Chapter Text
Extended separation can change how a cat responds to familiar company. Allow the animal to make the first approach.
Sanji had already been annoyed to find out that Zoro managed to make it back to Sabaody before any of them, and even managed to find Shakky’s Rip-Off bar.
He was both unsurprised and, irritatingly, impressed to learn that Zoro had boarded the wrong ship from a troubled fisherman. Two years had apparently done nothing to help that navigation problem of his; if anything, it had gotten worse. He looked at the water, watching where the fisherman indicated the pirate ship had gone down.
“No, it’s all right. Don’t worry.” Sanji spared a glance at the fisherman, hoping to assure him that he hadn’t inadvertently sent the mosshead to his doom. As if on cue, he turned his attention back to the water in time for the pieces of a destroyed ship to emerge from the water. The pirates were jumping off the ship before it started to sink again, cursing someone as they went. Sanji scanned the ship and found what he was looking for: a green-haired, green-eared idiot resheathing a sword on the ship’s mast. He closed his eyes, sighing, and pulled out a cigarette while he waited.
Zoro hopped down from the mast, landing in front of him with the damned impossible grace no one should have after jumping from that height, and shook the water off himself, bringing his hand up to try and slick the water off the green fur on his pointed ears. “I got on the wrong ship…” He muttered, his other hand joining the effort to try and free both ears of water quickly.
Sanji grimaced as he lit his cigarette, avoiding the droplets of water being thrown everywhere. “No kidding.”
Zoro wrinkled his nose as he finished getting the water away from his ears and sniffed the air before turning his attention to Sanji, eye narrowing as he leaned in closer. Oh. That was something new. Sanji noted the missing left eye for later. There was a more pressing issue. “Back off, Mosshead!” He moved his hand to Zoro’s face, the tips of Zoro’s fangs pressing into his palm as he pushed his face to the side.
Zoro’s hand immediately came up, his palm pushing back against Sanji’s own face to push in the opposite direction. “I wasn’t doing anything, shitty cook!”
“Like hell you weren’t, with your sniffing bullshit again! I’m smoking. Deal with it! I need it to deal with your algae-brained crap!” Sanji shoved again and then pivoted to the side, letting Zoro fall forward. Zoro stumbled for a step before he caught himself, going upright again. “Now stop wasting time and let’s go.”
“Tch.” Zoro clicked his tongue, turning back toward the water, forearm resting on his swords. “I want to go fishing.”
“Absolutely not!” Sanji yelled, grabbing Zoro by the back of his collar and steering him towards the market. “That is exactly how you ended up on the wrong ship. I’m not letting you go wandering off again.”
“Number seven sure has a lot of nerve trying to tell number one what to do.” Zoro smirked as he stepped backwards, keeping up with Sanji’s pull on his shirt.
Sanji stopped. Zoro nearly walked into him before Sanji released his collar and turned around.
“Number one?” Sanji repeated, a shadow falling over his eyes that Zoro gleefully ignored.
“First one back.” His smirk widened, showing the edge of one sharp fang. “You were seventh.”
Sanji bit down on the cigarette filter in his mouth sharply. Of course the mosshead knew. Worse, he had been waiting for an opportunity to use it and Sanji had walked right into it. “You got here first by accident, you directionally-challenged algae-infested idiot! You probably left wherever you were six months ago and only found this island through divine intervention!”
“Still got here first.” Zoro grinned, like he deserved some kind of prize for accidental competence.
“And then immediately got on another crew’s ship!” Sanji stepped forward, spitting the cigarette to his feet and stomping it out as he did.
Zoro stepped forward himself, stopping with barely an inch between them. “Still counts as getting here first. I was here for days. What were you doing, Number Seven?”
“Some of us were making better use of our time than accounting for basic functional capacity, Number One!” Sanji bit back. Their foreheads hit. For a half second, neither moved, each pushing stubbornly forward against the other. Sanji suddenly snapped his leg up at the same time Zoro jumped back, drawing Kitetsu and Shusui in time to block the blow.
Sanji knew he had gotten stronger, so common sense would dictate that Zoro had as well. The lack of give from the swords as his leg collided with them told him how much. The way Zoro’s eye narrowed and then lit up told Sanji the moss-infested moron had reached the same conclusion.
“Not bad, shitty cook.” Oh, that bastard.
“You didn’t get any worse, Marimo.” Sanji moved his hands into his pockets, taking a more casual position as Zoro put his swords away. “Now come help me carry supplies. The rest of the crew will be here soon and we have to get the ship ready.” He didn’t say anything further, turning to head to the market. He could hear the footsteps approaching until Zoro fell in line with him.
The floating bubbles were an amazing feature in Sabaody, and Sanji made good use of them for transporting the supplies by letting them float above them like a bundle of balloons. The simplicity of the task might have been dangerously mundane for Zoro if the very strings Sanji was holding didn’t keep catching his attention. Sanji kept the swordsman in the corner of his eye anyway, as he stopped at the next stand. He slapped at another mosquito on his neck as he did.
“Oh, you look like you’re in need of some insect repellant.” The woman working the stand gave him a smile. “We don’t sell it, but they have some two stands down.”
Sanji’s irritation from the bug disappeared as quickly as it had come. “Thank you, my lovely lady. You may have just saved my life.”
The woman laughed and Sanji felt his heart soar hearing it. “I don’t know about that. But they can be pretty annoying.”
Sanji leaned closer to inspect the stand. “It would be criminal for me to take such excellent advice from a beautiful woman without returning the favor.” He reached for his wallet. Behind him, just inside his periphery, one of Zoro’s ears flicked.
Sanji ignored it.
The woman pointed out a few things she had for sale, and Sanji found a seasoning he could use in the galley, adding it to the bubbles floating overhead after she wrapped it for him. He smiled at her all the while. The second ear joined the first, and Sanji didn’t need to see them to know they were falling flat back against that mossy head. The marimo had been making that same face since the Baratie. Two years and he still hadn’t learned basic courtesy towards women.
“Thank you again, my dear.” Sanji tucked his wallet away.
“Of course. Remember, it’s two stands down, on your left.”
“As if I could ever forget advice from you.” Sanji gave her a wink before turning to leave. “Come on, Mosshead.”
Zoro made a low, disgruntled noise before turning to follow him. “Do you have to do that with every woman?”
Sanji waved his free hand, dismissing the question as they walked. “Someday you’ll learn how to treat women with the respect they deserve, Number One. Until then, the rest of us with a sense of chivalry will have to pick up your slack.”
“Tch.”
Sanji smirked as he heard the defeated dismissal and continued on to the suggested stand.
Behind him, Zoro’s footsteps disappeared.
Sanji closed his eyes. “Mosshead…” He muttered under his breath, before opening his eyes again. He continued on his way to the stand. One more bug bite and he was going to murder every man on the street from the irritation. He’d get the repellant and then waste the rest of his afternoon looking for the damned algae.
He got to the stand and looked it over. “I was told there’s insect repellant here?” He pulled his wallet out again.
“Oh yeah.” The man running the stand pointed. “It’s those bottles there. Nepeta oil. 300 beri for a bottle.”
Sanji nodded and handed over the money. He put his wallet away, picked up a bottle and sprayed it quickly on his hands and neck.
“Oh, you know the bugs can bite through clothes. Just do a quick once over and you’ll be good.” The man told him before turning to another customer. Sanji did as directed, putting the bottle in his pocket. Already starting to think about which way Zoro could have gone, Sanji turned back to the market.
Zoro was one stand over, at the stand Sanji had passed when the footsteps disappeared, holding a bottle of sake up to the light.
“Are you kidding me.”
“They have the good stuff.” Zoro didn’t look away from the bottle. “Cheap, too. I even have enough for it. Bring one of those bubbles over here.”
Sanji almost let go of all the balloons just to claim Zoro did it. Then he wouldn’t have sake money after Nami wringed every last beri from him. But he was the responsible one, so instead, he tugged the strings behind him and made his way back to the sake stand.
“You disappeared you shit-for-brains algae stain, and I bought bug spray and made a plan to waste my whole afternoon looking for your dumbass and everything.” Sanji scowled as he pulled the bundle low enough for Zoro to add the two bottles he had purchased. “One whole stand to get lost. That’s a new record for you.”
“I wasn’t lost. I was here the whole time.” Zoro added a third bottle. “You kept walking past me.”
Sanji refused to acknowledge the validity of that statement. Instead, he waited for Zoro to finish and then grabbed his collar, pulling Zoro to continue their trek through the market.
“Come on. We can get some fish since you were so keen on-” Sanji stopped when Zoro didn’t move with him. There was no give in it; none of the automatic step back, not even any complaints. Sanji’s body committed to the action and there had been nothing on the other end of it.
Behind him, Zoro was still, not even the usual flick of an ear. Sanji started to turn towards him, but the den den mushi ringing in his jacket pocket stopped him. He let go of Zoro’s collar, using the free hand to answer.
“Sanji!” Franky’s voice came over the receiver. “We’re moving the Sunny to Grove 42. Meet us there, now!” An explosion could be heard in the background.
“Right, we’ll be there.” Sanji hung up, putting the receiver back. “Come on, Mosshead. It’s time to go!” He turned back to Zoro, just in time to see him shaking his head in a jerky motion before settling back to his usual demeanor.
“Right, let’s go, Curlybrow.”