Chapter Text
Zoro jumped without a second thought.
When the Going Merry got ambushed by an opportunistic gang of pirates in the middle of a storm, he, along with the rest of the crew, had no choice but to fight back. Their opponents weren’t particularly formidable, but they did have a numbers advantage, something that diminished with each passing minute. They didn’t seem to realise they’d bitten off more than they could chew with this particular crew.
Then, amongst the chaos and the cannonfire, half the yard of the Going Merry’s main mast came crashing down, the rigging remaining the only thing that kept it from separating completely from the ship, suspended in mid-air. It hung precariously over the deck as the battle and the storm raged on. Zoro kept his eyes on it as he fought, the tangle of wood, cloth and rope swinging with every rise and fall of the Going Merry as it crested each crashing wave. Something was bound to go wrong, and the thought of that inevitability had Zoro’s nerves on edge. It didn’t stop his blade from striking true each time, and if anything, it made him more vigilant than ever, keeping track of each member of the crew even as he fought multiple attackers at once.
Soon, all his worries were proven to be warranted. From the corner of his eye, he saw Sanji holding off two opponents at once when the broken yard came swiping along the quarterdeck, hitting the cook in the back and taking him with it as it swung out over the water. Zoro watched, wide-eyed, as Sanji’s limp form went over the railing, and he was almost certain he had been knocked unconscious by the hit. He was plummeting to certain doom, unless…
He knew what he had to do, and didn’t think twice before jumping after him, into the dark and icy ocean. None of the others noticed what had happened, and he knew that if he hesitated even for a second, Sanji would sink beneath the waves and out of his sight in an instant, and then he would have had no chance of being saved. Even in just the few seconds between the cook falling overboard and Zoro leaping after him, he had slipped out of sight completely, and the swordsman had only his memory of where he saw him go under and an educated guess as to which way the waves carried him to rely on. It seemed that his haste paid off, as he spotted Sanji’s unmistakable golden hair just before he sunk once more out of sight. Zoro took off towards him, honed-in on the spot where he saw him disappear beneath the waves, and dove to follow him where he sank, reaching out blindly for his crewmate, hoping against all hope that he was still within reach.
He hadn’t realised how worried he’d been until he felt the rush of relief when his fingers wrapped around the fabric of Sanji’s suit jacket. He pulled the cook’s body closer to him and wrapped his arms below his armpits, essentially hugging him from behind as he kicked towards the surface.
Keeping both their heads above water was no easy feat, and it made looking around more difficult than he would have preferred. Both the Going Merry and the enemy vessel were far away by then, and the wave continued to carry the two further away from the ships. In a direction away from the ships, but far closer to the two of them, he spotted floating debris, some of which seemed large enough to hang onto. There was no way he could make it back to the ship under better circumstances, let alone with Sanji’s dead-weight, so going towards the debris seemed to be the only viable option left. With renewed determination, he started dragging the cook towards what seemed to be a large chunk of the attacking ship’s railing, blasted off by one of Usopp’s cannon shots, no doubt. The progress was much slower than he hoped, and with the heights the waves were reaching, it was hard enough just to stay above water, let alone make progress. Even after he reached the railing and pulled Sanji and himself onto it, just keeping both of them on it as they were buffeted by wave after wave required all his strength and concentration. Finally, the storm started to subside and the waves started to even out.
Just as he was about to catch his breath and let himself relax, he heard hacking and heaving from Sanji’s direction, and immediately turned his attention to the cook, who was leaning on shaking arms over the edge of the railing, coughing up water, and, more alarmingly, his last meal. Sensing that Sanji’s arms might give out at any second, he put a steadying hand on his shoulder as the cook struggled to even out his breathing. It sounded like he was trying to say something to him, but between coughing and the weakness of his voice, Zoro couldn’t make out a single word.
‘Save your breath,’ he told him, his voice as stern and even as ever. ‘I think you might have a concussion.’
Sanji finally got his breathing under control. He looked miserable, suit completely soaked, wet hair sticking to his face, shivering in the cold wind. Zoro felt the cold too, felt his body shaking, but he had the feeling he was still looking a touch less miserable than the cook.
Now that the most immediate danger was over, the realisation of the full breadth of what happened started to sink in. The attack in itself was nothing he wouldn’t have been able to handle, but he had surprised himself when he acted so quickly to save Sanji’s life. Of course, he never truly hated the cook, it was just hard to be nicer to him when everything he did annoyed Zoro. It annoyed him that he presumed to know Nami better than him back at Coco Village, that he got along with Luffy so well and he didn’t know how or why, that he limited himself to only fighting with his legs for no good reason and still he was a close match to Zoro, that he insisted on flirting with every pretty woman they met, and the list went on and on. But he didn’t hate Sanji, because despite all of that, he was a genuinely good person, a fantastic cook, a valuable member of the crew, and worthy of Zoro’s respect - not that he’d ever tell him. The fact that he risked his own life just to save Sanji’s, he felt, should be enough to clue him in to that, and if he was too dumb to pick up on it, well, that was his problem, not Zoro’s.
The ocean around them started to still as they drifted further and further away from where they fell into the water. While the storm had moved on, the sky remained mostly overcast as the sun continued its descent towards the horizon. Still, there was no Going Merry in sight, and Zoro knew that with the main mast as damaged as it was, it would take quite some time for the rest of the crew to repair it enough to try to find them again. He could only hope that one of them, most likely Usopp, saw what happened, and that Nami could tell which way they were.
Were they alright? The tide of the battle seemed to be in their favour when the two of them went overboard. There was no reason why Luffy couldn’t finish off the remaining attackers with Usopp and Nami by his side, even in the absence of two of their most capable fighters. He had to assume they survived, that they won and they were doing everything in their power to find him and Sanji, because they were the best hope the two of them had to survive this ordeal.
Besides, he had enough to worry about without the terrifying thought of their crew not being able to find them. Like, for instance, Sanji, who had just thrown up due to what seemed like a pretty bad concussion, and was now even more vulnerable to dehydration, not to mention starvation. Zoro was far from a doctor, but he’s caused, suffered, and seen other people suffer enough concussions to know the signs. One did not become the most feared pirate hunter in the East Blue without knowing how to take care of oneself, and that included learning how to recognise symptoms, health risks, and learning how to treat them.
Out there in the sea, floating on a broken piece of a ship’s railing, there was nothing he could do for Sanji. In theory, he knew not to worry about things out of his control, but he hated the feeling of helplessness inevitably set in. He was Roronoa Zoro, First Mate to the Captain of the Straw Hat pirates, and with such a responsibility, he expected a certain level of competence, of vigilance from himself, and it bothered him when all he could do amounted to nothing. When all he could do was wait.
‘You alright?’ He asked, more as a way to check if Sanji was even conscious than an attempt at chatting. The strangled groan, bordering on a whimper Sanji made as a response was possibly the most wretched sound he’d heard the cook make since he met him. When he spoke, his voice was raspier than usual and much weaker.
‘What… happened?’
Zoro half expected that question, although he'd hoped against it, as it was one more symptom of a concussion he’d hoped he was hasty to diagnose earlier.
‘We were attacked,’ he said, dryly. Usually, it would be sometime around this point in any conversation they were having when one of them, usually Zoro, would provoke or agitate the other into a verbal or even physical sparring match. Zoro, however, deemed that now was neither the place nor the time for petty stuff like that. ‘You fell off the ship. I managed to drag you to this piece of wood, but the Going Merry is out of sight. Now we’re stuck in the middle of the sea.’
Sanji’s eyelids fluttered open, then pulled together immediately as the thinning clouds above them let more sunlight through than before, and he covered his eyes with his forearm to protect them from the light.
‘You saved me,’ he said. It wasn’t clear if it was a question or a statement, but Zoro supposed that if it was a question, Sanji already had his answer.
‘Yeah, well… Luffy would have been pretty upset if I hadn’t. Anyway, you got hit pretty hard in the head,’ he said. ‘I’m pretty sure you have a concussion, but I told you that before. You can’t remember?’
There were a few moments of silence before the smallest shake of Sanji’s head.
‘No,’ he said, softly. At first, Zoro didn’t know what to say, or if he should say anything at all, but then he saw tension in Sanji’s lips, even if he couldn’t see the worry in his eyes.
‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘It’s probably nothing too serious, you’ll just be in a bad way for a bit. It’ll pass.’
Sanji’s chortle at his words caught him off guard. Zoro was just as surprised by his own instinct to soothe rather than berate the cook as Sanji must have been, but in their situation, he felt some compassion was warranted.
‘That bad, huh?’ Sanji rasped. His words were slightly slurred, and he spoke slower than usual, almost as if he were drunk. ‘When Roronoa Zoro offers words of comfort, you know things are proper messed up.’
‘I mean it,’ Zoro said, sternly. ‘We’re getting through this, you hear me? I’m not about to let some freak accident at sea take us both out.’
Sanji didn’t respond for a bit, not too long, but long enough for Zoro to start to suspect he might have passed out again.
‘Well,’ he said, finally. ‘It’s not like I haven’t done it before.’
That took Zoro properly by surprise.
‘Done what?’
Sanji pulled his arm away from his eyes, gesturing to the chunk of railing they were floating on, then generally all around them.
‘Getting lost at sea,’ he said. ‘Shivering in the cold, burning in the sun, starvation, despair, all of that.’
Luffy might have mentioned something like that about Sanji, but he never heard the details. “Starvation?” “Despair?” It begged the question…
‘How long?’
Sanji’s face contorted into a pained grimace.
‘Almost three months,’ he said, darkly. He seemed tense, strained, and more exhausted than he looked just moments earlier.
‘Fuck,’ Zoro breathed. He couldn’t even begin to imagine what that must have felt like, and the thought of anyone having to go through that more than once, let alone Sanji, was unacceptable. He could barely stand the cook, didn’t know him very well, but he knew he didn’t deserve this. As if he needed any more reasons to do everything to get out of this situation alive. ‘No, fuck that. I’m not letting it happen again.’
Sanji’s eyebrows shot up his forehead. At first, he looked surprised, then amused.
‘And how, pray tell, are you planning to do that?’ He asked. ‘Do you know something that I don’t? Because I’m pretty sure there’s nothing you can do about it.’
‘I’ll think of something,’ Zoro said, trying to sound more confident than he really was. He’s already established to himself that he was helpless in this situation, something Sanji also knew, and probably understood much better than he did. Even so, he didn’t know why, but he got the sense that this time would be different, that something will happen, someone will come along, their fortunes would turn long before it got as bad as months of starvation and isolation. Maybe it was a premonition, or maybe he just had to believe that.
The conversation died down after that. It was hard to tell without any landmarks around, but as the day progressed, Zoro got the sense that they weren’t just drifting, but being carried by a current in some unknown direction. While the cloud cover was more and more patchy above them, what initially just looked like more clouds in the sky over the horizon turned out to be a mist they were getting closer and closer to. The sun was low by the time they were completely swallowed by the fog, and once inside, even though it seemed less thick than he expected, there wasn’t anything to look at in either way other than Sanji’s silhouette on the other side of the broken railing. The cook hadn’t said a word in what felt like hours, and judging by his breathing, he spent most of that time asleep. Zoro couldn’t fault him, he needed to save his energy, especially after throwing up his last meal, and even if he didn’t, Zoro wouldn’t have been any less vigilant.
He wasn’t going to wake Sanji at first, but then a silhouette appeared through the thinning mist, large and unmoving, and he had to shake the cook awake to confirm he wasn’t just seeing things. When Sanji spotted what he was pointing at, he moved quicker than he had since he fell off the ship, propping himself up on his elbows to get a better view.
‘That’s… a Marine Sea Fort,’ he breathed, incredulous. Zoro had to assume he himself looked just as shocked as Sanji. Sure, Marines were their natural enemies as pirates, but so far, only Luffy had his face on a wanted poster. No one had to know they were on the crew of the most wanted man in the East Blue, and if they played their cards right…
Zoro’s train of thought was interrupted by a light smack on the shoulder from Sanji.
‘I said there’s something wrong,’ he said. Zoro looked at Sanji, then back at the silhouette, which was now less covered by the fog, but getting harder and harder to see due to the setting darkness.
‘What do you mean?’
‘There are no lights,’ Sanji said. That hadn’t occurred to Zoro, but now that Sanji mentioned it, it seemed so obvious. An occupied sea fort would have had at least some lights on, especially in foggy weather, not to mention there weren’t any ships docked anywhere near it. ‘It’s abandoned.’
Zoro supposed it would have been too good to be true if it wasn’t. Still, it was much better than their current situation, and he didn’t have to tell Sanji that.
The current seemed to be passing by it rather than going straight towards it, forcing the two of them to abandon the safety of the wooden railing they relied on so far and swim their way towards the sea fort, but it wasn’t as straightforward as that. Even when they finally reached the rocky platform the fort was built upon, they still had to find a ladder or some kind of stairs to be able to get out of the water. Barnacles and other sharp growths they could barely see in the darkness cut their palms as they moved along the edge of the platform, which made purchase on the slippery rock even harder to find. Finally, after what felt like the good part of an hour, they found a stairway that seemed to start underwater and lead straight to the docks of the fort. The two were barely out of the water when they both decided to take a break right then and there, on the first patch of solid land they reached. As exhausted as Zoro was, he also felt restless, unable to completely relax until he knew he could set a fire to dry themselves up and see if there was more this place could offer them than dry land and protection from the elements.
As his eyes got accustomed to the low moonlight, he could see the stone wall that separated the docks from the rest of the fort. Its large, wooden gate was open and mostly rotten away, and beyond that was what he assumed was a courtyard of sorts.
‘Come on, get up,’ Zoro said, rising to one knee and holding out his hand to Sanji. The cook took the offered hand without complaint, and although he was clearly trying, much of the effort to help him stand fell to Zoro. When he was finally standing on his own two feet, he swayed slightly, unsteady at first, but able to move on his own. Zoro kept within arm’s reach of him, just to be sure. The last thing he needed was the cook falling over and hurting himself more.
Tools, crates, rusted weapons, and even a cannon or two, were strewn around inside the courtyard, along with general detritus, loose palm leaves and weeds. The same storm that battered their ship during the attack must have passed through here, as everything was still damp, and water pooled up in puddles on the uneven ground. Zoro, still thoroughly soaked, felt himself shiver as a cold breeze picked up, and wrapped his arms around his torso. He was pretty confident Sanji was faring much the same in the cold, but took a look at him just the same, although in the dark, he couldn’t see much, other than his shaking silhouette.
‘Everything’s too wet out here for a fire,’ he said. ‘Inside’s our best bet.’
Luckily, whoever was the last out of the sea fort didn’t lock the doors behind them. Aside from a bit of moonlight shining through the open door, it was completely dark inside. He heard the sound of water dripping to the ground and turned around to see Sanji rummaging through his still dripping suit jacket’s inner pocket.
‘Let’s hope it really is waterproof,’ Sanji muttered as he pulled whatever it was he was looking for out of his pocket, and Zoro heard a high pitched metallic ring, followed by the unmistakable sound of a spark wheel being spun. With shaking hands, it took Sanji more than a few tries, but finally, he got a spark, and a flame sprung to life in his lighter.
The light it provided was weak, but much better than nothing. Sanji passed it to Zoro, who wasted no time searching the room for anything useful. He didn’t have to look long before he found the first great help: an oil lantern, and not too far away from it in a cupboard, some oil. The warmth of the lighter helped ease the numbness of his fingers, and he made quick work of filling the oil lamp and lighting the wick. Now that he had the much more powerful light of the lantern, he handed the lighter back to Sanji. There was no knowing how long they’d be on the island, and there was the possibility that they’d have to rely on that lighter for several weeks.
Ten or so minutes later, they were back outside, where Zoro fashioned a makeshift fire pit and filled it with dry wood he cobbled together from old chairs, baskets and barrels from inside, lit it using the lighter, a bit of oil and parchment for kindling, and eventually, they had a bonfire going. Zoro had just one more thing in mind before they could call it a night, and left Sanji at the fire to look for it.
Not too long later, he returned to the fire with two, musty-smelling, stiff and rather coarse blankets, a bundle of crumpled and discoloured marine uniforms, and two mostly clean metallic cups to scoop up the similarly not-so-clean rainwater that collected in an open barrel outside.
Now out of their wet clothes and in the dirty, but dry ones, and with their thirst attended to for the time being, they sat down by the fire, wrapped up in their blankets, while their usual clothes were draped on some empty weapon racks near the fire to dry. Perhaps because of their exhaustion, or just a lack of anything to say, they just sat there next to each other, wordlessly. As tired as he was, Zoro felt way too alert to go to sleep just yet, and for a while it seemed that so was Sanji, but just as Zoro was getting lost in thought staring at the flames, he was brought out of them by the cook’s head hitting his shoulder.
Zoro couldn’t find it within himself to get annoyed at the cook falling asleep on him like this, but he did wind up moving Sanji’s head from his shoulder to his lap for a more comfortable position for both of them. He was lucky Zoro didn’t make a habit out of bullying the weak, otherwise they would have annoyed each other to death by now with their constant bickering. Not that he didn’t think Sanji could take it even in this state, he knew he could, that’s why he did it in the first place, but he wasn’t about to make their situation more unbearable than it was with something like that. The last thing they needed was to get on each other’s nerves, although he wasn’t sure how long they could keep that up for.
With a deep breath, he looked out the courtyard gate. The moon was close to setting, leaving a long, shimmering reflection on the surface of the water. Zoro just stared at the horizon, hoping to spot the familiar silhouette of the Going Merry any second.