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By the time the light began to thin, Zoro still wasn’t back. But since Zoro getting lost was practically a law of nature (tides rose, suns set, Zoro walked confidently in the wrong direction), no one was particularly concerned.
“Give it an hour or so,” Usopp said, sprawling back like this was a solved problem.
“Hey,” Luffy chimed in. “What’s for dinner? It smells delicious!”
Nami didn’t even look up from her book. “Sanji, be a dear,” she yawned. “Go get him. Some islands aren’t safe after dark.”
Sanji sighed, looking up at the sky. A few hours til sundown. Somehow, through no decision he could recall making, he had become the one responsible for retrieving the aberrant swordsman. Every single time.
At least he had already prepared tonight’s dinner - a delicious coq au vin - so no problem.
“Anything for you, my Nami goddess,” he cooed.
When there was no reaction, he shrugged into his jacket and fished his lighter from his pocket, thumb rolling it open and shut once before he sparked a new cigarette to life. Then he hopped off the ship without further ado, already halfway gone by the time Luffy shouted something about bringing back extra meat while he was out and about.
The jungle was dense and fragrant. Sanji walked at an easy pace, letting his shoulders loosen and the tension of the day bleed out of him with every slow exhale of smoke. This part, before the inevitable irritation at the sight of the mossheaded idiot, was actually pleasant.
He let his mind drift to tomorrow’s dinner as he walked. Tweaked a sauce in his head. Considered whether they still had enough garlic for the journey ahead. Made a mental note to yell at Zoro extra long for the horrible timing: Not coming back this close to sunset was fucking rude because it was a sacred time for any cook.
Well, it normally didn’t take him long to find the idiot. There was an almost artistic consistency to how Zoro lost his way. Always uphill. Always opposite from the obvious path. Always toward whatever looked the least sensible and the most stubbornly confident. They’d joked once about sewing a compass into his skin, only to abandon the idea when it was proven, conclusively, that Zoro couldn’t read one anyway.
Sanji knew he had to simply follow the signs. Snapped branches where someone broad-shouldered had pushed through without slowing. Deep footprints where someone heavy had stopped paying attention to where he was going. The faint scuff of boots on stone. The subtle absence of undergrowth where Zoro had walked straight through instead of around.
He was on his third cigarette when he noticed the blood.
It wasn’t much at first. Just a smear along the bark of a tree, dark and drying, almost missed. Sanji stopped short, smoke catching in his lungs. His lighter clicked open and shut once, unlit, before he forced himself to flick ash away and step closer.
The light had dimmed another fraction, shadows pooling thicker between the trees, the warmth of the afternoon slipping away. Sanji scowled, irritation flaring sharp enough to push back the unease.
Was it possible the stupid swordsman was hurt?
He told himself it was nothing.
Even when another smear appeared ten paces later. Even when it wasn’t just bark anymore, but leaves, trampled and stained. Even when a dark drop marked the edge of a stone like something had paused there.
Zoro bled all the time. Bled like it was a hobby. A smear of blood didn’t mean anything… except maybe that he’d picked a fight with something he shouldn’t have, or tripped, or simply had been an even bigger idiot than usual.
Ugh. Still.
Sanji ground the cigarette out and started moving again, pace no longer quite so easy.
He was almost running when the trees thinned before him and the forest opened into a small clearing. Sanji slowed, breath catching as his eyes locked onto the figure at its center.
Zoro was sitting on the ground, swords laid neatly beside him. His head was bowed, one hand braced against the dirt like he’d needed the support to stay upright.
Sanji’s chest tightened painfully.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, crossing the clearing in three long strides, already scanning for injuries.
Zoro’s head snapped up.
“Finally! Took you long enough, ero-cook” he growled.
There was blood on his knuckles. Dark streaks smeared along his forearm, disappearing beneath the sleeve. A thin line of it trailed down his calf, soaking into the dirt where he was sitting.
Sanji swallowed.
“You’re bleeding,” he said, because stating the obvious felt safer than saying what he was actually thinking.
Zoro snorted. “Only part of it is mine.”
“What idiotic thing did you do?” Sanji ground out, dropping to a knee in front of him. His fingers hovered, not quite touching, cataloguing damage. Swelling at the right wrist, a tear in the fabric near the thigh, the stiffness in the way Zoro held his weight. Nothing life-threatening.
Zoro looked away.
“Ran into something,” he muttered. “Was more obstinate than I expected.”
Sanji’s eyes flicked to the churned-up earth around them. The gouges. The disturbed soil. The faint, dark splatter further back near the treeline.
“That so,” he said flatly.
Zoro didn’t elaborate.
Sanji’s jaw tightened. “Can you walk?”
“Yes. Sure,” Zoro claimed immediately, then only managed a weak shift of his shoulders, like even that had cost him something.
“Fuck,” Sanji said quietly, running through options in his head. He glanced at the fading light, then back at Zoro who looked truly winded now that he wasn’t pretending otherwise. Carrying him was out. Too heavy. Too proud. Not injured enough to keep it from turning into a stupid fight that Sanji had neither the patience nor the time for.
He scrubbed a hand through his hair, irritation curling tight in his stomach. The dark around them was gathering quickly, creeping in around the edges of the clearing. The air was cooling faster than before.
Sanji exhaled slowly.
“Alright,” he said, already reaching for his lighter. “We’re building a fire. We wait it out until you’re fit to travel.”
Zoro opened his mouth to argue, but Sanji shot him a look sharp enough to cut.
“Non-negotiable,” he added. “You stupid idiot, you are such a pain in the ass.”
Zoro closed his mouth with a scowl, which Sanji took as agreement.
He moved quickly and efficiently, scooping up fallen branches and snapping smaller ones against his knee until he had collected a nice pile of firewood.
Something shifted in the undergrowth behind him.
Sanji froze.
Just a faint rustle, leaves brushing together. Too deliberate to be a bird. Too slow to be nothing. He straightened by degrees, eyes cutting toward the treeline, pulse spiking hard.
Nothing there.
The forest stared back at him, shadows knotting strangely between the trunks. Sanji held his breath for a moment before swallowing and forcing himself to move again.
He gathered more wood. Stacked it higher than necessary. Well, there was no such thing as too much firewood, especially if the alternative was stepping back into that dark to fetch more.
Another sound followed… closer this time, leaves parting, then stilling again.
Sanji didn’t look up. He dropped to a knee, struck the lighter, and held the flame low, knuckles white as he coaxed it into the kindling. It flared, sputtered, then caught, fire blooming warm and bright, pushing the dark back in a shaky circle.
Only then did he let himself breathe.
“Is that thing you hunted going to come back?” he asked, eyes still on the fire as if daring it to go out.
Zoro snorted softly.
“Nah,” he said. “It exploded.”
“Do I even wanna know?” Sanji murmured.
A faint chuckle rumbled out of Zoro’s chest. “You would’ve geeked out over it,” he said. “Had teeth in weird places.”
“Didn’t know I was into teeth in weird places,” Sanji muttered, nudging another branch into place, making sure the structure held. He shifted the larger logs closer, angling the heat toward Zoro. “Did you get bitten?”
Zoro shrugged.
Sanji’s head snapped up. “You were probably poisoned,” he ground out. “Stupid dickhead. How long ago?”
Zoro squinted slightly, like he was trying to remember through fog. “Dunno. Before you showed up.”
“That’s not a time,” Sanji snapped. He leaned forward, grabbing Zoro’s wrist before the other man could pull away, fingers pressing to his pulse. It was steady, but slightly slower than it should’ve been.
Zoro made a low sound of annoyance but didn’t fight him.
Sanji pulled a face and reached for the hem of Zoro’s robe. “Where.”
Zoro’s hand snapped out, catching his wrist mid-motion in an iron grip.
“Don’t,” he said.
Sanji stared at him. “Don’t what?”
“Don’t start fussing.”
“I’m not fussing, I’m just trying to see where you got bitten! We don’t want you getting an infection.”
“I’m fine.”
“People who are fine can move and don’t sit on the ground bleeding into the dirt!”
Zoro’s jaw tightened. “Drop it.” He looked very serious, almost menacing.
Okay, fine. Sanji scoffed sharply and yanked his wrist back. “Fuck off, then.”
Zoro relaxed a fraction, like he’d won something.
“I’ll walk,” Zoro added, after a second. “In a minute. I’m already feeling better.”
That did not inspire confidence, but before Sanji could argue again, Zoro pulled something from his coat. A cork came free with a dull pop and Zoro tipped the bottle back to swallow deeply. The smell hit Sanji a second later. Sharp, biting, unmistakably strong.
Zoro wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Disinfectant,” he said dryly. “So fucking stop with the fussing.”
“That is not how…” Sanji cut himself off with a frustrated exhale. “You can’t just drink your way through venom.”
Zoro gave him a sideways look, faintly amused. “Of course you can, worked before.”
Sanji’s eyes dragged over him again, assessing. Color still in his face. Breathing steady. No tremors he could see. He didn’t look like he was dying.
“Next time,” Sanji grumbled, poking the fire with a stick and sending sparks spiraling upward, “hunt something I can actually cook.”
“I was trying to,” Zoro answered.
Sanji paused. Wait… Had the idiot gone chasing some bizarre, probably inedible nightmare creature because he thought Sanji might want it? It had become a habit of sorts over the months, Zoro dragging whatever strange, dangerous thing he found back to the ship with the vague expectation that Sanji would “do something with it.”
Sanji clicked his tongue, refusing to look at him. “Well, try not to explode it next time.”
A faint, pleased huff of laughter came from Zoro’s side of the fire, and Sanji rose abruptly, feeling flustered and vaguely irritated with himself for reasons he did not intend to examine.
“I saw fruit,” he muttered, brushing dirt from his knees. “A bit further in. Might as well make yourself useful and not pass out while I’m gone?”
“Fuck off,” Zoro growled. “Told you I’d be back on my feet in a minute.”
The firelight thinned at Sanji’s back with every step. He kept his spine straight and his pace steady, refusing to rush, refusing to acknowledge the way his pulse had begun to quicken.
He found the fruit where he’d seen it: small, hard, red-gold things clustered low on a crooked tree. He plucked them quickly, stuffing them into his jacket, adding a handful of bitter leaves he recognized, something that might help if Zoro had actually been poisoned.
All the while, his instincts screamed at him, a steady, rising wrongness at the base of his skull.
Sanji turned and walked back.
Then walked faster. Boots crunching loudly in the hush, breath coming shorter than he liked. The clearing reappeared ahead, the firelight flickering thin and uncertain between the trees.
He almost ran the last few steps, stepping back into its warmth and the fragile safety it promised.
Zoro looked up, unimpressed.
Sanji dropped the fruit beside him.
“Something’s out there,” he said, eyes already scanning the treeline again. “It’s not happy we’re here.”
Zoro snorted and reached for one of the apple-looking things without hesitation. He bit into it and swallowed in three large bites, juice running briefly down his thumb.
“Did you piss something off with your attitude?” he asked.
“It’s great to see that you’re better,” Sanji snapped, jabbing a stick into the fire hard enough to send sparks spiraling upward, “but we both know it was you who exploded a native species… which normally doesn’t go down well with its friends and relatives.”
Zoro grunted, unimpressed.
That was when the clicking started.
Sanji went utterly still.
The sound didn’t belong to the wind, nor did it belong to anything with feathers or fur. It was dry. Hollow. Rhythmic in a way that made something ancient in his spine lock up.
They came into view at the edge of the light.
Sanji made a high, humiliating sound and bolted across the fire.
Too many legs. Too many joints. Bodies that caught the firelight, glossy, pale, segmented in ways that made Sanji’s stomach turn. Spider things. Big enough that their shadows stretched thin and warped across the ground, legs bending where legs shouldn’t bend.
“Fire keeps ’em back,” Zoro said. “Mostly.”
“Mostly?” Sanji repeated, voice far too high.
One spider crept forward anyway, long front legs lifting and lowering in a creepy dance. Its body was the size of a small dog. Its mandibles flexed.
Sanji hadn’t realized his fingers were fisted hard in the swordsman’s sleeve until Zoro moved.
Steel flashed. The body hit the ground in pieces, twitching violently, pale fluid spilling and steaming where it met the dirt. The smell hit a second later, sharp and sour, like something that had never been meant to be opened. The others recoiled with a collective, furious chitter, retreating just far enough to remain outside the heat’s reach, where they formed a loose ring, legs shifting, bodies low.
Sanji’s lungs refused to work properly. Every instinct screamed at him to move, to run, to put distance between himself and the writhing thing on the ground. His skin crawled like something had already brushed against him, like phantom legs skittered over his boots. His vision tunneled briefly at the edges.
“Oi,” Zoro said, almost bored. “They’re only bugs. Try not to faint.”
Sanji’s head snapped toward him, outrage slicing clean through the panic.
“I am not fainting,” he hissed. “And those are not ‘only bugs,’ you blind moss-brain!”
Another spider edged forward.
Sanji grabbed the nearest burning log with shaking fingers and swung it hard, sparks exploding outward as the spider recoiled. Zoro stepped in and sliced it apart.
“See?” Zoro said. “Easy, even you can do it.”
“If only you had some sense in that skull of yours,” Sanji snapped, bringing the log down on another spider with a nauseating crunch.
He didn’t manage to swallow the sound that clawed up his throat as something burst beneath his heel.
“Tell me,” he squealed, “that the one you exploded didn’t have a nest?”
Zoro shrugged. “It probably did.”
Sanji stared at him in disbelief.
“Stay inside the light,” Zoro added, voice sharpening into command. “Don’t let them get behind you. Aim for the joints. If they climb, roll through the fire. I’ll clear the rest.”
“Oh, fantastic,” Sanji shot back. “Just roll through the fire. Brilliant strategy. Why didn’t I think of that?”
That was when the clicking changed. It stopped being scattered and became synchronized.
“Oh, you have got to be kidding me!”
They rushed.
Sanji kicked the edge of the fire outward, scattering burning wood in a defensive arc. The first line recoiled mid-charge, legs jerking back from the sudden heat. He pivoted and drove his heel straight through one that had slipped too close, feeling the crunch travel up his spine.
Don’t think about how it feels.
Another leapt.
He twisted, leg snapping out in a long arc. The body split under the impact, halves slapping wetly into the dirt. Something sprayed across his boot.
He gagged. Acid burned at the back of his throat and for one horrifying second he thought he was actually going to throw up…
…and then he imagined Zoro never letting him live that down. That helped.
“Try not to scream, curly-brow!” Zoro called. Steel rang behind him, when Zoro started carving through the second wave.
“I am not screaming!” Sanji yelled, immediately proving otherwise as another spider lunged and he smashed it mid-air with a spinning kick.
One skittered low and fast, slipping between two burning branches and climbing his shin before he could stop it.
Sanji made a broken, furious noise. “Get it off…!”
He slammed the burning log against his own leg, crushing it between wood and bone. The smell was indescribable.
“Keep the fire alive, loser!” Zoro barked.
They came again.
Sanji spun, sweeping low, knocking three back into the flames where they ignited with a shrill, hideous screech. He followed through with a rising kick that sent another crashing into a tree hard enough to split bark.
Every brush of air felt like contact. Every tick of ember sounded like chitin. His lungs burned from breathing smoke and rot. His muscles were already beginning to tremble from the relentless motion. Kick, pivot, guard, feed the fire, kick again.
They did not stop.
“Marimo,” he said through clenched teeth, not looking back, “you are never exploding anything ever again.”
Zoro’s laugh was short and savage.
“Shut up and kick.”
It felt like hours when it was probably only minutes.
Finally, the clicking faltered and thinned. The ring broke. One by one, then in clusters, they retreated beyond the firelight, dragging pieces of their dead with them.
The forest swallowed the sound.
Sanji stood there a moment longer, burning log still raised, chest heaving.
Nothing moved.
Slowly, carefully, he dropped the wood back into the fire. He fumbled for a cigarette with fingers that wouldn’t quite cooperate. It took three tries to light it.
He slumped down hard.
“Fuck,” Zoro muttered, slumping down opposite him, swords resting across his knees. “They held a grudge.”
Sanji inhaled deeply. The smoke hit his lungs and stayed there for a while. That was when he realized he was shaking. His entire body trembled like he’d stepped out into winter water. He stared at the cigarette between his fingers and willed them to be steady.
Zoro watched him for a long second.
“…You can faint now,” he smirked. “I saved your sorry ass.”
Sanji shot him a death glare that felt wobbly. “Eat dirt, you fucking idiot.”
Zoro huffed a quiet laugh. Then his head tipped forward.
“…Oi.”
Zoro swayed. And then he just… went down.
Sanji’s cigarette dropped from his fingers. He was moving before he consciously registered it, scrambling across the dirt on hands and knees. He caught him before his face hit the ground, barely.
“Oi. Oi!”
He shook him once. Hard. Zoro’s head lolled.
“Don’t you dare,” Sanji hissed, panic rising sharp and hot. He slapped his cheek, not gently. “Wake up, you moss-headed moron.”
Nothing. He shook him again. Harder.
“Oi! Zoro!”
A low sound escaped the swordsman’s throat, annoyed and distant.
“Mm… quit it, ero-cook…”
Relief hit so hard Sanji nearly choked on it.
“You absolute disaster,” he breathed, fingers digging into Zoro’s shoulders. “You do not get to pass out right now.”
Zoro’s brows twitched faintly. “…’m not.”
“You are horizontal!”
“…’m resting.”
Sanji stared at him. The pulse under his fingers was still there. Strong. Steady. His breathing was deepening. Fuck. The swordsman was asleep. Not unconscious. Asleep.
Zoro made a disgruntled noise and turned his face slightly into Sanji’s chest like that solved something.
“Ten minutes,” he muttered.
And went still.
Sanji stayed frozen, still gripping his heavy body.
Fine. Someone had to keep the fire going…
###
Sanji woke to warmth.
For one blissful, suspended moment, he thought he was in a dream… back in a galley kitchen before dawn, wrapped in heat and steady breathing and safety.
Breathing.
Slowly, Sanji opened his eyes. His face was pressed into fabric that smelled like steel and sweat and smoke and him.
Zoro’s arm was around him. Heavy and secure across Sanji’s back, hand curled at his side like it had always belonged there. Their legs were tangled. Sanji’s knee hooked over Zoro’s thigh. His forehead rested against Zoro’s collarbone, close enough to feel the steady thud of his heartbeat under his skin.
Safe.
He catalogued the details automatically, like inventory: the fire reduced to embers, glowing low; the bodies of spiders scattered in a wide, brutal ring beyond the light; the faint metallic tang of dried blood; the way Zoro’s breathing was deep and even.
The way he looked relaxed and content, thick lashes painting faint shadows on his skin.
Sanji stared.
Then Zoro shifted. A tightening of the arm around him. A faint hum in his throat.
Sanji’s heart detonated.
Before he could think, his leg lashed out. The kick landed hard, snapping Zoro’s head back and to the ground with a dull sound.
Silence.
“Fuck,” Sanji whimpered. “Fuck, I’m sorry…”
He scrambled backward. Then he ran.
He ran hard enough that branches tore at his sleeves and lungs burned raw. The trees blurred. The sky had begun to pale, dawn creeping in gray and thin.
Halfway to the ship, he slowed. Stopped. Stood still for a moment, head bent, heart jackrabbitting in his chest.
You fucking coward.
Sanji swore under his breath and rushed back.
The clearing reappeared. Zoro lay exactly where he’d left him. Sprawled on his back, unmoving, one arm still half-curled like it had been around someone.
Sanji crossed the distance fast, dropping to his knees. He pressed fingers to Zoro’s throat. There was that stubborn pulse again, strong and even.
“…You unbelievable bastard,” Sanji whispered, “I really hate you.”
He gathered the swords first. Wiped the worst of the grime from their hilts on his already ruined sleeve and secured them at his side. Then he slung Zoro over his shoulder and began the long walk back.
Thankfully, everyone was still asleep when he reached the ship. He dumped Zoro’s body unceremoniously onto the front deck. Zoro rolled slightly onto his side with a dull thud.
Sanji crouched low and arranged the swords neatly beside Zoro’s body. Lined up within easy reach. Adjusted the angle of Wado so it rested where Zoro’s hand would fall naturally.
Then he straightened. His shoulders ached. His legs burned. His ruined clothes stank of smoke and rot and something sweet-sour he never wanted to smell again.
But none of that stuck.
What stuck… What would not leave… Was the memory of warmth.
The heavy, secure weight of an arm around his back. The steady thud of a heartbeat under his cheek. The way his body had fit there without thought.
Safe.
The word pressed in on him from the inside.
He wanted to hate it. He wanted to hate how easily and deeply he had slept. To hate that his first instinct upon waking had not been to escape, but to stay. Hated the quiet, fragile contentment that had lived in that space before panic set it on fire.
Zoro shifted faintly in his sleep.
Sanji flinched like he’d been struck and took several steps backwards.
“You absolute idiot,” he muttered. “You better not remember any of that.”
Zoro only grunted and turned his face toward the warmth of the rising sun.