Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Roronoa Zoro liked being alone. Or at least, that was what he told himself. Solitude had never felt like a punishment to him. It was a discipline, a way to keep the world from dulling his edges. Since childhood, being on his own had been the only constant he trusted. To fight alone…to win alone…to breathe without depending on anyone else.

Some people called it loneliness. Zoro called it balance but sometimes, especially on nights like this, the word loneliness felt harder to ignore.

When he straightened his back, a sharp ache pulled through his muscles, forcing a brief tightening of his jaw. He had just won the most important fight of his career. Months of brutal training had finally paid off and the victory was his. The crowd that had screamed his name, the blinding flashes of cameras, the swarm of reporters had all disappeared the moment he stepped out of the arena.

All that remained was him. One man on a barstool, surrounded by the hollow echo of success.

With the tip of his finger, he traced slow circles along the rim of his glass. He knew he should not drink. But tonight, he thought, he had earned the right to forget himself.

The woman’s voice cut through the low murmur of the bar.

“That’s you on the screen, isn’t it?”

Zoro didn’t look up. The replay of the fight glimmered faintly on the wall-mounted television, his body caught in slow motion, every punch, every drop of sweat exaggerated under the lights. He had already lived that moment once; he didn’t need to see it again.

“Is it?” he said flatly.

She laughed, the sound soft but intentional, meant to be heard. She stepped closer, the clack of her heels barely audible beneath the bass-heavy music.

“I didn’t think someone that sweaty could look that sexy.” she teased, letting her hand rest on his thigh.

Something in his stomach turned, a slow, unpleasant twist. His fingers tightened around his glass before he finally caught her wrist and moved it away.

“If you knew how bad sweat smells, you wouldn’t think that.” he said quietly, taking a drink. The liquor burned his throat, sharp and punishing. He almost welcomed it.

She giggled again, that hollow kind of laughter that never reached the eyes, and leaned even closer. “Maybe you just need to work up another sweat.” she whispered.

Zoro took a slow breath, steadying himself. She was flawless, really. Blonde hair falling over a sculpted face, perfume that smelled expensive and foreign, lips glossed to perfection. By all means, he should have wanted her. A man in his position probably would’ve taken her hand, walked out of the bar, disappeared into a hotel room until morning. 

But the thought made something in him recoil.

He pulled back slightly, his tone polite but distant. “Thanks.” he said, dismissively.

She tilted her head, still smiling, still refusing to take the hint.

“My girlfriend wouldn’t like that.” Zoro added, the words quick and quiet. The only kind of lie that wouldn’t make tomorrow’s headlines.

For a moment, she hesitated, lips pressed in a pout. Then she turned, muttering something under her breath and walked away.

Zoro let out a slow exhale and took another sip. It tasted bitter now. 

“Want me to turn it off?”

The voice came from behind the counter. Robin, one of the few faces Zoro actually recognized in this city. She never bothered him, never asked for pictures, never tried to pry. She just knew what he drank and poured it without words. In a place that still felt foreign, she was the closest thing he had to a friend.

“Yeah,” he said, his voice low. “Please.”

The screen went dark, and the noise in his chest eased, just a little.

“Roronoa Zoro!”

The shout behind him made his jaw clench. Not this again.

He kept his eyes on his drink and took a slow sip, as if ignoring the voice would make it disappear.

“Wow! It really is you!” the same voice said, now closer.

“I’m not taking photos today,” Zoro muttered, still not turning.

The stranger laughed. “Man, I’m Monkey D. Luffy. Ace’s brother.”

That name snapped through the noise. Zoro finally turned his head.

He recognized nothing about the kid except the energy; wide-open, bright, impossible to dodge. 

Ace had taken over as his manager only a few months ago, handling all the noise Zoro had no patience for. He had mentioned a brother once, but Zoro had assumed he lived somewhere far away.

“I didn’t know he had a brother in town.” Zoro said.

“I wasn’t,” Luffy grinned. “Went off for university. Just got back.”

Before Zoro could respond, Luffy leaned over the bar. “What are you drinking?”

Zoro opened his mouth, but-

“Hey! Four of these!” Luffy called out, pointing at Zoro’s glass.

Robin raised a brow at the order but set the drinks down with practiced speed.

“My friends are here.” Luffy said, already picking up two glasses. “Come join us!”

“I’m tired.” Zoro replied. “I’m heading home.” 

“Nope.”

Luffy slapped his shoulder once-friendly, forceful-and nudged the remaining drinks toward him.

“You bring those. Come on.”

Before Zoro could argue, Luffy disappeared into the crowd, the top of his messy hair bobbing between bodies.

Zoro glared at the glasses, the urge to walk straight out the door pulsing hard and clear.

Instead, he grabbed them.

He carried the drinks through the crowd, careful not to spill any of them, slipping between bodies and half-turned shoulders. He still was not sure why he had not left when he had the chance. He barely knew the guy, and yet somehow he was already being dragged into his night.

When he reached the table, three pairs of eyes turned toward him at once. For a brief second, it felt like he had stepped into the wrong place entirely.

“Guys, this is Zoro. Ace-”

“We know who he is.” the boy in the bandana cut in, already on his feet. He stuck out his hand with barely contained excitement. “That fight today was insane. I’m Usopp.”

Zoro shook his hand. “Thanks. Nice to meet you.”

The woman beside him leaned forward next, her expression composed, assessing. Her orange hair caught the light as she offered her hand.

“Nami. I didn’t watch the fight.”

Zoro nodded and took her hand. Her grip was steady, confident, not what he had expected.

Only one person at the table hadn’t moved.

The blonde man sat back in his chair, striped shirt open enough to show the sharp line of his collarbone. A strand of hair fell over one eye, shadowing it completely. He took a slow drag from his cigarette, exhaling the smoke in a lazy stream before finally extending his hand, more out of politeness than interest.

“Sanji.” he said, his gaze flicking over Zoro head to toe in a single practiced sweep.

“Zoro.” he replied, gripping Sanji’s hand harder than necessary.

Sanji didn’t react, but his eyebrow barely lifted. Unlike the others, he didn’t look impressed. Or curious. He looked…unmoved.

“Figures.” he muttered under his breath, too low for anyone but Zoro to catch.

Before the moment could stretch, Luffy appeared at Zoro’s side, dragging a chair out with a screech.

“Sit, sit! You’re with us now!”

The moment Zoro sat down, he felt the weight of two stares land on him. Bright, unfiltered curiosity from Luffy and Usopp. Their energy hit him like a sudden burst of heat in an already crowded room.

“So, uh…your fights,” Usopp began, leaning forward with wide-eyed enthusiasm. “Aren’t they… insanely tough? Ever since Ace stepped into the UFC world with you, we barely see him anymore.”

Zoro kept his posture straight, answering with the same practiced tone he used in press conferences.

“If you’re in this field, it’s part of what you sign up for.”

Usopp nodded. He opened his mouth for another question, but another voice cut in before he could speak.

“Is it really a job, though?”

Zoro turned his head to the right, not entirely sure he had heard him correctly.

“What?”

Sanji didn’t look at him right away. He was too busy flashing a smile at a woman passing behind him, the kind of smile meant to stop someone in their tracks. She walked on without even glancing his way. 

“I said,” he repeated. “is it really a job?”

Zoro blinked once. The question caught him off guard, not because it was clever, but because of how casually it was delivered.

“Oh,” Zoro said. “And what do you do?”

“A chef.” Sanji replied, without hesitation.

The laugh that slipped out of Zoro was short and unplanned. It was barely a sound, more breath than humor, but it was enough.

Sanji’s head snapped toward him. “What was that?”

He leaned forward slightly, eyes narrowing. The small cross at his neck shifted against his skin as he moved, catching the low light of the bar. Zoro’s gaze flicked to it for a fraction of a second before he forced himself to look back up. 

“Nothing,” Zoro said evenly. “I just assumed someone who speaks with that much confidence would have a more…important profession.”

The silence that followed was immediate.

Sanji straightened in his chair, cigarette paused between his fingers, his jaw tightening just enough to be noticeable.

“You,” he started.

A sharp thud cut him off. Nami’s palm landed squarely on the back of his head, hard enough to make the cross bounce against his collarbone.

“Oh my god, shut up.” she said.

She turned to Zoro with a tired exhale, her tone shifting. “He’s usually more polite than this.”

Sanji recovered fast. Too fast.

“My apologies, my lady,” he said, voice suddenly smooth, almost practiced. He looked away, lifting his glass, fingers curling around it tighter than before.

“Okay, so,” Luffy said, immediately launching into motion, hands slicing the air as he spoke. “Zoro is really strong. Like, stupid strong. Ace said-”

“Ace exaggerates.” Zoro cut in, almost reflexively.

“No, he doesn’t.” Usopp said at once. He leaned forward, eyes bright, pointing at Zoro as if he were a story that had finally come to life. “He says getting hit by you feels like getting run over by a truck.”

Nami lifted her glass, unimpressed. “That comparison makes no sense.”

“It does if the truck is going downhill,” Usopp insisted. “In the snow.”

Nami took a sip. “That still makes no sense.”

Luffy nodded thoughtfully. “I think it makes sense.”

“You have never been hit by a truck.” Nami said.

“I could have been.” Luffy replied, completely serious.

Usopp nodded in agreement. “That’s true.”

Zoro didn’t interrupt. He just watched them talk over one another, voices overlapping, laughter cutting in and out of the conversation without anyone getting offended. It was loud, unfiltered, messy. Normally, it would have worn him down within minutes.

Instead, he felt oddly removed from it, like he was standing just outside the edge of something warm. Close enough to feel it, not quite close enough to belong to it.

Zoro caught fragments of the conversation more than full sentences.

Luffy and Usopp talked fast, their words tumbling over each other, voices rising and overlapping. He followed the gist of it. Jokes. Exaggerations. Something about trucks again. But every now and then, a phrase slipped past him, meaning lost somewhere between accents and speed.

It irritated him more than he liked to admit.

He had been in the States a little over a year now. Long enough to get by. Long enough that people assumed he understood everything. He usually let them. It was easier than asking someone to repeat themselves, easier than exposing the gap he still felt whenever conversations moved too quickly.

He stayed quiet, listening, nodding when it felt appropriate.

“You always this quiet?” Sanji asked. He flicked ash into the tray, eyes drifting toward Zoro with casual precision.

Zoro glanced at him. Sanji was watching him openly now, chin tilted slightly, cigarette balanced between his fingers like it belonged there.

“I speak when there’s something to say.” Zoro replied.

Sanji hummed, leaning back in his chair. His gaze lingered, not impressed, not dismissive either. Just assessing. 

“Must get boring.” he said.

“Sanji!” Nami warned, not even turning her head.

“What?” Sanji said. “It’s an observation.”

“It’s rude.”

Luffy leaned forward, elbows landing hard on the table.

“Zoro’s not boring. He’s cool.” he declared. 

Nami smiled softly and turned back to Zoro.

“So,” she said, “how long have you been in the States?”

“About a year and a half ago.” Zoro replied. “Came for training.”

“That’s a long way from home.”

He nodded once. He appreciated that she left it there.

Luffy launched into a story about how Usopp once tried to fight a guy twice his size because he thought the man had insulted his shoes.

Usopp nearly choked on his drink. “He did insult my shoes.”

“He said they were nice,” Luffy argued.

“Exactly,” Usopp shot back. “Sarcastically.”

Nami rolled her eyes. Sanji let out a short, amused breath, smoke curling from between his fingers.

Zoro felt the corner of his mouth lift before he caught it and looked away.

The drinks slowly disappeared. The noise softened. The night settled around the table in layers of conversation and laughter.

Zoro didn’t say much. The space filled itself without asking anything of him. Arguments overlapped with jokes, small interruptions slipped between sentences. It was the easy rhythm of people who had known each other for years.

And somehow, he stayed.

Longer than he meant to. Longer than he understood.

He glanced toward the door once. Then again.

Still, he didn’t move.

Luffy was laughing too loudly. Nami hid a smile behind her glass. Usopp was halfway out of his chair, reenacting something dramatic and ridiculous.

Sanji sat back, cigarette burning low, gaze unfocused.

Then, briefly, his eyes lifted. They met Zoro’s. Just for a second. Long enough to register. Long enough to feel deliberate.

Sanji’s expression gave nothing away, but he didn’t look away first. Zoro broke the glance, lowering his eyes to the empty glass in front of him.

He wasn’t sure why he stayed. Maybe it was easier than going back to the silence.

Chapter Text

He ran.

The city was still half-asleep, streets slick with leftover rain, air sharp enough to sting his lungs. His breath burned as it filled his chest, each inhale scraping raw on the way in. He welcomed it. Pain meant he was awake. Pain meant he was moving.

This was how his days began. Not by choice anymore. By habit.

He pushed past the pace his body asked for, past the quiet warning signs that had learned not to argue with him. There was always more distance to cover, more strain to draw out of his muscles before the sun came up. By the time most people opened their eyes, he had already crossed the city once.

He never complained. If anything, he did more than he was told. Enough that Koshiro and the rest of the coaching team had started giving him the same lecture after every major fight. Rest mattered. Recovery mattered. Zoro listened, nodded, and returned the next morning as if the conversation had never happened.

The sky above him should have been brightening. Dawn usually crept in slow and quiet here. But today, it didn’t. Thick clouds sat low and unmoving, sealing the horizon shut. Somewhere behind them, the sun strained to break through, a pale suggestion of light pressing uselessly against gray. Nothing reached the street.

Zoro’s footsteps echoed against the pavement, steady and unchanging, the only sound cutting through the muted world. He kept his eyes forward and ran beneath the dimness as if it were normal. As if it belonged there.

His mind slipped, just for a moment.

The bar from last night surfaced without permission. The noise. The warmth. Voices overlapping too fast for him to catch every word. Laughter that filled space without asking. A table crowded with people who seemed to fit together without effort.

Focus.

He ran harder, letting sweat cut down his jaw, breath turning rough in the cold. 

When Zoro reached the gym, he pulled his earbuds free and let the door swing shut behind him. The familiar scent of rubber mats and metal greeted him at once. The place was nearly empty, the way it always was at this hour. Too early for the rest of the fighters. Quiet enough that his thoughts had room to stretch.

He spent more time here than in his apartment. Some days, he wasn’t sure he remembered what the apartment even looked like in daylight.

“I told you not to come in today.”

Koshiro’s voice carried easily across the open space, calm and firm, without surprise. Zoro barely slowed as he reached for a towel, wiping the sweat from his neck and jaw.

“I didn’t have anything better to do.” he said.

Koshiro stepped closer, his gaze moving over Zoro with practiced precision. He had given him two days off after the fight. Not as a suggestion, but as an order. Zoro had listened. He always listened. He just didn’t always obey.

“Rest is part of the job.” Koshiro said.

Zoro rolled his shoulders, already loosening his muscles, his body slipping back into routine as if it had never left it. “Not in my book.”

Koshiro watched him for a moment, the way he always did when Zoro pushed too far. There was no anger in his expression, only the quiet patience of someone who had learned when to argue and when to wait. They had been working together for two years now. Long enough for Koshiro to recognize stubbornness when he saw it. Long enough for Zoro to know when a lecture was coming.

“You keep this up,” Koshiro said quietly, “and you won’t give your body time to catch up with your ambition.”

Zoro said nothing. Koshiro already knew he’d be back tomorrow.

He had left everything for this man. Koshiro hadn’t promised him championships or told him what he could become. He had simply looked at Zoro across a gym two years ago and seen something worth refining. That had been enough to pack a bag, board a flight, and leave behind a country that had never quite felt like home anyway.

“All right,” Koshiro said at last. “If you insist on being here, then we train. Light work only. No sparring.”

Zoro nodded. They both knew how little that meant.

Koshiro remained beside him as Zoro began his warm-up, offering the occasional correction, the occasional warning. He didn’t hover. He didn’t lecture. He was simply there, a constant presence that asked nothing and demanded everything.

The rope slapped against the mat in a steady rhythm, the sound dull and familiar, when the door swung open.

“Ace,” Koshiro said from across the gym. “Welcome.”

“Sensei.”

Ace dipped his head in a brief bow, respectful enough to count, then straightened like the gesture had already slipped from his mind. He was dressed the way he always was. A red varsity jacket hanging loose on his shoulders, shirt open enough to look careless even if it never really was. His gaze found Zoro almost immediately, and his mouth curved into an easy grin.

“You’re early.”

Zoro kept jumping. The rope moved without thought now, his body following a rhythm it had memorized long before this morning.

“Woke up early.”

Ace snorted softly. “That’s not the same thing and you know it.”

Zoro did not answer. He did not need to.

Koshiro watched them for a moment, then shook his head and turned toward the table near the wall. “Sit.” he said, already walking away. It was not a request.

Ace pointed after him with two fingers. “He was very clear about today being a rest day.”

“I am resting.” Zoro said, breath even, rope still moving.

“If that’s rest,” Ace said, rubbing his temple, “you’re trying to kill me.”

Zoro let the rope slow, then drop. It coiled at his feet as he reached for a towel, wiping at his neck and face without much care.

“You always exaggerate.” he said.

Ace laughed, the sound loose and unforced. “No, I really don’t.”

They crossed the gym together. Zoro sat first, rolling his shoulder once as he did. Ace followed, leaning back in his chair, jacket slipping farther down his arm like it never quite wanted to stay put.

““How’s the shoulder?” Ace asked, his tone casual, like he was asking about the weather.

Zoro rolled it once, slow and deliberate. The movement was smooth, practiced, but the brief tightening of his jaw betrayed him before he could stop it.

“It’s fine.”

Koshiro didn’t even look up from where he stood. “It isn’t.”

Zoro glanced at him, unimpressed. “It’s still attached.”

Ace huffed a laugh, leaning back in his chair. “You know, you’re actually allowed to say when something hurts. Doesn’t suddenly make you weaker.”

Zoro frowned, genuinely caught off guard. “That’s not why I didn’t say it.”

Ace tipped his head, studying him now, interest sharpening. “That somehow makes it worse.”

For a moment, the gym was quiet again. The hum of the lights overhead, the distant sound of traffic outside. Zoro picked at the edge of his towel, eyes fixed somewhere past Ace’s shoulder.

“It’ll pass.” he said after a beat. 

Ace sighed, not pushing further, but not letting it go either. He glanced toward Koshiro, then back at Zoro.

“You don’t have to carry everything like it’s a personal challenge, you know.”

Zoro didn’t answer. He never did, when the conversation edged too close to something real.

“So,” Ace said after a moment, stretching his arms behind his head. “You met Luffy.”

Zoro paused, the image of last night slipping back in without asking. Too much noise. Too many voices. Luffy’s grin, impossible to ignore. The drinks he had not wanted but somehow carried anyway.

“He met me.” Zoro said.

Ace laughed, low and easy. “Yeah. That tracks.” He tilted his head. “He’s been wanting to meet you for ages, you know. Couldn’t shut up about it. Went on all night about how cool you were.”

Zoro snorted. “Sounds like him.”

“I told him you’re not that cool,” Ace went on, clearly amused. “Told him you’re kind of an asshole, actually. He didn’t believe me.”

Zoro glanced at him, a faint smile pulling at his mouth despite himself. “Good.”

Ace leaned back in his chair, hands laced behind his head. “Anyway, you’re probably getting a message today. Or several. You didn’t give him your number, so he took my phone instead.”

Zoro groaned and dragged a hand down his face. His body still ached, a deep, familiar soreness that hadn’t settled yet, and the idea of plans made his head feel heavier than it already was.

“Great,” he muttered. “Just what I need.”

Ace shifted in his chair. The ease in his posture remained, but something in his expression tightened, as if a different weight had settled on his shoulders.

“There’s something I’ve been meaning to talk to you about,” he said. His voice was still calm, but slower now, more careful. “It’s not confirmed. I don’t want to get your hopes up over nothing. But after the fight last night, I spoke to someone. It wasn’t official. Just a conversation.”

Zoro straightened without realizing it. The casual slouch he carried most of the time slipped away, replaced by focus. Impatience crept into his voice.

“Are you going to tell me who or am I supposed to guess?”

Ace watched him for a second, then exhaled. “Mihawk’s manager.”

For a brief moment, everything inside Zoro went still.

It was not the rush people expected when they talked about dreams coming closer. His heart did not pound. His breath did not hitch. It was as if something deep inside him paused, suspended in place, the way a blade does just before it strikes.

Mihawk.

The name alone had weight. It always had.

Ace continued, slower now, gauging him. “I figured they’d been watching you for a while. You don’t climb the rankings like you have without people noticing. But this is the first time they reached out directly. We talked about the possibility of a match. Again, nothing official. Just… the idea was there. And this time, it came from them.”

Zoro’s hand pressed flat against his thigh, fingers curling slowly into the fabric. He had spent years learning what wanting something felt like in his body before his mind caught up with it. This was the same. Quiet, physical, impossible to argue with.

“You told them we’d accept?” he asked.

His voice was steady, but Ace knew him well enough to hear what sat beneath it.

“I didn’t need to,” Ace said. “They weren’t asking if you wanted it. It’s the kind of fight people assume you’d take. Still, I didn’t want to sell you a future that isn’t locked in yet. I just thought you deserved to know.”

Zoro did not answer right away. His eyes drifted across the gym. The worn mats. The heavy bags swaying faintly from earlier strikes. The familiar smell of sweat and metal that clung to the air. This place had always felt like the center of his world, the place where everything made sense.

Mihawk was not just a name. He was the measure. The line drawn at the edge of the horizon. The proof that all of this, every mile run, every bone-bruising round, had led somewhere real.

Finally, Zoro let out a breath.

“Alright,” he said. “I’ll start preparing.”

Ace blinked. “I said it’s not confirmed.”

Zoro was already on his feet, rolling his shoulders as if the thought alone demanded movement. “You’ll make it happen.”

“I might not,” Ace shot back. “That’s kind of the point.”

Zoro glanced over his shoulder, the corner of his mouth lifting just slightly. “You will.”

Ace stared at him, a laugh slipping out despite himself. “You’re unbelievable. Completely unbelievable.”

Zoro didn’t respond. He stepped back onto the mat, stance settling into something familiar and grounded, his body easing into readiness like it had been waiting for this permission all along.

For the first time in a long while, the weight in his chest shifted.

It wasn’t pressure anymore.

It was direction.

*

Just like Ace had predicted, by late afternoon Zoro’s phone became impossible to ignore.

One message turned into five. Five turned into a stream that kept buzzing in his pocket until he finally stopped checking who it was. Luffy didn’t seem to understand the concept of waiting. When messages failed, calls followed. When calls went unanswered, more calls came. The invitation was simple enough. Game night. His place. Tonight.

Zoro rejected it every way he knew how. Short replies. No replies. Turning the phone face down on the counter.

None of it worked.

By the time the call finally went through, Luffy sounded pleased with himself.

“You’re coming,” he announced.

“I’m not,” Zoro replied.

“Cool, see you tonight!”

The line went dead.

Zoro stared at his phone for a long moment before exhaling through his nose.

After training, he showered, changed, and checked the address again. Walking distance. Twenty minutes, the map promised. Easy. Straightforward. Even he could not mess that up.

He stepped outside.

At first, everything went smoothly. Too smoothly. The streets were familiar enough, the turns made sense, and the city hummed with early evening life. Zoro walked with his hands in his pockets, focused on the rhythm of his steps instead of the screen.

Twenty minutes passed.

Then thirty.

By forty, something felt wrong.

He slowed, frowning, and finally looked up.

The gym stood across the street.

Zoro stopped walking.

He turned in a slow circle, scanning the block like the city might rearrange itself if he stared hard enough. Same storefronts. Same cracked pavement. Same banner hanging crooked over the gym entrance. He had walked in a perfect loop.

His jaw tightened. “This is bullshit,” he muttered.

He pulled his phone out and called Luffy.

“The location you sent is wrong,” Zoro said the moment the call connected.

“What!? No way,” Luffy replied. “Hold on.”

There was shuffling. A burst of static. Someone yelling in the background.

“It looks right on my end,” Luffy said cheerfully. “Send me your location. Where are you?”

Zoro closed his eyes, breathed out once, and sent it. The silence on the other end lasted just long enough to be insulting, and then Luffy started laughing, the kind that built on itself.

“Dude. You’re literally at your gym.”

“I know that,” Zoro snapped.

“Oh. That explains it.”

“Explains what.”

“You went the wrong way.”

Zoro pinched the bridge of his nose. “I walked straight.”

“Yeah, that’s usually the problem,” Luffy said. “Stay there. Sanji’s super close. He’ll grab you.”

“No,” Zoro said immediately.

The call ended.

He stared at the screen for a moment, then shoved the phone into his pocket. Sanji’s face surfaced anyway, the way things did when he was trying not to think about them. That careless posture that somehow never looked sloppy. The cigarette. The way his eyes moved like he was already three steps ahead of whatever he was looking at.
Zoro looked down the empty street and said nothing.

Zoro waited and hated that part the most.

The cold crept in fast once his body stopped moving. He shifted his weight from foot to foot, bounced lightly in place, tried to keep the stiffness out of his legs. Breath fogged in front of his face as he rubbed his hands together and blew warm air into them, eyes flicking down the street for the fifth time in under a minute.

Nothing.

Just when he considered calling Luffy again, the restaurant across the street exploded open.

The door slammed so hard it rattled the glass. A blond man stormed out, swearing under his breath, and kicked an empty crate out of his way before fishing a cigarette from his pocket. He lit it with shaking fingers, dragging in a harsh breath like it was the only thing keeping him upright.

Zoro froze.

Sanji.

He recognized him instantly, even from across the street. Same careless posture. Same sharp movements that pretended not to care while giving everything away.

Sanji took one step forward, clearly planning to disappear down the sidewalk, when the door flew open again.

A tall man with a thick beard followed him out, fury written into every line of his face.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Sanji snapped, spinning around. “Leave me alone already.”

“Get your head straight, eggplant,” the man barked. “Stop acting like you run that kitchen, or tomorrow you’re back to peeling potatoes.”

Sanji laughed, loud and sharp, smoke spilling from his lips. “As if I’d ever be head chef under you.”

“If you keep this up, you’ll never be anything but a cook,” the man shot back. “Get it together.”

He turned and slammed the door behind him.

Sanji stood there for a moment, cigarette burning forgotten between his fingers. Then he muttered a string of curses under his breath and took a deep drag, shoulders tight.

Zoro hadn’t moved. He stayed where he was, half-hidden by the angle of the street, watching without meaning to. 

Sanji exhaled, then noticed him.

The change was instant.

The tension slid off his face like a curtain dropping. His mouth curved into that crooked smile Zoro recognized from the bar. He flicked the cigarette to the ground, crushed it under his shoe, and crossed the street toward him like nothing had happened at all.

“Didn’t expect to see you here.” Sanji said lightly, stopping a few steps away. “Lost already?”

Zoro scowled. “I’m waiting.”

Sanji hummed, glancing down the street once, then back at him. “Sure you are.”

Sanji started walking, and after a brief hesitation, Zoro shoved his hands into his pockets and followed.

He was almost certain he had walked this exact route earlier. Almost.

They moved in silence for a while. Sanji walked a step ahead, long strides, shoulders tight. Zoro trailed behind, matching the pace without meaning to.

“I thought you were a chef,” Zoro said at last.

It was casual but it carried enough weight to make the point clear. He had heard everything.

Sanji stopped so abruptly Zoro nearly walked into him.

He turned, eyes narrowed, jaw set. “And I thought you were smart enough not to get lost.”

“Hey,” Zoro said. “I’ve never been through these streets before.”

Sanji glanced sideways. “You’ve been living here for over a year.”

“Yeah, but I basically live at the gym. In before sunrise, out after dark. Not much time for sightseeing.”

Sanji let out a short laugh, sharp at the edges. It sounded more irritated than amused. “Sounds familiar.”

Zoro caught that. He didn’t comment.

After a beat, Sanji spoke again. “You met Luffy. You’re going to have to learn the city. He doesn’t let people stay comfortable.”

“Great.” Zoro said flatly.

Sanji snorted. “That enthusiasm’s inspiring.”

They kept walking. The silence that settled between them wasn’t comfortable enough to be ignored, but not sharp enough to demand fixing either. It stretched, thin and stubborn, following them down the street.

Zoro glanced at Sanji once, then away just as quickly.

Annoying, he thought.

Sanji, for his part, clicked his tongue softly, hands buried in his pockets, eyes fixed ahead. He didn’t slow down. Didn’t speed up.

They walked like that for another block, neither of them willing to be the first to speak again.

By the time they turned the corner and reached their destination, Zoro felt an unexpected sense of relief. Maybe it was just the cold air. Or maybe it was the simple fact that he no longer had to walk beside someone who managed to get under his skin without even trying.

Chapter Text

Zoro could call himself smart, if the word meant anything beyond bragging. He was good at analysis. He could watch a man move for thirty seconds and start predicting what came next, not because he had some gift for it, but because he paid attention in the way most people did not. In a fight, patterns were honest. They repeated themselves. They gave you something you could punish.

The cards in his hands did neither.

They were ordinary pieces of paper with a logic he could not pin down. He had already sat through three rounds, listening while Luffy explained the rules with the conviction of someone who did not understand them himself. Zoro had nodded at the right times, kept his face still, tried to learn by watching. It was not working. Every turn felt like an argument he had entered halfway through, with everyone else already laughing at a punchline he had not heard.

Across the table, Sanji leaned on his elbow as if the whole night had been designed to bore him. His fingers hovered near his mouth, his attention drifting between the cards and the room, the kind of restlessness that looked like confidence until you stared at it long enough.

“Come on,” Sanji said, sounding fed up, “we’re not playing chess.”

Zoro let out a slow breath through his nose, more force than he intended. Two hours into this, he had been tested in ways he had never trained for. He could take a hit and keep thinking. He could push through exhaustion and stay sharp. He could fight in front of a crowd and ignore the noise. None of that helped him here, sitting in a living room with a hand of cards that refused to become meaningful.

Sanji’s comment was not the problem. It was the timing of it, the casual way he dropped it into the air, as if Zoro were the only one holding the game up. Sanji talked with his hands, too, the gestures loose and careless, making the space feel smaller without actually moving closer. When he spoke, he seemed to take his time with the words, rolling them out as if he expected the room to listen.

Zoro kept his gaze on the cards. He should have been able to tune the rest out.

Instead he found himself noticing small things that didn’t matter, and getting irritated that he noticed them at all. The ashtray was filling faster than it should have, the cigarette smoke clinging to the air in a way that made the room feel warmer than it was. A strand of Sanji’s hair hung where it always did, stubbornly out of place. Zoro looked away from it, then looked back at the cards, as if concentration were a decision he could make and enforce.

He shifted the hand of cards once, arranging them into an order that felt more logical, even if it meant nothing. It was a habit. If he could not win, he could at least impose structure.

When Zoro placed the green card on the table, the reaction was immediate and loud enough to startle him.

Usopp’s chair scraped sharply against the floor as he pushed himself halfway up. “Zoro, you can’t do that!”

Zoro looked up, confused, his gaze moving from Usopp’s face to the card, then back again, trying to locate the problem.

“What,” he said, flatly. “What did I do?”

Nami had covered her face with her cards, shoulders already shaking. Luffy bent forward in his seat, one arm wrapped around his stomach, laughter breaking out of him in loud. 

“You just gave the round to Sanji.”

Zoro glanced down at the table again. The cards lay there in the same order he had placed them. Nothing looked different. Nothing looked wrong.

“I did not,” he said.

Sanji leaned back in his chair, already smiling, “Well,” he said lightly, reaching forward, “if you insist.”

He dropped his last card with a small, satisfied flick of his fingers. “Thanks, Mosshead.”

Zoro felt something tighten in his jaw, sharp and immediate. His hands curled into fists under the table, knuckles pressing into his thighs hard enough to ground him. He kept his eyes on the cards, on the wood, on anything that was not Sanji’s pretty face, because the urge to do something stupid was rising fast and he did not trust it.

He didn’t understand what he had done wrong. That was the worst part.

The game kept moving around the round table, easy and fluid, like this was something they had done a hundred times before. Jokes flew back and forth without explanation. Someone brought up a story from weeks ago and everyone else seemed to remember it. They interrupted each other without friction, filled in each other’s sentences, laughed at references Zoro didn’t recognize.

He tried to follow. He really did.

He watched the rhythm of it, the way the conversation curved and shifted, the way the game and the talking seemed to exist in the same space without colliding. 

Zoro sat there with his cards and his straight back and his attention pulled in too many directions at once, waiting for a gap he could step into. It never came. By the time he thought he understood what they were talking about, they were already somewhere else.

When it was his turn again, Zoro looked down at the cards in his hand, then at the ones spread across the table, his brows drawing together as if staring harder might force meaning into them. There had to be a tactic. There always was. He checked his hand again, hesitated, then chose the card that felt right and placed it down.

“Zorooo! It can’t happen again,” Luffy groaned, his head dropping to the table.

Zoro did not react. He looked at the card. Then at Luffy. Then back at the table, waiting for the mistake to make itself visible.

Sanji burst out laughing and threw his own card down. “Please, we have to invite him to every game night.”

Nami grinned. “I really thought you would figure it out faster than this.”

Zoro’s jaw tightened. He kept his gaze forward, the irritation sitting heavy but contained, until Sanji spoke again.

“That is why Mihawk is still the best.”

Zoro turned sharply toward him. “What do you mean by that?”

His tone must have come out harder than he intended, because Sanji blinked, eyes widening for a fraction of a second before the grin slid back into place.

“I think you also have a hearing problem,” Sanji said lightly.

Zoro leaned toward him. Not the table. Not the room. Just him.

“Do you actually want to fight me?”

The noise at the table died. No one laughed or no one spoke. The attention narrowed to the space between them.

Sanji leaned in as well, unbothered, closing the distance until their faces were level.

“Yes?” he said.

He was close. Close enough that Zoro could feel his breath against his skin when he spoke. Close enough that it registered before Zoro had time to decide whether it should.

Zoro pulled back. The movement was quick, unplanned, as if his body had made the decision without consulting him. Not from fear. Not from hesitation. Just a sudden need for space.

Nami cleared her throat. “Zoro,” she said quickly, already standing. “Have we shown you the balcony yet? I am going to smoke. Come with me.”

Her hand closed around his wrist before he could answer, and she pulled him up. Zoro let himself be moved, his attention still caught on the other side of the table.

Sanji had not looked away. Zoro did not either, not until Nami tugged him toward the door.

“I really need more girlfriends,” Nami said the moment they stepped onto the balcony. “I swear, I can’t deal with you men and your nonsense.”

Zoro glanced around. There was no view. Just the opposite building, concrete walls and dark windows stacked on top of each other. If he leaned a little to the side, he could see into someone’s kitchen. That was about it.

“So this is the famous scenery.” he muttered.

Nami laughed, already lighting her cigarette. “Yeah. I lied.”

Zoro rested his forearms against the railing, the cold metal pressing through his sleeves. He hesitated, then spoke, quieter than he meant to.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to ruin your game night.”

It felt strange to say out loud, but the weight of it had been sitting on him since he left the table. He had walked into their space, their routine, and somehow managed to turn it into tension.

Nami exhaled smoke and looked at him. “He is not always like that,” she said. “I mean, I won’t pretend he isn’t annoying. Sometimes I want to hit him too. But that is kind of part of being friends, right?”

Zoro let out a short breath that might have been a laugh. “I am not usually that quick to start something.”

Nami’s eyebrow lifted. Then she laughed. “Sure. Of course you aren’t.”

Zoro shrugged, a little stiff. He could hear how ironic it sounded. He had not meant it as a joke.

They stood there for a moment, the city noise faint below them.

“So,” Nami said, glancing sideways at him. “Do you have a girlfriend?”

Zoro’s hands tightened on the railing before he could stop himself. His shoulders tensed, breath catching just enough to be noticeable to him. He kept his eyes on the buildings across from them.

“Uh. No. Not right now.”

Nami nodded. “Figures. Then I guess we will keep waiting for one of the hundred women Sanji swears is the love of his life to actually be the love of his life.”

Zoro swallowed. His throat felt dry.

He leaned against the railing while Nami smoked, the city noise drifting up from somewhere below. For a few seconds, neither of them spoke. It was not uncomfortable. Just quiet in the way that comes after something tense.

He glanced sideways at her. “So,” he said. “What do you do?”

Nami blinked, then smiled slightly. “That is a dangerous question.”

Zoro raised an eyebrow. “Why.”

She took another drag from her cigarette before answering. “I studied cartography. Mapping. Spatial data. Geographic analysis. All that impressive-sounding stuff.”

Zoro tilted his head. “That sounds… useful.”

“It is,” she said. “In theory.” 

She exhaled smoke and leaned her weight back against the railing. “In practice, it is very hard to get someone to hire you when you do not have five years of experience and three internships you could not afford to take.”

Zoro frowned. “So what are you doing now?”

Nami hesitated, then shrugged. “Retail. Not exactly what I had planned.”

He looked at her properly this time. “That has to be frustrating.”

She laughed, short and sharp. “You have no idea. I can calculate optimal routes and read satellite data, but I can’t even get an interview.”

Zoro considered that. “Seems stupid.”

Nami glanced at him. “It is stupid.”

He nodded once, satisfied. “Yeah.”

She smiled at that, softer this time. “What about you? You came here just for training, right.”

“Yeah.”

“That is a big move.”

He shrugged. “It made sense.”

“For who.”

“For me.”

Nami studied him for a moment. “You don’t really talk about yourself, do you?”

Zoro shifted slightly. “There is not much to say.”

She didn’t push. She just nodded and flicked ash over the edge of the balcony.

“Well,” she said, “if you ever need help not getting lost in this city, I am technically overqualified.”

He huffed a quiet laugh. “Technically.”

She bumped her shoulder lightly against his. “Seriously though. You are welcome here. Even if you are terrible at card games.”

He smirked. “I am not terrible.”

“You are.”

He did not argue.

For a moment, they just stood there, the noise from inside muffled behind the door. 

“I’m going to get a beer. Do you want one?” Zoro said, breaking the silence. He definitely needed a beer.

“No, I’m good. You can grab one from the fridge.”

When Zoro went inside, Usopp and Luffy were having too much fun to notice him, laughing loudly. He passed by them and headed toward the kitchen, which he remembered was right near the entrance. It was not hard to find.

Luffy’s apartment was neither big nor modern. It was in an old building, and the whole place was filled with colorful furniture placed without much care.

When he entered the kitchen, he stopped instead of walking to the fridge. 

Nami had been with him just a moment ago, and Usopp and Luffy were in the living room, so of course Sanji would be in the kitchen. If he had known, he would have quietly left the apartment instead of coming in.

Sanji was standing at the counter, an old apron tied around his waist, his sleeves rolled up, cutting bread in front of him. There was a different expression on his face. At least the annoying look Zoro had seen earlier had been replaced with a small smile and focus.

Zoro did not move. He was trying to decide whether he could leave without being noticed, but before he could make up his mind, Sanji had already looked up and their eyes met.

His gaze was neither hostile nor friendly. He was looking at him without expression. It was something in between the two of them, something that made Zoro’s shoulders tense and straighten without him realizing it.

Zoro walked toward the fridge deliberately, as if he had not seen him at all. He could feel Sanji’s attention on him. It was not heavy, but noticeable enough to make him aware of his own movements. He opened the door and stared inside longer than necessary.

“Are you hungry?” Sanji asked before Zoro could even close the fridge. The question felt strangely out of place at the moment.

Zoro closed the fridge slowly and turned. Sanji had already turned back to the counter, moving the knife again as if nothing had happened.

“Always?” Zoro said, almost like he was asking a question.

Sanji looked at him. His expression had softened. “I’m making sandwiches. Do you like cheese? Usopp won’t let me add it, but I can put it in yours.”

Zoro hesitated, then shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. I eat everything.”

The corner of Sanji’s mouth lifted. “Not surprised. You’re like Luffy. No standards at all.”

Sanji left the counter and walked toward the fridge to grab something. Zoro moved quickly without thinking, making space for him. They passed close enough that their shoulders nearly brushed. Zoro took another step back.

“Can you cook?” Sanji asked when he returned to the counter. He was rummaging through one of the drawers, clearly looking for something specific.

The question caught Zoro off guard. He had not come into the kitchen expecting conversation. Especially not with him. He didn’t understand how Sanji could act like nothing had happened, like they had not been one sentence away from a fight only minutes ago.

Zoro leaned back against the counter, crossing his arms loosely, buying himself a second.

“I don’t really have time.”

Sanji wrinkled his nose. “That’s not an answer.”

Zoro’s mouth twitched before he could stop it. He did not respond. It was true, he barely had time, but he also couldn’t honestly say he knew how to cook. Most of his meals came from wherever was fastest and closest. 

When no answer came, Sanji turned back to what he was doing. The tension from the living room had not followed them in completely, but it had not disappeared either. It lingered in the space between them, quiet but noticeable.

Zoro found himself watching him.

He did not mean to. He just… did.

It was obvious that Sanji cared about what he was doing. Even something as simple as making sandwiches held his full attention. He sliced the tomatoes with quick but careful movements, precise without being rigid, focused in a way that felt almost excessive for something so small. His expression had changed, the earlier sharpness replaced by something calmer, more intent. Like this mattered.

Zoro shifted his weight, realizing he was staring, and looked away.

“Here,” Sanji said, handing one of the sandwiches to him. “And before you get confused, the green thing is pesto, not moss. Just so you know.”

Zoro shot him a look. “Shut up.”

He took a bite.

His eyes widened before he could stop himself. Just for a second. Enough to be noticeable. It was… good. Really good. Annoyingly good. He could have sworn it was one of the best things he had ever eaten, but there was no chance he was saying that out loud.

“So,” Sanji said. “What do you think?”

“Meh,” Zoro replied, already taking another bite.

Sanji stared at him. “Meh?”

Zoro did not answer. He was already halfway through it.

Sanji scoffed. “Unbelievable. You wouldn’t recognize good food if it hit you in the face. Living in a cave does that to people.”

Zoro shot him another look. “Shut up.”

Sanji pulled his apron off with unnecessary force. “You will never eat something like that again in your life.”

Zoro took the last bite. He didn’t argue.

“What! Food?”

Luffy burst into the kitchen, already grabbing one of the sandwiches. Usopp followed him, reaching for another before Sanji could react.

“Hey! those were…” Sanji started, then gave up with an irritated click of his tongue. “Unbelievable.”

Zoro barely registered it. He pulled his phone from his pocket and checked the time. It was later than he had thought. He had training in the morning, and his body already felt the weight of the day. 

His screen showed two missed calls from Ace. He frowned slightly. His phone must have been on silent. He locked the screen and slipped it back into his pocket. He would deal with it in the morning.

“Thanks for tonight,” he said, already stepping back. “I should go.”

Luffy turned toward him, cheeks full. “Zoro, no, stay. We were going to play Monopoly.”

“Yeah,” Usopp added. “You have to make up for being terrible at cards.”

Sanji glanced at him. “Running away already? I was just starting to enjoy watching you lose.”

Zoro didn’t bother responding. “I have training in the morning.”

That seemed to be enough. Luffy frowned but did not argue.

Zoro grabbed his jacket and pulled it on.

“Try not to get lost,” Sanji called after him.

“Sanji,” Usopp muttered.

Zoro shot him a look over his shoulder. “Shut up.”

He stepped out into the hallway and closed the door behind him.

The air outside was colder than before. The kind that crept under his collar and settled on his skin. He adjusted his jacket and started walking.

Halfway down the street, something felt off. Not a sound. Not a movement. Just a sense of being… noticed.

Zoro slowed without realizing it. His eyes moved to the edges of the street, to the dark windows, the parked cars, the empty sidewalk. Everything looked normal. Too normal…

He stopped and turned around. There was no one there. The street was empty, quiet, stretched out behind him. A stray cat sat near the curb, watching him. It didn’t move when he did. It only stared.

Zoro exhaled through his nose. He held the cat’s gaze for a moment, then turned back.

“Get a grip,” he muttered.

He started walking again but the feeling did not go away. It stayed with him, just behind his shoulders, just far enough that he could not place it. He did not look back again.

Chapter Text

Working in a kitchen meant learning to exist inside a certain kind of chaos. The kitchen never slept.

Even at its quietest, there was always sound pressing in from somewhere. Machines groaned as they cooled and reheated. Oil snapped in shallow pans, knives struck wood fast, practiced rhythms that never fully stopped. Silence, if it came at all, lasted only long enough to make the noise that followed feel louder.

But it was never just the sound. Everything in the kitchen fed the disorder. Grease clung to fabric, knives moved too fast to track properly, pans were never where they were supposed to be…Someone was always shouting for something that should have already been there. Orders stacked on top of one another. Plates left the pass only to be replaced seconds later. One dish burned while another spilled, and somewhere behind it all, a timer screamed until someone remembered to shut it off.

All of it left its mark on him. Even on the day he would no longer be able to work in a kitchen, he knew he would still carry it with him. The small burn scars scattered along his arms, the thin lines across his fingers where knives had slipped too close… To anyone else they might have looked careless, unnecessary, the kind of damage a person would rather forget. To Sanji, they were proof.

He wore them without embarrassment. Every mark meant time spent standing when others sat, heat endured without complaint, nights stretched longer than they should have been. He had given too much of himself to this job to pretend otherwise, and he would give more without hesitation if it meant staying here.

When he reached his station, thought fell away. There was no need for it. His body already knew where to go, what to reach for, when to turn back. His hand found the asparagus without looking. His wrist flicked, sending the pan into motion before the food could stick. Seasoning followed by instinct rather than measurement, pinches added from memory instead of recipe.

He was working on one of his favorite dishes.

The tension in his shoulders eased as he spread the base across the plate, careful but unhurried despite the noise around him. For a moment, his mouth curved into a small smile.

“Table twelve is ready,” Sanji called, setting the plate into the service window before turning back toward his station, already reaching for the next pan as the rhythm of the kitchen pulled him forward again.

“Who made this?”

Zeff’s voice cut across the space, not loud, but unmistakable. It carried the weight of interruption rather than anger, the kind that made people look up without being told to. Sanji lifted his head and saw the plate in Zeff’s hand.

Of course it was his. If Zeff walked into the kitchen holding a dish like that, it was almost always his. 

Sanji felt his jaw tighten as he wiped his hands against his apron and stepped forward.

“I did,” he said. “What’s wrong with it?”

Zeff studied the plate for a moment before answering. “You changed the recipe.”

“I adjusted the sauce,” Sanji replied. “It needed acid.”

The response came without hesitation. Zeff let the plate slip from his hands. It shattered against the floor, porcelain breaking into uneven pieces that scattered across the tiles and slid beneath nearby counters.

“My kitchen,” Zeff said, his voice steady. “My menu. My recipes. You don’t improvise here.”

Sanji stared down at the broken plate, then back at him. “It was better,” he said, unable to stop himself. “I’m tired of sending out food that tastes safe. People like it when something bites.”

“That’s not what this is about.” Zeff’s gaze didn’t soften.  “You don’t decide what leaves that pass. I do. Don’t forget where you stand in this kitchen.”

The words landed deeper than they should have. Sanji’s mouth tightened. He looked aside for a moment, then back again, the irritation still there but edged now with something sharper.

“Then maybe the recipe is the problem.”

Zeff reached for a towel and tossed it at his chest.

“Front of house,” he said. “If you want to be creative so badly, go charm the customers instead.”

Sanji caught the towel on instinct. “Are you serious?”

Zeff met his eyes. “Completely.”

For a second, Sanji’s expression twisted into something unguarded and ugly before he forced it back into place. He folded the towel once, then nodded.

“Yes, chef.”

He untied his apron, folded it without thinking, and hung it back on its hook before reaching for his jacket. When he stepped out of the kitchen, the noise did not disappear so much as dull into something farther away, as if it had followed him into the hallway and chosen to linger there.

Sanji moved through the narrow space on habit alone. He knew every loose tile, every uneven corner of the wall. The rhythm of the kitchen still clung to him, ringing in his ears long after he had left it behind.

There were days he told himself he loved working here. That this was what he wanted. That the long hours and the heat and the constant pressure were worth it because the food mattered.

Tonight was not one of those days.

He stopped just outside the door and pressed his palm flat against the wall, eyes closing as he drew in a breath that felt too shallow to be useful. Only after leaving the line did the weight settle properly into his body. The tension in his back tightened until it bordered on pain, every movement pulling in places that had not fully recovered from the day before. His shoulders felt heavy, as if something had been resting there for hours without permission. The ache at the base of his neck refused to loosen, dull and persistent.

It had been his sixth day in a row. The seventh hour of his shift. He could feel it now in the way standing still made things worse instead of better.

Sanji rolled his neck once, then again, trying to work out the stiffness without much success. The smell of oil still clung to his clothes. His hands smelled faintly of garlic and metal no matter how many times he washed them.

He needed a cigarette.

He picked up the plate he had prepared only minutes earlier. Table twelve. He stood there for a moment longer than necessary. This was not where he was meant to be.

He inhaled and the breath stopped halfway in. A familiar pressure tightened beneath his ribs. He had lived with it long enough to recognize the pattern. It always started like this, small and contained, a whisper telling him to move faster, do better, try harder. It grew when he stayed still.

What if this was it?

The question slid in before he could block it.

What if this was as far as he went. What if all the patience he kept swallowing never turned into anything real. What if the years passed and he was still here, still waiting for permission, still convincing himself that endurance counted as progress.

His grip tightened around the plate until his fingers ached.

He told himself not to think like that. He told himself he was tired. That it was just a bad moment in a long week. But the fear did not lift. It pressed closer instead, curling around his lungs, making each breath feel borrowed.

His throat tightened. He swallowed once, then again, and neither helped.

He was so tired. Tired in the way sleep would not fix. Tired in the way that made doubt feel permanent.

When he finally looked toward table twelve, the dining room seemed far away. The lights blurred at the edges, dissolving into something indistinct until he narrowed his eyes and forced the room back into focus.

The dim amber lights hanging from the ceiling softened every silhouette. Baratie always looked different once evening settled in. The chandeliers cast a muted golden glow. Soft music drifted beneath the murmur of conversation, the kind meant to be felt rather than heard, weaving together with the quiet clink of cutlery and the steady movement of servers passing between tables.

The restaurant was full, but never loud. Baratie did not allow noise, and every guest seemed to understand that instinctively.

When Sanji’s vision finally cleared, he saw the two beautiful women seated at the table. He closed his eyes once more and drew in a slow breath. His shoulders rolled back on their own. He lifted his chin slightly, ran a hand through his hair, and without even realizing it, a smile settled onto his face.

By the time he reached the table, his steps had found their familiar rhythm.

“Welcome to Baratie, ladies,” he said, his voice warm, smooth, charming enough to feel personal. “It looks like I’ll be taking care of you for the rest of the evening.”

Both women looked up at the same time. The blonde with full lips smiled at him, while the brunette, older than the other, let her gaze travel over him from head to toe.

“I think we’re already having a lovely night,” the brunette said.

Sanji’s smile widened effortlessly. “Then I’ll try not to ruin it.”

He set the plate down with practiced grace, angling it slightly toward the light so the colors showed properly. He described the dish without looking, his words flowing easily, as though they were not information but part of the performance itself.

The blonde rested her chin in her hand. “Is that part of the service?”

Sanji winked. “Only for special guests.”

After a few more minutes of conversation, he left them to their meal. The moment he turned away, the smile disappeared, his shoulders sinking as he blended back into the flow of the restaurant.

He took a towel from the station and moved toward the table that had just emptied.

The fabric was damp and smelled faintly of detergent and old heat. He wiped the surface without thinking, watching grease smear and vanish, crumbs clinging for a second before dropping away. The plates were stacked where the guests had left them, their edges still warm from food eaten too quickly.

This was the part he hated. He should have been the one hearing compliments, not scraping leftovers into silence.

Porcelain clicked softly as he gathered the plates against his arm. 

“I don’t think you’ll convince him. But if you do, I’m in.”

The words came from behind him, clear enough to cut through the room.

Sanji kept moving. He shifted the weight of the dishes, reached for the cutlery, focused on not dropping anything.

“Of course he’ll say yes,” another voice replied. “No one turns down money.”

Laughter burst out, loud and ugly, flattening the softer sounds of Baratie. Sanji glanced back as he reached for a glass.

The man laughing wore a pink feathered coat that caught the golden light too harshly. Across from him sat another man in yellow, jacket and tinted glasses alike, both of them looking painfully out of place in the restaurant’s dim elegance.

“This week, then,” one of them said. “We make our move.”

Sanji lifted the last glass and turned away. The towel slid on his shoulder. He barely noticed.

He glanced up at the clock above the door. The numbers took a moment to come into focus. When had he last taken a break? He definitely needed a cigarette.

Without giving himself time to think, he was already reaching for his cigarettes by the time he pushed through the door.

The narrow space behind Baratie smelled of damp brick and old smoke, the walls rising too close on either side and trapping the night inside. Light from the street slipped through unevenly, catching on rusted metal and darkened mortar before fading again. It was quiet in the way places became quiet after midnight, not silent, but emptied of urgency.

Sanji closed his eyes, leaned back against the wall and lit his cigarette.

The flame flared briefly against his fingers, then vanished. He drew the smoke in slowly, holding it until his lungs ached before letting it escape in a thin stream. The tension in his shoulders eased just enough to be noticeable, his body responding before his thoughts could follow.

Cold seeped through the fabric of his shirt and into his skin. It kept him present. The chill pressed him downward, anchored him in place, and for a moment he welcomed it.

Footsteps crossed the far end of the alley.

A laugh followed, cutting through the stillness with no regard for where it landed.

“…you’re worrying too much.”

The voice carried easily, relaxed and amused, as if the night belonged to him.

Sanji kept his eyes closed. He flicked ash toward the pavement and inhaled again, the words dissolving before they could gather meaning. Conversations drifted past him every evening. Arguments, deals, confessions made softer by darkness. None of it demanded attention.

“I told you, he’s exactly the type we want.”

The laugh returned, louder this time, echoing briefly between the bricks before settling.

“Strong and quiet…”

The footsteps shifted, closer now, until only the wall separated them. The sound of shoes against concrete felt too clear in the narrow space.

“You’re underestimating him,” another voice said through the phone, warped slightly by distance and static. “Men like that don’t bend easily.”

“Oh, I know.”

Sanji opened his eyes.

He lowered the cigarette, watching the ember pulse faintly in the dark.

“Roronoa Zoro isn’t the easiest one to pull in,” the man continued, his tone almost fond. “But he’s not impossible either.”

The name reached him with a physical weight. His breath caught against it, sharp enough to sting, and his foot hesitated above the cigarette he had meant to crush. The sound of the restaurant behind him seemed to fall away, replaced by the low thud of his pulse. Images followed without permission, green hair, a familiar presence that occupied space effortlessly, something solid and unyielding.

“Give me a week,” the man said. “By then, he’ll be one of us.”

Sanji swallowed. He could not piece the words together into anything coherent, but instinct filled the gaps where logic failed. Whatever was being discussed did not feel distant or abstract. 

He rose slowly onto his toes and leaned toward the corner, careful not to let his shadow stretch too far. The wall blocked most of his view, but motion slipped into sight all the same. Pink feathers caught the streetlight as the man gestured with his free hand, laughter curling lazily through his voice.

Recognition settled late and heavy. He should have known from the sound alone.

As he shifted his weight back, the loose gravel beneath his shoe gave way. The scrape against stone was small, but in the stillness it felt exposed.

The man’s voice faltered.

Sanji didn’t wait to see more.

He pushed away from the wall and ran for the door, slipping back into the warmth and noise of Baratie as the alley swallowed its silence once again.

“Shit. Shit.”

The word left him on a broken breath as warm air closed around him, thick with music and voices and the smell of food. His lungs burned as he slowed, hands braced briefly against the wall while the world steadied.

Fragments of the conversation replayed in his head, pieces he had not paid attention to at first now resurfacing without order. The laughter. The certainty. Zoro’s name.

What had he just overheard? He could not assemble the plan into anything clear, only the shape of it, sharp at the edges and wrong in his gut. Whatever those men were arranging, it was not meant to end well. That much felt obvious.

He reached for his phone without thinking. The screen lit up too brightly in the dim corridor. His thumb moved fast, searching, scrolling, then stopping short. There was no number there. Of course there wasn’t. They were not close like that. They barely spoke unless circumstances forced them into the same space, and when they did, it usually sounded one breath away from a fight.

Sanji lowered the phone slowly.

Still, the idea of doing nothing sat heavier than the exhaustion in his limbs. He might not like the bastard, but that did not mean he would stand by and let someone else decide his fate.

Whatever was coming for Zoro, it would not reach him quietly.

“Hey. You okay?”

Sanji flinched before he could stop himself, then straightened, dragging his expression back into place as if it had never slipped.

“Yeah,” he said, too quickly. He forced a smile into something passable. “Of course.”

The server hesitated, studying him for a second longer than Sanji liked.

“Okay,” the kid said. “Your girl’s here.”

The words landed late. Sanji blinked once, then swore under his breath.

“Shit.”

Pudding.

The date surfaced all at once, the quiet plan they had made earlier in the day, the certainty in her voice when she had said she would meet him after his shift. He pressed his thumb into his palm, trying to keep his thoughts from scattering.

If he didn’t talk to Zoro tonight, it might already be too late. The man on the phone had sounded certain, far too certain, saying everything would be settled within the week. Tomorrow could already be past the point of fixing anything.

His gaze drifted toward the front windows. He could go himself and tell him directly.

Sanji turned back to the server. “Can you tell her I’m a little busy in the kitchen, but I’ll be right there?”

He paused.

“No. Wait. That’s stupid.” He ran a hand through his hair. “You shouldn’t lie to a woman. A real man doesn’t do that.”

The kid stared at him, visibly confused.

Sanji frowned, trying to place him. He was probably new. Zeff fired people so often and replaced them just as quickly that Sanji had stopped bothering to learn names.

“Just tell her I’ve got a small errand,” he said finally. “That I’ll be back soon.”

The boy nodded uncertainly.

Sanji was already moving. He jogged toward the back, grabbed his sunglasses from his locker, and shoved them onto his face before pulling his hat down low. The man outside had not actually seen him, but caution felt necessary, if only to calm his nerves.

He turned and bolted for the exit.

“Where are you going?” the server called after him.

“I’ll be right back,” Sanji shouted over his shoulder. “Don’t tell Zeff!”

The door swung shut behind him as he disappeared into the night, already halfway across the street before the bells finished ringing.

The gym stood directly across from Baratie, its lights still burning stark white against the dark street. From the outside, it looked closed, almost abandoned. There were no windows facing the road, no music leaking into the night, no sign of life behind the walls. Only a metal entrance door, marked by small LED lights, indicated that the building was a gym at all.

Sanji had probably walked past it thousands of times over the years without ever paying attention. From the outside, the idea that an UFC fighter might be training inside felt almost impossible.

He pushed the door but it didn’t open.

He tried again, putting more force into it, but it remained unmoved, as if locked.

He stepped back and looked up at the sign once more. He was definitely in the right place.

“Come on,” he muttered.

This time he knocked. When nothing happened, he knocked again, harder. There was still no response. He started pounding on the metal instead. The sharp sound rang out, too loud in the empty street, and he glanced over his shoulder to check. Only a few people were walking by, uninterested.

He raised his fist to strike again when the door finally cracked open.

A man in his fifties stood there, glasses resting neatly on his nose, posture straight despite the late hour. His expression was calm but cautious, the look of someone used to strangers arriving at inconvenient times.

“Yes?” he asked.

“Hey, old man,” Sanji said, his breathing still uneven. “Is Zoro here?”

The man’s brows drew together. “Who are you?”

Sanji hesitated for a moment, then lifted his chin. It was natural to be wary of a stranger pounding on the door in the middle of the night, especially one wearing sunglasses and a hat. Even more so with a fighter inside who could be worth millions.

“I’m his friend.”

The word left a bitter taste in his mouth the moment he said it.

The man studied him in silence. His gaze moved from Sanji’s face to the hat pulled too low, the sunglasses still on despite the darkness, the restless shift of his weight.

“Wait,” the man said at last.

Before Sanji could respond, the door closed again, leaving him staring at his own slightly warped reflection in the metal.

He exhaled slowly through his nose. Uneasy, he glanced around the street once more. He was hardly important enough to be followed, yet the tension refused to leave his shoulders.

He waited there for several more minutes, doing nothing but listening to the muted sounds of the street. He checked the time on his watch again. Every minute spent standing here was time stolen from the date waiting across the road.

When the metal door finally opened again, it was not the man with the glasses who appeared this time. Familiar green hair slipped into his line of sight instead.

Zoro wiped sweat from his forehead with the towel in his hand, frowning as his gaze settled on him. The sight of him like that, damp with sweat and standing far too close, pulled an uneasy tightness through Sanji’s stomach, which he dismissed instantly as annoyance.

“What are you doing here?” Zoro asked. His voice hovered somewhere between irritation and confusion.

Sanji opened his mouth to answer, but before a single word could form, laughter drifted down the street. The same voice he had heard earlier,, already etched into his nerves despite the short time they had crossed paths.

His eyes widened.

Instinct took over before thought could catch up. He grabbed Zoro by the front of his shirt and shoved him backward, dragging him inside the gym with him.

“We need to talk.”

Chapter Text

Training usually solved everything. As long as his body kept moving, the rest of him could stay quiet. Breath, weight, controlled strain... Inside that rhythm there was no space for thought, and there never had been.

Zoro adjusted his grip on the bar and lowered himself beneath it, shoulders settling into their usual alignment with practiced certainty. He drew in a slow breath and held it, waiting for the familiar narrowing of focus to follow, the moment when the world reduced itself to muscle and motion.

It didn’t come.

He exhaled through his nose and tightened his hands around the metal, irritation rising in a slow, recognizable way. The bar felt colder than it should have. His grip shifted once, then again, searching for a steadiness that refused to settle.

His gaze slipped sideways before he could stop it.

He closed his eyes, sharper this time, and let go of the weight altogether, straightening with more force than necessary.

“How long are you going to stand there?” he said, the edge in his voice arriving before he meant it to.

Sanji was near the entrance, far enough from the center of the room to avoid the direct glare of the lights, close enough that leaving would have taken only a few steps. He wasn’t doing anything. One hand rested in his pocket, the other hung loosely at his side, a cigarette caught between his fingers as if he had forgotten it was there.

He didn’t answer right away. The silence stretched just long enough to feel deliberate.

Finally, he said, “I’m trying to understand how you can be this calm after what I told you.”

Zoro opened his eyes and looked past him, not at him, letting his gaze settle somewhere near the ceiling. “I heard you.”

“Did you?” Sanji’s voice sharpened. “Because it doesn’t look like it.”

“A man in a pink coat thinks he can make me an offer,” Zoro said. “That’s all.”

He kept his tone flat on purpose, pressing the words into something smaller than they were. It was easier that way. Easier than letting them take shape.

For a moment he thought Sanji would push again, demand a reaction Zoro had no intention of giving. Instead there was only the soft shift of fabric, followed by the dull, failed click of a lighter on the first try.

“What are you doing?” Zoro asked, irritation slipping through before he could stop it.

Sanji looked at him, the lighter held loosely in the air, as if the question had caught him somewhere between movement and thought.

“What does it look like?”

“You can’t smoke in here.”

“This place is disgusting,” Sanji muttered, exhaling the words more than speaking them. “Then take me somewhere I can.”

Zoro drew in another slow breath and let it out carefully, dragging a hand across his face as he forced the tension down.

Sanji had already said what he came to say. There was no reason for him to still be here. No reason for Zoro to still be standing in front of him instead of going back to the bar.

And yet he found himself turning toward the back corridor anyway.

“There’s a door in the back,” he said quietly.

He didn’t check whether Sanji followed. He didn’t need to.

The hallway behind the training room stayed dim even during the day, cooler than the rest of the building, carrying the faint smell of concrete and old rain. Zoro pushed the metal door open and stepped outside, the night air settling against his skin with a quiet kind of relief.

Behind him, the lighter caught on the first strike.

For a few seconds neither of them spoke.

He should have left Sanji there and gone back inside.

The city moved somewhere beyond the walls, distant traffic folding into a low, continuous hush. Closer than that there was only the slow burn of tobacco and the breath Sanji held a moment too long before letting it go.

Zoro stayed near the wall instead of stepping farther out, arms loose at his sides, gaze fixed ahead on nothing that required his attention. The back lot was narrow and dim, enclosed by concrete that kept the rest of the city at a distance. A weak streetlight reached only partway across the ground between them.

Behind him, Sanji inhaled again. Smoke drifted past Zoro’s shoulder and disappeared into the dark.

For a few moments neither of them moved. Zoro told himself he was only waiting for Sanji to finish the cigarette so they could both leave. Even as the thought formed, it felt thin. He didn’t bother correcting it.

“You really don’t care.” Sanji said at last.

There was no accusation in his voice. If anything, it sounded like he was still trying to understand.

Zoro didn’t look at him. “About what?”

Sanji let out a quiet breath that might have been a laugh if there had been any humor in it. “You know.”

“I heard what you said,” Zoro replied, calm, almost indifferent. “It doesn’t mean much to me.”

The ember of the cigarette flared briefly at the edge of his vision, then dimmed again.

“They didn’t look like people you can ignore.”

Zoro lifted one shoulder in a small, dismissive motion meant to end the subject. “People like that always look important. That’s the trick.”

Silence settled again, heavier this time, pressing into the narrow space between them.

When Sanji spoke, the sharpness had faded from his voice. “Don’t you even wonder why they’re watching you?”

“That’s my problem.” The answer came too quickly, automatic as breathing.

Sanji shifted his weight; the sole of his shoe scraped lightly against the concrete.

“Yeah,” he said. “But you should still be careful.”

Zoro pushed himself off the wall, taking a step that should have created distance.

It didn’t feel like enough.

“This doesn’t concern you.”

Sanji went quiet for a moment. When he answered, the words came out softer, almost careful.

“That’s not how this works. Even if you don’t take it seriously, you could at least tell someone. You don’t know what they’re planning. Being alone just makes it worse.”

Zoro almost laughed. Who exactly was he supposed to tell?

“You’re overreacting, cook.”

He turned his head slightly, not enough to face him fully, only enough to catch the line of Sanji’s profile in the dim light. Smoke drifted thin and unsteady between them.

“That empty head of yours,” Sanji said, jaw tight. “You’re an idiot. I’m wasting my time.”

“Then go,” Zoro said. The words came the moment Sanji finished speaking, fast enough to feel like they had been waiting there all night.

Even Sanji seemed to freeze.

“I was going to,” he muttered. “I’ve got somewhere to be. I’m already late.”

Zoro said nothing.

“A date,” Sanji added after a second, like the detail had only just occurred to him. His tone tried for something lighter, something that didn’t quite fit the silence around them. “You know. Normal people have those.”

He didn’t leave immediately. One second passed. Then another. Each was quiet enough to pretend it didn’t matter.

“This isn’t nothing,” Sanji said again, almost under his breath. “Stop acting like it is.”

It didn’t sound like an order. It sounded tired. Like the last attempt at something he already knew wouldn’t work.

Zoro looked away, his gaze settling on the empty stretch of concrete in front of him.

He could feel Sanji without looking. The faint warmth of the cigarette ember..The subtle shift in the air whenever he moved…

“It’s always like this,” Zoro said after a moment. “Someone talks. Nothing happens.”

Sanji didn’t answer right away. When he finally spoke, the quiet in his voice felt different from before.

“And what if something does?”

Zoro let out a slow breath. “Then I deal with it.”

“Alone?”

The word landed heavier than it should have. Zoro didn’t respond. There wasn’t anything to argue with when it was said that plainly.

Still, irritation rose fast and defensive, easier to hold onto than anything underneath it trying to surface.

“That’s how this works,” he said.

“Yeah,” Sanji answered softly. “I figured.”

The tension in Zoro’s shoulders began to change, turning colder, less familiar, like something settling in that didn’t belong to him.

Sanji dropped the finished cigarette to the ground and crushed it beneath the shine of his shoe.

He turned away without looking at him.

“Try not to get yourself killed,” he said over his shoulder, the words shaped more like irritation than concern.

Zoro let out a short, almost mocking breath. “Worry about your date.”

Sanji gave a quiet sound that might have been a laugh.

“I always do. You should try it sometime.”

Then he left.

His footsteps faded slowly through the narrow passage until the night closed over the space he’d been standing in, leaving nothing behind but the cold air and the silence that returned too easily.

Zoro let out a slow breath, waiting for the familiar sense of balance to return, for the steady certainty that usually followed, the feeling that the world could still be reduced to something his own hands could handle.

It didn’t come quickly. He didn’t give himself time to notice.

He pushed the door open and went back inside.

Training had always been enough. Movement, strain, the burn spreading through muscle until thought lost its shape. If he drove his body far enough, the rest usually went quiet.

He worked until the burn stopped feeling sharp and turned dull, until breath came rough and uneven, until the edges of the room blurred whenever he lifted his head.

Still, the silence he was waiting for stayed just out of reach.

Koshiro’s voice cut through it eventually, calm but firm, the kind of warning that meant he had already gone too far. Zoro ignored it once. Then again…

Only when his hands failed to close properly around the bar did he finally step back.

By the time he left the gym, the night air felt thinner than before, colder against sweat that hadn’t fully dried.

His apartment was only a short walk away. That had been the only reason he chose it. Close enough to collapse when his body stopped moving. Far enough that nothing followed him inside. He used it for sleep.Nothing else.

A car slowed somewhere beyond the stretch of concrete, the sound easing down until it matched his pace, just a step behind.

Zoro stayed where he was for a moment and listened, letting instinct measure the distance before thought could interfere.

He already understood the situation. He knew the car behind him was there for him.

He straightened his shoulders and turned.

A dark vehicle rested along the curb, clean enough to catch the weak glow of the streetlight across its surface. Nothing about it looked hurried. Nothing about it needed to.

When it drew level with him, the rear window lowered slowly.

“Roronoa Zoro.”

He recognized the voice.

The face...The strange glasses…

In this world, some names didn’t need introductions. The face before him belonged to the name that had truly made the legendary Mihawk what he was, the one who stood at the center of every title he had ever claimed.

“You’ve got the wrong person,” he said, without meeting the man’s eyes.

Soft laughter answered him. “I don’t think so.”

The man leaned forward just enough for light to brush the edge of pink feathers at his shoulder, color too bright for the dim street yet completely at ease inside it. His smile followed a heartbeat later, relaxed, faintly amused, as if this meeting had always been inevitable and only the timing had remained uncertain.

“We were beginning to wonder how long you’d keep pretending not to notice us.”

Zoro’s jaw tightened slightly. “I don’t notice things that don’t matter.”

“Of course,” the man said easily. “That’s what makes you interesting.”

A thin, steady silence settled between them.

Zoro could feel the shape of the conversation before it fully formed, politeness stretched carefully over something harder beneath. He had seen versions of this before. Different streets. Different voices. Always the same expectation waiting at the end.

The rear door opened with a quiet, precise sound.

“Get in,” Doflamingo said, tone unchanged, as if suggesting something ordinary. “We’d be more comfortable talking inside.”

Zoro didn’t move. He could still turn away, walk back inside. Let the door close on all of it.

“And if I don’t?” he asked.

The smile didn’t fade. If anything, it softened. “Then nothing happens tonight. You go home. You train tomorrow. The week passes.”

A brief pause followed, gentle enough to sound considerate. “But time has a way of narrowing choices.”

The words settled quietly between them. Zoro felt their weight before he understood it, a slow pressure beneath his ribs that had nothing to do with fear.

For an instant, he thought of the narrow back lot behind the gym, of smoke drifting past his shoulder, of a presence that had stayed longer than necessary.

He forced the image away.

“You don’t know anything about me,” he said.

Another quiet laugh. “On the contrary. We know enough.”

The open car door waited.

Zoro remained where he was, balanced between refusal and motion, the familiar certainty of walking away resting against something heavier he couldn’t quite name.

It always worked like this. Choice reduced until it barely resembled one.

He exhaled once, slow and controlled, then stepped forward and bent into the car.

The door closed, and the quiet inside the car felt too deliberate to ignore.

Zoro didn’t sit back. He stayed slightly forward, forearms resting on his knees, as if this were just another place he hadn’t chosen to be. Across from him, Doflamingo watched without hurry, the faint curve of his smile suggesting patience rather than interest.

“Well?” Zoro said. “You got me in the car. Start talking.”

“You’re direct,” Doflamingo replied, almost approving. “I was right about you.”

“Don’t flatter yourself.”

A quiet breath of amusement passed between them, soft enough that it never quite became a laugh.

“We want you to fight for us,” Doflamingo said.

Zoro’s expression didn’t change, but something in his shoulders did, tightening before he could stop it. “I already fight.”

“Not like this.”

Silence settled for a moment, not empty, just waiting.

“With the people we choose,” Doflamingo continued. “In places that don’t ask questions.”

Zoro leaned back then, slow, buying himself a second that didn’t help. “Underground.”

“If you like that word.”

“And when this leaks?” Zoro asked. “Because it always leaks.”

Doflamingo’s smile widened slightly, not offended, not surprised. “You’re assuming anyone would let it.”

“My career’s done,” Zoro said flatly. “One rumor is enough.”

Doflamingo studied him as if the answer had already been decided somewhere else. Then he let out a quiet laugh, the sound warm in a way that didn’t reach his eyes.

“You keep forgetting who you’re sitting with.”

Zoro’s jaw shifted. Anger would have been easier to hold onto, something solid. This felt thinner than that, harder to push against.

“If Mihawk’s already working with you,” he said, “why not use him?”

“For the same reason you don’t bring a blade to cut paper,” Doflamingo answered lightly. “Some things don’t require that level of care.”

The meaning landed before Zoro could block it. He looked away first, toward the dark window where the city kept moving without him. “So that’s what I am to you.”

“That’s what this situation makes you,” Doflamingo said, voice calm enough to sound almost kind. “Don’t confuse the two.”

The correction was gentle. It still felt like being pushed down a step he hadn’t seen.

Zoro exhaled slowly, steady enough that it almost looked controlled. “And if I say no?”

“You won’t,” Doflamingo replied.

Zoro pressed his nails into his palm until the sharp sting steadied something inside him. Every second in the car felt like a quiet violation. He had spent most of his life forcing space open for himself, paying for that space with discipline, silence, and victories no one else had handed to him, and sitting here while someone else spoke as if his future were already decided settled in his chest like something difficult to swallow.

“What do I get out of this?” he asked, the question tight in his throat, shaped more by restraint than curiosity.

“Money,” Doflamingo answered with easy indifference, as though the word itself were too ordinary to matter, and the faint amusement in his expression suggested he already knew it would not be enough. “Although I doubt that’s what would interest you. You don’t look like someone who cares much for comfort.”

A soft laugh followed, unhurried and certain of its place in the conversation.

“I can arrange a real fight for you.”

Zoro felt the shift before he understood it, a quiet pull beneath the anger that redirected his attention with unsettling ease. He did not react to the insult hidden inside the offer, and he did not question why he ignored it.

“What kind of fight,” he said, already aware that the question mattered too much, “and with who?”

“With Mihawk. A title match.”

The name filled the space between them without needing to be repeated. For a moment Zoro forgot to answer, holding himself still so the silence would not betray how quickly the offer had reached somewhere deeper than pride. Across from him, Doflamingo watched with open satisfaction, as though he had confirmed a calculation rather than made a promise.

“That’s why you won’t say no,” he continued. “It’s the only way this fight happens.”

Zoro’s thoughts drifted, briefly and against his will, to a conversation he had had with Ace only a few days earlier, when the possibility of facing Mihawk had sounded distant enough to speak about without consequence. He understood then that this moment had not begun tonight. It had been moving toward him long before he ever noticed the car.

“And why should I trust you?” he asked at last.

He could accept the deal and still walk away with nothing. That much was obvious. Doflamingo didn’t look like a man who relied on promises in the ordinary sense.

“You will,” Doflamingo said, not insisting, simply stating it as something already settled. “And in return, we’ll expect the same discretion from you. No one hears about this. That way, no one gets hurt.”

The final words rested quietly in the air, light in tone and heavy everywhere else, and Zoro found himself listening to the silence that followed instead of answering it.

Zoro didn't answer immediately. He let the silence remain where it was, steady and watchful, as if testing whether the offer would change shape if he waited long enough. It didn’t. The car stayed quiet, the man across from him just as certain as before, and the weight of the decision settled slowly into something that felt less like a question and more like an edge.

“If I agree,” Zoro said at last, his voice even, controlled in a way that cost more than he showed, “I fight him for real. No tricks. No interference. Just the match.”

For the first time, Doflamingo’s smile shifted, not fading but sharpening slightly, the way an expression changes when a conversation finally becomes interesting.

“You would have my word,” he replied smoothly.

“That doesn’t mean much.”

“On the contrary,” Doflamingo said, still calm, still patient, as if time itself worked for him. “It means exactly what it needs to.”

Zoro held his gaze then, properly this time, measuring the distance between promise and lie and finding, as expected, nothing solid in between. The smart decision would have been to step out of the car, to let the door close on the entire conversation and walk back toward the narrow, disciplined life he had built piece by piece. He understood that clearly. He understood the cost, the risk, the way everything he had worked for could disappear the moment this became known.

And still, beneath all of it, there was Mihawk.

The name had been placed in front of him like something inevitable, and refusing it now felt less like caution and more like turning away from the only path that had ever made sense.

“What do you want in return?” he asked quietly.

Doflamingo leaned back slightly, satisfied in a way he didn’t bother hiding anymore.

“Very little,” he said. “You fight when we ask. Where we ask. Against who we choose. Nothing that interferes with your… public career, of course. We’re not unreasonable.”

Zoro almost laughed at that, though no sound came out. Reasonable was not the word he would have chosen, but arguing over language would not change the shape of the trap closing around the conversation.

“And if I refuse later?”

Doflamingo’s expression didn’t change. That was the answer.

“You won’t,” he said softly.

The certainty in his voice wasn’t loud, wasn’t threatening, and that made it harder to push against. It settled into the silence with the same calm inevitability as everything else in the car.

Zoro felt the decision arrive before he spoke it, the way impact reaches the body a fraction before pain. He could still walk away. The door was right there. Nothing had happened yet.

But walking away would mean letting the one fight that mattered remain out of reach.

He exhaled slowly, the breath leaving him like the last moment of balance before a fall.

“Fine,” Zoro said at last.

The word settled between them without emphasis, quiet enough to sound almost ordinary, yet it shifted the air inside the car in a way that made the silence afterward feel different. Across from him, Doflamingo’s mouth curved into a slow, satisfied smile, the expression of someone watching a long-expected outcome finally arrive.

“You made the right choice,” he said lightly, as though they had agreed on something trivial rather than irreversible.

Zoro ignored the tone. “When do these fights happen?”

“We’ll find you,” Doflamingo replied.

Nothing in his voice suggested uncertainty. The answer did not sound like a plan. It sounded like a certainty that had already been arranged somewhere beyond Zoro’s reach.

A moment later the car began to slow. The movement was smooth, almost unnoticeable, the city outside the tinted glass drifting into stillness until the vehicle came to a quiet stop. Only then did Zoro realize where they were.

His building stood directly ahead.

For the first time since entering the car, something cold moved cleanly through his awareness. Not surprising, something sharper. The simple understanding that this conversation had never depended on chance, and that the distance between his private life and the people inside this car was far smaller than he had allowed himself to believe.

The rear door unlocked with a soft click. No one told him to leave. No one needed to.

Zoro stepped out onto the street. When the door closed behind him, the car remained there for a brief second, silent and composed, before pulling away without hurry and disappearing into the dark as smoothly as it had arrived.

He stood still, looking at nothing in particular, the upper floors of the building rising above him in clean, dark lines. From the outside, everything appeared untouched, distant from the streets below, the kind of place built to suggest safety through height alone.

It meant nothing.

After a few seconds he turned and went inside.

The lobby lights were warm and carefully dimmed, reflecting off polished stone that carried no trace of the day’s footsteps. The elevator opened almost immediately. As it climbed, the city slipped lower behind sealed walls and muted glass until motion became the only proof that the ground still existed somewhere beneath him.

When the doors opened onto the top floor, the hallway was quiet. His apartment waited at the far end, separate from the others.

He unlocked the door and stepped inside.

Darkness greeted him first, followed by the faint outline of a space arranged with careful restraint. The apartment was large without feeling full, every surface intentional, every object chosen for use rather than comfort. Floor-to-ceiling windows faced the city, though at this hour they reflected only the interior back at itself, turning the view into another wall.

He let the keys fall onto the console near the entrance. The sound carried briefly through the open room, then disappeared.

For a moment he remained standing there, jacket still on, listening to nothing.

The refrigerator’s quiet hum reached him from the kitchen. He moved toward it without thinking, opened the door, and took a beer from the shelf. Cold metal pressed into his palm as he closed the door again and crossed to the chair near the window.

The seat was positioned to overlook the city during the day. At night, it faced only glass and darkness.

He sat, the faint scrape of the chair against the floor the only sign of movement in the room, and rested the unopened can loosely in his hand.

Only then did the stillness change.

The thoughts did not arrive all at once. They surfaced slowly, pushing through the emptiness he had kept in place since stepping out of the car, until distance was no longer possible. He had known this sensation before, the quiet realization that something he believed finished had only been waiting for the right moment to return. Each time it happened, it wore a different shape, but the weight beneath it remained the same.

For years he had moved forward with the simple belief that effort could keep his path clear. Train harder. Focus longer. Keep life stripped down to what could be controlled. The cost had been silence and separation, but the direction had felt certain enough to justify both.

And still, certainty had slipped.

For a brief moment he imagined that morning could arrive clean, unchanged, another day shaped only by training and repetition, a life contained within boundaries he understood. The image held just long enough to reveal how fragile it was before dissolving.

Because he knew this pattern.

Just when he began to believe he had stepped clear of something, it returned, patient and unavoidable, waiting for him to stop looking.

And without intending to, his mind caught on a different image entirely. Not the car. Not the man inside it. Only the memory of someone who had stayed standing in a doorway long after being told to leave, as if walking away had never truly been an option.

Zoro remained there, unmoving, the beer slowly losing its chill in his hand while the silence of the apartment settled deeper around him, until the stillness felt less like rest and more like the quiet pull of something opening beneath his feet.

This time, he had no sense of where it ended.

Chapter Text

If you asked Zoro to describe himself, he would say a few things without thinking too much, and somewhere among them he would mention that he didn’t care. At least, that was what he showed people. He wasn’t good at expressing what he felt and he never really knew how he was supposed to react to things, so the easiest solution had always been not reacting at all. That was why, earlier that afternoon, Koshiro grabbing him by the collar and dragging him out of the gym while telling him to get his head straight had caught him off guard.

His head was fine. That wasn’t the issue.

For the past week, there had only been one thing running through his mind, circling back to the same moment inside a car where a threat had been delivered without ever being said outright. The threat itself didn’t matter to him. What could they take from him anyway? If they wanted to hurt him, they could have done it already. If they wanted to go after the people he cared about, there was no one left to go after. His family was gone, buried, beyond the reach of anyone living, and no one was bringing them back just to take them from him again. He had nothing worth holding over him.

What stayed with him, what had been sitting badly since the moment he stepped out of that car, was the open ending of it. We’ll find you, Doflamingo had said, and those three words had a way of making every ordinary moment feel like a waiting room. It could be today, tomorrow, or never. He couldn’t build anything around a timeline that belonged to someone else. He had one direction, and he wanted to move toward it without anything dragging at his heels.

Zoro already knew the phone was about to ring when the music in his ears cut off. He slowed down, coming to a stop as he pulled it out.

Luffy’s name filled the screen, written in all caps the way it always was, as if the man had set it up himself and thought it was funny.

Zoro had never been good at collecting people. He didn’t try, didn’t leave room for it, and most of the time no one pushed hard enough to matter. Luffy had ignored all of that without seeming to notice it existed. He called every day without fail, and if Zoro didn’t pick up, the messages came anyway, one after another, until the phone became impossible to ignore. Someone had warned him once that Luffy didn’t really ask to be your friend, he just decided, and that was the end of it. They had been right. Without Zoro quite understanding how it had happened, Luffy had become the first person in this city who felt like a close friend.

He picked up.

“Zoro! Where are you?” Luffy’s voice came through bright and loud enough that Zoro pulled the phone slightly from his ear.

“Outside,” he said.

“We’re going to a festival tonight. Brook’s performing. It’s going to be amazing, you have to come.”

Zoro exhaled quietly. Koshiro had thrown him out, and there was nothing waiting for him at home except four walls and the same thoughts he had been carrying all week.

“Fine,” he said. “Where?”

“I’ll send it to you!”

*

Zoro had no idea what people were supposed to wear to a festival. He had stood in front of his closet for a while, looking through clothes that all felt more or less the same, trying to make a choice out of options that didn’t really exist. In the end, he went with what he always did and dressed in black from head to toe before heading out.

When he stepped into the festival area, he realized he hadn’t made a wrong decision. No one seemed to care about what anyone else was wearing.

The festival had taken over the park entirely. Food stalls lined the paths between the trees, smoke rising from the grills, oil crackling, the smell of charred meat and fried dough hitting before anything else could. Further along, other stands sold handmade things arranged carefully under warm yellow lights. The crowd moved through all of it without pause, voices overlapping, laughter cutting in from directions impossible to pinpoint. It was louder than it had looked from the outside, bright enough that the evening hadn’t quite managed to settle in despite the hour.

There was nothing wrong with the place. Nothing that stood out. People moved freely between the stalls, talking, laughing, brushing past each other without thinking about it. It should have been easy to blend in.

It wasn’t easy.

The feeling settled in without announcing itself. He couldn’t name it, couldn’t point to anything in particular, but it stayed, steady enough to keep pulling his attention sideways. Like someone’s eyes had found him in the crowd and hadn’t moved.

Zoro’s gaze shifted, slower now. He looked through the crowd instead of at it, scanning faces, hands, the spaces between people where attention tended to hide. His shoulders tightened slightly as he adjusted his stance.

There was nothing there.

He had been so focused on the crowd, trying to catch anything out of place in the moving picture in front of him, that when a hand touched his shoulder, his body reacted before his mind did. He turned sharply, fingers closing around the wrist with a firm grip, stopping the movement where it was.

It took him a second to register who it was.

Luffy stood there, caught mid-motion, and behind him three others had gone still in the way people did when they weren’t sure what they had just witnessed. Zoro let go just as quickly as he had grabbed him. “Sorry,” he said, the word coming out short.

He knew it had been strange. The looks were enough to tell him that.

Usopp’s eyes were wide, fixed on his hand like he was still expecting something to happen. Nami’s gaze moved between him and Luffy, her expression carrying more than surprise, tighter around the edges, like she was already deciding how much of this to let go. Sanji was different.

He didn’t look away. His eyes stayed on Zoro’s. There was no shock there, no tension like the others carried. It felt closer to a question than a reaction, like he was waiting for something without saying it out loud. He took a drag from his cigarette, exhaled slowly, and through all of it, his gaze didn’t shift even for a second.

Luffy broke the moment with a laugh loud enough to cut through the noise around them.

“That was so cool!” he said, shaking his arm out even though there was nothing wrong with it. “You moved really fast. You should teach me that.”

Zoro didn’t answer right away. His gaze passed over them briefly, drifting back to the crowd as he scanned it once more before returning.

“Don’t come up behind people like that.” he said.

“I didn’t even sneak,” Luffy replied, still grinning. “I just walked up to you.”

“That’s even worse.” Usopp muttered under his breath, taking a few steps back as if he’d only just realized he might be too close.

Nami let out a quiet breath. “You almost broke his wrist.”

“I didn’t.” Zoro said.

Sanji tapped the ash off his cigarette, his gaze lingering on Zoro for a second longer before he turned his head slightly. “Why are you so tense?” 

Their eyes met briefly, then Zoro looked away first.

“I’m not.”

Sanji let out a quiet laugh, more in the way his mouth moved than anything that could actually be heard, then dropped it as if it wasn’t worth pushing further. 

The moment passed as quickly as it had formed, swallowed by the crowd, by Luffy already moving again, pulling them along toward the next stall.

Zoro followed them without saying anything, but the feeling from earlier hadn’t gone anywhere. It stayed there, steady enough to keep him from fully giving in to the noise around him.

They were passing a hot dog stand when Luffy stopped abruptly, just like he had at nearly every stall they had passed so far, loudly announcing how hungry he was. For a while the group fell into a quieter rhythm, everyone focused on the food in their hands.

“Why didn’t you bring your girlfriend?” Nami asked, turning to Sanji. It didn’t sound like a serious question, more like something meant to poke at him.

Sanji looked away. “She had work.”

Nami laughed, and Luffy and Usopp joined in like it was a joke with a long history behind it. Zoro kept his eyes forward and said nothing, though he found himself listening more carefully than he intended to.

“Did she break up with you again?”

“No,” Sanji said quickly. “She just wanted some time to herself. Of course I agreed. When a lady asks for time to better herself, you give it to her.” He didn’t look at them while he spoke, taking a slow drag from his cigarette instead.

“That girl’s the weirdest person alive.” Usopp said. “How do you even deal with her?”

Sanji turned on him immediately, fast enough to cut him off before he could say anything else. “Watch how you talk. If a woman wants something, who are we to stand in the way?”

The words sounded forced. Zoro caught himself reacting before he could stop it, a faint shift in his expression that didn’t quite hide the disbelief.

“Got a problem, mosshead?” Sanji turned fully toward him this time. The same man who couldn’t meet his friends’ eyes a moment ago was now looking straight at Zoro, the edge in his expression clear.

“No,” Zoro said. “I was just thinking about how fake that sounded.”

Sanji’s eyes narrowed. He dropped the cigarette to the ground and crushed it under his heel, slow and deliberate.

“What would you know about it?” he said. “Like any woman would want to be with someone like you.”

Zoro crossed his arms. “I do just fine with women.”

Sanji took a small step closer. The irritation on his face was obvious, but it wasn’t the only thing there, at the very corner of his mouth, barely enough to catch, was the faint suggestion of a curve that didn’t belong to anger at all.

“When was the last time you had a girlfriend?”

Zoro didn’t answer right away. The question landed at an odd angle, out of place enough that it took him a second to catch up with it. He frowned slightly, looking at Sanji as if he had said something in a language Zoro almost spoke but not quite.

“How long is this going to go on?” Nami cut in, her tone flat as she looked between them. “I’ve had more girlfriends than all of you combined, I just don’t feel the need to announce it every five minutes.”

Zoro barely registered the words at first. His attention was still caught somewhere else, held in place by the way Sanji hadn’t looked away, the way the tension between them hadn’t broken even when the conversation shifted. There was a quality to it he couldn’t account for, one that didn’t sit the same way as the usual back-and-forth he had with people.

Nami seemed to notice it too. Her eyes lingered on them for a second before she stepped forward, slipping neatly between them like she was used to doing it.

“Sanji,” she said, turning to him as if nothing had happened. “Can you get me some corn? I really want some.”

Whatever had been on Sanji’s face disappeared almost instantly. He didn’t argue, didn’t hesitate, just turned and walked toward the stall like the moment hadn’t existed at all.

“I hate men.” Nami added under her breath.

Luffy laughed and ran after Sanji without thinking twice, leaving the space behind them to fall quiet in a different way.

Zoro didn’t move. He was still looking at Nami, his expression not quite settling into anything readable, like the words had arrived before he was ready for them. His mouth parted slightly before he closed it again, jaw tightening as the meaning caught up with him.

Girlfriends.

She had said it like it was nothing. Like it didn’t require a pause, or a lowered voice, or any of the careful distance people usually kept around a word like that.

Zoro held her gaze for a second longer than necessary. The question formed before he could stop it, rising fast and wordless, and he pressed his teeth together and looked away before it could find its way out.

Nami didn’t say anything. She just looked at him for a moment with an expression that was difficult to read, then turned and followed the others.

He stayed with them as they moved deeper into the festival, letting Luffy pull the group from one stall to the next without much resistance. The energy didn’t drop for a second. Every few steps, Luffy stopped again, pointing at whatever had caught his eye, insisting they had to try it, his voice cutting through the noise like it belonged there. Usopp argued half the time, already convinced each new option would be terrible before even tasting it, while Nami kept an eye on how much they were spending, stepping in just before things got out of control.

Sanji moved differently from the rest of them. He didn’t rush, didn’t get caught up in the excitement the same way, but he didn’t stay distant either. He stopped at certain stalls longer than others, watching closely as things were prepared, his attention narrowing in a way that didn’t match the chaos around him. When he finally picked something up, he took his time with it, tasting first, deciding after.

“This one’s overcooked,” he said at some point, more to himself than anyone else, though he knew they were listening. “They rushed it.”

Usopp frowned. “It tastes fine.”

Sanji didn’t bother looking at him. “That’s because you don’t know what it’s supposed to taste like.”

Luffy laughed and took another bite anyway, unconcerned, already moving on to something else. Nami shook her head but followed, and Usopp went with them after a moment, still muttering under his breath.

Zoro stayed where he was for a second longer. He watched Sanji without meaning to, the way his focus sharpened around details most people walked past without registering, the way he seemed to catch everything and discard it just as quickly if it didn’t meet whatever standard lived in his head. Zoro didn’t know what to call that kind of attention. He looked away before he could decide, and stepped forward to catch up with the others.

“Hey, we should go closer to the stage,” Luffy said suddenly, already turning in a new direction. “Brook’s gonna start soon!”

They followed him again, weaving through people, the noise shifting slightly as they moved further in. The food stalls began to thin out, replaced by a small open area where a stage had been set up between the trees. It wasn’t large, nothing impressive, just a raised platform with a few lights and scattered speakers.

The crowd loosened just enough to reveal a small open space scattered with worn-out puff seats thrown across the ground. Most of them were already taken, people sitting in loose circles, talking over each other while waiting for the show to start.

Luffy dropped onto the nearest empty one without hesitation, dragging Usopp down with him. Nami claimed another with more care, brushing it off first before sitting. Sanji lingered for a second, glancing at the ground like he was judging the condition of it, then sat anyway, one leg stretched out slightly, cigarette already between his fingers again.

Zoro took the last empty spot nearby.

“You look lost.” Sanji said, without looking at him.

“I’m sitting down.”

“That’s what I said.”

Zoro didn’t answer. There was nothing worth answering.

For a while, no one said much in their group after that. Luffy was still finishing whatever he had in his hand, Usopp talking to him between bites, Nami scrolling through her phone with the expression of someone pretending not to listen.

Sanji broke the silence first. “Is this your first concert or something?”

Zoro let out a quiet breath. “You’re really irritating.”

Sanji’s brows drew together instantly. “You’re the most irritating person I’ve ever seen.”

“Then don’t talk to me.”

“Gladly.”

Neither of them looked away right after.

Luffy leaned forward, cutting in with a grin before the moment could stretch any further. “You guys sound like you’ve known each other for years.”

“We haven’t.”  they said at the same time.

Sanji was the one who looked away first this time, bringing the cigarette back to his lips like the conversation hadn’t been worth continuing. Zoro didn’t push it. He leaned back slightly, his attention shifting past them toward the stage.

The noise of the festival didn’t disappear when Brook stepped onto the stage, it only softened, like the crowd had shifted its attention all at once without fully letting go of the energy around them.

Luffy reacted immediately, leaning forward with a grin that was impossible to miss, calling out his name like the rest of the crowd didn’t exist. 

Brook didn’t rush. The music built on its own, simple at first, then fuller, and the crowd followed it naturally without being asked to.

Zoro stayed where he was, sitting back just slightly. The sound carried differently here, steady enough to hold his attention without demanding it.

Beside him, Sanji had gone quiet, the cigarette between his fingers burning down slower than usual. His attention stayed on the stage, but not completely. It drifted once, briefly, toward Zoro, then returned without comment.

Zoro noticed but said nothing.

*

The next day, he went back to where he belonged. No one threw him out this time, and he spent most of the morning the way he preferred to, moving through the gym’s familiar rhythm without interruption, the hours passing in the way they only did when his body had enough to do.

Ace stopped by in the afternoon. He dropped into the chair across from Zoro the way he always did, jacket half off his shoulder before he had even fully sat down, and they went over the same ground they had been covering for days. Fight scheduling. Upcoming opponents. The careful management of a career that had been climbing fast enough to attract the wrong kind of attention alongside the right kind.

“Still nothing from Mihawk’s team,” Ace said at one point, leaning back, arms folded behind his head. He said it casually, the way he delivered most things he didn’t want to make into a bigger deal than necessary. “I’m still pushing. Just don’t want you sitting around waiting on it.”

Zoro nodded once and said nothing.

He knew, somewhere in the back of his mind, that this was the moment to say something. Ace was the one person in this city whose job it was to know everything that touched Zoro’s career, and what had happened in that car a week ago touched more than just his career. Saying nothing was a choice with a cost he hadn’t fully calculated yet.

But nothing had been set in motion. Not visibly, not yet…

He picked up the tape from the bench beside him and started wrapping his hand.

“You good?” Ace asked, watching him.

“Yeah,” Zoro said.

Ace looked at him for a second longer than the answer deserved, then let it go.

The rest of the afternoon passed the way most of them did, quietly and without incident, until Koshiro’s voice reached him from across the gym just as he was packing up to leave.

“You’ve got another visitor.”

Zoro was already changed, bag half-zipped on the bench beside him.

“A visitor?” 

Koshiro didn’t answer him.

Zoro stood there for a second with his bag half-zipped, running through the short list of people who knew where he trained and would show up without calling first. It wasn’t a long list. The last time someone had been waiting outside that door, it had been the last person he would have predicted.

He finished zipping the bag, slung it over his shoulder, and pushed the door open.

The cigarette smoke was enough for him to recognize who it was before even seeing his face.

“If you like coming to the gym this much, I can ask Koshiro about a membership for you.”

Sanji pushed himself off the wall he had been leaning against. “Like I need it.” he said.

“I don’t know. Showing up at the door every day makes it look like you do. So why are you here?”

Sanji pressed the container in his hand firmly against Zoro’s stomach.

Zoro took it from him, looking down at it. “What is this?”

“What does it look like?” Sanji said. “Is your brain covered in moss too?”

He spoke in that same irritated, slightly mocking tone, but he wasn’t looking at Zoro. His gaze moved everywhere else instead, drifting across the street like the buildings on the other side had suddenly become worth examining.

Zoro took the chance to look at him properly.

He was still in his suit. A black jacket, sharp lines, a blue striped shirt underneath, the top button undone in the way that looked careless but probably wasn’t. It was late, and he had likely been wearing it since morning, but there wasn’t a single crease on him. Zoro didn’t know how that was possible after a full shift in a kitchen, and he didn’t spend long thinking about it.

He shifted his attention back to the container in his hand.

“Food?”

“Wow. Congratulations, you figured it out.” Sanji said, rolling his eyes.

Zoro looked at him for a moment. Sanji had brought him food, crossed the street with it, waited outside a gym that had no reason to mean anything to him, and was now standing there acting like he had been dragged here against his will. The attitude and the action didn’t match, and the gap between them was wide enough to notice. Zoro didn’t point it out. He filed it away instead, the way he did with things that didn’t have an obvious explanation yet.

“Then why did you bring it to me?” Zoro asked, still not fully following.

“Why do you keep questioning it?” Sanji snapped. “There was extra food. It was going to go to waste. And since you’re some prehistoric man who clearly can’t cook, I brought it to you. Just eat it.”

Zoro looked at him, then at the container, then back at him.

Sanji was still not meeting his eyes, jaw set, one hand shoved into his pocket like he needed somewhere to put it. 

“You sure you didn’t poison it?” Zoro said.

Sanji’s head snapped toward him. “I will throw you through that door.”

“So that’s a maybe.”

Sanji’s expression shifted so fast it was almost impressive, the irritation hitting him before the sentence had even finished, a faint flush climbing around his ears. “I’ll beat you. I won’t even need my hands.”

Zoro smirked slightly. “You want to try?”

“Fuck off!” Sanji said, loud enough this time, already turning his back and starting to walk away.

Zoro was about to look inside the container when Sanji turned back and walked toward him again. He stopped right in front of him, his gaze drifting everywhere but Zoro’s face for a few seconds before finally settling on him.

“Did you run into those guys?” he asked.

Zoro almost told the truth.

He looked at Sanji for a moment, taking in the way he was standing, the careful disinterest he was performing with his eyes aimed slightly to the side, the question delivered like it didn’t cost him anything to ask.

Sanji was the only person who knew any part of it. He had noticed before Zoro had said a word, had shown up at a gym door in the middle of the night over it, and had clearly not let it go.

Pulling him further in was a different thing entirely.

Zoro looked away, letting his gaze drift across the street the same way Sanji had done earlier.

A black car sat parked at the far end of the street, just behind Sanji’s shoulder.

At first glance it looked like any other, nothing that should have pulled his eye, but it didn’t belong to that street the way the others did. It was too clean, too still, positioned with the kind of deliberateness that had nothing to do with parking. Zoro tilted his head slightly, trying to see past the glass, but the windows gave nothing back.

“No,” he said, his tone flat. “I told you, you were exaggerating. Nothing happened.”

He was certain they were being watched.

“Do whatever you want. Just don’t come to me for help.”

Zoro let out a quiet laugh. “Why would I ask you for help?”

The words landed the wrong way. He could see it in Sanji immediately, the slight narrowing of his eyes, the shift that moved through his jaw before he could stop it.

Sanji said something back, his voice sharpening, but Zoro didn’t listen to it.

Both doors of the car opened at the same time.

Two men stepped out without urgency, without any of the small hesitations that came with not knowing a place. They moved like the street already belonged to them, like being seen had never been a concern worth having, and that particular kind of confidence was the most recognizable warning Zoro knew.

Zoro looked at Sanji, then at the men, then back at Sanji.

He grabbed him by the arm and started walking.

“Hey, don’t touch me.” Sanji snapped, trying to pull free, but Zoro’s grip tightened.

“Stop talking. Just keep walking,” he said under his breath. “And don’t look back.”

Zoro didn’t slow down. He kept the pace steady, not fast enough to look like running, not slow enough to give anyone time to close the distance. Sanji kept pulling against his grip with every step, his whole body resistant, the kind of stubbornness that had no sense of timing.

“Have you lost your mind?” Sanji started, still struggling.

Zoro didn’t answer. He turned into a side street and pulled Sanji into the narrow gap between two buildings, a space barely wide enough for one person to stand comfortably, let alone two.

Sanji stumbled with the sudden stop, his shoulder catching Zoro’s chest before he could find his footing. “What’s wrong with you?”

Zoro raised his hand between them. He didn’t cover his mouth, but he came close enough that Sanji went still anyway.

“Stay quiet.”

The tone landed differently than the words. Sanji’s next breath came slower.

Zoro shifted his weight, angling himself toward the street, and leaned just far enough past the edge of the wall to see without being seen. The narrow opening framed a thin strip of pavement, the distant movement of people, the unremarkable surface of the street.

His hand was still raised. Without meaning to, his fingers had curled slightly, hovering near Sanji’s jaw without touching it.

He didn’t move them.

Behind him, Sanji adjusted his footing, his back pressing further into the wall to make room that didn’t exist. The shift brought him closer instead. Zoro could feel the warmth of him now, the uneven rhythm of his breathing, the faint tension in the body next to his that was trying very hard to stay still.

The street outside had gone still. Either they had stopped, or they had never been following to begin with.

“You didn’t run into them, right?” Sanji said through his teeth.

“It’s none of your business.” Zoro replied.

“If I’m standing here, it is.”

Sanji was looking straight at him now.

Zoro turned his head to answer and didn’t.

He wasn’t sure what he had been expecting. He had stood next to Sanji before, across from him, close enough to argue with him, close enough to be annoyed by him. But the gap between them right now was measured in inches, and at this distance there was nowhere else for his attention to go. 

The blue of Sanji’s eyes was different up close, deeper than it had any right to be, the kind of color that didn’t have a clean name. Zoro had used that word carelessly his whole life, had thrown it at mossy walls and overcast skies and the inside of gym bags, and standing here he understood for the first time that he had never actually been looking at something blue.

The street outside didn’t exist for a moment. Neither did the men, or the car, or the decision he still hadn’t made.

There was only the uneven rhythm of Sanji’s breath against his face, and the fact that Zoro still hadn’t looked away.

“Hey,” Sanji tapped a hand against his chest. “You have to tell me what’s going on.”

“I don’t owe you anything,” Zoro said.

Sanji’s jaw tightened. He didn’t step back.

The street outside was empty. The men were gone, the car was gone, and there was no reason left to stay in this narrow space between two walls with barely enough room to breathe. Zoro knew that. He registered it the same way he registered everything, but he didn’t move.

Sanji grabbed him by the collar instead and pulled him closer, fast and without hesitation. “You’re a selfish idiot,” he said, his voice low, tight with anger. “I’m already in this. I need to know.”

The space between them, already too narrow, collapsed entirely.

Sanji’s breath came uneven, brushing against Zoro’s face with every exhale, close enough to feel. The rise and fall of his chest pressed against him with each breath, steady at first, then sharper, like he hadn’t registered how close they actually were until the moment had already passed the point where stepping away would look casual.

With Zoro staying silent, something shifted in Sanji’s expression. He let go of the collar as if his hand had burned, pulling back too quickly, taking a step away until his back met the wall behind him.

“Do whatever you’re doing. I don’t care.” he said.

He looked at him one last time, then turned and walked out of the narrow space.

Zoro stayed where he was, the container still in his hand. The narrow space felt different without Sanji in it, emptier in a way that had nothing to do with the extra room. He stood there a second longer than he needed to, then stepped out into the street.

Everything looked normal. People passing by, distant voices, the city moving on at its usual indifferent pace. The car was gone. The men were gone. The street had closed over the whole thing like it had never happened.

Zoro tightened his grip on the container and started walking.

The further he moved from the main road, the quieter it got, the noise of the evening pulling back by degrees until there was only the sound of his own footsteps and the cold settling in around his collar. He walked without direction for a while, not toward anything in particular, just moving until the tension in his shoulders had somewhere to go.

He found a low wall near the corner of a quieter street and stopped.

He looked down at the container in his hand. He sat down and opened it.

The smell reached him before he had properly looked at what was inside. He picked up the fork tucked beneath the lid and took a bite without thinking too much about it.

He went very still.

He took another bite. Then another, slower this time, like slowing down might help him understand how something could taste like this. It didn’t help. It just kept tasting the same, careful and precise and almost unreasonably good, the kind of food that made every other meal feel like it had been assembled without paying attention.

Zoro stared at the container for a moment.

Then, without meaning to, the corner of his mouth lifted.

He finished every last bite sitting on that wall in the cold, alone, and said nothing about it to anyone.

He walked the rest of the way home without thinking about much.

His building came into view at the end of the street, the lobby lights burning low behind the glass. Zoro slowed as he reached the entrance, pulling his keys from his pocket, his mind already somewhere else entirely when he noticed the paper lying on the doormat.

He bent down and picked it up. It felt light between his fingers, almost nothing. There wasn’t much written on it, just a place, a date, a time, and when he turned it over, the back was completely blank.

He read it through twice, standing there in the cold with his keys in one hand and the paper in the other.

Two days from now. Midnight.

Zoro stood there for a long moment, the city moving quietly behind him, indifferent as always.

They had found him, just like they said they would.