Archive of Our Own

“I see your latest mission was successful.”

Sanji pauses where he’s been in the act of casually examining his nails while he’d waited to be addressed. There’s a chip in one that he wouldn’t normally allow. He’ll have to make arrangements to get it tidied up now that he’s returned to the flagship.

“Of course it was.” He says belatedly, glancing up at the room’s other occupant when the older man clears his throat. “As if there was ever any doubt.”

“ … Indeed.” His father says after another moment’s pause. “However, aren’t you interested in how I knew as much prior to your arrival?”

“Not particularly.” Sanji replies. “But I’m assuming by your tone that you want me to ask. Alright then. How did you know the mission had gone well before I arrived to tell you?”

In answer, his father holds up a slightly crumpled newspaper in one hand. “Because you made headlines in the fucking world news.” He snarls, his upper lip curling in distaste. “Big News Morgans himself wrote the article.”

“And?” Sanji asks mildly. “I know your preference is to keep the royal family out of the papers when we go on missions these days, but it’s hardly the end of the world if our presence is discovered. Germa’s history among the criminal underworld isn’t exactly a secret.”

“Maybe not,” Judge replies, “but it hasn’t been quite so blatant in years, which was a status quo I was trying to adhere to. You’ve now gone and blown that out of the water. There’s even a photo for heaven’s sake.”

About to reiterate the fact that this shouldn’t matter, Sanji’s cut off when the paper is unceremoniously thrown towards him. It sails down the steps leading up to the throne, eventually landing in a crumpled heap at his feet.

Not bothering to pick it up, Sanji prods at it with the toe of his boot until he manages to flip it over entirely. Once that’s done, he’s greeted with the sight of his own face staring back at him, surrounded by a crowd of cheering locals.

“This is what you’re worried about?” He asks, quickly skimming the headline. “It’s entirely complementary and is taking the position that Germa helped liberate this country from its oppressors. I’m not even wearing the raid suit in this image.”

“I know,” Judge growls, as if this fact is somehow the biggest offence of all. “Anyone can see your face since you’re lacking Stealth Black’s mask.”

“Again, I’m failing to see your point,” Sanji informs him. “None of the other suits even have masks. My dear siblings are always fighting with their full faces on display.”

“Your sister and brothers don’t have the history that you do!” Judge snaps, thumping the arm of his seat with a heavy fist. “I’ve told you before that I want you to keep to the shadows. Especially if you’re going to be looking like that!”

Sanji takes a final look at the image in the paper, searching for but once again failing to find anything of concern. All he sees is himself - blue eyes, black hair lightly dusted with gray, and an outfit on par with typical royal Germa regalia. The only thing even slightly out of place is the brooch resting at the base of his throat, but he’s worn that for as long as he can remember.

His fingers twitch with a sudden need to trace them over the jeweled front, and then down the length of the gold pendant that dangles from the bottom. Judge has never liked when he draws attention to the thing, though, so he stills his hand before it has a chance to move.

“Regardless,” he says aloud. “It’s been a long trip, and I’ve been stuck on one of our smaller ships for the entire duration. If it’s all the same to you, I’d like a chance to grab a hot meal and a decently long shower.”

His father holds his gaze for several long moments, but ultimately capitulates with a grunt. “Fine.” He says, waving a hand in evident dismissal. “Go do as you please, but I would also suggest that you get used to being here for the time being. Under the circumstances, I suspect it’ll be a good idea to keep you close to the capital until this blows over.”

Until what blows over? The words are there. Sanji can feel them dancing along the tip of his tongue in a bid to force their way out of his mouth and demand to know just what it is he’s apparently done to warrant the king’s ire.

But, of course, they don't come. They never do. Just like his sister and brothers anything he might say against their father freezes in his throat, unable to work its way free. He finds himself nodding instead, and then turns to march out of the room, intent on putting as much distance as possible between himself and Vinsmoke Judge for the time being.

*****
“I heard you were back. How did the mission go?”

Sanji doesn’t even bother to turn away from the mirror in front of him. Not only does the reflection allow him to see his sister where she’s now standing in his bedroom doorway, but it also enables him to continue combing his hair back into place. The dark strands are still wet from his shower, and he doesn’t want them drying in an awkward position.

“If you heard I was back then I’m sure you heard how the mission went.” Sanji replies, eyeing his hair critically as he runs the comb through it. “I doubt Father was kind enough to save his comments for me and me alone.”

He sees Reiju smirk behind him, the image growing larger as she steps closer until she’s right behind his chair. “He might have said a word or two.” She admits coyly. “I gather he was somewhat unimpressed with your refusal to keep to the shadows like usual.”

“It wasn’t my fault!” Sanji retorts with perhaps slightly more force than necessary. He sets the comb down on the vanity in front of him so as to avoid snapping it with his not inconsiderable strength, but neglects to turn around to look at her. “I was the only one there this time around, so he should have expected that I might wind up in public at some point.”

“I don’t even know why he’s so upset to begin with.” He grumbles irritably. “I doubt he’d be making nearly as much of a fuss if it had been you or one of the others who had gotten photographed.”

“That’s true,” Reiju allows, “but none of us are Stealth Black, the most elusive of Germa’s raid suit bearers. The rest of us are meant to be out in the open, posing an active threat. Meanwhile you’re supposed to be lurking in the shadows, being far more insidious.”

“Is this a joke to you?” Finally having grown tired of whatever game his sister is playing, Sanji twists around so that he can look up at her. “I completed a flawless execution of my mission, got us paid in full with minimal losses of our own people and tech, and yet Father’s acting like I bungled the whole thing. It makes no sense, and - ”

“And?” Reiju prods when he clamps his teeth down on the rest of what he was going to say.

“And nothing,” Sanji grunts once he’s confident he’s gotten control of himself. “I don’t have anything to add.”

“Hmm, is that so?” Still wearing that same bemused expression on her face, Reiju props her elbows on the back of his chair and rests her chin in her hands. “That’s funny because it sounded like you did.”

“Well I didn’t,” Sanji mutters. “You must be confused.”

“Oh please,” Reiju croons, shifting one hand without warning and using it to tug at his right ear. It’s a habit she’d picked up ages ago, and Sanji swears she keeps doing it only because she knows how irritating he finds it. “Don’t be so grumpy, little brother. Not when you’ve only just got home.”

“The sole thing making me grump is you,” Sanji retorts, batting her hand away. “Would you stop that? You know I dislike it when you do it.”

“Which is why I do it.” Reiju says, drawing her hand back. “It wouldn’t be any fun if you didn’t react.”

“I’m sure,” Sanji grumbles, running his fingers along the shell of his ear and then down to the lobe. As always, they graze over the ridged scarring there, the one he can’t for the life of him remember the origins of. “Is that why you never do it to any of the others?”

“Naturally,” she replies. “Bugging them never gets me anywhere. You’re the only one I can even slightly get a rise out of.”

“You’re thirty-six years old, Reiju,” he grumbles. “You’re too old to be wanting to get a rise out of anyone.”

“I’m your sister,” she says. “I’m sure someone told me once that this is what older sisters do with the younger. I’m therefore acting accordingly.”

“If you say so,” Sanji notes. Turning back around, he runs a hand through his hair, wanting to make sure he’s satisfied with it before he vacates his chair. Finding that he is, he picks up his favorite brooch from where it’s lying in the case he keeps it in when he’s not wearing it, and fastens it at his throat.

“All good?” Reiju asks as he stands.

“All good.” He confirms, smoothing a hand down the front of the vest he’s wearing, wanting to make sure there are no wrinkles in the fabric. “It’s nice to look like myself again.”

A shadow darkens Reiju’s eyes ever so briefly, but she quickly turns away to settle in one of the armchairs she prefers to use when she visits him. “It’s good to have you home,” she says. “The other boys aren’t nearly as willing to chat with me when they’re around.”

“Are they around?” Sanji asks as he moves to join her in the seat opposite hers. “Given that Father sent me off on my own, I figured they were all still busy with their own missions.”

“Niji and Yonji are,” Reiju confirms, “but Ichiji was with me and therefore came back when I did. I think he’s spending the evening in one of the labs, going over some new project of Father’s.”

“Good for him,” Sanji says simply, although inwardly he grimaces in distaste at the notion of voluntarily going anywhere near those horrible rooms. “I’m sure whatever they’re working on will wind up being wildly successful.”

“By Father’s standards, no doubt,” Reiju agrees. “But enough about him, tell me how your mission went. How did you wind up on the front page of Morgans’ newspaper?”

“I’m afraid there’s not much to tell,” Sanji replies with a shrug. “The numbers of the enemy required me to take a more on the ground approach to getting the matter dealt with, so I did. It’s not my fault that a reporter happened to be in the vicinity. It’s not like I sought him out on purpose.”

“I know you didn’t,” Reiju’s quick to assure him, “and I agree with you that Father’s probably overreacting. You know how he is where you’re concerned, though. After we spent so much time searching for you, I’m sure he’s just afraid of losing you again.”

“You were missing for twenty years, Sanji.” She adds, softly now. “The fact that you’ve been back for five still pales in comparison to that. Especially when you don’t remember anything about your time away, right?”

“Right,” Sanji confirms, tugging absently at his ear again. He then drops his fingers down to trace over his brooch the way he’d wanted to back in the throne room. “Although I have a hard time imagining Judge having motivations that are quite so … sentimental.”

“It may be a bit of a stretch, I’ll admit,” Reiju replies. “Still, it’s as good an explanation as any.”

“I suppose,” Sanji says, “but enough about me. Has anything interesting been going on while I’ve been away?”

“Nothing in particular,” Reiju says. “At least not among our people, anyway. I did hear a rumor that a ship from the Strawhat Grand Fleet may have been spotted nearby, but it was never confirmed if it was true or not.”

“It’d be awfully odd for them to be all the way in the North if it were.” Sanji muses. “Don’t they typically keep to the Grand Line?”

“They’re representatives of the King of the Pirates,” Reiju points out. “These days, I think they go wherever they please. Honestly, you’re probably right, though. I didn’t bother even mentioning it to Father.”

“No?” Sanji questions. “Oh well, that might be for the best. We wouldn’t want him getting worked up over nothing, now, would we?”

“Indeed, we wouldn’t.” Reiju replies with a lazy smile. “And, like I said, I’m sure it’ll turn out to be nothing.”

*****
“I wonder how much longer Father’s going to be pissed at you. Really, I didn’t care at first, but now his behavior is starting to spill over onto the rest of us, and I find I’m getting a little tired of it.”

Swirling the remnants of his drink in his glass, Sanji knocks it back in a single gulp before turning to look at his least favorite brother. “If you think you’re getting tired of it, you should try being in my shoes.” He grumbles. “It’s been weeks, and the old bastard still hasn’t let up yet.”

Niji sneers back at him, but it’s Ichiji who speaks first. “Careful, Sanji,” their oldest brother warns, saluting them both with his own glass. “Father won’t appreciate it if he hears you talking about him that way.”

“Yeah,” Yonji snickers from where he’s claimed an entire couch for himself. “If you keep this up, it’ll be another year or two before he lets you off the flagship again.”

“Alright, that’s enough.” Rounding out their little group, Reiju toys absently with the label of the bottle she’s been keeping close at hand all night. Sanji’s pretty sure he’s the only one she’s shared any of it with to date, while the others have been forced to find their own. “There’s no use in fighting amongst ourselves when it’s Father who makes the decisions regarding who goes where.”

“There is when it’s one of our actions that has Father holding us all under lock and key.” Niji retorts irritably. “I asked him when my next mission was going to be, and he said he didn’t know, it could be weeks or even months before he sends us out again. That’s not an arrangement I’m looking forward to.”

“But it’s still not Sanji’s fault,” Reiju counters. “He completed the mission he was sent out to do. If Father’s angry about how he had to go about doing it, then he should have sent appropriate resources.”

“She’s not wrong,” Ichiji says in the ensuing silence. “Sanji was ordered to secure a specific outcome, and that’s exactly what he did. The rest of us would have done the same in his place. We couldn’t not have.”

“Exactly,” Reiju says. “If Father’s unhappy about the outcome, he’s got no one to blame but himself.”

“Be that as it may,” Niji says. “It doesn’t change the fact that we’re all about to find ourselves on the wrong end of Father’s temper. I don’t relish the idea of being stuck on this ship with nothing to do for the next several months.”

“If it helps, I’m not overly enthusiastic about being stuck here with you,” Sanji quips. “I can think of far better things to do with my time. Like watching paint dry, for instance, or counting the individual stones on the battlements.”

“Sanji, don't antagonize him.” Reiju says, holding up her bottle and popping the cork out. “Here, let me pour you another glass.”

Since whatever’s in there is apparently potent enough to have even him feeling it, Sanji’s not so sure he should take her up on her offer. Reiju’s quick to take matters into her own hands, though. Snagging his empty glass, she fills it almost to the brim and then passes it back to him.

“Dear sister, I do believe you’re trying to get me drunk.” He says as he accepts it. “Is this your way of telling me that I should try and drown my sorrows?”

“I think it can’t hurt,” Reiju replies with a shrug. “And, as the others have so helpfully pointed out, it’s not like we have anything else to do.”

“Hear hear,” Yonji says, raising his glass in a sarcastic toast as Sanji takes a decent sized swig from his own. “It’s good to know we can always count on Reiju to tell it like it is.”

Reiju raises the bottle in acknowledgement of his point, but rather than use it to top off her own glass, she tucks it back between her seat and her body. Then she looks over at Sanji, raising her eyebrows when she sees that his glass is still mostly full.

“I gave you that to drink it,” she stresses. “It’s a new import, and I know how you like to be able to sample rare vintages. Don’t let it go to waste.”

Wanting to keep her off his back, Sanji makes a show of taking another sip. He then follows it up with a few more because it really is good wine. There’s a slight aftertaste that he can’t quite place the origins of, but overall he can’t find much to complain about.

Having said that, it’s definitely hitting him harder than most wines normally do. Most often it takes multiple bottles for any of them to feel any effects at all, but his head is definitely a little fuzzier than usual.

“I think I’m going to turn in.” He says once he’s finished his latest glass. “It’s not that I don’t enjoy all our time together,” he adds somewhat sarcastically, “but I think I can hear my bed calling to me.”

He’s almost positive he hears Niji make a crack about how there’s no point in a perpetually empty bed calling anybody, and he aims an errant middle finger in the direction he last remembers his brother being. An offended huff suggests he may have found Yonji instead, however, and he sees Reiju stand out of the corner of his eye.

“I’ll walk back with you.” She says when he blinks owlishly at her. “Call me crazy, but I think you might be a bit under the influence, little brother.”

Her comment sends Yonji hooting with laughter and Niji snickering about how of course Sanji can’t hold his liquor, he’s never been on par with the rest of them in any respect. Only Ichiji doesn’t say anything, but Sanji thinks he sees the red head’s brow furrow in contemplation as Reiju starts to drag him away.

“I c’n walk by m’self!” Sanji grumbles, trying to irritably tug his arm free. His sister’s grip is like iron, however, which may be for the best given the way he stumbles when they’re only a few steps down the hallway.

“The hell w’s in that wine?” He wonders, following where Reiju leads. “I don’t ‘member feelin’ like this since - since … R’ju, when did I last feel like this?”

“Back when you were with your family, I’d imagine.” She replies, her words somehow seeming to make sense to his addled brain. “Certainly not since you’ve been back here with all your modifications activated.”

“R’ght, r’ght, got it.” Sanji nods. “Th’nks for clearin’ that up.”

“My pleasure,” Reiju says. “Now, come this way, would you? And be careful on the stairs.”

“Eh, s’all good,” Sanji slurs. “‘F I start to fall I c’n just - c’n just … hmm? Wha’s a Skywalk?”

“Something that, in a just world, you will someday remember how to do again.” His sister informs him. “Along with several other things if this works. But, hurry up, please. We still have a bit of a walk ahead of us, and I’m going to look rather suspicious carrying you if you pass out on me this early.”

“M’not gonna pass out!” Sanji exclaims indignantly. He tries to rear up to his full height, and nearly overbalances in the process. “Damn! M’head feels funny.”

“I know,” Reiju says, and for a second Sanji could swear she sounded apologetic. “It’s going to for a while too, but with luck it’ll be worth it in the end.”

“Not makin’ no sense, R’ju,” Sanji announces, “but I th’nk we got bigger pr’blems. M’gonna fall down now.”

“Of course you are,” Reiju says, sounding exasperated. “Well, just try not to throw up while you’re at it, and I’ll get us where we’re going as fast as I can.”

“M’mk.”

*****
Sanji wakes with a pounding in his head, the likes of which he can’t remember ever experiencing before. He feels like hot spikes are being jabbed directly into his brain, a situation that only intensifies when he tries to open his eyes.

“What the hell?” He croaks, blinking when he finally forces his eyes open and finds himself staring up at an unfamiliar ceiling. “What happened?”

He’s lying in a bed, he soon realizes, but not one he’s ever been in before. The ceiling above him also isn’t like anything that would be found in Germa since it’s made of wood, as opposed to stone. More importantly, he can feel a deck swaying gently beneath him, but nowhere can he hear the sound of a snail ship’s motor.

Confused and concerned by turns, he tries to sit up, only to find that he can’t. Both his arms have been shackled to the bed he’s lying on, and a quick test reveals that the same again has been done to his legs.

“What the hell?!” He repeats, more harshly this time. “What’s going on here?!”

His words are greeted by the sound of heels clicking against the floor. Jerking his head in the direction of the noise, he’s greeted with the sight of a tall, dark haired woman smoking a cigarette right as she comes around a corner.

“Good, you’re awake.” Pulling the cigarette from her mouth, the woman expels a faint cloud of smoke before taking another drag. “I’ll let the captain know.”

“Captain?” Sanji echoes, struggling against his restraints. They’re somehow holding him fast, something that should be impossible thanks to his enhancements, and he feels a sense that’s not unlike dread start pooling in the pit of his stomach. “Who are you and why am I here? I am a prince of Germa kingdom! Kidnapping me is going to result in the kind of payback that nightmares are made of.”

“Please,” the woman scoffs. “You obviously don’t remember me - the name’s Baby 5 by the way - but I used to work for a way bigger northern nightmare than your daddy. I also sail under the flag of someone he’s not going to want to touch these days, so I’ll take my chances where he’s concerned.”

“Anyway,” she continues on, “like I said, you wait here, and I’m going to go tell Sai you’re awake.”

“No need,” a new voice says, and it’s followed by a large man with dark hair and tanned skin making an appearance. “I heard you talking to someone when I walked past the stairs and figured he had to be up. How’ve you been, Blackleg? Long time no see.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Sanji demands, straining uselessly against his bonds. “I’ve never met you before in my life!”

“Yeah,” the woman says when the man quirks an eyebrow at her. “He didn’t recognize me either, and I’ve arguably known him longer. I hope that crazy swordsman knows what he’s doing.”

“Swordsman? What swordsman?” Sanji wants to know, feeling his heart rate kick up an extra notch at the mention of the term. “The only swordsmen I know are members of Germa’s military, and none of them would dare to be part of whatever’s going on here.”

“Damn, they really did a number on him, didn’t they?” The man - Sai - comments. “I don’t envy the other one if this is what he’s getting himself into.”

“Maybe not,” his companion agrees, laying a hand against his chest. From his vantage point, Sanji sees a glint of gold curved around her left ring finger. “But you know as well as I do why he’s doing this.”

“True,” the man replies, his voice softening in a way that makes Sanji feel like he’s suddenly intruding on something private. “You’re right about that.”

“Um, excuse me?” Sanji says, wanting to put an end to whatever’s happening here so that he can try to get some answers. “You’ll have to forgive me if I’m being rude,” he adds sarcastically, “but would one of you please tell me what the fuck’s going on here?”

The pair break apart, and the woman plants her hands on her hips in evident irritation. “Well, he’s still got a mouth on him, I’ll give him that much. It looks like those Germa lunatics didn’t manage to do away with that entirely.”

Sanji glares back at her. “For the record,” he sniffs, “I find it highly questionable that you’re describing my people as lunatics when it is becoming readily apparent that you’re kidnapping me. So, what’s the deal then? Is it revenge against my family for a war we helped an enemy win? Or maybe you’re looking to ransom me, is that it? If so, you’re going to be sorely disappointed. Vinsmoke Judge isn’t the kind of person who gives in to other’s demands.”

“No shit,” the woman scoffs. “However, we’re not looking for either of those things. Hell, technically we’re not even kidnapping you. This is more of a rescue operation. You just don’t know it yet.”

“You’re insane.” Sanji says, gaping at the pair of them. “You’re in fact certifiable. Never mind the fact that I’m a member of the royal family. Judge is going to come after you simply because you’ve slighted him.”

“He’ll have to figure out you’re missing first,” Sai points out, “and we have good reason to believe that won’t happen for a while. After that he’ll have to figure out where we’ve gone, which is unlikely, and then he’ll have to catch us.”

“Which he will,” Sanji stresses. “You have no idea what kind of might Germa possesses. My father has spies in every port in the North Blue, and he won’t hesitate to call on them if the situation arises.”

Sai and Baby 5 share another look, after which the former shrugs. “Then I guess it’s a good thing we’re not staying in the North Blue, now, isn’t it?”

“Try and make yourself comfortable, Your Highness.” He adds when Sanji’s mouth falls open. “You’re going to be here for a while.”

*****
Sanji has no idea how long he’d been unconscious prior to waking up onboard Sai and Baby 5’s ship. He also has no idea how long he’s been their prisoner to date, and he frankly hasn’t managed to gather much of anything about the rest of their crew either. The captain and his wife are the only people he ever sees, and the lack of windows in his room means he can’t even track the passage of time through the rising and setting of the sun.

That last fact sits especially poorly with him. For some reason he doesn’t understand, he doesn’t do well in cramped, dark places. He assumes it’s due to something that happened to him during his period of amnesia, but none of his relatives or doctors have ever been able to provide a suitable explanation.

The only thing he’s certain of is that it hasn’t just been days that he’s been trapped on this ship, but rather weeks and possibly months. He counts his meals where he can to try and get an idea, and Baby 5’s helped him shave and trim his hair enough times for him to know he’s been here a while.

He tries prying answers out of his captors in any way he can think of. He’s been polite, he’s been rude. He’s offered bribes, he’s offered threats. He’s tried cajoling them and giving them the silent treatment, but not a lick of it has worked. Even when he’s been at his most obnoxious they’ve looked at him with something far too close to pity in their eyes and gone about their business.

It’s getting to the point where most days Sanji finds himself wanting to scream. He’s been trapped in this room, chained to this bed the entire time, except for when they let him up to use the facilities, and he still doesn’t have a clue as to why or where he’s going. It’d be infuriating if he had the emotional capacity to get that worked up.

And not just infuriating, mind you. His raid suit is nowhere to be found, which explains some of his inability to fight back. The more he and his siblings use the things, after all, the more they come to rely on them.

On the other hand, he’s still genetically enhanced without the raid suit, which means that he should be at least able to put up a fight. Whatever they have him chained down with is too much for him to beat, though, and leaves him trapped where he is.

All he has with him is the clothes he’d been wearing when he’d got caught and the brooch he never lets out of his sight. Baby 5 had offered to fetch him some clean clothes a while ago, but Sanji had snarled at her with such fervor that she’d yet to ask again. In fact, she’d gone so far as to tell him it was no skin off her back if he wanted to stink, and Sanji had let her think as she pleased, not wanting to tip her off to the fact that it was the brooch he was concerned about losing.

He can feel it now, resting against the base of his throat like it’s supposed to, and the mere idea of it is enough to calm his racing thoughts. He has no idea where his attachment to the damn thing has come from, but it’s always been intense enough that not even Judge has ever tried to properly take it from him. He’d actually seemed nervous to press his luck.

Sanji snorts as that thought crosses his mind and sags even further against the pillow beneath him. Under the circumstances there are far more important things he should be worrying about than a piece of jewelry, yet it remains at the top of the list. Whatever else is waiting for him he can figure out when the time comes.

*****
“Alright, you grumpy bitch, it looks like this is the end of the line for you.”

Blinking up at Baby 5 where she’s now standing above him, Sanji frowns as her words register. “I’m sorry,” he says. “Is this you admitting that you really have kept me hostage for ages just so you can kill me?”

Baby 5 blinks in return, and Sanji can see her mentally reviewing the words that had come out of her mouth. “Jeez,” she grumbles around her latest cigarette. “Do you have to take everything so literally? We’re not going to kill you, dumbass. All I meant was that the part of your trip that includes us is done. You’re getting off here.”

“Oh?” Curious in spite of himself, Sanji sits up as she begins unhooking his chains from the bed posts and organizing them into the arrangement that she uses to walk him to the washroom. “And where exactly is here?”

“Some godforsaken spit of land at the ass end of the Grand Line.” She replies, busy with the task at hand. “This is where he told us to meet him, so he’d damned well better be where he said he would.”

“Who? You mean the swordsman you’ve mentioned in the past?” Sanji demands. The shackles at his wrists and ankles mean he can only follow after her at a shuffle at best, but he doesn’t miss the way they walk right past the washroom and towards a set of stairs instead. “Are you finally going to tell me what he wants with me?”

“For the millionth time, I don’t know what he wants with you,” Baby 5 insists. “I mean, not specifically, anyway. We’re pretty sure he’s got some kooky plan to try and knock your brain back into gear, but overall he’s been sparse on the details.”

“You realize that’s not at all helpful, right?” Sanji grumbles, managing to express his frustration despite the way he also needs to focus on climbing the stairs without tripping and falling. “Far be it from me to speak ill of a lady, but you are downright difficult.”

Coming to a halt in the middle of the stairs, Baby 5 turns around to look at him. She holds his gaze for several beats, her dark eyes searching for something he doesn’t know the origins of, and then she turns around again.

“Just keep walking.” She says, tugging on the chains for emphasis.

It’s dark out when they finally emerge from below decks. There are enough lanterns lit for him to see by, but not so many that he can make out many identifying marks of the ship he’s on. It’s bigger than he’d been expecting, he can tell that much, but he can’t even make out her flags to try and identify her.

The deck is also strangely empty for a ship this size. Sanji has no idea where the crew is hiding now, but the only people he spots when Baby 5 starts leading him over are Sai and a tall man largely covered by a cloak.

Both men turn when they hear them coming, and Sanji doesn’t miss the way the cloaked man stiffens at the sight of him. Beside him, Sai claps a hand over the man’s shoulder, giving him an encouraging nod when their gazes meet.

“He’s all yours.” Sai murmurs as they come within earshot. “And, for the record, I really do hope this works.”

“You and me both,” the man replies. His voice is deep, but strangely pleasant, somehow possessing a quality that puts Sanji at ease despite the circumstances. “Sorry for asking you to go through so much trouble to get him here.”

Sai claps the man on the shoulder a second time. “You’re the right hand man of the King himself,” he says, sounding bemused. “When you call, I answer. Especially since the head guy also threw his two cents in.” He adds cheekily. “There was no way I was saying no to that.”

“I appreciate it.” The man says. “Now can you help me get him into the dinghy? I want to get him to my ship before morning comes.”

Sai nods to show willing, at which point Sanji decides he’s had enough of being spoken about like he’s simply a piece of furniture in a room. Planting his feet as best as he’s able, he refuses to go any further, and instead glares over at the mystery man.

“Yes, hello,” he starts, infusing as much disdain into his voice as he possibly can. “I don’t know how things are done in whatever backwater you’ve undoubtedly crawled out of, but where I come from it’s considered good manners to at least introduce ourselves after we’ve kidnapped somebody.”

The man turns to look at him, his face shadowed thanks to his hood, and then he snorts. Broad hands rise to flip the hood back, revealing a face that Sanji needs a moment to sort out where he recognizes it from.

“Hold on,” he frowns as it starts to sink in. He notes the missing left eye and hair that has a greenish hue, visible even with how dark it is. “Aren’t you Roronoa Zoro?”

“I was the last time I checked.” The man replies, tilting his head to the side in a way that makes lantern light glint off the three gold piercings in his left ear. It’s two longer bars dangling from the lobe and a cuff that sits up high around the shell, and Sanji can’t for the life of him figure out what about them has intrigued him.

Then the other man’s words catch up with him, and he frowns. “What in hell’s name does the World’s Greatest Swordsman want with me?” He demands. “And why couldn’t you approach me about it like a normal person? You’re a big enough name in your own right, if you’d sought us out, Germa would have listened.”

All traces of amusement vanish from Roronoa’s face. “Germa,” he growls, “wants nothing to do with me, and would never have agreed to what I have in mind. This was the only way to try and fix this.”

“As I keep asking, fix what?” Sanji replies. He nods at Sai and Baby 5. “Your compatriots have been remarkably tight-lipped on the subject, despite my many requests for an explanation. I don’t suppose you’ll be kind enough to be a little bit more forthcoming, hmm?”

“You’ll find out soon enough,” Roronoa assures him, and motions to where a small boat is waiting down below. “Now, let’s get moving.”

*****
Getting into the waiting dinghy is easier said than done thanks to the shackles Sanji’s captors still refuse to remove. No amount of pointing out that he has literally nowhere to run does him any good, and in the end Sai has to lower him down over the side with a rope while Roronoa waits to catch him down below.

Once this has been achieved, he finds himself hunched uncomfortably in the front of the dinghy, watching as Roronoa reels in the line that had been used to attach his smaller boat to Sai and Baby 5’s much larger one. Wrapping up one last coil, he salutes the watching pair with the entire mess, and then goes to claim his own seat.

“Thanks you two,” he says, nodding upwards as he picks up an oar and starts to paddle. “I’ll see you around.”

“Provided you don’t get yourself killed,” Sai says, while Baby 5 murmurs a heartfelt ‘Good luck, Commander’ next to him. The two keep their place at the railing until their ship eventually fades from sight, and Sanji finds himself feeling oddly bereft at their sudden loss.

The dingy cuts quietly through the oddly calm waters, with the only sound being that of Roronoa’s oar paddle as he moves it back and forth in precise strokes. Meanwhile, there’s a dense fog creeping in, such that the single lantern hanging from a hook at the front of the boat does little to help him see anything.

“I really hope you’re not planning to travel any great distance in this dinky little thing,” Sanji says when the silence becomes too much for him to bear. “Because I have soaked in bathtubs larger than this, and if we really are on the Grand Line, this thing won’t stand a chance in its weather.”

“We’re really here, and, yes, I know that,” Roronoa confirms. “There’s a tiny island nearby, more of a glorified rock than anything else, but it was big enough for me to moor my ship while I came to get you. We should be there soon.”

“And you couldn’t just come to meet me in this so-called ship because why?” Sanji asks, earning himself a shrug for his troubles.

“Didn’t feel like it,” Roronoa replies. “Plus, I don’t want anyone to be able to describe what we’re traveling in. Not even friends.”

“Okayyy,” Sanji drawls, dragging the word out. “Because that’s not weird at all. Has anyone ever told you that you seem to be a bit on the paranoid side?”

“Paranoia keeps you alive,” Roronoa says simply. “Although, for the record, I didn't used to be this bad. You should consider being flattered with how seriously I’m treating this mission.”

“You don’t know much about my family, do you?” Sanji notes when he hears this. “I don’t feel things like flattery, none of us do. My siblings and I don’t feel emotions.”

“That,” Roronoa says with conviction, “isn’t true, and I’m going to prove it. At least where you’re concerned.”

To an extent, yes, but Sanji has no idea how this clown knows as much. Frowning, he stares back at the other man, watching the give and go of his muscles as he continues guiding them along. “You’re very strange,” he announces finally, “and I don’t much care for being kept out of the loop.”

A corner of Roronoa’s mouth ticks upwards in a minute grin. “I know you don’t,” he says easily, “but you’re going to have to suck it up and deal for now. Also, maybe be quiet for a bit, yeah? I’ve got to concentrate on getting us back to my ship, and you distracting me isn’t going to help with that.”

Part of Sanji considers becoming even more distracting just to fuck with him. His rational brain prevails, however, by reminding him that he’s chained up in a glorified rowboat, in the middle of nowhere, on the most dangerous ocean in the world. Now is a time to sit back and gather information, not a time for rash decisions.

“I can hear your brain whirring from all the way over here,” Roronoa says, his grin broadening. “Stop plotting my death and get some rest instead. We’ve got a long trip ahead of us, so you’re going to want to conserve your strength.”

“That sounds ominous,” Sanji notes. “Should I be concerned?”

Roronoa snorts. “This is the Grand Line, Curlybrows,” he says. “Concerned should be your base state of being.”

Sanji makes a face at the name that can only be a reference to his eyebrows and the way they unusually curl to the left the same way his siblings’ do. “I’ll thank you not to mock an obvious genetic component that I have no control over,” he says stiffly. “After all, you don’t see me commenting on your hair.”

“You can if you like,” Roronoa replies with an indifferent shrug, never once breaking stride with his paddling. “I’ve dealt with far worse.”

“Well, yes, obviously,” Sanji says, struggling not to roll his eyes. “I can see plenty of scars from here, and I imagine you have umpteen more buried beneath your clothes. That’s not the point. I’m telling you, don’t insult my looks, and I won’t insult yours.”

“And I’m telling you I’ll do as I like, Twirls,” Roronoa informs him. “I’m kind of stubborn like that. You’ll see.”

“Maybe, maybe not,” Sanji says, and then lapses into silence.

He doesn’t say another word, wanting to see if the quiet will get to Roronoa anymore than the chatter had. Unfortunately, it doesn’t appear to be having any effect, and the man’s face screws up in evident concentration as he continues steering them through the fog.

Eventually another light breaks through the mist, this one larger and coming from somewhere up above them. Craning his neck around, Sanji’s barely able to make out the shape of a ship that’s still much smaller than Sai and Baby 5’s, but is at least bigger than the dinghy.

“I take it this is yours?” He comments, unsurprised when Roronoa nods.

“Yeah,” he says quietly. “A friend rigged her up for me specifically for this trip. She may not look like much, but she’ll get the job done.”

“Ah yes, the fabled ‘job’,” Sanji says, shifting in his - for lack of a better word - seat. “Am I allowed to ask what that is now?”

“You can ask,” Roronoa says as the ship draws closer, “but that doesn’t mean I’m going to answer. You might want to hold tight, though. I’m gonna bring us in now.”

“Hold tight to what?” Sanji wonders, and the question soon becomes moot. Roronoa does an impressive job of lining the dinghy up with the larger ship, such that the dim lantern light reveals a series of notches that have been carved into her side. “I genuinely hope you don’t expect me to be able to climb those like this.”

“Nah,” Roronoa says, and this time the grin he gives Sanji is that of a pure shitdisturber. “Don’t worry, though, Curls. I’ve got you covered.”

About to ask yet another question that he’s sure won’t get a proper answer, Sanji never gets a chance. Standing abruptly, Roronoa takes a moment to find his balance, and then reaches down to grab Sanji by the front of his tunic. From there, he shifts his grip slightly, and uses it to fling him unceremoniously over his shoulder.

“What is the matter with you?!” Sanji refuses to call the noise that comes out of him a shriek, but he’s more than willing to admit it’s a little undignified. However, he feels that it’s warranted under the circumstances. “You could have at least warned me.”

“Where’s the fun in that?” Roronoa asks, and Sanji’s pretty sure that the man’s shoulders are shaking with laughter as opposed to exertion as they continue their climb. “My way is better.”

Seeing no part in arguing with him, Sanji goes limp so as to not do anything to result in his body being dropped. There’s no guarantee he’d hit the dinghy if Roronoa loses his grip, and he doubts he’ll be able to swim with his limbs bound as they are.

Inevitably they get to the top and Sanji grunts as the act of heaving them over the railing digs Roronoa’s shoulder sharply into his gut. Then the next thing he knows he’s being set down on his feet, and he blinks as he takes in his surroundings.

As he’d guessed, the ship isn’t large. It’s small enough that one person would be able to crew it, meaning that Roronoa most likely is traveling solo, although it does sport a cabin, unlike the dinghy.

And speaking of the dinghy, Sanji watches as Roronoa busies himself making sure the thing is secured to his larger vessel. After that’s done, he reaches for Sanji and begins steering him towards the cabin.

“It’s not much,” he says as he pries open the door and ushers Sanji in ahead of him, “but it’ll do for our purposes.”

Sanji blinks, his eyes needing a moment to adjust to the light. Out on the deck the handful of lanterns hadn’t done much to beat back the oppressive darkness. Here, though, the room is well lit enough to illuminate most of the tight quarters.

There’s a bed built directly into one of the walls, designed such that it should move with the swaying of the ship. The other side of the room boasts a small table that’s been bolted down next to a counter, a sink, and a stove with two lone burners.

Various cupboards have been built into the walls for storage, while hooks have been further utilized to contain whatever gear Roronoa might need. Lastly, there’s a door off to one side, near the foot of the bed, and Roronoa nods when he sees Sanji eyeing it.

“The head’s through there,” he explains. “It’s not huge, definitely not the kind of thing that’s up to your standards, but Franky installed a tank that’ll make sure we always have enough hot water for the shower and the taps.”

“Franky?” Sanji asks, tilting his head to the side at the unfamiliar name.

“Cyborg Franky,” Roronoa says, as if that will somehow make things clearer. “He designed this entire rig, the same way he did the Thousand Sunny. Seriously?” He adds in the wake of Sanji’s continued blank stare. “You’ve never heard of the shipwright of the Strawhat Pirates?”

“Oh,” Sanji says, realization dawning. “He’s one of your crew. You’ll have to forgive me,” he shrugs. “My father says that keeping up with the likes of pirates, even the ones in your league, is beneath me. I recognized you because of your title, and I know about your captain thanks to his exploits. The rest, however,” another shrug, “I’m afraid I can’t really comment on.”

“Fucking Judge,” Roronoa growls, shaking his head when Sanji blinks at him. “He’s not stupid enough to keep you uninformed about major world players for no reason. He did it deliberately.”

“You’re making it sound like you know him,” Sanji notes. “Which seems unlikely.”

“You’d be surprised,” Roronoa mutters, “but enough of this for one night. You must be tired after your trip out here. Let me get you sorted, and then you can take the bunk.”

“I can?” Sanji asks, frowning. “That seems awfully chivalrous for a man who’s keeping me prisoner.”

“Again, it’s because I didn’t have another option,” Roronoa sighs, running a hand through his hair. Up close Sanji can see that it’s flecked with gray around his temples, and he’s suddenly struck with the baffling urge to reach out and touch it.

Having absolutely no idea where that had come from, Sanji misses whatever Roronoa says next. When he finally checks back into reality, it’s because the man drops to his knees without warning, and reaches for the mancels around his legs.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” He demands, his left leg automatically rising in an aborted move to strike. The chain pulling tight ends up making this impossible, but he supposes it’s the thought that counts.

Roronoa tilts his head up, squinting at Sanji through his good eye. It’s gray too, Sanji notes, but in an oddly soft shade that makes his stomach lurch.

“ - already told you, there’s no need to keep you as pinned down as you are.” It takes him a moment to realize that Roronoa’s mouth is moving, and longer still for his words to register. “Sai and Baby 5 must have been playing it extra cautious, but between getting you away from the raid suit and the drugs you’ve taken, you’re not that much of a threat.”

“Drugs? What drugs?” Sanji frowns. “I don’t remember them giving me anything that felt off, and I definitely didn’t see any needles come near me. Not that it would have mattered, mind you, the exoskeletons mean those don’t work on us.”

“Trust me,” Roronoa says, sounding exhausted all of a sudden, “I know. Adapting for your modifications was a huge part of this job. Regardless, do you want the chains off or not?”

“The fact that you’re even offering tells me you’re an idiot,” Sanji replies. “What makes you think I won’t kill you the second my hands are free?”

“You mean besides the fact that you’re unarmed and the weakest you’ve been in decades?” Roronoa’s grin isn’t nearly so nice when it’s accompanied by words like these. “You’re in the middle of nowhere on a ship you don’t know how to pilot and with no way to call for help. I don’t have even a mini transponder snail onboard because I don’t want to risk being tracked. If you kill me, assuming you even could, you’ll be dead yourself not long after.”

“Well,” Sanji pauses to let this information sink in. “I guess when you put it like that, I’m left with little alternative but to accept your hospitality.” Nodding, he motions for the other man to return to what he was doing. “Very well then. Get me out of these things, and I promise to behave myself. For the time being.”

“Duly noted.”

*****
Having his wrists and ankles freed does serve to improve Sanji’s mood, as does getting his first night’s sleep unencumbered by the damn things in who knows how long. At Roronoa’s insistence, he does take the bed, burrowing down under a number of homespun blankets, while the swordsman settles in a hammock that he sets up using two of the hooks embedded in the ceiling.

For the briefest of moments, Sanji considers attacking the other man as he watches him sway in the hammock, snoring like he hasn’t got a care in the world. Then his practical brain makes itself known by reiterating all of Roronoa’s earlier points, along with an admonishment that the man wouldn’t have earned the title of World’s Greatest Swordsman by being a pushover. He can almost certainly use haki, including its observation form, so it’s wiser to get a feel for his capabilities before doing anything rash.

By the time early morning sunlight starts filtering in through the porthole set into the cabin door, Sanji’s awake and waiting to see what’s going to happen next. Roronoa had stopped snoring about ten minutes ago, meaning that he’s most likely rousing as well.

It’s as Sanji has this thought that the hammock lurches. Moving from a reclined to an upright position in a single swoop, Roronoa shakes his head in a manner that sends his hair flying in every direction and lets out a yawn that he’s lucky doesn’t see his jaw snap.

Wakefulness thus achieved, he rolls out of the hammock in a single, fluid motion. The soles of his boots hit the deck, alerting Sanji to the fact that he’d slept in them, and he turns to look at the bed, scratching a hand absently underneath his shirt as he goes.

“I know you’re awake, Curls,” he says, the barest hint of sleep lurking in his voice. “It’s time to get up, though. You’ve had enough beauty rest for one night, and we’ve got things to do.”

Since there’s no point in arguing with him, Sanji doesn’t bother. Instead he sits up, the blankets pooling around his lap as he meets the other man’s gaze.

Roronoa gives him a crooked grin. “Mornin’,” he says glibly. “How’d you sleep?”

“I slept,” Sanji replies simply. “It’s a necessary bodily function, one I’ve now taken care of for the time being. That’s all there is to it.”

Roronoa’s mouth flattens into a thin line for a moment, before he sighs and scrubs a hand through his hair. “Yeah, that’s going to take some getting used to,” he mutters. “Alright, I’ve gotta take a piss and then see about getting us underway. Once I’m done in the head, feel free to use it yourself. There’s some clean clothes in the locker over there that should fit you.”

Sanji briefly follows his pointing finger, before glancing down at himself. The clothes he’d been wearing on his last night in Germa have certainly seen better days at this point, and they’re not exactly practical for traveling on a boat such as this.

“Alright,” he decides. “I’ll see what you have.”

There turns out to be a surprisingly eclectic assortment, some of it much more high end than he would have expected from the likes of Roronoa - who looks like the kind of man who steers towards practical clothing that he can wear until it’s all but falling off his body.

No, this stuff isn’t exactly fit for a king - or a prince, rather, in this case - but it doesn’t look like it’s crawled out of some hovel either. When Sanji finally exits the cabin a little while later, he’s wearing a pair of comfortable slacks and a button down shirt, with the only remnant of his Germa ensemble being his boots.

Well, not his only remnant, if he’s being honest. None of the clothing Roronoa had provided had sported anything for him to attach his brooch to, so for the moment he has it cradled in his left hand, wary of parting with it.

Roronoa’s busy fussing with the rigging when Sanji emerges out onto the deck, but he pauses in his task when he catches sight of him coming. “D’you feel any better?” He asks as Sanji approaches, his eye lighting on where his hair is still damp from the quick shower he’d taken.

Sanji looks at him. “You seem awfully concerned about my wellbeing for a man who’s arranged to kidnap me,” he notes. “Is this your first time?”

“What? Kidnapping someone?” Roronoa blinks and then laughs, but his expression quickly sobers when he realizes Sanji hadn’t been joking. “Damn, you’re serious, aren’t you?”

Sanji crosses his arms over his chest. “It’s a valid question,” he says simply. “As royalty my siblings and I were warned of the possibility that people might try to use us for ransom or something similar when we were children. I don’t recall ever having scenarios like this one be described, however.”

“Yeah, it’s definitely a unique situation,” Roronoa agrees, scratching at the hinge of his jaw with a pointer finger. “Still, I guess you’re not wrong, I don’t have much experience with kidnapping people.”

“Unless,” he grins suddenly, glancing at Sanji like he’s sharing an inside joke. “I did accidentally hold an entire kingdom hostage once, years ago. Got yelled at good for it too, once the dust settled.”

Sanji simply stares at him. “Alright,” he says finally, when it becomes obvious that the other man is waiting for a reaction, but doesn’t add anything else.

For a moment, it looks like Roronoa’s face falls, but Sanji doesn’t know the man well enough to be certain. Then his single grey eye proceeds to travel along Sanji’s body, coming to a halt when the swordsman spots the brooch he still has held in his hand.

“What’ve you got that out here for?” He asks, nodding at it with a slight incline of his head.

Pure instinct sees Sanji tighten his grip on the brooch, and he cradles it more closely against his chest. “I don’t have anything to properly attach it to,” he says, years of not wanting Judge to get suspicious keeping any inflection from his voice, “and you’re a pirate. I can’t trust you not to steal it.”

Rather than look offended by this, Roronoa’s eye softens. “I’ve got no interest in taking it from you,” he says quietly. “I’m after a much bigger treasure than a little trinket like that.”

“It’s not a trinket!” Sanji snaps, regretting his words instantly when they make Roronoa’s eye widen. “I mean - never you mind what I meant. It’s my property, and you’re not to touch it? Is that clear?”

Roronoa holds his hands up in an apparent bid for surrender. “Like I said, I don’t want it. You might want to leave it inside the cabin if it’s so important to you, though. If you accidentally drop it overboard, there won’t be much chance of getting it back.”

Logically, Sanji knows he’s right, but the thought of leaving the brooch where he can’t see it doesn’t sit well with him. He’s always been like that with it, though. It had never been left unattended in Germa, either, out of concern that it might no longer be present by the time he came back for it.

“I’m keeping it with me,” he says aloud. “I’ll be careful with it.”

“If you say so,” Roronoa replies with an easy shrug. “Give me some time after we’re underway, I’ll see if I can’t find you something to string it up on. It might be safer if you wear it as a pendant to keep it from getting lost.”

“That’s completely nonsensical of you,” Sanji decides, frankly baffled as to the man’s motivations. “Why would you do something kind like that for an enemy?”

Roronoa’s mouth purses into a thin line. “The only one who thinks we’re enemies here is you, Curls,” he says. “But I get that you can’t help it. Why don’t you go get breakfast sorted out, while I take care of things out here?”

“Breakfast,” Sanji repeats flatly. “I’m sorry, did you just imply that you expect me to cook during whatever venture you have planned for us?”

For some reason, this of all things seems to get Roronoa’s back up. “Yeah,” he grunts irritably. “What of it?”

Sanji squares his shoulders, feeling a prickling sensation crawling along the back of his neck the way he used to whenever Judge was observing something he was doing and finding him lacking. “I’m a member of the royal house of Germa,” he announces. “Cooking is beneath me.”

Roronoa gives him a long look, and when he finally speaks again, his eye is hard. “Wanna bet?”

*****
In a baffling turn of events, Roronoa turns out to be completely serious in his claim that Sanji is going to prepare their meals. He flat out refuses to take no for an answer, and directs Sanji back into the cabin to get started.

Sanji considers arguing with him, he truly does, but there’s not an ounce of give in Roronoa’s voice by the end of their conversation and he doesn’t want to risk having the man tie him up again if he doesn’t behave. Many more avenues of escape will present themselves if he’s able to move about freely than they will if he’s not.

That’s how he finds himself back in the cabin, staring down at the small kitchenette like a man facing an opponent in the ring. Outside he can hear the sounds of Roronoa working to get them ready to cast off, but it barely registers as he continues his standoff with an appliance.

“I mean,” he says finally, “if lay people can do this then surely I can. How hard could it possibly be?”

Amazingly, the answer to that once he starts working is not hard at all. Roronoa’s ship sports a surprisingly well stocked pantry between the cupboards, deep freeze, and storage compartments, and his cookware appears to be top of the line. It’s more than a little at odds with the man himself, but Sanji’s quickly coming to the conclusion that his captor contains multitudes.

Not wanting to dwell on that, however, he busies himself with pulling down the items that he thinks he’s going to need. His fingers dance over the space, pinching here, tweaking there, almost as if some subconscious knowledge that he’s long buried is rearing its head and telling him what to do.

He distantly registers a shift in the movement of the deck below his feet, but it’s only when a wind-tousled Roronoa ducks into the cabin, briefly allowing him to hear the strains of the open sea, that he realizes they must have cast off.

By this time the cabin is filled with the aromas of smokey bacon, cooked eggs, coffee, and a remaining spread that he can only halfway recall the origins of. He feels like he blinked and somehow an entire meal just appeared.

“What?” He asks, wondering why he sounds defensive when Roronoa quirks an eyebrow at the food now sprawled over the table. “I did what you wanted, didn’t I? You have no reason to be angry.”

“Trust me,” Roronoa says with a level of earnestness that Sanji doesn’t think is warranted. It’s certainly not relevant in any event. “I’m the farthest thing from angry.”

“Yes, well,” wiping his hands on the dish towel that had been hanging from the handle of the stove, Sanji takes the few meagre steps required to reach the table and pulls free the extra chair. “I make no promises as to the quality or as to whether or not I’ve poisoned anything in here.”

“You didn’t.” Roronoa says with a confusing level of certainty. “You couldn’t.”

“You don’t think so?” Sanji asks, now seated at the table and reaching for one of the mugs of coffee he’d laid out. “My sister, the Crown Princess, is a master with every known form of poison. It’s always been more her area of expertise than mine, but she’s taught me a thing or two over the years.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Roronoa says, and then refuses to elaborate. Granted, Sanji also doesn’t ask him to, but he doubts the man would have been forthcoming even if he had. Instead, he spears a piece of bacon with his work, bringing it to his mouth and chewing thoughtfully.

“Not bad,” he says before he’s fully swallowed everything. “I knew you could do it.”

“You made it clear I didn’t have a choice,” Sanji replies, watching the other man as he continues eating.

Roronoa’s hands flex around his knife and fork, and it’s as Sanji eyes him that he notices something he hadn’t the night prior. Not only does Roronoa have the three earrings set into his ear, but he’s also sporting a slim golden band around his right pinky finger.

It looks like a wedding ring, but it’s on both the wrong hand and the wrong finger. Sanji doesn’t know why this incongruity bothers him, but it does, and he finds himself inexplicably unable to look away.

“Have I got something on my face?” In the wake of Sanji’s inquisitive noise, Roronoa shrugs. “You’re staring,” he says simply. “I was wondering if I had food somewhere I shouldn’t.”

“I wasn’t staring,” Sanji denies, “but no. You don’t have anything that I can see.”

“Maybe I don’t,” Roronoa replies, “but you were staring. What’s on your mind, Curls?”

“Stop calling me that,” Sanji says, already positive that this direction is going to quickly become his new mantra. “I have a name, and a title for that matter. If anything, you should address me using that.”

“Not on your life,” Roronoa says with a wolfish grin. “I don’t go in for that frou frou bullshit at the best of times, but like hell am I going to do it for Germa of all places. You’ll get no respect from me there.”

Taken aback by this immediate dismissal of his heritage, Sanji falls silent. He busies himself with taking a few bites of his own meal, absently noting how he genuinely did do a half decent job, but his gaze keeps returning to the ring on Roronoa’s finger.

“Are you married?”

Sanji has no idea what possesses him to ask the question. In fact, he has no idea he’s actually done so until the words have left his mouth and are hovering awkwardly between them.

“I mean,” he hears himself continue on when Roronoa pauses in his eating, his posture going stiff. He gestures at the ring that had caught his attention. “It looks like you might be, but if you are, you’re wearing that in the wrong spot.”

Roronoa’s own gaze drifts to the ring. He stares at it for several beats, the air around him feeling charged, and then he shrugs.

“It’s complicated,” he says. He speaks with an air of finality, and Sanji doesn’t ask anything further.

*****
Roronoa finishes eating first, and surprises Sanji by standing to gather all the dishes that aren’t still in use. He stacks them in a neat pile on the available counter space, and flicks the tap to start filling the sink with water.

“What are you doing?” Sanji asks.

“What does it look like?” Roronoa replies, glancing at Sanji over his shoulder. “This crap isn’t going to wash itself.”

“Well, no,” Sanji allows, leaning back in his seat. “I suppose I just assumed you were going to make me do that part too, is all. I mean, I am your prisoner.”

Something flits across Roronoa’s face at these words, but it’s gone too quickly for Sanji to identify it and he has no interest in prodding. He simply watches the other man from where he’s sitting, waiting to see if he’ll say anything further.

“Are you done eating then?”

While that hadn’t been the question Sanji was expecting, he does opt to answer it. Scraping up the last of his meal onto his fork, he clears it away quickly and then nods. “I am now.”

“Great, give those here,” Roronoa says, nodding at Sanji’s plate and utensils. “The quicker they get in the sink, the less chance of anything congealing on them. Plus, I’m gonna need the table to work.”

“Alright,” Sanji says, handing them over.

He watches as Rorona adds the last dirty dishes to his stack, and continues watching as the man washes down each individual dish. From there he moves on to drying everything, after which he returns the entire mess to the cupboard and finishes off by wiping down the counter and sink.

“There,” Roronoa says with a self-satisfied nod. “All good.”

Turning to glance at Sanji, he raises the eyebrow above his good eye, almost as if he’s trying to elicit some form of commentary. Sanji has nothing to add, however, and merely stares blankly back at him.

“ … right,” Roronoa sighs, running a hand through his hair. “I’m going to need the table to look at my charts now. You can stay where you are if you like, but I don’t know how interesting you’re going to find the whole thing.”

“Probably not very,” Sanji replies. “But I’m not likely to find anything interesting out there, either,” he notes, indicating the area outside of the cabin with a slight jerk of his chin. “All there is is water.”

“Ocean,” Roronoa corrects.

Sanji shrugs. “Salt water then. It’s the same thing.”

Roronoa briefly closes his eye, visibly steeling himself against making a response that Sanji can’t guess the origins of. Then he lets out a heavy breath and walks over to a locker that’s similar to the one Sanji had dug his clothes out of earlier.

Cracking it open, he roots around in it for a moment, before drawing out a sealed tube that’s about as long as his arm. Recognizing the kind of contraption one might use to keep paper documents protected from the elements, Sanji watches as Roronoa pops the cap off of one end, and proceeds to shake free a rolled up piece of parchment.

Roronoa holds the parchment carefully as he sets the tube aside to rest next to his swords where he’s propped them up against a wall when he’d come to eat. Once this is done, he steps back over to the table, and spreads the paper out over its surface.

It’s a map, Sanji can tell that much right away. Intricately drawn, it possesses a level of quality that would put even Germa’s machine generated pieces to shame, although he doesn’t recognize any of the landmarks depicted on it.

“Am I supposed to be impressed?” He asks when Roronoa invites him to take a look. He casts his gaze over it again, just on the off chance that he’s wrong and he does spot something familiar, but it’s no use. If this map is depicting where they’re going, it’s not somewhere he’s ever been before.

“As a matter of fact, you should be,” Roronoa says in response to his question. “This piece was more than five years in the making, and you have no idea how hard it was to gather all the information to put it together.”

“If you say so,” Sanji says dismissively. “Is this the part where you expect me to ask what it’s a map for?”

“Sure,” Roronoa says. “Or you can tell me what you think it is.”

Sanji gives him a flat look. “It’s a map and you’re a pirate. Based on what pirates typically use maps for, I’m going to guess it’s meant to lead you to some kind of treasure. What I don’t understand is what that’s got to do with me.”

Roronoa goes quiet for long enough that Sanji starts to suspect he’s not going to answer. Then he shakes his head and runs a hand through his hair, his scarred fingers making a number of the green strands stick up awkwardly. “What would you say if I told you it was a map to the All Blue?”

Sanji’s stomach lurches, and his hands automatically tighten with a sudden urge to clamp them in his hair. He settles for gripping the edge of the table instead, and stares resolutely forward, refusing to meet Roronoa’s eye.

“The All Blue doesn’t exist,” he recites dutifully, even as his tongue tries to get stuck in the back of his throat. “It’s a myth, a childish fantasy that only superstitious sailors believe in. There’s never been any evidence that it’s real, and it would provide nothing of value even if it was.”

“Funny,” Roronoa drawls. “You’re saying it’s not worth anything, but you’re also the most worked up you’ve been since you got here. It seems to me like this mythical ocean might just mean something to you.”

Tearing his gaze away from the wall he has it fixated on, Sanji risks a glance at his companion. He’s expecting to find him looking amused, if not outright smug, but instead he looks almost … hopeful.

“It means nothing to me,” Sanji snaps, his shoulders hunching when he hears the level of emotion in his voice. As a child showcasing anything similar had always come with unpleasant consequences. Hence why he’s refused to allow it to happen since his return to Germa. “I want nothing to do with it.”

“No?” Roronoa asks, his eye theatrically wide. “That’s a shame then because it’s where we’re headed.”

Sanji blinks at him, thrown. “You mean - you mean you actually found it?”

Now Roronoa grimaces. “Not exactly,” he admits. “We tracked down the spot where it was most likely to be, based on every single scrap of information we could come across. Then the witch plotted out the map, but none of us felt right going to see it without … well. I’m not sure you’d understand why at this point.”

“Correction,” Sanji says. “I don’t understand any of what you just said. Who’s this ‘we’ you’re talking about? The only people on this ship are you and me, and I certainly didn’t have anything to do with whatever you have planned here.”

“That,” Roronoa says with fervor, “you technically couldn’t be more wrong about. As for your other thing, though, I mean the other Strawhats and I. We put this together as a last ditch effort.”

“A last ditch effort to do what?” Sanji demands, beginning to reach the end of his patience. “I have been asking this question for weeks now, and I think it’s high time I was given an answer. Just what is it that you’re trying to achieve here?”

Roronoa stares at him for a long moment. “To get you back,” he says finally. “The real you.”

*****
Sanji gets the sense that Roronoa hadn’t been intending to make that confession so early in their voyage, if at all. He stands up from the table as soon as the words have left his mouth, returning the map to its holder, and then grabbing both it and his swords before storming out of the cabin.

The door doesn’t so much close behind him as it does slam shut hard enough to make the hinges rattle. Everything about the man’s reaction suggests that it would be a good idea to give him some space, and Sanji sinks down in his chair as he considers what to do.

He’s not sure how much time passes while he sits holed up in the ship’s tiny cabin. Truthfully there’s not much to look at inside, but he can hear the sound of thumps and crashes as Roronoa works out whatever frustrations he’s dealing with up on the deck. It doesn’t seem like the man wants company, and, unlike most of his siblings, Sanji’s always preferred to gather what information he can rather than acting rashly.

On the other hand, he can’t stay in here forever, and, furthermore, Roronoa had left mid-conversation. He’d dropped his earlier bombshell with no explanation, meaning that Sanji’s been left with even more questions than he’d had before.

His mind made up, he stands. Nodding decisively to himself, he strides over to the cabin door and yanks it open. Blinking at the abrupt change in lighting, he gives his eyes a moment to adjust and then steps outside into the early afternoon sunlight.

If he’s expecting to find Roronoa out here destroying something, he’s sadly mistaken. Instead the man is standing by the helm with one hand resting on the wheel while he gazes out at the water surrounding them. He looks calm, all things considered, but there’s an aura about him that tells Sanji not to be fooled.

Nevertheless, Sanji is a scion of the ruling house of Germa, and he’s not afraid of a lowly pirate, no matter how notable the rest of the world may believe him to be. He wants answers, and Roronoa is going to give them to him.

The other man tilts his head towards Sanji as this thought passes through his mind. His good eye narrows slightly, gray meeting blue for a moment before Roronoa looks away again.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” he says preemptively, but this does nothing to halt Sanji’s steady progression across the deck.

“What makes you think I care about what you want?” Sanji asks. He comes to a stop a few feet away from the man, mindful of the swords he has resting on his hip and what his reputation says he can do with them. “I’m not above beating it out of you, if that’s what it takes.”

To his surprise, rather than hit him with a fierce scowl, Roronoa’s mouth turns upwards slightly at the corners. “Yeah,” he says almost wistfully, “you never have been.”

“And just what is that supposed to mean?” Sanji asks. There’s an itchy feeling crawling back and forth between his shoulder blades, and he doesn’t like it. “Until yesterday, you and I had never met.”

Roronoa returns his gaze to him, and now the man has the nerve to look amused. “Really?” He deadpans, one eyebrow rising sarcastically. “Do you honestly think I’d go through all this trouble for someone I’ve never met? You’ve got a twenty year hole in your brain, Curls. Doesn’t it make more sense that we’ve met somewhere in that timeframe?”

Sanji stares at him. The massive gap in his memory is one of the royal family’s most heavily guarded secrets, as well as being the main reason behind his father’s reluctance to send him on missions alone. Judge has never come right out and said it, but Sanji knows he considers the situation to be a liability.

Although, perhaps not quite as much as he had considered Sanji’s inconceivably disappointing childhood to be one. Judge’s entire face still curdles like he’s smelled something unpleasant if anyone dares to bring that up.

And yet here Roronoa is, looking at him like he knows not only about the memory issues, but all the rest as well. His calm scrutiny leaves Sanji feeling not unlike an insect under a microscope, prompting the kind of bristling that he would normally keep under wraps.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he says flatly. “Furthermore, even if your claims about my memory were true - which I can assure you they’re not - I certainly would never have debased myself by associating with a filthy pirate.”

“Hey, I showered yesterday before you got here,” Roronoa retorts, his mouth twisting into a mocking smirk. “I know how you get all up in arms about that kind of thing.”

“As for the rest,” he continues on while Sanji’s still trying to work out a response to that, “I’m far from the only pirate you’ve associated with. Hell, you were fucking raised by them from age eight and up. All told, you’ve spent more time with our kind of people than without.”

“Please,” Sanji sneers. “As if my father would have ever allowed that to happen.”

“If by father you mean Judge, then yeah, he actually did just that,” Roronoa replies. “But I imagine the issues with your memory start before the cell, so you wouldn’t recall how he threw you away.”

“Cell?” Sanji latches onto that word like a dog with a bone, his stomach twisting for reasons he can’t articulate. “What cell? What are you talking about?”

For the briefest of moments Roronoa looks caught out. Something that Sanji can only describe as shame passes across his face, but he’s quick to move away from it. “Never mind,” he says aloud. “There’s no need to drag up old wounds. The long and short of it is that you were raised by pirates in the East Blue until you were nineteen, and then you found a crew of your own to join.”

“Oh I did, did I?” Sanji says mockingly. He rests his hands on his hips, the fingers of the left one inadvertently pressing up against the brooch tucked into his pants pocket. “Pray enlighten me as to who I was sailing with and what I thought I was doing.”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Roronoa asks, his arms spreading wide. “You were one of us, a Strawhat. You were the last to join before we hit the Grand Line, and you were our cook. The best damn one in any of the Blues.”

“Like hell I was,” Sanji says. That prickling sensation is ramping up again, and it’s making him want to lash out in an uncharacteristic fit of pique. “I don’t care what you say, I would have remembered something like that.”

“You did up until five years ago,” Roronoa counters. “Or maybe even more recently, I can’t say for sure. All I know is it’s been five years since I’ve seen you, so I don’t know when exactly Judge fucked with your memories.”

“Ju - ?” Sanji freezes. “You’re saying that my father is the reason for the gap?” He demands, heedless of the implicit admission buried in the words. “That’s ridiculous.”

“God I wish you’d stop calling him that,” Roronoa huffs, sounding peeved. “Usually you go with something like ‘the sperm donor’ or ‘that rat-faced bastard’. This whole acting like he’s someone worthy of respect thing is getting old.”

“He’s my father,” Sanji reiterates, “and a king of one of the most powerful countries in the world. Why would I refer to him with anything other than respect?”

“Gag me,” Roronoa says bluntly. “I really wish you’d have let me kill the stupid fucker all the times I asked. If you had, this mess might not be quite as bad as it is.”

“You’re talking nonsense,” Sanji says then. He’s quickly growing tired of this conversation, yet at the same time can’t bring himself to put an end to it. “You also haven’t finished answering my questions. You claim I’m one of your crew, but you’re being rather sparse on the details. If I’m supposedly one of you, why did I go back to Germa?”

“Because you’re a self-sacrificing idiot,” Roronoa grunts, crossing his formidable arms over his chest and giving Sanji an unimpressed look. “You got it into your thick head that you were making us all miserable and took off.”

“Please, as if I’d ever care about the feelings of a ragtag group of pirates,” Sanji scoffs. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Maybe not now,” Roronoa allows. “Not with what that fucking Germa tech has turned you into, but there used to be a time when you cared about us more than anyone. A time back before that fucking raid suit.”

Sanji eyes him warily. “How do you know about the raid suits?” He wants to know. “That technology is classified.”

“I know everything about them that you do,” Roronoa replies. “If not more.”

“You really want to know the truth?” He asks when all this comment does is make Sanji look at him blankly. “Fine.” Squaring his shoulders, he leans back against a nearby railing and looks Sanji straight in the eye. “I’ll tell you.”

“Judge has been experimenting on you and your brothers since before you were born.” He says, starting a point that Sanji isn’t expecting. “Your mom didn’t agree with this, though, and tried to stop him. What she did had no effect on the other three, but it worked where you were concerned. Instead of being born as an emotionless killing machine you were, well, normal.”

“You mean weak,” Sanji sneers, recalling the words that people used to throw around during his childhood. Most of the time they hadn’t even bothered saying them where he couldn’t overhear. “A failure and a disappointment.”

“I don’t mean anything of the sort,” Roronoa says stoutly. “I’d have taken you over those other three assholes any day of the week. Hell, I still would.”

“You’re deluded then.”

“Probably,” Roronoa agrees, “but not for the reasons that you think. Regardless, you were born normal and Judge was pissed about it. He tried to make you be like the others, fucked around in ways that I can’t even begin to imagine, and then cast you aside when you were eight years old, which I’m guessing is where your memories cut off.”

“From there you were raised by someone else, like I said, and for the record he’s as pissed with you as I am these days. He also says hi and to get your fucking head on straight.”

“After that,” Roronoa keeps going before Sanji can get a word in edgewise, “like I said, you joined up with Luffy and the rest of us. Or, not the total rest of us, I guess. You were the fifth one to join. A bunch of the others came after.”

“We sailed together for a while, but after a couple years on the Grand Like we came across Germa thanks to a mess Judge dragged you into. We sent them packing, but not before he slipped you that damned raid suit during a fight.”

“You put it on to give us an edge in a place called Wano,” he says darkly. “Only a couple of times before you got wise to what it was doing and destroyed it, but by then the damage was already done. The suit connected with whatever ‘enhancements’ Judge had hidden in your genes and you started to change.”

“None of the rest of us even noticed at first,” he admits, his shoulders slumping. “The changes were so minor that most of them were easy enough to gloss over. You caught it, though. You realized that you weren’t feeling things the way you once were, and insisted we keep an eye on it. You even made me - well, never mind. The point is, you knew something was wrong and that it was getting worse.”

“So let me guess,” folding his arms over his chest, Sanji stares the other man down. “You opted to get rid of me when you realized that I was turning into someone you didn’t want around any longer?”

Roronoa’s eye widens. “What? No,” he says harshly. “Have you not been listening to a word I’ve said? You left us, dumbass. As the years went by you started getting worse, not better, and you fucking took off because you convinced yourself that we wouldn’t be able to fix you. You ran like a coward.”

“I’m not a coward,” Sanji replies. “You have to be able to feel fear for that, which I can’t.”

“Well you could then,” Roronoa snaps. “That was your whole point in your little goodbye letter. You were afraid you were going fully dark side on us and thought everyone else was in denial, so you took off.”

“To do what?”

“To protect us,” Roronoa replies. “Plus something else I’m not prepared to get into with you. You gave up, Curls. That’s what you did. You wouldn’t let anyone try to help you anymore.”

“And that,” he concludes with relish, “is why we’re here. We’re going after the one thing left that might snap you back to reality.”

“And that is?” Sanji asks.

“The All Blue,” Roronoa says, like it should be obvious.

Sanji’s stomach lurches again, much the same way it had the first time Roronoa had mentioned the mythical ocean. He keeps his face implacable, however, and simply gazes back at the other man disdainfully. “Why would a body of water, of all things, have any effect on me?”

“Simple,” Roronoa replies. “Because finding it has always been your dream.”

“That was kind of our crew’s thing,” he further explains when Sanji wrinkles his nose at him. “We were all united in our goal of finding the One Piece, but each of us also had a specific goal we wanted to achieve. Becoming King of the Pirates, becoming the World’s Greatest Swordsman, drawing a map of the world - that kind of thing.”

“And mine was finding … an ocean that doesn’t exist?” Sanji says, unable to bring himself to say the name aloud.

“It exists,” Roronoa says firmly. “You believed in it, and I believed in you, which is enough to convince me that it’s real.”

“Then you’re an idiot,” Sanji says flatly. “A gullible, easily manipulated idiot who’s out here on a fool’s errand. One that you’ve now dragged me into as well. This is insane.”

“It’s not,” Roronoa says, still just as firmly as he had before. Say what you will about the man, but what he lacks in brains he apparently makes up for in conviction. “Out of all of us, you were the only one who didn’t get to see your dream through to the end. I’m fixing that now, and with luck it’ll fix you.”

“How?” Sanji asks. “I mean, I get that you’re saying you expect me achieving this dream will somehow cause my emotions to come back - your logic is flawed, but I can at least follow it from point A to point B. What I don’t know is what makes you so sure we can find the thing at all.”

“Oh trust me, this is a group effort,” Roronoa tells him. “I might be the only one out here, but we all chipped in to make it work.”

“After you left we scoured everywhere we could think of for any information about the All Blue. Every scrap, every rumor - you name it, we chased it, and we didn’t stop there. Robin sorted through all the information to find what seemed true. Nami used that to create the map we’re using. Franky built this ship and crammed a bunch of automated systems into it to make our route as easy as possible. Everyone contributed what they could.”

“You keep dropping these names like you expect them to mean something to me,” Sanji says. “They don’t. I don’t know who any of these people are.”

“I know,” Roronoa says quietly. “We were warned about how sheltered Judge was keeping you after he messed with your memories. Our doctor’s best guess is that he was worried any exposure to your old life might cause whatever he did to your head to reverse itself.”

“And is that what you’re banking on?” Sanji wonders. “Are you out here not only trying to get my emotions back, but also my memories of the life I supposedly had before?”

Roronoa shrugs. “In an ideal world, yes, but I’ll settle for the former. Getting you free of what’s been done to you is my first priority. Having your memories come back would just be an added bonus.”

He’s lying, Sanji thinks, or at least he’s downplaying how severely he wants to achieve both goals. The problem is he doesn’t know how he knows that, which is a fact that leaves him feeling unsettled.

“Alright,” he says finally. “Say I believe you, believe all of this, that still leaves me with one question.”

“And what’s that?” Roronoa asks.

Sanji looks him dead in the eye. “If I’m so important to your entire crew, why are you the only one out here on this mission?”

Roronoa’s entire face goes blank. “That,” he says with an air of finality, “is for me to know and for you to find out. Don’t ask me again.”

*****
Sanji considers pushing the issue, he really does, but the look in Roronoa’s eye stays his hand. He decides instead to wait and see if the other man might reveal more information by accident, figuring that’s the safer option when compared to making him angry.

They don’t say much to each other for the rest of the day, not until Roronoa directs him back into the cabin to try his hand at supper. Once again he’s surprised to find himself working under some kind of rote memory - a fact that he supposes lends credence to the claim of him having been a cook in his past life.

Roronoa hums appreciatively when he’s presented with his meal, digging in as eagerly as he had during breakfast. He also repeats the process of tidying up after he’s done, but then disappears out on deck until the sun sets and he ultimately retreats inside to reclaim his hammock.

Sanji has a harder time falling asleep tonight than he had during the one before. He lies in the bunk, once again burrowed down amongst the covers, and watches Roronoa’s hammock sway gently back and forth.

He could attack now, he’s almost certain of it. Roronoa is asleep - the harsh, guttural snores he’s letting out are far too convincing to be an act - and his swords are propped up against the nearest wall. The swordsman is fast, no doubt, but Sanji would be willing to bet he’s faster.

A fight between the two of them may or may not be well matched, though. Sanji hasn’t had enough time to gauge the other man’s skill set. Plus there’s still the matter of him being trapped in the middle of the sea with a map he’s not sure he can read and a ship he definitely doesn’t know how to sail. Roronoa hasn’t been lying when he’d said it was of an unusual construction, and it’ll take him time to learn its inner workings.

All told, attacking now seems like a poor strategy. There are too many variables he can’t account for, such that the odds are good he’ll end up in an even worse predicament than he is now. At least now he knows Roronoa doesn’t intend to harm him. Although if they fail to complete the mission he’s set for them, who knows if that might not change?

Sighing tiredly to himself, Sanji hunkers even further down into the blankets, waiting for sleep to claim him.

*****
Sanji’s not sure at what point he falls asleep, but at some point he must. When he next opens his eyes, sunlight is leaking in through the cabin’s lone window, and Roronoa’s hammock has been tucked away for another day.

Yet the man himself hasn’t gone far. Sanji can hear the telltale sounds of someone moving around in the bathroom, and since it’s not him, it’s got to be Roronoa. He highly doubts they’ve gained any new passengers during the night.

As if to prove his point, the door to the bathroom soon opens, and Roronoa ducks into the main cabin area. He’s bare from the waist up, one hand busy trying to tame his hair into an arrangement that’s not quite so wild, and Sanji’s eyes are drawn to the mottled scar that runs from his left shoulder to almost his right hip.

“Mornin’ Curls,” Roronoa says absently when he catches sight of Sanji sitting upright in his bed. “How’d you sleep?”

“More poorly than I would have if I was back in my proper chambers in Germa,” Sanji says, earning himself an eye roll for his troubles. “Never mind that, though. What happened to you?”

“What, you mean this?” Following Sanji’s gaze, Roronoa traces two fingers over the edge of the raised tissue. Then he grins. “Got it in a fight I had no business being in,” he says. “You were there when it happened.”

“Was I?” Sanji asks curiously, and then quickly backtracks. “I mean, I don’t recall that.”

“Why would you?” Roronoa asks. “It happened about right in the middle of the gap in your memories.”

Striding over to his locker, he cranks out the combination and then pulls the door open. Rooting around for a moment, he eventually comes up with a navy coloured t-shirt that he tugs over his head, effectively hiding the scar from view. After that, he reaches for the battered looking haramaki that Sanji’s yet to see him go a day without.

“That thing looks like it’s seen better days,” he notes as Roronoa twists it until it’s sitting snugly around his waist. “How long have you had it?”

“Way too long in your opinion,” Roronoa replies. “But, too bad for you, I like it. Also, here.” Fishing around in his pocket, he pulls free a small length of chain, the kind one would use for a necklace, and then tosses it in Sanji’s direction. “I dug this out earlier. You should be able to string that trinket of yours on it, and it’ll be safer around your neck then it will be in your pocket.”

Catching the chain with one hand, the other automatically strays to Sanji’s hip, where his brooch is indeed located. Frowning, he twists the chain around a couple of his fingers, treating the strength of the individual links.

They’re sturdy, more than sturdy enough to handle their intended purpose, and he weighs the pros and cons of accepting such a gift. “If you think being kind to me is going to help me revert back to the person you say I was, you’re going to be sadly mistaken. This is who I am.”

“Maybe, maybe not,” Roronoa replies. “I guess we’ll see.”

Seeing no point in arguing with him further, Sanji pulls the brooch free from his pocket. It takes him the work of a moment to string it onto the chain, which he then loops around his neck so that the brooch itself is resting near the base of his throat.

“This is not at all how this piece is meant to be worn,” he notes. “It’s meant to attach to clothing, not … whatever you want to call this arrangement.”

“Beggars can’t be choosers, Curls,” Roronoa announces. “You can give it back to me if you don’t like it.”

“No,” Sanji says quickly, reflex causing his fingers to wrap protectively around the brooch. “No, that won’t be necessary. This will do until a better opportunity presents itself.”

“Glad to hear it,” Roronoa says, opening up the locker next to his and pulling a bundle of clothing free. He then proceeded to toss the whole mess at Sanji’s head, causing the blond to have to scramble to grab everything. “Now, get dressed. You can get breakfast started while I double check our heading.”

Telling himself he has no other alternative, Sanji goes to do as he’s told.

Breakfast is a slightly quicker affair today than the day before, but this time once it’s done Sanji follows Roronoa out onto the deck right away.

“There’s nothing for me to do in the cabin,” he says preemptively when Roronoa shifts to look at him. “It’s not as if you’ve equipped the place with multiple sources of entertainment.”

“Why would you need entertainment if you consider yourself to be an emotionless robot, or whatever it is you want to call it?” Roronoa asks. “Seems to me like you should be fine sitting around doing nothing if that’s the case.”

“Why would you want me sitting around doing nothing if you’re trying to trigger my memories into returning?” Sanji counters. “I can’t imagine me doing the equivalent of waiting around watching paint dry during our trip is going to help with that plan.”

Roronoa gives him an annoyed look, but follows it up by nodding his head in a touché sort of gesture. “Fair enough,” he admits grudgingly. “What did you have in mind?”

“I figured I’d leave that up to you,” Sanji says, moving to sit down on a barrel that’s been stacked next to a couple of others not far from the helm. “Maybe you’d care to dazzle me with stories of my adventures with the Strawhats to see if that will knock anything free.”

Roronoa gives him a smarmy look. “I could tell you the story of your first bounty poster,” he says, his voice dripping with saccharine sweetness. “The marines couldn’t get a decent photo of you, so they decided to go with a drawing instead. It was an incredible likeness, if I do say so myself.”

Sanji gives him a flat look. “Based on your tone, I’m going to guess it was an abomination,” he says, unsurprised when Roronoa nods. “Really? You think childish taunts are going to be enough to have any impact on work that you claim was done by my father? The man is one of the most talented scientists of his era. You’re going to have to do better than that.”

“And you need to stop talking about Judge like you admire him,” Roronoa says, making a disgusted face. “The guy’s the worst, and you hate him.”

“I don’t - ”

“Feel hate,” Roronoa finishes for him, holding up a hand to prevent any further protests. “I know, I know. It’s the weirdest difference of all, really. You were the world’s biggest bitch when I knew you.”

“And you want me to return to that?” Sanji asks dubiously. “If I was so terrible to you when we sailed together, I fail to see why you’d even want me back.”

“I never said you were terrible,” Roronoa replies. “You were an ass, sure, but so was I. It’s part of what made us work so well together.”

“Did we?” Sanji asks. “How so?”

Roronoa’s quiet for a moment. Sanji can practically see the wheels turning in his head as he determines what he wants to say, and he can tell the exact moment that he decides he’s going to speak again.

“They called us the Wings of the Pirate King.”

“Who’s they?”

“Does it matter?” Roronoa makes an exasperated face. “Everybody. The global They. Our friends, our enemies, and even people who never met us. It wound up in the papers, and we never managed to shake it.”

“Alright,” Sanji says, willing to concede the point since he seems so adamant about it. “What did it mean?”

“We were the path clearers for Luffy,” Roronoa explains. “We were the two heaviest hitters on the crew after him, so we used to take out the biggest names that were in front of whoever he was gunning for. The others would help, but we dealt with the worst so that they didn’t have to.”

“Which of us was better?” Sanji asks, and Roronoa grins.

“Well,” he says, dragging the word out obnoxiously, “minus one brief fluke, my bounty was always higher, so I think it’s fair to say it was me.”

“Bullshit,” Sanji says immediately. “I refuse to believe that the likes of you could compare to me.”

“The facts don’t lie, Curls,” Roronoa says with an easy shrug. “I used to get the upper hand whenever we sparred together too.”

“Now that I definitely don’t believe,” Sanji says. “I’m confident I’d wipe the floor with you.”

“Yeah?” Roronoa asks, still with that lazy grin crawling across his face. “We can give it a go later if you’d like. Although, I don’t see how you could expect to keep up with me with your fancy suit being back in Germa.”

“I don’t need a raid suit to beat you,” Sanji sneers. “Lend me one of your precious swords for a minute. Hell, ten seconds should be enough time to put you in your place.”

Sanji’s not expecting the way Roronoa’s eye goes wide and his jaw drops, but he’s expecting the way the other man surges towards him even less. Thrown off kilter, he nearly falls from the barrel he’s seated on, and the only thing that stops him is the fact that Roronoa grabs him by the hands.

“You’ve been fighting with swords?” He demands, sounding scandalized. Meanwhile, he lifts both of Sanji’s hands and eyes them critically, apparently searching for signs of anything untoward.

“Of course I have,” Sanji replies, futilely trying to tug his limbs free. It’s no use, though. Roronoa’s grip is like iron, and he doesn’t budge, no matter how hard Sanji yanks. “Swords, spears, guns, my fists - we use whatever we have available in the moment.”

“All of which could damage your hands,” Roronoa stresses. “Why would you ever risk that?”

Sanji blinks. “First all, they’re just hands. Yours are covered in scars, so I fail to see what the big deal is if the same thing happens to anyone else. Second of all, our invulnerability makes any such damage impossible. My father saw to that.”

“It doesn’t matter, you’d never risk your hands in a fight,” Roronoa insists. “They’re the tools of a cook’s trade, his most treasured possession.”

“You’re talking nonsense,” Sanji says, using a break in the other man’s concentration to finally pull his hands free. “How could I have been the powerful fighter you claimed I was if I didn’t use my hands in battle?”

“You used your feet,” Roronoa says, sounding like he thinks this is completely reasonable, as opposed to the utter nonsense it actually is. “People called you Blackleg Sanji because you were usually wearing dress pants when you fought, and that’d be the last thing an enemy would ever see.”

“Please,” Sanji deadpans. “You honestly expect me to believe I made a name for myself as a fierce pirate by kicking my enemies to death? That’s insane.”

“Insane isn’t the word I’d use,” Roronoa replies. “I’ve seen you dole out more damage with those legs than the entire Germa fleet combined. Hell, I’ve felt you do it. You used to love trying to kick my head in whenever I’d pissed you off.”

“Like everything else you’ve said, I’ll have to take your word on it,” Sanji decides. “Though, for the record, I don’t believe ninety percent of what you’ve told me.”

“You should,” Roronoa says seriously. “I’m not a liar. I’ve never really seen the point in it. Besides, given that you had twenty years of training in one style of fighting, I’d be willing to bet the muscle memory is still in there. If you want convincing about how you fight, then all you have to do is spar with me.”

“Not right now, though,” he adds, his gaze once again returning to Sanji’s hands. He looks like wants to make another grab for them, so Sanji pulls them back towards his chest just in case. “You can take some time to think about it.”

“How generous of you,” Sanji murmurs, and then doesn’t say anything else.

*****
They spend the next two days in relative silence. Sanji doesn’t ask for any more information about the previous life he’s supposedly led, and nor does Roronoa volunteer it. They go about their business on the ship with minimal interactions.

Day five of Sanji’s stint in Roronoa’s company brings the first real change they’ve come across. So far to date the sea has remained unusually calm for the Grand Line, with nothing to break up the watery vista.

The calmness remains, but when Sanji exits the cabin after breakfast, today he finds a dark smudge on the horizon. Eyeing it critically, he can only assume that they’re approaching an island, a fact that Roronoa confirms when he asks about it.

“Yeah, the witch has it recorded on her map,” he says, one hand steady on the wheel. “According to her notes it’s uninhabited and doesn’t sport anything flashy, but it won’t hurt us to stop and see if there’s anything we can use to resupply.”

“Here,” he adds, shoving a hand in the pocket of his pants and coming back up with what appears to be a spyglass. “You can have a look for yourself if you like.”

Seeing no reason to refuse, Sanji takes the spyglass as offered. He turns it over in his hands, absently noting the intricate craftsmanship, and then brings it to his eye for its intended purpose.

An image of the oncoming island swims into view, but it’s a much more detailed one than Sanji was expecting. He feels as if he can make out the individual leaves on some of the trees, with the resolution being much better than it should be from a device so small.

“Where did you get this?” He asks, pulling back so that he can study the spyglass as opposed to the island. “The quality is better than what I’m used to.”

“Of course it is, it’s one of Usopp’s,” Roronoa says, indicating through his tone that this should be all the information Sanji needs. When all Sanji does is stare at him blankly though, he huffs and rolls his eye.

“Usopp? Sogeking?” He tries, grunting when Sanji shakes his head. “Fuck, this is so stupid. You’ve known the man as long as you’ve known me. Curly hair, freakishly long nose, and a habit of shrieking like the devil himself is after him if someone so much as looks at him funny.”

“He’s our sniper,” Roronoa concludes in the wake of this less than helpful description. “The best one I’ve ever seen, not that I’d ever admit it to his face. He even puts his old man to shame.”

“I’m afraid it’s not ringing any bells,” Sanji says, rolling the spyglass back and forth over his palm. “He did good work with this, though. I’m not sure even Germa’s machine shops could have produced something like it.”

“From where I’m standing, that’s not much of a compliment,” Roronoa says. “Still, I’m glad to see you recognize talent when you see it.”

“Mhm,” Sanji replies. He takes another look through the spyglass just because he can, but is quick to hand it back. He watches Roronoa twist a knob somewhere, and then the entire thing collapses in on itself in a way that will make it even easier to carry.

“This Usopp,” he says after Roronoa’s tucked the spyglass back into his pocket and returned his hand to the wheel. “Tell me more about him.”

“Can I get a please in there somewhere?” Roronoa asks, snickering when Sanji looks at him. “I’m kidding. It’s fine, I don’t mind talking about the crew. What do you want to know?”

Sanji thinks about it. “You said I’ve known him as long as I have you. How did we all meet?”

“In a word? Luffy.” Roronoa says. “He’s the one who brought us all together.”

“How?”

“Uh, well, jeez it was a long time ago, Curls,” Roronoa scratches a hand over the back of his head. “I might get some of the details wrong.”

“So tell me what you do remember,” Sanji suggests. “You can at least do that much.”

“Fine,” Roronoa grunts. “I was his first. Luffy’s, I mean. I’d gotten myself in a spot of trouble with the marines, and he came looking for me where they were keeping me prisoner, wanting me to join his crew.”

“I agreed in exchange for him freeing me,” he adds with a laugh, “but I didn’t know at the time that said crew was only going to be him and me. We didn’t pick up the witch until a couple weeks later, and after that we met Usopp when we docked at his village.”

“So you’re all the ones from the East Blue then?” Sanji surmises, and Roronoa nods.

“That’s right,” he says, following the words up with a laugh. “God, we were such kids back then. I was the oldest at nineteen, Nami was next at eighteen, and the other two were both seventeen. Looking back on it now, I don’t know what we thought we were doing.”

“How old are you now?” Sanji asks, suddenly struck by the fact that he doesn’t know.

“The same as you,” Roronoa replies. “Thirty-three.”

Sanji does the math in his head. “So you’re saying we’ve all known each other for fourteen years.”

“That’s right,” Roronoa confirms. “Or at least the original five of us have. You came along right after Usopp, but we didn’t meet any of the others until we’d hit the Grand Line.”

“The others,” Sanji repeats thoughtfully. “You’ve mentioned Franky the shipwright a couple of times, as well as a Robin who helped research the All Blue. How many more are there?”

“Aside from those? Three on the main crew - Chopper, our doctor, Brook, our musician, and Jinbe, our helmsman. We’ve had others sail with us at various points, and these days we’ve got more allies than you can shake a stick at, but that’s the core group.”

“Ten pirates,” he concludes. “The only real family I’ve ever known.”

“But hey, you were asking about Usopp specifically,” he notes, shifting topics abruptly. “Let’s start there and we can do the others later if you like. He’s our sniper, like I said, and he’s also got a decent knack for machinery. He’s always coming up with new gadgets, some of which work better than others, and before Franky he used to do most of the maintenance on our ship.”

“Was he any good at it?” Sanji asks. “Because if he’s not a trained professional, he could have done more harm than good.”

Roronoa scowls, apparently taking offense to a perceived slight against his friend. “He did the best he could with what he had, and if heart alone could have seen us through he’d have kept us going with only that.”

“That’s very poetic,” Sanji replies, “but also unrealistic. Based on your reaction, I’m going to assume that he wasn’t good enough. Not for the Grand Line anyway.”

“He tried,” Roronoa snaps. “And you more than anyone backed him up on that. You were the one who finally got through to him that it wasn’t his fault.”

“Yes, but the Merry still died anyway.” Sanji says. “Regardless of whether or not anyone was technically at fault.”

Up until this point Roronoa has been partly slumped over the helm as they chat. Now he jerks up right so fast that he slams his knee into the base it’s set in, yet fails to register doing so.

“You remember the Merry?!” He demands, looking like he’s half considering climbing directly over the helm to get to Sanji. “I thought you didn’t remember anything about us?”

“I - I - ” Caught as off guard as his companion, Sanji takes a step backwards and nearly trips over a coil of rope when he misjudges the distance. After a moment spent reobtaining his balance, he brings a hand to his head, massaging his temple with his fingers.

“I remember a ship,” he says finally. “A caravel class with a - a sheep’s head figurine?”

“Yeah, that’s her!” Roronoa says, sounding the most excited he has since their voyage had begun. “The Going Merry. She was our crew’s first ship. She was a gift from Usopp’s wife Kaya for saving her back in their home village.”

“None of that means anything to me,” Sanji says. “But I can picture the ship, and I know it was destroyed at some point. If all that is true, then maybe the rest of what you’ve been saying is as well.”

“Told you so,” Roronoa says smugly. “Even better, if you remember the Merry without me even bringing her up then it stands to reason that there’s plenty more we can knock free from your head. Chopper was right. It’s all still in there, we just have to figure out how to pull it out. Go on, ask me something else.”

“I - ” Sanji stares at him, his thoughts forming a whirlwind in his head that he can’t articulate the source of. “I’m feeling tired all of a sudden,” he lies. “I’m going to go lie down in the cabin. Let me know when we’re close enough to make land.”

“But - ” Roronoa stretches out a hand as Sanji brushes past him, forcing the blond to twist to the side to evade him. “Curls.”

“I’ll see you later,” Sanji says, more firmly now. “Come find me when you’re ready.”

*****
As promised, Sanji hides in the cabin until he feels the ship slow to a stop. He lies in the bed, trying to nap, but his head is buzzing too much for that to be possible. He keeps being flooded with images of the Going Merry, even though he’s yet to picture anyone who sailed on her.

Nevertheless it forces him to conclude that Roronoa hasn’t been lying to him about how they know each other. For better or for worse, they’d been connected together at some point, and possibly for quite a while at that.

He supposes that explains the man’s determination to bring him back into the fold. The most famous pirate crews tend to be incredibly loyal to each other - needing that loyalty to survive - and a crew that had risen as high as the Strawhats would have to be particularly loyal indeed.

Sanji’s torn from his musing by the sound of boots stomping across the deck and the cabin door being unceremoniously flung open. Pulling his head out from under the blankets, he squints at where Roronoa is silhouetted in the doorway, backlit by the late morning sun.

“We’re here,” he says, as if Sanji hadn’t managed to figure that part out for himself yet. “Get up, and let’s go take a look around.”

“Why?” Sanji asks. “Whatever tech your shipwright has built into this contraption obviously doesn’t need a log pose to navigate by, so it’s not like we have to stay here and wait for one to reset. We can just keep going.”

“Only an idiot passes up the chance to resupply out here,” Roronoa reminds him. “We might have plenty of provisions for now, but we also have space in storage and you never know when we might have trouble substituting with fish. A ship runs on its crew’s stomachs, Curls. You taught me that.”

And feeding you was always more of a challenge than most.

Sanji freezes when that thought springs unbidden to his mind. It’s closely followed by a series of calculations that he doesn’t entirely understand - words like macros and protein intake and electrolytes flitting through his brain.

Enough of this, he tells himself sternly, shaking his head. He then pushes back the covers and rolls out of bed, wondering if the distraction provided by the island might actually make him feel better.

“I’m coming,” he says aloud. “Let me find my shoes.”

Nodding, Roronoa ducks back out of the doorway so Sanji can get himself situated. His shoes are right where he’d left them, and he quickly scurries into the washroom, figuring he may as well make use of it while he has a chance.

By the time he’s done, Roronoa’s outside waiting for him by one of the railings. He has his swords hooked to his belt like usual, but he also has a large basket slung over the opposite shoulder.

“For anything we might find that’s worth bringing back,” he explains when Sanji’s gaze drifts to the container. “Over the years, you’ve gotten me pretty well trained when it comes to foraging.”

“If you say so,” Sanji replies. Glancing over the railing he notes that there’s no wharf, but Rironoa was able to get them reasonably close to the beach, such that traveling down the gangplank should keep their feet relatively dry. “I thought you were Strawhat’s first mate, not his helmsman.”

“The ship honestly does most of the work,” Roronoa replies, following his gaze. “But Jinbe’s also given me a few pointers over the years.”

Realizing that he’s inadvertently opened up another window for Roronoa to talk about his crew, Sanji falls silent. Without saying another word, he starts climbing over the railing and onto the plank, letting his feet carry him until they’re sinking into the sand.

It’s been a bit since he’s been on land. By his calculations, the last time would have been during the mission where he’d wound up in the newsreels, much to Judge’s chagrin. He therefore takes a moment to let his legs adjust, and then starts plowing forward.

“The island doesn’t look very big,” he says, coming to a stop right as he’s about to reach the tree line. He surveys the surrounding area, trying to gauge the likelihood that there’s actually anything here worth examining. “I truly don’t know what you expect to find.”

“It’s a tropical climate,” Roronoa says as he draws even with him. Despite the pace Sanji has set and the gear he’s carrying, the man isn’t the slightest bit winded. “Means we might get lucky and find produce ripe for the picking.”

“I suppose,” Sanji replies, forced to acknowledge his point. Not even Germa’s genetic altering has found a way to eliminate scurvy, so it can’t hurt to see what’s out there to try and stave that off. “Let’s keep going then.”

They move through the terrain for the better part of an hour, stopping occasionally when they come across certain berries that look worth taking. Then eventually they emerge into an entire grove of wild pear trees, and Sanji has to look away to avoid the smug look Roronoa shoots him.

“Just pick the ones that are in the best shape,” he mutters, moving closer to the trees. “Avoid anything with obvious bruising, or that feels either too hard or too soft.”

“I know the drill,” Roronoa says, swinging the still mostly empty basket down off his shoulder and resting it on the ground near his feet. “I’ve been doing this for years.”

“So you say,” Sanji notes absently, most of his attention on a pear he’s roaming a critical eye over. “Spent a lot of time as my pack mule, did you?”

“Somebody had to,” is the reply. “You used to buy and gather so much shit that you hardly ever had enough hands to carry it all. Plus, it was easier if you kept them free so that you could test out whatever goods you were looking at.”

“I suppose that makes sense,” Sanji says. Deciding he doesn’t like the specific pear he’s looking at, he moves along to the next closest one. “But why you? Was it sheer brute strength alone that made you the prime candidate? Surely you had better things to do with your time.”

“Nah, not usually,” Roronoa says. He’s shuffled over to a different patch of trees, but Sanji can still see him out of the corner of his eye. “Sometimes I might need, like, cleaning supplies for my swords or stuff like that, but it was small shit and I could give the list to whoever else was going to be in that area.”

“Honestly,” he adds with a laugh. “Most of the time, if I wasn’t with you, I’d have been off either napping or finding a bar if one was available. The witch always said sending me with you was better because I could make myself useful.”

“That and it made you less likely to get lost,” Sanji murmurs, his eyes widening at the exact moment he plucks a pear from the tree.

He stays where he is for several seconds, frozen in place with the pear still held aloft, until Roronoa comes around the tree he’s been picking from. The swordsman looks equally shocked, but he squares his shoulders as he looks at Sanji straight on.

“I don’t,” he says with great dignity, “get lost.”

They hold each other's gazes for several seconds later, until Sanji snorts. “Bullshit,” he says flatly. “I don’t have to remember anything to tell you’re lying through your teeth.”

Roronoa holds himself in stubborn silence for a few more moments, his face taking on a mulish cast. “I can’t believe that’s one of the first things you remember,” he grumbles, clearly put out. “You’re such a dick.”

“For remembering an honest fact?” Sanji asks, unable to follow his logic. “I thought that’s what you wanted me to do?”

Roronoa gives him a dirty look. “I can think of far better things for you to remember than that,” he huffs. “Although I don’t know why I expected anything better.”

“What was it you told me the other day?” Sanji reminds him. “Beggars can’t be choosers? I think you might want to follow your own advice. Also, there’s more pears over there that look decent. Go grab some, will you?”

“Ugh, why not?”

*****
Their stint on the island doesn’t do anything so trite as to magically unlock a flood of memories, but they do start trickling in as their voyage continues. Over the course of the next week Sanji is hit with about a half a dozen recollections regarding the Strawhat Pirates, and even begins being able to visualize some of them.

Honestly, he thinks his mind is playing tricks on him the first time that happens. He’d been sitting at the table in the cabin, watching Roronoa wash the dishes for the umpteenth time. It’d been a particularly large pile by their standards - Sanji had unintentionally found himself getting creative where some sauces were concerned - so it’d been taking him longer than usual.

Somewhere in the middle of the mess, Roronoa had absently begun humming to himself while he worked. The melody had started without warning, low enough that Sanji hadn’t noticed it at first. Then his ears had picked up on it, and he’d realized he recognized the sound.

It wasn’t anything from Germa, a place that disdains much in the line of music. There it was customary to reserve music mainly for funeral dirges and war chants. This was the opposite of that, and, as he’d sat there listening, an image had come to mind.

“How can a skeleton play the violin?” He’d wondered, taken aback enough by the vision to ask the question out loud. “Or any instrument for that matter?”

“The same way he can play the piano or the guitar,” Roronoa had replied without missing a beat. “Provided you’re talking about Brook, that is. It’s all down to his devil fruit power.”

“So he’s real?” Sanji had asked, raising his head to meet Roronoa’s gaze when the other man had twisted around to look at him. “I’m not imagining that he looks … like that?”

“Nah,” Roronoa had replied with a faint half-smile. “He is very much a living skeleton. Just like Franky’s a cyborg and Chopper’s a reindeer.”

“A rein - ?” Sanji had paused, his nose wrinkling at the very idea. “You’re joking, aren’t you?” He’d concluded. “This is your idea of being funny.”

In answer, Roronoa had pulled his hands from the sink. Flicking them back and forth to shake off as much excess water as possible, he’d proceeded to pat them dry using his shirt and had then strode over to his locker.

Sanji had watched him root around in the mess for a few moments, the muscles of his back shifting as he’d ducked even further into the compartment when his quarry continued to elude him. Eventually he’d made a triumphant noise, however, and had then returned to the table with his prize held aloft.

“I don’t know if I should even be showing you this,” he’d admitted as he’d slapped the thing down on the surface of the table. “But maybe it’ll help.”

Unsure of what the other man was getting at, Sanji had leaned over the table for a closer look. It’d taken him the work of a moment to ascertain that he was looking at a photograph, and from there it wasn’t hard to clue into what it was a photograph of.

Monkey D. Luffy - recognizable even to Sanji thanks to how much time he spends making news headlines - sits centre stage in the middle of the frame. His infamous straw hat is slightly askew on his head, but he clearly doesn’t notice if his beaming grin is anything to go by. He looks like a king holding court, which Sanji suspects is exactly what he is.

“Franky and Usopp rigged something up to take that right after Luffy was named King of the Pirates,” Roronoa had said, inadvertently confirming Sanji’s theory. “They kept yammering on about needing to commemorate the moment, and this was the result.”

“I see,” Sanji had murmured, scanning the photo for faces he recognized. “Some of you are more photogenic than others.”

“Yeah, well, it was a big deal and there was a lot of excitement to go around.”

“Hmm.” Returning his attention to the page, Sanji had noted the skeleton, standing even taller than his memory had indicated near the back of the group. “Brook, right? That’s his name.”

“Uh huh,” Roronoa had confirmed, moving to take the seat across from him. He’d stretched out an arm then, trailing his finger over the skeleton’s face before shifting it to the large fishman standing next to him.

“Jinbe,” he’d said simply, and then moved on to a laughing red headed woman who was holding a wriggling creature in her arms. “Nami and Chopper.”

“Usopp,” he’d said next, moving to a man whose identity Sanji had already guessed thanks to his previous descriptions. Then it was over to the grinning man with blue hair and the dark haired woman beside him with her hands curled around his arm. “Franky and Robin.”

They’re married, a voice had whispered suddenly in his ear. You cooked all their favorite foods for the wedding. Franky sobbed over the cake infused with cola.

Shaking his head to keep himself from getting distracted, Sanji had followed Roronoa’s finger to the last two people depicted in the image. Neither of them are looking at the camera. Instead, they’re standing nose-to-nose behind Luffy, looking like they’re about to square off in a fight.

“You were pissed that I hadn’t ’dressed up for the occasion’,” Roronoa had said, flashing his fingers in a sarcastic set of air quotes. “I tried telling you that I had no way of planning for something like this, but you were always impossible to calm down once you got in a snit.”

“I’m sure you deserved it,” Sanji had replied, confident that his younger self would have known what he was doing. “Also,” he’d peered closer at the picture, “your earrings are different here. You’re missing the cuff higher up.”

“Yep,” Roronoa had replied, his shoulders shifting the way they did when he didn’t want to explain something further. “I changed them out a little while after this.”

Sanji had considered pressing further on the topic, but he’d quickly gotten distracted by something else. “Am I smoking in this?” He’d asked, having belatedly caught sight of a cigarette resting between two of the fingers of his right hand.

Roronoa had snorted. “Back then you were more likely to be smoking than not,” he’d said. “You smoked even more than I drank, and between the two of us Chopper used to say we were trying to drive him into an early grave.”

“And he was right to say so,” Sanji had replied. “It’s a stupid habit to get into, especially for a fighter thanks to what it can do to your lung capacity.”

Roronoa had then given him one of those smiles that never seemed to reach his eye. “So I take it I shouldn’t worry about getting your favorite lighter back to you? It’s on the ship somewhere. I can dig it out if you want it.”

“No,” Sanji had replied, and followed this up by sliding the photograph back to him. “That won’t be necessary, and you can keep this as well.”

Roronoa had eyed him carefully for a moment, watching him in quiet contemplation. Then he’d nodded and gone to return the photo to his locker without another word.

*****
“What did I call you?” Sanji asks one day out of the blue.

“Hmm?”

The sea is deceptively calm again - Sanji’s starting to think this stretch of the Grand Line is somehow separate from the turbulent waters of the rest, even though he knows that makes no sense - and Roronoa has himself posted up against one of the railings. He’s sitting with his legs crossed in front of him and his swords just out of reach, but he cracks his eye open in light of Sanji’s question.

“What was that?” He asks around a yawn, scratching the fingers of his right hand over his chest.

“I keep thinking of you as Roronoa in my head,” Sanji replies, watching the sunlight glint off the ring the other man wears on his pinkie. “But we sailed together for almost a decade, so presumably that’s not what I called you.”

Roronoa’s quiet for long enough that Sanji starts to suspect he’s not going to answer. Only then he heaves out a heavy sigh, letting his hand drop down to rest in his lap.

“You called me a lot of things,” he admits ruefully. “Most of them rude.”

Sanji frowns at this. “Why would I call you rude names if we were friends?”

“For the same reason I did,” Roronoa replies. “We weren’t friends at first, we were rivals, and we constantly fought like cats and dogs. That changed over time, though, and the names just … kind of became our thing.”

“Like Curls,” Sanji surmises, unsurprised when Roronoa smirks.

“Yeah,” he says. “Exactly like that.”

Sanji considers this for a moment, twisting it around in his brain to try and grasp the concept, but ultimately he has to admit that he’s coming up short. “That’s pointless,” he says aloud. “There’s no benefit to it.”

All traces of amusement vanishing from his face, Roronoa sucks in a heavy breath, not unlike as if he’d just gotten kicked in the stomach. “It’s not stupid,” he insists, sounding both annoyed and offended. “It was our thing.”

“So you’ve already said,” Sanji reminds him. “It doesn’t make any more sense now than it did the first time. If my younger self believed you were worthy of his time then he should have called you by your first name. If he didn’t, then the last one would suffice, or maybe even nothing at all. Anything else is unnecessarily complicated.”

“Unnecessarily - ? We’re talking about nicknames, Curls,” Roronoa sputters. “There’s nothing complicated about them. They all have their purposes, whether it’s for fun or teasing or - or affection or whatever.”

“Is that what it was for us?” Sanji asks. “Affection? Because that’s even worse. Affection is a distraction that can keep people from completing missions or from reaching intended goals. It’s why my father had it stripped from us. It gets in the way.”

“No,” Roronoa says with a level of ferocity that makes Sanji sit up a little straighter, his instincts for danger flaring. “It doesn’t. Caring about things or people isn’t a distraction, it’s a reason to keep fighting, to drive you. It’s a benefit.”

“You used to understand that,” he adds quietly. “Better than anyone I knew.”

“Then I was a fool,” Sanji replies. “A naive fool who was lucky he didn’t become a detriment to your crew. Do you know how effective my siblings and I are on the battlefield? Combined, we make up the main reason Germa is as revered as it is.”

“There’s nothing revered about Germa,” Roronoa sneers, baring his teeth. “Or has Judge neglected to mention how badly he failed in Whole Cake Island? Or in anything else he’s tried to accomplish since? It’s taken him years to try and rebuild, and he’s no further ahead than he was before. Germa’s still just a landless fleet stuck sailing an ocean it has no hope of ever conquering.”

“You say you and your siblings are powerful together, and maybe that’s true, but it’s not the whole story.” Leaning forward, Roronoa eyes him intently, clearly wanting him to listen to what he has to say.

“I’ve met your sister and brothers. Hell, I’ve met Judge. We clashed a few times over the years, and you know what? The guy I knew back then - Blackleg Sanji? The cook of the Strawhat Pirates? The Wing of the Pirate King? He was stronger than all the Vinsmokes put together. None of them were even close to being in his league.”

“That’s impossible,” Sanji replies. He may still have a thousand more gaps in his memories than he does actual pieces, but of this much at least he’s certain. “I may be on par with my siblings now that my modifications are active, but if you truly knew anything about my family’s history, you’d know that I lagged far behind them for most of my life.”

“Please, you’re nothing now,” Roronoa retorts, his hackles well and truly up. “Fucking around with your DNA didn’t make you stronger, it did the opposite. There’s no doubt in my mind that I could kick your ass without breaking a sweat these days.”

“That’s unlikely,” Sanji tells him, “but even if it were true, it’d be a justifiable loss. You’re the second in command of the Pirate King. You should be capable of wiping out all but the strongest of enemies without batting an eye.”

“And you should be on par with me,” Roronoa says. “We came up together, you and me. We spent our whole lives pushing each other to get stronger, and it worked. We were equals, we were partners. Until you went and threw it all away.”

“You keep making it sound like I did something wrong by leaving,” Sanji notes. “In all honesty, however, it just sounds like I was practical. I recognized what was happening to me and dealt with it accordingly.”

“Fuck you.”

Roronoa spits the words out with enough vitriol that Sanji almost recoils. They’re absolutely laced with venom and Sanji’s observation haki flares in tandem with the other man’s conquerors. Roronoa isn’t just angry, he’s incensed.

All of which makes no sense to Sanji. Wrinkling his nose, he frowns, genuinely confused as to why his words have had such an effect. “I don’t understand why you’re angry,” he says. “I’m not saying anything that isn’t true.”

Grabbing for his swords, Roronoa surges to his feet. For a brief moment Sanji thinks he’s going to attack, but then the man lets out a great, shuddering breath, his shoulders hunching and his teeth clenching.

“I’m going to the cabin,” he grits out. “Do not follow me.”

And with that said, he turns and stomps across the deck, slamming the cabin door behind him with such force that Sanji’s surprised it doesn’t snap off its hinges.

*****
Roronoa does an impressive job of avoiding him over the next few days, especially when one considers the size of the ship. Its tight quarters means that the two of them should be in each other’s space more often than not, but instead Sanji barely sees the other man.

For starters, he ignores his usual hammock in favor of sleeping out on the deck, heedless of what the weather decides to do. Sanji’s left alone with the entire cabin to himself, stuck trying to fall asleep in silence in the absence of Roronoa’s ever present snoring.

Then he starts acting as if there’s some sort of revolving door in place where the cabin is concerned. If Sanji decides to come outside, Roronoa suddenly has a pressing chore that needs completing inside. If Sanji’s inside, the opposite is the case.

They hardly speak, and they barely even look at each other. Roronoa keeps his swords and his map close, most often being found hunched over the helm, staring out at the horizon like whatever answers he’s seeking are really going to be found there.

Lastly, he starts eating his meals on the deck as well. Rather than hovering around, picking at Sanji while he cooks, he waits for a plate to be brought to him, and refuses to come inside to sit at the table. He also stops doing the washing up, which leaves Sanji stuck inside the cabin to do it.

It’s on the afternoon of the fourth day of this that Sanji realizes he’s had enough. He’s in the cabin, staring down at a large pile of dirty dishes - lunch had been uncharacteristically elaborate today, he’s not sure why - and something sparks in him, telling him that Roronoa should be in here helping sort this out.

A noise akin to a growl slips out from between his teeth, but rather than make his way out onto the deck, Sanji instead lurches into the bathroom. He stands in the cramped space, his hands gripping either side of the sink as he stares down at its white porcelain surface.

Then he lifts his head to look at himself in the tiny mirror. He’s half expecting to see someone else’s face staring back at him, yet somehow his reflection is the same as ever.

His black hair, lightly streaked with grey, is brushed back in its usual arrangement, with one eye covered and the other not. His eyebrows curl in the same way they always do, exactly like that of his siblings. Even the uneven notch in his right ear is the same, and he tentatively raises a hand to run a finger along the ridged skin.

He hasn’t changed, he decides, and if he has, it isn’t his fault. Anything that’s happened to him in the last however many weeks has been Roronoa’s doing, and the man has no right to be angry with him under the circumstances. Just like he has no right to be shirking his responsibilities because he’s being emotional.

It’s as that thought crosses through his mind that Sanji reaches a decision. Letting his hand fall back down, he carefully adjusts the chain around his neck, wanting to make sure his brooch is tucked safely out of sight in case Roronoa reacts poorly to what he has to say, and then exits the bathroom as quickly as he’d entered it.

His feet carry him out of the cabin in the span of a moment, and it takes him only a single glance around to determine that Roronoa’s in his usual spot by the helm. That’s therefore where he heads.

The other man’s eye widens slightly when he sees him coming, but Sanji doesn’t give him a chance to try and run this time. Planting himself at the base of the small set of stairs that lead to said helm, he finds his hands coming to rest on his hips as he blocks the potential escape route.

“For the record,” he says calmly, “your recent display of behaviour is all but proving my father’s point about how emotions only ever get in the way.”

“Excuse me?”

Up until this point, Roronoa’s been standing half slumped with his arms slung over the helm. Now, however, he straightens to his full height, and his good eye is flashing dangerously. “What the fuck did you just say to me?”

“Given that you’ve provided no indication there’s anything wrong with your ears, I’m going to assume that you heard me fine,” Sanji replies. “You’re just angry because you know I’m right, which is again further proof that you’re too emotional.”

“You have no idea how rich that is coming from you,” Roronoa growls, but Sanji simply shrugs.

“Because I was the overly emotional one back when we knew each other?” He guesses, unsurprised when Roronoa grunts in acknowledgement. “Well that wasn’t my fault, and those days are long gone. I’m better now.”

“You are not better,” Roronoa hisses, his eye narrowing into a furious slit. “There is nothing better about this. You’ve lost everything about you that makes you you, and the longer we’re out here, the harder it’s getting to think that might be a chance of changing that. If it wasn’t for - !”

He cuts himself off then, clearly having decided he’s said too much, and punches a fist angrily against the top of the helm. “Damnit!”

Sanji tilts his head to the side. “If it wasn’t for what?” He asks.

“No, I’m not talking about this,” Roronoa replies. “I decided at the very beginning I wasn’t bringing it up unless you remembered on your own, and I’m sticking to that.”

“Remembered what?” Sanji asks again. “Because I believe you that I was a member of your crew now, but if it’s got to do with something else, I’m afraid I’m at a loss.”

“Which it must,” he adds slowly, taking a moment to think the situation through. “You wouldn’t be acting like this if it wasn’t something deeply personal to you.”

He takes a moment to consider things further, and then asks, “Why are you the only one out here?”

“I’m not,” Roronoa grunts. “You’re out here with me, even though I’ve made it clear I want you to stay the fuck out of my way.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Sanji says now. “You keep talking about how the Strawhat crew is this - this tight knit entity. So why are you the only one on this mission? On a ship that was built specifically for it? Where are the others?”

“We didn’t know what to expect where you were concerned,” Roronoa says. “If you’d reacted poorly to the situation things could have gotten dicey. It was decided that I was that it was better to risk only one of us than everyone.”

Sanji’s instincts are telling him there’s more to it than that, but he doesn’t have the words to articulate why. All he knows is that Roronoa’s response, combined with the evasive way he’s delivered it, doesn’t add up.

“Why you then?” He asks, trying to come at the problem from a different angle. “Why were you the one to risk it?”

“Because I’m me and you’re you,” Roronoa says, completely unhelpfully. “There was never any question over who it would be.”

“But why?” Sanji asks.

“Because - fucking hell!” Looking about two seconds from throwing his arms up in the air, Roronoa lets out a frustrated growl. “How can you have no emotions and still manage to be this goddamned annoying?”

“I don’t know,” Sanji says. “All I’m doing is asking for an explanation. If you want me to stop, all you have to do is give it to me.”

“Fine!” Roronoa snaps. “It’s because I want my damned husband back, okay?!”

He utters the words with such force that they echo around the deck, bouncing off the helm, the railings, and whatever other items they might encounter. They ring repeatedly in Sanji’s ears, and he keeps his eyes focused on Roronoa as he tries to make sense of them.

“We’re married?” He tries finally, having reached the only conclusion he possibly can.

Roronoa slumps back against the railing behind him, sagging like a puppet whose strings have been cut. “Yeah,” he mumbles to the toes of his sturdy leather boots. “For almost eight years now.”

“I don’t remember that,” Sanji says next. “Or anything related to it.”

“Trust me,” Roronoa sighs tiredly. “I know.”

Not really knowing what to do with himself, Sanji stays where he is, but he keeps his eyes locked on his companion. “I think it’s time you told me everything,” he decides after a few moment’s consideration. “It’s been long enough.”

Lifting his head slightly, Roronoa rakes his gaze over Sanji’s face, seemingly searching for something only he knows the origins of. Eventually, he nods.

“Yeah, alright.”

*****
Sanji half expects Roronoa to insist on them going into the cabin, since it’s the only place with actual furniture for them to sit and talk at. Despite this, the other man surprises him by moving to the prow of the ship.

Seeing no other option but to follow, Sanji trails after him until they’re both in the same area, standing across from each other with matching railings at their backs. Sanji continues to stand straight, but Roronoa hunches against his.

What he does not do, however, is start talking. He stays quietly where he is, his attention focused somewhere over Sanji’s left shoulder as he stares out at the ocean with troubled eyes.

Well, Sanji’s not about to tolerate that. He’s been promised answers, and he’s going to get them. Clearing his throat until he’s got Roronoa’s attention, he nods at the ring on the other man’s hand, the one he’s noticed more than once.

“I asked you before if you were married,” he reminds him. “You could have told me the truth then.”

“I did tell you the truth then,” Roronoa retorts. Glancing down at his hand, he splays his fingers out, wriggling them around so that the golden band on his pinkie catches the afternoon sunlight. “I said it’s complicated, and it is.”

“ … but you’re not wrong to call that a cop out answer,” he admits, even though Sanji had done nothing of the sort. “I didn’t want to have to explain it to you. I wanted you to either remember on your own or for it to never come up.”

“Why?”

“Wh - god, you never used to play twenty questions like this, you know,” Roronoa grumbles. “Then again, you used to have the emotional sensitivity of something other than a dead animal, so that’s probably part of the problem. For the record, I don’t like being the more dramatic of the two of us.”

“You’re avoiding the question,” Sanji notes, and this time when Roronoa snorts there might actually be some genuine humor in it.

“Yeah, I know,” he says. “And the answer is because it hurts. It hurts that you don’t have a clue what we were to each other, and it hurts that you’re not likely to care once you do.”

“It’s not intentional - ” Sanji starts, but Roronoa holds up a hand to stop him.

“Don’t,” he says simply. “I know it’s not, trust me. I’m not blaming you.”

“Alright,” Sanji allows, “but you still said you’d tell me everything. Let’s start at the beginning then. That’s your wedding ring, right?”

“Wrong,” Roronoa replies, bringing his hand up for a closer inspection. He then shifts it over to his left ear, and traces the golden cuff that sits high on the shell. “Mine’s right here,” he says. “Wearing it on my finger was too risky thanks to what I do for a living, so I figured this would be safer.”

“This one’s yours,” he says, rotating his hand back and forth. “You left it behind when you disappeared, and I’ve been keeping it safe ever since. The reason it’s on the wrong finger is that your hands are smaller than mine.”

“Oh.” Sanji takes this information in and then shrugs. “I see.”

His words pull another sigh from Roronoa, who scrubs his hand over his face before finally letting it drop to rest over the hilts of his swords. Sanji watches the arc the limb makes as it moves, but quickly returns his attention to Roronoa’s face.

“There was always some kind of spark between us,” the other man says now, choosing his words carefully. “Right from the very beginning we were, well, the witch describes it as we were ‘really fuckin’ weird about each other’, but me, I just say we were us. It took us a few years to act on anything, but once we did, things were good.”

“Good enough for us to get married,” Sanji surmises.

“Mhm,” Roronoa replies, the corners of his mouth turning up in a faint grin. “You cried so hard when I proposed,” he says. “Just tears and snot everywhere. Then you yelled at me because you’d been in the galley when I did it, and a soufflé you’d been watching got ruined. Kicked me right in the jaw for that one.”

Sanji cocks his head to the side. “I don’t know much about this kind of thing, but I don’t think most people would sound so pleased by that.”

Roronoa snorts. “We’re not most people.”

“No,” Sanji acknowledges. “I suppose not. So, you proposed, and I apparently said yes. Then what happened?”

“What do you think?” Roronoa counters. “We got married. I mean, it was a typical shitshow since it was us - the marines showed up halfway through, even though Luffy’d gotten crowned as king all of a month beforehand - but it was good. Perfect even.”

“And then,” he adds darkly, “your fucking Germa genes started flaring.”

“You remember how I told you that putting on that first raid suit made some stuff activate?” He asks, and Sanji nods. “Well, it stayed pretty dormant for a while. Honestly, after Elbaf we thought you had a handle on it, but it didn’t last. About a year after we got married it started up again.”

“And when was that?”

“We got married at twenty-five,” Roronoa confirms. “So twenty-six.”

“Two years before I left.”

“Right,” Roronoa agrees. “Two years that we spent searching for a cure, anything we could do to reverse it.”

“Like finding the All Blue?” Sanji suggests, and now Roronoa makes a face.

“Kind of?” He decides. “I mean, that was on the list, sure, but Chopper was also researching anything he could get his hands on medically, while Franky and Robin were putting out feelers with pretty much any scientist we’d ever come across.”

“But nothing came of it,” Sanji concludes.

“Nothing had a chance to come of it,” Roronoa retorts, sharper now. “You got it into your head that you were slipping too far, too fast, and took matters into your own hands.”

“I woke up,” he says, softly but fiercely, “to an empty bed with your ring and a note on the pillow next to me. It said a lot of crap about how you loved me, loved the crew, and were leaving for our sakes because it was obvious I wasn’t going to keep my promise, but that’s bullshit. You got scared, and you ran.”

“It sounds more like I was being practical,” Sanji muses. “Also, what promise didn’t you keep?”

Roronoa’s entire face curdles. “When you … first started having trouble, and I mean the very first time, we were fighting for our lives in fucking Wano it was so long ago, you made me promise to … take care of things if you ever weren’t yourself any more.”

It takes Sanji a moment to parse out what he’s getting at. “I told you to kill me,” he says, realization first dawning and then being further cemented by the way Roronoa’s expression sours even more. “If I turned into, well. This.”

“Pretty much,” Roronoa admits grudgingly. “We weren’t together at the time, and I didn’t really know what I was agreeing to, but that’s the gist of it. If you ever went fully dark side, I was supposed to put you down.”

“But I did,” Sanji points out, “and you didn’t. You broke your word.”

“The hell I did!” Roronoa snaps. “You were still somewhat yourself when you took off, and we hadn’t exhausted all our options yet. All I did was refuse to give up on you.”

“If you say so,” Sanji allows, “but that doesn’t change the fact that what my younger self thought would happen did. I’m fully a product of Germa now.”

“No.” Roronoa says firmly. “You’re not, and I can prove it. Or rather you can.”

Sanji eyes him quizzically. “How?”

Roronoa’s smile sharpens, and it’s not necessarily pleasant. “If you want me to believe that there’s nothing left of my husband, then give me my earring back.”

Sanji gives him a flat stare, before glancing pointedly at the man’s triple pierced ear. “I can assure you that, had I removed one of said earrings, I would have noticed.”

“Not quite,” Roronoa replies, and he raises a hand to flick the two gold bars that dangle from his left ear lobe. “I used to have three of these, until I used the third to propose to you. You’ve got it hanging around your neck right now.”

Sanji’s hand flies automatically to where his brooch is resting at the base of his throat, safely hidden beneath his clothes. “That’s not possible,” he denies. “I had this piece commissioned in Germa.”

“The top part, maybe,” Roronoa allows. “With the blue jewel and the gold fringe circling it, but the part at the bottom is my fuckin’ earring. Come compare it to the other two if you don’t believe me.”

“No,” Sanji says, taking an instinctive step backwards, flinching when this brings him right up against the railing with nowhere else to go. “I don’t need to do anything like that. I know I’m right.”

“Then why are you squirming like a worm on a hook all of a sudden?” Roronoa asks. “C’mon, Curls. If you really care nothing for anything then you won’t have a problem with giving up some silly bauble. Hand it over.”

“It’s my property,” Sanji says, planting his feet as Roronoa draws nearer. “I don’t have to give it to you because you have no right to it.”

“Technically it was mine first,” Roronoa counters, cocking his head to the side with a smirk, “and if you have no attachment to it, what’s the problem with giving it up?”

“There’s no problem,” Sanji insists. “I just don’t want to.”

“Yeah,” Roronoa drawls, “I’m betting you really didn’t want to, actually. You used to wear it as an earring, you know. In your right ear.”

The hand not resting at the base of Sanji’s throat rises to said ear. Just like they had earlier, his fingers glide over the ridged scarring, the source of which he’s never been able to figure out.

Until now.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he tries. His fingers drop back down to his side, but even he can hear the stilted way his words are coming out. “I’ve never worn earrings in my life.”

Roronoa snorts, continuing his steady progression across the deck. “Curls, not even Usopp could make that one sound convincing, and you’re definitely not him. No, you wore it, and I’d bet any money that you fought to keep it. Hard enough that Judge had to have it ripped off you, and then thought better about taking it away completely because of how strongly you reacted.”

“Please,” Sanji scoffs. “Are you honestly saying Judge let me keep a piece of jewelry because he was afraid I’d rediscover my emotions if he didn’t? That’s ludicrous.”

“Is it?” Roronoa says, one hand starting to reach towards Sanji. “Then let’s find out.”

What happens next is a blur. One moment Roronoa’s hand is coming towards him, his fingers just about to graze the chain around his neck, and the next the man is landing in a crumpled heap on the opposite side of the deck, while Sanji stands with his leg still raised in a defensive position.

For just a second it’s as if time stands still. Neither of them says anything, even the ocean around them is silent, and then Roronoa rolls over onto his back with a groan, his head lolling to the side as he blinks up at the afternoon sky.

The noise starts a little after this, and it takes Sanji a bit to realize what it is. He almost mistakes it for a sob, but then Roronoa throws his head back, allowing Sanji to get a proper look at his face as he laughs and laughs, hard enough to make his stomach shake.

“Yeah,” he says, punching the deck beneath him triumphantly when he turns to look over. “There’s my guy.”

*****
Roronoa has a cracked rib, possibly even two. He is also the only person Sanji’s ever met who’s delighted by this.

“Please, it’ll heal in, like, a couple of hours max.” He says when Sanji points out how ridiculous he’s being. “And even if it doesn’t, who cares? I was right, and that’s all that matters.”

“One) that’s not how ribs work,” Sanji says flatly. “Or any bones, for that matter. Unless you’ve been genetically altered like I have, your body is going to need time to repair itself. Two) you weren’t right about anything. I still don’t remember anything about us being together, and I also still don’t care.”

Roronoa gives him a look that can be described as dubious at best, but follows it up with a shrug, heedless of his injured ribs. “That’s horseshit, but whatever. I’ll be nice for once and not push you since I’m sure you’re feeling a little delicate right now.”

“I’m not feeling anything,” Sanji replies. “That’s my point.”

Now Roronoa flaps a hand dismissively. “Maybe you’re not now,” he says, emphasizing the last word. “But you were earlier. Enough that you reacted on instinct and came at me with the fighting style that makes you the most dangerous. That’s a win in my books.”

“I didn’t attack you because of the earring - brooch - whatever,” Sanji stresses. “I did it because you were threatening me and I needed to defend myself. The jewelry had nothing to do with it.”

“Really?” Roronoa asks skeptically. “Do you honestly want to go there again? Because I’m not above making another grab for it to make my point.”

“Don’t touch me,” Sanji hisses, only to then recoil at the sound of his own voice. It’s too harsh, too ragged, and has him feeling like he’s losing control.

“Hey,” Roronoa’s voice is softer now, and, when Sanji glances over at him, his face has lost its teasing expression, having been replaced with something gentler. “It’s okay, Curls.” He promises. “M’not actually going to take it from you, and you’re not doing anything wrong by feeling something.”

“I’m not feeling anything,” Sanji snaps, the words catching in his throat. “I’m a Vinsmoke. We don’t feel.”

“Well my Vinsmoke does,” Roronoa says simply. “In fact, he feels more than most people. Sometimes too much, to the point that it gets kind of annoying. So you’ll have to forgive me if I can’t bring myself to weep over the idea of you remembering that.”

“Your Vinsmoke doesn’t exist anymore,” Sanji tells him. “Whatever we were to each other before is gone. Even if you’re right about my necklace, it doesn’t change the fact that I don’t feel anything about anything else.”

“Maybe not now,” Roronoa concedes, “but that’s why we’re out here. Once we find the All Blue, everything will sort itself out.”

“Right,” Sanji says, drained. “Because the All Blue - which certainly exists and most definitely isn’t a myth - will magically fix me by giving me back every emotion I ever had. You really believe that?”

“Do you think I’d be out here if I didn’t?” Roronoa asks, and Sanji nods.

“I do,” he says. “You’ve as good as admitted that you couldn’t see the truth about me, even when it was standing right in front of you. My younger self left because he could tell what was happening, but you couldn’t. I think you’ve deluded yourself into thinking this will work, and that you’re going to be very disappointed when it doesn’t.”

Roronoa’s smile fades, but doesn’t disappear entirely. “It’ll work,” he says more seriously now. “I know it.”

“And what if it doesn’t?” Sanji asks. “What then?”

To his credit, Roronoa makes no attempt to hide from answering him. “If it doesn’t work,” he says slowly, “then I’ll have to admit that it’s over. That my Sanji is really gone. And if that happens, I have a promise to keep.”

And in that moment, Sanji finally has his answer, the real answer for why Roronoa’s the only Strawhat out here. He’s protecting the others, alright, but not from Sanji. He’s protecting them from himself, and the deed he’s going to carry out if it turns out there’s nothing left to save.

“You’re going to kill me.” Sanji says. “If I can’t do what you want.”

“Yeah,” Roronoa says, the bleakness returning to his face the way Sanji had previously been expecting it to. “I am.”

“I’ll fight you,” Sanji says then. “In fact, I could fight you right now.”

“You could,” Roronoa agrees. “Hell, maybe you even should. I don’t think you’re going to, though. You’re too rattled right now. Plus,” his mouth twists into a thoughtful moue, “I’m pretty sure you want to see how this ends.”

“I don’t care how this ends,” Sanji says.

“So I keep hearing,” Roronoa snorts. “Why don’t you put another record on? Or, if you really mean it, I guess you can always take another shot at me. Go on, Curls. If you really do want me dead, have at it.”

“I never said I wanted you dead,” Sanji replies. “I don’t care enough to want even that much.”

“Oooh, ouch,” Roronoa snickers. “That’s not a bad burn, all things considered. Still, if you’re not going to try and cave my head in again, we may as well just stay on course and see what comes next.”

They both fall silent then, and stay like that for a while. Each of them sizes the other up, clearly waiting to see what the other’s next move is going to be. Finally, and mindful of what had brought him out on deck in the first place, Sanji nods.

“Fine,” he says aloud. “We’ll have it your way for now. We’ll keep sailing, and deal with the fallout, if and when we actually stumble across this thing. Until then, however, there’s something else you need to do.”

“And what’s that?” Roronoa asks.

“The dishes.” Sanji replies, standing firm when Roronoa chokes. “They’ve been your job for this entire trip, but you haven’t done them for days because you’ve been letting your emotions run away with you. Stop it, and get them done.”

Roronoa looks at him like he’s lost his mind, but it’s not long before he dissolves into laughter. “Alright, Curls,” he says in between snickers. “Sure. I’ll do the damn dishes.”

*****
If Roronoa was hoping that his coming clean about what he and Sanji used to be together would unlock a torrent of memories, he’s going to be sorely disappointed. Sanji’s memories continue returning exactly the way they have been, in a trickle as opposed to a flood, and that arrangement doesn’t appear to be changing.

Sanji says as much on the third day after Roronoa’s confession, but all the other man does is shrug. He shows no signs of either surprise or irritation, and simply tells Sanji to let him know if he has any questions.

“I don’t,” Sanji assures him in light of this. “The only questions I had left, you’ve now answered.”

“Well maybe you’ll find some new ones now,” Roronoa suggests, sounding amused. “All I mean is you know where to find me if anything crops up.”

“Of course I do,” Sanji says with a pointed glance around the deck. “It’s not as if it’s a big ship. The Sunny was much larger.”

“Is much larger,” Roronoa corrects, “but the Sunny was built with all purpose traveling in mind. This one is just meant to get us from Point A to Point B, and she’ll be repurposed once we’re done with her. That’s why I never bothered to give her a name.”

“Germa ships don’t have names,” Sanji notes when the thought occurs to him. “Judge thinks it’s a sign of unnecessary sentimentality. They’re referred to by their serial numbers.”

Roronoa makes a face. “Every time I think that man can’t get more obnoxious, you go and prove me wrong. He’s pathetic.”

Sanji opens his mouth to utter his usual protests about how Judge is a king and a brilliant scientist, but the words won’t come. Instead, he frowns and says, “Where are we according to your map?”

“I thought you didn’t have any questions left?” Roronoa says cheekily, his grin only widening in response to Sanji’s flat stare.

“I remember how terrible you are with directions,” the blond reminds him. “I can only assume that the reason we’ve stayed on course to date is because of the fail safes built into this ship by your shipwright and your navigator. However, that doesn’t mean it’s not a good idea for me to check in from time to time.”

“Damn, do I detect a hint of sarcasm there?” Roronoa asks theatrically. “Maybe some disdain or a little bit of snide indications? That’s not very emotionless of you, Curls.”

“Only you could be impressed by the possibility of rudeness,” Sanji replies. “Also, you heard nothing of the sort. I was merely making statements of fact.”

“Statements of fact, but in a bitchy way,” Roronoa counters. “Having said that,” he adds when Sanji raises a single eyebrow at him, “according to the witch’s map, we’re right where we’re supposed to be. We’re coming up on another uninhabited island. Although this one sounds like it’s going to be even more remote than the last one.”

“So no foraging for supplies this time?” Sanji asks, and Roronoa shrugs.

“We can take a look,” he says easily, “but I wouldn’t get my hopes up if I were you. And yes,” he notes before Sanji has a chance to do it for him, “I know getting your hopes up isn’t something you do. You’re starting to sound like a broken record these days.”

“I wouldn’t have to keep repeating myself if you would just come to your senses,” Sanji tells him. “Your refusal to acknowledge what’s right in front of you is what’s put me in this position.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Roronoa waves a hand dismissively. “We’re both stubborn and set in our ways. Trust me, that’s not news.”

And that much Sanji is aware of. Not only has he been presented with multiple firsthand examples just since he and Roronoa have reunited, but what memories he has managed to regain involving the man further speak to such a dynamic. From what he can tell, they were often at odds with each other, which makes their fabled romance even more confusing.

Having said that, Sanji had meant it when he’d said he had no intention of asking anymore questions. He understands the basics now, and doesn’t see a need to probe any deeper. All that would do is likely bring more of Roronoa’s emotions to the surface, which seems unhelpful under the circumstances.

Feeling that he has nothing left to add, Sanji turns away from his companion and wanders over to one of the railings. Resting his arms on top of the wood, he gazes out at the water, deciding to let the afternoon pass him by until he has to get supper ready.

*****
“I don’t think this even qualifies as an island. It’s more like a glorified rock.”

Roronoa barely pauses in the act of making sure the ship is securely tied off. “Well, we are in arguably one of the most remote areas of the world,” he says, tugging at a pair of ropes until he’s satisfied with the state of them. “It stands to reason that there wouldn’t necessarily be much out here.”

Sanji gazes out at the area they’ve arrived in, and lets out an unimpressed hum. The island seems to be comprised of a series of rock formations, many of which are several stories taller than their ship. About the only benefit they provide is a break from the wind that’s recently picked up. Aside from a couple scraggly looking pine trees at the highest peaks, he doesn’t even see any vegetation.

“We’re not going to find anything worthwhile here,” he says with certainty. “We may as well just keep going.”

“I’m not so sure about that,” Roronoa says, and when Sanji glances at him, his attention is focused on the sky above them and the clouds that are moving in. “Oh, I think you’re right that we’re not going to find anything we can use here, but if that turns into a real storm, we might want to batten down and wait it out here.”

Giving the clouds a look of his own, Sanji considers the other man’s point. They don’t look particularly threatening now, but the wind is definitely picking up and this is the Grand Line they’re sailing on. The fact that the voyage has been relatively uneventful to date doesn’t mean that they’re not due for a mess.

“You may be right,” he says, willing to concede since it’s practical to do so. “In that case, we may as well just stay on the ship to wait it out.”

“Eh? Where’s the fun in that?” Roronoa asks, grinning when Sanji raises an eyebrow at him. “I mean, sure, it makes sense not to hit the open water while we’ve got a chance to keep an eye on things, but it’s not even doing anything yet, so we may as well go explore while we have a chance.”

“Explore?” Sanji repeats, extending an arm to encompass the surrounding area in a sweeping gesture. “It’s a rock.”

“C’mon, Curls.” Striding forward, Roronoa clamps a heavy hand over Sanji’s shoulder, and uses his grip to shake him back and forth. “Where’s your sense of adventure?”

Sanji just looks at him.

“I know, I know,” he huffs, removing his hand and holding them both up in a sign of surrender. “You don’t have one. Fine, you can stay here if you like, but I’m going to take a look around.”

“You’ll get lost,” Sanji says, confident of that much. Never mind the fact that the man should stick out like a sore thumb among the rocky terrain, Roronoa’s directional fortitude is not to be taken lightly. “I don’t want to have to come find you in the middle of a storm.”

“Then it sounds like you might want to come with me now,” Roronoa calls over his shoulder. He’s already made it to the island’s equivalent of a beach, and is several yards ahead of where Sanji’s standing now. “It’s up to you.”

It takes Sanji the work of a moment to weigh the pros and cons in the situation. Huffing, he then shoves his hands in his pockets and begins trailing after the other man, careful to keep him within sight at all times.

He’s pretty sure he hears the sound of Roronoa chuckling drifting back towards him, but he pays it no mind. Following the other man is just practical since he still doesn’t know how to sail his ship by himself. He needs him alive if he doesn’t want to die stranded out here.

Roronoa keeps up his steady pace into the interior of the island, but not much changes by way of their surroundings. There’s no flora or fauna to speak of, to say nothing of any living creatures. Essentially the only significant difference is it’s a little drier here because the ocean's waves don’t land this far inland.

“There is absolutely nothing worthwhile out here,” Sanji says when Roronoa finally comes to a stop. Drawing even with the other man, he stands shoulder to shoulder with him as they both survey the rocky vista. “We should head back to the ship before the storm gets here.”

Glancing upwards, Roronoa squints his good eye, surveying the clouds where they’ve continued to darken. “The storm’s going to be a bit,” he eventually declares, “and we’ve been stuck on the ship for weeks now. We should take the opportunity to stretch our legs.”

“We’ve already done that,” Sanji reminds him. “We’ve been walking for at least a half an hour, and we haven’t turned up a single thing worth noting. Let's go back.”

“You can if you want,” Roronoa says. “Or,” he adds, his mouth stretching into a grin and his hand dropping down to finger the white hilt among the three on his hip, “we could make use of the available space while we’ve got it.”

“C’mon,” he cajoles, cocking his head to the side when Sanji doesn’t respond. “Aren’t you the slightest bit interested in seeing how we match up these days?”

“No.” Sanji says simply.

Surprisingly, Roronoa’s expression doesn’t falter. “Alright,” he says instead. “Then what about thinking of it as training? You’ve been either tied down or stuck in close confines for the past few months. Do you want your skills to atrophy?”

“That’s not how my modifications work,” Sanji starts to say, but the lie sticks in his throat. The truth is that not even Judge had been able to build enough enhancements into his children to negate the need for upkeep. Between the loss of his raid suit and the lack of ongoing training, he probably could use an opportunity to spar.

“What did you have in mind?” He asks, unsurprised when Roronoa’s grin gets even broader. “I don’t exactly have anything to fight you with out here. I’m unarmed.”

“You,” Roronoa says firmly, “are never unarmed. Come on, Twirlybrows, let’s give those legs of yours the workout they haven’t gotten in years.”

It’s on the tip of Sanji’s tongue to say no, to maybe even demand one of Roronoa’s swords to defend himself with if they’re really going to do this, but he never gets the chance. One moment Roronoa’s standing next to him, aloof and relaxed, and then the next he’s bringing up the white sword in a furious slash.

Much like he had the other day, Sanji reacts on instinct. The only difference this time is that Roronoa’s already armed by the time he moves, such that the heel of Sanji’s boot catches the blade of the descending sword.

“Atta boy,” Roronoa says approvingly. “Make me put in some effort for the win.”

Sanji feels his own mouth twist up in a smirk. “I was actually thinking I’d make you put some effort in for the loss,” he sneers. Flexing the muscles in his leg, he uses the motion to test the force behind the other man’s stance, and is unsurprised to find it’s like trying to move a wall.

“You’re good,” he says then, “but that doesn’t mean you’re unbeatable.”

“By anyone? Maybe not,” Roronoa admits, “but you’ve never been in my league, Curls. Not even when you were at your best.”

Sanji snorts. “Liar,” he says, and then sags backwards unexpectedly. He turns the motion into a handstand, using Roronoa’s surprise to allow him to catch the other man in a vicious spin kick. After that, he leaps nimbly back to his feet, all while dancing out of range of the sword blade.

Rather than look annoyed at being caught off guard, however, Roronoa seems pleased. He allows Sanji to put some distance between the two of them, and draws another of his swords while they circle each other.

Kitetsu, a voice whispers in Sanji’s ear. It’s arguably the least dangerous of the three, but it’s still a nasty piece of work thanks to its curse.

Honestly, it’s a little bitch, the voice adds, sounding amused.

Sanji doesn’t think that last anecdote is worth much of anything, but the reminder of the sword’s most dangerous attribute is convenient. Kitetsu has a penchant for blood, he remembers. More than either of her sisters. Over the years he’s been nicked by her more than any other sword Zoro’s wielded.

Roronoa, he quickly corrects himself. He means Roronoa.

As if on cue, the man in question lunges at him again. They meet in a series of clashes where Roronoa’s blades move like they’re an extension of him, but Sanji counters each and every blow with the movement of his legs. Not once does he consider using his hands. It doesn’t even occur to him.

By the time they pause again there are cracks and slashes embedded deep in the rocky terrain surrounding them. Entire spires of rock have been sliced through by Roronoa’s swords, or crushed beneath Sanji’s feet. The area looks like it’s been the victim of a cataclysmic event, but neither he nor Roronoa are even breathing hard.

“We really did this a lot, didn’t we?” Sanji asks, brushing a lock of hair out of his eyes.

“Almost every damn day,” Roronoa mutters around the hilt of the sword that he’d transferred to his mouth at some point during their match. “You were the best training partner I ever had.”

A crack of thunder booming out saves Sanji from having to answer, and he’s not sure if that’s a good thing or not. The words “and you were mine” had been trying to escape, but he’s not sure what he would have done if they’d made it out.

Instead, he tilts his head back, looking up at the sky just in time for the first droplet of rain to splash across his cheek. Snorting, he shifts to look at Roronoa as more drops start to fall.

“We should get back.”

*****
The sky opens up almost the second those words leave his mouth, prompting them to race for the ship at a considerably faster speed than they’d left it. They hurtle over rocks now slick with wetness, their feet occasionally skidding out from under them as they run.

Miraculously they both make it back to the ship without faceplanting into the ground at any point. Sanji tears up the gangplank with Roronoa hot on his heels, the pair of them still stumbling to and fro as the deck lurches beneath their feet.

“Check and see if the lines are still good!” Roronoa orders, his voice muffled thanks to the storm. “If they are, the only thing for us to do is to get inside and wait it out!”

Sanji signals with his hand to show that he’s heard, and the two of them stream along the deck, each of them taking a side to look over before they both come to a halt in front of the cabin door.

“Good?” Sanji asks, getting a nod in return. “It’s the same here. Let’s get out of this mess.”

He’s the one standing closer to the door, so he reaches for the handle without waiting for further commentary. It twists easily in his grasp, and he and Roronoa duck into the cabin, bringing a burst of cold air and rain with them in their wake.

“Ugh, gross.” Shaking his head so that water droplets spray everywhere, Roronoa scrubs a hand over his face, trying in vain to dry his skin with the sopping wet sleeve of his coat. “This is not the shower I had in mind for today.”

“Me either,” Sanji admits, shoving a hand through his hair to get his bangs out of his eyes. They’re plastered to his forehead thanks to the storm, covering both instead of just the one he prefers. “This is entirely unnecessary.”

“I don’t think the elements much care for our opinion, Curls,” Roronoa says with a snort. “Although you’re not wrong. We should get dried off before this gets any worse. You can have the washroom first if you like.”

“Fine,” Sanji agrees. “Then I’ll start cooking while it’s your turn.”

Roronoa nods his head in acquiescence of this plan, so Sanji makes his way over to the locker he considers to be his own. He pulls out his warmest slacks and a long sleeved shirt, wanting something further to combat the chill in the air, and then disappears into the washroom.

He briefly considers taking a hot shower while he’s in here, but in the end opts to pad himself dry with one of the towels kept in the small linen cabinet. After that, he dresses perfunctorily and uses a comb to arrange his hair into something that’s not quite so disastrous.

Taking a moment to look himself over in the mirror, he decides that he’s as good as he’s going to get. He therefore tucks his necklace safely into its usual place beneath his shirt, hangs his soaked clothes on the rack in the hope that they’ll start to dry, and exits the washroom much the same way he’d entered it.

Roronoa’s seated at the table when Sanji spots him, having apparently decided that’s the best place for him to drip all over. Given that the only other options would be either of their beds, Sanji supposes he can’t fault him for that.

The other man stands when Sanji approaches, and the blond catches a trail of rainwater making its way down the side of his neck as he moves. He also thinks he sees the faint outline of goosebumps on his tan skin, but imagines Roronoa wouldn’t react well to him pointing this out.

“Your turn,” he says, figuring that’s the safest option. He moves to shuffle to the side so that Roronoa can slip past him, which is when a particularly harsh wave decides to rock the ship. It sends both of them stumbling as the deck lurches under their feet, such that Sanji has to grab the counter to keep steady and Roronoa the table.

“Careful,” Roronoa says, sounding amused. “We wouldn’t want you going ass over heels onto the floor now, would we?”

“I’m fine,” Sanji sniffs, straightening once it looks like the worst of the motion has passed. “You just worry about yourself.”

“Hey, I’m good,” Roronoa says, holding up his hands to prove his point. He manages to stay steady on his feet for a few seconds, and then starts heading for the washroom once he’s proved his point. “Back in a few.”

“Mhm,” Sanji says, turning back to the stove. He’s got some leftover soup from the other day that should be good once it’s reheated, and he thinks that kind of meal would be well suited to this weather.

Said soup is almost done by the time Roronoa returns, and the swordsman sniffs appreciatively as he steps out into the main cabin. He’s dressed in his usual worn pants and sturdy boots, but rather than the form fitting shirts he tends to favor, he’s now wrapped up in a cozy looking sweater that looks well loved.

“Don’t you look comfortable,” Sanji notes as the other man brushes past him. “I take it you’re not planning to go anywhere for the rest of the evening.”

“Not when things are like this,” Roronoa confirms. “I might check the deck before I turn in, just to make sure everything’s okay, but other than that I’m staying put.”

“It’s probably for the best,” Sanji remarks as he ladles soup into a matching pair of bowls. “This isn’t the kind of weather for anyone to be wandering around in, but especially you. You’d probably wind up on the opposite side of the island.”

“Ooh, Curlybrow’s got jokes,” Roronoa says sarcastically. “Look at you, trying to be funny.”

Snorting, Sanji picks up each of the bowels and carries them carefully over to the table. “That wasn’t a joke, it was a statement of fact,” he says as he sets one down in front of Roronoa and the other in the place reserved for himself. “Now stop talking and eat this before it gets cold.”

He half expects Roronoa to argue with him, but perhaps the weather’s lulled him into a docile mood. Shrugging lazily, he reaches for the cutlery Sanji offers him and readily digs into his meal.

They eat in relative silence, with the only sounds being that of their spoons scraping against their bowls and the wind howling outside. It’s an easy way to pass the time, and Sanji’s not surprised when Roronoa stands upon finishing, his hands outstretched to start gathering up the dishes.

He is however surprised when the ship lurches the same way it had earlier. Indeed, judging by the look on Roronoa’s face and the way he flails his arms uncharacteristically, he suspects they both are.

The ship rocks again, in the opposite direction this time, and both Roronoa and the dishes start sliding away from the table. Sanji’s quick reflexes allow him to save both bowls from shattering onto the floor, but he’s got no hands left to help once he’s done so.

Roronoa lets out a startled yelp as the rocking continues, and he must react on instinct. Rather than grabbing for the table and trying to pull himself back into his chair, he reaches upwards instead.

His flailing hand finds one of the hooks that his hammock usually hangs from, but the contraption must not be designed to have that much weight suddenly clamp onto one end. It’s also definitely not designed to handle someone with Roronoa’s brute strength. The hook snaps, the entire piece snapping out of its hold where it’s bolted to the ceiling, such that both it and Roronoa hit the deck in a heap.

Not knowing what else to do, Sanji twists around to peer over the edge of the table. A dazed looking Roronoa stares back at him, although a quick glance over his body doesn’t show any immediate signs of injury.

“Are you alright?” Sanji asks, nevertheless, and Roronoa grunts.

“M’fine,” he says, holding up the mangled hook he still has clutched in his fist. “I don’t think I can say the same for this thing, though.”

Sanji looks at the hook, and then up at the ceiling where it had previously been attached. He’s no mechanic, but it looks to him like the damage has been done on both ends. “I don’t suppose you have any spares in storage somewhere?”

“I can check and see,” Roronoa says, following his gaze, “but I’m not going to hold my breath.”

He tosses the piece he’s still holding onto the floor, where it makes a harsh clattering sound as it lands. “Well. That sucks.”

*****
As Roronoa expected, there’s no spare parts when it comes to rehanging the hammock. More importantly, however, the clamp is equally damaged, to the point that there’s no way of getting it back up where it once was. This, combined with the fact that there’s really nowhere else to put it in the tight confines of the cabin, presents a problem.

“No, it’s fine,” Roronoa insists when Sanji summarizes everything as such. “I can sleep on the floor until the weather stops being shit, and after that I’m sure I’ll be able to rig something up outside.”

“Where you’ll be exposed to the elements and god knows what else,” Sanji points out. “Not to mention you’ll destroy your back if you try and sleep on the floor on a consistent basis. I don’t care how much you like to nap in random places, it won’t work.”

“Well then what do you suggest we do, Curls?” Roronoa asks sarcastically. “It’s not exactly like we’re flush with sleeping arrangements.”

“No,” Sanji admits, “but we do have the one bed, and it’s big enough for two in a pinch.”

Roronoa stares at him. “Absolutely not,” he says finally. “I’m not - no. We’re not doing that.”

“Why not?” Sanji asks, nodding towards the bed in question. “It’s a perfectly serviceable bed, and it’ll hold us both.”

“I know that,” Roronoa says through gritted teeth. “That’s not the problem.”

“Then what is?” Sanji asks.

“You mean aside from the fact that the last time I went to sleep in a bed with you I woke up to abandonment and the start of a five year long nightmare?” Roronoa retorts snidely. “Gee, I haven’t the faintest fucking idea.”

“You’re being emotional again,” Sanji sighs. “When you should be being practical. You’re not going to do yourself any good by sleeping on the floor of the ship. Stop being ridiculous.”

“I’m not - ” Roronoa starts to protest, but Sanji cuts him off.

“You are,” he says firmly. “So either stop it and sleep in the bed voluntarily, or I’ll knock you unconscious and leave you there anyway.”

“I'd like to see you try,” Roronoa says with a scowl. It’s clear his heart’s not in it though, and Sanji finds himself oddly intrigued by the faint flush of pink he can see tinting the other man’s cheeks.”

“Fine,” Roronoa grunts in the end. “We’ll have it your way. We’ll share for tonight, and I’ll see if I can fix the damn thing in the morning.”

Sanji flicks his eyes over to the broken hook, noting once again that it appears to be well and truly mangled. “I wish you luck in that,” he says simply.

*****
While technically big enough for two people, the ship’s bed still makes for a tight squeeze. It takes them a while to properly arrange themselves once they turn in for the night, and Sanji winds up with an elbow to the gut more than once because Roronoa can’t seem to keep still.

“I know you’re not usually this restless in bed,” he says after the third time it happens. “You don’t fidget when you’re in the hammock, and I’ve seen you nap in strange places enough times to know you don’t do it there either.”

“It’s not the bed that’s the problem,” Roronoa retorts. “It’s having somebody in it. The last time I slept next to somebody, it was with you.”

“ … ah,” Sanji says belatedly, that thought having honestly not occurred to him. “I suppose I should have expected that - what with your whole plan to get me back and the like.”

“No shit,” Roronoa grumbles, shifting so that he’s pressed up tight against the wall and therefore creating a couple inches of space between them. “This might shock you, but infidelity’s not really my thing.”

“No, it doesn’t shock me,” Sanji feels compelled to admit. “You’re the type to take vows seriously.”

“If it helps,” he adds unexpectedly, “I think I am too.”

Roronoa stops wriggling in place long enough to peer at him suspiciously. “The hell is that supposed to mean?”

“I haven’t - ” Sanji stops, trying to think of the best way to parse out what he wants to say. “There hasn’t been anyone. Since I’ve been back in Germa. My brothers tease me about it.”

“Your brothers are assholes,” Roronoa says by rote.

“Mhm,” Sanji acknowledges. “They always have been.”

“ … right.” Roronoa says then. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to bring up bad memories.”

“It’s fine,” Sanji replies. “They don’t bother me like they used to. I didn’t understand why they were like that when we were children, but now I do. It was my own fault for being too weak to defend myself. Now that I’m on par with them, they’ve stopped.”

“ … fuck, there is so much to unpack there,” Roronoa says, sounding pained. “You didn’t deserve any of that shit, most of your family are monsters, and you’re not on par with the idiot trio, you’re a thousand times out of their league. They don’t behave because you’re equals, they do it because they’re afraid of you.”

Sanji snorts. “That seems extremely unlikely,” he says. “If for no other reason than the fact that my brothers are unable to feel fear. It was the first thing the modifications altered.”

“Ugh, there’s no talking to you about this, is there?” Roronoa groans and punches the pillow under his head a couple of times before bunching it up in a way that still doesn’t look comfortable. “Fine, I’m too tired to get into it with you tonight. Let’s just try and get some sleep.”

“You don’t have to tell me twice,” Sanji announces, and that’s the last thing either of them says for the rest of the night.

*****
Sanji’s the first to wake the next morning. He comes to slowly, only aware it’s daytime thanks to the light slipping in through the porthole window, and he blinks when he realizes there’s a heavy weight slung over his torso.

They’ve moved during the night, it occurs to him. Not far, the tight quarters won’t allow for that, but they’ve both shifted into the middle of the bed, such that they’re pressed together chest to chest and Roronoa’s extended an arm over his waist at some point while they were sleeping.

It’s … not entirely unpleasant, Sanji decides after taking a couple moments to consider it. The hold isn’t oppressive or uncomfortable. In fact, if he’s being honest with himself, it feels familiar in a way he can’t bring himself to mind. Judge would no doubt be appalled by even this brush at sentimentality, but Sanji can’t find it within himself to care.

He stays like this for several minutes, watching the steady rise and fall of Roronoa’s chest. For once the man isn’t snoring like a snail ship’s engine, and Sanji idly wonders if that’s because he’s asleep on his side, as opposed to his back like usual. Some spark of memory is telling him that it might be.

In actuality, that’s not the only thing his memories are telling him this morning. They seem to be going a little haywire today, something he’s going to blame on his close proximity to his sleeping partner.

Frowning, Sanji continues letting his gaze roam over Roronoa’s prostrate form, searching for signs of things he remembers. He ultimately comes to a stop at the man’s left ear, and reaches up on instinct to run a finger over the clasp that sits up high on the shell.

He doesn’t remember that it’s supposed to be a wedding ring, and isn’t sure that he would have if Roronoa hadn’t told him. He does acknowledge that it appears to be made from the same material as the ring that Roronoa wears on his finger, but both are different from the two gold bars dangling from the bottom of his ear.

Instinctively, Sanji reaches for the brooch that’s still hanging from the chain around his neck. He’d gone to sleep with it on like always, and now he tugs it up so that he can get a better look at it.

The piece that dangles from the end of the brooch really does look similar to Roronoa’s two remaining earrings. Holding them next to each other for comparison, he’s forced to concede that all three are the same.

Out of nowhere, he’s hit with a sensation of pain in the vicinity of his right ear. Dropping the brooch, he clamps a hand over the lobe, his fingers tracing the spot where the skin has scarred over.

A second bolt of pain lances through his temples, and he clamps his eyes shut reflexively. As he does this, though, a vision invades his brain, the image easily the clearest of all the memories he’s recalled to date.

The clarity isn’t the only area where it differs, however. Up until this point, all the memories that have returned to him have pertained to either his time with the Strawhats or, in a few rare instances, his days on the Baratie. Here, the very first thing he sees is Judge.

There’s no sound at first, but he can see the older man’s mouth moving. Based on the angry curve of his lips and the scowl on his face, it’s evident that he’s unhappy about something, his gestures getting more pointed as he speaks.

“You have absolutely no reason to keep it.” Those are the first of the king’s words that Sanji can make out, but it’s obvious that he’s not done yet. “It represents nothing but pure sentiment, and you have no need of it now that you’ve finally become the man you were supposed to.”

“Father, I - ” Sanji hears himself say, but Judge raises a meaty hand to stall any further commentary.

“I won’t tolerate disobedience,” he says firmly. “You know this. I’m therefore going to give you one last chance to remove it voluntarily. If not, I’ll deal with the issue myself.”

Sanji feels himself take an automatic step backwards, his right hand moving to cover the ear on the same side. He can feel a familiar bit of metal dangling from it as he opens his mouth to speak. “You can’t,” he says firmly. “I won’t let you.”

Judge moves to take an angry step forward, but another figure steps between them. “Father. Brother.” Reiju says calmly. “We should be celebrating Sanji’s return, not fighting amongst ourselves.”

Letting out an explosive snort, Judge moves to shoulder past his daughter. “There’s nothing to celebrate until he’s given up all vestiges of his former life. I want no ties connecting him to those vagabond pirates.”

“I don’t have any,” Sanji starts to say, but he gets no further. Judge has reached him now, his arm extended as he reaches for the side of his head.

“If you won’t remove it willingly, I’ll do it myself,” he snarls, and Sanji feels that same burst of pain flare in his ear when the king wraps his fist around his earring and yanks.

The modifications that he and his siblings had had imparted on them make them nearly invulnerable, but not entirely. Any injuries they do suffer will heal quickly too, yet that doesn’t change the fact that having even a small item ripped from his flesh is unpleasant.

Sanji can feel blood streaming from his ear and trickling down his neck, but it’s the noise that truly surprises him. Someone is letting out a roar of fury, and it’s only when Judge’s eyes widen in fear that he realizes it’s him.

Judge shrieks something that Sanji can’t make out, and a flood of guards come surging into the room to throw themselves between the king and his son. They pile onto Sanji like they think they can hold him down, none of them making a sound as he lashes out with fierce kicks that shatter their bones or worse.

At least three of the guards, maybe more, are dead by the time he manages to fight his way through them. The rest are either unconscious or groaning on the floor, too injured to continue trying to fight him.

Meanwhile, Judge is backed up against his throne, keeping the hefty piece of furniture between himself and Sanji. The golden earring still dangles from his clenched fist, and Sanji’s eyes lock on his target as he keeps moving forward.

Suddenly Reiju is between them again. This time, though, it’s not Judge she’s attempting to calm. “That’s enough,” she says, holding up a hand to halt Sanji’s progress. She then reaches for Judge with the other, snapping her fingers imperiously until he clues into what she’s after and drops the earring into her waiting palm.

“There, you see? It’s fine,” she says, holding it up so that Sanji can get a good look at it. “Unlike your ear, I’m afraid,” she adds, shooting Judge a look that borders on both exasperated and disdainful. “You’re not going to be able to put it back on with that kind of damage.”

“I don’t care,” Sanji says through gritted teeth. “Give it back.”

“I will,” Reiju says, again giving Judge a quelling look when he rallies enough to speak, “but you’re going to have to either wait for your ear to heal and hope we can re-pierce it now that your modifications are active or you’re going to have to find another way to wear it. I think I may have an idea on that front.”

“Fine,” Sanji says, holding out his hand and letting it hover between them expectantly until she drops the earring onto his palm. “But it’s staying with me regardless.”

“Of course.”

Sanji blinks back to reality, surprised to find Roronoa watching him through a slitted eye.

“Everything okay?” The other man asks after a few moments of awkward silence.

Swallowing heavily, Sanji lets his hand slip away from his ear. “You were right,” he says quietly. “About what happened to my ear. Judge ripped the earring out when I wouldn’t give it up willingly, and I … didn’t handle it well.”

“No reason why you should have,” Roronoa replies, his eye softening. “He had no right to take something that belonged to you. At least he saw reason in the end.”

Sanji shakes his head. “He did nothing of the sort,” he explains when Roronoa - when Zoro frowns. “Reiju was the one who realized there would be no stopping me until it was returned. She handled the situation, and Judge - Judge had my memories altered in retaliation.”

Zoro closes his eye and sucks in a deep breath before letting it out slowly, grimacing like he’s in pain. Then he opens his eye again.

“I’m sorry.” He says softly, and Sanji stiffens when heavily scarred fingers suddenly come up to stroke his cheek in a gentle caress. “You didn’t deserve that, and I should have been there to help you.”

“There was nothing you could have done,” Sanji tells him. “You’re not to blame.”

Zoro’s smile gets impossibly sadder. “The thing is, Curls,” he says, his voice still just above a whisper. “That’s not how love works.”

*****
What had previously been a trickle where Sanji’s regained memories were concerned quickly becomes the long awaited flood. He’s bombarded with images over the course of the morning, such that Zoro goes so far as to offer to make breakfast for them.

“No.” Sanji says simply when the swordsman puts forward his suggestion. “Especially not now that I remember how useless you are in the kitchen.”

“Hey, I’m not that bad!” Zoro protests, feigning offence. “At least I can boil water and put together something that won’t poison us.”

“The answer’s still no,” Sanji replies. “As the person trained in the area, it makes sense for me to keep doing it. It’s practical.”

“Practical,” Zoro huffs. “I guess it’s too much to hope that having your memories kickstarted did the same for your emotions?”

Having been busy rolling up his sleeves so he can start working, Sanji pauses and turns to look at where the other man is sitting propped up on the bed. “No,” he says flatly. “Why would it? The emotions were already gone by the time Judge altered my memories. There’s no correlation between the two.”

Zoro sighs and scrubs a hand over his face. “I honestly don’t know if this is an improvement or not.”

Finished with the conversation, Sanji turns back to the stove.

He prepares a typical breakfast for them, while Zoro finally hauls himself upright. The man disappears briefly into the washroom to get dressed, and then heads out on deck under the guise of wanting to see if the ship has taken any damage.

The storm had died down sometime during the night, and Zoro hasn’t come back inside by the time breakfast is ready. On a whim, Sanji does up two plates of food, bypasses the table, and instead carries them out into the early morning air.

There’s a slight chill, but nothing he can’t handle. Meanwhile, the water around them is calm, and what little he can see of the island’s rocky expanse looks no worse for wear. All told, everything seems to have emerged relatively unscathed.

And that includes their ship. As Sanji makes his way along the deck he notes that all the gear that had been tied down remains securely fastened, while he can see no obvious damage to the rigging. It all looks as good as new.

He finds Zoro in his usual place near the helm, slumped against a railing and with his head tilted up towards the sky. His single eye is closed, revealing none of the soft grey Sanji knows is under the lid, and he merely grunts to acknowledge Sanji’s presence.

“There’s no need of that,” Sanji says, nudging his foot with his own. “You have to eat.”

Zoro’s eye cracks open, revealing a sliver of the grey that Sanji had just been thinking about. He shifts slightly to look at the food in the other man’s hands, and nods belatedly.

“Yeah, okay,” he says, pushing away from the railing and holding out a hand for the plate Sanji offers him. “Let’s eat, and then it looks like we should be able to set sail again.”

“I’m sure you’re anxious to get going,” Sanji says, settling down on a nearby barrel to use as an impromptu seat. “How much longer do you think we’re going to be out here?”

“Based on all the information everyone was able to put together, not much,” Zoro says, busting himself with spearing a piece of bacon with the fork Sanji has included. “We should be getting close.”

“Assuming the place we’re looking for even exists at all,” Sanji notes. He takes a bite from his own meal, nodding when he finds it to be satisfactory. “This could still all turn out to be for nothing. There’s no guarantee the All Blue exists.”

“It exists,” Zoro says firmly. “I’ll believe in it for both of us until we get there.”

“That’s … ” Naive, Sanji thinks but finds himself unable to say aloud. Instead, he drops the subject and changes track slightly. “What if it’s not where Nami and Robin think it is? What will you do then?”

“What do you think?” Zoro replies with a shrug. “Keep searching until we find it.”

Sanji frowns. “But if the map turns out to be wrong, you’ll be back at square one. Only this time you won’t have any new leads to follow.”

“So we’ll find some,” Zoro says, speaking like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “Your ocean’s out there somewhere, and we’re not going to stop until we track it down.”

He falls silent then, and for a few moments the only sounds are that of waves lapping gently against the hull and their combined chewing as they continue eating. Then Sanji speaks.

“I’d forgotten,” he says slowly, “how brashly overconfident you can be. You can’t just will things to turn out the way you want them to.”

“Maybe not,” Zoro admits after a slight pause, “but I don’t think it’s fair to call me overconfident when I’m usually right in the end. Historically, my track record’s pretty good.”

Sanji snorts. “Not if we’re counting every time you’ve insisted something was in a specific location that was nowhere near it, it isn’t.”

Rather than look offended, Zoro grins at him. “I was talking about the big things,” he says. “Like finding the One Piece and all the crew achieving our dreams. We’re nine out of ten so far where that’s concerned, so it seems to me like the odds are in our favor.”

“Again, I think you’re confusing causation and correlation,” Sanji points out. “Most of those dreams were unrelated, at least when it comes to finding the All Blue. Therefore, seeing them through doesn’t necessarily mean anything else.”

“You need to have a little faith, Curls,” Zoro tells him. “But, if you can’t, don’t worry about it. I’ll have enough for both of us and that’ll see things get sorted.”

“I don’t think that’s how that works.” Sanji says, but Zoro just shrugs and goes back to finishing his breakfast.

*****
They finish their meals out on the deck, and then Zoro heads into the cabin for the purpose of tidying up the dishes. Aside from the period where the other man hadn’t been speaking to him, Sanji’s given up on trying to convince him that said chore isn’t his responsibility. Instead, he merely hands his empty plate over without comment.

He watches Zoro’s back as the man ducks through the door to the cabin, his gaze not straying until it’s closed behind him. Then he leans back in his seat, tilting his head back much the same way Zoro had been when he’d found him earlier, letting the sunlight wash over his face.

If he listens hard enough he can just make out the sound of seabirds soaring somewhere high above them. The things probably nest in the scraggly trees he’d noted yesterday, since they’re too far away from any land for them to use as a home base. Idly, he wonders how plentiful the fish are out here for them to feed off of.

Not as plentiful as they would be in the All Blue, he decides, that stray thought passing through his brain as he continues to recline in his seat. Between the books his mother had given him as a child and the stories Zeff had spun back on the Baratie, he has a vision in mind of what the place might look like, and it’s absolutely full of life.

A creak from the direction of the cabin signals the start of Zoro’s return, and Sanji blinks his eyes back open, wondering how long he’s been sitting here like this. “That was fast,” he says as Zoro approaches. “Are you sure you didn’t miss anything?”

Zoro quirks an eyebrow at him from where he’s busy untying the lines that will let them cast off. “Did you fall asleep or something while I was gone?” He asks, coiling a length of rope over and over until he’s got it into a properly organized bundle. “Because I was in there for a bit.”

Sanji allows himself a small shrug. “It didn’t feel that way,” he says simply. “And I don’t want to find a messy kitchen when I eventually head back inside.”

“Your kitchen’s fine, Twirls,” Zoro says, having already moved onto another line. “Trust me, I’ve been well trained.”

By you, his words heavily imply. Sanji can hear the unspoken comment as easily as if it had been spoken aloud, and nods to acknowledge the swordsman’s point. “Good. Taking proper care of one’s space and tools is one of the first things any chef learns. Zeff drilled that into my head with vigor.”

Zoro looks up at that. “You finally remember your old man, do you?” He asks, sounding pleased. “That’s good. I’ve been getting sick and tired of hearing you call Judge your father.”

“Judge is my father.” Sanji replies, but then some instinct compels him to add, “Biologically speaking. It’s a completely accurate statement.”

“Blood doesn’t make family,” Zoro retorts. “Any idiot knows that.”

“I think it’s actually part of the definition,” Sanji replies, but Zoro’s already shaking his head.

“It isn’t,” he says firmly. “Not the definition that matters, anyway. Redleg Zeff is the only father you’ve ever known, and it’d kill him to hear you say otherwise.”

“That’s highly unlikely,” Sanji starts, holding up his hand when Zoro looks like he’s gearing up for an even more forceful protest. “But I understand the point you’re trying to make. You’re right, a comment like that would hurt Zeff very badly.”

“Yeah, it would,” Zoro agrees, eyeing him warily. “And how do you feel about that?”

Sanji’s hit with a sudden urge to sigh. “I don’t know why you insist on asking me questions that you know you know you won’t like the answer to. I don’t feel any way about it because I don’t feel anything period. In other words, I don’t care.”

He’s half expecting Zoro to get angry about this, but then the man surprises him by letting out a low whistle. “You know, you’re lucky Zeff’s not here to hear you say that part in particular. I’m pretty sure you’d be taking a peg leg to the face for it.”

“Please,” Sanji scoffs. “As if an elderly old man would be able to even get near me. He’s got to be, what?” He does the math quickly in his head. “Seventy-nine?”

“Something like that?” Zoro replies with a shrug. “That doesn’t mean he’s slowing down any. The old bastard’s as terrifying now as he was the day I met him.”

Sanji stares at him. “You’re the greatest swordsman in the world,” he says flatly. “You’ve helped take down Kings, Warlords, Emperors, and the entire World Government. You’re the second in command to the Pirate King. Do you honestly expect me to believe you’re scared of an elderly chef with only one leg?”

“An elderly chef with only one leg who happens to be my father-in-law,” Zoro corrects. “The man can and will make my life a living hell if I piss him off.”

“You’re deranged,” Sanji says, shaking his head. “Besides,” he adds as a thought occurs to him, “he’s always liked you. He just likes messing with you more.”

“How flattering,” Zoro says dryly. “Although, I’ve got to say, this rush of memories you’ve been getting this morning is pretty cool. Is it all there now, do you think?”

Sanji cocks his head to the side, considering the question from all angles. “I think so,” he says finally, concluding the statement with a satisfied nod. “Or if it isn’t, there are only a handful of gaps left.”

“That’s good,” Zoro says. “I was getting tired of all the blank stares whenever I mentioned something that you definitely should have known. I mean, I know you couldn’t help it, but still.”

“I can see how it would have been tiring,” Sanji says with another nod. “Or perhaps irritating is a better word.”

“No, it isn’t,” Zoro says. “I don’t blame you for any of it.”

“No?” Sanji asks, eyeing the other man thoughtfully. “You could, you know. My memory problems were strictly a result of my own actions. If I hadn’t left the Strawhats, I never would have been in a position for Judge to track me down and do what he did.”

“Yet I’m still not about to pull that kind of a dick move,” Zoro replies, crossing his arms over his chest. “And if your memories really are back, you know full well that I’m telling the truth here.”

“Yes,” Sanji says slowly. “I do know that. You always were a terrible liar.”

“The absolute worst,” Zoro agrees with a crooked grin. “So what do you say we call an end to this stupid conversation and get back to sailing? We’ve got a magic ocean to find.”

Seeing no other answer to give, Sanji nods.

*****
The days creep ever onwards with them following Nami’s map, until suddenly they can’t anymore. Sanji emerges from the cabin one morning to find Zoro studying the map with his shoulders hunched and a frown on his face.

“What is it?” He asks upon seeing this. “Have we drifted off course? If so, I suppose it was always inevitable with you at the helm.”

“Ha ha,” Zoro says sarcastically, his expression lightening for a moment before it shifts back to the sour one he’d been wearing. “And we’re not off course … not exactly anyway.”

Sanji gives him a flat stare. “Just so we’re clear, the fact that I have my memories back means I can tell when you’re not giving me the whole truth,” he says. “What’s wrong?”

In answer, Zoro gestures at the map where he has it spread out awkwardly over the helm. “Come see for yourself.”

“What’s wrong,” he adds when Sanji steps up next to him to peer down at the parchment, “is that we’ve run out of course to follow.”

Now it’s Sanji’s turn to frown. “That can’t be right,” he says, tracing the detailed chart with a careful finger. “Nami drew this. She’d never make a mistake like that.”

“She would if she was working without all the necessary information,” Zoro points out. “Remember what I told you, the crew and I never followed the route ourselves. All we did was compile the information into something that could be charted.”

“Meaning there was no guarantee you had all the required parts,” Sanji concludes. “That’s such a typical Strawhat plan. It’s been fourteen years, how is your crew still flying by the seat of its collective pants?”

“Our crew,” Zoro corrects him with a grin and a shrug. “As for your question - it’s worked in our favour so far.”

“Be that as it may,” Sanji replies. “What are we supposed to do now?”

Zoro answers him with another shrug. “There’s only one thing we can do,” he says. “We keep going.”

“That is … not a strategically sound plan,” Sanji notes, attempting to be diplomatic. “The wiser move would be to turn around and regroup once we have more information.”

“There is no more information, Curls,” Zoro says firmly. “We had years to hunt it all down and this is the sum total of what we came up with. If you want your ocean, and whatever you say I know you do, we have to keep sailing.”

“Sailing into unknown waters in the Grand Line, you mean,” Sanji reminds him. “That is - the word risky doesn’t even come close to summarizing what that is. We’re as good as dead if anything goes wrong.”

Zoro gives him a long look, but then surprises him by stepping away from the helm. “Alright,” he says, crossing his arms over his chest and settling his back against a nearby railing. “I’ll leave the decision up to you. If you want to keep going, we keep going, and if you want to turn around, we turn around. What’s it going to be?”

Sanji eyes him warily, wondering if this is some sort of trap. Then he shakes his head as soon as that thought enters into his head. Zoro doesn't play the kind of mind games one might find in Germa. It’s not his style. If he’s saying the choice is up to Sanji, then the choice is up to Sanji.

Unbidden, his gaze is drawn back to the map. Nami’s perfectly tailored sketches stretch out before him, all of them culminating in the spot where they are now.

The Strawhats have poured everything they have into this mission. From Nami drawing the map, to Franky building the ship, to Robin researching every potential lead. Even Chopper had contributed by concocting the drugs that had been used by Reiju (and hadn’t that been an interesting revelation) to put him under and smuggle him off the flagship.

So many people have given it their all to try and help him find the All Blue, to try and help him period. Sanji still doesn’t have the emotions for that to mean what it should, but some sixth sense is telling him that if he turns back now, he’ll be making a mistake.

Taking a deep breath, he looks back up at Zoro, who smiles.

“Yeah,” the swordsman says before Sanji can fully open his mouth. “That’s what I thought. Come on, Curls. Let’s go find your ocean.”

“It’s not my ocean,” Sanji mumbles weakly. “And this is still a bad idea. The smarter course of action really would be to turn back.”

Zoro shrugs indifferently, a lazy grin crawling across his face. “You’ve been telling me how stupid I am for years,” he says philosophically. “So I guess this idea is just par for the course.”

“We could both be killed,” Sanji points out. “In fact, there’s a very good chance we will be. We don’t know if there are any more islands out there for us to resupply on, or what kind of storms we might wind up facing. We could starve or be shipwrecked or who knows what else.”

“Or,” Zoro counters, “we could be the first people to find the All Blue. An ocean filled with fish and ingredients that we could sustain ourselves on for the rest of our lives. A sea cook’s paradise. If we’re going to come up with potential outcomes, I think I’ll aim for that one.”

Sanji looks at him. “Even if we find it,” he says slowly. “You do understand that it still might not give you what you want, don’t you?”

Zoro’s gaze doesn’t waver. “Like I said, if we’re considering potential outcomes, I’m going to bank on us winding up with exactly the one I want. There’s no reason not to.”

“That’s impractical,” Sanji says weakly, shaking his head. “You’re setting yourself up for a situation where the odds are stacked against you.”

“Maybe,” Zoro allows, “but I’ve got nothing left to lose at this point, and everything to gain.”

“Now, come on,” he adds, shrugging his shoulders. “We’ve got work to do.”

*****
“You didn’t have the grey when I saw you last.”

The words slip unbidden from Sanji’s mouth a few nights later. They’re lying in bed together, facing each other but not touching, as has become their usual arrangement, and he finds himself unable to drift off. He’s going to blame that for why he speaks without meaning to.

For a second he thinks Zoro hasn’t heard him. Unlike Sanji, the swordsman’s eyes are closed, and his breathing is even. It’s entirely possible that he’s already fallen asleep, meaning he’ll have missed his companion’s unexpected faux pas.

Then his good eye cracks open part way, and Sanji has to bite back a sigh as a result of his luck. Zoro watches him silently for a few seconds, before letting out a tired yawn.

“Chopper thinks it’s stress related,” he says once the sound has tapered off. “Apparently that can be a cause of premature grey hair. On the other hand, I’m thirty three, it could just as easily be genetics. Besides, if you want to talk about a drastic change in hair color, I suggest you go look in a mirror.”

Subconsciously, Sanji reaches up to tug at a lock of his own hair. Thanks to some of the portraits hanging in Germa’s flagship, he’d known that it used to be blond even before his memories had returned. Just like he knows that the shift to black is a result of his modified genes activating.

“It’s not something I had any control over,” he murmurs, continuing to pull at his hair until the skin around his forehead tightens. “It’s because of … ”

“You don’t have to explain,” Zoro tells him. “I know why it happened. It was already starting before you left.”

“Right,” Sanji says, his motions continuing. “Both my parents were blond. I imagine all my siblings and I would be if not for, well, you know.”

“Mmm,” Zoro replies, which isn’t much of an answer. “I don’t know if that would be a better or worse look on the rest of them.”

“But you know which you prefer on me, don’t you?” Sanji says, now tugging to the point of pain. “I’m sure I don’t have to guess about the answer. It’s obv - ”

He freezes when one of Zoro’s hands slips out from under the blankets to flatten over his own. “Stop.” He says, firmly but gently. “You’re going to hurt yourself.”

“I don’t - ” Sanji starts, his fingers twitching reflexively, but all Zoro does is shake his head.

“Stop,” he says again, and now he starts carefully prying Sanji’s fingers out of his hair, loosening them one by one until his entire hand has slipped free. Then he carefully pats the disturbed strands back into place.

“I like you as a blond because that’s the way I met you,” he says easily, “but the black is fine too. Or, I guess it’s more salt and pepper if we’re being honest here. I don’t think you get to make fun of me for having some grey when you’ve got way more than I do.”

“I wasn’t making fun,” Sanji replies. “I was just - I don’t know. Commenting.”

“Commenting? Right, commenting.” Sounding far too amused for the hour, Zoro swipes at Sanji’s hair again, brushing his bangs back until he has both eyes uncovered. “You know, your hair might be different, but that blue is still exactly the same.”

“Is it?”

“Mhm.”

“It’s from my mother,” Sanji admits quietly. “Judge’s eyes are brown. The blue eyes were the one thing all five of us got from her.”

“I know.” Zoro says, and of course he does. Over the years Sanji has confided more secrets in him than he has any other person. It was just one more facet of their relationship. “I bet the water of the All Blue will be the same shade.”

Sanji feels … something … stir in his chest. Not sure what it is, and frankly vaguely uncomfortable in the face of it, he shifts to try and make the feeling go away. His action has the effect of seeing Zoro drop his hand, and he’s not sure if that’s any better.

“I used to dream about it all the time, you know.” He hears himself say against his better judgment. “In fact, that was only the half of it. When I was younger, I used to try and draw what I imagined it would look like.”

“I know,” Zoro says again. “Zeff still has a bunch of ‘em. He busts them out the way some folks do baby pictures whenever we visit.”

Sanji makes a face at this. “Zeff’s a sentimental old fool,” he mutters, assailed by memories of encounters exactly like the ones Zoro has just described. “There’s no need of holding onto something so pointless.”

Moving with a speed that belies how tired he obviously is, Zoro’s hand trails down to the chain around Sanji’s neck. “I bet Judge said something awfully similar about this,” he notes, his thumb and forefinger curling around the repurposed earring. “And yet here you are, refusing to part with it.”

“An act that got me mildly maimed if you’ll recall correctly,” Sanji points out. “Some might say that was an ill advised move on my part.”

“Some might,” Zoro agrees, letting the golden bar fall from his grasp, “but not me. Did I tell you I saw a picture of you wearing it in the newspaper before I set sail?”

“You did not,” Sanji says. He distantly recalls the photo Zoro must be referring to, the one that had gotten Judge so worked up. Perhaps the Germa king had had good reason to fear. “Was that what finally spurred you into coming after me?”

“Got it in one.” Zoro confirms, and his grin may be sharp but his eye is soft. “The second I saw it I knew that some part of you was still in there. You might not have realized it yourself, hell, maybe you still don’t, but it’s there, I promise. We just need one big push to shake it loose.”

Sanji opens his mouth to tell Zoro that he doesn’t care one way or the other, to remind him that his ongoing lack of emotions mean he doesn’t actually have a stake in this game, but the words won’t come. Instead, they fizzle out on his tongue, leaving behind nothing in their wake.

“Curls?” Apparently Zoro’s caught onto the fact that Sanji had been considering saying something because he’s frowning at him in confusion. “You okay?”

“Fine,” Sanji says, settling more firmly into the bedding. “It’s late, though. We should get some sleep.”

“Yeah, okay. G’night.”

*****
“Well … fuck.”

Zoro’s choice of wording may be somewhat crass, but given that they’re both taking in the same sight, Sanji’s forced to admit that it’s a fair assessment of the situation. This was certainly not what he was expecting the day to bring.

“Surely there’s something we can do,” he hears himself say aloud. “There must be.”

“Something we can do to sail through solid rock, you mean?” Zoro asks, gesturing at the veritable wall that they’re sailing up to. “I don’t know about you, but I think the fact that we’ve run out of water might be a problem.”

Sanji eyes the range himself, noting with no small amount of concern that it stretches as far as the eye can see, in either direction. “Maybe we can go around it,” he says dubiously, a comment that makes Zoro snort beside him.

“As much as I like to believe anything’s possible, our supplies are getting low and we haven’t had any luck bringing in fish for days now.” The swordsman gives him a bleak look when Sanji glances in his direction. “Whatever this is might have an end if we sail far enough, but I can’t promise we won’t starve to death first.”

Without warning, he slams a heavy fist down on the railing in front of him, hard enough that Sanji’s surprised the wood doesn’t crack. “Fuck!” He snaps, louder this time. “Fucking fucking fuck! This can’t be how it ends. I refuse to accept that.”

Sanji stretches out a hand towards him, but to do what he isn’t sure. He lets it hover awkwardly in the air for a moment, before letting it fall back down against his side. “We should stop here for a bit,” he suggests. “I can make us something to eat while we figure out our next move.”

“I’m not hungry,” Zoro mutters, to which Sanji responds by kicking him lightly in the back of the knee.

“You need to eat,” he says firmly when the swordsman twists around to look at him, one eyebrow raised high in surprise. “You won’t do yourself any favors by throwing some kind of childish tantrum.”

“Come eat,” he directs. “Then we’ll decide how we want to go from here.”

“You’re right,” Zoro says a little while later, after he’s got two onigiris in his stomach and is working his way through a third, “sailing along it is our only option. We can’t go through it, so we’ll have to go around.”

“It does seem to be the most logical approach,” Sanji says. It’s something of a lie, since technically the most logical choice would be to turn around, but he doubts either of them are really prepared to accept such an option at this point. For better or for worse, he suspects they’re in this to the end.

“I’ll set out some lines as we go,” he says next. “It might not amount to anything, but it can’t hurt to at least try to bring in some fresh stock. Even if we can’t deal with the issue of fresh produce, newly caught fish would be better than nothing.”

“Makes sense,” Zoro agrees. “Let me know if you need a hand.”

“Of course.”

*****
They pick a direction to sail at random. With the rock formation in their way, they can’t go straight ahead, but it’s impossible to tell if left or right is more preferable than the other. Zoro suggests choosing by way of a coin toss, and Sanji can’t think of a better idea.

The scenery doesn’t change for days, to the point that Sanji finds himself eyeing their depleting food stock with increasing frequency. He’s been casting lines out each morning to try and catch fish to supplement the things they’re running out of, but so far he hasn’t had any luck.

He tries broaching the subject with Zoro a couple of times, but doesn’t have any luck. The swordsman is adamant that they have to keep going, and Sanji finds himself unwilling to put up much of a fight, even though he knows it’s not the practical approach to be taking.

“It’s because you want to find the All Blue even more than I do,” Zoro says when he makes the mistake of murmuring those words out loud. “You know it’s out there, that we’re close, and you’re not about to let this one last hurdle stand in your way.”

“I’m not sure a risk of starvation can be described as simply a ‘hurdle’,” Sanji retorts, shaking his head. “No creature can survive without sustenance, not even ones as monstrous as you and I. Not even Judge would try and make that argument.”

“Ugh, could you not make things worse by mentioning that bastard?” Zoro says, wrinkling his nose in distaste. “My stomach’s cranky enough as it is.”

Daring to glance away from the fishing pole he’s holding, Sanji twists his head around to look at Zoro. The other man is reclined back against a railing, apparently having given up on trying to meditate for the time being.

Zoro has his eye closed when Sanji first turns to him, but he must sense the attention because he soon cracks it open to meet his gaze. “What?” He asks, scratching absently at the front of his chest. “Have I got something on my face?”

“No,” Sanji says, answering the question, but quickly moving on to one of his own. “You truly loathe Judge, don’t you?”

Now Zoro gives him a look that suggests that much should be obvious. “Loathe, hate, completely and totally despise - take your pick. You called us monsters a second ago, but as far as I’m concerned that’s a term way better suited for him.”

“Hmm,” Sanji says, returning his attention to the water in front of him. “You say that, but people still tend to use it to describe my siblings and I, not him.”

“Those people are wrong then,” Zoro says from behind him. “Sure, the whole modifications and lack of emotions thing is probably terrifying up close to the average lay person, but I’d argue that someone who could strip the humanity right out of their own children is the real nightmare.”

“I suppose,” Sanji says after taking a moment to consider this. “I can see your point of view in any event.”

He hears Zoro snort, followed by the sound of shuffling. Then, the next thing he knows, Zoro’s crossed the deck and is coming to sit down next to him.

“You’re not a monster,” he says when Sanji turns to look at him. “Not really, and you never have been.”

“What about my siblings?” Sanji asks, curious. “I know you don’t like them.”

“You’re damn right I don’t,” Zoro confirms, the corner of his mouth curving up in a faint grin. “But that’s because I’m inherently biased thanks to all the things they did to you. Looking at it from the outside, though, I can at least admit that they were victims too.”

“They won’t thank you for that,” Sanji notes. “In fact, they might react worse to perceived pity than they would to you hating them.”

Zoro shrugs, seemingly unconcerned. “That’s not my problem,” he says. “Just because I can look at them in a different light doesn’t mean I actually want anything to do with them. They’re still collectively a bunch of dicks.”

“Even Reiju?” Sanji wonders. “She helped you get me out here, so surely you must have some tolerance for her.”

“Well, we’re never going to be best friends, if that’s what you mean,” Zoro replies. “But I respect her more than I do any of the others.”

“You don’t respect the others at all,” Sanji points out.

“Exactly.”

Seeing no viable response to that, Sanji turns back to his fishing. “We’re going to be in trouble if this doesn’t work soon,” he says. “I don’t care if you’re getting tired of hearing me say it, it’s the truth.”

“Eh, you’ve always been a bit of a nag,” Zoro replies with a shrug. “I’m used to it.”

Sanji looks at him out of the corner of his eye, unsurprised to find that the man is grinning again. “I may not care enough to respond now, but I do know that the old me would have thrown you overboard for a comment like that.”

“Kicked,” Zoro reminds him easily. “He would have kicked me overboard. Or at least he would have tried, you weren’t as strong as you seem to think.”

“Yes I was,” Sanji replies flatly, “and I still am. I can show you if you like.”

Zoro gives him a look that can best be described as fond. “If we get into it now, you’ll have to leave off your fishing. I’m good.”

Sanji gives the fishing line a look and a tiny shake. “You’re probably right,” he acknowledges, “but I still haven’t had any luck with this.”

“You will,” Zoro replies with that same confidence that he seems to bring into any task he’s faced with. “I know it.”

Sanji shakes his head. “For a man who’s always been so adamant that there’s no such thing as a higher power, you seem to take an awful lot of things on blind faith. The two concepts are very at odds with each other.”

“I blame Luffy for that one.”

*****
Sanji startles awake thanks to the hand that’s just gripped his shoulder to jostle him back and forth. Blinking the sleep out of his eyes, he sits up abruptly, the motion causing Zoro to release his hold on him, even if the swordsman doesn’t go far.

About to open his mouth to harshly demand to know what’s going on, he catches sight of the look on Zoro’s face. Something in the other man’s expression causes him to ask a much gentler, “What is it?” instead.

“I need you to get up and come outside,” Zoro says. “There’s something you need to see.”

A quick glance out the portal window tells Sanji it's morning, but still very early based on the way the light is drifting in. Frowning, he wonders what could be important enough for Zoro to force him out of bed when all they’ve really had to do lately is sleeping and conserving energy.

Shoving the covers back, he slides out of bed and stands when his bare feet hit the floor. He doesn’t bother looking for his boots under the circumstances, but rather hurries after Zoro where he’s already heading for the cabin door.

Stepping out onto the deck doesn’t immediately reveal anything of note, so Sanji spends a few moments glancing around in confusion, wondering what it is that’s grabbed Zoro’s attention. Then he hears it.

The shrill cry isn’t quite like any seabird Sanji’s ever heard before, but he’ll wager that’s what it is all the same. Moving carefully along the deck, he walks towards the railing that Zoro’s already leaning against, following the swordsman’s gaze until he too can spot the birds circling at the top of this section of the neverending rock range.

It’s the first sign of life they’ve come across since they’d encountered the line of cliffs, and Sanji feels his throat tighten as he stares up at them. “They’re - they’re too far away for us to try and hunt if that’s what you’re thinking,” he notes. “There’s no way either of us can get up those cliffs without actual climbing gear.”

“Says the man who can literally walk on air,” Zoro snorts. “You really need to man up and try to skywalk again now that you’ve got your memories back. Having said that,” he adds when Sanji opens his mouth to tell him no yet again, “that’s not what I was thinking at all. For those things to be up there, there has to be something nearby that they’re feeding off of.”

“We don’t know what’s on the other side of the rocks,” Sanji points out. “There could be all manner of flora and fauna that we just can’t access from here.”

“It’s possible,” Zoro admits, “but they look like some kind of gull to me, which means the most likely source of food for them is some kind of fish.”

Sanji watches the birds for a few minutes longer, petting Zoro’s words sink in before he nods. “I’ll get the lines,” he says, pushing away from the railing with a renewed sense of purpose. “Are you going to help, or do you have something better to do?”

“I mean, trying to catch something so that we don’t starve sounds pretty important,” Zoro notes, pushing away as well. “I’ll give you a hand.”

That’s how they find themselves sitting side by side a little while later, each of them holding a fishing line that’s been cast out over the side of the ship. They do still have some food supplies in storage, but they’re getting dangerously low and Sanji isn’t about to waste a chance to replenish them if that’s what this is.

Above them the gulls have continued circling, but no matter how many times Sanji checks, he doesn’t see any of them move to dive into the water. Hoping that this means they’ve simply already had their fill for the morning, he squares his shoulders and continues with his task.

He and Zoro stay where they are for at least an hour with no luck. It’s getting late enough that Sanji knows he should get up to prepare a breakfast using whatever items he does still have on hand, and he’s just about to do so when he feels something tug on his line.

“You got something?” He must have made a noise or moved without realizing it because Zoro notices the moment the line twitches. He turns to Sanji with a hopeful look in his eye, that hope only increasing when his companion starts slowly reeling in whatever he’s found.

“Possibly,” Sanji grunts, refusing to say anything in the affirmative until he can see what’s on the end of the line for himself. He continues reeling it in at a snail’s pace, not wanting to risk losing it if it’s what he’s hoping it is.

A few seconds later the line slips out of the water, a thrashing body covered in scales dangling from the hook. The fish is far from the largest one Sanji’s ever seen, but nor is it the smallest. So long as it's edible, both he and Zoro can get a couple meals out of it.

“Alright!” Zoro crows next to him, thumping him on the back with a triumphant hand. “Would you look at that?!”

“Pay attention to your own line,” Sanji instructs, never taking his eyes off the still struggling fish. “If it’s from a school there might be more of them out here, and we should take whatever we can get.”

“Yeah yeah, I’m on it.” Letting his hand fall back down, Zoro readjusts his grip on his fishing pole, but there’s no mistaking how pleased he is. He’s back to oozing that same level of confidence as always, and he starts positing on what Sanji can do for breakfast in light of their new acquisition.

“We don’t even know that it’s not poisonous yet,” Sanji mutters as he hauls the fish the last of the way up. “Given the fact that we’re in completely uncharted waters, it could be anything. It could be the most toxic creature you’ve ever encountered. It could be - oh my god.”

“What?” Zoro demands, twisting around again to look at where the fish is now flopped on the deck. “What is it?”

Sanji feels his mouth move, but no sound comes out. He continues staring down at the fish, his eyes wide as he tries to make sense of what he’s seeing.

Zoro, perhaps thinking that the fish represents some kind of threat, stretches out and stuns it so that it’s now lying prone with no further movement. Then he looks at Sanji, one eyebrow raised in an obvious question.

“It’s a Goa Sea Trout,” Sanji says without being asked. He waits to see if the name will mean anything to Zoro, and when it evidently doesn’t, he adds, “It’s native to the East Blue.”

Zoro’s good eye widens and he stares at the fish with new interest. “What does that mean?” He asks, and Sanji swallows heavily.

“I think you know.” He rasps, and then sinks down heavily on the deck.

*****
“You’re sure you’re right about where that fish came from?” Zoro asks a while later.

Sanji doesn’t even bother looking up from where he’s avidly staring over the side of the ship, looking for other signs of life. “Honestly, Mossball,” he says through gritted teeth, “when have you ever known me to be wrong about the origins of food?”

His question is met with shocked silence, and Sanji nods decisively to himself, figuring that means the other man is well aware of the obvious answer. Nodding a second time, he leans even further over the railing, scanning the oceans for the faintest ripple worth following.

“There’s no way a fish from the East Blue could be native to this area,” he says, speaking his thoughts aloud. “Either somebody dumped it here - which is extremely unlikely given the fact that we haven’t come across a single inhabited island or another vessel since leaving Sai and Baby 5 - or, far more likely, it came from somewhere else and got lost trying to find its way back.”

“Maybe a poor sense of direction is an East Blue trait,” he adds, lifting his head and glancing over his shoulder to where Zoro is standing a little ways behind him. “What do you think?”

“Technically Shimotsuki Village was populated by escapees from Wano,” Zoro reminds him, sounding like most of his attention is still focused elsewhere. “So your little joke falls flat.”

Sanji makes a face at him. “You used to be better at humoring me,” he recalls, pushing away from the railing. “Regardless, though, we have more important things to be doing now. That fish got out here some way, probably through a crack in that rock formation. We need to find it and see if we can make use of it.”

“Our ship’s an awful lot bigger than that fish, Curls,” Zoro notes. “If it did come through the rocks it was most likely through a narrow path, big enough only for it. Otherwise there’d be a lot more of the things swimming around on this side. Assuming there’s more than one, that is.”

“There is,” Sanji says with an inexplicable certainty. “It came from somewhere, and somewhere nearby at that.”

He half expects Zoro to keep arguing with him, but he’d forgotten who it was he was dealing with. The World’s Greatest Swordsman could just as easily bear the title of the World’s Most Determined. Zoro’s already dragged them this far through pure stubbornness. He’s not going to falter in the wake of Sanji showcasing a little of his own.

“Alright,” he says, striding forward until he can join Sanji at the railing. “What do you propose we do?”

“We keep the fishing lines out,” Sanji says. “As many of them as possible. Firstly because we still need to take in more food if we can, but also because the more fish we find in a certain area, the more likely it’ll be that that’s the spot where they’re slipping through.”

“And if the spot’s too small for us?” Zoro asks, a question that causes Sanji to quirk an eyebrow at him.

“I’ve seen you cut mountains in half before,” he says primly. “Are you honestly telling me you wouldn’t bring down this one if I asked?”

Zoro gives him a long look. “There’s literally no mountain on earth I wouldn’t tear down for you,” he says firmly, his words causing Sanji’s stomach to lurch in a swooping sensation. “But what if it hurts your ocean?”

Forget swooping, Sanji’s stomach has just been invaded by an entire army’s worth of butterflies. Telling himself sternly to get a hold of things, he squares his shoulders and matches Zoro’s solemn gaze with one of his own.

“I know how precise you can be with these things,” he says. “I trust you to carve out only the space we need.”

Zoro’s eye widens briefly, but then goes soft. “Curls,” he says quietly, anything else he might say getting cut off when Sanji raises a hand to silence him.

“It’s fine,” he says brusquely. “We need to focus on finding our entry point above all else for now. The rest we can deal with later. Does that sound good?”

“It’s sounds … like as much of a plan as we’ve had to date,” Zoro admits with a shrug. “So I guess it’s good enough for me.”

“I’ll take it,” Sanji says. “So come help me with the lines and we’ll see if this works.”

*****
They watch the lines for over an hour without anything happening. Given how long they’d already been at it before this, Sanji’s just about to declare he may as well go get a meal started when he sees something move out of the corner of his eye.

It’s not the lines, it’s too far out for that, but there’s something rippling under the surface of the water. Even better, it’s on the side of the ship that’s closer to the rock wall, meaning whatever it is may have come from that direction.

Ignoring the questioning noise Zoro lets out when he stands, he heads for the section of the railing that’s directly across from the ripple. He keeps his gaze locked on where the water is moving, shifting excitedly when something breaks through the surface.

“There,” he exclaims, pointing. “Do you see it? It’s too far away to be sure, but I think it might be a school, or at least part of one.”

“Could be,” Zoro says from where he’s now standing at Sanji’s elbow. “Your eyesight’s better than mine.”

“Yes, it comes from me not being an idiot who didn’t think to dodge when Mihawk was coming at him,” Sanji mutters haphazardly, the bulk of his attention still focused on the swirling water. “I don’t know what you thought was going to happen. It’s not like the man had ever pulled his punches with you before.”

“Is rehashing me losing my eye for the thousandth time really what you want to be doing right now?” Zoro complains. “It was over a decade ago, Curls. You really need to let it go.”

“I don’t have to do anything I don’t want to do,” Sanji replies by rote. “However, lucky for you, I have more important things to worry about right now. If there’s multiple fish over there, it’s our most likely entry point. We need to get closer.”

“We could use the dinghy?” Zoro suggests, referencing the smaller vessel that’s still attached to their larger one. “It’d let us get in pretty much right up against the wall.”

“That … could work,” Sanji allows after a couple moments spent considering the idea. “Alright, let’s try it.”

It doesn’t take them long to get the dinghy properly situated, and Zoro quickly takes the oars the same way he had the night they’d started this journey together. He guides them carefully over to the spot where the fish have chosen to gather, while Sanji sits in the prow to tell him when to stop.

“I think we’re as good as we’re going to get,” Sanji finally announces. The rock wall is now close enough that he could probably lean out and touch it if he tried, but currently his attention is focused on scanning the water for any new signs of fish.

“Curls, look.”

Zoro’s voice effectively snaps him out of his reverie, and when he risks a glance over at the other man, he finds him staring at a fixed point on the wall. Following his gaze, he too quickly spots what had snared the swordsman’s attention.

There’s a hairline crack in the rock, sitting right at water level. Below it, however, the water is clear enough to show that the crack widens past the surface, spreading out until it’s almost the width of a fist.

As Sanji watches a fish - another Goa Sea Trout no less - wriggles its way out of it, struggling the last of the way through until it’s free and goes zipping past the front of the dinghy. “This is it,” he breathes. “This has got to be it.”

Rocking back and forth in his seat a bit, he tries considering the crack from a couple of different angles. Then he twists to look at Zoro. “How much room do you need to manoeuvre?” He asks. “To cut it open, I mean?”

“You want me to do it right now?” Zoro asks, looking surprised when Sanji nods. “It’d make more sense for me to do it back on the ship. It’s more stable than the dinghy, so I can balance better.”

They’re so close to something, Sanji can feel it, and it almost makes him press the issue. Zoro’s right, however, and it’s more important that they do this properly than not at all. Nodding to show his agreement, he watches as Zoro reaches for the oars and begins to steer them back to the ship.

“Are you okay to take the helm?” Zoro asks once they’re safely back onboard. “You’ve seen me use it enough by now that I figure you should be okay on your own.”

“Well, I’m no Jinbe,” Sanji allows, briefly glancing at the wheel before turning back to his companion. “But if you can do it, I’m sure I can. Go show that wall what your swords are made of.”

“If you insist,” Zoro says. “Although I think it’ll be sword singular in this case. I want as much control as I can possibly maintain.”

Nodding to show he’s heard, Sanji watches as the other man strides up to the prow of the ship, which is now pointed directly at the space where the crack is located. He’s unsurprised when Zoro then draws Wado from her sheathe, well aware she’s the swordsman’s most trustworthy blade.

He feels it as Zoro’s haki flares, but is startled to note its observation, as opposed to armament. Then he realizes it’s because Zoro’s carefully prodding along the recesses of the rock wall, mapping it out as best as he’s able.

The cuts when he starts to move are the most precise Sanji’s ever seen from him. Slash after slash, slice after slice, he meticulously carves out a trench in the wall, one just wide enough for the ship to slip through.

It’s slow going, both because the rock is as thick as Sanji had imagined, but also because Zoro refuses to rush what he’s doing. Piece by piece, however, he slowly creates a path for them to follow, and Sanji suits action to words by placing his hand on the wheel.

The ship moves forward as if guided by some unknown force, miraculously not scraping her hull against the rocks despite the tight quarters. Up above them a few confused seabirds are now circling, their occasional cries mixing with the sound of severed slabs of rock falling into the water.

Pulling his gaze from the wheel for a moment, Sanji lets it shift to where Zoro’s now gone still at the front of the ship. Wado rests easy in his hand, the tip of her blade tilted down towards the deck, and the swordsman’s shoulders are heaving with exertion.

“Are you through?” Sanji calls from his place at the wheel. “Because we’re not going to be able to turn around if you’re not.”

Zoro doesn’t answer him with words. Instead, he flicks Wado a few times, and then slips her carefully back into the scabbard on his hip. After that he turns and comes loping back over to Sanji.

“Let me take that,” he says, nodding at the helm and stretching out a hand at the same time. “You should be the first one to see it when we cross over.”

Sanji balks at the suggestion, his hands tensing on the wheel rather than releasing their grip. “We - we still don’t know what’s on the other side,” he says weakly. “There’s no guarantee that it’s - that it’s - ”

Rough yet familiar fingers curl around his own, gently prying the wheel out of his hold. “There’s no guarantee, you’re right,” Zoro admits when Sanji blinks at him, “but I’ll be damned if I’m going to take this from you.”

“Go on,” he adds softly. “Go see your ocean.”

*****
Sanji’s thoughts are racing as he stumbles over the deck, nearly tripping over himself in his rush to get to the front of the ship. There’s no telling if they’ve actually managed to find the All Blue, not until he goes to look, but the thought of getting his hopes up, only to have them dashed, makes him want to be sick.

His right foot snags on a coil of rope, and he has to catch himself before he winds up spilling across the deck. Taking a deep breath, he steadies himself for a moment, uttering a stern admonishment to get it together.

Unbidden, his free hand trails along his chest until he can wrap it around the brooch sitting there. His fingers trace over the jewel - the colour he’d always imagined the water of the All Blue to be - and then down along the smooth surface of the earring.

He remembers the first time he’d put it on. He’d gone to have the ear pierced professionally on an island they’d stopped at - Chopper’s dire warnings about infections fresh in his mind. He’d been told to wear a stud for the first few days while the puncture healed, but he’d traded that out for the real thing as soon as possible.

Or rather, he’d made Zoro do it for him. Never mind the fact that he’d been perfectly capable of doing it himself, he’d gone to find the swordsman in the crow’s nest, and had kicked him imperiously until he’d done as he was told. Zoro had been oddly reluctant at first, but then …

“I’m not hurting you, am I?”

“You think I wouldn’t rub it in your face if you were?”

“Fair enough. … Do you like it?”

“ … I love it almost as much as I love you.”

Those words are accompanied by a rush of feeling, the same rush of feeling he’d experienced when Zoro had carefully slid the earring into place, his hands moving with a previously unknown level of gentleness as he’d set everything to rights.

Suddenly overcome, Sanji lurches forward until he can grab the railing at the front of the ship. At the exact same time, the ship clears the rock wall, and he gasps like all the air has been punched out of his lungs.

Blue. There’s nothing but blue as far as the eye can see. Fathoms of sparkling water spread out before them, while above them more gulls have come to soar over the ship, their harsh cries acting out a bizarre symphony when compared to the momentousness of the occasion.

Gasping again, he leans over the railing, stretching as far as he can without toppling over the side. For a moment he thinks he might be too high up to see anything, but then he blinks, the action causing his abnormally blurry vision to clear and it’s now that he sees the ocean around them is teeming with life.

There’s fish, so many fish. They come in every size, shape, and colour. Some of them are swimming in schools, while others are happily trundling along on their own. There are too many species for him to count, and a couple he’s not sure he can even identify.

And, of course, it doesn’t end there. Fish may seem to have the highest numbers, but he can see eels and crabs and all other manner of creatures scooting around among the rocks. He imagines that the sea bed is equally full of life, the likes of which he’s only dreamed of.

“Curls? Sanji? You still with me there?”

Turning at the sound of his name, Sanji finds Zoro standing a bit below him, his own face creased with hope. “What is it?” He asks once he has Sanji’s attention on him. “What do you see?”

One hand still clamped around the railing to keep him upright, Sanji lets out a shuddering breath and raises the other to cover his mouth. Something other than words is trying to force its way out through his lips, and he feels overwhelmed in the face of its power.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay.” Scrambling the rest of the way over the deck, Zoro comes to a halt right in front of Sanji, both his hands hovering like he doesn’t know what to do with them. “Talk to me gorgeous, what’s going on?”

Sanji lets out a forceful expulsion of air, the likes of which he normally makes when he’s gotten punched in the stomach. Then, horrifically, he starts to sob.

“You - you only call me that when you want something, you bastard,” he chokes, tears starting to stream down his face. “Would it kill you not to be so underhanded when I’m in a delicate state?”

Zoro’s eye widens. His mouth drops open, and the hands that haven’t known what to do with themselves suddenly curve around Sanji’s face. “Curls,” he rasps, his voice as thick as Sanji’s had been. “Is that you in there?”

Sanji’s pretty sure every emotion he’s ever felt is bubbling in his chest, each of them trying to get ahead of the other in an attempt to be the first one to make it to the surface. In the end, though, it was never any question which one was going to be first.

“Yeah, Moss,” he whispers, a rush of love wonder delight adore flooding through him. Taking one of Zoro’s hands in his own, he pulls it back just far enough that he can press a kiss to the swordsman’s palm. “It’s me.”

Zoro groans like he’s in pain, but he’s surging forward before Sanji can ask him what’s wrong. Rough hands grab him by the waist, shoving him backwards until he hits the railing, and then Zoro’s mouth is on his, kissing him like he’s starving for it, like he’s drowning, and Sanji’s the only thing that could possibly save him.

For his part, Sanji gives as good as he gets. Fisting his hands in the back of Zoro’s coat, he clings to the man like there’s a chance he might vanish if he dares to let go. He then meets the kiss head on, getting lost in the heady rush of heat and desire that courses through him.

“I knew it. I knew it. I knew you could do it,” Zoro murmurs when the need for air finally forces them apart. He pulls back just far enough to let them breathe, their foreheads pressed together as they pant against each other. “I knew you were still in there.”

“I - ” Sanji shudders, not sure what he’s trying to say. “I never wanted to leave,” he finally manages to get out. “But I was terrified of what I was becoming, and I was losing hope.”

“I should have had more faith, though,” he murmurs, tangling one hand in Zoro’s hair while the other trails through his earrings. “I should have been more like you, my stubborn, stubborn brute who refused to take no for an answer.”

“You did this,” he says, tilting Zoro’s head forward so that he can press a kiss to the centre of his forehead. “You never gave up hope, and you chased a legendary ocean when I couldn’t anymore.”

“‘Course I did,” Zoro mutters, a red flush spreading across the bridge of his nose. Sanji knows from experience that it’ll also be gliding down the back of his neck as well, all the way to the collar of his shirt. “I needed it to make you come to your senses.”

Sanji shakes his head. “It wasn’t the ocean,” he says in response to Zoro’s unasked question, certain of that much. “It was how far you were willing to go for me.”

He feels it everywhere when Zoro shudders against him. “There’s nowhere I wouldn’t go for you,” he says, shoving his face in the crook of Sanji’s neck and inhaling deeply. “And nothing I wouldn’t do if I thought it would help.”

“I know,” Sanji says, kissing his temple as he continues to be assaulted by feelings he hasn’t experienced in years. It should be overwhelming to the point of being uncomfortable. Instead it feels like coming home. “I know, darling. What I don’t know is what I did to deserve that.”

Zoro huffs out an annoyed noise and pulls his face free from Sanji’s throat. “You’re you,” he says like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “My you.”

“That … doesn’t even make sense grammatically, let alone generally,” Sanji says, laughing when Zoro makes an exasperated face. “I know,” he says, brushing a lock of hair out of the other man’s eye and smoothing it down with a gentle hand. “I’m a pedantic asshole. I’m sorry.”

“I’m not,” Zoro says, his voice turning solemn. “Five years ago, I’d have given anything to hear you insult me again. At least it would have meant you cared enough to bother.”

Sanji feels his face soften, and he continues stroking his hand through Zoro’s hair, marveling at how soft the strands feel against his skin. “Poor love,” he croons. “I really have put you through a terrible time, haven’t I?”

“Don’t say it’s fine,” he adds when Zoro immediately opens his mouth. “It’s not, and we both know it. I should have listened to you and at least exhausted all our options before I ran. I should have learned my lesson after Whole Cake Island.”

“I’m going to make it up to you,” he concludes firmly. “Even if it takes me the rest of our lives to do it. After all, look at how far you went to get me back.”

Letting his voice trail off, he uncurls one arm from around Zoro’s neck and gestures expansively with it. The sweeping motion encapsulates the glittering ocean vista, and Zoro sucks in a gratifying breath as he finally turns his attention to their surroundings.

“We really did it,” he says, sounding faint. “We actually found the damn thing.”

“That we did,” Sanji agrees, a laugh crawling its way up his throat until it can slip free. “Please tell me we have time to explore a bit before we turn around.”

“Are you kidding?” Giving him an incredulous look, Zoro shakes his head like he can’t believe Sanji would say something so stupid. “Not only are we going to explore, I think you should get a closer look.”

Sanji opens his mouth to ask what’s that supposed to mean, but he’s already toppling over the railing, courtesy of Zoro’s helpful shove, before he can get the words out.

He hits the water with a resounding splash, his momentum carrying him all the way under as he tries to get his bearings back. Finally managing to orient himself towards the surface, he pushes upwards with a powerful kick, sucking in huge lungfuls of air when his head comes out of the water.

“Damnit, Marimo!” He shouts, shaking a fist in the direction of the ship while he futilely tries to wipe the water out of his eyes with his free hand. “You couldn’t have given me a little warning? I’m still fully dressed, for crying out loud!”

He’s expected to hear laughter from up above him, but what he actually gets is the sound of running feet, followed by the torrential swoosh of another body cannonballing into the water not far from him. Shoving wet hair out of his eye, he turns to the splash just in time to see Zoro breach the surface.

“It’s warm,” is the first thing the swordsman says, sounding surprised. “I’d have expected it to be colder than this.”

“It might be in some areas,” Sanji replies, his thoughts turning to the fact that different fish need different temperatures to survive. “It probably depends on what area of it we’re in. The South and West Blues are notoriously warmer than the others, maybe one of them is feeding this spot.”

“Maybe,” Zoro says, but in the tone that Sanji recognizes as him humoring him. “I guess anything’s possible in a place where all four Blues and the Grand Line meet.”

“Yeah,” Sanji says, a giddy feeling washing over him and making him send a splash of water in Zoro’s direction. “The All Blue, Moss!” He says, throwing his head back in delight as he treads water to keep himself afloat. “We found it!”

His own treading having taken him back over to the side of the boat, Zoro grasps the side of the hull with his left hand, while extending his right towards Sanji. “That we did,” he agrees, using his hold to tug Sanji over to him once he’s grabbed him.

Overcome, Sanji wraps his arms back around Zoro’s neck, allowing the swordsman’s hold on the hull to keep them in place. “This is amazing,” he crows, kicking his feet when he feels fish swirl around them.

“Yeah. It is.” Zoro says softly, and when Sanji looks at him he finds that the only thing the other man is looking at is him.

“Sappy, Moss,” Sanji says, immediately feeling his stomach dip. “You really missed me that much?”

In answer, Zoro leans in for another kiss, heedless of the difficulties presented by their awkward position. He once again kisses Sanji like he’s desperate for it, like he’ll die if he’s forced to go one second longer without.

“What do you think?” He asks, his voice rough when he pulls back.

Sanji thinks he’s feeling a little faint if he’s being honest, but he also has an idea of where to start piecing them back together again. Unhooking one of his arms from around Zoro’s neck, he shoves it in the water and roots around until he locates the other man’s right arm.

Gripping the limb by the wrist, Sanji tugs it upwards until it’s out of the water and the gold band that sits on his pinkie is shimmering in the sunlight. “I think,” he says firmly, “that you should put this back where it belongs. The earring too,” he adds as an afterthought. “Provided the scarring will allow it to be pierced again, that is.”

Zoro makes a choking noise, but he’s already nodding by the time Sanji’s finished speaking. “Sure,” he says raggedly. “Sure, I can do that. Although, we should probably wait until we’re back on the ship again so we don’t risk losing it.”

“ … that’s fair,” Sanji allows, shaking as he’s gifted with a horrifying vision of the ring slipping through both their fingers as they try to exchange it. “Until then, can I convince you to swim with me for a bit?”

“Like you even have to ask.”

*****
“You know,” Sanji says when he emerges from the cabin a while later, dressed in dry clothes and using a towel to try and squeeze more water out of his hair. “You never did tell me what your plan was for after we found this place. Are we just supposed to stay here forever and no one else will ever know?”

Having propped himself up against a couple of crates while Sanji was busy in the washroom, Zoro stretches languidly and then climbs to his feet. Scratching absently at his chest as he wanders over to where Sanji is standing, he shoves his way into the other man’s personal space until Sanji swats at him with his towel.

“Rude,” he says without any heat in it. “Also, are you crazy? Do you really think Luffy and the others would be okay with something like that? I left a vivre card with them so they’d be able to track me down.”

“That’s … not a terrible plan,” Sanji allows once he’s taking a moment to think about it. “How are they supposed to know when to come looking, though? The vivre card won’t tell them anything’s happening unless you get hurt.”

“Well, I guess you could always try and kick my ass if you like,” Zoro suggests, snickering when Sanji thwacks him with the towel again. “Relax, Curls, I’ve got it under control. Or did you forget that Franky built this rig?”

“Seeing as I’m not an idiot and you’re told me so at least a dozen times, no, I haven’t forgotten,” Sanji says flatly. As done with the towel as he can be, he slings it over his shoulders and grips each end in his hands, pinning Zoro with a look. “I’m afraid that doesn’t answer my question, however.”

“Sure it does,” Zoro says, palming Sanji’s hip briefly before stepping away from him entirely. He then starts heading in the direction of the helm, motioning for Sanji to follow him as he goes.

“It’s a steering wheel, Marimo,” Sanji says dryly when they both come to a stop in front of it. “Exactly what else am I supposed to be seeing here?”

In answer, Zoro drops into a crouch and starts fiddling with the plate that covers the centre of said wheel. “What you’re supposed be seeing,” he says slowly, most of his attention focused on whatever it is that his hands are doing, “is our way to call home.”

There’s a faint click as the plate twists to where Zoro wants it, and the swordsman lets out a triumphant noise. He then slips the plate all the way off, leaving a single red button exposed behind.

“Is that - ?” Sanji starts, and Zoro nods.

“It’s a homing beacon,” he confirms, brushing a finger over the button but not yet pressing down. “Franky and Usopp rigged it up so I’d have a way for them to know to come get me, no matter how this played out.”

Sanji’s not expecting the surge of relief that floods through him, but he’s even less expecting the source. As good as it is to know that the crew has a way of tracking them down, he’s even more pleased to know that Zoro wouldn’t have been trapped out here alone if the situation hadn’t gone the way he’d hoped.

Clearing his throat, he meets the other man’s eye, reasonably certain he can tell what Sanji’s thinking. Not wanting to get into it, though, he therefore nudges him lightly in the shoulder.

“Then what are you waiting for?” He asks. “Let’s get them out here.”

*****
Epilogue

Sanji’s in the process of getting dressed for the day when it happens.

He’s standing in the cramped washroom, having gotten distracted while he was running a comb through his hair. Over the past several weeks his natural blond roots have started returning, and, much like he had when Zoro had noticed that his eyebrows had returned to their original position, he finds himself fascinated by the flecks of gold.

That’s why he’s standing frozen in front of the mirror, still half-dressed as he prods at his hair, when he hears the sound of a commotion out on deck. Concerned, he hurries through the rest of pulling his clothes on, and then ducks out of the bathroom.

Once there’s only one door between him and the outside world, he starts being able to make out the sound of voices. Furthermore, they’re not just any voices, but rather ones he knows as easily as he does his own thanks to his returned memories.

Hurrying forward, he grabs for the door of the cabin. He pulls it open, just as a number of bodies come spilling onto the deck.

“Zoro, oh god, Zoro! You’re here! We found you! How are you, buddy? Did it - did everything go okay?”

Impressively, Usopp’s been the first to make it over from the Sunny. He’s now standing directly in front of Zoro with his hands braced on either of the swordsman’s shoulders as he peers nervously at his face.

“Come on, big guy,” he’s saying now. “You can tell us the truth. We’re here from you. If - if things didn’t go the way we were hoping, we’ll get you through this.”

“ … thanks,” Zoro says after a moment, and his expression is such that Sanji can’t help but start laughing.

It’s like he’s done the equivalent of detonating a bomb in the middle of a room. Usopp’s head snaps around with the rest of his body following, while a number of voices start shouting over each other.

“Sanji!”

“Sanji!”

“Cook-Bro!”

“Oh god, you’re here! You’re really here!”

“And you look well, thank goodness!”

Sanji has just enough time to brace himself as Usopp, Chopper, and Brook all slam into him. A few seconds after that he finds himself lifted off his feet as a sobbing Franky follows suit and grabs them all up in a bear hug. Everything dissolves into a mess of joyful shouts and crushing embraces, such that he can barely get a word in edgewise.

“It’s nice to see all of you too,” he finally manages to gasp. He’s having a bit of trouble breathing thanks to the way Nami is clinging to his neck and Chopper’s jumping up and down on his shoulders, but he likewise can’t bring himself to be upset about it. “How was your trip out?”

“How was our trip out, he asks!” Usopp scoffs, waving both his hands in excitement. “As if we didn’t spend the entire way here terrified of what we were going to find. It was nerve wracking, you ass, that’s how it was!”

“Not for all of us,” Robin says simply, and when Sanji glances at her, he finds that her attention is focused on the outskirts of the dog pile.

Following her gaze, he first spots Zoro near one of the railings. The swordsman is standing with his arms crossed over his chest and a smug grin on his face, like he’d never had any doubt that this tension would come to pass. It’s the man who’s standing next to him, however, who truly grabs Sanji’s attention.

Swallowing heavily, Sanji meets a pair of dark eyes with his own, unsurprised when they crinkle at the corners thanks to the beaming smile their owner gives him.

“Hey, Captain,” he says roughly. “It’s good to see you.”

“Shishishi, good to see you too!” Luffy exclaims, pumping a celebratory fist in the air. “You look great!”

“Do I?” Sanji asks, honestly surprised. “I’ve still got some Germa in me, so I’m not sure that’s a fair thing to say.”

Luffy scoffs dismissively. “You’re Sanji however you look,” he insists, his flipflops slapping against the deck as he moves to cross the distance between them. “You’ll always be Sanji.”

“I wasn’t, though,” Sanji feels the need to point out with a shake of his head. “For a long time I was … one of them, and I couldn’t stop it. I wouldn’t have been able to stop it if you lot hadn’t done what you did.”

“You’re lucky this worked,” he adds quietly. “There was no guarantee it would turn out the way you’d hoped.”

“Please,” Luffy’s close enough now that he can touch Sanji without needing to use his powers, and he leans in close to lightly bonk their foreheads together. “Do you honestly think I’d have let Zoro do this all alone if I didn’t think it was going to work?”

“I … no, I guess not,” Sanji admits after a moment’s pause, “but thinking it was going to work, or even hoping, are very different from knowing it would. You took a chance, Luffy. A big one.”

“Because he’s never done that before where one of the crew was concerned,” Zoro says from where he’s now drawing in to complete the group huddle. “He definitely hasn’t been doing that from the very beginning now, has he?”

“I - ” Whatever protest Sanji might have been about to come up with dies on his tongue when he meets the swordsman’s eye. “Fair enough,” he says instead. “I guess I should stop being surprised at this point.”

“Hell yeah, you should!” Luffy cackles, thumping him on the back with a heavy hand. Sanji can’t be sure, but he thinks the younger man has grown since he’d seen him last. “That’s not important now, though. What do you say, do you want to show us your ocean now that you found it?”

“It’s not my - ” Sanji starts to say, but again the words die off before he can finish his sentence. Shrugging weakly, he doesn’t bother to try and fight the grin that’s spreading across his face. “Yes,” he corrects. “I want to show you the All Blue.”

“Awesome! And then you’ll cook us a feast, right?”

“Luffy!”

Several people begin scolding the fabled king of the pirates, Nami and Jinbe chief among them. The noise quickly devolves into the kind of riotous chaos that Sanji’s memories tell him are so frequent among the crew, and he finds himself laughing helplessly in the face of it all.

He does startle, however, when an arm wraps unexpectedly around his waist. Twisting around, he finds Zoro watching him with a fond look on his face, rather than paying attention to the antics of their friends.

“You good, Curls?” He asks, and Sanji nods, the earring that’s now hanging from his left ear bobbing with the motion.

“I’m great, Marimo.” He says. “Absolutely perfect, in fact.”