Chapter Text
Yips of excitement and, in Usopp’s case, fear ring out around him as they race down the mountain. Zoro can’t help but let out his own yell of joy. Wind whips through his hair, cold ocean spray peppering across his cheeks, and something warm bubbles in his chest. His heart hammers, lips pulling into a smile.
This is what freedom feels like.
The sudden thought burns his eyes. He’s happy, for the first time in ten years. Zoro gets to be happy and free and he doesn’t need to worry about Kuina or Sensei. Everyone is safe and Zoro is free. And nothing is going to change that.
“There it is!” Luffy’s cry of excitement reaches Zoro’s ear. “The Grand Line!”
Another round of excited cheers roars up around him. And, then, a long deep moan. Zoro’s eyes move around the deck. THe others don’t seem to notice it beneath the whipping winds and shouts of excitement.
“Did you hear that?” Zoro calls to Nami.
“What?” she shouts back, brow furrowed in confusion.
“That noise.”
As if waiting for its cue, the long moan echoes again. Nami’s nose wrinkles as she looks around thoughtfully. Strings of orange hair stick to her face, soaked through by the spray of the ocean, and she blows them away with obvious annoyance.
“It’s probably just the wind. There must be lots of unusual landmarks around here. Between that and the speed we’re going at, everything will sound strange!”
Zoro doubts it. The sound doesn’t seem like howling winds distorted. This sound seems more like the deep grumbles of something unhappy and something massive. Like the seacow he’d encountered several years ago, only the sound is deeper. Which means the creature is larger. Much larger.
Nami turns her attention back to the sea before them. Zoro swallows the comment.
“N-Nami!” Usopp screeches from above them. “There’s a mountain up ahead!”
Behind them, Sanji swears and moves to climb up the mast for a better look. Zoro takes a few steps forward, squinting to try and see through the thick fog encasing them.
“Who cares!” Luffy cheers. “We’re going to the Grand Line!
Through the gray, black begins to emerge. Zoro’s breath catches in his throat. Nami, Usopp, and Sanji all shout at each other behind them, as though that is going to help anything. The gray fog vanishes as suddenly as it had arrived leaving them with a clear view of what lays ahead of them.
“Oh, crap,” Zoro breathes.
“Usopp, you idiot,” Luffy shouts. “That’s not a mountain. It’s a black wall!”
“No, it’s not!” Nami sounds torn between crying and throttling Luffy.
“Then what the hell is it?” Sanji demands. His boots slam against the deck boards as he lands, appearing beside Zoro to look up at the monster sized whale before them.
“I-i-i-it’s,” Usopp stutters. “It’s a whale!”
The whale screams.
“Wh-wh-what are we gonna do?”
“Should we fight it?” Luffy asks, jumping up on his seat.
“Idiot!” Nami snarls. “There’s no way we can fight that!”
“B-b-b-but, our path is blocked. What else are we supposed to do?”
Zoro scans the area around them, searching for a way out. All of the excitement bleeds from his body, replaced with heart pounding terror. Hitting that whale, especially at this speed, will - without question - wreck Merry and drown them all. They need to get out of the whale’s way.
“Calm down,” Sanji snaps. “We don’t need to fight it, Usopp. If it looks like a wall from this close, we must be nothing more than a speck to it now. If it’s even seen us.”
“He’s right,” Zoro says. “It probably hasn’t seen us yet, but unless we do something, we’ll run into it.” A gap catches his eye and Zoro throws a finger out. “Look, on the left. Port! Usopp, turn it hard to port!”
“I can’t turn anything!” Usopp snaps. “The rudder’s broken!”
Spinning on his heel, Zoro shoves past Sanji and sprints toward the galley. “We have to do something!”
They can’t hit that whale. They can’t . Usopp babbles around him as Zoro digs his fingers into the broken base of the rudder. Splinters press into his fingertips. Zoro ignores them, same as he ignores Usopp. A warm body slams into Zoro’s as Sanji appears, the cook’s hands joining his as they strain to turn the rudder.
“Come on,” Sanji snarls under his breath. “Turn, damn you!”
The rudder ignores him. Zoro digs his heels into the ground, straining to pull. Nami screams ahead of them. The whale must be within throwing distance now. In the back of his mind, Zoro knows it's probably too late. By now, nothing short of a miracle will keep them from colliding with the massive beast.
A loud, thunderous crack echoes around them and the ship shudders. Dread fills Zoro’s stomach, his hands slipping from the broken rudder as the ship jerks to a halt. Both he and Sanji fall backwards in a heap.
“Please,” Sanji moans, shoving Zoro off of him. “Please tell me that wasn’t the cannon.”
“My special seat!” Luffy screeches from below.
The smoke from the cannon begins to clear. By some miracle, the whale hasn’t responded yet. Swallowing hard, Zoro scrambles to his feet, shoving Sanji upwards as well.
“Get the paddles. We have to get out of here before it’s too-”
The whale screams.
“So,” Nami asks hesitantly. “What do you think?”
“I need a drink,” Sanji moans, scrubbing a hand down his face.
“D-did we get swallowed?” Usopp asks. “Or is this all just a bad dream?”
“It’s gotta be a dream,” Zoro says.
Because it has to be. One moment they were being swept into the deep abyss of a giant whale’s mouth and now they sit in the middle of the sea, clouds floating peacefully in the sky with a small island sitting before them. A shack sits on the island, palm tree shading an empty lawn chair, and clothes out to dry in the still air.
Too still air. Zoro looks up, staring at the clouds and the bright blue around them. Something feels wrong. Everything seems to still. The water below them is far greener than the water they left behind. A strange calmness has settled over the Going Merry. Calmness that can’t exist on a ship with Luffy.
A dream, Zoro decides. Most definitely a dream.
Nami inches a little closer to Zoro. “Then what are an island and a house doing here?”
“Illusions,” Zoro tells her.
Water erupts before Merry’s bow. A giant purple figure glowers down at them, pointed head towering above them, long tentacles all reaching out at once. Screams fill the air as Usopp and Nami bolt for the far end of the ship. Zoro’s hand drops to Kitetsu, thumb inching the blade up. Power wraps around his arm, slithering through his skin. Power and safety. Zoro can fight anything. Protect anyone. No one will ever control him.
Kitetsu can give Zoro power and all Zoro needs to give Kitetsu is blood.
Three long harpoons shoot out of the squid from its back. Kitetsu drops back into its scabbard, shock loosening Zoro’s fingers as the monster falls into the ocean, dead. Beside him, Sanji straightens, lips pulled down in displeasure. Pulling in a deep breath, Zoro straightens, fingers tracing around Kitetsu’s scabbard.
“Someone must be in there,” he tells Sanji.
“Let’s hope they’re at least human,” Sanji lights his cigarette. “Feeling alright?”
Zoro blinks. “Eh?”
Sanji nods to Kitetsu. “Luffy’s gallivanting somewhere else, Zoro. Let me handle this, alright?”
Luffy isn’t here to calm Kitetsu’s shouts. Luffy isn’t here at all. Luffy flew off the ship and Zoro forgot. Holy shit. Zoro lost his captain and didn’t even notice. The realization slammed into his chest with the force of Mihawk’s whip.
Zoro lets his hand fall away from the hilt, averting his eyes from Sanji and trying to tame the panic fighting to build through his chest. The door opens suddenly and a short man with what looked like a flower on his head stepped out of the house.
The man glares their way briefly before stalking across the law, toward the lawn chair. Behind him, Zoro feels Nami move a little closer to him and hears Usopp whining slightly. Sanji stands beside him, chest puffed up to look intimidating. It should be funny, sitting in what may be - must be - the stomach of a whale with an old man growing a flower on his head, sitting in a lawn chair across from them on an island; easily the most ridiculous thing that has happened to Zoro in a long time.
But Luffy’s missing. Zoro’s captain - his nakama - flew off the ship and probably into the ocean. Because Zoro wasn’t fast enough to catch him. It sends a shiver down his spine. He’s supposed to protect his captain. His nakama.
Gritting his teeth, Zoro forces the thoughts from his head. Luffy is fine. He has to be. If anyone could find a way to make it out of that, it’s Luffy. If his captain can survive fighting Mihawk, his captain can survive falling off the ship.
From the corner of his eye, Zoro watches Sanji tense, jaw working.
“Well don’t just stand there!” the cook shouts. “Say something, damn you!”
Behind them, Usopp’s teeth and knees seem to chatter. It does nothing to try to keep their sniper from shouting. “You looking for a fight?” Usopp demands. “We can take you on! We’ve got a cannon!”
The old man lowers his newspaper a little more. “Forget it. Somebody would die.”
Sanji scoffs slightly, his cool confidence swirling in the air as he lights a fresh cigarette. “Oh yeah? And who would that be?”
“Me.”
Any ounce of patience Sanji has seems to vanish in one go. “Listen you!”
Zoro puts a hand on Sanji’s shoulder, pulling him back a step as he starts toward Merry’s railing. “Don’t get so worked up,” Zoro tells him. “We don’t have time to look for a fight, Sanji. We have to get out of here and find Luffy.”
“He started it,” Sanji growls. “Trying to make a fool of me.”
Zoro loves all of his nakama, he does. But, Sanji can be such a hotheaded, egotistical idiot. Resisting the urge to roll his eyes, Zoro takes a step forward. “Don’t get all steamed up. Oi, excuse me! My name is Roronoa Zoro and these are my nakama; Sanji, Nami, and Usopp. Do you know where we are? I could have sworn we got swallowed by a whale.”
The old man blinks, as though surprised, and then glares at them. Silence reigns again for a long pause. Sunlight glints off the man’s sunglasses. Uncertainty churns in his stomach as he stares back at the man, looking for any sign that he’s been offensive. Should he have asked for the man’s name first?
“You’d like to know where we are,” the man scoffs. “But that one’s rude behavior leaves me disinclined to accommodate your curiosity.”
Sanji snarls under his breath.
“But, if you must know, my name is Crocus and you, young man, are trespassing on my private resort. Does it look like we’re in a rat’s belly?”
Everything seems to happen all at once. Nami and Usopp begin to panic. Everything around them rocks violently, sea of stomach acid throwing them around. Then, screams fill the air as three bodies fly from what seems like the ceiling. All three of them fly by the Merry and Zoro catches sight of a familiar strawhat.
“Luffy?” Zoro says.
“You have got to be kidding me!” Sanji snarls.
“Yo, Sanji, Zoro! Is everyone okay?” Their captain begins to plummet toward the liquid below. “Um, I could use some help, I think.”
Zoro dives in after him without hesitation, barely remembering to toss Kitetsu to the deck floor. The green liquid burns his skin but Zoro ignores the feeling, reaching out to grab Luffy’s red vest. Sanji and Usopp wait above them when they surface, pulling both him and Luffy to safety before any real harm can be done. Seconds later, the other two people appear, clambering onto Merry as well.
“It’s calmed down,” Nami observes. “The whale is quiet again.”
“Seems like it,” Zoro agrees, pulling Luffy to his feet.
“Who in the shitty four Blues are you two?” Sanji demands.
Zoro looks down at the two figures at their feet. One of them - a scrawny man with orange hair, an awful green suit, and a crown with the number nine tattooed on each cheek - glares up at them. The other one - a woman with long blue hair - glances around at them carefully before leaning close to mutter to her companion.
Mr. Nine and Miss Wednesday. Easily the worst names Zoro has ever heard. Sanji’s swirling eyebrows narrow in suspicion.
“Oi,” their cook snaps. “Do we look like we have all day? Give me one reason I shouldn’t throw you back into the gastric acid.”
“You thugs are still around?” Crocus calls from above. “I won’t tell you again. I won’t let you lay a finger on either of them. Not so long as I’m alive!”
Miss Wednesday scoffs first, standing and raising her weapon. “Even so, I’m afraid we can’t leave. We have a mission to complete after all.”
“You won’t get in our way this time,” Mr Nine adds, standing as well. “Get ready, baby!”
Before anyone can move, boots thud against the deck behind them. A flash of blue and green catches Zoro’s eye as something sharp racks across the loaded hand cannons pointed in Crocus’s direction.
“Peacock slasher!”
A large, deafening bang echoes, smoke engulfing the deck as the two strangers fly backwards and collide with the wall to the galley. Zoro’s hand drops to Kitetsu as he shifts himself to shield Nami from the new threat, hidden in the smoke. Beside him, Sanji does the same for Usopp, one hand dropping to the pocket Zoro knows holds his knives.
“I’m sorry Crocus,” a young woman’s voice says. “But I can’t wait any longer. I have to get home.”
Nami peeks out from around their swordsman to try and see the newest body on their ship. Zoro and Sanji are tense, ready to strike at a moment’s notice. Luffy, unsurprisingly, seems unconcerned, standing between all of them and staring at the new mystery addition. The smoke from the explosion begins to clear, giving them their first clear look of their surprise guest.
She’s hot.
It probably shouldn’t be Nami’s first thought, given the situation they’re in, but she can’t help it. Blue hair falls down her shoulders and back in waves, far more beautiful than any ocean Nami’s ever seen. A black torn black top clings to her thin torso, giving Nami a generous look of the girl’s figure and chest. Black shorts cling to her thighs, a navy blue sash tied tightly around her hips. Tall blue socks reach up to her thighs giving Nami only a small flash of skin. Her pale skin compliments the dark blue of her socks and sash, tall black boots that Nami would just love to pull off of her.
Nami’s tongue traces across her lower lip as the girl flicks blue strands of hair away from her eyes.
“How many people are living in this goddamn whale?” Sanji growls.
“Miss Wednesday,” the girl growls. “Mr. Nine. Give me the eternal pose.”
“Not cool, baby!” The orange haired man cries.
“My patience is running thin. Give me the eternal pose.”
“We don’t have an eternal pose,” Miss Wednesday replies, face morphing into a smirk.
The girl’s face contorts, teeth gritting and eyes widening as though realizing she’s just walked into a trap.
“But thank you for confirming that this is your hideout. We’ve been looking everywhere for you, Nefertari Vivi.”
Hands curling into fists, Nefertari Vivi takes a step back. Above them, Crocus shouts out for her to get away. Mr. Nine and Miss Wednesday both leap to their feet. Nami’s hand fists in the back of Zoro’s shirt as both he and Sanji tense, trying to decide what to do. They don’t know any of these people. They don’t know who’s wrong and who’s right.
Mr. Nine and Miss Wednesday lunge toward Nefertari Vivi, who starts to raise her weapon. Nami’s heart slams into her chest. Is there a right decision? What do they do?
Luffy’s hands grab Mr. Nine and Miss Wednesday, slamming their hands together. They fall to the ground in an unconscious heap. Merry’s deck falls still and silent. Nefertari Vivi’s hair fans around her like a halo as she spins to look at them, brown eyes wide with shock.
“You,” she breathes. “Saved me. But why?”
“I wasn’t trying to save you,” Luffy tells her, straightening his hat. “I just felt like hitting them.”
The whale, Laboon, was left behind. It doesn’t surprise Sanji. The reasoning is sound. The Grand Line is not a place for the faint of heart or for creatures so young. In the crew’s place, Sanji might have done the same. From the corner of his eye, he sees Usopp move a little closer to Zoro, almost protectively.
His eyes meet Usopp’s. Sanji lifts his chin in Zoro’s direction. Usopp’s lips quirk in a slight smile as he presses his shoulder into Zoro’s.
“They were bad nakama,” Usopp says simply, once Crocus’s story concludes, a hand squeezing Zoro’s shoulder.
Luffy nods his agreement, allowing Zoro to lean against his leg. “We’d never leave our nakama behind.”
The words seem to calm whatever tension had taken over Zoro’s body.
The pretty young girl with blue hair is Nefertari Vivi and she is trying to get home, which is all she seems willing to tell them.
“I don’t want to endanger anyone else,” she repeats every time someone tries to get information from her.
Mr. Nine and Miss Wednesday slip away while their attention is on Luffy, who decides that the best way to keep Laboon from giving itself permanent damage is to pick a fight with the whale and then end it in a draw. Because, naturally, his captain can’t do anything that makes sense to anyone with more than one brain cell.
Sanji starts dinner while Usopp drags Zoro away to help fix the damage to Merry and Luffy bounces around, teasing them. Nami, rolling her eyes at their shenanigans, asks Sanji to keep an eye on them before vanishing to work on her maps. Sanji’s barely started plating when Nami’s shriek filled the air. From the corner of his eye, Sanji watches Zoro bolt off the ship, nearly hitting Usopp with the hammer he’d been using.
“Oi! Oi! Watch it, Zoro!” Usopp shouts after him.
Smirking, Sanji grabs the plates and balances them carefully. In front of the small table she set up, Nami stares down at her compass in dismay while Zoro hovers near her, looking concerned. Usopp and Luffy linger nearby as well, their confusion floating through the air.
“What’s wrong?” Sanji asks, carefully depositing the plates on the ground and making his way to Nami.
“The compass is broken.” She looks like she’s about to cry.
Her compass sits on the table, spinning uselessly as it tries to track down the magnetic pull of the Earth below them. Blinking, Sanji looks back up at her. Why is she trying to use a regular compass? Didn’t she bother to pick up a log pose?
A sinking suspicion settles in Sanji’s stomach. He tries to shove it down. This is Nami. Out of all the idiots on their crew, Sanji should be able to trust Nami to have done her research on the Grand Line and have the proper equipment.
“Nami,” he says, as Usopp and Luffy lean closer. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Crocus turns to them with a frown. “Looks like you guys came here with no knowledge,” the old man observes. “For God’s sake. Did you come here to die?”
“Ooh,” Luffy says, his attention turning to the fresh food Sanji set down. “Food.”
Gritting his teeth, Sanji turns to his captain, sinking a foot into Luffy’s gut to move him away from the plates. “That’s for everyone, shithead!”
“I thought I told you.” Crocus’s voice turns tight. “Common sense is useless on this sea. Your compass isn’t broken.”
Nami hums, her concerned face morphing into confused frustration. “But that doesn't make any sense. Unless the magnetic fields are being disrupted.”
“That’s right. The islands in the Grand Line contain lots of magnetic minerals. Because of that, they cause abnormality throughout the Grand Line. On top of that, the current and the winds don’t have constancy. As a navigator, you should know how scary that is.”
Moaning, Luffy stands up and grumbles as he makes his way back toward the food. Sanji glares at the captain before turning his attention back to Nami and Crocus.
“It’s hopeless,” Nami is saying. After a short pause, she lets out an embarrassed laugh. “I didn’t know. Oh well.”
Predictably, Usopp flies into full panic mode. “Nami! This is awful. Are we gonna be okay?”
“This isn’t awful,” Luffy says, voice strangely muffled. “It’s yummy!”
“Will you idiots shut up!” Nami screeches.
Sanji rolls his eyes. “Oi, oi,” he says, slamming a foot on Luffy’s head to stop his feast before digging in his pocket. “Stop panicking, Nami. We just need a log pose.”
The crew freezes, all eyes on him. Crocus nods his approval.
“Log pose?” Nami turns to him. “I’ve never heard of it.”
“It’s a special compass that can record magnetism,” Crocus explains.
Sanji nods. “Hai. Here.” Sanji pulls his log pose free, handing it to her.
Nami blinks, staring down at the log pose and then up at him. Then back again. “Sanji,” she says sweetly, a large smile taking over her face.
“No need to thank me,” Sanji tells her, waving a hand. “I don’t need it now that I’m sailing with - Ah!”
Nami’s fist slams on top of his head. It’s a pain Sanji thinks he’s only ever felt from Reuji and he hits the ground, hands cradling the large lump forming.
“YOU DIDN’T THINK YOU SHOULD TELL US ABOUT THIS EARLIER!”
Sanji barely holds back a wince. A shape shifts and he watches Zoro step in front of him, hands held up in a calming gesture. Luffy lets out a wild laugh.
“Nami,” Zoro protests softly.
“Man,” Usopp mutters. “Remind me never to piss her off.”
“I swear, you boys are useless!” Nami rants, turning her back on them.
Sanji glares at her back, rubbing the top of his head. She does this to everyone, he reminds himself. How many times has he seen her punch Luffy or Usopp? How many times has she yelled at all of them for doing something stupid? It isn't just him. Nami isn’t his sister. She isn’t. These are his friends. His nakama. They wouldn't do that to him.
Right?
A hand appears in front of his face and Sanji looks up to Zoro’s concerned face. Forcing a slight smile, Sanji accepts the hand and allows Zoro to pull him up. His family never would have done that.
“Thanks, marimo.”
Gray eyes scan Sanji for a long moment, as though Zoro’s trying to convince himself that Sanji is indeed fine, and then nods.
“Is everything alright?” a hesitant voice calls. Vivi makes her way over, a worried frown marring her pretty face. “I heard shou- Is that a log pose?”
They end up taking Vivi with them, even though Usopp isn’t sure it's the best idea. The mysterious blue haired girl still won’t tell them what she wants, only that she needs to get home as quickly as possible.
“I must save my family,” she told them.
Which seems to be more than enough for their captain. “Shishishi, don’t worry so much! She just needs a ride. Besides, if anything happens, it’ll be an adventure.”
The response received a smile from Zoro, an eye roll from Sanji, and a screech from Nami. Vivi seems nice enough. Though, Usopp doesn’t spend much time with her. Nami whisks Vivi away from girl time as soon as humanly possible, rambling about how she’s been stuck with annoying boys for weeks.
The weather on the Grand Line proves to be more deadly than anything Usopp thinks Vivi could bring upon them. He isn’t sure if that’s a good thing or not. A beautiful day goes from a tornado to a blizzard to a thunderstorm in what seems like a matter of seconds. They make it through with only a few tears. None of which belong to Usopp.
After a few days, they settle into a nice enough routine. The weather stays fairly even, allowing for some downtime. Sanji spends most of that time in the kitchen, trying out new recipes. He fills a notebook that Nami had gotten him with his successes. Usopp joins him most days, trying to find something to do.
That’s one thing no one ever tells you about life on the open ocean. It’s boring as well.
“Go work out with Zoro,” Sanji suggests.
Usopp almost dies of a combination of laughter and horror. Apparently, their swordsman still had yet to get the memo that Mihawk was gone and he could relax. Anytime he wasn’t playing around with Luffy or taste testing for Sanji, Zoro passed the day by lifting weights and practicing his swordsmanship - thankfully without the sword from the depths of hell.
“Oh, come on, Usopp. Don’t be such a drama queen. I bet he’d love to teach you how to fight.”
Usopp puffs his chest out. “The brave captain Usopp doesn’t need anyone to teach him how to fight. I teach people how to fight.”
Sanji smiles that smile again. The one that makes Usopp’s knees shake a little bit, blue eyes lit up. Like Usopp has made Sanji’s entire day just by talking to him.
“Well,” Sanji says, pulling a whisk from one of the cupboards. “Maybe you can teach Zoro something new.”
Usopp highly doubts it. But, somehow, he finds himself standing on deck with Zoro anyway. The swordsman seems both surprised and touched that Usopp wanted to train with him. So, there’s no backing out of it now. Zoro rambles clumsily about training and fighting, as though he’s never talked for this long without being interrupted before.
“Every fight has rules,” Zoro tells him. “It’s always important to keep them in mind. You should never strike an opponent when they surrender.”
“What the hell are you on about?” Sanji appears, a tray of drinks in his hand and his eyebrows furrowed in confusion. “You always hit an opponent until they stop moving.”
Usopp looks between the two of them, unsure of who to listen to. Normally, Sanji and Zoro seem on the same page but now, they’re both looking at each other like the other one has grown a second head.
Sanji shakes his head, turning to Usopp. “Look, Usopp, the most important thing in any fight is not getting killed. Biting, eye gouges, kicks to the groin. All go in a fight.”
Zoro blinks, eyes wide. “That’s awful!”
Sanji raises an eyebrow. “It’s a fight to the death, Zoro.”
“I was taught to fight with honor.”
“So, you were taught to die young.”
Looking flabbergasted, Zoro’s lips move silently for a moment. “N-no. But Sensei said-”
“What Sensei said landed you with Mihawk for ten years,” Sanji replies sharply.
Zoro’s mouth clicks shut and he averts his gaze. Usopp shrinks back, looking between the two closely. He sees the flicker of regret move across Sanji’s face and the cook heaves a heavy sigh, taking a step forward. Zoro inches back.
“Look, Zoro,” Sanji says, eyes softening. “I know your sensei meant to raise you with a swordsman’s honor. But, fighting with honor doesn’t always mean fighting to win.” Sanji’s voice grows a little more firm. “And, if you want to live, you have to win.”
Zoro lifts his chin, though he still doesn’t mean Sanji’s eyes. “If I don’t fight with honor, I lose anyway.”
“Sanji.” Luffy appears at the cook’s elbow, cocking his head to the side. “It's okay if Zoro wants to fight the way he wants to fight. Zoro’s really strong! He’ll be fine.”
Sanji looks torn, looking from Luffy’s relaxed face to Zoro’s wide eyes. After a moment, Luffy grins up at Sanji.
“‘S okay to worry about Zoro, too,” their captain says. “We’re nakama, we’re always gonna worry about each other. But, we’ll take care of him. So, don’t worry so much!” Luffy turns his attention to their swordsman. “Oi, Zoro, come nap with me!”
Luffy whisks Zoro off without giving the green haired man a chance to respond. Sanji pulls in a deep breath and lets it out slowly. Usopp leans against Merry’s railing beside him.
“Luffy’s right,” Usopp offers after a moment. “We’d never let that happen to Zoro again.”
“I know,” Sanji says, too quickly and too firmly. He pauses for a moment. “I know. I just. Not everyone fights with honor and Zoro can't expect them to. If he never expects someone to attack his back, he’ll never think to watch it.”
“Well, that’s what we’re here for, right?”
Sanji’s brow furrowed. “Hai. I suppose. But, don’t take after Zoro, alright? I mean it, Usopp. There’s no playing fair when you’re fighting for your life.”
“R-right,” Usopp stutters out, staring at the fire raging in Sanji’s eyes. “Got it.”
Sanji nods. “Good. Alright, looks like Luffy stole your trainer, so I’ll keep training with you. Let’s start with push-ups.”
“Push-ups?” Usopp echoes, his gaze dropping to his own scrawny arms. “I don’t know, Sanji.”
“You don’t know what?”
“I’ve never done a push-up before.”
For a moment, Sanji stares at him, lips slightly parted. “You - Usopp, it’s a push-up. Just do one.”
Usopp shakes his head. “I can’t. I’m afraid I’ll die.”
Sanji looks like he’s questioning his sanity. “God, I hate this crew.”
A town that welcomes pirates. Sanji almost scoffs at the ridiculousness of it all. No town would truly welcome a crew of pirates, no matter how convincing this town’s “mayor” may be. The rest of his nakama don’t seem to have the same worries. Luffy cheers about how great this whole town is, shoving as much food as he can eat into his mouth. Usopp regales the town with tall tales that everyone is far too interested in. Nami ropes Vivi into a drinking contest, which Sanji should probably enter to maintain a healthy cover. Zoro sits next to Luffy, watching their captain with something between horror and amazement.
Sanji feels the same. Watching Luffy eat reminds Sanji of watching a wild, starving tiger devore an injured prey; it's fast, disgusting, and loud as hell. Shaking his head, he makes his way over to Nami and Vivi.
The navigator grins when he joins them. "Oh, good! Sanji, there's a big beli prize. Help us win, okay?"
Sanji decides to last about twelve glasses of whatever this horrid liquid shit is before he feigns unconsciousness. Vivi actually passed out about seven drinks ago. Usopp and Luffy have long since fallen asleep as well. Zoro, Sanji notices, has his eyes closed and his breathing even. But there's a tension in his body that tells Sanji he hasn't fallen asleep just yet.
So he isn't the only one who noticed there's something off about this town. Good. Sanji should have known he could count on Zoro.
Closing his eyes and falling onto the table, Sanji waits. Nami wins her contest before falling asleep as well. The room around them quiets until only the breathing of their nakama remains. Sanji peaks open an eye and glances around. The room holds only his crew and their guest.
Zoro has his eyes open as well, flickering around at their sleeping nakama before landing on Sanji. They stare at each other for a moment before Sanji jerks his chin to the roof.
I'm going to climb up top and see if I can figure out what's really going on.
Zoro nods once, leaning back into the wall and feigning sleep again. Grinning to himself, Sanii makes his way from the room.
They're a town of bounty hunters. The name Mr. Nine flickers into Sanji's head again as all the pieces click together. Baroque Works. He should have seen it earlier. He'd had a run in with Mr. Eleven some years before this. The man had been looking to recruit a new agent. Sanji had sent him back to his group of spineless bounty hunters, short an arm instead.
If Mr. Eleven's abilities were anything to go by, Sanji could take all of these idiots without needing to disturb Zoro. His hand drops to his pocket, pulling loose his knives.
"Go on," the town's mayor says. "Capture them."
"Do you think you could hold off on that?" Sanji calls, flicking his wrist. One of his knives sinks into the neck of the man headed back for the room holding Sanji's nakama. Blood glistens in the moonlight. Sanji forgot how beautiful the red could be, dancing on the wind and glittering as though made of diamonds. "I'd much rather settle this without bothering my nakama. They're tired, you see. We had a very long trip here."
All eyes turn to him, a muttering going around the crowd of people.
"I think I count about a hundred of you. Well, ninety-nine. Seems like a fair enough fight."
"KILL HIM!" The mayor shouts.
Sanji grins. A fight where he doesn't need to hold back. Finally .