Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Roronoa Zoro laid sprawled out on the backseat of the car he was in. He huffed out a long suffering sigh as he eyed the expansive water surrounding the bridge they were on as he and his adoptive father and sister traveled to the island they were to call home now. The open windows of the car filtered in the spring air into the car ruffling Zoro's hair from where it rested by the window.

Perona spun around in her seat to level him with an annoyed glare. “Stop complaining so much Zoro. I’m sure this new school will have a kendo club, even if you will be an unknown third year they may take you in still. Also what do you have against quaint old islands with abandoned buildings and ruins that we can explore?”

Zoro shot back a glare. “I wasn’t worried about that!” Zoro blushed lightly he had been thinking of if he would join this schools kendo club or if they even had one, he had been in line to be the captain of his old one and then that all changed when Mihawk announced their move, his eye twitched as he recalled the rest of Perona’s sentence. “You’re the only one who likes that old building shit anyway!”

“That’s just because you are boring and no fun. Who knew old age would affect you like this?” Perona faced the front of the car again and put a hand to her chest acting as though her heart were aching and, with her free hand, pretended to wipe tears from her eyes.

“Old?!” Zoro sputtered sitting up quickly in his seat reaching for his sister who just moving just beyond his reach. “I’m only 17 stop acting like I’m your grandfather!”

Perona giggled and just shrugged but still stayed just a hair’s breadth out of his reach so Zoro could muss up her hair which he had been dead set on doing in retribution.

“Zoro,” Mihawk sighed from the drivers seat. “sit back we are almost there and I’d love to not have an accident in this car before we've even arrived on the island.”

“Fine, fine just you wait until we’re out of the car, Perona.” Zoro muttered smirking as he redirected his attention to the scene outside of his window; he could still see the sea from where they were driving despite already having made it to the mainland.

Perona squeaked and covered her head with her arms out of instinct, she hated when Zoro went after her hair because it took a lot of time to get it into such even pigtails and he always destroyed her hard work.

Time passed by silently after that, or Zoro must have drifted off because the next thing he knew the car was stopped but they were definitely not as the new house and Perona was chattering loudly about something.

“What is happening?”

“Nice of you to join the land of the conscious again Zoro.” Mihawk intoned from the driver’s seat as he unbuckled he seatbelt and made to get out of the chair.

“There’s this abandoned town it looks like beyond this wall!” Perona said happily vaulting herself from the car, brushing off dust and opening her umbrella once she was standing up straight.

Zoro leisurely stepped out of the car as well, stretching as he came to full height, reveling in the warm spring sun on his skin and the crisp air that still carried the scent of the sea this far in the island where he couldn’t see or hear the sea at all.

“Yeah but why are we here? I’m pretty sure Mihawk wasn’t dumb enough to get us a new house in a town of ruins.”

Mihawk shot him an unimpressed look as Zoro smirked at him smugly. Perona sighed at her two idiotic family members and gestured at the old entry way tunnel that was behind them.

“Yes this is not our new house, but I saw the old town from the road and I asked if we could stop to see, and since you were asleep and therefore couldn’t object, we are going to explore the town for a bit.” Perona said tapping her foot impatiently.

“We are ahead of time to move in anyway, I doubt the movers have finished their job so we might as well stay out of their way for the time being.” Mihawk said already walking towards the entry way. “Come Zoro, its not like this is that much of a hindrance on our time.”

Perona skipped after their father and turned to face Zoro sticking out her tongue at him. “If you want you can just stay with the car, but who knows how long we’ll be.”

Mihawk sighed at the antics of his children and kept moving towards the tunnel.

Zoro groaned and stuffed his hands into his pockets scuffing his shoe against the dirt. He’d rather not be sitting here for that long and knowing Perona she’d take forever exploring this damn thing, and something in him was urging him towards the dark opening of the tunnel. Zoro cut his losses and jogged to catch up them before he lost sight of them walking down the tunnel. He expertly ignored Mihawks amused chuckle at his arrival and Perona’s smug cackling as he caught up with them.

As they walked through the darkened tunnel, Zoro tried to focus on the surroundings and how far it was to the end of the tunnel, but he kept getting distracted by the same odd pulling sensation in his gut from the entry that almost seemed to be forcing him to keep moving in the tunnel and not give up and turn around like he had wanted to after the first few minutes. He had at first assumed the pulling sensation was something like hunger but there was something else in the back of his mind quietly urging him to get to the other end.

Zoro found it was easier to idly listen to Perona’s excited babble about the possibilities in the old town rather than think of the persistent feeling in his gut which still refused to go away as the exit finally came into sight. When they stepped back out into the sunlight, Perona was happily pointing at the old building they could see from here to an amused Mihawk who quietly listened to all of her gushing with his usual small bemused smirk on his face while Zoro could only think of how the feeling in his stomach was possibly stronger than before.

He was surprised to see that out of the three of them it was himself that set off towards the old town first, turning to look at Mihawk and Perona who watched him questioningly with varying degrees of interest, ranging from idle confusion to gaping at him.

“Zoro? I thought you didn’t want to see the town?” Perona asked leaving her spot by Mihawks side to walk next to him. Zoro could hear the scuff of Mihawks boots rather close behind them that meant he was still following.

“Yeah but the quicker we get there the quicker this is over right?” Zoro said, trying to cover up how quickly he had set off for the town, even he was unsure of his own actions. It was much easier to fall into the same old routine with Perona than think too hard on why he was so driven to get into the town.

Perona pouted at him. “And here I thought you were excited to see the town too.”

Zoro smirked and raised his right hand, setting it between her two pigtails and began rubbing it back and forth, mussing up her hair in a mock ruffle. Perona gasped indignantly and ducked out from beneath his hands and spouted angry half formed words at him as she went to fix it. Mihawk was quietly laughing behind them and Zoro himself could help the loud laughs that escaped his own mouth as he watched Perona glare at him as she tried to fix her hair while simultaneously trying to jab him with the sharp end of her umbrella.

The three of them had set off back down the small rolling hills towards the abandoned town. Perona latched on the Zoros arm at one point, her umbrella folded and hanging off the crook of her elbow. Zoro eyed it warily, Perona usually would wait some time to try and attack him in retribution, he was probably safe for now, but it was better to keep an eye on the umbrella than get a pointed jab from it in his kidneys later on.

He raised an eyebrow at his sister. “What’re you doing?”

“I’m about to tell interesting facts about spirits obviously so you don’t accidentally offend any lingering spirits with your brutish nature.” Perona huffed looking up at him.

Zoro chuckled and turned his head back towards their path. “Okay whatever. Do what you want, I probably won’t listen.”

“So rude.” Perona sighed. “Anyway, those small houses we saw before the gate were houses for the spirits, they act as shrines it’s very important not to mess with them.”

Thinking back on it, Zoro hadn’t actually even really seen any of those tiny houses. But then again he hadn’t been actively looking for them. Perona continued to lecture him on the proper respectful ways to behave around places that might have spirits but Zoro tuned her and directed his gaze to just idly looking at the village.

They came upon the village, standing just before the archway to enter. Zoro felt the sudden urge to sprint off into the town; something in his gut had been steadily urging him closer to the town and farther from where they had started. Zoro hazarded a look behind him, maybe something had been following them and his instincts were telling him to get away from it, but when he looked there was nothing but the green hills behind them and the tunnel off in the distance.

“Well Perona, would you like to enter?” Mihawk asked calmly looking to Perona who stared wide eyed into the town.

“Yes, lets go!” Perona said excitedly. “I was just taking it all in; this is very exciting I hope you both know that.”

Zoro and Mihawk both exchanged a dry look of skepticism before being tugged past the first few buildings by an eager Perona who had latched onto one of their sleeves each and forced them to keep with her pace.

Perona eventually released her hold on their sleeves but still lead them through the town, Zoro folded his arms behind his head and cast a bored look around. There was nothing special about all of these old buildings; nothing seemed out of the ordinary with the town. Mihawk just walked with his head forward as if he’d already been to this town before, while Perona was running back and forth to each building but never taking step inside them.

“Didn’t you want to explore?” Zoro asked cocking his head at her.

Perona stopped abruptly and spun on her heel to look at him as if he’d asked her the color of his own hair.

Mihawk kept walking, chuckling to himself about their behavior, but not bothering to stay and watch it play out.

“Obviously I’m just not going to enter the buildings! If there are spirits entering so offensively would be very disrespectful to them. Its polite to just admire from here.” Perona said turning back around.

Zoro shrugged and examined the part of the town they were in, the shops seemed to be similar to food stalls in a market a little beyond them he could see a stone staircase leading up to somewhere and Zoro every part of his being pull him towards it and without really noticing his feet began heading towards the stairs not realizing he was now walking opposite of Mihawk and Perona.

Zoros boots scuffed the dirt path and kicked up clouds around him as he stopped at the base of the stairs. He could see a large clock at the top and the stairs seemed to be a good vantage point of the whole town. He jogged up the steps and turned to face the town below him. A humid breeze blew by him and ruffled the tanktop that was sticking to his back from the heat of the sun and his sweat. He breathed in and closed his eyes; the area was silent save for the whistling of the wind through the old shops and the flutter of their signs.

It was nothing if not peaceful in this old town.

Turning in place, Zoro noticed Perona and Mihawk had somehow gotten separated from him. But he only shrugged at this development in events. Those two were always getting lost, but they’d eventually find him again.

Zoro felt the weird sensation pull at his mind and he turned away from the stairs and followed a path winding deeper into this second level of the town.

Zoro wandered among the old buildings until the path gave way to a small red bridge, leading up to what looked like a bathhouse that was located on the edge of the town. Oddly enough there was steam rising out of the top of the smoke stacks.

“The bathhouse is still open?” Zoro asked himself questioningly. “I thought this town was abandoned.”

Off in the distance, Zoro could see and hear a train running past them. He idly wondered where that would even go on this island. The island hadn’t seemed that large when they were driving up to it. Zoro padded over to the edge of the bridge leaning over to look at the ground below.

He glanced between where the stairs were and the ground below them, they were higher up than he expected but he surmised it as the town was built into one of the hills that seemed common on this part of the island. Another breeze wafted around Zoro, and once again Zoro could smell the scent of the salty ocean though there was definitely no ocean anywhere near him at the moment.

The tightening pull in his gut that had been steadily growing since the moment Zoro stepped in the village disappeared as soon as he heard a voice talking behind him.

“Hey, are you lost guy? You shouldn’t be up here.”

The boy before him was dressed in red, with messy black hair and what seemed to be a straw hat hanging off his back. Zoros eyes focused on the small scar beneath one of the boys eyes.

Before Zoro could answer however, the other boy took notice of the lengthening shadows on the planks below them and the rapidly setting sun in the distance. He shot Zoro a wide-eyed look.

“Okay now you really shouldn’t be here.” He said pushing at Zoro’s arm, “You need to go back to where you came from before it gets dark.”

Zoro could only offer half protests as the boy practically pushed him away from the bridge.”

He heard a chuckle behind him as he was unceremoniously pushed back onto the pathway. “I can distract these guys for a while but you really need to go.”

Throwing a confused thanks over his shoulder Zoro began to set off back down the pathway but as he rounded the final turn that would hide the bridge from his view Zoro turned to look at the boy again. He saw the boy give him a cheerful smile and wave, Zoro finally turned and head to the stairs he had come from.

The boy behind him lingered on his mind and Zoro could hear what sounded like tinkling glass as he walked further and further from the bridge and the boy on it. As he walked though, his thoughts were overtaken by the fact that lanterns were suddenly lighting up beside him.

“What the hell is going on here?” He yelled angrily as another set of lanterns came to life as he passed them, this was supposedly an abandoned town but it seemed to be functioning just fine.

Mihawk and Perona paused in their walking.

“Maybe Zoro already returned to the car? It feels like we’ve been searching for him forever.” Perona sighed looking for her wayward brother wearily. Normally she’d be more despondent in her search for her brother, but Mihawk was weirdly determined that they had to find Zoro quickly.

“We need to find him before it gets dark; we need to return to the car.” Mihawk said turning to walk down another path, his head sweeping the streets for a sign of his son.

If Perona didn’t know any better she would have thought Mihawk was beginning to get very worried over Zoro’s disappearance, but she mainly shrugged it off, it wasn’t the first time he’d gotten lost and it definitely wouldn’t be the last.

More lanterns were lighting up around them and Perona was enthralled by it, she couldn’t see anyone lightening them and her heart was telling her it had to be spirits doing the work, but her good mood faltered as Mihawk swore under his breath at the rapid number of lit lanterns surrounding them.

“Seems like you’ve gotten yourself into some trouble.” A voice said teasingly from behind them, “You also seem to be missing a kid, looks like you could use my help.”

As Perona and Mihawk startled at unexpected third voice, they turned to the source and Perona became more confused while Mihawk sighed deeply as he eyed the man before him.

“You usually don’t help much.” Mihawk drawled. “But we really do need to find Zoro.”

Zoro swore loudly as he was met with another dead end. He could have sworn this was the way he had come but suddenly there were buildings where the path used to be and a path where building should have been and it was dark all around him. He didn’t know why that boy wanted him out of here so quickly but it seems he was here and it was night and nothing bad had happened so what was the worst that could happen to him now?

As Zoro turned and rounded another corner he was met again by a deadend of buildings. He swore under his breath, how was he still getting turned around in this damned town? The town hadn’t seemed all the large on the drive end but now it seemed endless.

He let out an annoyed breath and headed back up the path he came, he was bound to get out of here somehow. Zoro was also steadfastly ignoring the rapidly spreading darkness that was spreading all around him, most of the lanterns on the street had been lit by this point and the sun was only a sliver over the horizon.

Mihawk was swearing under his breath and pacing in short steps at the edge of the town. Perona nervously twirled her umbrella in her fingertips. Zoro got lost pretty much once a day so it was nothing new but she had never seen her father acting this distraught over her brothers’ commonplace disappearances.

Perona turned her gaze past her father as they waited for the man who had helped them earlier to return from scouring one side of the town. She eyed the village behind her and watched more and more lanterns come to life, still without any visible people tending to them, she’d put it at the lanterns being on a time or a solar powered system but this town was far too old for such devices.

The idea of the town being haunted was extremely pleasing to her as she loved anything and everything to do with spirits and the supernatural but her father’s worried atmosphere was putting her on an anxious edge and she kept craning her head for any sign of Zoro’s bright green head.

She sighed trying to expel some of her own nervousness.

“Honestly this always happens.” She mumbled to herself, resigning herself to twirl a stray strand of pink hair around her fingers as she waited.

For most of her life she can remember events in which she and Mihawk had to search or wait for Zoro to appear as he could never keep still or stay with the group it seemed. He was always walking off somewhere on his own.

Perona stared at the ground and the scuff marks she had been steadily making in the dirt, there was something one of their neighbors always used to say about Zoro that she could now hardly remember. The last time she had heard it she had been still young, no more than 8 was her guess, and they were living in their original house and not the one they had just moved from, but she could recall the sly smirk of the womans lips and the amused glances she would throw at Zoro, who true to form never really was one for paying attention. She could remember Mihawk bristling in response to whatever she had said about Zoro and she could remember feeling confused since she had thought the remark had been rather silly to her, now if only she could figure out what it had been.

Perona shifted her weight from one foot to the other as she thought, blowing strands of hair out of her face as she did so, when the memory finally came back to her, Perona’s head shot up as she frantically looked about the town for Zoro again. The things the woman said couldn’t have been true but the gleam of her eyes in her memory was less amused and more cold and calculating now that she thought about it and Mihawks irrational anger then and his worry now seemed related and Perona could guess as to why. As she quickly looked down the neighboring streets from where they were standing the womans cold voice echoed in her ears.

“It seems that boy of yours is always one step off from being spirited away. You may want to watch that one.”

A throat cleared behind them and Perona flung herself around hoping to see Zoro but it was only the man from earlier.

“Did you see him?” Mihawk asked quickly his voice clipped.

“Not from the parts I was in. This kid of yours really takes getting lost to another level.”

“We have to find him it is almost night.” Mihawk said his voice taking on a tone of urgency.

“Yeah, yeah I know that but we also have to get you guys out of here too because its not almost night, it pretty much is night. So I’m going to take you guys out of here and me and some of my friends will keep an eye out for him.”

“I am not leaving without him.” Mihawk said darkly leveling a glare at the red-haired man.

“We can’t just abandon Zoro here! What if a spirit gets him? He lacks some common sense he’s bound to offend one of them!” Perona huffed stamping a foot into the dirt.

“Spirits?” The other man laughed a little under his breath and Mihawk just gave one of his own quiet laughs in equal parts affection and amusement.

“Don’t worry you aren’t going far, I have a place just a little off of the town where you two will be safe from this area but close enough that if one of my friends finds Zoro we can get you guys together and out of here quickly.”

“What is happening here anyways? Why do we have to make sure to be out of here by night?” Perona asked looked back once more as she was led away by Mihawk.

“I will be sure to explain it all when we are out and safe.” Mihawk promised her, his hand on her back steering her on the path out of the town.

Perona could only nod and take solace in the fact that her father had somewhat calmed down even though she could easily see the tense posture in which he held himself, but at this point what more could she do but trust in her father and hope that Zoro showed up soon.

Zoro sighed in relief as he came upon the entrance to the village. He was finally going to get out of here, now all he needed to do was find his family and they could leave.

However as Zoro drew closer to the exit he saw something was wrong, before the area surrounding the town had been small hills with the old town lying in the valley, now the town seemed to be the one resting on the hill and water surrounded the town, far off in the distance he could hear the whistle of the train from earlier.

“What the hell in happening?” Zoro asked falling into a crouch at the waters edge.

There was no way in hell this water had been here before, but more importantly he couldn’t see Mihawk or Perona anywhere.

“Shit that kid said to get out of here. That probably applies to them too.” Zoro looked around for them but he couldn’t see or hear them at all.

While he was looking a boat drew up to the edge of the water and lowered a walking plank that slapped to the ground by Zoros feet. Startled Zoro looked up and saw people dressed in masks and colorful outfits getting out of the boat. Zoro watched them approach and was a little confused when it appeared as if they were all gliding off the boat.

As they drew closer to him something deep in his being urged him to get away from the shore and the people arriving and Zoro all but stumbled back as this urge hit him, scrambling back up the small slope and ducking down a small grassy area besides the entrance of the village turned port.

He sank into a sitting position and covered his face with his hands letting out a shaky exhale. He was loathe to admit it but he was most certainly lost now, and he was stuck in this town some kid told him to leave by dark. But here he was sitting alone in the town at night and his family was still missing. He scrubbed his hands over his face and his face roughly for a few moments before freezing when he heard light chuckling near him on the hill.

He jerked upwards in surprise, knocking his head against the building behind him as he eyed the boy from the bridge who was outright laughing at him.

“What the hell is your problem? What’s so funny?” Zoro asked angrily.

The kid stood up and paced over to him. “You’re not too good at listening to directions are you?” He laughed again.

From Zoros spot on the ground he had to now look up to see the kids face which was shadowed more so now by the lack of light and the straw hat he wore on his head.

“Its not my fault this town has so many damn dead ends.”

The kid paused, eyeing him for a moment, before laughing again and crouching down to his current height and sliding the hat of his head to rest on his back, mussing up his black hair along the way. Despite himself and his situation Zoro felt his own smile pull at his cheeks as boy continued to laugh.

“Well theres not much we can do about this now.” The kid said propping his head in his hands, resting his elbows upon his knees, “I tried to get you out of here before hand but that was before I knew you sucked at directions.”

Zoro sputtered indignantly. “Im not bad at-” His sentence died out on his lips as the caught sight of his hand gesturing in the moonlight except something was wrong because it almost seemed like the light was going through his hand.

“Okay now what the shit is this?” Zoro said holding up his hand to the moon feeling his body run cold as the outline of his hand disappearing against the bright light. He immediately turned his face away from his disappearing hands and focused on the blades of grass next to his still visible feet.

The other boy’s hands reached for his wrists to bring both hands up to his eye level, Zoro felt an odd sense of relief drift over him in a wave as the boy took hold of his wrists. Zoro looked up at the boy from his downwards glance, bracing himself for the next horrible turn in this weird nightmare.

Zoro didn’t like the now serious set to the boys face, up until now he had only seemed cheerful and this serious set to his eyes was raising all sorts of alarms in Zoros mind.

“You’re disappearing.”

Zoro felt his heart bottom out. “What do you mean disappearing? Besides that I have to find my family!”

Zoro felt his heart begin to race was this happening to Mihawk and Perona too?

The boy cocked his head at him confused.

“My dad and sister are out here somewhere too, is this happening to them?” Zoro asked his tone verging on desperation.

“I haven’t seen them, so they might have made it out of the town already or someone came along to help them.” The boy said.

Zoro felt a little relief. Hopefully they had gotten to the car before night. Maybe they weren’t disappearing as well. He turned his gaze back to his hands still held lightly in the other boy’s grip.

“Can we stop this or am I just going to disappear?”

A large smile wound up on the kids face and Zoro felt his heart unclench. “All you have to do is eat!”

“What.”

The boy was cackling again, thoroughly amused by his reactions, “You’re a human, you can’t survive in the spirit world without eating some of our food of course. That’s why you are disappearing; your body doesn’t belong here so that’s going away.” He paused before his smile increased, “Unless you eat of course, then you’ll be fine.”

Zoro sighed in relief and slumped against the wall of the building. “Well then let’s get me something to eat because now I am starving.”

The kid laughed again and Zoro felt his worry for the situation ease slightly as the kid handed him something that looked like a meat bun but at this point Zoro was far too hungry to care and ate the thing without a second thought. Then he replayed to kids explanation in his head and almost choked.

“Wait what do you mean spirit world?!” He asked wiping his mouth with the back of his arm giving the kid a wide-eyed stare. “Who are you anyway?”

“I’m Monkey D. Luffy!”

He extended a hand towards Zoro and Zoro slowly shook the boys hand when he noticed that his hand was fully visible again.

“Holy shit that’s a relief.” Zoro sighed. “I’m Roronoa Zoro.”

Luffy chuckled again standing up, letting Zoros hand slide from his grip, and stretching his arms above his head. “I already knew that!” Another bright grin lit up his face and Zoro found himself smiling along.

“Oh yeah!” Luffy said smacking his hands together. “This is the spirit world. The town we were in before is kind of a link between the two which is why I was trying to get you out of here before dark.” Luffy shrugged. “But now you’re here so we gotta find you a place to stay so we can find your family and get you back.”

The smile Luffy offered him helped Zoro feel marginally more at ease.

“Well if this is the spirit world Perona must be having the time of her goddamn life.”

Luffy laughed at that and Zoro was not really surprised to hear his own deeper laugh reach his ears. The laughter cut off when he saw every line in Luffy’s body go taut like a wire as he stilled, eyes sharp but not really concentrating on Zoro even though they were directed towards his face. It vaguely reminded Zoro of an animal bracing for an attack or even preparing to attack.

Zoro was about to ask about what had happened when Luffy fluidly slid into a crouch once again, one hand bracing himself on the building behind Zoro and the other grabbing the back of Zoros head and smashing his face into Luffys chest.

“What are you doing?” Zoro whispered, anger filtering into his voice trying to remove his head from Luffy’s grip. But the serious set to the other boy kept him from raising his voice and getting truly angry and he had surprising strength in his smaller arms as Zoro found it futile to try and fight his grip.

“You’re being looked for, don’t move.” Luffy whispered into his ear, his eyes still trained on a point in the distance.

Zoro shivered almost imperceptibly and for once, Zoro had no compunctions following Luffy’s directions so he stilled and let out another breath letting his head rest more comfortably against the chest it was currently pressed against. With nothing better to do than wait, Zoro idly traced the outline of the boy’s sandals with his eyes and then moved on to counting the blades of grass by his feet. A few long moments later, Zoro realized that he must truly have been in the spirit world because Luffy had not yet breathed from what he could recall and even from his place against Luffy’s chest Zoro could hear no beat of a heart.

Zoro closed his eyes as the realization that this must truly be the spirit world washed over him again. He breathed deeply through his nose, almost laughing at being able to smell the ocean all around him, but then he vaguely recalled the new found port that was somewhere to his left and summed it up to being that.

“How’d you know my name?” Zoro asked quietly, practically whispering the question into the fabric of Luffy’s shirt.

Luffy gave a quiet hum for a moment as he thought. “It’s just always been there I guess?” Luffy shifted a little on his feet. “I looked at you and your name just popped into my head.”

Luffy finally relaxed from his tense and guarded posture and fell back onto his heels releasing Zoros head, Zoro however just moved himself into a comfier sitting position against the wall and regarded the slightly mysterious spirit boy.

The boy laughed loud for a moment. “Maybe I’ve just always known it huh? I feel like I’ve known you for a long time.”

They both held eye contact for a long moment and Zoro thought that a saying like that should confuse him or worry him in some way yet the notion that they had known each other for a long time sat well with him and he let the other thoughts go.

Zoro broke eye contact first, looking around them curiously, “So now what?” He looked to Luffy who just gracefully pulled himself to his full height once again.

“Now we have to get you somewhere safe for the night and while we find your family. But we should probably get out of here before they come searching for you again.”

“Why were they searching for me?”

Luffy hummed in thought again placing a hand on his hip the other reaching up to ruffle through his own hair. “Probably because you’re a human. Some spirits don’t like that, a lot of spirits dislike humans and some are super against them and try to kidnap them, but the ones looking for you probably just didn’t want a human around.”

“Well that is super comforting.” Zoro drawled sarcastically, leveling an eyebrow up at Luffy. The boy in question just chuckled under his breath and shrugged, holding out a hand to help Zoro up.

“Anyway I know a place you can stay for a while; you’re probably going to have to work and some people might not like you because you’ll smell like a human for a while but it’s safer than wandering out here.”

Zoro mumbled his assent and once again slid his hand into Luffys, looking down in shock when he couldn’t bend his legs from their current position.

“Im…stuck? How does this even happen?”

Luffy crouched down again, looking at Zoros shocked face amusedly, before whispering something and sliding his hand over Zoros knees. To Zoro mounting shock, he felt a cool rush in his legs, as if water had been poured over them, and suddenly he was being yanked upward by Luffy with no resistance.

“You good now?” Luffy said, his amusement hardly veiled by his attempt at a normal tone.

Zoro leveled him a dry look. “Yes. Let’s go.” Zoro was just about ready to be done with this entire day.

But his day, or more accurately night, was far from over when Luffy offered him and sharp grin before gripping his hand tightly and sprinting off in the direction that Luffy had appeared from early. The wind whipped at his face and Zoro marveled at the speed in which they were running and found that he wasn’t winded or tired for running this fast, but he resolved to pay attention to where he was going when Luffy kept making sharp turns that almost sent Zoro sprawling into the streets.

He made a sound of annoyance as they made another quick and sharp turn, the wind biting at his heels, and the only response Luffy gave him was another large grin, amusement lighting his eyes and Zoro resigned himself to following this kid at his break neck speed until they got to their destination.

Though if he were being totally honest with himself, the happiness Luffy was feeling and showing through his countenance was identical to, despite the entirety of what Zoro had been through up until that point, the happiness Zoro could feel bubbling up deep in his chest.

Luffy slows them down to a halt after a few more long moments of practically flying through the village, peeking around the corner Zoro can see that they have stopped a few yards off from the bridge where they met earlier.

Luffy turned his wide grin back towards him. “Okay, this is the next thing we have to do.”

Zoro looked around the corner again. “Walk across a bridge? Seems pretty simple to me.”

Zoro said smirking eyeing the bridge which was no longer empty of people but had people similar to the ones from the boat crossing it and others welcoming them.

“Yeah but you can’t breathe on the bridge.” Luffy said shrugging. “Besides that yeah it’ll be simple.”

Zoro did a double take staring incredulously at Luffy who just looked up at him innocently as if he hadn’t just suggested something slightly close the edge of possibility. “Why can’t I breathe?”

Luffy stared at him like he was an idiot for a long pause of time before rapping him lightly on the forehead with his knuckles. “Spirits don’t need to breathe. Are you kind of stupid Zoro?”

Zoro felt his annoyance build in his chest. “No.” He ground out. “But in case you didn’t know humans kind of need to breathe.”

“I knew that!” Luffy huffed. He drew in a bunch of air and let out a deep exhale, in some kind of mock form of a sigh. He continued a little quieter, “You just have to hold it to the edge of the bridge okay?”

Zoro nodded and ran his hand through his hair, allowing himself to be pulled forward by Luffy once again. As they drew upon the edge of the bridge, Luffy grabbed his hand.

“What are you-?”

“They’ll be less likely to notice you and notice you’re human is we walk like this. Also you need to hold your breath as soon as we cross to the planks.”

Zoro just nodded and drew in a deep breath, trying not to concentrate too much on the lack of air, instead focusing on Luffy’s cool grip in his own, using that to anchor him.

They walked quickly across the bridge; Luffy’s face was set forward and determined, it was oddly serious once again. Zoro watched him out of the corner of his eye, noting that the seriousness of his expression was belied by the quick glances he would throw to Zoro out of the corner of his eye.

The bridge was nearing its end as Zoro could feel his lungs burning for air, when one of the spirits who was welcoming the guests ran up to them.

“Master Luffy! You have come back!”

The fact that the spirit came largely out of nowhere and popped up directly in front of them sent Zoros breath rushing out of him in the form of half made curses. He cursed under his breath once again as the people began causing chaos around them, shouts of “Human!” were ringing out on the bridge.

Zoro felt ashamed they had been so close to the edge of the bridge, however throwing his gaze back to Luffy he saw that the other boy seemed to have no problem with this change in events. If anything he looked more excited at the new chaos and danger clamoring towards them. The wide grin wound its way back to Luffys face and the grip in his hand tightened for a moment.

“Now we really got to make an escape!” He laughed loud and gleefully and Zoro felt himself smirk in kind. “Hold on!”

Not a second later, Zoro was mere inches from the ground as he and Luffy wound through the population of the bridge, Zoro kept his hand clenched around Luffys and swore he could hear the others laughter ringing in his ear. Zoro forgot what he said earlier about their running having been like flying through the town, if Zoro didn’t know any better he could say he and Luffy were flying right now.

Luffy threw one more large grin back at him, before cutting a quick corner and practically throwing themselves behind a gate. Zoros felt touched the ground as they both landed in a crouch and he took a deep gasp of a breath. His feet had definitely just hit the ground, so they must have been flying somehow, he looked toward Luffy and couldn’t help but laugh along with the quiet chuckles the other had been trying to smother.

The two of them laughed for a long moment as Zoro tried to process that he had literally just flown, when he remembered why they had to fly in the first place. He scrubbed a hand angrily over his face. “I messed that up. Sorry.”

Luffy laughed and waved a hand. “It’s no problem. Zoro did better than I thought he would anyway.”

That comment earned him an unamused look from Zoro which just sent Luffy into another fit of laughter. Once the shorter boy had calmed down he stood up and looked around.

“Okay, I have to go deal with all those people on the bridge, but I’m going to show you how to get to the basement of the bathhouse. Just remember to ask for work and kept asking no matter what they say until you get some kind of job okay?” Luffy asked crouching again, placing two of his fingers on Zoro’s forehead.

Zoro fought back a flinch as images flew quickly through his head. After Luffy was done the boy stood up and hopped over the fence, he leaned over the posts for a quick second, sliding his straw hat back onto his head before speaking. “Just get any job; I’ll come find you later okay?”

“Yeah. You got it, we’ll meet up later.” Zoro nodded, cringing at the lilt of hopefulness he could hear in his voice at the end of the sentence.

Luffy nodded again, a wide grin partially hidden by the brim of his hat was the last Zoro saw before he was off again walking around the corner.

Zoro could hear his voice echo and fade as he talked to the people on the bridge. He waited for a moment before standing up slowly, relishing in the way his back cracked with the motion. Zoro felt a little off with Luffy having been gone, since it was the straw hatted boy who had gotten Zoro this far into the night safely.

He rolled that thought out his mind and the accompanying feeling of loneliness as he picked his way through the yard he was in and out the back gate. A gentle urging in his mind kept him on the path and Zoro was little dismayed by how often he could feel something in him tugging him back onto the path, he never seemed to almost get this lost before,

Zoro chalked it up to the stress of the night.

He silently followed the directions Luffy had placed in his mind, the trip took quite some time as Luffy had seemed to have given him very odd out of the way paths for him to take, probably to avoid the most people but it left Zoro wishing he could finish the trek quicker. Or that he could have company to ease him of his boredom.

In his walking, Zoro’s thoughts kept drifting back to the thoughts of his family; he hoped fiercely that somehow the two of them had made it safely away from the town before night fell. Zoro could imagine Perona and the excitement she would have over the people of this town and the strange events that Zoro was finding himself in, he could vividly imagine her running about the town trying not to be too obvious about staring at the populace.

He could also imagine her failing that task.

The thought left him laughing quietly to himself, which was followed shortly by ducking beneath a window as the houses resident heard the laughter and peeked outside to investigate the noise.

This night was beginning to become wearisome for the 17 year old. Moving back away from the house and continuing Zoro was a little taken aback to realize that this had really all happened in about a day. It was hard to imagine this morning he had been napping in the back of his father’s car and now here he was trying to navigate an unknown town as quietly as possible, to get to a bathhouse, just to have the hope of reuniting with his family soon.

Zoro found that he was already missing them.

He quickly shook that thought from his head too. There was no time to be regretful of what had happened his only choice at this point was to keep going forward and strive for the best possible outcome.

The path in his mind led him around a couple more twists and turns, while Zoro let his thoughts drift back to better thoughts of his father and sister, and he supposed, amongst his musings that it was for the best he was the one with this task. He could imagine Perona would have gotten past the bridge, her joy over seeing spirits would have given her away instantly and Zoro just couldn’t even begin to imagine Mihawk going through these trials. The image of Mihawk holding his breath and walking across the bridge with Luffy caused Zoro to have to smother his snickering behind his hand.

It was for the best that he was the only dealing with all of this after all.

The thoughts of the bridge brought Zoro’s mind back to Luffy and he wondered how the other was doing. Back when they were on the bridge, that spirit that had messed the whole thing up had called him master, so hopefully he would be able to easily resolve the situation and meet back up with him soon, as the other boy had promised to do.

Though, thinking on it, with Luffy’s personality Zoro assumed the other boy wouldn’t mind the challenge of dealing with the people on the bridge or the resulting chaos of the event. He could easily recall the way Luffy’s, and not to mention Zoro’s own, excitement grew as the danger also grew.

Zoro pulled up short as he was faced with a heavy iron door.

Somehow in his thought he hadn’t noticed that he’d reached the place in his mind that Luffy had directed him to as the basement entrance.

Zoro drew in a deep breath, as he could only guess the real difficulties of this journey were about to begin, he pulled open the door and quickly stepped through it.

The resounding slam echoed about like a heavy verdict in his mind

Chapter Text

Zoro stilled as the resounding slam of the door echoed around him. He leaned briefly on it, inwardly congratulating himself for making into this building; the last direction from Luffy that was floating in his mind was to find some person named Usopp but after that there was nothing.

Zoro shrugged and looked around the room, he had made it into some kind of boiler room and he could hear the roar of a fire in the adjoining room. Zoro hoped this Usopp person was around here because he didn’t look forward to spending all night looking for someone who the only information he had on them was a name.

He moved forward to the door side-stepping around all of the strewn about extra wood and tools that lay on the floor. It almost seemed as if someone had been building something in this room and just never cleaned up. Zoro couldn’t blame the person. He would not have put this all away either especially if it was only him down here.

Zoro was about the walk under the doorway and call out for the Usopp person when a wooden staff, seemingly one from one of the piles of garbage all around this place, was shoved in his personal space and leveled at his neck causing him to quickly stop his advance. Zoro turned an irritated glance the far end of the pole where he was met by the stern glare of some girl with orange hair.

“Are you Usopp?” Zoro asked, lofting an eyebrow. “I’m looking for someone named Usopp.”

Deeper in the room he couldn’t quite see into Zoro heard a startled yelp and the noise of someone scrambling around. Zoro looked back to the girl and assumed from the other reaction that this person wasn’t Usopp.

“What do you need with Usopp?” The girl bit out at him.

Zoro was quickly becoming unamused with the situation he was in. He could see why they were acting like this, but Zoro really did not have time to play twenty questions down here with some girl and some dude who was currently hiding from him.

He tried to push out of the way but was met with the girl giving him a forceful shove with her staff that didn’t really push him back just ended up preventing him from entering the room once again.

“Who are you and what do you want?” The girl asked again.

Zoro was now officially down with having this girl stop him from meeting this Usopp, so he quickly ducked under the staff, using the moment of confusion to fully enter the room just in time to see a black mass of something dive behind what looked to be a large chair surrounded by some type of invention that looked like multiple arms.

Turning to face the girl again, Zoro felt a smirk slid onto his face at her enraged expression and he held up his hands to show he meant no harm.

 “Calm down, I come in peace.” He said sardonically.

“Okay but who are you?” She responded clearly not believing him as her makeshift staff was still trained on him.

Zoro dropped his hands and straightened up deciding to stop playing with these people and finish what he came here for. “I’m here for work. I need a job.”

Zoro watched her expression carefully and saw no change or give in her face; he also couldn’t hear anymore movement from the dude who took a flying dive behind the chair when he walked in. Zoro slumped minutely, this was not going as he wanted it to, and he scrubbed a hand through his hair.

“Luffy sent me down here to get a job, I need to work.”

At the casual mention of Luffy’s name the girl dropped her staff in surprise in straightened up, and the guy who dove behind the chair popped his head up over the edge looking at him curiously.

“Luffy sent you?” The boy called over cautiously still not moving from his protective barrier.

Before Zoro could nod in affirmation the girl spoke up again.

“You, you must be the human that is causing all the chaos upstairs. I can see why Luffy sent you here; if you’re going to want to stay here you’ll need a job, at least until you can get back to where you came from.” The girl paused and looked him up and down critically. “You should be fine with any work. I’m Nami. That one over there is Usopp. We’re friends of Luffy’s.”

At the mention of his name Usopp gave a wave before pulling himself out of his hiding place and going over to stand by Nami’s side and assess the newcomer. Zoro assessed him as well as the other boy scurried over to their side of the room, standing behind Nami. Zoro couldn’t find anything overtly threatening about either of them, despite Nami’s predilection of thrusting a wooden staff in his personal space and he allowed himself to relax. He trusted Luffy, at this point he had virtually no other option, and if Luffy trusted these two then he could use their help as well.

“How did Luffy even manage to find the only human lost in the spirit world?” Usopp groaned planting his forehead onto the Nami’s shoulder.

Nami gave a droll snort. “It’s Luffy. Did you really have to ask?”

The drawn out silence served as Usopps response and Zoro could only guess at the antics Luffy regularly got into to make this seem like a normal situation.

“So how do I get a job here?” Zoro asked, he was starting to get impatient he couldn’t just sit in

this boiler room forever he had a family and apparently a world to get back to.

Nami opened her mouth, hopefully to give directions, when a wooden panel that served as a door slide open and a blond man stepped in the room a tray of food held in his hands. He stopped short when he saw Zoro in the room and his visible eye narrowed.

Zoro stiffened. While the other two strangers in this room hadn’t seemed to be much of a threat to him or his person, this newcomer was tense and Zoro sized him up internally, he’d probably win the fight but he didn’t know if there was any caveat to his fighting style in this world as compared to the human world.

“Nami, Usopp,” The other boy addressed them tersely. “Who is this?”

From the corner of his eye Zoro could see Nami place the butt of her staff onto the floor and then folded her arms across the top of it and rested his chin atop her folded wrists. Zoro did trust the other man to not make a move for him once he looked away, and he could see the other man think the same thing because the borderline hostile eye contact between the two of them hadn’t ended.

“Stand down Sanji,” Nami sighed. “This is the human causing all of the shit upstairs; apparently Luffy has vetted him because he sent him to us to find work.”

Sanji sighed and looked away from Zoro. “Are you two okay?”

Usopp nodded vigorously, “Nothing we brave warriors can’t handle!”

Zoro chose not to bring up the fact that Usopp had dived behind his wooden chair and mutli-arm contraption when he entered.

A bell rang in the room and wooden tiles on strings dropped from the ceiling, Usopp gave a short shout and all but sprinted back into his chair and fastened the arm contraption back on, using the excess arms to pull items from the drawers all around the room while he responded to whatever those tiles were.

Nami gave him a short tap on the back and shuffled him off the dirt floor and onto the raised wood section of the floor and black balls of soot began drifted around the area they had been standing in. Zoro scowled over his shoulder at Nami and didn’t miss the snort Sanji smothered into his hand or the sly smirk that had crawled across Nami’s face.

“What are those?”

It was Usopp who answered without turning to look at him, “Those are my soot balls, they stoke the fire and help me work.”

Zoro cast another look at the soot balls that paid him no attention while he left his shoes on the ground and turned his attention back to Sanji and Nami, who were conversely quietly.

“I’ve brought your dinner Usopp, and Nami we have to get back upstairs before break is over.” Sanji called over the din of Usopps work, Nami sighed and left her staff propped near the door.

“You’ve got to take the human upstairs to get work.” Nami said snickering at the annoyed look Sanji leveled her. 

“Speaking of, human you got a name?” Sanji asked dryly popping a cigarette between his lips.

Zoro paused a moment before answering, “Roronoa Zoro.”

When he had met Luffy, he had known his name already for some reason but here were Luffy’s friends who had no clue about his name, the situation struck him as odd but Zoro filed it away for now.

“Alright Zoro,” Sanji said turning around and going back through the door, “follow me.”

Zoro cast a look back at Nami and Usopp who watched them idly. Zoro bit out a gruff “Thank you.” as he followed Sanji through the passage. He didn’t know the hierarchy of this place but from what he’d gathered humans weren’t welcomed here and Luffy and his friends were probably risking something by helping him.

Once inside the elevator it was silent mostly except for Zoros breathing which seemed loud due to the lack of the fire and the fact that spirits didn’t need to breathe. “What job does Usopp do?”

Sanji didn’t turn to look at him but answered his question all the same. “He stocks the hot water for the bath; you probably won’t get a job like that.”

Zoro did ask what type of job he’d probably get but Sanji continued on, “You’ll probably be doing what Nami and I do mostly. We clean the tubs, the bathhouse and attend the guests, though I also split my time with the cooks.”

Zoro did not look forward to that kind of tedious work, but Luffy had told him he needed to work here as they attempted to find his family and a way out of the spirit world, so Zoro cut his losses and stifled a sigh.

“Oi, Curly brow.” Zoro bit out feeling amusement curl warmly in his stomach as Sanji stiffened and leveled an angry glance at him out of the corner of his eye.

“What do you need moss head?”

Zoro felt his amusement turn to annoyance but shouldered it to ask a question, “What does Luffy do here? Same as you?”

Here Sanji stilled, his expression falling a little slack. “Ah. He doesn’t, he works mostly for the higher ups but he sneaks down to work with us and mess around in the baths often enough he might as well work with us.”

Zoro interest was piqued at this small bit of information, but he recalled the people on the bridge addressing him as Master and now it made sense if he worked under whoever ran the bathhouse.

The elevator pulled to a stop and Sanji stepped out, holding up a hand to halt Zoro from following him.

“What the hell are you doing?” Zoro bit out, suspicious of the man in front of him, he had given him some begrudging trust that he’d take him where he needed to go but it seemed he was backing out of it.

“Calm down human,” Sanji hissed under his breath, using his hand between them to shove Zoro back into the elevator. “I have other work to attend to and I can’t follow you up or they’ll know who helped you, so just ride this to the top floor and talk with Ms. All Sunday. She’s the one you’ll get a job from.”

Zoro gave him a wary glance. “Alright shitty cook, I’ll go to the top floor.”

Sanji eyed him as the doors began to close. “Unluckily for me, I’ll probably see you later shithead.”

The doors shut and the elevator began to surge upward again, as Zoro mulled over the uncertain tone that Sanji had left him with. Was there a chance Zoro would be left without a job? Zoro had no idea how he was going to find Luffy or even his family if he wasn’t allowed to stay here because this bathhouse was the only connection and hope he had of returning home. A sick, worried feeling snaked its way through Zoros gut at the unknown factors in this situation, it was too big a situation, too dangerous for him to have so very little information to go on.

Another piece of Sanji’s parting lodged itself in Zoro’s mind, was the reluctance to be named as a helper due to his being a human or was there something else about this bathhouse?

The elevator stopped again and Zoro saw that it wasn’t the top floor but he glanced down as a small reindeer spirit, or what he assumed was a reindeer spirit, enter it as well.

“Going up?” Zoro asked gruffly, no one had said anything about talking to other spirits and Zoro could only watch the small animal jump for the lever so many times.

The reindeer yelped and faced him before nodding at his question, “Just up two floors.”

The rest of the ride was taken in silence and Zoro nodded once the reindeer had disembarked and he resumed his solitary ride to the top floor.

When the elevator finally stopped at his destination, he was surprised at how quiet and removed from the bustle of the baths this floor was. He walked up to the heavy, ornate doors and paused before opening or knocking them, he had not yet shaken the sick, anxious feeling that curled unpleasantly in his gut.

He shook his head in an attempt to rid himself of the feeling and reached for the door but a voice stopped him once he grasped the handle.

“Hesitating outside my door? How uncouth you are.”

Zoro flinched and whipped his head around not seeing anyone around him until he saw the figurehead doorknocker which rolled its eyes to look at him. Zoro tamped down the internal freak out he could feel coming on and opened the door and stepped in, the doorknocker chuckled, “Still no manners, barging in without a knock.”

The words drifted after Zoro and he let the pairs of doors close behind him before he continued on.

“I got to get out of this damn place.”

The hallway continued on for what seemed like forever until Zoro came upon another set of doors, this time, remembering the mocking he had received at the first set of doors, Zoro rapped his knuckles against one of the doors.

“Come in.”

The doors flew open before Zoro could so much as lower his hand, so he stepped inside carefully managing not to jump when the doors slammed closed once he’d passed the threshold.

A black haired woman sat behind the desk her head propped up in her hands, around her other sets of arms were doing various tasks like signing papers and counting money, Zoro very determinedly did not stare at the extra arms.

“Welcome to the spirits bathhouse, what possibly could a human want with us?” She drawled smirking at him.

“I would like a job.” Zoro said steeling himself, he hesitated a moment before tacking on a “please.”  

The woman hummed, from the name placard on her desk Zoro could see she was Ms. All Sunday, who Sanji and the others had told him about. “Now why would I do that? This is for spirits and you are a human all you ever do it disrespect the spirit ground and go tramping around through our town.”

Zoro slumped minutely; of course this would happen, if only Perona hadn’t needed to stop in this town in the first place.

“I need a job, please.” Zoro stated again.

The continual asking was leaving a sour taste in his mouth, but he couldn’t stop now and his worry for Mihawk and Perona reared its head again but he dare not say anything about them.

“Or,” Ms. All Sunday continued without so much as acting like she’d heard him at all, “We could just punish you like we did you family for traipsing all throughout the town.”

Zoro stilled, he hadn’t heard of them being caught or more whispers of humans around so Zoro studied her face carefully, something seemed to be lacking there and the edge of her words felt as if she had been baiting him. He hoped he wasn’t making the wrong choice as ignored the comment about his family, and stood facing straight ahead.

“But how would a human make it all the way up to see me without some assistance? Someone must have aided you on your quest up to meet me, who was it?”

Zoro didn’t acknowledge her question; two could play at that game, it seemed wrong as well to drop the names of Luffy or any of his friends. Zoro highly doubted they would be treated positively once they’d been named.

“What a sense of loyalty you must have, you can’t have known any of them more than a few hours and yet here you are.”

Ms. All Sunday chuckled and pushed herself out of her seat, the extra arms disappearing as she did so.

She slowly paced up the carpeted floor until she was in front of him, “A job you say? How about I give you the grunt work of the bathhouse, cleaning the tubs and tending to our very important guests? Someone with your ego,” Here she poked a manicured nail in the center of his forehead, Zoro still didn’t move or talk, which only seemed to make her more pleased, “would have a very difficult time with such menial tasks.”

“I just need a job.”

She took a step back and annoyance flit over her features, she waved a hand and zoro found himself unable to move or talk. “I’m tired of hearing that over and over again, I may just leave you as a statue at the front of the bathhouse like this.”

The silence that droned on was almost unbearable; Zoro could move a finger much less craft a response to her question. She watched him, her face betraying none of her thoughts as she gave a short laugh and waved a hand to release him. Zoro was not ashamed at the large relieved breath he sucked in when he was freed or a hand coming up to clutch at his chest to make sure he could move.

A hand popped up on the floor next to him holding a piece of paper, “Here is your contract, sign it and you belong to us.”

Zoro crouched to sign his name and glanced around the floor for a pen, when another hand tapped him on the shoulder holding out a pen, he took it after a brief pause and as soon as his name was written down the page flew from his grasp.

“Roronoa Zoro.” Ms. All Sunday read out, she stared at the name for a moment, “From now on your name is only Zoro, and the rest belongs to me now.”

Zoro began to protest but she waved a finger in his direction, “I could still make you a statue.”

He stopped his protests and seethed silently glaring at her back, at least he had a job now, which was his whole goal in coming here, and now all he had to do was meet back up with Luffy somehow.

“You called?” A familiar voice said from the doorway, despite not having heard the door open, Luffy was now standing against the door eyes trained on Ms. All Sunday.

It was an eerie juxtaposition to his early behavior, but from what Zoro had just seen transpire between himself and Ms. All Sunday he could assume much of the same had happened between Luffy and her as well.

“Ah yes Luffy, come meet our newest worker.”

Luffy turned to look at him and Zoro was surprised to see his face blank as if the hours before hadn’t happened between the two of them, but at another glance Zoro could see the excitement in Luffys eyes as he took in the fact that Zoro had made it this far.

“Who are you?” Luffy asked cocking his head to one side in contemplation.

“Zoro.”

Zoro could see the edge of Luffy’s mouth twitch upward at the statement and Zoro felt the anxiety finally start to unclench from his stomach.

“Luffy take him downstairs, get him a job and get him out of my sight.”

Luffy gave a short bow and flicked his head towards the door for Zoro to follow him. Zoro gave a short perfunctory bow in the direction of Ms. All Sunday before quickly walking out of the door with Luffy.

Once they were in the elevator and it began its descent, Luffy gave a loud, joyful laugh and slung his arm around Zoros neck bringing them cheek to cheek.

“I can’t believe Zoro made it all the way upstairs, you’re really bad with directions.”

Luffys laughter turned to snickers as Zoro grumbled and shrugged him off. “Yeah, yeah I made it upstairs didn’t I?”

“You did.” Luffy agreed, “Did you meet Usopp and the others?”

Zoro hummed in agreement. “Yeah, Usopp, Nami, and a stupid cook.”

Luffy cackled again, “You mean Sanji. I have a few more friends I want you to meet but I have to show you your work assignment.”

The elevator slowed to a stop and they stepped out onto what Zoro assumed was the ground floor. Luffy lead the way through the crowd, some people wrinkling their nose at him as they passed and the majority nodding to Luffy and greeting him.

A large orange haired woman sat in the foremans desk and yelled orders at the workers around her, until Luffy grinned and flung himself at the desk.

The foreman desk sat on a raised platform and Zoro could easily see over it, but the edge came up to about Luffys eye level and the boy in question folded his arms over the edge, and looked up at the foreman who looked exasperate as she caught sight of Luffy.

“What do you need brat? Ace and Sabo better not be around here I don’t have time for your shenanigans theres are human around.”

Luffy laughed. “Dadan that’s what I’m here about, the humans under contract and he needs a job!”

Dadan looked past Luffy, and Zoro was startled to see her eyes harden when she caught sight of Zoro standing over Luffys shoulder, he wouldn’t have thought her earlier expression was soft towards Luffy but seeing how she regarding himself was a world of difference than how she looked at Luffy.

The crowd around them paused and began to murmur; Zoro caught some protests about him being human, many people were worried about laziness and others moaned about his smell. Zoro paused, he hadn’t been aware that humans smelled, he tried to take a discreet sniff of himself but he couldn’t smell anything at all.

Luffy hopped down from the platform and addressed the crowd; he was once again more serious and resembled the Luffy who had been in the upstairs office rather than the one who had pulled him through the city.

“He has a contract here and in a few days he’ll smell like one of us. Besides he looks like he can manage the work.”

Luffy placed a strong hand on Zoros shoulder as he looked out into the crowd. Some people still spoke up their disagreements, claiming not to care what Ms. All Sunday would do to them if they refused but Luffys eye caught someone in the crowd and he grinned, wide and joyful.

“Sanji!” He called out beckoning the blond with a hand.

The crowd laughed at Sanjis misfortune and dispersed, while Sanji snuffed out a cigarette and came forward, Nami surprisingly trailed behind him.

“Yes Luffy?”

“Zoros gonna stay with you guys in do the bath attendant work, so you and Nami get to keep an eye on him.”

“Luffy be honest, do you hate me?” Sanji said exasperatedly, placing his hands on his hips and shaking his head at the ground. Luffy just grinned and slapped him on the back.

“I gotta go do other work though,” Luffy said. “So I’ll see you guys around! Help Zoro get settled in and be careful he’s bad with directions!”

Luffy jogged from the room, calling a goodbye to Dadan who responded with a grunt that seemed to be all feigned annoyance.

“I’ve got to say, I’m surprised you made it this far.” Nami said eyeing Zoro critically.

Zoro’s eyes were still trained on the doorway which Luffy had disappeared to. Sanji pushed him on the shoulder lightly to break his concentration on the door.

“Let’s go little lost boy, we’ll take you to the rooms.” Sanji smirked, leading Zoro to a set of stairs.

Nami went behind him, a hand on either of his shoulders as the two of them maneuvered Zoro up through the maze of the bathhouse. Sanji and Nami held idle chatter between the two of them as the wandered up to the rooms but Zoro was more content to try and figure out the layout of this thing. The three of them stopped next to two adjacent rooms.

“Alright here we are. The girls stay on the right side, the boys on the left. Sanji will show you the bedding and such when its time, most people are still out working so the rooms are mostly empty. If you have a question find Sanji or I we’ll probably be able to answer it.” Nami said ticking off the points she was making on her fingers like she was reading off a list.

The door to the girl’s side slid open and a blue haired girl hung off the doorframe. “Nami! you’re back and this is the human I guess?”  

“Hello my lovely Vivi!” Sanji gushed bending at the waist to grasp at Vivi’s hands. Vivi in turn rolled her eyes and shook her hand free of Sanji’s grasp.

She offered a hand to Zoro, “I’m Vivi. I work mostly alongside Nami so we’ll see a lot of each other probably.”

“I’m Zoro.” They shook hands quickly.

“Is Usopp up here yet?” Nami asked shoving aside the still besotted Sanji to enter the girl’s room.

“No he must still be in the basement working.”

“Does Usopp stay up here as well or in the boiler room?” Zoro asked he had seen some bedding near Usopps chairs when they had been there so he had assumed he just slept down there.

Sanji was the one who answered, straightening up and following Nami and Vivi out to the balcony in the girls room, “Sometimes, he has a bed down there for long work days but sometimes he joins us up here.”

Zoro seated himself on the balcony with them as the three of them relaxed against the slight breeze and the fading night sky. He paused a moment after he mulled over that thought.

“What about Luffy does he stay up here?”

The three of them exchanged a wary glance and before they could answer the sound of a door sliding open on the boy’s side interrupted them. A second later Usopps head popped around the wooden barrier of the balcony. “Give me a second I’ll be right there!”

They listened idly as they could hear Usopp trip his way through the boys room. Nami and Vivi giggled once Usopp appeared in the door way looking haggard and Sanji gave a short dry laugh.

“Come on idiot, join us.”

“Zoro man good to see you made it past Ms. All Sunday, she terrifies me.” Usopp shuddered and sat crossed leg alongside them.

“It doesn’t take much Usopp, everything terrifies you.” Nami snorted.

“Anyways Zoro,” Vivi cleared her throat, “about Luffy his work is different than ours but sometimes yes he does sleep up here, Usopp has a spare bed for if he crashes in the boiler room as well.”

“Sometimes though,” Usopp began nervously tugging on pieces of his hair, “He doesn’t sleep here, we don’t really know the kind of stuff he has to do since he works directly under Ms. All Sunday.”

That explained the tense and wary looks the three of them had shared before Usopps appearance, Zoro didn’t quite enjoy this lack of knowledge about what Luffy was doing or even where he slept, if put his mind in turmoil. He hadn’t known Luffy very long but he felt as though he had and the uncertainty of this situation put him at odds.

“Where is Luffy by the way?” Usopp asked. “I would’ve thought he would come to see our newest worker get settled in.”

“He dropped him off with us and then had to go back to work. We probably won’t see him until tomorrow.” Sanji sighed standing up. “Ladies it was lovely to see you but we must retire to the boy’s room for now.”

Usopp stood up, giving quick one armed hugs to both Nami and Vivi, while Sanji did a ridiculous exaggerated bow. Zoro stood more slowly and left with a nod to both of them. He followed the other two into the boy’s room.  Sanji opened a panel and hefted a bed mat, pillow and blanket at Zoro which he caught easily, earning an impressed noise from Sanji and a short clap from Usopp. Sanji also passed over a set of clothes that were identical to the work uniform he’d seen everyone else wearing.

“Can I be honest I was hoping you’d drop that.” Usopp said laying out his own bed next to Zoro, on Usopps other side Sanji dropped his own stuff onto the floor.

Zoro snorted, “Good luck with that.”

“Now you’re going to have to be on guard always.” Sanji muttered lying down and punching his pillow a few times.

“Ooh I’ll help.” Usopp said rolling over onto his stomach and stuffing his face into his pillow.

Zoro looked skyward and wondered how this had become his life. Someone in the hallway tripped making a loud thud and Usopp yelped vaulting himself halfway onto Zoros bed. The other men who shared their room filtered in hardly paying any mind to the three of them, and any comments they would have said were drowned out by Sanjis hysterical laughter.

“No love Sanji, noises like that freak me out. Who knows what they could be?”

Zoro pushed Usopp so he rolled back onto his own bed and propped himself up on one arm and raised an eyebrow at Usopp. “Aren’t you both already spirits? Isn’t that more of a human fear?”

Usopp muttered under his breath, “I hate the both of you.”

Zoro chuckled and fell back onto his pillow as he heard Sanji give Usopp what should have been a consoling pat but sounded more like a slap.

The lights flicked out in the room and one by one everyone fell asleep, except for Zoro who stared at the ceiling in silence. He folded his arms beneath his head and tried to figure just how this had all happened in just one day. Somewhere during his thoughts Zoro slipped off into sleep.

He awoke sometime in the night while the sky was fading into dawn, but considering the sleep cycle of the spirit world and the fact that everyone was still asleep around him it wasn’t time to get up just yet, for which he was glad he did not feel rested enough to be a person let alone do work just yet.

He lifted himself up, resting all of his weight back onto his elbows and sent a cursory glance around the room. No one in the room was awake but there was an empty bed next to him. Zoro was confused and he scrubbed a hand over his bleary eyes, there had been no bed there when he fell asleep.

A quiet noise on the balcony drew his attention. Zoro cut his eyes over to Sanji and Usopp quickly but neither had so much as twitched at the noise and Zoro sat up in his bed. He rubbed his eyes again and stared out into the fading night, the first light of dawn was just casting soft sun beams onto the balcony and Zoro could see a figure crouched on the railing, a now familiar worn strawhat hanging on the figures back.

Zoro stared hard at the figure on the balcony, he was half sure he was still asleep because he hadn’t heard Luffy come in or noticed him laying a bed out next to him.

“Luffy…?” Zoro whispered trying not to wake anyone else in the room.

Luffy, who was still crouched atop the railing of the balcony, paused in his movements and looked back over his shoulder; He caught Zoros eye in the still dark room, the slowly rising sun light his face half in light, leaving the other half in shadow making him seem more otherworldly than Zoro already knew he was. Luffy grinned at him and pressed a finger to his lips in a quieting gesture, and with a quick wave goodbye Luffy hopped off the balcony railing and into the empty space beyond in.

Zoro scrambled from his bed and ran to the railing, but he couldn’t see any trace of Luffy below him. He blinked dumbly at the ground and when Luffy didn’t magically reappear he stumbled back to his bed and face planted into it.

The next time Zoro awoke sometime in the middle of the day, Sanji had kicked him ‘accidentally’ on his way to put up his bed from the night before. Zoro groaned and sat up, rubbing his hand over his hair.

“Time to start the day sleeping shithead.” Sanji muttered standing at the food of the bed.

“I heard you bastard.” Zoro said rolling his eyes, he looked next to him the bed from the night before was gone, Zoro assumed then that the Luffy he had seen must have just been a dream. He glanced to his other side and saw Usopps stuff already put away.

 “Where’s the brave warrior?” Zoro said sardonically gesturing to where Usopp had been before.

“He’s gone to the dangerous task of tending the boiler already.”

Zoro snorted and folded his bed putting and passing it off to be placed into the storage along with the others. They exited the room and ran into Vivi and Nami who stood outside the girl’s room waiting for them.

“Are you ready for your first day of work Zoro?” Vivi asked falling into step beside him as Nami and Sanji lead them down the passage.

“It shouldn’t be too bad from what everyone has been saying about the work.” Zoro shrugged.

“Wait until you are knee deep in a mud caked tub and Sanji is off on a smoke break.” Nami said turning to walk backwards so she could face Zoro, she jabbed an elbow in Sanjis side at the offended noise he made.

“I’m not even working in that area today, I have kitchens today.” Sanji said rolling his neck and lifting a hand in goodbye as they went down a separate staircase.

“Does everyone switch jobs?” Zoro asked pointing a finger over his shoulder in the direction Sanji had headed.

“No, just Sanji really.” Vivi mused, flipping over her work tile in quick succession after Nami flipped her own.

Zoro was surprised to see his own tile had been added to the board and he only fumbled a bit trying to flip his quickly. 

“Sanji was originally hired as part of the cleaning, upkeep, and attendants; which are what the three of us are technically, but he wandered into the kitchen one day and somehow walked out with a job.” Nami rolled her eyes but her words betrayed the action with the affectionate tone they had taken on. 

Their conversation paused as the foreman, who Zoro faintly remembered as Dadan or something similar, barreled up to them.

“You two get the newbie with you today, mop and prepare tub two for guests.”

“You got it.” Vivi smiled giving a polite bow as Nami nodded and began to head towards the tub.

She hesitated for one second before securing two fingers in the sleeve of Zoros uniform shirt,

“Come on, Luffy told us you’re the worst at directions so tub two is this way.”  Zoro could hear Vivi’s polite giggle smothered into her hand behind him as he walked after Nami.

They picked up mops, cleaning buckets, and brushes on the way as the headed into the sectioned off tub that Zoro assumed was tub two.

“So where do we begin?”

Nami placed a hand at the center of Zoro’s back and shoved him into the room towards the tub. Vivi shook her head and began cleaning the corner of the room.

“You get to clean the tub.” Nami smirked devilishly at Zoro.

Zoro felt his temple begin to pulse in irritation. “And why do I have to clean the tub myself?” He bit out, he was certain Nami had been trying to con him into doing the most work.

Namis smirk turned into what would have been an angelic smile on probably almost anyone else, but on her sent the message to Zoro that he was in fact being conned and she was going to win.

“You owe me. This is how you’re going to be paying off your debt to me.”

“What debt?” Zoro ground out angrily but Nami paid no heed to his works and Zoro muttered curses under his breath while he approached the tub, his anger practically floating off him in visible waves.

The cleaning wasn’t difficult at all, Zoro scrubbed and washed the tub, cursing Nami with every breath for which she just began adding hours of work to Zoros debt every time she passed him with a mop. Zoro learned quickly to keep all his annoyed commentary internal. Vivi was a pleasant counterpoint to Nami’s behavior as she mostly quietly hummed to herself and set about to the work.

Zoro noticed a weird behavior among some of the other staff, whenever they passed the room and greeted them the three of them each got a different sort of greeting; Zoro as the only outsider at the moment got a few passing nods or wrinkled noses, Nami got friendly waves, but the greetings Vivi got were respectful and polite almost always accompanied with a small bow of some sort which Vivi herself always laughed and waved off.

Soon enough the tub was clean and Nami opened a wall panel and Vivi, who had left the room for a moment, came back with a tile that Zoro recognized from the boiler room.

“Those get sent to Usopp right?”

Nami looked up surprised that Zoro seemed to have caught that yesterday or even remembered. “Yeah he puts together the herbs and heats the water and it’ll come out when its ready.”

Without further ado, she clipped the tile and sent it to Usopp and almost less than a minute later a spout came out and Vivi pulled a handle and Zoro easily sidestepped from the tub to avoid the water.

A moment later a familiar voice came hopping into the room and Zoro was stunned to see the reindeer from the elevator hurling himself up to Nami. The reindeer greeted Nami and Vivi, which they responded to in kind and yelped and hid behind Nami when he spun and saw Zoro there.

Zoro pointed at him. “The reindeer from the elevator?”

“Zoro, this is Tony Tony Chopper, he’s a spirit and a friend of ours.” Vivi said gesturing to the reindeer that had come out from behind Nami. “Chopper this is Zoro, he’s a friend of Luffy’s and a new worker here.”

Zoro greeted Chopper with a nod and a grunt. Chopper seemed to relax once Luffy’s name had been thrown out into the conversation.

“If you’re friends with Luffy you can’t be that bad.” Chopper said nodding to himself. “I thought you were some kind of demon spirit on the elevator yesterday.”

Zoro blinked at Chopper too stunned for a few moments to answer before he laughed loudly. “No I’m not a demon,” Zoro felt a smirk pull at his face, “I’m something much worse.”

Chopper turned wide eyes of Nami and Vivi. Vivi seemed amused and Nami looked a little exasperated but the glint in her eyes was sharp, “He’s a human Chopper, don’t worry he probably won’t eat you.” She smiled at Chopper but it was full of teeth and did nothing at all to ease the fear that was on Choppers face.

Chopper turned haltingly back to face Zoro, who gave him a wide predatory smile that matched Nami’s. Chopper turned and all but vaulted into the tub and when he came up both Nami was cackling loudly and Zoro just laughed and shook his head at the betrayed look on Choppers face.

“Don’t worry Chopper, they’re messing with you. Zoro is a human but hes no threat.” Vivi smiled at him, patting him on the head between his antlers before shooing Nami and Zoro off to go to their next assignment. “We’ll see you later!”

Choppers goodbye followed them out of the room as they headed to get their next assignment.

In the next tub, which didn’t have a designated number and was just apparently called the ‘big tub’, Zoro stood in the bowl of the tub scrubbing with Vivi working at his back and Nami cleaning to floor.

“Have you guys always worked here?” Zoro asked turning his shoulder to glance at Vivi out of the corner of his eye. Zoro could hear Nami stop working and Vivi too paused in her ministrations.

“Ah well, you could definitely say that I’ve been here almost as long as I remember.” Vivi said trailing off slightly; something about her tone sent an internal alarm off in Zoro that he was missing something big here.

“Most of us have worked here for as long as we can remember, it’s just like the human world, people have to work and get paid and thrive.” Nami said leaning over the tub to look at them.

She paused for a moment tilting her head in thought, and then she flapped a dismissive hand towards Zoro, “Well not just like the human world, but similar enough that the comparison would work for you little brain.”

“I’m going to kill you when I get out of this tub.” Zoro growled up at her.

“Good luck with that!” Nami sang.

“The two of you are too much, I swear.” Vivi giggled, resuming her scrubbing of the tub.

A few moments later she let out a relieved breathe and swiped a hand of her forehead. “Alright we can get out of here Zoro, the tub is clean.”

Zoro hefted himself out of the rub easily and turned to pull Vivi out, only for her to already be out of the tub as well. Vivi sent him a small smile and slid off the rim of the tub. Zoro was in a pretty content mood until a now familiar blond head stepped into the room. Zoro felt his face twist in annoyance and saw what must have been a mirrored expression on Sanji’s face.

“Moss brain I hope you have bothered these lovely ladies too much today.” Sanji said leaning against the partition of the room.

“I’m sure it’s your presence which is doing the most bothering swirly brow.” Zoro sneered back.

“Boys.” Vivi chuckled placing her hands on her hips in fists; Nami slapped her palm to her forehead at the same time.

A large commotion drew the attention of the four as they head Dadan yell at someone and the rapid pounding of feet towards their room. A tall blond and a black haired boy skidded into the room and threw a tile at Nami.

“Fill it quickly!” The black haired boy yelled excitedly, bouncing on his toes as he waited, the blond boy sent them all a wild grin and paced outside the tub. Nami laughed boisterously, and obligingly went to the wall. Vivi and Sanji shared an amused look and Zoro assumed it was another case of friends of the group he had yet to meet.

As soon as the water, which was a cloudy mixture Zoro couldn’t understand why they’d use,  began to fill the tub, the two boys easily hopped into it, but instead of relaxing right away they leaned over the edge and called out to someone to hurry it up.

A moment later, Zoros grip on his brush because the loud laugh the echoed in the baths had to be Luffys, it was already ingrained in his mind for some reason and as soon as he heard it he had known who it was that was coming, and sure enough on the heels of the laughter Luffy came barreling into the room and dove into the tub fully clothed in his uniform still.

The other two boys, held him underwater with a free hand each just as Dadan appeared in the doorway panting.

“Alright brats, where’d Luffy go?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” The blond one said tilting his head to the side and grinning at her.

“Sabo, do we even know a Luffy?”

Sabo hummed thoughtfully, “You know Ace I don’t think we even know a Luffy.”

Dadan snorted. “Sure, that makes total sense.” Dadan nodded before resuming her yelling, “You three brothers are the worst. You’ll be the end of me I swear.”

She muttered to herself and left the room, waving a hand as she let out an aggrieved huff and ambled back to her station. As soon as she was gone Sabo and Ace let go of Luffy and he came up to the surface of the water and laughed loud and delightedly.

“You three are idiots.” Sanji snorted, he picked up a tray that Zoro hadn’t even seen him put down and handed lunch to Vivi, Nami, and Zoro, and took his own food as the four of them sat on the floor on some of the mats to eat their lunch.

“You shouldn’t mess with Dadan so much.” Vivi laughed as she dug into her food.

“Dadan loves it though she won’t admit it.” Ace snorted leaning back in the water.

“She loves us; can you imagine her life without us?” Sabo laughed joining Ace in relaxing.

“She’d probably be calmer,” Nami said dryly. “but then again she does treat you idiots like she raised you.”

Luffy snickered. “We’ve always hung around here and messed with Dadan.”

“Who are we to break her routine?” Sabo nodded along.

“You know what they say, routine is really important to those in old age.” Ace snickered, face half buried in water so a multitude of bubbles came along with the laughter.

Zoro felt a weird emotion float over him as he watched Luffy interact with the group as a whole. Ace and Sabo who, if Zoro remembered correctly, were identified as Luffys brothers and it was a strange group of people but Zoro could see the fondness as the three of them splashed and messed with each other in the tub and everyone outside the tub just seemed to go along with it like it was a common occurrence. Though something in Zoro told him it probably was. There was a pang in his chest as he watched them interact and Zoro felt a keen sense of yearning for his own family.

It was then that Luffy caught Zoros eye and his whole face brighten, and with it Zoro felt his own mood lighten immeasurably.

“Zoro you’re here!”

“Ah so you’re the human stray that Luffy told us about.” Sabo said turning a critical glance at him.

“Looks like a moss spirit to me.” Ace said a teasing smirk on his face.

The room paused for a moment as Zoro yelled in indignation, Sanji gestured wildly proclaiming that he felt the same, but Zoro, after he had finished his protesting, felt his eyes caught on Luffy who was laughing so hard he slipped back underwater and had to be hauled up by his brothers.

The two brothers exchanged a glance and pushed Luffy out of the tub which sent him sliding to the floor before them.

Luffy smiled warmly up at Zoro, “I’m glad Zoro got to meet all my friends.”

Zoro himself sent a, what felt like uncharacteristically soft smile back to the boy of the floor, “They’re all pretty good, except for this blond bastard.” Zoro said pointing a thumb towards Sanji.

Sanji in turn just muttered about never bringing him lunch again. Privately, Zoro thought he’d mention Nami and her debt habits but felt that saying anything about it would just end up with him owing even more to the girl.

The group relaxed for a moment longer, until Zoro and the rest had to get back to work and with a departing wave they left Luffy and his brothers alone.

That night, Zoro sat out on the balcony, while the rest of the group had retired inside after they had eaten their dinner. His bed was laid out inside once again and Sanji and Usopp had already retired for rest, but something in Zoro felt unsettled. It must have rained sometime during the day because the ground outside was flooded, but Zoro recalled the first day here when the plains had turned into a sea and he couldn’t quite reconcile if this was just a normal thing. Somewhere in the distance a train whistle blew. The door behind him slid open and the smell of the ocean filtered past his nose, Zoro attributed it to the waters below him but that didn’t feel quite right. Luffy plopped down next to him, feet hanging off the railing and chewing on a meat bun which he held the second half of in a free hand.

“How’s Zoro job been going?”

Zoro shrugged. “its fine, the work is simple enough. Nothing I can’t handle.”

There was a serious set to Luffy’s face as he looked Zoro up and down for a moment. “Do you remember your name?”

“Of course I remember my name.” Zoro scoffed looking at Luffy like he was crazy, but even as he said it Zoro found himself unable to remember anything past his first name. He knew it was there but it was like a wall had been placed before the rest of it. He felt the blood drain from his face and he looked at Luffy aghast.

“I can’t remember all of it.”

Luffy placed a hand atop of Zoros where it rest on the banister. “You’re Roronoa Zoro. Don’t forget that.”

Zoro nodded, feeling shaken, the serious expression on Luffy’s face hadn’t left yet and Zoro felt exposed under its scrutiny.

“How come I couldn’t remember?” Zoro demanded.

Luffy shrugged one shoulder, downing the rest of his food. Once he finished he spoke up, “It’s how the bathhouse works and how Ms. All Sunday keeps everyone here, she takes the name and you forget who you are. Names are everything to spirits.”

Zoro could vaguely remember Perona once saying something similar to this. Names gave power and for spirits was a link to their domain, it was why rivers and oceans were named for the spirit who guarded it.

“How come your brothers don’t work here but you do?”

Luffy paused in the idly swinging of his legs which he had taken up, and he looked at Zoro and he shook his head casually, “It’s a long story Zoro.” Luffy laughed a little, but the casualness of his behavior seemed rather forced from Zoros point of view.

Luffy paused again, before he continued on. “But Ace and Sabo, they remember their whole names and their domain, but I can’t. I just woke up one day and it was all gone.” He spread his arms wide as he gestured, “So I came to work here. But Ace and Sabo visit all the time.”

Zoro felt sympathy for Luffy, but chose not to say anything about it, once he’d mentioned his brothers Luffys face had relaxed and became more open and happy and Zoro didn’t want to cause him to revert but to the serious countenance.

They sat in a peaceful silence, for a bit, Zoro regarding the landscape before them casually and Luffy kicked his feet in time with the song he was humming while he rested all his weight on his hands splayed behind him. Luffy caught Zoros eyes as Zoro idly looked around and the air between them seemed charged with something, Zoro felt something inside his unfurl but before anything came of it Luffy had flopped back onto the deck and closed his eyes. Zoro took a few moments to collect his breath and shake off whatever had come over him.

“Do you guys ever swim in the sea below us or is it just here from the rain?” Zoro asked leaning back to tilt his glance towards Luffys face.

Luffy opened a single eye and gave Zoro a small smile, “Not really, we don’t get a lot of time off but I can’t swim in that.”

Zoros eyes widened in shock. “You can’t swim?”

Luffy shook his head in denial and sat up, eyeing the waters below them. “It’s not that I can’t swim. I’m pretty sure I can swim Zoro,” Luffy laughed at him, “but theres something wrong about it. Like the idea of getting in that water feels wrong somewhere in my mind and I can’t do it.”

Zoro had no response to that, he didn’t quite know what the reasoning was for it, but the way Luffy spoke about it made Zoro accept it without a doubt.

The two of them let the conversation fall to idle small talk until Luffy was yawning and slipping into sleep. It took Zoro a moment to realize that Luffys breathing had evened out into a steady cadence. Zoro shifted all his weight to the hand near Luffys head so he could stare down at the relaxed and peaceful expression on his face.

Zoro hesitated for a second before bringing up his other hand, it traced lightly over the plains of Luffys face; over his the ridge of his brow and down his nose, following the line of Luffys jaw and his thumb skirted the edge of Luffys bottom lip. Zoro felt like his limbs were charged with electricity and his heart was a crashing wave inside his chest, the space around them was warm and stifling, these casual touches felt too intimate and Zoro had to pull back from Luffy.

It all felt like too much.

He placed a hand on his shoulder instead and woke Luffy up to lead him inside. Luffy was asleep on his bed almost instantly but Zoros mind didn’t stop churning until sleep eventually took him. 

Chapter Text

The sun was making its ascent into the sky when Zoro woke up.

The rest of the room slumbered soundly around him, Zoro however, could not lay still anymore. A restless sort of itch was vibrating underneath his skin. It sent him from his bed quietly stepping onto the balcony, the mid-morning light hitting his eyes causing him to squint reflexively.

Zoro lowered his head and scrubbed a hand over the back of his neck, ruffling the short hairs that lie there. He knew realistically he hadn’t been in the spirit world that long; the other spirits still complained plenty of how he smelled like a human, as well as that the food still didn’t sit the best with him. He knew he couldn’t have been gone from his world and his family for more than a few days but time seemed to flow strangely here and he could feel himself getting pulled into the flow of this world.

It was getting harder and to remember that he didn’t actually belong in this world or in this bathhouse. Zoro sighed and turned to go back inside and at least feign sleep until the rest of the room began to wake up. As he was turning something caught the corner of his eye, a red streak shot through his field of vision, but when he turned to find it, he couldn’t see it anywhere on the horizon.

A beat later Zoro turned on his foot and stepped back into the rooms and slide the door shut with a barely audible snap. Once again, there was an empty space where Luffy’s bed had been the night before. Sleep was once again pulling at Zoros mind and he could no longer fight to keep his eyes open or wonder where Luffy kept disappearing to, and so without much fight sleep pulled Zoro under once again.

Days passed relatively the same way as the first few days that Zoro had spent in the bathhouse. He awoke early, his body still used to the diurnal schedule of a human and not quite used to the nocturnal schedule the spirits seemed to live on; he would fall back asleep after spending time either lying in bed and recalling his name and the names of his family or standing in silence on the balcony, and he would be awoken again but Sanji’s less than friendly wake up calls or the rapid pokes from Usopp and he would spend the day with Nami and Vivi, and occasionally Sanji, cleaning tubs. The days would end with the entire group sitting in either room and hanging out before returning to sleep. Zoro, however, would set up his bed and not sleep immediately but he would retire to the balcony, which seemed to have become his spot and most times Luffy would join him there.

The land was still flooded from rain and water and looked like the sea; when he and Luffy would sit out there it was comforting and sometimes he could smell the familiar scent of the sea and it eased him mind.

There were still many things about the bathhouse that set Zoro on edge, and many of those things centered around Luffy. He seemed to be an intrinsic and well-known piece of the community here but there was almost no knowledge of what he actually did besides causing trouble for Dadan with his brothers, and almost no one knew where he went when he did work.

Some days, Luffy would spend all of his time in the bathhouse and he would fall asleep on the bed next to him and other days, days that set Zoro more on edge that usual, no one would see or hear from Luffy at all and he would return in the dead of night, past the time the two of them would hang out on the balcony and talk and he would fling himself on his bed, falling asleep almost instantly while Zoro subtly tracked his movements throughout the room from his own bed. 

The soft slide of the paneled door was what woke Zoro up, one day as the sun was just about peaking in the sky, Zoro knew the rest of the people in the room would be up relatively soon, but only one person would wake up this early besides himself.

In a scene reminiscent of days ago, Luffy was crouched on a railing peering down at the waters below, but unlike last time Zoro didn’t call out to Luffy, he waited and watched silently. Luffy once again pushed off of the balcony and Zoro rose from his bed quickly as he did so and practically fell out into the light of the balcony.

His heart always seemed to freeze in these moments when Luffy stepped out into the open air and seemingly disappeared. Zoro felt his heart pick up into double time and his mouth fall open as a red blur shot out from below the balcony and twisted and curled higher into the sky.

Zoro had never thought to look up before when Luffy jumped from the balcony, too concerned about what he might see below, but now that Zoro had his gaze directed towards the sky he knew he had no reason to have ever been worried.

At first he didn’t believe what he was seeing, then he remembered he was literally in the spirit world and instead focused on what was happening. Two dragons circled high about the bathhouse, one was a deep dark blue and the other was a vibrant orange.

But what held his attention was the red dragon the spun in the air and shot up to meet the other two, the three dragons tumbled and rolled in the sky, twisting and winding around each other before rising higher into the sky past the range of Zoros vision.

Zoro closed his mouth with a click and stared at where the dragons had last been and had thusly disappeared from, he didn’t know why but he knew, without a doubt the red dragon had been Luffy. When he had first seen him his mind automatically knew it was him. As he thought about the other two dragons, Zoro came to the realization that they must have been Luffys’ brothers.

The way the three of them had curled about the other seemed to make sense then, it was playful and exuberant but also familiar and broadcast the amount of fondness they had for each other. Zoro could very easily liken that behavior to the three of them tumbling into the tubs one after the other and there was no way to mistake that display for anything less than family.

Zoro chest ached at the thought of family, he had no idea where his even was or how they had even faired in the spirit world. Zoro had only made it this far from the help of Luffy and the others and he had no way of knowing for sure if his family had been equally as lucky.

Zoro didn’t know how long he had stayed out on the balcony for, his eyes trained at the sky, but the next thing he knew Sanji was grumbling and pulling him back in the room but the back of his shirt and throwing his work clothes at him.

Zoro took in the room, everyone had already headed off to work, except Sanji who gave him a half-hearted scowl and Nami and Vivi whom he could see loitering by the doorway.

“Oi, moss for brains what gives? Is your brain not up to functioning today?” Sanji asked leaning against the doorjamb with the girls.

Zoro tilted his head and cast a glance out of the corner of his eye. Being completely honest what Sanji had said was not too far off, he was still wrapping his head around Luffy being a dragon and key pieces of whatever was happening here seemed to be falling into place but he couldn’t quite figure out which they were exactly. So all he said in response was:

“Watch it swirl-brow, I could beat you even without my brain functioning!”

As Sanji geared up to fling a retort back at him, Zoro was idly aware of Nami and Vivi exchanging a look of commiseration.

“We are leaving you two idiots behind.” Nami called from the hall as she began moving away. “The amount of brain power in that room in way below threshold.”

Zoro didn’t hear Vivi’s response but he could vaguely hear the laughter of the two of them. Regardless, he and Sanji did hurry out of the room, shoving and insulting each other all the way down the stairs.

So essentially the start of the day was almost exactly like any other.  

Zoro remained drawn into his own headspace for the better part of the morning, despite responding as usual to Sanji’s insults or Nami’s teasing, Zoro would soon go silent again as he returned to work. Once lunch had rolled around and Zoro sat with his back along the outside of the tub they had just filled, the warmth seeping through his clothes and making him calm and comfortable, Nami sat to his right and Vivi and Sanji a little further down from him.

Zoro ate slowly, tilting his head back and closing his eyes briefly as he let the head of the tub warm his entire head. He could hear the other three shifting and muttering to each other, and before any of them could ask Zoro anything, Zoro broke his own imposed silence.

“Do you guys know who Luffy really is?”

There was a cut off choke and Zoro cracked open one eye in time to see Nami slapping Vivi’s back as Vivi fell into a coughing fit.

“What do you mean?” Sanji asked, eyeing him critically.

Zoro could see the slight spasm of his hand and his jaw clenched subconsciously, Zoro had been here long enough to have learned that this was a particular tell for Sanji when he wanted to smoke. This was enough for Zoro to know, along with Nami and Vivi’s shocked expressions, that the three of them did indeed know something about Luffy.

For the first time since he had gotten to know them, Zoro felt a spark of anger flicker to life in his chest and he felt his content mood get swept away by the resounding current of anger that flew through him. Zoro knew what was probably just the brief facts about what was going on here, but what he did know was that Luffy was only forced to work here because he did not know who he was truly, but somehow these three did and they had not deigned to share this info.

Nami probably figured out the rising anger Zoro felt because she held up her hands placating and spoke to him in measuredly calm words, “It is not that simple Zoro. This isn’t your human world we have a set of rules, of laws, that we have to follow here. Almost everyone in the bathhouse knows who Luffy is.”

That stopped Zoro up short, just enough for him to put a cap on his anger. As he took in this newest piece of information.

“What does that mean? Why can’t you just break the rules?”

Sanji rapped a knuckle on the ceramic tub to draw Zoros attention away from Nami, “First off what has Luffy told you? We need to know how much info you already have.”

Zoro paused in surprise, Sanji was alarmingly calm and despite his original anger he had shown, Zoro allowed himself to let go of the anger he was holding onto. Once he relaxed, Nami let her hands fall back into her lap. Vivi had not yet spoken since her original coughing fit, but there was guilt and remorse easily read in the lines of her face. Zoro relayed a summarized version of what Luffy had told him nights ago on the balcony.

Nami blinked, her eyes had widened a little in surprise as Zoro recounted the story, and she and the other two shared a brief look of surprise before turning their attention back to Zoro.

“Luffy told you more than I expected him to, he’s always been a little more tight-lipped about his own problems.” Nami’s mouth twisted in a wry smile.

“But you guys do know his real name? The one Ms. All Sunday has?” Zoro asked, turning to face them bodily.

“In short?” Vivi asked, twirling a piece of hair about her fingers, “Yes, we do.”

“What about where he belongs?”

“That is a yes as well.” Nami sighed, rubbing a hand over her forehead.

“Well why don’t you tell him?” Zoro ground out, he could feel his anger sparking back up in his chest. He still couldn’t quite understand why they wouldn’t help Luffy be free of whatever work he always disappeared to do.

“Oi I know you’re practically a heathen but don’t yell at the ladies.” Sanji rebounded, pointing a finger in Zoros direction. “It’s as Nami said, spirits are bound by laws that forbid us from telling Luffy who he is.”

As Zoro was about to cut in to reiterate his earlier point about just breaking the rules, Nami held up a hand in his face, successfully stopping his sentence from ever leaving his mouth.

“It’s like this,” She began. “We would tell Luffy who his is and where he really belongs if we could, but we literally can’t. It’s not like a law that is enforced by a person, no matter how hard we try we can’t actually even speak about who Luffy actually is.”

Zoros face must have betrayed his confusion, because Nami placed her hands on his shoulders and looked him in the eye.

“Watch what happens,” She took a steading breath, which threw Zoro off a little because he knew the spirits didn’t actually need to breath. “Luffys real name is-”

Zoro watched mystified as the words died in her mouth, she opened and closed her mouth a few times but nothing came out and her own face was screwed up in annoyance.

“So you see,” Vivi cut in as Nami released him, “Despite how much we would like to tell Luffy who he is, we can’t do anything about it.”

“But why aren’t you able to tell him?”

“Who really knows?” Sanji said shrugging and picking up his discarded lunch. “Possibly because of the power names and domains have over spirits. Names hold a lot of power, as you’ve seen from Ms. All Sunday and how she runs the bathhouse, and Luffy for whatever reason can no longer remember his name or domain and us telling him upsets the power balance I would assume.”

“He has to remember it for himself,” Nami all but muttered, “The only way to fix it is for Luffy to remember his name and where he belongs. But we know it isn’t the bathhouse.”

With that, their lunch break was called to a close, by the distant voice of Dadan and another sudden thought struck Zoro.

“If he isn’t able to get help to figure out who he is, how come he can’t just figure it out by his brothers names?”

Vivi was the one who answered him, as Nami and Sanji had gone to get rid of their lunch and receive their new work orders.

“Those three are brothers by choice only, they weren’t born into it. So their names have no impact on Luffy’s identity. But Luffy does have family out there, they don’t get to see him much, Ms. All Sunday always seems to know when they are coming because Luffy is always far from the bathhouse whenever either of them arrive.”

The rest of the day was carried out in a companionable silence, there were a very small instances of discussion and banter among the four of them but what had transpired at lunch had thrown off the whole group and everyone was more or less distracted from engaging with the others.

By the time they had all settled in the girls room after dinner, the situation had not been rectified and Usopp sent them all a wary glance as he folded himself into a seated position in their group.

“What is happening here?” Usopp asked looking around the group. “Should I be worried?”

Sanji leaned over to the open balcony door to blow smoke out of it, “No,” he began in between blowing smoke and taking another drag of his cigarette. “Moss-brain over there interrogated us over lunch about Luffys name and spirit world law.”

“Oh.” Usopp nodded turning his gaze to Zoro. “It really is such an unfair situation.” Usopp chuckled humorlessly, running his hand over the top of his hair.

“Let’s leave the Luffy discussion behind for now.” Nami said clapping her hands loudly. “Its too somber and we’ve had our fill of that for the day.”

Zoro shrugged, realistically he wanted to know as much as possible for what was happening with Luffy but he had a few other concerns he wanted addressed so he could shelf this discussion for a later time.

“Alright,” Zoro began, the group released their tense postures only to take them back up again as Zoro continued, “Why do all the bathhouse workers only nod to you two,” At that he gestured to Sanji and Nami who watched him warily, “But everyone I have seen bows to Vivi?”

“Learn to read the mood of a group you idiot.” Sanji grumbled, stubbing out his cigarette on the wooden floor, earning a sharp smack from Nami.

“Honestly Zoro,” Usopp whined. “can we not have such heavy discussions? Nami just asked for a less somber mood.”

“He’s an idiot we should have expected this.” Nami said commiserating with Usopp as the two of them leaned against each other. “There’s no saving him, he’ll be an idiot forever.”

Zoro glared at them, Usopp flinched and cowered behind Nami’s shoulder, but Nami just smirked at him.

“At least we can actually tell him about this one.” Vivi said, pulling Zoros attention from Nami and Usopp. “Theres no spirit world law preventing us from talking about this one.”

Vivi must have been pondering the best way to tell Zoro more about the actual truth behind the bathhouse but Sanji cut in before she could, and she sent him a grateful look as he spoke:

“This bathhouse actually belongs to Vivi and her family, not Ms. All Sunday.” Sanji said seriously.

Of all the possibilities that had been in Zoros head, this one was not expected, he stared harder at Vivi somehow expecting for some sort of joke to come after the explanation. But as none came he was drawn up short.

“I thought Ms. All Sunday runs the bathhouse? If its Vivi’s why does she work here?”

“Technically that’s true.” Usopp nodded

“Technically?” Zoro repeated.

“What are you a parrot?” Sanji snorted. “Ms. All Sunday does oversee the bathhouse, but its currently owned by someone named Crocodile.”

Zoro was slightly surprised to see Vivi clench her fists in anger at the name, Nami put a consoling hand on her back.

“Crocodile is the one pulling all the strings from far away.” Vivi bit out angrily. “He’s the one who practically stole it from my family and forced us into working for him and I bet he’s behind the way Ms. All Sunday steals the names of the workers.”

“Even we’re a little unsure on the details of how it happened.” Nami admitted seriously, “We had all worked here before the switch, but it was different then.” Nami continued in a softer voice, “It was better then.”

Usopp nodded rapidly in agreement. “Yeah we all worked here and Luffy would hang around and visit us with his brothers but he didn’t work here then.”

“Then one day we all go down to work and its no longer Vivi’s father addressing us but Ms. All Sunday. The bathhouse swapped hands over night and we were left with what you see now, the stealing of names, essentially forcing us all to stay here.” Sanjis eyes were cast at the ceiling but like before, Zoro could see how tightly his jaw was clenched in anger.

Vivi wiped furiously at the tears that had formed in her eyes. “I hate that man, I don’t know how or what he did to take the bathhouse but I know it wasn’t right and I would do anything to change it.”

“Would Luffy know something about it?” Zoro asked seriously, “Considering he does work under Ms. All Sunday.”

Nami nodded her head at him. “That’s a very likely possibility, but without his name and with the fact that Ms. All Sunday and Crocodile probably do know his name they are probably limiting what Luffy can do. So even if he does know it, without his name it wouldn’t be likely that he could tell us or do anything about it to help us.”

More of the other female workers had entered the rooms at this point, so their small group shuffled out to the balcony and slide the door closed as they continued their conversation.

“Names really are everything here aren’t they?” Zoro asked considering the four spirits before him and everything he had learned in the past day.

“They are.” Vivi nodded. “As a human it probably has less of a hold over you but for us, if someone knows your true name and who you are and you don’t, much like Luffy right now, it gives them power over you.”

“It’s really hard to explain to someone who isn’t a spirit.” Nami continued. “For us its such an intrinsic thing, its hard to even think of how to explain it to you.”

“Theres also the fact that this guy is an idiot.” Sanji teased, a grin cutting into his face.

Zoro shouted in indignation as the other laughed, the tension diffused from the group and the boys departed into their own room. Many of their roommates were already lying down to sleep, so Zoro, Usopp and Sanji quickly rolled out their bed mats. Zoro settled into his, and eyed the empty space where Luffy usually slept, he was still unnerved that he hadn’t really seen Luffy at all that day, and apparently neither had anyone else.

Zoro fell into a fitful sleep after that and when he awoke next the rest of the room was slowly rising as well for the days’ work.

There was no sign that Luffy had appeared at all the night before.

As their group shuffled down the hallway for breakfast and the start of the days work, Zoro turned his attention to the others.

“Have you seen Luffy at all since yesterday?”

Usopp shook his head in denial, “No and his bed and stuff in the boiler room haven’t been moved recently so I don’t think he’s been down there either.”

“You boys would probably see him before Vivi or I.” Nami said worriedly.

“This isn’t exactly an unusual situation,” Sanji said seriously as he rubbed his chin in contemplation. “sometimes he is gone for a few days on a job and then he’ll just turn up like nothing happened.”

“If we see Ace or Sabo in the baths we could ask them. Luffy does spend a good amount of his time away with his brothers.” Vivi assured them.

Zoro felt his unease sate a little at the prospect of asking Luffys brothers, the last time he had seen Luffy was when he was joining them in the sky. 

Luckily it didn’t take long for Ace and Sabo to make themselves known in the baths.

Zoro was shoulders deep into a tub, scrubbing mindlessly at the sides when the sound of a wooden panel clicking into place broke him from his daze and was all the warning he got before water began pouring into the tub he was just standing in. He had tumbled out of the tub as quickly as possible, culminating in him rolling off the edge of it. He glared up at Nami who was feigning innocence badly at the edge of the room, conveniently next to the panel where the tokens were sent to Usopp.

Vivi was doing her best to pretend she didn’t know them as she continued sweeping along the outside of the room.

“What the hell was that for?” Zoro demanded, shuffling his position of the floor so he was sitting up and no longer laying down.

“Someones coming to use this tub, I was just preparing it.” Nami called back coyly, battling her eyelids rapidly. “You don’t think I didn’t tell you on purpose did you?”

“I don’t need to think,” Zoro grumbled, sending her a halfhearted glare, “I know you did.”

“Alright you too,” Vivi giggled. “We have to prepare for the customer we can’t just mess with each other.”

Two sets of footsteps approached the room and a familiar voice cut in to the conversation.

“Oh whats this?” Ace said grinning over his shoulder at Sabo, “Luffys new human friend is slacking off on his share of the work?”

“What a shame,” Sabo said, shrugging in commiseration, “we had such high hopes for him from all Luffy had told us about him.”

“What a shame.” Ace nodded, slipping into the tub.

“A regular tragedy.” Sabo laughed as he vaulted in as well.

Zoro grit his teeth on the floor as Nami and Vivi laughed along with the two in the tub. Zoro threw his brush at Nami in protest before standing up. Before he had a chance to really think it over, Zoro walked to the edge of the tub and rested his arms along the rim before addressing them.

“Hey, have you guys seen Luffy lately? Last I saw him he was heading out somewhere with you two.”

The uneasy look Sabo and Ace shared did nothing to ease the worry that had been steadily building in his mind.

“We did see him yesterday, but only for a little bit.” Ace said, drifting over to the edge of the tub.

Sabo joined him at the rim, one elbow braced on the edge as well, “He said he had to go to a job but we don’t know anything about it.”

Zoro chewed the inside of his lip in unease, Sabo and Ace watched him with critical, considering eyes. From this close and with them this serious it was easy to see how these two were the dragons he had seen yesterday, there was something about them that spoke of that nature rather than the calmer nature of the other spirits Zoro had come to know here.

 “You’re a good guy aren’t you Zoro?” Sabo said tilting his head back to regard Zoro, “You seem very earnest.”

“I,” Zoro began, slightly unsure of where this was coming from, “guess?”

Ace chuckled and smirked up at him, reaching one wet hand to ruffle his equally wet hair, “He does seem like it doesn’t he?”

There was a long pause as Zoro waited for either of them to continue or even explain where this conversation had come from, Ace and Sabo shared one last look, Sabo drifted back to the opposite end of the tub. Ace, however, caught Zoros eye and held his gaze.

“He’s a handful of a little brother, this is true. But we can’t always be there to help him especially as you probably know by now with the way the spirit world runs.” Ace admitted, he lowered his voice into a more serious tone and continued on, “So when we can’t, we need you to take care of him for us.”

“We’re entrusting him to you.” Sabo clarified, his relaxed tone was at odds with the serious set of his face and the warning that Zoro could very easily read underneath his words.

Zoro didn’t need long to consider their words at all, he knew without a doubt that he would do whatever he could to help Luffy. He nodded in agreement.

“I understand.”

He gave the two brothers a quick goodbye and set off to join Nami and Vivi, who had left sometime during their conversation, at their next assignment.

“Have a nice chat with Ace and Sabo?” Nami asked from inside the next tub.

“Did they have any news about Luffy?” Vivi asked worriedly, popping her head over the rim of the tub to address him.

Zoro hopped in the tub to join them, “No they haven’t seen him since yesterday as well.”

“That idiot, he’s gone and gotten himself into trouble I just know it.” Nami muttered to herself, shaking her head.

Zoro couldn’t help but agree with her. He could feel a deep ache in his chest, what had started off as an idle worry for Luffy had grown into a physical ache. The unease turned his stomach and Zoro no longer was looking forward to lunch.

“Ace and Sabo can turn into dragons right?”

Nami and Vivi paused and twisted to look at him, struck by the sudden conversation change.

“Yes?” Nami answered unsure at why he was asking this.

“Alright just wanted to make sure I didn’t actually hallucinate that the other day.” Zoro nodded to himself, grinning just a bit when Nami slapped the back of his head.

“Luffy can too right?” Zoro asked, casting a glance over his shoulder.

“Yes he can,” Vivi agreed, “He has quite the beautiful dragon form.”

“I couldn’t see much of it the other day, just glimpses.” Zoro remarked, he kept the unspoken desire to see Luffys dragon form up close, to be able to study it and really get a chance to admire it to himself, but he couldn’t help but mentally agree with Vivi.

From the brief glances and far away view he had the other morning, Zoro couldn’t deny that his dragon form was nothing short of stunning.

He shook his head rapidly to clear those thoughts and Zoro sent a quick thought to every possible deity he knew of that Nami and Vivi, especially Nami, couldn’t see how warm his cheeks had grown at the recollection.

Distant clamoring brought them all out of whatever conversation they could have continued on from there, and a harried attendant ran into their room and braced themselves on the doorway, panting heavily before beginning to speak.

“We have a guest coming,” The attendant wheezed, “Needs the biggest tub we have, Zoro is assigned to it.”

“Wait!” Nami shouted, stopping the attendant from turning around, “By himself? That’s crazy he just barely started working here.”

“It does not seem right for him to have to do it all himself.” Vivi continued.

The attendant looked nervous as he hopped from foot to foot, “Well it’s the orders from upstairs so I really cant say otherwise.”

As Nami and Vivi both continued to pin him with a glare he deflated and began again.

“But if you two help him out of your own free will I guess nothing can be really done for it?”

“Much better.” Nami nodded waving him off.

The pure relief on the mans face was enough to make Zoro snort.

“What’s so bad about the big tub?”

“Its usually really dirty and hard to clean, so no one ever likes to do it.” Nami said wrinkling her nose in distaste at the thought.

“It does seem as though Ms. All Sunday is being unusually hard on you still.” Vivi wondered as they quickly headed in the direction of the biggest tub on the floor.

Zoro rolled his shoulders, releasing some of the tension that had built up during the day, “It’s nothing I couldn’t have handled.”

Nami gave a short bark of a laugh, “Wait until you see it.”

They rounded the corner to the big tub and Zoro barely contained a sign of exasperation, even from here he could see a layer of dirt caking the inside.

“I’ll go get tokens,” Vivi nodded to herself, “Nami if you could start sweeping that be good and Zoro in one the exterior rooms there is extra brushes and such would you go and get those?”

Zoro, who had no clue where to begin on the tub himself, accepted the direction and set off quickly lest Nami give him some other type of grunt work on the tub. In the side room Zoro paused a moment to stare at another onslaught of rain pouring outside the doors, the longer he stared the more he realized there was something outside the doors.

“Is that a skeleton?” Zoro mused to himself.

He slid open the door enough to stick his head out, “Do you want to come in?”

A trilling laugh echoed from the skeleton and Zoro stiffened minutely. The skeleton stood and gave a bow to Zoro.

“Oh yes I would, thank you sir.”

Zoro nodded and spun on his heel grabbing the bucket and leaving the room quickly, he had left the door just open enough for the skeleton to follow on through behind him.

He walked back to the tub room, bucket hoisted under his arm.

“Oh finally what’d you do get lost?” Nami snickered.

Zoro rolled his eyes and climbed the edge of the tub to begin scrubbing.

“Don’t even bother Zoro.” Vivi said from the edge of the room. “Ive gotten a water token that has herbal water so its murky, the client won’t even know if the tub is still dirty. The dirt on the inside would take days to scrub regardless.”

“So what now?”

“Scrub the outside of the tub, Nami and I have sent the water token down to Usopp for now, and when he gets it down just fill the tub up.” Vivi said brushing her hands together to clean them off.

“In the meantime, we’ve been called in to do work in another tub, guess Ms. All Sunday was serious about you being alone.” Nami shrugged placing her broom into Zoros hands. “We’ll catch you at lunch.”

Vivi waved as the two girls departed from the room leaving Zoro alone.

Zoro idled at the edge of the room, he hadn’t really been on his own any time during his work hours here and now that he was in this large spacious room the emptiness was somewhat unsettling. He could remember times back when he wasn’t in the spirit world how he valued the solitude and silence but here and now a part of him desired for at little company.

He shook the thoughts off and began to clean the outside of the tub, soon enough the water spout descended from the water and Zoro climbed the basin to pull at the string, balancing there on the edge while he watched the tub fill up. It was then Zoro noticed how unnaturally quiet it was outside his tub room, he slid down the outside of the tub and walked to the doorway. There was no one moving around outside, until a shorter attendant scurried past him, Zoro caught them by the back of the neck as they passed.

“What’s going on?”

“Ah the human,” The attendant began wincing, “We have been ordered to take our lunch now.”

“No one told me that.” Zoro said arching an eyebrow in confusion.

“Oh well, because you’re assigned to the upcoming guest so you aren’t allowed to take your lunch now, but once the guest is done with you can…?” The small spirit trailed off questioningly.

Something was very off about the situation but Zoro doubted this spirit would know so he released them and they practically slipped on the floor they ran from him so fast. Zoro paced the length of the room in contemplation a sense of annoyance growing as more time passed and nothing changed.

He couldn’t very well leave the room just in case there actually was a customer coming and if he wasn’t here when they came there was no telling what Ms. All Sunday could do to him. That thought irked Zoro even more than the waiting did, he didn’t enjoy the uncertainty around her power in the bathhouse, and there was no telling what she could do in this world, in the human world maybe he’d have an idea but not in the spirit world.

He leaned against the doorway of the bathhouse and chewed idly on the corner of his thumbnail. He was largely unnerved by this situation and the quiet echo of the bathhouse only served to amp up the weird atmosphere of the room. There was no sound besides the water filling the tub behind him, the sound echoed out of the basin and rebounding all about the open bathhouse floor. It was times like these, the unnatural stillness of this room, the unnatural stillness of this whole world, that really reminded Zoro that he was actually in the spirit world. He turned and climbed the edge of the tub to pull at the string once more to stop it and now there was no sound in the open area except for his own shallow breathing.

There was a sudden sound that broke his reverie; a low deep grumbling echoed from somewhere on the bathhouse floor. Zoros spine straightened and a chill ran down his back. A hulking form finally rounded the corner and walked into the bath stall Zoro had been waiting in.

His appearance took Zoro back for a second, he didn’t know what he was expecting when he was told he had a guest coming that no one else was going to work on, but it certainly wasn’t someone who seemed to just be an older man. As he came closer Zoro could see a large thick scar that came from the man’s forehead and down over his eye onto his cheek. Zoro turned and let him get into the tub; to be honest he was not the best at the customer service portion of attending to people in the baths but the older man seemed content to just soak in peace and silence.

Zoro took to sweeping the floor to keep himself busy, he paused for a second and considered the old man, there was something in his face that struck him as familiar, “Is there something I can do?”

The old man cracked an eye open at him and laughed, “No you’re good kid, the name is Garp by the way. You new here?”

Zoro sighed, because of course it had been that easy to figure it out. He merely nodded in acquiescence. Garp simply laughed again.

There was another pause as Zoro considered going back to work, but as Garp was still holding eye contact with him Zoro wasn’t going to be the first to break the stare. He felt as though Garp was staring into him and it caused his limbs to lock up and freeze. 

Garp was the one to break the eye contact in the end, he sighed and stared into the reflective surface of the water. It was quiet a moment longer before he spoke up again, his voice was boisterous and teasing as it had been before, now it was quieter and more solemn.

“I have a grandson who works here.”

Zoro blinked in surprise at the sudden confession, “Who is it?”

Garps jaw clenched but he said nothing, Zoro felt as though the answer to something was right on the tip of his tongue but he couldn’t quite figure out what it was yet.

Garp stretched and turned instead of continuing the conversations and Zoro could see debris of some kind sticking out from the spirits back.

“Do you want me to get that for you?”

Garp turned and glanced over his shoulder before his loud laugh returned, “Ah shit I had forgotten about that. Well that explains a lot of things, come over here kid and give me a hand with it.”

Zoro nodded and walked over to the spirit and put a hand on the hilt of whatever was stuck in the spirit.

“Alright, here we go.”

That was the only warning left as Zoro gave a hard yank to the misshapen object stuck in the spirits back and it came free with a bare bit of resistance and Garp gave a relieved sigh and sunk into the water. Zoro dropped the object with no second thought and stepped back from the tub.

What came out of the water next was not the same form that had gone in. Zoro found himself suddenly staring face to face with the massive dark blue head of a dragon, the long whiskers on its face whipped gently through the water stirring it and leaving small waves in its wake.

The dragon bowed his large head to the point that his nose dipped into the surface of the water, Zoro haltingly gave a nod in response. The dragon, Garp his mind corrected belatedly, locked their eyes in a piercing stare, his eyes were intense and locked onto Zoro and once again he felt his soul laid before this unfathomable spirit.

A column of water rose from the tub and wound slowly around Garps fierce form. The column detached from Garp and Zoro was transfixed by the slow moving rope of water that moved towards him. The water was cool as it engulfed him from head to toe but he could still breathe in the water, in fact this sensation felt a little familiar. Something about it was off but in the back of his mind a memory tugged at Zoros thoughts, the water receded back into the tub before it could be remembered though.

In his dragon form still Garp gave one last nod towards Zoro before shooting out from the tub and whipping his way outside through one of the high windows located in the bath area. All that was left from this encounter was a tub full of water and a ball of what seemed to be medicine left behind in Zoros hands.

Zoro was still stunned from the encounter and he numbly set about draining the tub and wandering out of the room to go and try and find lunch.

By the time all the other spirits had returned from their jobs and retired for the night, Zoro sat on the balcony his legs dangling over the edge and his chin dug into his forearms which were crossed on the railing in front of him. Today had been a sort of revelation of sorts and there was still something that sat in the back of his mind, a big piece of what was happening here was ready to be figured out, he knew he had figured out many of factors but they weren’t aligning themselves in any sort of way that solved anything.

Nami folded herself into seated positions beside him on the balcony not too soon later.

“Don’t think too hard you only have so many brain cells to use.” Nami snorted nudging him with an elbow.

He cast her a glance out of the corner of his eye, “Where are the others?”

She yawned and stretched flopping onto her back and folding her arms up under her head, “Gone off to bed already, it was a long day. How did the big tub go for you?”

Zoro shrugged one shoulder and angled his body to face her, “It worked out fine,” he reached into the pocket of his shirt and pulled out the ball he’d been given. “I got this from him though.”

Nami raised herself up onto a hand and took the proffered ball from him and turned it around examining it from all directions.

“It’s a medicine ball,” She began slowly raising the ball up to her nose to sniff, “Yeah definitely medicine, this is some strong stuff. That must have been a powerful spirit.”

Zoro took the medicine ball back from her outstretched hand and tucked it away again.

“I was meaning to ask you guys can you all turn into dragons?”

Nami looked at him critically for a long moment, the train bell echoed off in the distance but Zoro and Nami kept a tense eye contact.

“What do you mean?”

Zoro rubbed the back of his neck quickly before spinning in his seat so he was now seated cross-legged facing her rather than the landscape around the bathhouse.

“Luffy and his brothers can be a dragon, the spirit from today, Garp, can become a dragon. Do you all also turn into dragons or just them?”

“Garp?” Nami repeated slowly, “The spirit today was Garp?”

“Yeah you know him?” Zoro asked his interest spiking and he felt his body tense.

Nami opened and closed her mouth a few times, and Zoro recognized the action as when the spirit tries to talk about something that the laws of the spirit world forbid.

He let out a loud sigh and gently scuffed his hand over the top of her head, “Forget that, back to the dragon thing.”

Nami scowled and fixed the hair he had mussed, “No we can’t all turn into dragons.”

“Damn that would have been cool.”

Nami snorted at his comment and continued. “Some spirits don’t have any other form besides their base form. A lot of us, due to how the bathhouse is run, can’t remember how to transform because its been taken away much like your own name has been I assume.”

Zoro nodded to indicate she was right in her assumption.

“What determines if you can transform or not?” Zoro asked.

“Strength mostly.” Nami said sitting up fully and mirroring Zoros position. At Zoros quirked eyebrow she sighed in exasperation, “Not physical strength. It depends on our strength as spirits.”

Nami must have read something in the completely blank uncomprehending look that Zoro must have had on her face because she continued her explanation.

“Some spirits are just that, only spirits, these are the ones that really only have one form. Some of us are spirits that represent something like luck, wealth, prosperity and we have usually another smaller form, like an animal or something. But guardian spirits are the strongest type of spirit that has claim to entire pieces of nature that they watch over and guard. Those are the spirits that can turn into dragons.”

“Entire pieces of nature?” Zoro repeated confused, he had a few questions from her explanation but this one was pulling at him.

“Yeah usually physical aspects in the mortal realm that are also reflected here. For example, there’s a Guardian Spirit of the Western Wind and a Guardian Spirit of Fire; so things such as that.”

“What kind of spirit are you? And the others?”

Nami quirked her lips in a smug smirk, “Someone is full of questions tonight.” She giggled at Zoro’s disgruntled look, “Calm down I’m just teasing you. I’m a spirit of fortune and luck, I also have two forms, my second one is a cat but I prefer this form.”

“Usopp is a regular spirit though he has some ability with the soot balls and his contraptions as you’ve seen. Vivi is a spirit that’s sort of hard to explain but she encompasses hospitality, which is a very old custom so she’s much older than Usopp or I. Sanji is a fire spirit as well, hes not the Guardian Spirit but he also has another form like I do.”

Zoro stared blankly at her as he took in the veritable onslaught of information. “Alright that is a lot of process.”

“I knew it would be too much info for you all at once.” Nami teased patting Zoros shoulder in faux sympathy.

“Wait Vivi is older than you guys by a lot and you mentioned her dad, but do you all have like families like humans do?”

Nami blew out another breathe that he knew she didn’t actually need to take and this time it was her who was giving a one shouldered shrug.

“Kind of? Not really. A lot of spirits just came into existence, like minor nature spirits are born of the world. But some of us, like Vivi and Luffy for example, are born of other spirits. Not a lot can harm or destroy us which is why we can have such large age disparities but families like that are able to pass their powers or guardian spirits can pass their domain onto a progeny. Which is how Vivi got the bathhouse from her father who became just a regular spirit again.”

“Seems so complicated.” Zoro mused he fell back onto the wooden deck and Nami laid down next to him after a beat.

“Its confusing enough being a spirit, I knew you’d have issues with it and you don’t seem like the smartest of people.” Nami said moving slightly to bump their shoulders together.

Zoro decided not to respond to another of Nami’s digs and he once again felt the ever expanding pit in his chest that reminded him of the fact that his family was somewhere lost here, far from him.

“Zoro have you seen Luffy recently?” Nami began a little unsurely.

Zoro swallowed the bitter taste in his mouth. “Not for a few days. That isn’t good is it?”

“He sometimes disappears for a while but it feels off this time-” A yawn broke off whatever she was going to say next and Zoro bid her goodnight and shuffled back into the boys room, falling into his spot by Usopp and Sanji, though he was keenly aware of the empty space next to him.

It was still empty and cold the next day when he awoke again.

Zoro yawned and rubbed at his eyes as he noticed that no one else was in the room either, which was strange in itself. The balcony doors were left open and a gentle breeze drifted through ruffling Zoros sheets, the smell of the ocean was somehow ever present and encapsulated the whole room.

He stretched and stood up from his bed just as someone bodily ran into the room door. HE trudged over and cracked it open only to be greeted by the sight of a harried Usopp holding himself on the door frame.

“Is there a problem?”

“Zoro!” Usopp cried. “You’re up! We thought you woke up when we all left but then you never appeared downstairs so they sent me to get you.”

Zoro craned his neck out of the door and looked down the hallway, distantly he could hear some sort of commotion going on.

“What is that?”

“So um theres this little situation going on downstairs,” Usopp began fidgeting. “A skeleton spirit is in the bathhouse, funnily enough he’s a friend of ours, but he’s been banned because he always causes a commotion among the female spirits and he’s asking for you.”

This made Zoro pause. “A skeleton spirit?”

“Well he just looks like a skeleton, but anyway did you let him in? Or is he asking for some other green haired spirit that smells like a human?”

Zoro sighed, “Yeah yeah I think I left a door open for him the other day in the rain.”

A flicker out of the corner of his eye drew his attention towards the open balcony door, he could have sworn he saw something spiraling through the air.

“Dude you good? We’ve got to go; I need your help to get Brook out before Ms. All Sunday comes down on all of us.” Usopp said tugging gently on the sleeve of Zoros shirt.

But Zoros attention was only for the window as another blur of red and blue wound its’ way through the scenery he could see outside of his room.

“I’ll be there in a bit I have to see something first.” Zoro said distractedly as he slid the door back shut and ignored Usopps dismayed shout.

He heard the thudding of Usopps’ feet as he ran back down the stairs, Zoro all but tripped onto the balcony and scanned the horizon for what he could have sworn was Luffy’s dragon form.

He gripped the balcony tightly, the wood cracking under his grip, he looked around the landscape and in the waters that still lay below them but he couldn’t see anything until a shadow passed over him. He cast his glance up towards the sky so quickly he may have heard his neck crack but there he could finally see Luffy.

What he saw didn’t ease any of the worries that had been building up over the past couple days, the way Luffy was loping throughout the sky was not like the first time he had seen him rolling and twisting towards his brothers. This time Luffy was dropping through the air rapidly and lurching back up and then dropping again. It was a listing sort of flying and Zoro knew something was really wrong with Luffy, it was like when someone was stumbling due to an injury or a sickness.

His heart was lodged in his throat and pounding in his head as he could do nothing but watch Luffy lose altitude and then lurch back upwards in the sky before almost folding in on himself again.

Luffy was steadily getting closer and closer to the bathhouse with each bob and roll in the air and Zoro had horrible flashes of him smacking into the side of the wall, he didn’t know if it could destroy a spirit such as Luffy but he suspected it wouldn’t do him any good.

Just as he approached the bathhouse Luffy suddenly fell out of the sky and dropped towards the water below, as he passed the balcony Zoro was practically frozen to, Zoro reached an arm out to try and grasp anything. His fingers may have just reached one of the black hairs that made up Luffys mane but he had no hold whatsoever on him.

When there was no splash Zoro leaned over and saw Luffy roll over himself and once again make a zig-zagging climb back up into the sky. Zoro was practically hanging off the balcony as he watched Luffy work his way into the sky, being outlined against the waning sun.

The was a sudden shattering of glass and ice spread down Zoros spine as Luffy crashed head first into the top floor which he knew could only be Ms. All Sundays office.

There was no time to stop or think as Zoro ran from his room. But as soon as he got into the hallway there were people crowding the stairs and shouting, distantly there was someone singing and Zoro remembered Usopp asking for his help earlier.

Zoro cursed under his breath and turned on the ball of his bare foot and crashed back inside his room.

He leaned over the balcony, he had to get up to the top floor but with the commotion in the hallways there was no way he could make it up there. As he took in the outside of the bathhouse Zoro couldn’t see any real ladder except for one floors above him and the only way to get there was a series of interlocking pipes sticking out of the wall.

Steeling his nerves Zoro hoisted himself onto the awning of the balcony, there was a steel pipe located just above him and with a short jump he was able to grab ahold of it and pull himself on top of it.

The metal groaned under his weight and Zoro grit his teeth tightly as his body tensed at the noise. He couldn’t afford to lock up here and now and he had too much of the wall left to climb to stop now. He was momentarily grateful for all of the workouts he had gone through for kendo because without those Zoro had no idea how he would fare on this task.

The steel pipe he was currently balanced on continued on horizontally which was the only way he could continue on from here, steadily he began to walk along the pipe trying not to tense or move to much as the metal began groaning under him again.

When he was about halfway there, a popping noise from behind him broke his concentration. Zoro was spurned into action on nothing but instinct as he ran along the pipe and threw himself at the bottom rung of the waiting ladder. One hand grasped the rung while the other slipped from its grip.

Zoro hung suspended in the air, the sound of his labored breathing was joined with the sound of metal creaking as the pipe disjoined from the wall and fell with a clamor into the water below. He heaved a breath, shaking off the nerves that had begun creeping along his senses as he stared at the wreck of the pipe in the water below him.

He couldn’t concentrate on that now, he had to get to Luffy. With that he put his other hand on the rungs and began to pull himself up until he could get his feet on the ladder as well. A relieved breath slipped out from between his lips as he began climbing.

Zoro climbed as high as the ladder went and he was finally even with the window he could see that Luffy had crashed through. There was glass strewn about the windowsill and much to Zoros dismay a few smears of blood were left along the edge of the window as well.

From his vantage point he could very easily grasp the windowsill and heave himself onto it. He quickly transferred himself from ladder to window and steeled himself as he peered inside the dark room. He couldn’t see Luffy but he could hear restless shuffling and quiet noises from deeper inside the room.

He climbed into the shattered window, a few stray shards of glass cut his calves and forearms but he paid no mind to it as he carefully and quietly walked into the main receiving room of Ms. All Sundays office and with a rare streak of luck she was nowhere in the room.

However, his luck ended there.

As he stepped fully into the room he saw Luffy strewn on the floor. He was in his dragon form and at any other time Zoro would have taken the chance to appreciate how he looked in this form, but any appreciation he had for his dragon shape was overtaken by the visible wounds he could see among the gradient scales and the unfocused, bloodshot eyes that stared unblinking at the far end of the wall.

Zoro went to his knees with a heavy thud and placed his hands on top of Luffy’s form, his touch garnered only the slightest of responses; a twitch of the muscle under his hand and his eyes shuttered ever so slightly off to the side.

“Luffy. You need to get out of here.” Zoro shook him slightly, anxiety was pulling at his gut, he knew he had to get Luffy out of here before Ms. All Sunday returned. At this point there was no way to even know who had done this to Luffy but Zoro wasn’t willing to count Ms. All Sunday or her group as being innocent just yet.

Luffy seemed to respond vaguely to his name, at least that is how Zoro chose to interpret the twitch of his body. He called out to him again, he could hear how strained his voice was. He needed Luffy to be awake and responsive but so far he was unshakable from this fugue state.

Zoro’s hand slide against one of the wounds the laced Luffys side and earned a full body flinch that turned into a spasm as Luffys body responded to the pain of the wound.

An icy fist enclosed Zoros chest and squeezed, his heart felt strained and he was being pulled in too many directions all at once. He needed to get Luffy out of here but he didn’t want to move him if it caused him to respond like this. There was an open floor panel that seemed to function as some sort of air shaft and Luffy pained spasm and twitching seemed to move him closer and closer to the whole.

Zoro covered Luffy’s body with his own to try and hold him in place. Luffy writhed and flailed against him. Zoro could feel his own heart pounding loudly between him and Luffy. Adrenaline coursed through him as he held Luffy in place.

Before he could get Luffy to still he heard voices and an unmistakable click of heels in the coming hallways. Another burst of adrenaline rolled through his vein in a heavy wave and the open floor panel suddenly seemed to be the only escape route that he had.

Zoro loosened his hold on Luffy who, without the force holding him to the floor, began to list into the opening in the floor. Zoro hastily grasped a hold of one of Luffys horns that protruded just behind his ears and the two of them tipped over the edge of the opening and fell into the dark chasm below.

Zoro struggled to hold on as they began their descent into what Zoro could assume would end up being the boiler room.

There was an odd sense of déjà vu as he held onto to Luffys horns and held on as the two of them fell through the airways. His knees enclosed either side of Luffys flank to hold on and the sense of familiarity was so tight in his chest it was almost choking him; like his head was suddenly thrust underwater.

After another moment of his hold onto Luffy, something seemed to jolt through the spirit below him and suddenly Luffy was alert and the power and danger of the spirit thrummed to life as his muscles tensed and he regained the control of his body.

Zoro was somewhat unsure with how it happened but Luffy managed to slow their descent and instead of a fall that would have definitely killed him in the human world but in this spirit world they hadn’t succumbed to any sort of injury yet. A wooden panel was at the end of the shaft and Zoro only had time to tense in alarm before Luffy folded himself up and seemed to cover Zoro with his body and he then drove them through the wooden panel crashing into the ground below.

White spots exploded in his eyes and for a short moment Zoro was stunningly aware of the pain that resounded from the crash. He blinked away the spots in his eyes and a small groan slipped from his mouth. He then whipped his head to the side and stared at Luffy.

He was still in his dragon shape but his alert state had left him and the crash and previous injuries left Luffy unconscious and nonresponsive on the ground next to him. Zoro rolled onto his side to try and jostle Luffy into wakefulness again but as his head cleared he was aware of someone shouting.

He cast a glance around the room and saw that he was in the boiler room as he suspected they would end up in. Standing a few feet away from the debris and wreckage of their sudden explosion into the room were Nami and Usopp who watched them with wide, shocked eyes and they both shouted over each other.

“Zoro!” Usopp shouted, standing behind his chair as a barrier once again, “What happened? Is that Luffy?”

Zoro rubbed his head to try and stave off a headache, Nami was suddenly crouched in his eye line.

“Zoro look at me, what is happening here?” Nami placed both her hands on Zoro’s shoulders and forcefully pulled his attention from Luffy’s unmoving body.

“I don’t know exactly; Luffy’s hurt I found him like that.”

“He doesn’t look good.” Nami said worriedly. “I’ve never seen him like this.” Nami shifted away from Zoro and carded a hand through Luffys mane, it came away streaked with blood. Nami unsuccessfully tried to hide her grimace.

There was more grumbled swearing as Sanji suddenly slid the panel of the room open and lurched towards the four of them quicker than Zoro had seen him move before.

“Shit.” Sanji cursed, popping a cigarette into his mouth. “So this is why you couldn’t deal with Brook. Do we know what happened?”

“Zoro says he doesn’t know.” Usopp called out still from the safety of his hiding place.

“I think it may have been related to work, I saw him flying back into and he crashed into Ms. All Sundays office and I went after him.”

Sanji walked over and crouched by Luffys body, he put one hand on the scales and studied his prone form carefully.

“He’s must have been attacked on his job,” Sanji addressed the group, removing his hand from Luffy and standing back up, “His injuries are very serious and I think he might have been cursed by Ms. All Sunday.”

“What do you mean cursed?” Zoro asked his body subconsciously shifting into an alert state, he was tense and wired with restless energy he had no way of expelling.  

Sanji hummed thoughtfully, “This magic power around him and this injured state he’s in, its not entirely out of the realm of possibilities that Ms. All Sunday had this as a contingency for Luffy going against her.”

“It is sort of how she operates to keep all these spirits under control. Taking our names, cursing us to not be able to try and get them back without reparations such as this.” Nami muttered.

Zoro pulled the medicine ball from the pocket where it still resided, “Would this help?”

Nami blinked in surprise, “It could actually, I don’t know if it would completely heal him.”

“Woah where’d you get that? Usopp asked peering at the medicine ball resting between Zoros forefinger and thumb.

“Is there a way to completely heal him?” Zoro asked seriously, his attention which had been cast askew from the crash into the room was now hyper focused on saving Luffy.

The three of them exchanged a look that spoke volumes of secrets Zoro had yet to learn.

“What do you know?” Zoro demanded, this secret had some hand in whatever was happening with Luffy and why he was like this and the crash of anger in his veins was unexpected and unstoppable.

“Calm down.” Nami cautioned. “Biting our heads off isn’t going to fix any of this.” Her own anger bleed into her voice granting it a sharp edge as she gestured at the wreckage around them and Luffys prone form.

 “Well we think that there may be someone who could help…” Usopp trailed off finally stepping around from his chair, a ticket stub clutched in his hands. He passed the ticket off to Sanji.

“There’s a woman out in the marshes who could be able to help.” Sanji began, flipping the ticket over in his hands as he talked.

Nami got up and began pacing the floor. “It could work; I mean she would be the only person.”

“Who?”

“Her name is Robin and she’s a very strong nature spirit. Flowers, vines, that sort of thing.” Usopp explained sitting cross-legged next to Zoro.

“She’s got a gift for curses and obviously their remedies so if anyone could help heal Luffy from what Ms. All Sunday has done it would be her.” Nami nodded in agreement with Usopp.

“How do I get to her?” Zoro asked standing abruptly.

Sanji walked over and placed the ticket in front of Zoros face. “There is a sea train that runs from here to the last stop in the marches where Robin is. This ticket will get you there but not back, but assuming your idiot moss brain can do all that Robin should help with the return.”

“It also helps that Robin and Franky, who runs the sea train, are friends of ours. So they’ll probably help you help Luffy regardless.” Usopp shrugged.

Zoro took the train ticket from Sanji, sneering slightly at him, Sanji in response just grimaced back at him.

“Alright.” Zoro tucked the train ticket into his pocket, looked about the room at them. “I’ll go visit this Robin to try and save Luffy.”

“We would go,” Nami broke in a little unsurely, “But there is only one ticket and we aren’t really allowed to leave the bathhouse, your human nature sort of bends that rules.”

Zoro just nodded at her in understanding. His gaze drifted like a magnet back towards Luffy.

“Back up for a second theres something I’m going to try.”

“What do you mean?” Nami asked tilting her head in confusion.

Zoro held up the medicine ball again, “It couldn’t hurt to give it to him, but I also don’t know how he’ll react.”

“The idiot is right that is probably for the best.” Sanji sighed another grimace laced his features as the idea of agreeing with Zoro seemed to physically pain him.

Sanji shuffled the other two out of the small sliding door they had previously entered from and Zoro slowly approached Luffy. The red and blue scales were still streaked with drying blood though the wounds seemed to have finally stopped actively bleeding. In the quiet of the moment, Zoro paused and admired Luffy in this form.

Despite the grim, dirt and blood that caked him at the moment Zoro couldn’t help but acknowledge that Luffy was breathtaking. The scales were a gradient of blue scales starting at his black mane that ran down his back that faded into a stark red, the color he had originally seen when Luffy had been in the air with his brothers.

Putting aside his admirations for now Zoro pried open the menacing build of Luffys draconic jaw, the sets of sharp pointed teeth projected threat and harm but Zoro wasn’t really worried especially when Luffy hadn’t so much as twitched in the past few minutes. That was only really worrying for Luffys fate, not his own.

Zoro had a desperate moment where he almost wished more than anything that this would work; this entire misadventure from entering the spirit world had been one step downhill after another and this was starting to seem more like a fall than a gradual descent. He needed Luffy to live. Not just because Luffy was his best hope at reuniting with his family and leaving the spirit world.

He just needed Luffy to be alive. Nothing else seemed to matter at that moment.

With that Zoro shoved the medicine ball into Luffys mouth and closed his jaw. In less than a moment Luffy surged upward as if being shocked into wakefulness, but the violent, disoriented thrashing proved that this was an instinctual lash out and not any of Luffys own will.

Zoro bent over Luffys head holding his jaw shut and Luffy undulated and crashed back into the floor over and over again. After a few long moments, Luffy once again sunk back into stillness but instead of seemingly unconscious he looked more restful.

Zoro slowly released Luffys head which came to rest on his knees, the tightness in Zoros chest was back as he watched Luffy lay motionless but peaceful below him.

There was a sound like waves crashing and water rolling over itself and Zoro watched entranced as the dragon body seemingly melted off of Luffys and all that was left was the form Zoro had first met him in.

His head was still flopped into Zoros lap and relief was beginning to filter into Zoros mind as the look on his face was peaceful and not strained from whatever had happened.

Usopp and Nami stepped back into the room as the noise had died down and Usopp procured a bed from somewhere in the room and helped Zoro slide Luffy on to the futon rather than the wood paneled floor.

“We’ll take care of him, you should probably go before Ms. All Sunday comes looking for you.” Nami advised pulling Zoro up by his hands.

“Sanji had to return back upstairs for his job, but you need to get a move on if we want the best chance at saving Luffy.” Usopp babbled worriedly. “Also on your way out remember to get Brook.”

“Ugh of course you had something to do with that idiot.” Nami muttered to herself, rubbing a hand against her temple. “Go, and hurry time is really of the essence here.”

Zoro took a steading breath and straightened up, he nodded to the other two and walked towards the paneled door. It had seemed so long ago the first time he came through this door on his way to see Ms. All Sunday and now he was back here again, the circumstances an echoed parallel from his first trip. He turned and faced Luffy who was still motionless on the futon. An innumerable amount of feelings and thoughts welled up in him as he took in his figure; a deep seated worry and determination roiled along with something stronger he couldn’t quite name yet.

He took one last long look at Luffy, almost as if he were trying to commit his features to memory and turned back to face the way he was heading as he slid the panel of the door open.

“I’ll do whatever it takes to save him.”

With that he took a decisive step through the door and prepared himself for what was going to happen next. He knew that deep down it didn’t matter the cost to himself whatever needed to be done to save Luffy he would do willingly and without hesitation.

The door to the boiler room slid closed with a sharp, irrefutable pop.

Chapter Text

Zoro headed up towards the distant sounds of chaos and clamor, his resolve was a steel rod in his back. Some of the spirits he vaguely recognized from his time working in the bathhouse whispered and pointed as he passed. He assumed it was the fact that Brook was apparently asking for him and the cacophony of noises could only be because of that.

He turned that last few corners and came upon the scene that was causing so much trouble in the first place. 

Brook was standing in the middle of the room, a stringed instrument cradled between his head and his neck, the patrons and workers that surrounded him had a mix of countenances, some delighted in his music and others appeared at their wits end. Zoro could almost hear Perona’s voice snidely informing him it was a violin, he quickly stowed that thought, he couldn’t afford to lose his focus here. Ms. All Sunday was also present in the room, she leaned against the wall and regarded him coolly, for all that she was supposedly demanding his presence she seemed rather cavalier now that he was here.

“Ah, the human decides to grace us with his presence.” Ms. All Sunday drawled, her voice was at complete odds with her posture, while the way she stood broadcasted a casual atmosphere her tone was nothing but jagged ice.

Brook made a delighted humming noise as Zoro’s presence was announced. “My new friend! It is great to see you again, I never got to thank you for allowing me in.” Brook made a deep sweeping bow, a few of the smaller spirits dived off to the side as Brooks arm swept right where their heads had been.

Zoro was starting to understand why Ms. All Sunday had possibly banned Brook from the bathhouse, he didn’t seem like a bad spirit but from what he had seen of how the bathhouse was run he was much too lively and loud for any of the behaviors he had seen thus far outside of Luffys group.

“Yes, it is imperative we clear this matter up Zoro.” Ms. All Sunday broke in, stepping from the wall, and closing the distance between them in a few unnaturally graceful strides. She stopped mere feet in front of Zoro and leveled a considering stare at him. “Did you allow this spirit in?”

Zoro turned his head and glanced at Brook who had resumed serenading the patrons of the room, he made a few rather uncouth remarks towards the spirits that looked female, and Zoro could now definitely understand why he had been banned. He disregarded that matter, the tickets for the marsh were burning a hole in his pocket and the anxiety he felt over Luffy’s condition was sparking at the back of his mind. He had to get this over with quickly.

“Yes I did.”

More murmurs went around the crowd that watched them with blatant interest, Ms. All Sunday seemed rather off put by his blunt and unfriendly tone. He was reminded the last time he had seen her and really talked to her he was begging for a job. But now all he could think about was Luffy unconscious in the boiler room and the proposed possibility that this woman in front of him was the cause of it. His anger had turned his words to acid.

He had noticed a difference amongst him and the spirits of the bathhouse and the manner in which they spoke. The spirits were never so caustic, any actual threats were made in vague statements and talks that seemed to go in circles. It was a very cloak and dagger manner in which they communicated-no outright threats, it was all interpretations and implications-humans were much, much different. Zoro had seen it himself, while the other spirits, like Nami and Sanji, would insult him in turn as he would to them that was as far as it went.

But here and now he could really see the difference, all spirits spoke with deference to Ms. All Sunday and her ilk, though they all had issues with her their complaints were hidden behind secretive smiles and false cheer, but Zoro was no such spirit. Down to his core he was human and he was rather blunt at that, he had no time for fake smiles and fake attitude, the venom in his words let it be known how he felt about Ms. All Sunday and this sort of offensive behavior had struck the wrong cord with her, he could see it from the tightening of her jaw and the way her face had smoothed out into a perfectly still façade.

“Well then, since you disrespected the rules of my bathhouse and let in a spirit without my approval you must be the one to take him out of here and get rid of him. Then I expect you back to work.” Here she paused and tilted her head to the side, there was still a smile on her face, but the hard set to her eyes, spoke of untold threat. “If you do not I would hate to see what happens to your contract and your state in this world.”

Zoro let himself mull over the threat, he was not too worried over most of it, but this bathhouse was the shelter he had desperately needed when he first arrived and he still needed it to look for his family. He nodded to her and she stepped off to the side, her face set back in its usual blank smile.

“Come on Brook, I’ll show you the way out.” Zoro said gesturing a hand over his shoulder.

A spirit to his side gave a short cough, which made Zoro pause and turn to them since the spirits didn’t need to breath so a cough was rather out of place here. The small spirit resembled a tree of some sort and they jerked a branch like arm in the opposite direction Zoro had pointed. He felt foolish for half of a second nodded his thanks to the spirit for pointing him in the actual way of the door but he let it roll off his back.

Brook bid adieu to the people in the room, the women who he had been singing at seemed to make no effort to hid their relief. Brook laughed and sauntered his way over to Zoro.

“Yes I figured my time was up on this stage, but it is no matter I shall take my leave now with you.” 

Brook clapped a skeletal hand on Zoros shoulder and walked off in the direction of the entrance, humming the song he had been playing. Zoro turned and eyed Ms. All Sunday critically for a moment, she still seemed rather too smug about this and a comment was burning on the tip of his tongue. Perhaps he should keep it to himself, but Zoro had never excelled at this sort of self-control, it was what got him into situations like this often.

He stepped closer to Ms. All Sunday and tilted his head in her direction so only she could hear what he was about to say:

“Are they really your rules if it’s not really your bathhouse?”

He felt a wicked smirk split his face just then and he relished in the shock that flashed across her features too quickly for her to hide away. He didn’t wait for her response, he just turned on his heel and followed Brook from the room.

He and Brook stepped out of the bathhouse and into the low sunlight of the day, it had been so long since he felt like he had been outside like this and Zoro stretched and basked in the sun for a long moment while Brook tittered at his actions.

“So where shall you take me then Zoro?” Brook asked keeping pace with him while Zoro head to the train station Nami had vaguely told him about.

Zoro paused his walking and Brook stepped to a stop beside him, “You’re friends with Luffy right?”

Brook heaved a pleasant-sounding hum and nodded, “Oh yes, Luffy seems to really enjoy the songs I play, he often lets me into the bathhouse.”  Brook plucked a few strings on his violin, “Shame the overseer doesn’t enjoy my much as much.”

Brook didn’t actually sound to despondent about it as after that statement he let out a long trilling laugh. Zoro found himself chuckling as well.

“Do you know where the train station is?” Zoro asked as he looked around the town.

He had lost sight of the building, he could have sworn it was just there on the horizon but now it was gone.

“Yes I do! Follow me!”

It was a rather short walk later that they found themselves at the edge of town, the train station was just a small building by the water’s edge. Zoro was starting to believe less that it was just the sheer amount of rain that caused the water to appear and more of something to do with the nature of the spirit world. He and Brook had kept up idle conversation as they trailed through the town and now that they stood waiting for the train together. The distant shrill noise of the whistle announced the trains arrival and Zoro stood quietly shocked as he watched it plow through the water.

“Quite magnificent is it not?” Brook surmised watching alongside him. “Franky has rather outdone himself.”

“Oh yeah Nami and the others said something about a Franky being the conductor, he’s friends with all of you too right?”

“Yes he is, and since I so often get removed from the bathhouse he ends up just letting me ride for free!” Brook set himself off into delighted laughter once again, then singing a rather short song about Franky and the train.

“I’m making the trip down to the marshes,” Zoro shrugged pulling out the ticket he had haphazardly stuffed in his pocket.

“That is quite the long journey, I shall make it my duty to accompany you.”

Zoro couldn’t think of any reason to protest the company, and he thought it was a rather good idea as he couldn’t really afford to get lost on his way out there. He was being depended on.

“How did Ms. All Sunday give you permission for this long trip?” Brook asked suddenly.

Zoro snorted. “She didn’t.”

“You are very brave for a human aren’t you?”

Zoro couldn’t really think of a response to that statement and he was saved from having to do so by the train finally pulling into the station.

The door to the train slide open with a loud smack and a cheerful voice beckoned them on board.

“Brook! Bro! You’re back again!”

“Ohoho~ It seems I am Franky, the bathhouse kicked me out again.” Brook sang stepping onto the train and folding his large body into a seat. “Ah, Luffys human friend is here to board as well.”

Zoro stepped onto the train and there was a broad figure that swung around to stare at him, Zoro was momentarily shocked because, unlike the rest of the spirits he had seen so far in this world, Franky seemed more similar to a cyborg than a spirit.

“A new friend of Luffys huh?” Franky stared down at Zoro and sized him up. “You got a ticket there bro?”

Wordlessly Zoro handed the ticket over and quirked an eyebrow up at Franky. As he read over the ticket Franky gave a delighted laugh.

“He’s friends with Luffy and them alright, I gave Luffy this ticket ages ago.”

Franky beckoned him on the chain with a hand that spanned most of Zoros body width. The same large hand smacked Zoro on the back as he passed to take a seat beside Brook.

“I mean the ticket was from Usopp, but I guess Luffy doesn’t really need it.” Zoro shrugged, slouching in the train seat.

“You got a point there.” Franky laughed as he slid the door to the train closed. “The ticket was from before I had known that.”

Franky swiped under his eye like he was wiping a tear away and gave a dramatic cry, “I’m just touched they kept the ticket all this time.”

He composed himself half a moment later and Zoro was beginning to think all of Luffys friends were this eccentric and idly wondered what that meant about himself.

“So where to?”

“The marsh,” Zoro began.

“On your way to see Robin?” Franky asked suddenly.

“Uh, yeah?” Zoro said a little caught off guard, he was mostly certain that’s who Nami had him going to see.

“Yes, I am accompanying him there as well, I figure I will spend some time with Robin. It has been a while since I’ve made it out that far.” Brook surmised, he had pulled out his violin once again and way idly plucking the strings.

“The trips to the marsh is pretty far, but I’ll get you both to Robin no problem.”

Franky turned on his barefoot and pulled some lever behind him and the train once again began to move down the tracks.

Brook and Franky made casual, but clearly familiar, conversation with each other. Zoro threw in a few comments into it but felt the horizon pull his focus from engaging fully.

He kept his eyes on the horizon but the steadying motions of the train and the soft music from Brook slowly pulled Zoro into a light slumber.

Dreams came in quick scattered pieces. Flashes of light and noise and color.

A long stretch of beach, the inviting blue of the ocean. The noise of the waves crashing over and over. Mihawk and Perona’s voice muffled in the background. His feet straddling the barrier of the sand and the sea. Perona yelping as her hat blew from her head to land in the waves.

The scenes blended and blurred together.

He was underwater, drowning, gasping for air and then he was suddenly on the beach.

The scene of Zoro and his family crossing the bridge into the island from the day before he was cast into the spirit world.

Perona with her hands on her hips as she huffed at him to hurry up.

Mihawks calm look as he watched the two of them bicker and trudge down the dirt street.

Luffy standing opposite of him on the bridge where they first met. The bridge suddenly melted away to give shape the beach from earlier. Luffy cocked his head at him, a wide grin on his face and he began to say something, one hand stretching out towards him.

“Zoro, you need to wake up. We’ve arrived in the marsh.” But the voice that came out was not Luffy’s, rather it was Brook. Zoro felt the dream began to pull away from him as he was taken back into consciousness.

“Oh he’s up!” Franky shouted from the other set of chairs.

Zoro groggily blinked his eyes, disoriented from the abrupt transition to wakefulness. Brook stood before him, bent in half their faces level. “I tried to wake you up earlier but you were so deep asleep.”

Zoro yawned. “Yeah, well I’m up now. You said we were here?”

Franky nodded pushing off the seats, “Yup dude, just head off the train and Brook can direct you to Robins. I’d join you but I’ve got other stops to make.”

“It was good to see you again Franky.” Brook said jovially, stepping off the train.

A heavy hand settled on Zoros shoulder once again, “Good to meet you bro, even though you slept the whole time!”

Zoro nodded. “Yeah nice to meet you as well,” He rubbed a hand over the back of his head, “sorry about sleeping the whole way.”

“No big deal dude.” Franky leveled him a more serious look, “Listen since they’re sending you all the way out here whatever is going on must be pretty serious so be careful.”

Zoro nodded once again and lofted a smirk up at Franky, “I got it, I’ll be fine.”

“Cool then dude!” Franky laughed as Zoro turned to walk off the train.

Zoro joined Brook at the humid train stop, and paused as Franky shouted out of the doorway of the train before he pulled away:

“Give Robin my love guys tell her I’ll stop by soon!”

“Will do Franky! Leave it to me!” Brook gave his same trilling laugh as the train rolled out of the station.

The two of them stood there and watched the train fade from view for a long moment.

“So Robins?”

Brook startled from whatever thought he had been pulled into, he fixed his jacket and turned to face the pathway.

“Yes let us go visit robin without delay.”

Zoro chuckled as he trailed behind Brook as he led them through the winding path of the marshes. It was such a different landscape here, while the bathhouse had been mostly open land this was covered and overgrown and humid. Like a city that had been lost to the ages that had been reclaimed by nature.

Brook hummed as he led them through the thickets of tree and bushes and suddenly there was a modest house, covered in vines and plants nestled amongst the scenery.

“This is it?” Zoro asked stepping beside Brook.

“Yes it is,” Brook slid up to the door and gave it a rhythmic knock. “Robin! It’s Brook and a new friend of Luffys!”

The door swung open a second later and Zoro felt his jaw drop as Ms. All Sunday was on the other side of the opened door. He immediately felt himself become defensive and he took an unintentional step back from her.

“That’s not Robin,” Zoro began his teeth clenched almost painfully, “That’s Ms. All Sunday.”

“Oh dear, it seems that someone’s been causing issues again with my old persona.”

Brook seemed rather unconcerned as Zoros shock and distrust as he just stepped inside the open door and began to help himself to a drink.

“Come inside, friend of Luffy, and I will explain what happening. But know I am a friend of Luffys as well and not the person holding them all hostage at the bathhouse.” She gave him a measured look and stepped back inside her doorway.

Zoro had already come this far and he couldn’t see any other choice so he begrudgingly followed her inside.

The walls of the house were lined in bookshelves and books strewn about every possible surface. Zoro stood off to the side of the table, he was still unsure about the woman who had let them in but Brook had not hesitated and was currently busying himself with a drink.

“So you’re Robin?” Zoro asked crossing his arms and eyeing the woman as she poured herself a tea.

She hummed in amusement and cast her gaze at Zoro. “Yes that would be me.”

Zoro stiffened at her glance, the fact that she looked the same as Ms. All Sunday was making him suspicious and despite the relative ease Brook had with hanging around this house, Zoro felt himself even more tense and alert as Robin watched him curiously.

“Oh!” Brook cut in suddenly, “Franky sends his love and says that he’ll visit you soon.”

Zoro watched intrigued as Robin turned her attention over to Brook and Zoro could see her posture and gaze soften at the mention of their shared friend. Zoro hesitatingly began to lessen his suspicion of Robin. If both Franky and Brook, who were friends with Luffy and everyone back at the bathhouse, trusted and were friendly with her then Zoro could begrudgingly agree to at listen to her.

Robin, almost as if she sensed his change in opinion of her, turned back towards him, she gestured to the seat nearest to him at the table.

“Why don’t you sit and then we shall discuss what you came to talk about. What is your name?”

Zoro folded himself into the chair and crossed his arms on top of the table. “It’s Zoro.”

Zoro felt himself pause, there was something teasing at the back of his mind something he was just on the fringes of remembering. Robin sat across from him, her chin resting lightly atop her hands as she considered him, her gaze leaning more towards amicable than amused.

“Your real name Zoro, not the one that was given at the bathhouse.”

Zoro felt the blood drain from his face, it was so easy to almost lose himself in this world.

“Roronoa Zoro.”

Robin only nodded in acquiescence and took a long sip of her drink. “So what brings you to me Roronoa Zoro?”

Zoro almost bit his tongue with how quickly he snapped his jaw shut again, something in his mind just could allow him to fully relax and tell her about the worrying state of Luffy. He knew he would need to do this to save Luffy but she was too similar to Ms. All Sunday that he couldn’t separate the two in his head. Part of him felt as if telling her would result in a worse fate for Luffy while the other part wanted to tell her desperately to save Luffy as quickly as possible.

Something on his face gave away his internal struggle because Robin folded her hands atop the table and gave a short huff of breath.

“It seems my old persona is causing this lack of communication.” Robin surmised, Zoro could only nod in response. “Why don’t I explain to you the history of the bathhouse and then maybe you will be more inclined to discuss your issues with me.”

“I’m not making any promises but you are Luffy’s best bet so I don’t have much of a choice do I?”

“In this situation, I don’t believe you do.” Robin gave a short humorless chuckle.

Both of their attention was caught as Brook pulled out his violin and was plucking at the strings idly, Robin cleared her throat and they turned back to face each other.

“It is quite hard to find the right place to begin this tale, but I suppose I must explain the connection between myself and the person you’ve seen running the bathhouse.”

Zoro gave a terse nod, Robin hummed and fiddled with the cup of tea, sipping at it before placing it back down.

“I assume you know some bit about spirits and aspects, considering you’re friendly with Luffy and the others at the bathhouse. If you hadn’t already known I am a spirit of nature and plants, and here’s the first distinction between myself and the version you’ve seen running things at the bathhouse; she hasn’t ever displayed any nature aspect, has she?”

Zoro paused his mouth dropped open as he contemplated that, to be fair at this point he hadn’t seen Ms. All Sunday show any aspect, all the others had small tells that once he knew their aspect it was quite easy to see, but Ms. All Sunday almost seemed to have none.

Robin gave a bitter smile, “That’d be because she is not really a real spirit, she is a mirage to be most accurate.” She held up a hand, smiling genially know as she staved off the questions Zoro was about to start spouting. “My old partner of sorts is the one pulling the strings, he is another nature spirit, but whereas I am representative of plants, he is one of sand.”

She paused, her features tightening into a very subtle scowl, “His name is Crocodile, we were partners before, we were spirits that weren’t held to just one region so we traveled and, I’m sure as you’ve seen at your time in the bathhouse names mean everything it is tied to our power. Which is why when we were paired he knew me as Ms. All Sunday and not Robin.”

“Not all spirits are kind-natured, you’ve heard the tales of children being stolen by malevolent spirits I’m sure.” Robin continued, stirring the tea slowly, “while we were partners, Crocodile and I found that we had a rather good skillset for tricking others. I, myself, have a hand at small potions and brews due to me being a spirit with a domain in plants, and as I said before Crocodile can create mirage images and trick people. I won’t waste your time with our tales, but this ended in Crocodile drafting the contract I’m sure you signed which steals the spirits name and lets Crocodile essentially own their domain and identity.”

“Which means they can’t go home or leave the bathhouse right?” Zoro questioned, mind racing as he tried to piece together what he was hearing with what he had known before.

“Yes, that’s the core of it. This manipulation is how he won the bathhouse, I had already parted ways from him before he stole it from Vivi’s family, but to keep up appearances and shunt the blame he made the mirage image of myself to be his scapegoat. As it is part of him he knows all that happens in the bathhouse through it but he can run it from worlds away.”

“So, he tricked Vivi’s father out of the bathhouse?”

Robin grinned at Zoro, “You pick up faster than I thought, but to surmise it yes he did. Vivis family is a family of hospitality spirits as I’m sure you know. The old aspects, sprits that represent the base elements and old customs are generally born from a spirit, not in the way of human birth but this is the best analogy. The bathhouse technically belongs to Vivi, but as her father lost it to Crocodile and Vivi is also stuck there as the rest of them she can’t claim it. He did the same with the rest of the workers, he was able to get their names and aspects and with the contract he stole part of their identity to keep them chained to working for him.”

Robin eyed him as Zoro mulled over the information. Zoro felt his anger start to simmer below his skin, he had known Crocodile was an asshole but the more he was learning the more he was hoping he could meet this guy for the sole purpose of decking him. Zoro bit the inside of his lip and tried to stop off the anger and pay attention to Robin again.

“So that’s the history of how my look-alike sits in control at the bathhouse as nothing more than a puppet. Would you like to discuss how to help Luffy or do you still not trust me?”

In his haste to finally be able to get what he came here for Zoro almost agreed without hesitation. But a stray thought pulled at him as he recalled what Robin had said of her nature. 

“Show me some nature things so I know you’re not just another mirage.”

Robin chuckled at his request, “Definitely cleverer than you look at first glance.” Without further ado, she folded her hands together and when she opened them, a large white Lily was nestled in her palms.

“Now what is the issue that brought you to me?”

Zoro blew out an annoyed sigh, he explained seeing Luffy flying and crashing and the state he was found in. He glossed over their trip to the boiler room. Zoro grit his teeth as he explained Luffy’s current condition and the medicine he had given him that resulted in nothing more than the coma Luffy was currently in.

“This medicine you gave him who was it from?” Robin asked curiously.

“A water spirit, one that could turn into a dragon. I think his name was Garp?”

“I have good news and bad news for you Zoro. Which would you like first?”

Zoro felt as if an iron rod had been shoved down his spine with how quickly his back snapped into a stiff and straight posture.

“The bad, might as well get that out of the way.”

“There’s nothing I can do to help Luffy in his condition.”

Zoro felt the blood drain from his face, his stomach dropped to the soles of his feet and an icy feeling slowly crept up and settled in his gut.

“Theres nothing?”

In his mind, all Zoro could see was Luffy lying bloody and unresponsive on the boiler room floor. There was nothing that could be done. He couldn’t do anything to help Luffy and it was likely he’d be stuck in this bathhouse forever and his family would just be out there somewhere. He could feel himself spiraling into a panicked state of mind, the room began the blur in his peripherals and he couldn’t feel the floor under his feet.

A cool hand placed on his forearm anchored him back and his breath caught as he was able to break off the rapid breathing he had been doing unwittingly, slowly he came down to himself, and he could hear Brook’s violin still playing solemnly in the edge of his awareness.

“There is still the good news Zoro.” Robin said carefully, ducking her head to catch his eye.

“Oh.” Zoro said a little stunned, he had completely forgotten she had mentioned that there was good news. He gave her a small nod to urge her to continue.

“The curse is what made him so unaware and had caused him those injuries, no doubt Crocodile trying to control Luffy or keep him in line, but Crocodile has never had my inclination towards curses so his were always less potent. He uses them to dissuade any dissent among his workers, but they only work for a first offense, from there he would have to cast them again.”

A smirk pulled at the edges of her lips, she took her hand from Zoros arm and folded in beneath her chin again. “Luckily for all of you, he views repeat castings as too unnecessary, so he’d never trip out to make them. Its most likely that he casts them, for Luffy in this case, while he is off on a job and unaware. Another piece of good news is that the medicine you gave Luffy should surely deal with the lingering effects and injuries from the curse.”

“So, the medicine will wake him up?” Zoro asked, hope beginning to build in his chest. Another thought pulled at him, “How do I free Luffy from the bathhouse so he can’t get sent on those missions?”

“That is more complicated,” Robin sighed, “Luffy isn’t a usual worker, since he wasn’t one before Crocodile took the bathhouse, and with the laws of the spirit world we are unable to give him is name to free him. But you could help him there couldn’t you Zoro?”

“What do you mean?”

“You exist outside our laws; this world bends itself around you. You have more pull here than you realize. You are the one who could give Luffy back his name.”

Zoro felt some of his hope turn into confusion, “How? He introduced himself as Monkey D. Luffy when I met him. Isn’t that his full name?” Zoro demanded.

Robin tilted her head in consideration. “You know which kind of spirit Luffy is correct?”

Zoro nodded, “He can turn into a dragon, so he’s one of the guardian spirits.”

Robin opened her mouth to explain something and, like Zoro had seen with Nami and the others, ended up closing it again unable to break around the laws of the spirit world to tell him some piece of information. She waited a few moments before her face settled back into a bemused expression as she figured out a way to talk around the censor.

“What makes guardian spirits different than others?”

Zoro paused trying to recall what Nami had told him the other day. “They represent parts of nature in the real world like Fire and Wind.”

She nodded at him, “Somewhere in your mind, the answers are there, you just have to think about what you know of Luffy what you’ve learned from the others at the bathhouse. We are forbidden to give the whole truth but bits and pieces are able to slip through. It is a puzzle, and you hold the key piece.”

Zoro felt dumbfounded, he dropped his forehead down onto the table and tried to remember anything he could to help figure out the information.

Robin chuckled above him, standing up from her chair, “I have faith you’ll figure it out and free Luffy.”

Zoro closed his eyes, more motivated than ever to try and figure it out. His mind was pulling him in all different directions. He couldn’t distance himself from the images of Luffy unconscious on the floor of the boiler room. Zoro picked him head up and dropped it heavily onto the table to clear his thoughts, steadfastly ignoring the chuckles he could hear from the corner of the room. He took a steadying breath, reminiscent of when he would focus himself for a match and began to dive back into his own memories.

Pieces and parts of information collected in his mind; Luffy as a dragon, Luffys conflicted face as he stared from the balcony out at the ocean below them, the way he spoke when he told him he couldn’t go in the water because of his nature. Zoro paused and propped his head up on his chin as the encounter in the big tub with Garp kept pulling at him. He remembered Nami, the way she tried to speak of Garp but couldn’t, and how Garp had looked at him critically and was also stopped from speaking.

He had mentioned a grandson who worked at the bathhouse.

Zoros entire body stiffened, it all made sense now. Nami had mentioned how Vivi and Luffy were from families of spirits who share aspects sometimes, and Luffy who couldn’t go in water due to his nature. He racked his brain for what type of guardian Garp had been. He remembered cool and familiar water surrounding him as Garp left, he was some type of water spirit, which meant so was Luffy.

There was still something missing, he knew Luffy was some sort of water guardian but where he belonged was lost to him. He sat up and looked at his hands as he recalled the way the horns of Luffys dragon form had seemed similar, the way the sensation was almost like a memory from long ago.

The sensation of being underwater, the feeling of drowning.

Beyond that, there was nothing. He turned his eyes towards Robin and Brook who were watching him closely.

“I know he’s a guardian spirit of water but that’s all I’m getting.”

Robin hummed as she walked back over to him, “There is still more missing but you have a visitor.”

The wind was suddenly howling and the shutters on the windows were shaking in their hold. Zoro shot up from his chair, almost tripping over himself to get to the door. An urgent need pulled at his stomach, practically dragging him so he could get outside. Robin stopped him in from of the door with a hand on his chest.

“I never explained why you shouldn’t be worried about Luffy waking up and why you didn’t need me.”

“It was the medicine ball right?” Zoro said confused, not taking his eyes off the door.

Robin chuckled, “That healed his injuries, but what brought him back to that was something far beyond simple medicine.”

Zoro turned a cautious stare towards her, in his mind he knew what her next answer would be. Robin delayed her response as she opened the door, and Zoro felt the incessant need crest to a peak in his chest.

The door swung open and Zoro was floored, Robins hand on his chest still the only thing keeping him from stumbling out of the door.

Outside stood Luffy, towering in his dragon form. A weight dropped from Zoros chest as he noticed no injuries on Luffy, and how healthy he looked. His eyes raked over Luffy, he could finally see what he looked like up close and without any blood or injuries to mar his form.

He was stunning. The gradient of scales that flowed from the deep blue by his mane down into the stark red of his stomach were simply unbelievable to take in. It had reminded Zoro of an inverted sunset above the ocean, the way the red and the blue seamlessly wove into one another.

“The reason you didn’t need anything to wake him up was because you had already given it to him.” Robin began speaking again, softly this time, “What you gave him was love.”

Zoro chest seized at the word, the emotion rising in him, he had known it had been love. He would have been a fool to think it was anything other than that, the feeling had been pulling at him and growing beneath his skin and Zoro had been helpless to stop it. Robin released him from where she had stopped him. Zoro, despite the urgent pull in his stomach, walked steadily out to meet Luffy who was watching his progression across the yard.

Without even thinking Zoro placed either of his hands on Luffys muzzle and brought his forehead down to his own. He placed their heads together and finally gave out a shaky exhale that betrayed his calm demeanor. Luffy was cool to the touch, his scales felt like the first steps into the ocean, not cold enough to deter anymore, it was more enticing than that, it was refreshing and drew you in deeper and deeper.

Luffy gave some sort of short huff, the air puffing around the both of them, and Zoro felt a grin settle onto his face.

“He will take you back to the bathhouse, I trust you’ll figure out what you need to on the way Zoro.” Robin called to them as she gently leaned on her open doorway, watching their exchange.

Zoro turned and gave her a begrudging thank you and a more friendly goodbye, extending one to Brook as well who called out his own cheerful goodbye from within Robins house. Zoro then turned and caught Luffys eye. The dragon had turned sideways and lowered himself just enough that Zoro would be able to get on, and Zoro knew the excitement he could see in Luffys eyes were probably reflected in his own. Without any more hesitation, Zoro swung himself up onto Luffys back and gripped his horns. Just as he had any semblance of a grip on Luffy, the dragon in question shot up into the air, Zoro quickly bit down on the startled yelp that almost escaped him.

The view was breathtaking from all the way up here. Zoro couldn’t fathom any reason why anyone who could see this all the time would every come back down to land. He could see everything. The distant rails of the sea train routes lay below them, there was just open land and forests for miles around them. There wasn’t even any glimpse of the bathhouse in sight from where they were. The world seemed at peace and quiet.

The only thing that wasn’t quiet was the cacophony of Zoro’s thoughts. He was quickly running out of time to try and figure out who Luffy really was, and like a persistent itch, there was something just at the fringes of his awareness.

Zoro let out a ragged sigh as frustration was beginning to build in him. He really needed to figure this out, but the more he tried to concentrate on it, the further and further the piece of information seemed to be getting. Luffy made a sort of low rumble from deep in his chest, a questioning sound no doubt in response to Zoro’s sigh. Zoro knew there was nothing Luffy could help with, Luffy might be there only person in the spirit world who knew less in this situation than Zoro himself.

Zoro idly stroked a hand down the side of Luffys neck to placate him and ease him of his worries; at the idle ministrations however, Luffy let out a pleased sort of humming sound that reverberated all throughout his body. Zoro closed his eyes and buried his face into the mane in front of him, letting the humming noise calm him. He could almost feel himself begin to drift off to sleep again.

Nostalgia was once again pricking at his senses as he laid with his head buried in Luffys mane. The dream from on the train hit him once again but this time it played out like a movie.

He could see himself as a young kid on the beach, Mihawk resting in the shade, Perona with some sun hat that was too large for her loosely balanced on her head. They were at a beach, the water blue and sparkling and inviting. Zoro had crashed into it with all the grace that a young child possessed, which was to say none whatsoever. It had been peaceful and enjoyable until a sharp gust of wind sent Peronas hat flying from her head and into the water, mere meters from where Zoro himself had been. He had ignored his families warning and he splashed after it, wave after wave hitting him in the face and knocking him back from his goal. The hat itself seemed to just drift a little bit farther out of his reach with every successful step forward he made.

He had finally reached the hat, deep enough in the water that his feet were just barely brushing the sand with each kick to keep himself surfaced. He had turned, face beaming in success to show his sister that he had her hat securely in his hand. With his back to the deep sea, he had no way of knowing of the large wave cresting behind him, all he saw was Mihawk sprinting down the beach and the look of pure horror on Peronas face before he was submerged underwater.

From there it was just flashes of himself tumbling through the water, the hat lost to him, as he was rolled in the undertow and pulled deeper and deeper out to sea.

Then suddenly, his hands had a grip on something and there was something pulling him out of the depths of the waves. The flashes he could see, through his blurry underwater view were of dark hair and blue scales, the next thing he knew the creature was gone and he was on his hands and knees coughing up seawater.

His head shot up to look for his family and he was confused to see a different beach in front of him, this one backed up to an overgrown, ancient looking forest and in the distance, he could see the corner of a small shrine peeking out from between the trees.

“You okay?”

Zoro looked behind him and standing in the surf was a boy who looked just barely younger than him, with messy black hair and a hat haphazardly resting on his head.

“I’m good.” Zoro said slowly, now that he had finished spitting up all the water he had almost swallowed, “where am I?”

The boy ignored his question, “What’s your name?”

“Roronoa Zoro.” Zoro said cautiously, turning all the way around so he could sit himself in the sand and face the boy instead of craning his neck.

The boy rewarded him with a sunny grin and crouched to his eye level. He hummed in amusement as he watched Zoro for a long moment. Mouthing Zoros name to himself as he tested the syllables in his mouth and laughed in delight at the way they sounded.

“Well Zoro,” the boy began happily, “You’re in the spirit world.”

Zoro felt his stomach drop somewhere around the soles of his feet, all the old tales always told of never giving a spirit your name because that gave them power over you, but Zoro didn’t feel threatened from the boy in front of him.

“How did I get here? Did you take me?” Zoro said catapulting to his feet, his mind trying to figure out if he knew anyway to get back to the world he belonged in.

The other boy hardly even moved an inch at Zoros sudden movement, he just tilted his head back to look at him better, the motion causing his hat to slide down to his neck.

“I didn’t take you across the barrier, some other spirit brought you over here, but I chased them off and made sure you got to shore!”

Zoro deflated at the happy exclamation, at least this spirit probably didn’t mean him any harm. He scuffed a foot into the sand.

“I guess I should thank you for saving me then?” Zoro said begrudgingly.

The boy giggled again and told him he didn’t need to be thanked as he stood up, waves still gently brushing past his heels. The sea here was much calmer than the sea had been when Zoro was taken under.

“Ah wait what’s your name? Can you get me back home?”

The spirit tilted his head to the side and gave another wide smile, which already had Zoros mind settling, “Yeah I can get you back!”

He stepped deeper into the water, which made Zoro pause, a wary feeling building in his chest. The spirit grinned, cocking his head at Zoro and stretched one hand out towards him.

“I’m stronger in water so it’ll be easier for me to cross back from here.” When Zoro still didn’t move, the spirit made a confused noise in his throat that sounded more like a bird’s trill than anything.

Zoro hesitantly took a step forward, his hand grasping tightly at the spirits as the two of them stepped deeper into the water. The other boys hand was surprisingly cool, almost the same temperature as the water the swirled around their legs.

“Oh yeah! I didn’t introduce myself!” The spirit laughed joyfully, “My name is-”

Zoros eyes flew open and he sat up quickly, his entire body posture rigid as he came back from the memory. He quickly tugged on some of the hair that was cool and soft beneath his fingers, the strands slipped through his fingers like water. Luffy gave a discontented grumble and tilted his massive head to the side to cast a glance back at Zoro.

“Luffy,” Zoro began, his mouth going dry from the nerves that were setting fire to his chest, “when you first saw me by the bathhouse was the reason you knew my name because we had met before? When I was a kid a spirit tried to take me and I think you saved me?”

Zoro met Luffys one visible eye apprehensively, this could finally be the answer he was looking for, and as he broke the stare he could see the bathhouse in the far off distant, just barely visible due to the rising sun. He looked back down to Luffy and there was something in the gaze that Zoro couldn’t quite pinpoint but somehow, he knew that the answer was yes.

Zoro took a shaky breath and pressed his forehead back into the scales and hair that helped ground him.

“I know your true name Luffy, you told me that day before I got in the water with you.”

He felt Luffy stiffen beneath him, he had finally found the last key to setting Luffy free, his chest felt lighter than it had in days.

“Your name is Monkey D. Luffy, you are the Guardian of the Eastern Sea.”

There was a sound like ice cracking and Luffy had gone perfectly still beneath him. The two of them began to rapidly drop from the sky and Zoro just clung to Luffy, as he watched the waters below them come rushing up to meet them.

Before that could happen though, Luffy gave a violent shudder beneath him and suddenly there was a flurry of scales around him, Zoro instinctively closed his eyes against the sudden onslaught.

A tight grip on his hand, caused him to open his eyes and he was met with the blindingly bright beaming face of Luffy. Zoro felt a disbelieving grin pull almost painfully at his face, and then Luffy was laughing, boisterous and happy and so very full of delight, Luffy shot through the air and tackled him in a tight hug.

The two of them tumbled and rolled through the air, as Zoro clung to Luffy one part so that Luffy could keep them floating and the rest was due to the sheer delight and relief that were rolling through him at the moment.

Luffy pulled back a bit and clasped both of their hands together, their fingers naturally intertwining with one another.

“You remembered who I am Zoro!” Luffy crooned happily.

“I had forgotten that time, we moved from that city soon after and I’m sure the ocean it had happened on had been renamed by now.” Zoro said, somewhat guiltily, if only he had remembered then this could have been over much sooner and with less pain.

Luffy shook his head in denial and pulled Zoro forehead to gently lean their foreheads against one another. The soft and easy gesture was such a reversal from Luffys usual loud and exuberant behavior that Zoros chest felt tight and his heart gave a near painful thump in his chest.

“That doesn’t matter, all that matters is that you remembered now.”

“I’m not going to forget this time.” Zoro spoke, his voice had gone deeper and more serious than he had heard from himself in a long time.

“You’ve made me free Zoro,” Luffy said happily, a delighted giggle breaking the intense moment between them, “I can leave the bathhouse now.”

Zoro closed his eyes and felt the happiness that was bursting in his chest at the thought of Luffy finally being freed from the confines of the bathhouse.

Luffy brought the two of them gently to touch the ground, they were stood at the beginning of the village he had first stepped in with his family all those days ago.

He turned a questioning look on his face directed Luffy.

“I woke up soon after you left.” Luffy began, shrugging the one shoulder casually, one of his hands still held onto Zoros tightly. The other one pulled a piece of paper out of the pocket of his uniform, Zoro immediately recognized it as his contract to the bathhouse.

Zoro took the paper from him but as soon as he touched it the paper disintegrated and fell to their feet.

“What does that mean?”

Luffy gave him a smaller grin, “I went to Ms. All Sunday and got your contract released,” his grin faded a little and his face looked rueful, “You don’t belong here, they cant keep you trapped here.”

Zoro felt at war with himself, one side of him was elated at the thought of being able to leave, but the rest of him felt a growing sense of despair. He’d have to leave all of them behind.

“It’s time for you to go. Your family is safe, they’re back on your side of the barrier.”

Zoro sighed in relief, knowing that they hadn’t disappeared or been stuck like he had was one enormous weight off his shoulders.

“Zoro really needs to go though.” Luffy said, the grin dropping from his face.

“Why so quickly? What about everyone else in the bathhouse, they wont know where I’ve gone.”

Luffy shook his head in rejection, “If you go back into the bathhouse your contract can be drawn up again. Humans aren’t meant for this world until death Zoro.”

“But what about Crocodile and Ms. All Sunday? What if they get you in a contract again?”

Luffy dropped the hand he had been holding onto and rubbed the back of his head idly, he gave a short laugh, “That’s another reason you have to go Zoro, I sort of declared a revolt against them with everyone in the bathhouse, so Crocodiles on his way here and we’re gonna fight.”

Zoro gaped at him, his hands grasped Luffy on either side of his face. “I can’t just leave, not like this.”

Luffy once again smiled at him and Zoro felt part of him break inside, “You have to Zoro, you’ll start to disappear again if you don’t.”

Luffy placed his hands gently over top Zoros for a long moment before plucking them from his face. He gave a bright and happy laugh and turned Zoro around so he was facing the open field he had once walked across with his family.

“Go now Zoro, and make sure you don’t look back. Keep walking until you see your family.”

Zoros feet felt welded to the ground, there was no way he could leave Luffy behind like this, not when he had finally just freed him. Luffy seemed to understand his hesitation and gave him a small shove forward.

“We’ll see each other again Zoro, once all of us are free!”

There was a great rushing of air behind him and Zoro felt himself start to turn but he stopped before he could complete the motion. He began to walk away from the town and across the field, ignoring the painful tugging in his chest with each step further away. As he approached the tunnel that acted as the gateway between the worlds, Zoro was shocked to see a guy with red hair standing in the entrance.

“Ah so you must be Zoro? We spent a lot of time looking for you brat.”

Zoro cocked his head in confusion, but before he could ask any question the man approached him and clapped him on the shoulder.

“Don’t worry about it kid, go see your family.”

Zoro shook the guys hand off easily and ignored the laughter that echoed after him as he all but sprinted back down the tunnel.

Zoro stepped out of the tunnel and immediately the sun began to shine in his eyes and blind him. He shielded his eyes and startled at someones excited cry. His head shot up and he had a split second of warning before Perona had tackled him to the ground.

“You stupid idiot! How did you even get into this situation!” Perona yelled, sitting on his chest and slapping him on the arm.

Zoro was honestly so relieved to be back with them that he didn’t even try and shrug her off, he did however sit up and immediately muss up her hair. Perona shrieked in anger and rolled off him, complaining under her breath about worthless brothers.

Mihawk had taken the time to calmly join them and he reached down and helped heave Zoro to his feet. His face seemed stoic but Zoro could read the fine lines that betrayed how worried he had been and just how relaxed he was now that Zoro was home. Perona stood up and crossed her arms still pouting at Zoro. Zoro laughed, loud and joyful, he threw his arms around both of them.

“Let’s go home.” 

Chapter Text

The dull impact of a pillow being flung at his face was what roused Zoro from the dead sleep he had been enjoying. He blearily opened an eye to see Perona standing over him.

“I get that this is your last term for school but that doesn’t mean you can just start missing days!” Perona exclaimed pushed at Zoro to try and get him out of bed.

Zoro, thoroughly used to this behavior, ignored her and rolled over onto his stomach, looking at his clock during the movement. By his count he had at least 10 more minutes of sleeping possible and he was fully intent on using them. He closed his eyes again as Perona flopped down next to him on the bed having given up on getting him out of bed.

“Why are you so lazy?” Perona sighed, shifting closer laying her head down between his shoulder blades.

Zoro only gave a halfhearted grumble in response, trying to catch the vestiges of sleep that still clung to him.

It was quiet for a solid beat before Perona spoke up again;

“Did you dream of them again?”

Zoro didn’t answer but he knew Perona must’ve felt his body tense beneath her head. There was no use in answering her question, he knew she already knew the answer. Ever since Zoro had left Luffy and the others behind in the spirit world he had been dreaming of them. It wasn’t anything like nightmares, it was just like his time in the spirit world played like a movie in his head, stuck in a constant loop. What hadn’t help ease his fixation on the spirit world was that he had no way of knowing if everyone had been successful in winning back the bathhouse from Crocodile.

He had left the spirit world sometime in the beginning of April, leaving a scant amount of time before the first term of his last year of school began and he had only actually spent somewhere around two weeks in the spirit world but time had seemed to pass so strangely there. The longer time he spent back in the normal world the more it seemed like his foray into the other world had just been a vivid dream.

Somedays he would catch himself thinking he had almost made it up.

He sighed and pushed himself up and out of bed to begin getting ready for the day. After bidding Mihawk goodbye, he and Perona set out on the rather short trek to school. The island they had moved to was a rather small, close-knit community. There wasn’t much else around besides the school and the town and a large stretch of beach that was just down the road from their own house.

“You’ve got kendo today right?” Perona asked, humming idly as they walked in step.

Zoro gestured to his shoulder where his kendo bag was hanging, and raised an eyebrow at her.

“Don’t give me that look.” She huffed, “Here I am making idle conversation and you’ve got that face on like you’re about to be an ass.”

Zoro laughed and knocked their shoulders together, “Yes, I’ve got kendo today.”

“Then I’m not waiting for you, don’t get lost on your way home idiot.”

They had arrived at the school gates somewhere amidst their bickering and Zoro ruffled his sisters hair before taking off at a quick pace towards his homeroom, the sounds of Peronas indignant sputtering behind him putting an easy smile on his face.

The school day passed and Zoro seemed to hardly pay attention to anything at all, the September air drifted in through the windows and Zoro could feel the change as Autumn drew closer and closer. It’d almost been half a year since he’d seen Luffy and the others. An uneasy feeling began to settle beneath his skin.

Something is coming, it whispered in his mind, his hair standing on end, something is returning.

Zoro shook himself trying to rid himself of this feeling that clung to him like a second skin. He tried to focus on whatever the teacher was saying, something about English possibly. But the more he tried to focus the more he felt his mind slip away.

Somewhere in between one blink and the next he fell asleep.

When he opened his eyes next, he was sitting back at the table in Robins cabin. Robin herself was sat across from him a cup of tea in her hand. Outside, Zoro could vaguely hear voices shouting and yelling, almost masking the subtle music coming from a violin.

“Another dream then?” Zoro mused to himself.

“Hello again Zoro.” Robin greeted not looking up from her drink. “I imagine you didn’t think you’d ever be back here, hmm?”

Zoro looked around the room, “Am I actually here?”

Robin tilted her head at him, and watched Zoro try to process what was happening.

“I can’t be,” Zoro sighed, sitting back in his chair, “I left, I remember leaving. This is a dream.”

However, Zoro was rather unsettled, up until then all his dreams of the spirit world had just been his memories replaying in his head, this was the first time the scenario was something new.

“How strange it is to see your mind work.” Robin hummed at him.

Now that Zoro was sure this was a dream he could see the evidence in the setting around him; the strange discordant noise from outside railed against his ears, Robin was unnaturally still, more so than he was accustomed to with the spirits, the tilt of her head left her looking like a marionette that had been left, strings and body falling loose.

The feeling of the dream was beginning to slip away, Zoro was sure he’d wake up soon back in his desk. Robin jerked her head up, back ramrod straight and looked him into the eye. Vines were curling around her hand and wrists.

“Something is coming,” she said, voice hollow and echoing in the cabin, “It is returning to as it once was.”

She reached a hand forward, the vines and flowers falling away as she pointed one finger at him, “Balance is back and the passage will be open.”

Her finger darted towards him-

A sharp poke in the center of his forehead woke Zoro up and he turned an irritated glance up at the two boys who were crowded in front of his desk.

“What do you want Johnny? Yosaku?”

The boys grinned in response and leaned down onto his desk.

“Just thought we’d wake you before the whole class left and the teacher noticed you were asleep.” Johnny snickered.

Zoro looked around the room a little surprised, all of class had passed while he had been asleep and the other two were right and the majority of the class had left the room, eager to get out of school for the day.

“Man, how asleep were you?” Yosaku muttered as he pulled up Zoro from his desk by an arm.

Zoro shrugged him off easily and grabbed his stuff. Johnny swung an arm around his shoulders and shuffled him out of the room.

“Now we gotta get to kendo, Captain will have my head if I’m late again!”

Zoro snorted, “That’s your own fault.”

The three of them continued their bickering as they walked the halls towards where the kendo club met. Some of the uneasiness that Zoro had been feeling faded the longer Johnny and Yosaku distracted him from, but there was an ever-present feeling at the back of his mind that held fast to him.

Zoro fell into kendo practice with almost a mindless drive, it was nice and simple. He was able to just fade into himself and not think about any of his dreams that had happened or why the dreams had suddenly changed from memories to whatever it was that had just happened. His body moved through the katas and motions with practiced ease, even the praise from the coach and captain seemed to fall onto deaf ears, He was aware that they were saying something to him and he nodded to them in acknowledgement but he hadn’t really gathered any of what they were trying to say.

The practice went by quick enough and the next thing he knew Zoro was walking away from the school. He had already bid Johnny and Yosaku goodbye and he trudged towards his house alone. The evening was oddly silent.

Zoro stopped and looked around, there seemed to be no one out on the streets and the setting sun cast long shadows over everything. It was a little unusual for the town to be quiet at this time, Zoro shrugged and kept walking towards his house.

Once he got to the fork in the pathway that directed him either to his house or towards the nearby beach Zoro paused. There was something pulling him towards the beach and away from his house. A long moment passed, a far off bird called and it shook Zoro from his stupor.

He directed himself down the opposite path and headed in the direction of the beach. He didn’t know what was pulling him here but the feeling was hard to ignore. As the beach came in sight the feeling got stronger, there was a tension in his gut as he hastened his steps towards the water. But once he got to the edge of the water, the feeling disappeared.

Zoro stared at the horizon line, off in the distance he could see two old men sitting in a fishing boat, which was a usual site for the town. The older men in the village would float out there all day and come back with tales of what they had seen or almost caught. Zoro didn’t mind them so much, when he’d be in the town center with Johnny and Yosaku or Perona they always had the most interesting stories for him to eavesdrop on. Perona was always a fan of the folktales and legends they would tell, she would wander over to them and sit in front of them and ask all manner of questions.

The men never seemed to mind since they always indulged her questions, and it wasn’t just them the older men and women of the town seemed abundant with stories and folktales of the legends of the town, ranging from the ones that everyone, even Zoro and Perona, knew to tales that were just about the town and the deities that had protected or endangered it.

Zoro plopped himself into the dry sand a little way back from the water line and buried his feet. He propped his knees and up and rested his folded arms on them as stared out at the ocean. He couldn’t figure out why he had such an intrinsic desire to get to the water as fast as possible only for mental blocks to keep him from even getting a toe into the ocean.

He raked his hands through his hair with a disgruntled noise. Nothing was making sense anymore.

Zoro sat and watched the water until he saw the sun dip below the horizon line. The sight of the sunset over the ocean filled Zoro with a sense of nostalgia and longing. If he closed his eyes, Zoro could still see the scales of Luffy in his dragon form standing before him ready to fly. Zoro stuffed down the feeling of want deep inside of himself as he had been doing ever since he had come back from the spirit world. Time and distance had done nothing to ease the feeling of yearning that cropped up whenever Zoro thought of the spirit.

As the sky rapidly darkened, Zoro stood up and brushed off the sand that clung to him and turned his back on the water and trudged back to his house.

When he walked through the front door, he could see Perona and Mihawk both eye him, they had no doubt noticed the sand on him still, and what must have been a tired expression on his face because the two of them deigned not to mention where he had been instead of coming home.

Dinner was a quiet affair as it usually was in their house. Perona did the bulk of the talking for the three of them as she regaled them with her trials and tribulations of the day. As her questioning Zoro was drawn into a conversation about his kendo practices, which delved into a story about Johnny and Yosaku. As he relaxed and seemed to be more himself, he could see Perona and Mihawk relax.

The trip to the spirit world had had a marked effect on all three of them, but from Zoro’s perspective it seemed the effect it had on him was what was affecting his family the most. The sour taste of guilt seemed to crawl up his throat at the unbidden stress he had been giving them.

He hadn’t meant to obviously, and he had tried to get back into his normal lifestyle and behavior from before the entire experience had happened but it wasn’t entirely possible. He had left something of himself behind there in the spirit world and he had not come back the same as he had been when he left. It would have been impossible for him to come back unchanged, so much happened in the scant time he had spent there.

But he hadn’t meant for his family to worry over him.

Zoro put down his food and cleared his throat, Mihawk and Perona also ceased their eating and cast him questioning glances. Zoro shifted under their gaze, he didn’t even know how to breach the subject, and regardless of that Zoro was never quite good at expressing his personal feelings so bluntly. He floundered opening his mouth a few times before scrubbing a hand over his face in frustration.

“What is it Zoro?” Mihawk asked him.

On one hand Zoro was grateful because now that he had been asked he’d have to own up to it, but on the other hand now he had to say something.

“I’m sorry.” He said his head hanging slightly. “Everythings just been so goddamn weird since I came back.”

“But why are you apologizing?” Perona asked propping her head on a hand and looking at him.

“You’ve all been so tense and watching me like I’m gonna freak out.” When Perona opened her mouth, no doubt to counter his argument, Zoro shot back, “You can’t deny it I say it tonight when I came home late and even at dinner when I was just talking about today.”

“I can concede your point,” Mihawk began, placing his fingertips together in front of his face as he contemplated his next phrase. “We’ve all been out of sorts since we returned, but you cant deny you’ve been on edge lately as well. Everyone has been tense because of what happened.”

Zoro paused and nodded slowly, he had been different since he came back but this was also the center of one of his problems.

“It just feels like you guys are waiting for me to go back to how I was.” Zoro muttered, now that he voiced it aloud he felt horribly exposed and he trained his eyes on the slight chip in the table across from him.

“Now that’s not it, its just that-” Perona cut herself off, running her fingers through her hair in agitation.

Zoro blinked in surprise at her sudden act, out of the three of them Perona was usually the best at articulating what she was feeling even if most times it came from the form of her pouting. Mihawk took the pause from both of his children to cut in.

“None of us came back from there the same Zoro. Yes, it’s true you are the most changed because of what you went through, but we are not waiting for you to be who you were before. I think what your sister was trying to articulate is just that we want to make sure you are okay.”

Perona nodded emphatically, she stared hard at him for a second before nodding to herself and speaking again, “Who you are now doesn’t matter. The thing that matters is that you’re here now. The thing that worried us the most was that you’d be stuck there since we lost you that first night.”

Zoro paused he hadn’t even thought about it. He knew from his end the first few days he was fervent with trying to find them and get them back, it was practically his only motivator in the beginning, he hadn’t even realized that while he was looking for them, they had been looking for him.

“The fact that we lost you the first night and that we were taken to somewhere safe by someone I had known wasn’t too much of a trying experience for us. But as the days went by and no one knew where you were it seemed likely we wouldn’t be able to return with you.” Mihawk said seriously, he held eye contact with Zoro and Zoro could see just how heavily that possibility weighed on the two of them.

He hadn’t ever even given himself time to consider that he wouldn’t reunite with them or make it back to this world. If he had thought like that he would have lost himself in the bathhouse. But the bathhouse and everyone inside of it had given Zoro the change to distract himself and throw himself at a task so he didn’t have to time to consider these possibilities. The two of them however had no such distractions and were simply left with waiting.

“I feel like this is all my fault.” Perona said slumping her head onto the table.

Mihawk and Zoro both quirked a brow at each other and then directed their confusion towards her.

“Perona what do you mean?” Zoro asked incredulously.

She tilted her head up so her chin was resting on the table as she cut her eyes over to the both of them, “It was all my stupid idea to go see the old town.”

A glance over at their father showed an equally surprised look on his face, Zoro was momentarily glad that he wasn’t the only one who someone missed all these things that were weighing on Perona, but the larger part of him immediately rose to the forefront of his mind to ease his sisters misplaced guilt.

Zoro shook his head in denial of her statement, and Mihawk mirrored his actions.

“The blame isn’t on you Perona,” Mihawk began, “The town was just the place it happened but it wasn’t the cause, it was only coincidental.” his tone had softened noticeable at her distress and Zoro had vague memories of that tone from his childhood whenever he or Perona had been upset.

Zoro could see the effect his words and voice had on Perona, her shoulders relaxed and the guilty expression on her face faded into a more relaxed countenance. Zoro felt his own shoulders loosening and the pit that had been lodged in his throat throughout this discussion was worked away.

“It’s not like it hadn’t already happened to me before.” Zoro said a little wryly.

Perona jerked her head to him a stunned look on her face, Mihawks face hadn’t changed although. Zoro was momentarily taken aback until he realized that when he had told them of what had taken place in the spirit world he had told them about the issue with names but not exactly how he figured out Luffy’s name.

Perona stood up quickly and moved her chair closer to Zoro before throwing herself back in the chair and shoved her face into Zoro’s.

“What did you mean by that?” She demanded.

“When we were younger, one time at the beach I ran in the water to get something,” Zoro quickly decided to leave out the fact that it was her hat he was chasing, she had already been worked up about feeling like the second occurrence was her fault he didn’t want to make her feel the first one had been also, “But I was pulled under by the waves and I woke up on the beach in the spirit world. It had been Luffy who somehow got me back and then I washed ashore with you guys.”

Mihawk nodded minutely out of the corner of his eye, and Zoro turned his gaze to ask how he had already known what had happened.

“You were gone longer than anyone should be under and we couldn’t see you or find you in the water,” Mihawk said swirling the wine in his glass as he focused his gaze on it, “Shanks, the one who helped us this time had shown up and told me you’d be returning and where you had gone.”

Perona made a small noise of understanding, “There was this lady I remember from when we were younger saying that Zoro was one step off from being spirited away, is that what she meant?”

Mihawk grimaced at the reminder, “Yes, Shanks had warned me of that, traveling to the spirit world like that leaves a mark on you and spirits in this world can see that and it draws them. Zoro was always at a risk of crossing over accidentally since then.”

Zoro hadn’t really known any of that but it had made sense when he thought of it, no wonder his father had always been so tense whenever he retrieved Zoro from wandering off on his own. He had probably been on edge waiting for this to happen since he was a kid.

“Wow, it sure doesn’t help Zoro’s always getting lost.” Perona snorted.

Zoro made an aggrieved noise and shoved her slightly, Perona only giggled at the action and moved back to her spot. Mihawk had a small smile on his face as they all returned to their meal much more relaxed and happier.

That night when Zoro shuffled off to go to bed, Mihawk stepped in his path to halt him for a moment, he tilted his head as he observed his son. Zoro tilted his head and mirrored the action as the two watched each other. Zoro must’ve passed whatever Mihawk had been looking for because he pulled him in for a quick one armed hug, Zoro reciprocated without thinking and huffed a short laugh as Mihawk pushed him lightly towards the direction of his room.

“Night.” Zoro called over his shoulder.

He grinned at the gruff “Goodnight” That was directed back to him.

Zoro flopped into his bed, rolling easily into the spot he had left that morning. He felt much more relaxed that he had at the start of the day. He could sense that Perona and Mihawk had also been much more worried than they had let on since they had all returned. But now Zoro felt as if they all were finally on the same page and could move forward from here.

Not a few minutes later his door was pushed open and he could see Peronas’ silhouette in the darkness.

“What’s up?” Zoro mumbled sleepily.

Perona shuffled in the room and came up to the side of the bed. She poked him repeatedly in the side.

“Shove over.”

“What? No.”

She huffed and crossed her arms. Zoro and Perona held each other’s stares for a moment before Zoro sighed and rolled to face the wall. Perona immediately dove beneath the covers and sidled up to Zoros back, she placed her forehead between his shoulder blades and breathed out a shaky breath. Zoro tilted his head back to cast a glance at her over his shoulder.

“You good now?”

One of her hands gripped the loose material of his shirt that had gathered up on his side, Zoro could feel the fabric grow taut and tight in her grip.

“You really don’t blame me for going to the town?” She asked, her voice was more quiet and meek than Zoro could ever remember hearing throughout their childhood.

Zoro let his head fall back into his pillow and blindly patted at her hand with one of his.

“No, I don’t.”

The grip in his shirt relaxed and it took only a few quiet minutes of laying their before he could feel the breath fanning over his back even out as Perona fell asleep. Zoro chuckled to himself before he similarly was pulled under.

Somewhere early in the morning, Zoro was shaken awake. He cracked one eye open to see Mihawk’s amused face above both him and Perona, who was still curled into a ball behind him. Even without straining his ears Zoro could hear the loud cascade of the rain outside the window.

“School has been canceled for the day, the downpour outside has flooded the roads, so you don’t have to get up for class.”

Zoro gave a grunt of acknowledgement before he slammed his face back into the welcoming warmth of the pillow. He was asleep as soon as he touched its surface.

When Zoro next awoke, hours later, the rain was still going strong and Perona had wandered off somewhere in the house. Zoro rubbed at his eye as he tried to remember the dream he had just had.

In his dream, it had been raining as well, and he couldn’t remember much except for a calico cat that sat opposite of him on a stoop. They had regarded each other warily, until the cat had opened its mouth to speak and a somehow familiar female voice spoke to him,

“Just give it a little more time.”

The next day, the rain and the roads had cleared enough for everyone to go to work and school. The day started almost normally, Perona hauling Zoro out of bed, the two of them trudging to the school. The marked differences of this day were that, the rain still fell, not the downpour of the day before, but this was a steady light rain, the biggest change was that the whole town seemed to be in high spirits.

As they walked towards the school, Zoro and Perona had seen the people of the town smiling and chattering like everyone had somehow won the lottery overnight. It was the same when they got to the school, everyone was acting like they had a new lease on life and Zoro walked past no less than five confessions.

Sitting in homeroom, gave no clear answers on the subject either, and from the conversations he could hear, everyone just seemed to be talking about the downpour of rain. Zoro knew that they could have all used a day off from school and work but he didn’t think it’d make everyone feel this elated.

Their teacher came in and similarly, exchanged a few excited words with the students at the front of the class about the rain yesterday, and the continued rain today. His confusion must have shown on his face because his teacher addressed him next;

“Zoro you look confused, what seems to be the issue?”

Zoro paused as the collective gaze of the entire class swung to him, “Why is everyone so excited about the rain from yesterday?”

The teacher cocked her head in confusion for one beat before she concluded, “Oh I forgot you are new to this town, I must apologize.”

A collective noise of assent went around the room.

“What does that have to do with the rain?”

The teacher glanced at the clock, “Well we still have quite a bit of time before class begins so we can explain a little to you before the bell. The rain has to do with the towns history and the tale of the guardian of the town. But before that I’ll tell you that the downpour is a good sign, it generally is thought to bring us good luck.”

The rest of the class looked on eagerly as the teacher prepared to begin the tale, Zoro himself couldn’t deny the bourgeoning interest he felt in him.

“As far back as our towns history and folk stories go, there has always been guardian spirits that protect this town.” She began, she turned to the chalkboard behind her as she continued to speak, “There are legends of the battles that the guardian of this town partook in to protect us, and legends about the establishment of the town, general things such as that.”

She drew a stylistic dragon on the board, which Zoro could recognize from artwork and depictions around the town and lining the entrances to the beach.

“Our towns guardian has always, from what the stories tell us, been from the same family of dragons from the sea.”

“How’d you know that?” Zoro asked before he could stop himself.

The teacher smiled at his question, “Early depictions of them mostly, in art and legends passed to one another. The dragons were mentioned coming up from the sea, and there is art and tales of the dragons passing the title of the guardian of the town from one to the other. There is also a small festival we have in the town on the anniversary of the first documented inheritance. Though that is later in the year.”

She drew a quick sketch of figures standing on the beach, and the crowd around them, which he figured was meant to be the town. She waited until he nodded before continuing,

“The reason for the excitement surrounding the rain comes from this legend of the festival where the younger guardian spirit inherited the title of the towns guardian from the older one. In most accounts once the mantle was passed from one to the other, it would storm for three days and nights, starting as a downpour and tapering out as the days went on.”

She nodded outside the window and Zoro could see an excited grin tugging at her lips, he looked around the room and saw the rest of his class similarly looking excited.

“So everyones happy about a new guardian? Was the old one bad?” Zoro asked trying to piece together the story.

The teacher shook her head in denial, “It wasn’t that the guardian was bad, it was far from it we think. The tales of this guardian are some of the more common ones you’ll hear people tell.”

Zoro could hear a girl behind him whisper to her friend about the depictions of this dragon spirit being the prettiest among all the ones she had seen but he tuned her out in favor of the teacher.

“This legend is quite famous one because, there were three known spirits around this time. The oldest and biggest who was the guardian of the town, then there were two younger ones. Sometime before the passing of the mantle, the second oldest dragon had left.”

“Why did he leave again?” A student near the front asked, “A fight?”

“I don’t know how much you all know about spirits,” their teacher started, Zoro had to choke back a laugh at that sentiment, “But those who aren’t guardian spirits hold another title. In the tales, the older dragon doesn’t just disappear but they watch over something else while the newer one oversees the ocean surrounding us and the town.”

“Then the second oldest left to just protect whatever it had been protecting.” The student surmised.

“From what we can infer, yes. The mantle was passed from the oldest of the three to the youngest of the three, and the storm that followed was an impressive one just like the one we saw yesterday. For years, the town knew prosperity and peace. I’m sure you’ve all heard legends from your grandparents of a time when the young guardian had been spotted in the waters around the town, or even disguised as one of us in the town.”

A group of boys began jostling one of their friends who flushed and ducked his head.

“Kazuo’s granddad has been claiming he saw a dragon in the water yesterday during the storm!”

Zoro recognized the boy, Kazuo, as the grandson of one of the old men who was always telling stories in the town and fishing.

The teacher hushed the boys and continued her story, “The town had been very blessed in those times. Until sometime in the last two decades something had changed. A drought hit the town and until yesterday we hadn’t had a storm like this.”

“Did that mean the guardian left?” A girl this time asked the question.

“It’s a little hard to figure out,” The teacher admitted, “All we have is the legends to go off. There is only one tale of a guardian abandoning the town and it is much older than the rest of the legends. In that one, the guardian who was dissatisfied with the town people, departed and didn’t pass the title of and the town reportedly suffered dangerous winds and harsh storms and the town was almost destroyed until a new guardian took place. In this case, the drought but lack of destruction is a little harder to place what happened exactly.”

“My granddad says the dragon he saw was the same as before, at least the colors looked the same. Maybe it has to do with the renaming of the sea?” Kazuo theorized.

“That could be a good point,” The teacher nodded in contemplation, she turned back and readdressed Zoro, “A little over a decade ago, the government went forward with a project to rename the sea and the other older areas around here. The town pushed back hard on it but ultimately we lost and the sea was renamed.”

“What was the name before?” someone Zoro vaguely recognized as their class president asked. “Even though it was just recently changed wasn’t the name lost years ago?”

“The name of the sea was much debated to the point that in the tales, there is confusion over whether the name in the stories was the name of the sea or the guardian, so its possible the spirit lost its way when the town renamed the sea. But that’s beside the point, we can’t know exactly what happened or why it happened all we know is that from our stories and tales, the events taking place over these past few days means that we have a guardian again. Which explains why everyone is in good moods as well as this inheritance event was always thought to bestow the town with good fortune.”

The bell tolled overhead, breaking the class from their discussion and making no less than two-thirds of the class jump.

“Well Zoro, I hoped that this explained a bit of what was happening around town for you, but now we must begin our lessons for that day.”

Zoro nodded his thanks as the teacher launched into talking about their schedule for the day. Throughout the first half of the day, Zoro couldn’t help but let his mind wander with the legends of the town. The theory about the renaming causing issues for this towns guardian made sense, and the inheritance ceremony reminded him of the little he had learned in the spirit world from spirits like Vivi and Luffy who had inherited their titles. Although there was absolutely no way that Zoro could think to bring it up, how was he supposed to just casually explain such firsthand knowledge of the spirit world without delving into his trip there?

At the end of the day, as Zoro was standing up and stretching while he looked for Johnny and Yosaku before they headed off to practice he was stopped by a girl who stood in front of him. She fidgeted until she noticed Zoro’s attention on her and she straightened up suddenly.

“Zoro may I speak with you a moment?” She asked, her hands were folded behind her back and her body help tense in anticipation.

Befuddled, Zoro just mutely nodded his head and let the girl lead him out of the room. He didn’t quite know her, he had seen her around before and they were in the same class but beyond that he was drawing blanks.

“What’s going on?” Zoro questioned once they came to a stop.

The girl turned to him and took a deep breath, “I just figured now would be the best time for this, I’m sure you must have seen everyone feeling the luck from the storm and I felt that I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I didn’t try and take a chance at some of this luck for myself.”

Zoro quirked an eyebrow at her, but gestured for her to continue.

“I know we haven’t known each other that long, but I can’t help but notice you in our classes and notice you in your kendo practices!” She said quickly, “You’re really very good, if you hadn’t been new this year you could’ve easily been the captain of the team! But I just wanted to let you know that I have feelings for you and wanted to see if you’d want to try going out with me?”

Zoro blinked in shock for a long moment. He opened his mouth in an attempt to find an answer. Unbidden he felt his cheeks flush, he hadn’t been expecting much of this encounter and the sudden confession caught him completely off guard.

“You like me?”

“Yes,” She nodded, “I do Zoro, very much so.”

She must’ve read something in his face and the fact that he hadn’t been able to answer her yet.

“I can see that you don’t return the feelings however.” She continued, her face falling slightly.

Zoro nodded, “I’m sorry?” He offered up weakly, “It’s just that-” He cut himself off and, much to his own horror, he could feel the blush on his cheeks darken. One of his hands came up and scratched at the back of his head in a rare show of embarrassment.

The girls face changed from crestfallen to a strange sort of knowing leer, “There’s someone else isn’t there? You already have someone you love.”

Zoro let out a gush of air in a defeated sort of sigh, and the girl in front of him smiled genially at him. “Yeah, I already like someone.”

“Do I know them?”

“Nah, you don’t know him.” Zoro paused as the answer came out of his mouth, the phrase coming out easily and unguarded. There was a small chuckle from the girl.

“I see, I never stood a chance, did I?”

At Zoro’s helpless shrug, she just nodded and reached out a little awkwardly to give him a pat on the shoulder.

“Thank you for at least letting me down easily Zoro. I just wanted to try now with all the luck the rains brought. I hope the rain brings you luck.”

“So do I.” He muttered, as he watched the girl walk away. Zoro was partially glad that there had been no crying in the encounter, he would have had no clue on how to handle that.

He received a full ream of teasing from both Johnny and Yosaku when he showed up to practice, as they had both seen him depart with the girl. The teasing fell into full on dramatics when they had found out that Zoro had turned her down, and while the two idiots were prostrating themselves over the unfairness of it all, the rest of the team heard of his encounter and the rest of the club wasted no time in joining in.

“See you next week, lover boy.” The captain cooed as Zoro left with Johnny and Yosaku.

“Don’t break anymore hearts!” One of the other senior members called after him.

Johnny clung to his sleeve as they walked, still waxing poetic about the unfairness of the world.

“I just don’t get why? Who are you crushing on that you’d turn down a cute girl like that?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Zoro complained. trying and failing to shake off Johnny, “You don’t know them.”

“Well can we meet her?” Yosaku wheedled from his other side.

“There is no her.” Zoro bit out, tired of this conversation and already yearning for his warm bed.

“Okay, well can we meet him?” Johnny added on.

“No, he doesn’t live around here.”

Zoro was finally able to shake off Johnny and was already trudging ahead of the two of them as quickly as he could.

“Ah,” Yosaku sighed “It’s a sweetheart from his old town.” He wiped a fake tear from his eye as he and Johnny clutched at each other and mimed Zoro swooning over his ‘lost love’.

“I don’t know why I’m friends with you two.” Zoro mumbled to himself.

A more biting remark aimed at the two idiots still acting out a love story behind him was lost on his tongue as Zoro caught site of a cat sitting on the fence across from him. The calico was oddly familiar, Zoro struggled to place where it was from, but then the cat caught his eyes and gave a few flicks of its tail before hopping off the post and disappearing into the underbrush. Zoro was absolutely floored when he recognized the cat a moment later as the one he’d seen in his dream.

Johnny and Yosaku mistook his frozen state as a response to their act and they swiftly tugged him down the path, nattering on about how they were just kidding and how Zoro needed to relax more. But Zoro didn’t care about that anymore, all he was thinking about was the cat he had seen and how it had seemed to know him.

The next month and a half passed in almost a similar sort of fashion. The dreams of the spirit world hadn’t ceased if anything that had been getting increasingly convoluted, less about what had happened to him there and more instances of him seeing spirits in the town or them leaving him with a cryptic message. Always something about time and things changing. It was always raining in the dreams, or at least he could hear the sounds of water even if the sky in his dreamscape had been clear.

He had also kept seeing the cat, almost everywhere he turned he would catch a glimpse of a tail disappearing around a corner. He almost felt like the animal was messing with him.

Ever since the three day rainstorm the month before the town had also changed. Everyone was much more lively then they’d originally been. The older townspeople had taken to loudly retelling ancient folktales and stories, as well as that more people would stop by to listen in on them.

Zoro was sat on the beach once again, enjoying the lulling sounds of the waves rolling over each other. Perona was skimming the shoreline, large hat obscuring her face as she collected shells. He had recognized and waved at a few of his classmates he saw gathered further down the beach. He knew one was Kazuo because he and his friends had accompanied Kazuo’s grandfather and his friend when the two old men has set out in their fishing boat. Zoro could see the boat in the distance a little, the two old men seemed to be staring down into the water. Zoro paid them no mind really, but he felt the same old feeling of a tugging in his gut that had him rising to his feet and joining Perona at the shoreline.

“What’d you come down for Zoro? You gonna go swimming?” She asked tilting her head back so she could see Zoro from behind the large rim of her hat.

Zoro hummed noncommittally, before shrugging. Perona gave a put upon sigh and turned her attention back to the shells.

“Here hold some of these.”

Without waiting for any sort of response, she unfolded his arms and thrust a handful of shells into them. Zoro, well used to this type of behavior by now, just let it happen.

Their attention was drawn by the two old men rowing back to shore quickly shouting about something. Perona and Zoro headed over towards that part of the beach, while Kazuo and his friends all rushed in the water to pull the boat to shore.

“Grandpa!” Kazuo yelled as he pulled the small boat to the shore and helped the two men out of it. “What happened? Are you okay?”

His grandfather gave a sharp and loud laugh, “Am I okay? I have never been better in my life!”

The boys as well as Perona and Zoro were confused and it must have shown on everyones face because, the old men shared a glance and another chuckle. Zoro felt something pulling at his attention, he turned his gaze to the path up to the beach staring at all the people walking on it, trying to see who had caught his attention from the corner of his eye. He didn’t see anyone yet but the forest line was pulling his focus. He felt a dry sort of humor that the scenery of the forest bordering on the beach was so nostalgic to him, he must have been going to this beach more often than he thought.

“I saw him in the water I swear it!” Kazuo’s grandfather proclaimed.

“If not him than the biggest damn fish in the world!” His friend threw in.

“Saw who Grandpa?”

“The guardian.” His grandfather spoke reverently, turning back to gaze out at the sea. “Right beneath the water we saw it and it was just like the last stories. We couldn’t see the whole dragon, but the scales, the scales are exactly as described in the tales.”

His friend nodded along with him, “It was like seeing a picture brought to life, we were just looking in trying to see any fish below us. When the sun caught the scales as the great thing turned in the sea.”

Kazuo’s grandfather grabbed him by the arm and pulled him closer, “Just like the legends of the last guardian we had before the drought, ‘a great dragon lives beneath the waves and he watches over and protects this village’”, the grandfather quoted, “‘his mane is as black as the night and his scales are a sky at break, red bleeds to blue’. The scales matched exactly, a deep red that slowly fades into blue.”

Zoro had tuned back into the old mans conversation when he started quoting the old legend, but at the description of the dragon, Peronas head had swung towards him sharply. She had heard the description of Luffy from Zoro many times of the past few months, but Zoro didn’t even notice her movement. The description was so accurate to his memories of Luffy and the legends of the town and the stories he had heard of Luffy had seemed to fit together so seamlessly in that moment. 

His entire body locked up and the shells from his hand fell and scattered on the beach at his feet. He felt the small glimmer of hope that he’d see everyone from the spirit world again slam into him full force and crush the breath from his lungs. He didn’t want to allow himself to hope in case it turned out to be all for naught but it seemed like the universe was favoring him this time.

That was when he saw a group of people out of the corner of his eye again, one their own the heads of the people wouldn’t have really caught his attention but a girl with such bright orange hair walking between two boys, one with black hair and the other blond, had Zoro sprinting up the beach before he could fully process what he saw. He didn’t even hear the startled and confused shouts Perona and the others lobbied at his back as he ran.

His pulse thundered in his ears as he made his way up the beach, desperation was hedging at the corners of his mind as he almost lost them around a bend. He skidded onto the concrete, and shouted after them.

“Nami!”

He stood frozen as he waited for the group to react, and when the whole group paused and the girl in the middle began to turn, Zoro’s entire chest almost collapsed upon itself in relief. Zoro could hear Perona jogging up the beach towards him still shouting questions at him, but Zoro was focused on the three in front of him.

“Good to see you again.” Nami smirked gesturing to Zoros disheveled appearance from his sprint up the beach.

The glint in her eyes was bugging him as Zoro tried to place where he’d seen that recently, when a piece finally fit into place in his mind and he threw up a hand, pointing an accusatory finger at her. “You’re the cat I’ve been seeing.”

Nami placed her head into the palm of her hand sighing visibly.

“You always were slow on the uptake, moss idiot.” Sanji shook his head, exchanging a look of faux sympathy with Usopp.

“Oi shit cook watch it.”

“It’s good to see you again.” Usopp said, casting some furtive glances at Perona who had almost comically skidded to a stop by Zoro and was gaping at the three in front of them.

“Zoro…?” She began hesitantly tugging on the bottom of his shirt, “Are these your friends from the spirit world?”

Zoro nodded but was cut off by Nami before he could speak.

“Let’s get to your house or somewhere quiet first before we start just retelling the whole sordid affair.” Nami said wryly, waving her hands cutting off the group.

Perona excitedly escorted the whole group back to the house, the shells she had collected evidently forgotten on the beach for good.

Zoro fell back to walk alongside Nami, shoving Sanji aside when the idiot began sputtering in indignation, Zoro couldn’t believe he had missed that idiot.

“It was you, wasn’t it? The cat?” Zoro asked turning to address Nami.

Nami sent him an amused look and hummed a bit as she thought, “Yes it was me. Following you around was very interesting.”

Zoro sputtered torn between annoyance and something like embarrassment at her tone.

“What are you on about?”

She smirked at him, “Didn’t know you were such the heartbreaker.”

Zoro gaped, “You-? That was in my school like a month ago I hadn’t even seen you yet!”

Nami chuckled, bumping their shoulders together, “I wasn’t there, I heard from the two friends you’re always with.”

“Why the cat form for so long and why didn’t I see those two?” Zoro asked gesturing at Usopp and Sanji who were now situated on either side of Perona as the group walked the well-worn trails to Zoro’s house.

“We’ll explain when we’re all inside, its sort of complicated.”

Zoro let out a deep exhale, “When is it not.”

Nami sighed and shrugged in response, but the annoyed twist to her face let Zoro know that she was probably even more exasperated than he was.

Perona burst through the door of their house like a localized explosion and he could hear her yelling for Mihawk, through the walls of the house. Their father came sauntering around the corner, a knowing look in his eye when he saw the trio that had accompanied him.

“From the bathhouse, I presume?” He asked tilting his head at them in greeting when the three had nodded their affirmative. “Please come in and sit.”

They all gathered in the living room, Perona immediately turned expectant wide eyes on the trio, while Zoro just gaped a few times trying to figure out what question to ask first, Mihawk just seemed to lean against the wall content to watch it all unfold.

“Where to start…?” Usopp trailed off weakly, glancing towards Nami and Sanji for support. They didn’t offer much as they seemed to be just as hesitant as he was.

Zoro knew what question he needed to ask first, the fear and uncertainty about everyones fates was what had bothered him the most since he’d come back.

“How did the battle with Crocodile go?” Zoro practically demanded.

Sanjis mouth twisted into a wickedly pleased smirk, a pleased look had also settled on Nami’s features, Usopp was the only one who seemed to pale at the thought of the experience.

“We sent that bastard packing.” Sanji sighed happily reminiscing fondly on the memory.

Usopp sent him a scathing look, “Don’t sound so happy about it. That fight was terrifying.”

Nami patted him on the back idly, “It wasn’t that bad, though it was tough. In the end, though we all ended up victorious. Vivi’s got the bathhouse back in her name, we were all released from Crocodiles contracts and given back our names.”

Zoro sat back and rubbed a hand over his face in relief, he could feel all the tension he had carried since he had come back leave his body in one fell swoop.

“Why did you guys only come back now?” Perona asked curiously, “Did the fight really take that long?”

Nami pointed at her as she answered, “You have to remember time doesn’t pass over there the same as it does here, but in short no the fight didn’t take that long.”

“Crocodile had caused so many problems it took forever for the world to stabilize.” Usopp lamented, laying himself further back into the couch.

“That’s the reason it took so long for us to come back.” Sanji summarized, “For spirits to pass into the living realm takes a lot of spirit energy and Crocodile and his machinations had thrown that all out of sync for so long it took the realm awhile to stabilize itself that spirits would be able to pass freely.”

“It only recently stabilized enough for smaller spirits like us to be able to travel between worlds.” Usopp nodded along with Sanji’s explanation.

“Is that why I only saw Nami as a cat?” Zoro asked jerking his thumb towards the girl in question.

“On one hand yes, I’m a minor enough spirit that I can pass easily, but traveling is easier as that form because its smaller and takes less energy to manifest here. Usopp is a minor spirit but he has no second form so he couldn’t do it.” Nami explained.

“Sanji is stronger than us but his second form is a literal ball of fire so that wasn’t very inconspicuous to just suddenly appear like that in front of you.” Usopp snickered dodging the swipe of Sanji’s hand with practiced ease.

“So, the really powerful spirits have a harder time appearing here?” Perona asked delighted.

Zoro should’ve figured she’d be over the moon with the ability to ask questions to real spirits.

Sanji nodded. His expression was pained from where Nami had punched him in the side, stopping Sanji from fawning over and flirting with Perona, like he had done on the walk over. That had resulted in a brief but almost nostalgic scuffle with Zoro and two swift hits from Nami which finished it.

“It’s a way to get a balance between our world and yours, if the big and powerful spirits could just appear here all the time, especially in the older times, a lot of havoc could’ve been caused.” Usopp shuddered as he imagined what that would’ve been like.

“Is that why Luffy isn’t here with you?” Zoro tried to force his voice into something that was closer to a casual tone but his missed the mark by a mile and the question came out strained.

The three spirits shared a tense look, “Theres more to why Luffy still hasn’t shown up.” Nami began hesitantly, “Though if it were up to him he would’ve been here the second Crocodile had been dealt with.”

“Is the spirit world still too unstable for someone like him?” Zoro guessed.

“It shouldn’t be,” Sanji admitted, a frown pulling at the edges of his lips, “A few days ago the spirit world and this world balanced out so it should be as it was before, and before Luffy had no issue passing through. His brothers can also pass through just fine.”

“We think it might be because of the whole issue with his name.” Nami theorized. “He’s a guardian spirit and he’s a very strong one at that, so it already takes a lot for him to manifest here.”

“Also, guardian spirits always manifest in the same place once the take a domain under their protection. It’s where they’ll always manifest, old shrines used to mark these back in the days.” Usopp added in.

“Since Luffy had lost his name and the region he protected he was cut off from his place of origin essentially. He’s been able to pass over here but only for a moment and I don’t think he’s been able to do it looking like us either.” Sanji sighed, kneading his forehead as he tried to explain the issue.

“We’re not sure why he’s still having issues with it, his brothers don’t know either. You gave him back his name and that should have been enough.” Nami ran her fingers through her hair in frustration.

A sharp knock at the door put a pause to the whole conversation. Mihawk pushed off the wall to go and answer it but once he opened the door, instead of a greeting he addressed the person with a deadpan “what.”

“Don’t be like that,” A cheerful voice answered back, there was a brief rustling of movement and some muffled cursing before a red haired man slipped around the corner and greeted them.

“I know you.” Zoro said slightly dumbfounded, “I met you when I left the spirit world.”

The man slung and arm around Mihawk, who shot him a look of distaste in response.

“This is Shanks, he may be an idiot but he was the one who helped myself and Perona in the spirit world.” Mihawk sighed and gestured with a free hand.

Shanks grinned and knocked his head against Mihawks before letting the other man go.

Sanji pointed a finger at Shanks, “You’re a guardian spirit right?”

Shanks waved off the accusation with a flapping hand, “Yeah I got a piece of land out there that’s mine, but that’s beside the point.”

“So, what is the point?” Zoro asked quirking an eyebrow.

Shanks collapsed into one of the nearby plush chairs and draped his arms over the back and lofted a casual smirk at them, “What’s the one thing we all have in common in this room?” He tilted his head back to glance at Mihawk and Perona, “Well for the most part.”

“We’re all trying to figure out why Luffy hasn’t been able to show up?” Usopp asked unsurely, shrugging while he presented his idea.

Shanks clicked his tongue and pointed at Usopp, “Got it in one.”

Zoro turned to face Shanks head on, “Do you know why he hasn’t come back?”

Shanks gave a one shoulder shrug. “I have a good guess.”

“Why would you know and not his brothers?” Nami said eyeing him critically.

“Here’s the thing,” Shanks began leaning forward, “Luffy’s brothers are both guardian spirits like us, but what’s the different between our domains?”

Nami paused, tapping a finger on her chin. “You and Luffy are land and sea guardians respectively but his brothers are wind and fire.”

“I don’t get it, it’s all physical aspects and nature.” Sanji tilted his head in confusion.

“Is it because wind and fire don’t have like a set physical parameter?” Nami asked suddenly, her back straightening up quickly as she worked out the problem in her head. “Wind and fire aren’t always in the same place, so they can manifest where they want to as long as there is wind or fire in that place, but you and Luffy have certain physical boundaries of what you represent.”

“Luffy is a Guardian of the sea right?” Zoro cut in, “so he has to reappear at that sea only?”

“That’s the gist of it.” Shanks nodded, “The real issue came when he lost his name and domain. He was able to reconnect and he’s even taken back his mantle as the guardian.”

“Ah Garp passed it on to him finally,” Usopp sighed happily, “When did that happen?”

“While the spirit world was in flux due to the shifting powers. Luffy’s loss of guardianship had some hand in how unstable it had been, mantles don’t usually pass backwards in succession. So Garp re-passed the title to Luffy which helped stabilize the spirit world somewhat.” Shanks explained.

“So why can’t he pass through now? He has his domain back and his name, the realms are stable enough so whats missing?” Sanji let out a frustrated huff of air.

“The problem doesn’t lie within Luffy himself or the spirit world barrier, the problem is in this world. Hence, why I am here.” Shanks said folding his arms and leaning back in the chair.

“This world?” Perona asked confused.

Zoros eyes glanced over to his sister and father, he had almost forgotten that they were in the room.

“It’s not common but some spirits do lose the connection with this world. Usually, forest spirits when a forest burns down or is cleared. It’s not usual with water spirits.” Nami directed at her. “Though it also happens when things have been renamed, the spirit loses connection and has to manifest here soon enough after the change to reestablish the connection.”

“So how do we fix it?” Zoro asked.

His tongue felt heavy in his mouth, having Luffy back was so close and yet there was an almost impossible barrier keeping it from happening. Zoro couldn’t even begin to untangle the confusing web of hope and anxiety and doubt that was banging around in his head and heart.

“If only we could have like a marker or a guiding point for him.” Sanji muttered rubbing his chin in contemplation.

“He needs a bridge, someone to stand at the point where he would manifest and give him something to focus on and bring him fully across the barrier.” Shanks said. “That’s also a problem because that’s very difficult to do.”

“Especially because Luffy is already hard to get to focus in the first place.” Usopp bemoaned.

“It can’t be just anyone also, it needs to be someone who is important enough for Luffy to focus on in the state he is in.” Shanks continued, “This half manifestation state where he’s fading in between worlds stuck in his dragon form he’s going to be more instinct than reason. Which is saying something because the kid is already more instinct than reason.”

“None of that means anything if we can’t find the place he’s supposed to manifest at.” Zoro grumbled, frustration building in his chest.

The spirits in the room shot him odd looks, Zoro shot them back a defensive “What?” as the silence prolonged.

“Listen as much as we, though I loathe to admit it, missed your winning personality we didn’t just come to this town for you.” Sanji teased ignoring the snarl Zoro responded with.

“This town is Luffys manifestation point.” Nami murmured to him, her tone softer than he’d heard in a long time.

“So, what’s your plan?” Mihawk cut in for the first time succeeding in making half the room jump.

Shanks spun in his chair to address his friend, “Well we have to figure out where he’s been popping in and out of, that’ll be the easiest point for him to come through. Since we’re assuming his sea has been renamed the new name doesn’t actually matter all we need is someone to call him by his name and title and hopefully Luffy will feel the pull and do the rest.”

“Who will be the connection point when we do find it?” Perona asked, but with the way her eyes kept flitting to Zoro, it seemed like she already had a guess.

The rest of the room followed her eye line and they all fixed their focus on Zoro.

“He was the one to give him back his name.” Nami agreed with the silent consensus.

“You also can’t deny that they do have a strong connection.” Usopp admitted shrugging when Zoros gaze flit to him. “It’s obvious how much they like each other, like you can’t be in the room with them and not know.”

Zoro refused to blush under the weight of all the knowing smirks that were slid his way just them, but he also couldn’t deny his own feelings and the warmth spreading through his chest at the admittance of how Luffy felt for him.

“Would the idiot be a strong enough tether point for the town though?” Sanji asked critically eyeing Zoro, “We know hes hopelessly in love with Luffy but they just came to the town. That’s a weak bond.”

“We just came back to the town.” Mihawk corrected.

Both Perona and Zoro shot him shocked looks. “What do you mean by that?” Perona probed.

Mihawk sighed, “When Zoro was younger and he was crossed into the spirit world the first time, it created a beacon to spirits to come and try and get him to go back with them, and this town is highly active with spirits. As we’ve seen the border between worlds runs thin here, so for safety I moved us but now that he was older and less likely, I thought, to be taken we came back.”

White noise filled Zoros ears as he tried to piece together all this new info that had just been thrust upon him. He needed to focus on trying to figure out where Luffy would most likely manifest now that he knew Luffy was the guardian of the town. His mind kept cycling back to the fact that this was the town he had lived in as a child, the town where he had almost drowned but resurfaced in the spirit world and was guided back by Luffy so long ago, the town where he once again ran into Luffy and was sent to the spirit world only to return because of Luffy again.

The encounter with Kazuo and his grandfather suddenly came to the forefront of Zoros mind. His entire body froze at the realization though, in the shock of seeing Nami and the others again he had almost forgotten. Kazuo’s grandfather had been going on about seeing the guardian spirit in the oceans, a dragon that matched Luffy’s description perfectly. The blood drained from his face as Zoro recalled the nostalgia at seeing the forest from the beach.

It wasn’t because he’d been to the beach so much before.

That was the forest he had seen when he surfaced in the spirit world and when he was pulled from the ocean after his first encounter with Luffy. It was nostalgic because he had seen it so long ago as a child.

There was an urgent pulling in his stomach. He surged to his feet, the shouts of surprise from those in the room with him weren’t even registered. There was a reason he had been going to that stretch of ocean so much, why he felt so drawn to it but couldn’t get in. Why he would spend hours sitting there staring at the water when he was aching to be back in the spirit world with the others again.

The ocean was Luffys manifest point.

The ocean was Luffy.

Every time he had gone there, every time he had felt the desire to be at the water’s edge, it wasn’t the water he was finding solace in. It wasn’t the water he was yearning for and trying to get closer to.

It was Luffy.

He was out the door before he was even finished with that thought. He tore down the paths that he could walk in his sleep.

He was panting by the time his still bare feet finally hit the sand, chest heaving as he desperately sucked in gasps of air. The sun had just set and the world was bathed in the soft glow of twilight. Zoro practically tripped over himself as he ran down the beach.

This time instead of stopping at the edge of the water he ran until he was up to his knees in the cool water. Out of the corner of his eye he knew the whole group had followed him from the house to the beach. He could hear Usopp much further up the beach shouting for them all to slow down.

Zoro took in a few steadying breaths, the feeling in his gut was an ever present pulling, trying to tug him out to deeper waters. Zoro recalled what Shanks had said earlier, about all he needed to try and bring Luffy to his world. The waves were mind-numbingly loud as the crashed around him.

He took a breath, the tension on the beach was practically palpable. No one was talking behind them. He couldn’t even hear the labored breathing of Perona or Mihawk, the only two in the group besides himself who needed to breathe.

He looked out at the horizon and steeled himself, stowing the nerves as he took a final breath to steady himself and try to bring Luffy back to them.

“Monkey D. Luffy, the Guardian of the Eastern Sea.”

The ocean seemed to stop, no waves were rolling or crashing. The water fell perfectly still, but still nothing had happened. The whole world seemed to be suspended in time. Zoro concentrated on the pulling that was now centered in his chest, the ache practically unbearable.

He put all the anxiety, all the hope, all the anticipation and all the love that had been broiling in his soul since he had come back from the spirit world without Luffy, he put all the yearning and desire he felt for the guardian spirit; he took all of those feeling and emotions into a single motion. He focused on the pulling in his chest and, for the first time, gave a hard yank back.

There was a surging sound from beneath the still waters, the waters parted and Luffy rose from beneath them. He stood in the shallow waters still in his dragon form. He held Zoros gaze and the two of them stood frozen facing each other.

Zoro took a few determined steps forward, his hands came up on either side of Luffys head. He was just a magnificent in this form as Zoro could remember. With a shaky exhale, Zoro pressed his head to Luffy’s, the move reminiscent of when Luffy had appeared at Robins.

There was a sound like the one that had happened when Zoro had dropped all the shells earlier in that day. Zoro idly marveled at the fact that that had been earlier in the day, this day had seemed to be twice as long as normal.

The scales rippled away and left standing before him was the Luffy, beaming up at him. He was no longer in the outfit of the bathhouse but what Zoro recognized as an outfit like what he had seen him wearing as children. His skin was warm beneath Zoros hand and the hope and love he was feeling in his chest was insurmountable, Zoro was sure a wild and free grin was plastered on his face just as it was on Luffys.

Luffy laughed and laid his hand atop Zoros own.

“I missed you a lot Zoro.”

There was no mistaking the fondness and glee in Luffys tone, no way to take the glint in his eyes as anything other than extreme joy and unbridled love. Zoro’s soul felt free and his mood was soaring somewhere amongst the clouds at the moment.

“I missed you too.” Zoro admitted, ducking his head a little bit.

Luffy waited no longer, he removed his hands from Zoros and wrapped both his arms around the back of Zoros neck and tugged him down into a kiss that they both had waited far too long for, it tasted of salt and the sea and there was no place Zoro would rather be, even though a second later the two of them had toppled in to the water due to the excessive force Luffy had put into pulling him down into him.

They resurfaced still clutching at one another, Luffy called out a cheery greeting to the rest of theirs friends who were watching from the beach, half fond the other half exasperated.

Zoro and Luffy turned to each other again; Zoro laced their fingers together and tugged the spirit into another kiss, Luffy smiled against his lips and pulled back to give another delighted laugh before yanking Zoro to him once again.

Zoro was all too happy to sink into him once again.