Hello everyone! I have just had an incredibly crazy and strange idea. What if Tashigi gets brutally wounded and stranded at sea and is rescued by the Strawhats, but no one recognizes her but Zoro. Hummmm. How can I play this out?
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False Identity: Chapter 1. A New Name
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Today was boring.
Today the air was stifling.
Today it was foggy.
Today was a terrible day to be the strawhats' lookout, but Zoro didn't mind doing it and because when the rest of the strawhats wanted to have fun he would often be nominated as look-out because they insisted that he had nothing better to do. And he agreed with their logic, by normal standards he didn't have anything better to do, and he preferred being left up in the crows nest in peace and quiet to do his routine exorcises than being coxed into playing a dumb game his Captain might come up with on the spur of the moment.
Even though he told himself he liked this peace and quiet there was something that continued to gnaw away at the back of his mind, a fear that started to come more and more reguarly, and it was even now plaguing his dreams.
It was always about the combination of his past and future mixed. He would start having a dream about the dojo that he used to go to, it would show his progress and briefly his training, it would show his friends and collegues growing up and how he could beat them all. All but one.
Kuina was in his dreams too. However, she never died like she did in real life. She continued to grow stronger and stronger. She would continue to except his challenges and beat him.
Zoro found he really enjoyed these dreams they gave Kuina a chance to live again, even if it was only in his memory, but then they would change. He would get older. She would get older. He would be complemented and she would get scorned. He hated how her father would always introduce him first as his prized pupil, and he started to understand the pain Kuina had to be feeling for being so obviously overlooked. He wanted to her to know he understood her pain and would stand by her side if she asked him too. He wanted her to share in his successes and failings. He wanted her to smile and scowl at him. He wanted her laugh and mock the world with him. He wanted her. Yes, He wanted her. When Zoro's dream mind had started to understand this, it would instantly shift from a scene of them sparing together behind the dojo to them holding each other closely and kissing intimately.
Zoro would awaken from those dreams feeling stiff, hot, and broken. He didn't know why he was having these dreams, but they most certainly weren't doing him any good. But there was a small part of him that enjoyed it. He liked to imagine what Kuina might have been like if she had grown older. He liked to think that she might have wanted him in that way, or at least thought he turned out attractive. And so he dreamed. Sometimes it was a daydream and sometimes it was an actual dream, but they would change dramatically and then change again for better or for worse.
And the most recent one had started well, but then turned out terrible. He had gotten married earlier in life to Kuina, and had not become the world's strongest swordsman like he had wanted to do as a child. He had instead become content with his wife and she had been happy. They had run their own dojo together and had become good teachers. But then the dream had taken a turn for the worse. He'd be held down by strong, silhouetted strangers that seemed to want something, and she had been beaten in front of him. They told her to tell them what they wanted to know and she would refuse time and time again. They hit her so many times that her skin would split and her own blood would be running down her face and body making her unrecognisable. And then they disappeared. He got up and ran to her side, but found that he was too late, and she was dead. A feeling of desperate despair came over Zoro, and he cried out in his anguish. Then he had woken up sweating and on the verge of crying.
"I must get stronger." He said to himself as he lifted up the weights above his head. He couldn't allow these dreams to get to him any longer. He must overcome his fears, and in this case his only regret.
It wasn't my fault. He would catch himself thinking, but a part of him always pointed the finger, always condemned, and always thought it was. If he had never made her that promise then she might have never been hurt with Wado Ichimonji.
He had made himself a promise that he would complete his goal because he had promised her. He didn't, no he couldn't allow her death be in vain. He wanted to be able to look into her eyes from heaven or hell or even at all and say, "I did it."
His heart wanted to say. I did it for you.
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I don't want to think about this anymore.
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Today was boring.
Today the air was stifling.
Today it was foggy.
Today was a terrible day to be the strawhats' lookout, but Zoro didn't mind doing it and because when the rest of the strawhats wanted to have fun he would often be nominated as look-out because they insisted that he had nothing better to do. And he agreed with their logic, by normal standards he didn't have anything better to do, and he preferred being left up in the crows nest in peace and quiet to do his routine exercises than being coxed into playing a dumb game his Captain might come up with on the spur of the moment.
Zoro yawned, and continued to go through the rest of his exercises on autopilot as he surveyed the nothingness before him.
It wasn't surprising that one could not see anything with all the fog and cloud on the sea, but Zoro wasn't just anyone, and from time to time he would create a whirlwind from his blades that would temporarily break apart the cloudy blanket. On one such occasion an object caught his eye.
"Oi! Everyone wreckage on the left!" He got ready to jump to the deck below.
"Hey Zoro! I told you when you want to direct someone on a ship you say Starboard or Port to show which side of the boat you are indicating." Nami told him off, while coming out of what was supposed to be the Captain's quarters, but being Nami, she had miraculously obtained it for her own personal use.
"I don't care, Oi Luffy..." Before he could add anything else he had been cast out to sea by the bouncy Captain who just so happened to hit Zoro as he jumped down from the Crows-nest.
Damn Luffy. Were Zoro's thoughts as he landed in the middle of the wreckage.
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After looking around the dump they soon discovered the wreckage was basically driftwood and discarded rubbish.
But it wasn't long before Zoro made an unusual discovery. He had noticed a few boats floating off in different directions and instead of just ignoring them like the others did, he went to investigate. He caught a hold of a lot of them, but the majority where empty or broken and barely floating. One had been completely covered by a torn sail that had probably been torn off a ship. As he came closer to the ship he could see the sail had been stained in blood that hadn't been washed away in the previous storm, which probably meant it was fresh.
He pulled up the bloody sail curiously to look inside and his heart thudded against his chest at his horror. In the battered boat lay Kuina. Or else she looked exactly the way Kuina had in his dream. A Battered a broken young lady with black hair and torn clothes. He gripped the side of the boat there transfixed for a few moments until he shook himself too and reminded himself that Kuina had died a long time ago.
But there is that Marine girl that looks like her. No way. It can't be her.
He lifted himself up over the side and climbed in glancing around the boat looking for the Marine Girl's sword, Shigure, and any sign of her signature glasses, but there was no sign of them. He dipped his hand into the salty waves and lifted up water to her face to wash away the dry blood from her cold and dirty face. She might have a lot of cuts and bruises, but he was sure it was her. He placed two fingers on the side of her neck and felt for the pulse that would indicate whether she was alive or dead. A wave of relief flooded through him when he felt a tiny pulse, and he yelled out to the others immediately.
"Oi! We have a survivor here!"
He through what remained of the sail away and used the available driftwood around him to paddle himself back to the Thousand Sunny. He tried to prevent her head from moving to much as he knew it might hurt her back if she had a spinal ingury of any kind. Even if she was the Marine Girl she would certainly die if she didn't receive help.
With the swaying of the boat from the rising and falling of the waves it was a feet that he was able to get her back without letting her slip even once.
"Oi! Chopper! Are you here?" Zoro called out into the whiteness. But received no answer from the doctor.
"Hey, Zoro!" Franky called overboard. "Did you get lost alre..." He cut off when he saw the torn up person with Zoro. "Who's that!"
"It doesn't matter. Now, Open up a dock so I can come in."
Once Franky had tied the battered boat down he bolted upstairs and Zoro could hear him using some sort of megaphone that made his voice louder calling all Strawhats back to base.
Zoro bent down over the woman's sprawled body and picked her up as gently as he could, and carried her across the ship into the doctor's quarters.
The others that had been too far away from him to hear his call at first all gathered around to see what he had found as soon as they arrived.
"It's a young woman!" Brook said, pointing out the obvious.
Usopp pushed through the crowd, "Let me see! Oh, she's in bad shape." Usopp added with felt sympathy.
"She must have been caught in last night's storm." Nami explained. "Poor thing."
"Stand back everyone! Give her some room. I need to see if she is still okay." Chopper finally made it into the middle of the circle. And everyone backed off and gave the doctor some space. Chopper gave her a check over, frowned and shook his head. "I will do what I can for her, but she is in very bad shape and it is highly possible she won't last the night."
The relief at finding her suddenly turned hollow, and Zoro found fear gripping him again.
It wasn't the same girl, so it shouldn't matter so much right? but she was... no … she wasn't. That didn't make sense.
"Swordsman, you look pale." Robin said into the silence. And everyone gave him their utmost attention.
"It's nothing." No one looked like they believed him.
Was it okay to tell them? Would they mind or in their stupidity just not care. Why not? He knew a lot about their hidden pasts right? But they can never see that side of him again. No, Never.
"Well, I can't quite tell for sure yet, but she looks like an old friend of mine." he allowed his eyes to narrow, and his forehead to furrow into frown lines.
"Really?" Luffy came up behind him sounding serious for once. "Where did you meet her?"
"We used to train together, and fight each other at her father's dojo, but she disappeared a long while back and I never saw her again." Zoro's hand strayed to Wado Ichimonji to make sure it was in place, he never wanted this blade to hurt her again. The Marine girl had always been so adamant about wanting to have it, but Wado Ichimonji was the blade that ended Kuina's life and held him to his, but he would never let her take it for her sake as well as for his. He didn't believe in a anything supernatural, but there was always a part of him that contradicted himself. It allowed him to hope for the impossible and dream for the incredible.
She really didn't look that much like the Marine Girl right now, she looked more like...
"Kuina?" he reached out and held her cold hand in his. "Kuina? Can you hear me? It's me, Zoro."
What if this was just another dream? He could pretend she was his friend right?
Her hand was so tiny and cold he found himself beginning to gently rub her hands with his own. "Kuina." He asked again.
Why am I doing this to myself? It would be better and easier to just leave, and pretend that she means nothing to me at all. Chopper, Franky, and Luffy have the biggest bleeding hearts around. I should just leave her to them. Kuina's dead, even if Tashigi does wake up, she will still hate me. I need to go.
"So...ro..." a cracked sound came up from the cut lips and her eyelids split open for a fraction of a second, and then closed.
No, no. This is ….
Zoro stood up almost immediately, not looking anyone in the eye, and walked out of the medical room. She might not be Kuina, but she looked like her, and he had just called her by Kuina's name. He just couldn't bare to see her in that much pain.
It wasn't like I would be that much help in the recovery process after all. I should just leave her alone. She has nothing to do with me. Nothing to do with me.
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A very miserable chapter one. But it will get better I promise. Please leave a review. :D