thought of him and dammit if it didn't still sting.

Maybe he was being childish about the whole thing. He hadn't gone back to the guys' place in over a week. After two days he'd realized the scientist would probably be starving himself again and had bullied Patty into going over there and banging on the door yelling at the guy to eat something every day.

He knew he wasn't as smart as a studied chemist. Of course he wasn't. He hadn't gone to a university, he didn't really understand how elements worked or understood chemistry beyond how to fry meat. So he shouldn't really be angry at Usopp about thinking he was stupid. It wasn't like he was really wrong, after all.

But then he didn't have to spend his free time with someone who thought so little of him, either. He'd mostly gone back there after Miss Kaya's initial request because he'd been worried the guy would actually starve and letting someone starve when he could do something about it was not his style. Even if the problem was never that the guy had no access to food, he was just too dumb to think of eating. Was self inflicted starvation really worthy of his pity?

Didn't stop him from going back though, and after the guy had learned to bathe on a regular basis he was actually quite pleasant to be around, and maybe Sanji had enjoyed his company a little, so he'd gone back.

He absolutely didn't miss the shitty scientist. Not at all. Nope.

So he should really stop filling some of his newly made soup into the bowl he would've taken to Usopp's place were he going there.

"Hey eggplant, guy outside asked me to give this to you", Zeff said suddenly slamming a bunch of papers down on the counter.

"What is that?"

"Dunno, ask the guy with the weird nose", Zeff said dismissively, already limping away on his peg leg.

Weird nose? Could it be…? But Usopp had never left his flat in all the time Sanji had known him…

He picked up the stack of papers and looked it curiously. It was entitled "The Periodic Table of the Elements" and underneath it was Usopp's name. So he'd managed to write something about his elements thing after all, then. But why show it to Sanji, then? He was too stupid too understand it, anyway, wasn't he?

He flicked to the next page anyway, and almost dropped the papers when he read what was written there.

Dedicated to my dear friend Sanji without whom this would not have been possible.

He honestly hadn't expected this. Even if it was only thanking him for the food, he hadn't really thought Usopp appreciated it that much. Sure he'd said nice things about it, but if it really mattered to him he could've got out of his flat and gone to the restaurant when Sanji didn't come anymore.

Ask the guy with the weird nose, Zeff had said. So maybe he should do just that if he'd actually shown up here for once. He left the kitchen taking the papers with him.

He spotted the scientist almost immediately, though wearing street clothes that were neither rumpled nor unclean he looked a bit unfamiliar. He seemed uncomfortable standing around at the entrance to the kitchen and a nervous look spread on his face when he saw Sanji approaching.

"What's this all about?", Sanji asked, forgoing any greeting.

"It's my manuscript. I got done, I'm submitting it for publishing", Usopp explained.

"Oh. Good for you, I guess." Sanji probably would've been more excited for him before, since he'd seen how hard the guy had worked for it and he had been cheering him on to be successful. Right now he wasn't really in the mood to be supportive. "So is that normal in science circles to thank the people who cook for you? Shouldn't you be crediting Miss Kaya, too, for letting you live in her house?"

"Uh, no. This is not about the food. Even though I'm very grateful for that and it was excellent. It's about your suggestion."

"What, my unqualified blabbering about stuff I clearly didn't understand?" And it still stung, he just couldn't keep his tone neutral at that.

"I really owe you an apology, I'm so sorry Sanji! Really, I reacted the way the scientific community likes to when someone suggests something radically new that turns out to be true. I hate that they always dismiss new ideas and I hate it even more that I did that. Especially to my friend, I'm really sorry. And you were right, too!"

"I was right?"

"Look at the rest of the manuscript", Usopp requested. Sanji flipped past the dedication page and found the table he'd seen before on Usopp's draft. Featuring three noticeable spots of "Not yet discovered" among all the names of the elements.

"You left the gaps? I thought they're gonna laugh at you if you do that?"

"No I realized you were right, of course there can be elements that haven't been found yet, science still has so much to learn and so much to find, and me dismissing your idea was just a knee jerk reaction, I guess I just felt stupid because I'd never even considered that and I lashed out at you. And even if you hadn't been so overwhelmingly right I really never should've said something like that, I don't mean it. You are smart and probably a hell of a lot smarter than me if you can manage to make divine soups, match your socks and solve my biggest science problems all in one go."

Usopp suddenly bowed so deep Sanji thought he might fall over and clasped his hands together in front of himself. "Can you please forgive me, Sanji?"

So he wasn't all that stupid after all, then. He let Usopp stay in that position, saying nothing for a moment.

"Please? I'm really really sorry", Usopp pleaded. Sanji pretended considering it, as if he hadn't already made up his mind, as if more than a heartfelt apology had ever actually been needed.

"All the blood is rushing to my head, please say something!"

"Get up, you look like an idiot. Come on, I just made soup", Sanji finally said, jerking his head toward the kitchen.

"Does that mean you forgive me?" Usopp asked excitedly, getting back up and making his curly hair bounce on his head.

"Well if you keep singing my praises some more I might consider it", Sanji said with a grin.

As Usopp followed him into the kitchen, showering him with compliments of ever escalating ridiculousness Sanji was pretty sure they were going to be okay.

He handed the shitty chemist his new soup with a smile.