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Sanji is drunk. Not just pleasantly buzzed, or the warm around the edges kind —he is properly, gloriously, recklessly drunk. His legs carried him more like loose rope than bone, and every chandelier in the hotel shimmered twice as bright as it should have. He laughed louder than usual, grinned sharper, leaned into every compliment like it was sunlight.
It had been that kind of night.
The bar downstairs had been gaudy and loud, but it hadn’t mattered. With Nami at his side, every bartender was charmed, every bill miraculously shrank. Vivi’s laugh had turned heads all night, soft and golden, and Usopp—poor Usopp—had tripped over himself half the evening trying to impress people who probably hadn’t even been listening. Sanji, though? He had been stared at, approached plenty , flirted with. Men, women, couples—it hadn’t mattered. He’d soaked it all up until the liquor blurred faces faces and voices together into one endless, flattering haze.
They all felt flattered, really, but the truth was they hadn’t come out tonight for strangers. They’d come here together—to laugh too loud, drink too much, and celebrate something that actually mattered and that was Nami and Vivi’s engagement. Sanji had been approached more times than he could count, with polite hands brushing his arm, voices tried to coaxing him toward quieter corners of the bar. Normally, he would have followed in the attention, but tonight he turned every offer down with a smile and a shake of his head. Not because he didn’t enjoy being wanted—he always did—but because nothing felt more important than staying at that table, raising glass after glass with his friends, and watching the way Nami and Vivi couldn’t stop stealing glances at each other, their matching rings glinting in the low light.
Now as they stumbled through the carpeted hallway toward their rooms to continue their celebration there , a pack of half-broken stars glittering too loudly for the hour.
“Wait—wait, wait, wait—mirror!” Nami’s voice sliced through their laughter. She was already tugging Vivi toward the long stretch of reflective glass mounted across the wall. Gilded in cheap gold, the thing looked like it belonged in a palace ballroom or a nightclub bathroom, not in a half-decent hotel corridor.
Vivi with her cheeks flushed from the alcohol, giggled and obeyed. Usopp groaned but shuffled over anyway.
Sanji caught sight of the mirror and immediately tilted his chin, adjusted his shoulders, slipped into a pose as though it were second nature. With Jacket half-off, collar open, hair falling artfully across his face—he looked, even through the dizzy haze, like someone born for glossy magazine spreads. The carpet wobbled beneath him, but he held still long enough for Nami to line up the shot.
“Closer!” she ordered, yanking his sleeve until he bumped into Vivi, who squeaked and tried to hold her balance. Usopp threw up a peace sign, managed to smack Vivi in the eye, and the whole group dissolved into laughter.
Flash. Another. Another.
“Sanji, stop posing like it’s Vogue,” Nami complained, grinning despite herself.
He smirked at the mirror, intoxicated by his own reflection. Blond hair, flushed cheeks, blue eyes glassy but bright. His jacket framed his waist perfectly even if the sleeves were borrowed and too short. He looked dangerous, maybe beautiful. It was hard to tell through the fuzz in his head.
He leaned back against the wall for one last pose.
And the wall gave way.
It swung, smoothly and silently , and his weight toppled him backward before he even realized.
“Sanji!” Nami’s voice rang out, sharp with panic.
But his balance had already betrayed him. His shoulder clipped the frame, his knee twisted, and in one graceless stumble he vanished through the opening.
Like if it was a hole sucked him in.
The room inside was dark, the only light spilling in from the hallway Sanji had been in just a minute ago. The air felt cooler here, heavier without the perfume and noise of the corridor. He pitched forward, bracing for carpet or mattress, anything solid, ready for the sting of an ugly landing.
Instead, he landed on warmth. On something firm but alive.
Someone.
“What the—” the thought jolted through his drunken haze, confusion twisting his face. He’d been sure he was about to smash against the floor, but the surface beneath him gave in just enough to be solid, unyielding, and yet strangely… human. His palms pressed against it, registering the shape, the warmth, the faint rise and fall.
It wasn’t carpe or any furniture he could think of now .
His cheek pressed into a chest that rose and fell with a slow, startled breath. The thrum of a heartbeat pulsed steady beneath his ear, real and grounding, and for the first time all night Sanji’s haze faltered.
His hands scrambled for purchase, palms skidding across cotton stretched taut over muscle. He blinked through the dim light, hair falling into his eyes, and froze.
When Sanji lifted his head, hair falling into his eyes, he blinked hard and froze. Lying there beneath him was a man—a broad figure stretched out on the ground, shadowed features catching just enough of the hallway’s glow to reveal a sharp jawline, a mouth set firm, and eyes now staring straight back at him.
The man beneath him wasn’t shoving him off. Or shouting - which he totally should- Just staring down at him with shadowed eyes that caught the strip of light from the door. he looked like trouble sculpted out of stillness.
Behind Sanji, at the doorway, his friends gasped. Vivi’s horrified squeak. Usopp’s choked laugh. Nami muttering something that sounded like oh my god.
Sanji didn’t move. Couldn’t. Every nerve in his body locked up, awareness crashing through the liquor haze in waves.
Of all the doors in this hotel, he had to fall through this one.
And into him.
Why that man was in the floor though?
And wait a minute is that —— green hair?
Ok man that was hot.
Zoro hated hotel beds.
Scratch that—he hated all beds.
Too soft, too high, too damn foreign. The mattress in his room had been wide enough to swallow him whole, layered with pillows that felt like suffocating clouds. He’d tried sitting on it earlier, just to humor the idea, and lasted all of two minutes before his back started aching in protest. Growing up with futons had ruined him for anything else. He needed the ground beneath him, the steady support, and the simplicity of it.
He’d hated them since the first tournament trip he’d ever taken, when he was fifteen and some well-meaning sponsor put him up in a room with a mattress that could have drowned him alive. He remembered lying stiff on it all night, shoulders aching, spine curving in ways it had no business curving, wondering how anyone could call this comfort. A futon on tatami—that was sleep. Ground under your back, steady, supportive, familiar. No sinking or floating. Just solid ground.
Now, eight years later, nothing had changed. He was twenty-three, a kendo champion, his name printed on programs and whispered by competitors in the lobby, and he was still on the damn floor. The hotel room gleamed around him with its polished furniture and glass lamps, but Zoro had claimed a patch of carpet like it was his territory, tossed the provided pillow under his head, and stretched out with his arms folded across his chest.
He should’ve been asleep like three hours ago,Tomorrow was important.
But sleep didn’t come easy, never before a match. His body thrummed with restless energy, coiled too tight even after hours of training earlier that day. He’d done his routine—stretches, shadow drills, visualization of footwork and strikes—until sweat had dried on his skin and his breathing evened out.
It wasn’t nerves, not by far . Zoro didn’t get scared of opponents. What kept him awake was the fire in his blood, the itch under his skin, the anticipation of stepping onto the floor and testing himself against someone new. What tricks would they pull? How strong were they, really? What could he do to cut through them, to push himself further than last time? The thought of it kept his body thrumming with restless energy, He’d showered, eaten, sharpened his mind the way he sharpened his blades. He’d checked every box.
And still, he was awake.
His friends had tried to drag him out. Luffy, full of boundless chaos, had insisted they celebrate early his victory, Franky had promised the best bars in the city. Robin had smiled her quiet smile and gone along, and Zoro had waved them all off. Drinking the night before a fight was a rookie mistake, and he wasn’t about to throw away months of work on a hangover. Let them waste their energy. His job was to win.
Meditation it is , even if he doesn’t get any sleep he at least has to get his mind a little rest for the night .
He exhaled slowly, eyes closed, and tried to let his muscles loosen against the floor. The air conditioner hummed softly, A door shut somewhere in the hall. Muffled laughter drifted from another room.
But boredom gnawed at him. He hated waiting. Hated stillness. The adrenaline before a match itched under his skin like fire ants, impossible to ignore.
He rolled to his side, then back again. Glared at the ceiling. Counted breaths. Nothing helped.
Laughter floated in from the hall—shuffling footsteps, muffled giggles, the hiss of a whisper followed by another burst of amusement. Zoro’s eyes narrowed. He’d been hearing it on and off all night, ever since he checked in. The damn mirror across from his room seemed to be a magnet for drunks who couldn’t resist stopping to admire themselves. Every few hours someone staggered into view, posing, snapping pictures like it was the highlight of their trip.
Did they have to do it this late?
Zoro exhaled through his nose, rolling his eyes toward the ceiling again. Annoyance prickled at the edges of his patience, but he forced himself to shut it out, to sink back into the rhythm of his breathing, into the quiet meditation that usually calmed his nerves before a match.
And then it came—a sound different from the laughter. Soft, faint, but clear enough to cut through everything else.
A click.
His brow furrowed. His door? Did he even lock the damn thing? He could never remember, always forgetting, catching hell from his sister when she found out.
Zoro’s eyes snapped open sharply . His body stilled, every muscle going alert the way they always did when something felt off. That wasn’t the hum of the air conditioner or the muffled laughter down the hall. This was closer. Too close for his liking.
His brows drew together with suspicion flickering across his face. Nobody should be coming in here. He hadn’t ordered food. His teammates had their own keys. Luffy wasn’t dumb enough to forget his room number—well, maybe he was, but Robin wasn’t. And no stranger should have access to his door.
Zoro’s mind ticked over quickly, that old fight-readiness rising under his skin. An opponent, an intruder—his hand twitched against the floor like it was reaching for a sword that wasn’t there. The silence stretched as the latch gave way, the sound of the handle turning loud in the quiet. The crack of light from the hall split across the dark room, bright and sudden.
Whoever it was, they were coming in.
He pushed himself up on an elbow just as the door swung wide. Light from the hallway spilled in, blinding after the dimness of the room.
And then something heavy crashed into him.
It wasn’t just a stumble. The weight barreled down with drunken clumsiness, knocking the air from his lungs. Making the Heat sprawled across his chest, the press of limbs and the fall of hair. For an instant, Zoro’s muscles tensed, body ready to throw off an attacker—
But then he registered what it was. Who it was.
Not an attacker. Not danger.
A man. A stranger.
No—more like a falling angel.
Blond hair spilled wild across flushed cheeks, breath warm with the sharp bite of alcohol, limbs draped over him as though the world had tipped and delivered him straight into Zoro’s arms.
In the space of a heartbeat, he was undone. Not by a strike, or the usual blade, but by this stranger’s face hovering above his own.
A slim frame pressed against him, draped over his chest like he belonged there, palms braced against muscle as if searching for balance. The stranger looked more startled than Zoro felt, as if he’d braced for cold, unyielding ground and instead found something alive.
The hallway light cut across him in a slice of gold, enough to paint out every line Zoro couldn’t look away from: the sharp angles of cheekbones, lips parted on a breath that caught in his throat, hair shadowing half his face. But it was the eyes—blue, impossibly bright, glassy with haze yet still so vivid—that nailed Zoro where he lay. Startling, ocean-deep, wild and unguarded. They hit him harder than any strike ever had.
Zoro’s breath stalled in his chest. Something in him, usually steady as stone, lurched. He had faced opponents that made his blood sing, blades that had tested him to his limit—but he had never, not once, felt undone like this by just looking.
In the space of a heartbeat, he was sick with it. Sick in love, or lust, or whatever damn thing had sunk its hook into him at the sight of this stranger who’d fallen straight into his lap.
The weight of him was real. So Deliciously Warm.
Zoro’s breath came slow and steady despite the impact, his chest rising against the man’s palms. He didn’t shove him off he isn’t sure he wants to, he was stunned to speak. So he Just stared.
His first thought was simple: What kind of idiot falls through the wrong door?
His second, quieter, harder to ignore: He’s beautiful.
For a long moment, neither of them moved. Sanji’s palms were still pressed to the stranger’s chest, the other man’s arms still resting at his sides, but their eyes were locked like the world had shrunk to nothing but this dimly lit room. Both faces burned red, breaths short, their mouths hovering close enough that a wrong twitch could’ve bridged the gap.
They didn’t notice the hallway. Or the whispers, the stifled giggles, the fact that they were being openly stared at. The rest of the world blurred out for the two of them only the dizzy space between them seemed to matter.
Then a voice cut through dry with amusement.
“Well, isn’t this a picture.”
Sanji blinked, dazed, as Nami stepped into the doorway, arms folded, eyes glinting. Of course she’d look entertained instead of scandalized—typical Nami. She’d been watching her drunk friend fall headfirst into a stranger’s room, no stranger lap , and instead of pulling him out, she was clearly savoring every second.
Sanji, half-sprawled, half-clinging, flushed even darker. The other man didn’t budge, his gaze still fixed on Sanji as if Nami weren’t even there.
Nami sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose, though her grin betrayed her. Her friend was pissed drunk, red-faced and useless, staring like he’d forgotten what words were. And the stranger? On the floor, no less? She didn’t even want to ask why.
She crouched down, tugging lightly at Sanji’s arm. “Alright, loverboy, time to get up before you make this even more embarrassing.”
Sanji muttered something incoherent in protest, leaning stubbornly on the stranger as if gravity had made its choice. Zoro’s mouth opened at the same time, as though he’d been holding something back—
“Umm… can I have your number?” he blurted with rushed words but steady. His voice was low and rough, but it rang clear.
The room froze.
From the hallway came Vivi’s scandalized whisper, “Oh my god,” followed by Usopp’s half-strangled laugh.
Sanji’s eyes widened, his flush deepening to the tips of his ears. He stammered, “Wh-what—?” even as Nami yanked him upright, half-ungluing him from the floor and the broad chest he’d landed on.
The other man pushed himself to sit, green eyes steady despite the faint pink creeping along his cheeks. He looked dangerous, Nami thought as she gave him a once-over—he has sharp jaw, built like a fighter, expression unreadable except for that spark in his gaze still trained on her friend transfixed by him . Dangerous, but the kind of dangerous Sanji always loved. Exactly his type.
Nami smirked, already plotting. She needs to do Background check, for sure. She wasn’t about to let her friend dive headfirst into trouble without knowing the details. But she wasn’t going to deny that there was something electric here, either. And for Sanji—for her idiot, hopelessly romantic, terrible-at-choosing-men friend—it might be worth the risk.
Sanji blinked at him, still flushed to the roots of his hair. For a heartbeat he looked completely lost for words, then a crooked, drunken grin tugged at his lips. “…Yeah. Sure,” he slurred, the sound more breath than voice.
Nami’s brows shot up, amusement flashing in her eyes.
Well, well. Sanji had been brushing off advances left and right all night—gracious refusals, smooth dodges, a polite wall no one could get past. Yet apparently all it took was one dramatic tumble into the lap of a dangerously handsome stranger to unravel his ironclad resistance.
She watched as her friend fumbled at his pockets as if looking for something to write with, patting himself down, then squinting in confusion when all he came up with was lint and a crumpled bar receipt. His hands shook too much to hold it anyway.
Nami groaned, dragging a hand down her face. “You’re hopeless,” she muttered, though the amusement in her tone was impossible to miss. With the air of a long-suffering saint, she plucked a tissue from her purse, scrawled a number across it in quick, neat strokes, and leaned down to press it into the man stunned hand.
“Here, big guy,” she said dryly.
The green head man stared at the tissue like it might vanish, his fingers curling around it slowly, carefully, as if it were something fragile.
Like a treasure actually
Nami’s eyes flicked over him one more time, sharp and assessing. Built like trouble. Dangerous. And still staring at Sanji like he’d hung the moon. She smirked faintly, already filing away the look for later interrogation.
Then she hooked her arm through Sanji’s, ignoring his weak protests. “Come on, Casanova. Bed. Now.”
“I wasn’t—he’s—hey, wait—” Sanji spluttered, heels dragging against the carpet, still craning his neck toward the man on the floor.
But Nami didn’t let go. She hauled him out into the hall, Vivi and Usopp dissolving into giggles as the door swung shut behind them.
Now as he was Left alone, Zoro sat frozen on the floor, the tissue clutched so tightly in his hand it crumpled at the edges. His pulse hammered in his ears, wild and unsteady, as if he’d just stepped into the first clash of a fight—except no opponent had ever hit him like this.
He stared at the closed door, breath caught in his throat, the ghost of blue eyes and a crooked smile burned into his mind. Whatever that was—fate, chance, pure drunken chaos—Zoro knew one thing for certain.
He wasn’t walking away from it.
Slowly, he lowered himself back against the carpet, his grip still tight on the scrap of tissue unrelenting. The ceiling blurred above him, but all he could see was the blond stranger, flushed and reckless, falling into his arms like the world had planned it. His lips twitched into something almost like a smile.
Sleep took its time, but when it finally came, he was still holding the number tight in his fist—dreaming of a blond man beneath him, flushed beautifully looking breathless, just as he had fallen into his arms.