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Spirals upon spirals upon spirals, spiralling. He was staring at a spiral, tracing it with a rough fingerpad, feeling the hairs bend like caterpillar fur. He couldn’t remember exactly why he was staring at the spiral, only that it was the most fascinating thing he’d ever seen. He could’ve been staring for minutes, it could’ve been hours. Zoro felt like he was melting.
The spiral, it seemed, was life itself. Turning and turning and never stopping. So alive, the spiral was actually moving! Zoro heard his own gasp a moment after he uttered it, as beneath his fingertips the spiral was actually twitching, squirming, crinkling.
Stop! Zoro thought he spoke aloud, but his mouth never moved. Panicking, he pressed down on the spiral with the palm of his hand. Sitting up, he shot scattered glances about the room.
“Guys! Help me! The spiral is coming alive!” He was met with only laughter from where Nami was lounging with Luffy in a graveyard of empty beef jerky packets, both completely absorbed in the video game Ussop was playing. On the screen, Amazonian warriors swung through jungles that burst with realistic patterns and textures. Ussop’s character, Sogeking, had just been captured and was held at spearpoint beneath the voluptuous forms of several warriors who watched with painted eyes. Ussop didn’t look that sad about being captured. Zoro barked with laughter. He turned around to find the shitcook and share the joke, but then he saw it again, the spiral. It wasn’t moving this time, but he knew it would start coming alive soon. It was coming for them.
Zoro knocked the beef jerky out of Luffy’s hands and exclaimed. His voice was so loud it was like the only sound in the universe. Luffy squinted up at him. “Dude I can’t hear a thing you’re saying.”
Nami giggled, burying her face in Luffy’s shoulder.
Zoro started again, waving his hands about as he paced as much as possible in the cramped living room (so about 3 steps forwards and back). “The spiral’s alive. We need to stop it! It’s. It’s like. Life. The essence of life. It’s going to suck us in.”
Nami shrieked with laughter. “Yeah I bet the spiral’s gonna suck you.” She barely uttered the words before dissolving into giggles again. Her face was almost brighter than her hair.
Luffy had followed his beef jerky to the floor, and was making a spiral out of one particularly long strand. Zoro smacked it out of his hand. “It might come alive in the beef jerky too! The alchemists can do it, I know they can do it.”
Nami punched him lightly. “You mean Illuminati?”
“The people on the dollar bill? You can’t fool me--I’ve seen National Treasure 1, 2, AND 3. Oh shit!” Zoro had just noticed that he was standing on a most peculiar rug. It was a dark color, something inky, something that blended with his socks till he didn’t know where he ended and rug started, but scorching the surface of the rug were hideous lime green spirals that burned his eyes.
“Fuck!” Zoro jumped onto the couch to get away from the spirals, eyes wide and fixated on the coarse fibers of the rug. Were they getting longer? The rug looked familiar, like he saw it everyday, like it was following him.
His yelps began to stir the fifth person in the room, who had been previously sleeping, and was now blearily rubbing the sleep out of bright blue eyes tinged with red. “Marimo what the fuck are you doing I’m trying to sleep.” Sanji sat up on the unfolded futon, blankets tangling with impossibly long legs. His unbuttoned dress shirt was falling off one shoulder, half-discarded, an afterthought of an attempt to relieve some phantom itch.
Zoro paused to take in the sight of this creature. The pale wiry legs were tempting, and his hands twitched. But then he saw it. Sitting on sleeping beauty’s face, was the original spiral, squirming and scrunched with confusion. Zoro immediately calmed. He knew what to do. He had to take care of his shitcook.
“Sanji. Don’t move.” Startled by the rare use of his first name, Sanji accidentally obeyed, sitting passively while Zoro approached like he was Chris Pratt taming raptors. Zoro raised his left hand towards Sanji’s face, cupping his cheek and lifting his face towards him carefully.
Sanji’s blood pounded through his frozen body, paralyzed by the intensity in Zoro’s gaze. Sanji’s tongue lapped out to wet his pink lips, which parted with trembling anticipation.
Zoro leaned closer. He raised his right hand, and smacked it across Sanji’s forehead.
“What the fuck is wrong with you!” Sanji immediately kicked him across the room. The blow hadn’t hurt--to be honest it felt more like a toddler batting away a butterfly than a hit. But still. What the fuck.
Zoro was lying on the floor in the exact position in which he’d landed. Sanji stomped over to him, and pressed a bare foot into Zoro’s chest. “Why the hell’d you hit me, mosshole!?!”
Zoro was very comfortable. There was a nice weight on his chest, a strong presence over him. He opened his eyes reluctantly, smiling when he saw that it was his shitcook. He gently gripped the hairy ankle, tracing warm, rough hands up the sculpted calf and lazily stroking the smooth inside of his knee, delighting in the cherubic redness that painted Sanji’s cheeks.
Zoro could only see one possibility. “Are you an angel?”
Distantly, he heard someone shriek in laughter.
The leg lifted out of his grasp, extending straight to the ceiling in preparation to fall with the most destructive force. As it lifted, though, Zoro thanked every God he’d never prayed to, for the motion caused loose boxers to shift away from skin and reveal the forbidden territory: that strip of pale skin untouched by sun or man. As the leg fell, Zoro closed his eyes serenely, grateful that this dying day was filled with such immeasurable grace.
And then, he was knocked out cold.