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WINTER'S WISH

Zoro stared with a disbelieving eye at the navy blue coat crumpled on the snow.

The blue gleam of the snow globe in his hand was already receding but the rapid beating of his heart continued to pulse inside his ears. The last bit of snowflakes settled inside the globe, piling into heaps of useless white crystals.

Or so he thought.

“For you, Zoro-dono,” Kin’emon said and handed him a strange round glass.

“What’s this?” he asked, examining the gift with a curious eye. There was nothing inside but piles of white crystals which resembled the snow falling outside the shack. He tried placing it upside down but the white material was glued to the base of the glass.

“It’s a special snow globe,” the samurai responded. “Wano is known for building poneglyphs, but we have clans who are inclined into crafts. That snow globe is no ordinary. The flakes inside the glass are not made but are actual snowfall carefully collected around the holy grounds of the mountain temple. The High Priest himself blessed every globe produced by the chosen clans. It was said to grant any wish that your heart desires.”

“Was?” Zoro inquired with a raised eyebrow.

Kin’emon’s eyes went downcast as a sad emotion flashed across his face. “A snow globe that can grant any wish is dangerous, Zoro-dono. Twenty years ago, a war started inside the country because every person wanted to have their hands on a piece of that magical craft. To stop the conflict and to restore peace on the land, the shogun ordered the destruction of those crafts and the persecution of the clans responsible for producing them. The High Priest killed himself to ask for the Sun God’s forgiveness because of the dispute he had created.”

He looked at Momonosuke for a moment and then shifted his gaze back to Zoro. “That snow globe is the only piece left of its kind. Momonosuke-sama’s father gave that to me, hoping that it can one day save his son’s life.”

“Then why are you giving this to me?” the swordsman asked as he felt the urge to return an important heirloom like this.

“I asked for permission from Momonosuke-sama about this. It’s a token of appreciation for helping us,” Kin’emon said with a smile. “I don’t know if Kaido knows about that snow globe, but I think that it will be safer if it’s under your crew’s protection.”

“Why me? Why don’t you give it to Luffy?”

Kin’emon turned his head toward the direction of the rubber captain. Luffy was stuffing his face with meat on the dinner table as the other Strawhats, together with the Heart Pirates, ate, laughed and bickered. His team arrived in Wano Island five days ago and it was fortunate enough that they managed to find each other before Luffy stirred some kind of trouble under Kaido’s nose.

“Well,” Kin’emon began, “Luffy-dono is strong and I know that he will keep the globe safe. But I doubt that he won’t use it for anything unless it’s about getting to rain meat or asking for a mountain of food.”

Zoro grinned because, hell, it was completely possible.

“You’re the first mate and the vice captain of the crew, Zoro-dono. I trust your decision as much as I trust Luffy-dono’s strength,” Kin’emon spoke.

Zoro studied him for a moment. He really wasn’t sure if he should accept something like this. But upon seeing the decisive look on the samurai’s face, he resigned himself to taking the gift and tucking it inside the pocket of his coat.

“Okay,” he said to him.

With a smile, Kin’emon excused himself and walked toward the small banquet. It was Christmas Eve. Zoro wasn’t one to celebrate occasions like this, but being surrounded by your friends, good booze and delicious food made this one an exception. The cook prepared these. There was no doubt about it.

The swordsman followed him after a while and before he took his seat, his eye scanned the heads of his comrades and found no blond hair amongst them. As awareness dawned on him, his eyebrows furrowed and he pushed any thought about that stupid cook away and just resolved to enjoy his large bottle of sake before midnight struck.

It was twenty minutes away before Christmas and the crew was already readying a toast when Zoro caught a glimpse of that familiar blond hair outside the window. He frowned. What was the cook doing there? The snow was falling heavily outside and they all fucking knew that the subtlest wind in that weather could freeze anyone to death.

Zoro grouchily stood from his chair. He was going to give the cook a piece of his goddamn mind.

A few pairs of eyes trailed behind him but no one called out or bothered to stop him. The cold wind gushed through the door as he opened it and his irritation heightened. The cook was leaning against the wooden wall of the shack, his right knee bent, booted foot planted on the wall behind him, as both of his hands were pushed deeply in the warm pockets of his fur coat.

A lit cigarette was dangling between his lips and Zoro could faintly see the blueness of his eye under the curtain of blond hair. “Oi,” Zoro called out to him. “I know you’re stupid, Cook. But I didn’t expect for you to be this stupid.”

The swordsman noticed the subtle movement of the cigarette in the blond’s mouth. He was pissed.

“Mind your own business, Marimo. There will be a toast so get your ass back there,” Sanji answered quietly but loud enough for Zoro to hear in the icy wind.

The lobe of Sanji’s ears, his cheeks and the tip of his nose were red. He hadn’t seen the blond since dinner and it was more or less two hours since the banquet started. Was he standing here outside all this time?

A niggling sensation squeezed Zoro’s stomach but he desperately convinced himself that he was mad at Sanji and he didn’t fucking care if he froze his ass in this cold snow. “Why don’t you go back inside?” the swordsman asked with arms crossed over his chest and he told himself that he wasn’t worried. He was just curious. That was all.

Sanji chuckled and he pulled the cigarette from his mouth to blow a stream in front of him. Zoro tried not to pay attention to the pale tips of his fingers and the slight shiver that ran through them. Because he was mad. Yes. Really mad.

“You’re not the sharpest tool in the box, Mosshead, but I didn’t expect for you to be this lame. You’re clueless as fuck,” the blond replied with a mocking smirk.

“Ah?!” The swordsman stomped toward him and clutched his coat in a death grip. “What are you saying, Curlybrow?”

Sanji tilted his head to the side and steadied his gaze. “You probably wouldn’t eat if I was there so I went outside for you, asshole.” He shoved Zoro’s hand away from his coat and turned around to walk away, his shoulders hunched and tensed.

For a moment, it seemed that all the words in Zoro’s mouth vanished into nothingness. He shouldn’t feel anything about the cook’s consideration. He was pissed. He was mad. He couldn’t just forgive him that easily.

The cook was wrong. He fucked up. And Zoro wasn’t one to tolerate a hurtful mistake like that.

However, he found himself moving, his boots falling on the snow in dull thuds, as his voice finally echoed from his throat. “Oi, Cook!”

The blond stopped on his track but didn’t turn his head around. The swordsman stood a few feet behind him and he watched for a moment the snow falling on Sanji’s hair and shoulders. “Let’s talk.”

Sanji’s posture straightened. The swordsman expected that he would decline but when the blond pulled the cigarette from his lips and crushed the butt under his sole, he said, “Where?”

“Anywhere. Just the two of us,” Zoro responded.

Sanji considered this thoughtfully. “Okay. Come with me.”

Zoro followed him until they both ended up in a dilapidated toolshed built a few meters away from the shack. Taking refuge from the snow and into the small comfort offered by the shed, the two men brushed away white flakes from their hair and coats.

Silence hung between them. Zoro wasn’t sure why he wanted to talk to the cook. It was a spur of the moment but now that he was stuck in the hole that he’d dug on himself, he had no choice but to shovel down deeper.

Zoro opened his mouth, the words forming and coiling at the root of his tongue, when Sanji silenced him with his own statement. “I thought you don’t want to talk to me, or even bother with me in the least,” the blond said, his blue eye radiating a deeper shade of blue because of the dim illumination of the room.

Zoro frowned. “I never said that.”

At that, Sanji snorted. “Yeah. Well, you didn’t technically say anything, but your actions told me you don’t want to have anything to do with me.”

Zoro watched the emotions play across Sanji’s face. There was anger, guilt and pain. The moment that their eyes laid upon each other after weeks of separation, from Dressrosa until that whole tussle with Big Mom, Zoro felt a painful tug inside his chest.

He felt relieved that Sanji was safe, but there was also this resentful feeling brewing inside his heart. It was so powerful that he had to stop from hurling himself toward the blond and punching the life out of him.

Zoro felt so betrayed.

He and Sanji definitely had “something” between them. It was this warm and lush feeling that sprung out from the deepest compartment of his heart when the blond kissed him in the crow’s nest in one of his night watches. He tried to suppress that “thing,” but then the cook tore down all the barriers he desperately put around him by giving him a soft and innocent kiss.

Matters got worse after that. He found himself thinking about the cook all day and night. His low baritone resonated inside his ears like a chant and it just wouldn’t go away. He started to yearn for Sanji’s touch even if it was just a light brush of fingertips against his skin.

Zoro tried to bridge the gap between them. Whenever he did something out of character, or gave a silent message of “I want to be near you” to the cook, his nakama would just smile and would sometimes reciprocate his actions.

It was mutual, and from that moment on, Zoro knew that he was screwed pretty badly.

But all of that crumbled into pieces when the blond left to marry some woman from Big Mom’s crew. The cook hadn’t said anything to him. It was from Nami’s mouth that he heard about the news for the first time.

It was for the crew’s safety, he knew that, but still, Zoro felt so goddamn betrayed. He was furious that the bastard could just leave without telling him anything. That he could run off just like that to marry someone else that easily.

Was that “thing” between them meant nothing to the cook? Would he just disappear again when the situation called for it? Did Zoro mean so little to him?

All of his insecurities resurfaced when he met the cook again. He decided to put distance between them before Zoro could lose his control. It was better that way. They had their hands full with Kaido right now, so a conflict within the crew would be the least desirable thing that could happen at the moment.

“Stop making it sound that this is about me,” Zoro said with a frown. “This whole goddamn thing is your fault.”

Anger flashed across Sanji’s face and he stepped forward to glare at the swordsman. “Do you think I wanted to leave? Do you think I wanted to knock the shit out of Luffy? Do you think I wanted Nami-san to cry in front of me?”

Zoro held his ground as he returned the glare with the same wave of intensity. “I don’t care if you want it or not. The point is you left, you hurt your own captain and you jeopardize the crew’s safety because of your fucking mistake.”

“Mistake?” Sanji muttered in disbelief. His eyes were wide and the quick breath that rushed through his mouth was wounded. “You called my sacrifice a mistake?”

Zoro stood indignantly and the unrelenting words spilled impulsively from his mouth before he could manage to stop them. “Yes, Cook. You made a grave mistake. You should’ve known that Luffy wouldn’t back down when his nakama was in danger. If he has to go to hell to haul your ass back up, then he will. That’s how he is. Yet you drove him away in the worst way possible. He is your captain and you’re just a fucking cook in his ship. If Luffy is one of those conventional pirate captains, then he will maroon you into a barren island or probably persecute you because what you did is fucking mutiny.”

A broken look cracked Sanji’s hard expression. There was shame and self-hatred in that blue eye and Zoro knew that he had stepped on a very dangerous line.

Sanji was hurt because Zoro regarded him as nothing more but “a cook.” Like there wasn’t something more in him than what Zoro had branded him to be.

He swallowed thickly and averted his eyes from the swordsman. He took a few deep breaths first to calm himself before he spoke quietly, “You would’ve been happy either way though.”

“What?” Zoro asked in confusion.

Something ominous sparked in the blond’s eye and his voice was deep and rumbling when he said, “I said you would’ve been happy if I got marooned in a fucking island or shot to death, you dipshit!”

The swordsman moved and his hand balled tightly on the blond’s coat. “Don’t talk like you know how I feel,” he snarled.

Sanji gave out a sarcastic laugh. “Oh, I know exactly how you feel. You’re mad at me because I left and you won’t listen to a fucking word I say because you’re too busy being a dickhead and brooding over your feelings for me.”

That was the last straw for the swordsman. He shoved Sanji away and the blond stumbled on his feet before he regained his balance. His eyes looked up, the insulting words only a few milliseconds away from firing through his mouth. But Sanji felt that his tongue has been cut off by an unknown force radiating from the swordsman.

Zoro was gazing at him with dark eyes, filled with anger, humiliation and... regret.

“I should’ve known better,” the man said as his fists trembled at his sides, “you don’t fucking care how I feel.”

Pain stabbed through Sanji’s heart and he found himself opening and closing his mouth several times before he managed to get the words out. “Zoro, that’s… that’s not–”

“You’re terrible, Cook,” Zoro said silently and he saw how Sanji’s face contorted into something similar with pain and anguish. He was hurt, and as twisted as it was, he also wanted to inflict pain on the cook. He wanted him to feel how wounded and betrayed he felt when he left. He wanted him to understand that he was the only one whom Zoro bared himself to.

He let his walls down around Sanji; he let the man touch him like no other person had laid a hand on him before; he let him cradle him like a submissive child under the solitude of the night; he let him pat his head, pinch his cheeks and kiss his lips.

Sanji had to know how much Zoro trusted him with himself – with his life, with his being. But the man threw all of those away. He left Zoro and he didn’t have the resolve to come back on his own for him. If it weren’t for Luffy, then they wouldn’t probably be having this conversation right now because he wouldn’t see the cook ever again.

Just like that, the cook would vanish without a single trace and into the arms of another person. It pained Zoro to think that he was the only one who was holding on for the both of them.

Sanji’s eyelids fluttered and his mouth hung open with unspoken words. Zoro saw the tears teasing his blue eye but the blond desperately tried not to let them fall. “Zoro… I…”

“I hate you, Cook,” the swordsman said as he felt his heart broke anew. “I wish I never met you back in East Blue.”

Sanji’s face twisted into a look of pure shock, dread and agony. His shoulders dropped in defeat and the tears in his eye broke free from his lower eyelid. However, Zoro didn’t see them flow down the cook’s face as a strange bright light erupted between them.

The swordsman put an arm on his eye reflexively, shielding himself from the sudden luminosity. As the white light around him died down gradually, his eye fluttered open to blink the afterimages away. He looked up… and found out that the cook was no longer there.

“Cook?” he called.

His attention shifted to the dim glow inside his coat pocket. His hand fished for the object and his eye widened when he noticed the falling flakes in the snow globe. The snowflakes were white and shining. He remembered flipping the globe over earlier but not one flake seemed to drop from the base.

But this… this was different. Not only the snowflakes moved and shone like crystals but there was also a pine tree standing at the middle of the globe. He distinctly remembered not having that tree earlier. The snow globe was supposed to be a useless heap of white flakes and transparent glass.

So how did this happen?

Through the glass, Zoro noticed a blue material lying on the ground. He eyed the very much familiar fur coat that was clutched inside his strong grip merely fifteen seconds ago. “Cook?” he said again, but this time, a feeling of dread started to stir his insides.

“It’s a special snow globe… It was said to grant any wish that your heart desires.”

Kin’emon’s voice echoed inside his head like Death’s whisper. A shudder ran down his spine at the awful implication of what he might have done.

“No. No. That’s–that’s fucking impossible,” Zoro tried to convince himself and rationalize with his wits but the evidences in front of him were so real that he wanted to vomit.

Not allowing himself to waste another damn second in that suffocating place, he immediately seized the cook’s coat from the ground and turned around on his heels to find the only man who was capable of explaining the shit that he had done.

The door of the shack flew open, filling the room with the cold outburst of the wind from outside. The crew’s head turned to the man standing on the doorway. His hair was disheveled, gray eyes wide and mouth opened in hurried pants. He was clutching a navy blue coat in his left arm and as he closed the door, he instantly looked up to his nakama in panic.

“Kin’emon!” Zoro shouted and the samurai hastily stood up from his seat. “What the fuck is that globe?”

“What? What globe?” Nami asked, confused.

“He gave me a fucking globe and now the cook is gone!” Zoro accused the man with a pointed finger.

“Calm down, Zoro-dono. What do you mean Sanji-dono is gone?” the samurai asked as he made his way toward the fuming swordsman.

“I was talking with him two minutes ago and then he just vanished into thin air! This thing–” he pulled the snow globe from his coat pocket “–glowed and the snow flakes moved and… and then there was this fucking tree inside which shouldn’t even be there! What the fuck?!”

“Okay. Okay.” Nami stood up, her hands thrown in the air in defeat. “What the hell is going on here, Zoro?” She put her hands on her hips and raised an eyebrow at him. “What the hell are you talking about? Why do you have Sanji-kun’s coat?”

“Maybe, he was captured by wild hares in the forest and got eaten alive,” Robin said as amusement lit up her dark eyes.

“Oi, stop saying gruesome things, Robin!” Usopp complained as goose bumps crawled along his arms.

Luffy laughed and ate a whole piece of toasted chicken leg. “You’re overthinking. Maybe, he’s just out for a smoke or–”

“He vanished in front of my eyes, Luffy!” Zoro spoke in a frustrated manner. He didn’t know why his nakama were so calm about this. The cook was missing, and he might have been the reason behind it. Fuck.

“Can I see the snow globe, Zoro-dono?” Kin’emon asked. He nodded and handed him the glass.

The samurai stared at it with curious eyes, turning it around to have a better look. The snowflakes inside the globe were swirling, falling like real snow on the ground, and a pine tree with fine green leaves was standing firmly at the center.

“It has been set.”

All heads turned around to the source of that tiny voice. Momonosuke was sitting beside Nami, his eyebrows knotted tightly, as he chewed on his lower lip.

“What do you mean, Momonosuke-san?” Brook asked.

“I remembered my father talking about it once,” the kid explained. “He said that when the snow globe has been set, the pine tree at the middle serves as the ‘clock’ for that person’s wish.”

“You mean a ‘duration,’ Momonosuke-sama?” Kin’emon asked and the little kid nodded.

“Yes. As long as the pine tree’s there, then the wish continues,” he said.

“Okay. Will somebody please enlighten us what the hell’s going on here?” the navigator said impatiently. Zoro and the two Wano natives were talking about a serious matter which she didn’t know and it was kind of getting on her nerves. But one thing was for sure, it had something to do with their ship’s cook, her nakama, and it was definitely not something good.

Kin’emon sighed and filled in his companions about the matter at hand. All ears were attentive and there were curious glints in their eyes when he was narrating the part of a “magical snow globe” which could grant any wish a person desired.

“Okay, so that suuuuper snow globe is magical, huh?”  Franky asked as he pointed at the round glass in Kin’emon’s hands. “What does it have to do with Cook-bro?”

Momonosuke hopped off from his chair and walked toward Zoro and Kin’emon, his geta thumping on the wooden floor as all pairs of eyes settled on his small form. He looked at the globe with worried eyes and then shifted that gaze to Zoro. “Did you make a wish?”

“Of course not–” Just as he was about to refute the kid’s words, the swordsman’s mouth remained suspended as a horrifying thought struck him. His face paled a few shades and he felt as though his speech had left him.

That reaction didn’t go unnoticed however by Nami’s keen eyes. She knew something was wrong, if it weren’t for the fact that her strong and usually passive nakama looked like he was about to pass out.

“So you did wish for something,” Nami said matter-of-factly.

“I–” Zoro stammered out as he felt the gravity of his recklessness settle on him. “I might have done something like that.”

“‘Might have done’? What the hell did you do, Zoro?” Nami asked as her heart beat faster inside her chest. She didn’t like where this conversation was going. If her nakama had accidentally wished for Sanji to turn into a frog or to vanish into thin air out of impulse, or perhaps in a spur of the moment due to another petty fight, then she wasn’t sure where they would start looking for him. Or if they would be able to look for him at all.

Shit. She hoped that Zoro was a bit smarter to not wish for absurdities like those.

“The cook and I talked. Things got heated up and…” Zoro confessed and his gaze dropped on the floor. “I’ve said stupid shit I didn’t mean.”

A pang of guilt coursed through his chest as he clearly remembered the look of pain and shock in that pale face, how the tears pooled in that crystal blue eye and how the words were robbed from his mouth. The cook looked so broken – shattered. And it was all his damn fault.

Zoro’s knuckles turned white beside him and the muscle on his jaw jumped as he gritted his teeth. “I said that I hate him,” he continued, his voice sounding low and filled with regret, “and that I wish I haven’t met him in East Blue.”

A sharp gasp left Nami’s mouth. The other people in the room whispered to one another and looks of concern were palpable in their faces. The Strawhats were silent, looking steadily at the remorseful look on their swordsman’s face.

After a while, Luffy was the first one to speak. “It doesn’t matter,” he said and smiled. “If we find Sanji, then you can apologize. There’s no use regretting what has already been done.”

Zoro chuckled humorlessly. “You don’t understand, Luffy.” He ran an exasperated hand through his hair. “I told him that I hate him and for fuck’s sake, I don’t even know if it’s the last thing I’d be able to say to him–”

“You’re giving up?”

The swordsman’s words were cut short by Luffy’s serious tone. His eye met contact with the captain’s dark ones and there was this stern and searching look in them. For a moment, he felt that no one else was inside the shack except him and his captain.

He respected him. So much so that he was willing to lay his life for him. He knew that Luffy had the same respect toward him. He acknowledged his strength, his ambition, his passion and his principles. And having his captain look at him like this ignited something deep inside the swordsman.

He felt the storm inside his chest recede. He gripped the hilt of his white katana, coaxing that familiar sense of comfort and calmness from her, before locking his gaze with his captain once more. With his newfound determination, he uttered, “No.”

A wide grin broke out from Luffy’s face and he laughed as he put a hand on his straw hat. “Then it’s settled! We’re going to look for Sanji!”

Nami sighed heavily and massaged her temple with her fingers. She could feel a headache coming. “We just came back with Sanji-kun and now he was missing again. Where the hell could he be?”

“You can’t Mugiwara-ya,” Law interrupted. “We need you here.”

“But, Torao!” the rubber captain complained. “Sanji is missing! I have to find him!”

“You’ve just arrived and I know for a fact that Kaido already knew that you’re here. Right at this very moment, as we speak, his subordinates may be searching for you,” Law explained.

Law had a point, but he couldn’t just leave things like this! His nakama was missing and as the captain of his crew, he had the responsibility to look for him. But before Luffy could air his protest, a smooth voice spoke among them.

“Swordsman-san.”

Zoro shifted his eye to the raven-haired woman. As Robin rubbed the rim of her tea cup with her index finger, she said, “You said that you wished you shouldn’t have met Cook-san in East Blue, right?”

When the man nodded, she turned her head toward Nami to say, “Nami, I remember you telling me that Cook-san has told you about his family.”

“Well, yeah.” It was a brief moment in the galley as they sailed toward Wano Island. She didn’t really want Sanji to spill out things about his past, especially if it was too difficult and painful for him. She understood, because she’d been through hell herself. But the blond felt compelled to tell her about it: how cruel his father and siblings were; how much love he had for his mother, and how he fled to East Blue while he was still a little kid.

He owed an explanation to his nakama, he said. He was still feeling guilty for turning them away, for hurting Luffy and for making her feel bad. He already said sorry a few times but he felt that it wasn’t enough. Nami appreciated his effort so she patted his shoulder, telling him that she was glad that he was safe and back to the crew again.

They were nakama after all, and nakama forgave each other.

“If that snow globe really has magical power and if swordsman-san wished to not have met with Cook-san in East Blue, then the most logical deduction would be this,” Robin explained, “Cook-san didn’t vanish, but is just currently situated somewhere here along the Grand Line. And most probably, his family knows where he is.”

At that realization, Nami’s brown eyes widened and a terrible feeling clutched inside her chest. “Oh my God,” she said breathily as she covered her mouth with her hands.

No. Hell no. Sanji couldn’t be there. He shouldn’t be there.

“What is it?”

Nami’s eyes fell on the oblivious swordsman. Suddenly, she felt anger burn inside her and she strode her way toward him, gripping his robe in tight fists and shouting angrily at his face. “You bastard! You shouldn’t have wished for that bullshit!”

Zoro was taken aback by her outburst. The other Strawhats stood from their chairs and worriedly took a few steps toward them. The swordsman’s eyebrows pulled together and he snarled at her, “I know what I’ve done, you witch!”

“No! No, you don’t!” Nami shouted at him and he was tempted to pry her hands away from his robe. However, he was annoyed right now and he might not be able to control his strength. As much as how rigid and uncaring he looked, he really didn’t want to hurt her, or any woman for that matter.

“Nami.” Robin placed a hand on Nami’s shoulder and she felt her anger go down a few notches.

The navigator glared one more time at Zoro and she shoved him back harshly, turning around to face Luffy and feeling satisfied by the staggered step she heard from the swordsman. She heard him curse under his breath but she didn’t care. She wasn’t really mad at him, but rather at the hopelessness of their situation right now.

She knew that Zoro didn’t deliberately wish for something bad to happen to Sanji. It was unintentional and he wasn’t aware that that freaking snow globe would fuck things up pretty badly. But she felt so frustrated right now, at the complexity and unfairness of it all. Sanji had just come back to them, and now he was already tangled up with a terrible mess like this.

Wherever he was right now, then he didn’t deserve to be there. He belonged to the crew, surrounded by friends, by his nakama, who accepted him for who he was, who knew his dream and shared his passion.

He didn’t belong to those hateful, ruthless people.

Nami slammed her hands down on the table, making the plates and glasses clatter, and looked seriously at her captain. “Luffy,” she said, “I ask for your permission to set sail.”

“Oi. Oi. Oi! Nami!” Usopp went beside her frantically. “You can’t just set sail! We’re facing Kaido right now and the crew mustn’t split up again!” he explained as he waved his hand around to make his point.

“I don’t care! Sanji-kun’s safety comes first!” Nami shifted her attention back to Luffy, who had his arms crossed over his chest as a deep and serious look settled on his features. “You know how his family is, Luffy. We can’t leave Sanji-kun in their hands.”

“I agree!” Chopper jumped on the table and looked at Luffy. “I don’t like those guys!”

“Me too, Luffy-san,” Brook added as he stood his ground beside Nami. “I’ll go with Nami-san.”

“Guys…” Usopp closed his eyes and sighed. Sanji was strong, so he didn’t know why his nakama were acting like he was some kind of damsel-in-distress. The cook would be so pissed if ever he heard this.

“I understand,” Luffy told them. “I give you my permission to set sail. But Zoro has to go with you.”

Nami, Chopper and Brook were all delighted to hear their captain’s words. Their faces lit up and they expressed their gratefulness for his decision. “Thank you, Luffy,” Nami said, smiling as a bit of relief washed through her system.

“Why are you so worried about that Curlybrow?” It must’ve been the wrong question because the navigator had sent him another death glare from where she stood. Zoro wouldn’t admit it, but he was anxious as hell right now. He wanted to know what the deal was with their cook’s family and why his nakama were so damn protective over him.

“Because–” Nami began but she cut herself off. Her mouth remained open with unspoken words and Zoro saw the debate and hesitation in those round brown eyes.

He frowned at the reaction and he closed in the gap between them, his booted footsteps thudding dully on the wooden floor as silence hung thickly around them. He wasn’t in the mood for games or secrets right now. He wanted to know where the fuck that cook was and if he had to flip the whole Grand Line upside down just to find him, then he would.

“What is it?” he asked in a low voice. “What is it you’re not telling me?”

The windows of the shack rattled due to the snowstorm. The fire in the fireplace crackled and the silent breaths of the people inside the room were the only source of noise at that moment as they all waited for Nami’s reply.

The navigator let out a sigh and she tucked a few strands of orange hair behind her ear. “I can tell you later,” she replied and before Zoro could utter his complaint, the completely worried look on her eyes nabbed the words out of his mouth. “But right now, let’s pack up. We need to leave as soon as possible.”

She paused for a moment before biting her lower lip with downcast eyes. “If Robin’s theory is correct and Sanji-kun is indeed with his family,” she closed her eyes briefly before lifting her head up to look at Zoro, “then he must be suffering right now.”

Zoro didn’t get it – why Nami was so worried about the cook. Yes, she told him that he was bullied by his brothers when he was a kid but, fuck, that Curlybrow was strong. He wouldn’t let anyone beat his ass up. He knew it.

Still, the mere idea that he was the one who’d accidentally sent the cook back to that hellhole was eating him up so bad. He felt his hands clutch tighter on the ship’s railing, feeling the wood creak underneath his palms, and he’d better stop himself before Franky gave him a shit or two about it.

With a sigh, he pulled his hands from the Adam wood and continued to stare at the setting sun. Ever since they’d set sail this afternoon, Nami had had that deep and focused look on her face. She hadn’t left the spot beside the helm as Brook stirred it. She kept a close eye on her log pose, but a keener one on the vivre card on her palm. It was the cook’s, and Zoro saw how the little piece of paper twitched on the navigator’s palm, crawling toward the direction of its owner.

“Swordsman-san.”

Zoro shifted his eye toward the approaching woman beside him. Robin had a thick book tucked inside her arm. She wasn’t supposed to come, but Nami insisted that Robin could help them reverse the effect of that magical snow globe. True to her words, the woman had been locked up in her library for hours, finding clues and vital pieces of information from her history books.

“Momonosuke and Kin’emon-san are still browsing in the library. Care to join us?” she asked.

That kid, Momonosuke, insisted to come with them, telling them that he was feeling responsible about what happened. Luffy was against it at first, saying that he wouldn’t be able to protect himself, but the kid stood his ground. After a moment of intensely measuring up each other, Luffy grinned and patted Momonosuke’s head.

Owe it to Luffy to see great things in people.

“Have you found what you’re looking for?” Zoro asked as he followed Robin to the library.

“Not yet,” she said and opened the door. “But I managed to find a few interesting facts about the snow globe.”

As they both entered the room, Zoro saw the samurai and the kid seated on the floor with dozens of books around them, some left opened and some stacked into tall piles. They both nodded to acknowledge Zoro’s presence and lowered their eyes again on the books they were reading.

Robin sat on a chair and placed the thick book on her reading table. She opened it carefully and flipped through the pages. Leaning against the wall, Zoro crossed his arms over his chest and waited for the woman to find what she was looking for.

His eye caught the rounded object placed on the archeologist’s table. The snowflakes inside the globe were still swirling and a few leaves started to fall from the pine tree standing at the center. Zoro’s eyebrows furrowed. It was all thanks to that damn thing that they were in this mess.

Robin stopped in a particular page and her dark eyes skimmed through it before lifting her gaze up to the swordsman. “This snow globe,” she began as she pointed at the drawing on the page, “was a gift by the Sun God, Kitakomo, to the natives of Wano Island. This ancient artifact had been entrusted to the High Priest of Shira’o Mountain for protection. They used this globe to pray for bountiful harvests and to keep storms from destroying their lands. They thought it was an eternal gift, however, as generations passed on, they noticed that the pine tree inside the snow globe began to lose its leaves. Through a dream, the Sun God himself visited the High Priest that time and told him that the snow globe couldn’t grant everyone’s wish forever. Scared that their island would suffer a tremendous loss, the High Priest used the last wish to grant him the power to create replicas of the heavenly object.”

“However, there was a price,” the archeologist continued, “the Sun God was angered by the people’s greed and he put the Shira’o Mountain into an eternal winter, eliminating all forms of agriculture and livelihood in the mountain. The High Priest blessed the perpetual snowfall around the temple and he used it as flakes for the globes. He thought that he’d insured peace and stability in the island, but it only caused conflict and thirst for power amongst the people.”

The flames of the oil lamp danced and cast soft orange glows on Zoro’s features. He wasn’t fond of history and anything alike, but the story that Robin just told him unsettled him. “So that damn snow globe Kin’emon gave to me,” he said, “it could only grant one wish, unlike that ancient one?”

“Yes,” Robin confirmed, “so we can’t counter its effect on Cook-san by wishing the opposite.”

Zoro let out a disappointed sigh. “Can’t I just break the fucking thing?”

“No!” Momonosuke stood up and frowned at him. “If you break it without completing the wish, you’ll die!”

“What do you propose we do, then?” Zoro answered. Not that he was scared of losing his life. No. He was ready to die for his nakama anytime. Perhaps the only thing that he was worried about was the aftermath of his death – how devastated his nakama would be and his regret of not being able to achieve his dream.

Momonosuke pulled his eyebrows together as his eyes fell down on the floor. “My father said something about reversing the effect of the wish,” he explained, “but it’s complicated and depends on the wish of the user. For example, if I wish for my enemy to die, and I want to take it back, all I have to do is to save that person from his imminent death. That’s the purpose of the pine tree, to give time to the user to do something about the outcome of the wish.”

“What if the leaves of the pine tree fall out before the user can counter the effect?” Robin asked.

“If the last leaf falls,” the kid said as he stared at her, “then the wish will be irreversible.”

The swordsman gritted his teeth and his head turned to the snow globe resting on top of Robin’s table. The snowflakes were still swirling inside the round glass like crystals but what bothered him the most were the few green leaves lying at the base of the tree. The pine tree started to shed its leaves from the bottom, thus when the last set of leaves on top of it fell, then they’d be so screwed. Zoro wouldn’t be able to reverse his wish. He wouldn’t be able to do anything and he would blame himself to hell if he’d destroyed the cook’s life because of it.

“What can we do about Sanji-dono’s situation?” Kin’emon asked.

Robin contemplated for a moment. After a while, she closed the book on her table and stood up. “I still don’t know, but give me time to analyze swordsman-san’s wish. I’m sure I’ll come up with something.”

“There it is.”

From afar, Nami pointed at the giant snail swimming toward the shore of an island. It looked like a huge den den mushi with a tower built on its back. It appeared stupid to Zoro, especially when that snail attached its back on the makeshift lands made by the others of its kind.

They’d travelled for three days before Nami saw those weird snails floating in the midst of the vast ocean. Zoro thought that they were sea kings at first, but when the navigator told them to ready their weapons and saw the vivre card on Nami’s grip twitched livelier than ever, an uneasy squeeze settled inside his stomach and that was the time he knew that the cook was within an arm’s reach.

He was alive. His vivre card was the proof of that, and in a matter of hours, he’d be with Zoro again. That thought alone thrilled every fiber of his being and he wanted nothing but to snatch the cook and run away with him.

“It’s the Germa Kingdom,” Robin spoke.

“Yes,” Nami said with a nod. “It was a legend, talked about by sailors all the time, but Sanji-kun is the living proof that the mythical kingdom exists and we’ve seen them with our own eyes. They have no permanent land because they are seafarers and… conquerors.”

“Is Big Mom still involved with them?” Chopper asked.

“We don’t know, Chopper-san,” Brook was the one to answer. “But our primary goal right now is to rescue Sanji-san.”

Satisfied by the musician’s statement, everyone readied themselves for their planned attack. “Arms to starboard!” Nami commanded them and the men followed through. They would have to hide the ship and travel through the Mini Merry or Shark Submerge III if they wanted to sneak in.

After waiting for all the snails to assemble, Nami divided the group into two teams: one would enter the castle from the east, while the other invaded the west.

“Kin’emon and Robin will take the east, while Zoro and Brook take the west. Chopper, Momonosuke and I will stay here to guard the ship. If ever you see my rain clouds, it means that you have to retreat to the ship no matter what.” Nami’s coffee brown eyes shifted to Zoro in particular and said, “Understand?”

The swordsman’s eyebrow twitched in annoyance at the woman’s word. He wasn’t a fucking kid that needed supervision or a reminder. He was completely capable of doing things by himself. He tutted and folded his arms over his chest. “Whatever.”

Nami sighed and waved a dismissive hand. “Yeah. Yeah. Just don’t get lost meathead.”

“Um, Zoro-san?” Brook pointed toward the direction of the tower. “The vivre card is pointing that way.”

Zoro jolted and tried to hide the blush creeping on his cheeks. “I know, idiot!” he hissed, turned around a hundred and eighty degrees, and stomped his way toward the tower. He peeked at the piece of paper on his palm one more time. The cook was indeed somewhere here in this damn palace.

Both Strawhats heard loud explosions coming from the island. A few minutes ago, they saw an army marching from the kingdom toward the thick forest of the island. Zoro wasn’t one to back down and let the bastards do what they wanted to innocent people, but they had a more important mission right now. Clenching his teeth for a second, he pushed away the urge to run after the army and turned his head around to regain his focus.

After cutting a slit through the walls and once inside, Brook ushered the swordsman inside a dark and small storage room. “Zoro-san, can you guard my body while I search for Sanji-san?” Brook asked.

The swordsman grunted in response and before he could say anything further, he saw a green soul emerge from the skeleton. Brook’s corporeal body paled and went limp against a cargo box. “Zoro-san, I’ll be going now,” he said in that ghostly appearance.

“Find Curlybrow as soon as possible. I don’t like waiting.”

The ghost laughed and passed through the wall to search for Sanji. Zoro sighed and leaned against the wall, closing his eye and enhancing his senses tenfold. He could hear the thuds of boots and clanks of swords along the hallways and from the far side of the castle.

After half an hour, he sensed a familiar aura approaching him. Brook passed through the walls again and lodged his soul into his skeleton.

“Well?” the swordsman asked expectantly with a raised eyebrow.

“It took me a while to find the kitchen because that was probably the first place that Sanji-san would be in. He wasn’t there, but I managed to know something interesting,” the musician said. “They were talking about a mysterious prisoner in the dungeons. Then a soldier appeared in the kitchen and took a silver tray filled with food. He turned around without another word and I followed him from there.”

“So you’ve seen the cook?” Zoro asked.

Brook shook his head. “No. But I know he’s there because the soldier talked to his companions stationed near the dungeon doors. He said something about the ‘third prince’s meal.’ Then I went back here as soon as I could.”

Nodding, the swordsman stood up and clutched Wado’s hilt. “Let’s get moving.”

It took a few times of maneuvering before Zoro could find the hallway leading to the dungeons. Brook was laughing at him everytime he turned around to a wrong direction and the swordsman had to send two slashes at him to shut him up.

There was an explosion from the upper floors and the whole castle seemed to shake along with it. “Heh,” Zoro said and grinned. That was probably Kin’emon and Robin.

“Stop!”

The two Strawhats halted when a brigade of soldiers blocked their path. They heard another set of footsteps behind them and it took a second for them to realize that they were trapped. “Zoro-san,” Brook said as he took his sword from its sheath. “The dungeon is right through that wall on your right. You can go in first. I’ll take care of this mess.”

“You sure?” he asked.

“Yohohoho!” Brook stood tall, placed his left arm behind his back and held his sword vertically in front of him. It was his fighting stance. “Let me enjoy a beautiful jazz with them.”

The swordsman smirked at that and took out Wado and Kitetsu from their saya. “Nitoryu: Thirty-six Pound Canon!”

The wall shattered and rubbles flew out from the huge crack. As he leapt toward the hole, he heard the loud shouts of the soldiers lunging toward his nakama. He must hurry. Even though he trusted Brook, he wouldn’t want him to carry the burden of fighting with their enemies alone.

Zoro felt the soles of his boots land on a flight of stairs. Looking back and forth between the two ends of the stairs, he said, “Well, fuck.”

Couldn’t he just land directly in front of the idiotic cook? Why did he have to be stuck on choosing what the right direction was? “Fuck it!” he uttered frustratingly and let his instincts take over.

He descended the stairs and noticed the dim illumination of the torches along the walls. At the last step, Zoro saw a long stretch of a narrow hallway. He looked around for a moment cautiously, sensing another presence with him, before a voice called out to him.

“Who goes there?!”

Frowning, the swordsman bared his two katanas and ran toward the two soldiers guarding a prison cell. The soldiers fired their guns, but Zoro deflected the bullets easily with his weapon. They gasped in shock but the man didn’t waste any time, running in lightning speed and cutting his enemies in a blink of an eye. The two soldiers crumpled on the floor as blood dripped down from Zoro’s blade.

“W-Who’s there?”

His heart skipped a beat at that low baritone. His head slowly turned around to the source of that voice and his eye caught that shadow lurking in the darkness inside the bars.

“Did–” the voice paused for a moment, “–did my Father send you to kill me?”

Zoro’s eyebrows pulled together and he faced the shadow fully. “Cut that crap, Cook. I’m here to rescue you.”

The shadow went still and silent for a moment. Zoro tried to wait patiently but he still had to fucking help Brook out there. “Come on. Kick yourself out there, useless bastard,” he said.

But instead of flying bars and loud curses, Zoro was met instead by the approaching form of the shadowy figure. He saw a bare foot step out of the darkness and his grey eye travelled up, taking in the tattered clothes and the thin frame of his nakama, who was once lean and the most prissily dressed man he’d ever met.

Zoro’s lips parted at the iron mask placed around his head. He saw that clear blue eye and strands of blond hair from the eye slit of the mask and he swore that his heart just banged painfully against his chest.

“Cook?” Zoro whispered in disbelief. His nakama looked so worn out. His dull gray shirt and dark pants were frayed and his usually flawless skin was blemished with dirt and bruises and nicked with small shallow cuts.

“Why do you call me ‘Cook’?” Sanji said as he gripped the bars. “How do you know I want to be a cook?”

Zoro’s throat felt dry. This person in front of him looked like a stranger who was talking with his nakama’s voice. Was this really Sanji? Their ship’s cook?

“Because you are,” he said and his voice sounded strained in his own ears.

“No,” Sanji said and shook his head. “I’m not. I’m Germa’s third Prince, Sanji. Well, was.” He let out a sigh and directed his blue gaze once again on the stunned swordsman. “You shouldn’t be here. If my father and siblings knew you’re here–”

A loud laugh echoed from the staircase. Zoro saw how Sanji’s eye widened and how he looked at him wild panic. “Hide,” he whispered to him. “My brothers. Hide!”

“No,” Zoro said frowning. “I won’t leave you.”

Sanji was taken aback by the swordsman’s words. But when he heard the footsteps growing louder, he desperately reached out for the swordsman’s arm and said, “Hide. Please.”

Zoro’s arm tingled from where the cook was touching him. He felt a rough hand instead of a smooth one and he had to think first that this person pleading in front of him was the same cook he knew. Sanji never pleaded, especially to him.

Zoro found himself complying and he sprinted toward the end of the corridor and hid behind a wall. Letting his senses to take over, he heard the footsteps stop in front of the cook’s cell. Siblings or not, the cook could definitely kick their asses.

Sanji stood face to face with his siblings. Yonji smirked at him and said, “We’re going to destroy another island and Father's already starting the war. But we brothers need our good luck charm first, right, Sanji?"

His eyes bulged at that and he felt his heart beat nervously inside his chest. Just like how his instincts had overtaken him countless times before, Sanji found himself backing up fearfully against the wall. His knees gave out and he put his arms on his head, curling himself like a ball and wishing that the wall behind him would just swallow him whole.

Niji laughed and mocked the pathetic form of his brother. “That’s it, little brother. Fear us.”

Sanji heard the bars clicking open and grating along the stone floor. He trembled in fear. He felt so weak. Helpless.

He had always been like that in the first place.

“Did that skeleton kill those soldiers?” Ichiji asked.

When Sanji didn’t give a response, Yonji nudged his foot and cocked his head to the side. “Oi. Our brother asked you a question, little weakling.”

“I–I don’t know,” Sanji answered with a shaking voice.

“Well, it’s funny actually,” the first prince said. “How he just passed by you. Maybe, he thought that you’re too pathetic to be worthy of his rescue.”

Niji and Yonji both laughed loudly, their voices echoing along the stone walls of the prison cell, and it made Sanji’s stomach churn. “Reiju’s dealing with him now,” Ichiji added and cracked his knuckles. “Let us get our good luck charm first.”

The three princes grinned and as a frightened tear fell from Sanji’s eyes, he gasped when he felt the first painful blow on his right side, breaking two of his ribs and sending him flying toward the opposite wall of the room.

Zoro waited.

He could hear a fight going on but he didn’t know why Sanji was taking too long to beat their asses up. After a few minutes, he heard the bars lock again and the swordsman jolted. There was something wrong about that. So fucking wrong.

When he peaked beside the wall, he saw three men flying – fucking flying those weird shoes – toward the staircase without any broken bones or a bleeding wound. His system fired up with adrenaline and his feet took him toward the prison cell. Toward his cook.

“Cook?” he said frantically, and when he heard nothing, he cursed under his breath and cut the annoying bars down. Why couldn’t the cook just free himself? The bars weren’t even made of kairoseki for fuck’s sake!

“Cook?” He sensed a shadow move against the wall to his right. He sprinted toward it and as his eye adjusted to the darkness, he felt his heart break at the crumpled form of his nakama. Sanji was lying like a heap of broken flesh and bones on the stone floor. There was blood oozing from the iron mask and new ugly bruises marred the pale skin on his arms and legs.

Suddenly, Zoro felt anger boil inside him. He knelt down and clutched the front of Sanji’s shirt, pulling him up forcefully and earning him a wince and a painful groan from the blond. “What the fuck, Cook?!” he shouted. “Why didn’t you fight back?!”

“If Robin’s theory is correct and Sanji-kun is indeed with his family, then he must be suffering right now.”

Nami’s voice echoed inside his head – loud and clear. His fists clenched tighter on the cook’s shirt. No. He wouldn’t have that. The Sanji he knew wouldn’t let this happen–

“He can’t.”

Zoro jerked in surprise. His thoughts were too preoccupied by the cook that he hadn’t noticed the person standing in front of the cell. He lowered the cook down and stood up to bare his swords at the intruder. “Who the fuck are you?”

A woman walked toward them, lighting up an oil lamp and the sudden luminosity made Zoro’s eye squint. As the woman stared at her, he saw the resemblance of the cook with her – curly eyebrows and blue eyes.

He suddenly felt a surge of fury against her. Knowing how Sanji’s brothers cruelly beat him up, this woman right here wouldn’t make any difference. “Get the fuck away from him,” he growled threateningly.

“I will,” Reiju said and tossed something toward the swordsman. Zoro caught it in the air and opened his hand, finding a thin golden key resting on top of his palm. “That’s the key to his mask,” she added. “I don’t know who you are, but I believe you and the others who are breaking into the palace are good people. That’s why I helped your skeleton friend escape. Take Sanji away with you and never come back. He doesn’t deserve to be in this place.”

“You don’t have to say that to me,” Zoro assured with a frown. “I’m taking him with me whether you like it or not.”

A small smile tugged the corners of the woman’s mouth and her visible blue eye landed on the limp form of his brother. “You’ll find friends, Sanji,” she said. “Friends who will love and protect you.”

“R-Rei… ju.”

Zoro turned his head around to find the cook’s tired eye flowing with tears. His heart ached at the sight and he wanted nothing but to hug the cook and bury his face on his shoulder right now.

“Stay away as far as possible.” Zoro heard a crack in the woman’s voice and when he shifted his gaze at her, he saw a tear fall from her blue eye. Reiju’s eyebrows knotted and she turned around to hide her misery.

“I’m sorry, Sanji,” she said quietly, “for not being able to protect you.”

“Rei…ju.” Through the last string of his consciousness, Sanji saw the trembling shoulders of her sister: her sister who treated his wounds everytime his brothers beat him up; his sister who reminded him of his mother, and his sister who was now giving him the chance to finally live freely away from this hellish place.

“Thank… you,” he uttered silently before he let the darkness consume him.

“Stop making it sound that this is about me. This whole goddamn thing is your fault.”

“I don’t care if you want it or not. The point is you left, you hurt your own captain and you jeopardize the crew’s safety because of your fucking mistake.”

“Don’t talk like you know how I feel.”

 “I should’ve known better. You don’t fucking care how I feel.”

“You’re terrible, Cook.”

 “I hate you.”

“I wish I never met you back in East Blue.”

Sanji’s eyes flew wide open. He heard his heartbeat ringing inside his ears and felt sweat dampening his neck, back and limbs. The first thing that he noticed about his surrounding was the wooden ceiling. It wasn’t the cold stone ceiling that he’d been accustomed to everytime he woke up.

He turned his head slowly to the side. It was a small room, like the infirmary in the castle if he recalled correctly. He remembered seeing a stranger, his brothers, their painful blows and kicks, then Reiju…

Sanji rolled to his side and tried to lift himself with his arm. He choked on his breath when pain erupted from his ribs and he fell limply on the bed. He groaned as he felt his whole body ached. It wasn’t the usual beating. This one was one of those cruel times when his brothers would leave him completely battered and unconscious. It would take time for him to heal, that much was sure. Maybe five days and–

“Cook?”

There was a man seated on the floor beside his bed. His arms were folded over his chest and he looked like he just woke up from his sleep. Sanji’s mind took in the man’s face, carefully recalling his facial features through the haze of pain and when he did, his mouth hung open. “Y-You’re…” You’re the one who saved me.

The man was instantly beside him, bending over him and gripping his arms to help him lean back against the headboard. “Don’t move. I’ll get Chopper,” he said as his eyebrows knotted worriedly. Worried? Why would this stranger be worried for him? Did he know him?

Without another word, the man ran out of the infirmary and after just a minute, he was back with a small – raccoon? – who was bombing him with questions. The raccoon could talk? “Sanji!” he cried his name as tears sprung out of his face. “I’m glad you’re awake! I’m so glad!”

“Sanji-kun!”

Five more people flooded the room and an orange-haired woman suddenly wrapped her arms around him. He winced at the tightness but he was too surprised to utter a single word. When the woman backed away, he saw tears flowing down from her lovely face. “I’m glad we saved you.” She wiped the tears from her eyes and tried to smile. “I’m glad we were able to find you.”

“Um…” Sanji gripped her wrists gently and lowered them from his shoulders. With a confused look, he asked, “Do… do I know you?”

Nami’s jaw fell at his words. What the hell was Sanji talking about?

“He doesn’t remember us.”

Her head turned around to her nakama. Zoro was standing with his fists tightly closed beside him. He had this hard look on his face and she saw how the muscles on his jaws jumped as he gritted his teeth.

“When I saw him, the cook didn’t know who I was,” Zoro explained. “He even asked if I was sent by his father to kill him.”

“What?” Nami muttered in disbelief. Her coffee brown eyes shifted back to the blond who was looking at the “strangers” back and forth. “You don’t remember us, Sanji-kun?”

“Sorry, but no,” he answered. “I think I’ve never seen you in my entire life.”

“What?” Nami laughed incredulously. “Sanji-kun we’re your nakama.”

“Nami.” Robin went beside her and placed a hand on her shoulder. She kept a scrutinizing stare at the cook and he saw how his eyes averted from hers like a scared little kid. “If my theory is correct,” she began to explain, “then I believe Cook-san doesn’t have any recollection of his past before his time in East Blue.”

Nami blinked at her for a moment before turning her head toward Sanji. “Sanji-kun,” she said and gripped the blond’s hand, “do you know Zeff?”

“Zeff?” Sanji’s eyebrows furrowed and a look of confusion dawned on his pale face. “No. Who’s he?”

The navigator let out a sigh and she covered her eyes with her hands. “Oh God,” she said breathily.

“We’ll answer all of your questions, Cook-san,” Robin was the one who spoke, “but first, please let our ship doctor check on you.”

When the blond nodded, Chopper jumped on the bed and put his stethoscope in his ears. He was asking questions to the blond and the others decided to give them some privacy. “Swordsman-san?” Robin called to Zoro when the man didn’t move an inch from his spot. “Aren’t you coming?”

“No,” Zoro replied as his grey eye kept its keen stare at the cook. “I’ll stay here with him.”

The archeologist saw the stiffness on his shoulders, the slight tremble on his fists and the hard set of his jaws. Their swordsman wasn’t an outspoken man, but Robin knew him long enough to tell that he was blaming himself for the cook’s situation.

Zoro and Sanji might not tell them, but she was a witness of their clandestine love – those stolen glances and hidden smiles when they thought that no one was looking. That undeniable spark which radiated between them every time they would touch each other; the heated stares, the knowing smiles and the whispered words – she knew all of those.

There was a deeper connection between them, much deeper than a nakama. She didn’t know if they’d both realized that but after everything that happened, after Sanji’s fixed marriage, his return, and now this, she couldn’t imagine how much pain Zoro was in right now.

“We’ll be in the galley if you need us,” she said even though there wasn’t anything that could be said to comfort the swordsman at the moment. He grunted in response and the archeologist let out a worried sigh before she closed the door behind her.

“I’m afraid I will have to put you in a strict bed rest, Sanji,” Chopper said. “You have three broken ribs, bruises and wounds all over your body. You can’t move around and put unnecessary strain on your muscles.”

“Yes, Dr. Chopper,” Sanji said.

“Just Chopper.” The doctor jumped out of the bed. “I’ll check on you every hour. If you need anything, just ring that bell above your head.” After that, the little reindeer walked out of the infirmary with his shoulders sagged. He was sad and worried about his nakama. He even tried to stifle his cries as he examined Sanji earlier. He was hurt because he couldn’t remember him but at the same time woeful at the fact that his nakama had lost his memories.

After the door closed behind the doctor, Zoro took a few steps toward Sanji. “How’re you feeling, Cook?”

The blond stared at him for a moment before letting out a small smile which made Zoro’s heart skip a beat. “Better. I’ve never been actually treated by a doctor ever since I was imprisoned. The wounds heal on their own though. Fortunately.”

Zoro sat down at the edge of the bed, his grey eye never leaving the cook. “Why are you locked up in that dreadful place?”

If this were a normal conversation, then there was no way that the cook would open up to him, not unless he was drunk. He needed to be closer to the cook to unravel him, to dig up the deepest parts of him, and the blond must let him.

He’d always been cautious around the swordsman, like he was afraid of that “thing” going on between them. Zoro understood, because Sanji might’ve been having a self-debate about his sexuality. It was a big deal for him. Zoro respected that, but sometimes, the denial and doubt just hurt.

There was hesitation in Sanji’s eyes for a moment, but then he realized that he owed this man – his savior – an explanation. “My Father has always thought of me as a failure, someone who can’t glorify his kingdom and be the powerful soldier that he wanted. He couldn’t kill me, because I’m still his son, his flesh and bones. So he just locked me up and told the whole kingdom that I was dead.”

Sanji gripped the fabric of his bed covers. “My mom died when I was still a little kid. She was the only one who cared and loved me unconditionally in that cruel place. I always knew there was something different in me. I couldn’t kill without blinking an eye like my brothers and sister. I couldn’t even hold myself in a battle even if I wanted to. I’m just a weak, pathetic and useless human being.”

Sanji bowed his head and tried to blink the tears away. He felt a gentle hand on his cheek and his eyes flew wide open at that sensation. He lifted up his head and he was met by a beautiful grey eye gazing affectionately at him.

“You’re not weak, Cook,” Zoro said silently. “You’re one of the strongest people I’ve known in my entire life.”

Sanji unconsciously held that hand, feeling the rough skin on the man’s knuckles under his palm. “My mask,” he said, “you took off my mask.”

“Yes,” the swordsman said.

The blond’s chest brimmed with warmth and relief and he held that man’s wrist with both hands. “Thank you,” he uttered in a trembling voice as tears flowed down his cheeks, “thank you.”

Zoro’s heart ached at the sight of the cook crying in front of him. He inched closer and cupped Sanji’s face with his hands, brushing off strands of blond hair and seeing wholly for the first time his handsome features. If this were a normal circumstance wherein they mocked and insulted each other, then Zoro would laugh at the ridiculous asymmetrical curl of the cook’s eyebrows.

However, the blond only looked so breath-taking inside his hands. His pale face, his slightly chapped lips and his crystal blue eyes. They all looked so beautiful to Zoro right now.

He wiped the tears under Sanji’s eyes and the blond lifted that blue gaze to him. “That mask,” he said hoarsely, “that iron mask has been a part of me since I was eight years old. It was big and heavy at first, but then I grew in it. It became weightless for me and I never saw myself without it until now. It’s been so long.”

The crease between Zoro’s eyebrows grew deeper. The cook had been wearing that mask for a long time that he felt as though the cold metal had been a part of his skin. That was why he hadn’t realized that he was no longer wearing that damn mask until Zoro touched his face.

“How long?” Zoro managed to ask.

Sanji stared at him quietly for a moment, letting the last tear glide down his cheek. “Thirteen years.”

Zoro let out a shaky breath as he felt his heart throbbed painfully inside his chest. His hands fell down from the blond’s face and his head bowed down in shame. “I’m so sorry.”

“Hey.” The cook gripped his hands and the swordsman held back tightly in response.

Zoro felt tears burn behind his eyes. It was his fault. The cook shouldn’t have been through that hell. It was fucking thirteen years. If he hadn’t said that fucking wish. If he hadn’t been so stupid–

“Don’t cry.”

Sanji’s right hand held his face and stroked his cheek gently through his thumb. When the swordsman lifted his eye, he saw that familiar warmth and affection on his blue eyes. It was the same look he’d given him everytime they were alone at night in the crow’s nest, tangled on a makeshift bed or on the couch and with only each other’s breaths and heartbeats to hear.

“I’m not crying,” Zoro said quietly.

“You are,” Sanji insisted and he ran a hand through the swordsman’s hair. “It’s okay to cry once in a while. It doesn’t mean that you’re weak. It means that you’re strong enough to let go.”

The words pierced through Zoro’s heart and he felt his chest explode with burning emotions. Before he could stop himself, he gripped Sanji’s face and pressed his lips against his.

The blond gasped in surprise but he felt his whole being melt as Zoro’s lips continue to move against his. His heart jumped when he felt a brush of tongue on his lips. When he granted him permission, the man’s tongue entered like a wild animal and ravaged inside his hot cavern.

He felt Zoro’s tongue everywhere in his mouth and he had to hold on the swordsman’s robe for dear life. He gasped for air as saliva trickled down the side of his mouth and he felt something pool inside his chest, something warm and vivid, and that strange sensation coursed through his veins like wild fire, toward his throat and until the root of his tongue. And before he could stop himself, Sanji let out the words in a breathy moan.

“Zoro.”

The swordsman froze for a second. He pushed himself back from the blond’s now swollen lips and looked at him in the eyes. “You–” he tried to say amidst his shock, “–I’ve never told you my name.”

The blond’s lips parted and he was left shocked and confused at his own words. “I…” He swallowed. “I don’t… know. I don’t know why I said that. I don’t even know it’s your name. It just… rolled out of my tongue on instinct. I’m sorry.”

And when Zoro was about to open his mouth, his eye caught a white glow coming from his green robe. Pushing a hand inside his pocket, he pulled out the glowing snow globe and he heard the blond gasp in astonishment as he saw the shining and swirling snowflakes inside the round glass.

Zoro’s eye landed on the pine tree inside the globe and his eyebrows furrowed when he saw that the tree was halfway bare and the withered leaves that fell from its branches were now lying in patches on the snowy ground.

“Fuck,” he cursed under his breath. His time was running out.

“What is that?” Sanji asked, amazement still palpable in his voice.

The swordsman’s eye shifted to him. He didn’t know if he had the heart to tell Sanji the truth – how it was his fault that he was magically brought back to their kingdom and had to suffer in that hell for thirteen years.

Sanji saw the debate and hesitation in that grey eye. Holding the swordsman’s hand firmly, he said, “You can tell me anything.”

That statement seemed to relax the man for he heard him release a deep sigh, his hand moving to intertwine their fingers together. Sanji’s heart jumped at the act but somehow, oddly deep inside him, it felt so familiar and comfortable, like he had held the man’s hand a thousand times before even though he’d only met him recently.

Zoro closed his eye and pressed a kiss on the blond’s knuckles. Sanji blushed at the contact but he tried to disguise it by letting his hair fall on his face. “All right,” he heard Zoro say.

The swordsman placed the glowing snow globe on Sanji’s lap and caressed his cheek with his thumb before he looked at him straight in the eyes and said, “It all started with this damn snow globe… and a stupid wish…”

The snow was falling on Sunny’s lawn. It was funny how the ocean around them didn’t freeze at the cold weather, like it was just some sort of joke, but the cold wind now blowing at his face was the proof that it was indeed a winter morning.

Zoro let out an icy breath, watching the smoke curl and disappear in front of him. “We’re almost in Wano.”

“Hm,” he heard the blond hum behind him.

Zoro shifted his hands under the cook’s thighs and he hauled him up into a more comfortable position. “You’re heavy, Cook.” It wasn’t actually true. The cook weighed nothing if compared to those thousand pounds of metals he was training with in the crow’s nest. He said that for the sole purpose of making a rise out of the cook.

“I told you I can stand on my own,” he said frowning.

“No. Chopper will get mad if he sees your feet. You know he only let you out here because I said that I would carry you,” the swordsman countered.

Sanji let out a frustrated sigh and his head dropped in defeat on Zoro’s shoulders. “This sucks.”

He chuckled at the cook’s dilemma. “Yeah, well, deal with it, idiot.”

They both stood behind the railings in silence, watching the snowfall melt as it hit the deep blue ocean. Zoro felt Sanji’s arms wrap around his neck and his cold fingertips brush against his neck.

“You cold?” he asked.

“A bit,” the blond responded.

“Hang on.” Zoro turned around and let the cook sit on top of the Adam wood railing.

Sanji raised a curious eyebrow at the swordsman and he saw him pulling the red scarf from himself and then wrapped it around Sanji’s neck instead. Zoro searched for something in his coat pocket and when he found what he was looking for, he reached for Sanji’s hands and pushed them inside a pair of dark green mittens.

The blond was too stunned to speak. He watched silently as Zoro took care of the coldness in his hands and he just let his face bury on the warm scarf around him, inhaling Zoro’s scent and taking in a deep breath to calm down his heart.

“That okay?” the man asked.

“Yeah. Thanks,” Sanji replied as he hid the blush tainting his pale cheeks. “Aren’t you cold?”

“I’m warm-blooded than most people. I’ll be fine.”

Nodding in response, the blond took Zoro’s hand and played with his long, bony fingers. “Hey, Zoro,” he began as his mind swam with thoughts, “are we close friends?”

The man snorted. “No. I think we’re the nastiest rivals that the world has ever seen.”

“Really?” Sanji couldn’t believe that. “You mean we hate each other?”

“No. It’s not like that,” the man answered and moved closer toward the blond, settling himself between his thighs and placing his hands on the railing beside him. He looked at Sanji’s eyes and said, “We definitely annoy each other a lot. We fight. We bicker. But that’s the end of that. We’ll never hate each other because we’re nakama. Remember that.”

Nakama. The word sounded so rich. So warm and familiar. So much like what a family was supposed to be, and Sanji found himself easing in on the term.

“So you care about me because I’m nakama?” Sanji asked. He remembered when Zoro confessed about what happened to them two days ago. He said that they were pirates, that they met in East Blue, and that they had this big fight in Wano, and then Zoro’s wish, then this magical snow globe fucking things up…

It was a lot to take in and Nami had to step in and fill him up with the details. Zoro wasn’t a very good narrator. Unfortunately.

But when he had finally understood, he heard Zoro say sorry to him countless times that he had to actually pinch his cheeks hard enough to make him listen to him. He said that it wasn’t his fault, that he didn’t mean for it to happen to Sanji but the goddamn man was so stubborn. He continued to berate himself for it and the blond knew that it was a hopeless case.

“I can’t stop you from blaming yourself,” he said to Zoro and smiled. “But I can show you that I don’t give a damn about it and that whatever the hell you’ve done, I forgive you, got it?”

After the question left Sanji’s mouth, Zoro didn’t have to think twice before answering, “Of course, dumbass.”

Sanji hummed thoughtfully as he continued to play with the man’s fingers. “So,” he began, “nakama kiss each other?” It might have been a form of courtesy, he thought. He’d never been able to set foot outside the kingdom, thus he wasn’t accustomed to any culture aside from the one he’d been exposed to in his formative years.

“What?” Zoro asked in confusion.

“You kissed me. So does it mean that I can kiss Nami, Robin, Brook or Chopper? As long as they’re nakama?”

“Of course not, idiot!” the swordsman exclaimed and his outburst surprised the blond. “You can’t kiss any of our nakama! Or any person for that matter!”

“Huh?” Sanji furrowed his eyebrows. “Then why did you kiss me?”

“That’s–!” The words died in Zoro’s mouth. The blond was looking at him expectantly, seeking for an explanation with those beautiful blue eyes and Zoro wanted nothing but to just smother the damn bastard with kisses. But that thing was the issue. Why did Zoro kiss him? Of course, he knew Sanji was special to him. He knew he held a special place in his heart. But how could he explain it to him?

“Zoro.” The blond let go of his hand and placed his palm on the swordsman’s face. “Correct me if I’m wrong but…” He bit his lip briefly, feeling the blush spreading on his cheeks, before he lifted his gaze to meet Zoro’s eye. He could see his reflection in that smoky crystal. The color was so beautiful, like ashes, and it was absorbing him in, toward Zoro’s world, deeper and deeper, and he couldn’t fight back.

“Zoro.” His thumb caressed his cheek. “Do you love me?”

Zoro’s lips parted and he couldn’t hear anything but those words ringing inside his ears. He couldn’t see anything but Sanji. This damn Curlybrow. His heart was banging against his chest, so loud and almost painful.

“W-What the hell are you saying?” he managed to say.

“Well…” Sanji sighed and put his hand down from the man’s face. His eyes dropped on his lap when he said, “When I first met you, I felt this strange feeling inside my chest. I couldn’t name it, but whenever I see you, my heart beats so fast like I’m running a thousand miles. It feels so warm that it burns my cheeks. I’ve only known you for a couple of days but it feels like I’ve known you my entire life.”

Snow fell on his blond hair and Zoro let himself submit to his urge to brush it off with his hand. When Sanji lift up his head and their eyes met, the swordsman once again felt that electricity between them – that spark which ignited their beings everytime they held eye contact like this. Sanji must’ve felt it too for his rosy lips parted. Zoro could see him swallow but he kept his gaze fixed on that lovely blue eye.

This was Sanji in front of him, but at the same time, he wasn’t. He might have had his face, his hair, his eyes, his voice… but he wasn’t the cook he knew, that everyone knew.

Sanji, the Strawhat’s cook, was strong, foul-mouthed, loud, annoying and a ladies’ man. He wouldn’t easily admit his feelings to Zoro like this. He wouldn’t let him carry him on his back around the ship. He wouldn’t let the ladies cook their meals. And he wouldn’t forget to call him by that stupid name – Marimo.

It was his fault that Sanji was different. Even though he knew how special he was to him, he couldn’t tell it to him right now. He wanted that annoying cook to know what he felt, what he thought of him, so he could finally put conclusion to their messy relationship.

After everything was done, after he’d finally reversed the effect of the wish, after the real Sanji came back to them, he swore that the first thing that the cook would hear were his goddamn words – his goddamn confession.

Zoro laid his hands on the cook’s thighs. “I don’t know,” he answered.

Sanji forgot to breathe for a moment. He kept staring at Zoro’s eye, looking for some kind of closure, but that vague answer was the only one he gave him. “You don’t know,” he said silently. It wasn’t a question, but more like declarative words for himself. To reiterate what Zoro had said to him and when it settled in, he felt an ache inside his chest. It was weird. He wasn’t supposed to feel something like that. He only knew Zoro for a grand total of three days, but his words had already affected him so much.

Was he that weak? It was his emotion, wasn’t it? It was his emotion that made his Father and siblings hate him, the one which made him pathetic and useless? And right now, it was also the reason why he was feeling that pain inside his chest, why he was feeling so vulnerable in front of that swordsman and why he was feeling down at his response.

Sanji forced a smile on his lips. “That’s right. You can’t love me.” Because I’m weak. “You’ll find the one for you.” Someone who can protect and stand beside you. “You deserve the best.” And not someone like me.

Zoro’s eyebrows furrowed. “Cook?”

Sanji pulled the scarf down and leaned forward to press his lips against the swordsman’s forehead. Zoro froze under that touch and he just let the cook do whatever he wanted to him. When the blond pulled away, he said, “It’s that time of the year, right? Christmas season?”

But before Zoro could answer, Sanji shifted on the railings and helped himself down on his feet, ignoring the pain that shot through his healing ribs.

“Oi–” the swordsman started to protest.

However, Sanji put his finger on his lips and smiled. “Don’t tell Chopper.” Then he turned around and walked toward the infirmary, his shoes leaving footprints on the snow piled up on Sunny’s lawn.

Zoro watched him all the way, and as the blond closed the door behind him, he couldn’t help but think if what he’d said to him was right or just another damn thing that he would regret later on.

It all happened so fast. They were almost near the coast of Wano Island when a large pirate ship intercepted their path. Zoro felt it and he immediately alerted his companions.

“It’s the Beast Pirates!” Chopper shouted.

“Yohohoho! I’ll call for help!” Brook jumped out of the ship and ran his way toward the island. Zoro almost forgot that the skeleton could run weightlessly on water.

“What’s happening?” Sanji ran down the stairs toward the lawn.

“Sanji! You can’t fight! You’re still injured!” Chopper complained.

“Don’t be ridiculous!” Sanji replied as he positioned himself on the small defensive circle they’d made. He felt his back flush against the swordsman and said, “If you’re fighting, then I will, too.”

Zoro smirked at that and he threw a challenging look toward the blond. “Who do you think can beat up more pirates?”

Sanji sensed the competition in those words and he grinned back at him. “Me of course.”

“Heh.” Zoro put Wado between his teeth and unsheathed both Kitetsu and Shusui. Sanji’s eyes widened and the swordsman reminded himself that this was probably the first time that this Sanji was seeing him in full gear. “We’ll find that out, Shitty Cook.”

The fight broke out. The Strawhats were separated, fighting their own battle, as Kin’emon protected Momonosuke. Zoro gave the globe to the kid because he might accidentally break it while he fought. He was skeptical at first, but he didn’t really have any other choice.

Zoro was on deck; Nami and Chopper on the lawn; Robin, Kin’emon and Momonosuke near the main mast, and…

“Zoro!” Nami shouted at him.

“What?” Zoro yelled back as he sliced ten men simultaneously.

“Where’s Sanji-kun?” Nami summoned her thunder bolts and the pirates around her all fell down with pained groans.

“I don’t know!” Zoro answered as if it was the most absurd question he’d ever heard. He slashed the remaining enemies on deck. What the fuck was Nami talking about? The cook could take care of himself–

“YOU IDIOT!” The navigator ran toward him and clutched his robe inside her hands. She pulled him towards her and shouted at his face. “Find Sanji-kun right now! He hadn’t met Zeff which meant he hadn’t taught him how to fight with his legs!” Nami shoved him away. “I only agreed to let him fight because I thought you realized that shit and that you’d protect him.”

Zoro swallowed thickly and frantically roamed his eye around the ship. No blond hair.

“Shit!” Zoro jumped from the deck and slashed a few enemies on the lawn as he looked for Sanji. “Cook!”

He ran up the stairs, toward the side of the ship until his feet took him on the stern. That was where he saw him.

Sanji was slumped against the wall, his feet buried on his opponent’s chest as his hands held a sword – a fucking sword – horizontally in front of him to block the enemy’s blade. Both men tried to push forward, claiming dominance, but the cook was at a disadvantage.

Zoro saw how he gritted his teeth and how hard he was trying to push the man away. A few pirates tried to lunge for the cook but enough was enough. In an instant, Zoro was in front of them, and before the enemies could attack him, he spun around and a tornado blasted the enemies away.

He turned around and slashed the cook’s opponent. Sanji was panting when their eyes met and he attempted to lift the corner of his mouth for a grin. “Right on time,” he said, but Zoro could see his body tremble in exhaustion.

Sanji doubled over and coughed on the floorboards. He covered his mouth with his hand to stifle himself but one violent cough caused blood to splatter underneath him. Zoro’s eye widened and his heart beat nervously inside his chest. “Cook, what the fuck?” He immediately knelt beside him but the cook stopped him with a hand on his arm.

“I’m fine,” he said hoarsely as he grinned at the swordsman with bloody teeth. “Just a blow… on my ribs.”

Zoro had to refrain from hauling himself toward the goddamn bastard who punched Sanji on his broken ribs. The blond coughed out blood again and he was afraid for a moment that his rib might’ve punctured a lung.

“Fuck.” Zoro draped Sanji’s arm around his neck. “Let’s get you to Chopper.”

“No.” He shook his head. “I’ll wait here. You can’t drag me all the way there.”

“Don’t be stupid!” Zoro yelled at him. “You can’t protect yourself in that state!”

“SAAAAANJIIII!”

The whole ship rocked on the waves as a flying object coiled around the railings of the Sunny. The blond had to steady himself on Zoro’s sleeves because of the sudden movement. When he opened his eyes, he saw a young man embracing the railings with his long rubber-like arms and legs.

Zoro grinned at the raven haired boy. “You’re late, Luffy.”

“Shi-shi-shi!” Luffy gripped his Strawhat and smiled broadly. “Glad to see you, Sanji!” Then he hauled himself over and fought the approaching enemies. The young man stretched – freaking stretched – and Sanji had to suppress the urge to slap himself awake.

“He’s our captain, Luffy,” Zoro explained with a smile.

“I see.” The blond grinned.

The swordsman was about to carry Sanji when he saw a group of pirates lunging after them. Cursing, Zoro drew out his katanas once again and clashed with their swords. Sanji was stunned by how powerful and graceful Zoro was when he was in his element. Every flex of his muscles promised raw strength. Every slash of his blade meant absolute retribution.

Sanji was lost. He was drowning in Zoro’s world. He couldn’t see anything but him… until that moment came.

“Momonosuke-sama!”

Sanji saw the little kid falling down from the upper deck. Luffy stretched his arm to catch him but it was a moment too late to notice that thing.

“If this thing breaks before my wish gets completed…” Zoro looked at him in the eyes. “Then I will die.”

His feet were running. There was pain in his side but he didn’t mind. All he could see was that thing, slowly falling over the railings. And before he could think, he jumped, stretching his arm out, and reaching for that thing as much as his flexibility would allow. His palm gripped the round glass and he flipped his body around. “LUFFY!”

The rubber captain whipped his head around as he caught Momonosuke in his arms. Sanji threw the snow globe at him, his legs brushing against the railings as he felt himself fall. Toward the ocean beneath him.

The world spun slowly in his vision. He saw how the globe arched in the air, how Luffy caught it, how he screamed his name… and then there was the fall. Suddenly, he felt everything blurring around him, no sound, no noise. And then his back felt the impact, how the air got knocked out of his lungs, how the cold water engulfed him, how the dark ocean sucked him in toward its depth.

There was blinding pain on his side and he let out a groan. Bubbles rose from his mouth – and blood – but he tried to flail his arms. To swim toward the surface but it was as if gravity was pulling him in, deeper and deeper.

He saw black dotting the edge of his vision, his lungs burning for oxygen, his muscles aching and gradually stiffening. Through the last string of his consciousness, he saw green.

He saw a tuft of green hair under his chin, resting peacefully on his chest. He ran his fingers through the green locks and the man moved, lifting his head up slowly to face him. He was met by a sleepy grey eye and a lazy grin. Sanji smiled.

Ah, it was a memory.

“Zoro.”

He faintly saw the surface broke above him, how the water thrash around that person, how his hand reached desperately for Sanji, because even before he was halfway there, the blond closed his eyes, released the last breath of air inside his lungs, and let the dark abyss embrace him.

Zoro gasped for air when he broke out through the surface. “Luffy!” he shouted as he tried to keep the body inside his left arm above the water.

“Zoro!” Luffy stretched his arm and gripped Zoro’s forearm. He hauled his two nakama overboard. Bracing himself from the impact, Zoro tightened his arms around Sanji. They rolled on the wooden floor and the swordsman groaned when his back hit the wall.

“Let’s get out here, Franky!” Luffy shouted as he ran toward the deck.

After a while, Zoro felt the whole ship flying, toward the clouds, toward the horizon, until the enemy’s ship was out of sight. He panted for air as his arms continued to circle around the cook tightly – protectively.

When the Sunny settled down on the water again, Zoro immediately pulled himself away from Sanji. “Cook?” His wet hair was plastered on his forehead and beside his face. His face and lips were pale – cold. Zoro leaned down and placed his ear on the blond’s chest.

Nothing.

“Shit.” He put his right hand over his left and pumped Sanji’s chest. Then he tilted his head up, pinched his nose and blew air into his mouth. When the blond didn’t respond, he pumped his chest again several times, but this time, panic was starting to set it in.

“Come on, Cook,” he growled and blew air into his mouth again.

“Sanji!” Chopper knelt beside him and put his hooves over the blond’s carotid pulse. “Continue what you’re doing, Zoro!”

“Sanji-kun!” Nami’s hands flew to her mouth because of shock. The other Strawhats were standing around them, eyebrows furrowed, hands clasped together, fists on their sides – praying, hoping.

“Come on, Cook! It can’t end like this!” Zoro continued to pump Sanji’s chest but he wasn’t moving. Not a flinch. And his heart was starting to break. “Fuck! No! You can’t–”

“Zoro.” Chopper put his hooves on Zoro’s hands above the blond’s chest. The swordsman stopped because of that touch and the little doctor’s eyes started to pool with tears. When he shook his head, the other Strawhats gasped in despair.

Zoro was still looking at Chopper, unable to comprehend what the fuck his nakama had just meant. His grey eye landed on the cook’s face. His eyebrows were both visible. The cook would throw a hissy fit if he saw that.

The swordsman brushed a few strands of wet blond hair down the right side of his face. Snow fell on his face and Zoro had to wipe them away. The cook would hate that. He’d be cold.

“Zoro-dono.”

Kin’emon and Momonosuke walked toward him. The little kid knelt beside Sanji and showed the swordsman that round glass inside his hands. Zoro saw the almost barren tree inside it, and as the last set of leaves fell from the top of the pine tree, the swirling snowflakes started to settle down. And after a while, the whole thing just stopped. There were no snowfall, no falling leaves. Just… stillness.

“Sanji saved this globe,” Momonosuke said as his lower lip quivered. “He knew that if this thing breaks…” His hands gripped tighter around the base. “You’ll die.”

That was the moment when everything dawned on him clearly. The cook saved him, his life. He remembered that time when Sanji stood between him and Kuma, saying to take his life instead of his.

How could this idiot throw his life away like this so easily? He was a selfless bastard, but Zoro wouldn’t let this happen. He couldn’t let the cook sacrifice himself again. He had suffered enough… was hurt enough. That was why he… Sanji couldn’t…

Zoro took the blond inside his arms and pressed him against his chest. He let his face bury on those wet locks and he felt a silent tear glide down his cheek. A sob escaped from his mouth and he tried to bury his anguish against the Sanji’s temple, inhaling the salty spray of the ocean against his skin and the sweetness of his soft pale hair.

Nami sobbed on Usopp’s shoulders as tears steadily flowed down his face. Chopper, Brook and Franky were hugging and crying together. Robin had her head bowed down as quiet tears graced her lovely face.

Luffy was gripping his straw hat, pushing it down on his face to hide his mournful tears. Kin’emon knelt beside Momonosuke and put a hand on his shoulder. After a while, the tears burst out from the kid’s eyes and he wrapped his arms around the samurai.

Zoro could hear the sorrow from his companions, but his thought was all on the cook wrapped inside his arms. He was stiff and cold. He wanted to wrap that scarf around his neck again. He wanted to see his blue eyes staring at him with love and affection. He wanted to kiss those soft lips and feel the blond’s smile against his own. He wanted to hear his low whispers beside his ear. He wanted to feel his hot breath on his skin, his warm touches, his gentle caresses…

“Sanji,” he murmured on the cook’s cheek. “I love you.” He pressed his lips against Sanji’s as tears wet his cheeks. “I love you. I love you.” His arms wrapped tighter around the cook, pulling him against him as much as he could, unwilling to let him go.

A strange bright light erupted in front of him. When his eye cracked open, he saw the snow globe glowing on the wooden floor. It hoisted up in the air, the snowflakes swirling wildly inside the glass, glowing like bright rays of the sun, and then it shattered.

The tiny crystals fell from the sky like snow and everyone was too shocked to utter a single word. Zoro was still looking up… when he felt something move against him.

His grey eye landed on the body inside his arms and his heart almost dropped when the cook slowly fluttered his eyes. Zoro froze in his spot as he watched those blue eyes settle dizzily on him. “Cook?” he whispered in disbelief.

“What?” Nami paced toward them and when she saw Sanji, she gasped, “Oh my God, Sanji-kun!”

“Cook!” Zoro stroked the blond’s cheek as his heart beat rapidly inside his chest. “Hey. Hey. Look at me.”

“Zo… ro,” Sanji muttered in a raspy voice.

“Yes. Yes, Cook. Fuck. It’s me. It’s Zoro.” The swordsman tried to smile hopefully at the blond and his system flushed with tremendous relief when Sanji smiled back at him.

“Marimo.”

The words shocked Zoro and he didn’t know what to do for a moment. The cook had called him ‘Marimo.’ Fuck, he called him that stupid name. Did it mean…?

“I got stuck in this weird dream,” Sanji said silently. “I was fucking locked up in our castle for thirteen years. I never made it to East Blue. I never met Zeff, the crew, and… you.”

A shaky breath was released from Zoro’s mouth and he hugged the cook tightly. “You’re back, Shitty Cook.” He felt the tears burn in his eyes as a smile tugged the corners of his mouth. “You’re fucking back.”

Sanji chuckled and placed a comforting hand on the swordsman’s back. “Yeah,” he said. “I’m fucking back, Idiot Marimo.”

The crew all cried in relief. They couldn’t believe it. They couldn’t believe that Sanji was alive, but at the same time, they were so grateful for that miracle.

Momonosuke looked up at the few remaining debris of that snow globe in the sky. “To reverse one’s wish,” he whispered.

“Yes.” Robin stepped forward and the others looked at her. “Before the last set of leaves fell down from the tree, you were able to reverse your wish, Swordsman-san.”

“What?” Usopp was the one who spoke. “How come?”

“‘I wish I never met you back in East Blue,’” she repeated Zoro’s wish. “To reverse that kind of wish, there has to be a rebirth.” Her dark eyes settled on Sanji before a smile stretched her lips. “Cook-san had to die, and then come back to life…” she shifted her gaze to Zoro, “…to meet swordsman-san again. Not in East Blue, but right here, at this moment.”

The beautiful tale tugged at the hearts of everyone in the ship. Zoro’s eye met again with the cook’s, but this time, his heart brimmed with warmth and affection instead of sadness and regret. He brushed a few strands of blond hair from his forehead and said, “What do we do now, Curlybrow?”

The blond chuckled. “I don’t know. Maybe a good cup of hot chocolate? My ass is fucking freezing here, Damn Mosshead.”

Zoro laughed in that low baritone and he helped the blond sit up. “Yeah. I forgot. Your scrawny ass is gonna catch a cold.”

“Oi, my ass is not scrawny, you basta – ow!” Sanji gripped his side as pain coursed through his broken ribs.

“Sanji! I need to see you in the infirmary right now!” Chopper demanded and the swordsman had that amused smirk when the blond rolled his eyes and grunted.

“I’ll carry you,” Zoro offered.

“Oh, hell no, Shithead!” Sanji said defiantly.

“Come on, Sanji-kun! Don’t be such a baby,” Nami said as she folded her arms over her chest.

“But–but Nami-swan…” Sanji looked at her pleadingly but she just rolled her eyes at him and told him to just deal with it.

The other Strawhats, Kin’emon and Momonosuke all walked away to check if the ship had gotten any damage from the attack. Sanji huffed and grudgingly wrapped his arms around Zoro’s neck as the man lifted him up on his back.

“You’re fucking lucky Nami-san told me to shut up,” Sanji said with furrowed eyebrows.

“Well, you should stop being so fucking defensive about it,” Zoro explained. “You should let me help once in a while.”

“Heh.” Sanji grinned and craned his neck beside Zoro’s face. “What, worried about me, huh, Marimo?”

“Fucking hell, Cook,” the swordsman said with a sigh. “You don’t know how worried I was.”

Sanji gaped at him in shock because he hadn’t expected him to be so straightforward. “Why?” he asked as his heart started to beat faster. “Why would you be so worried? Because I’m nakama?”

There’s that bloody question again, Zoro thought. But this time, he wouldn’t miss the chance. He wouldn’t let the opportunity pass by just like what he did last time. Because the last time he dodged this question, everything crumbled into pieces and he almost lost the cook.

Thus, turning his gaze toward Sanji’s face beside him, taking in that beautiful blue crystals looking hopefully at him, he confessed, “I’m worried because I love you, Shitty Cook.”

Sanji’s lips parted in surprise and Zoro caught that moment to lock his lips with his. He tasted salt water and the bitter tang of blood in his mouth, but what made his heart beat loudly inside his chest was the mixture of coldness and warmth, softness and roughness, on Sanji’s lips.

And when he pulled back, Sanji’s cheeks were a beautiful shade of pink and his blond eyelashes were blinking at Zoro like he couldn’t believe what just happened. “You…” he stammered out and he buried his face on the crook of Zoro’s neck. “You bastard.”

His voice was muffled by his robe, but Zoro clearly heard what he said. He laughed at the blond’s flustered reaction and he started to walk toward the infirmary.

“Oi.” Sanji kicked the swordsman’s side and even though he was feeling weak and exhausted like this, the bastard’s kick was still more powerful than a normal person’s.

“What?” the swordsman said irritably.

Sanji leaned forward and pressed his lips against his cheek. But before the swordsman could recover from his shock, the blond moved closer to his ear and whispered affectionately, “I love you, too, Zoro.”

He wrapped his arms tighter around Zoro’s neck and he closed his eyes, feeling his lover’s warmth seep through the fabric of his robe toward his skin, and with a lovely smile, he said, “Now and forever.”

- fin -