Sanji's voice had dissolved into high-pitched, indecipherable screeching after the first five minutes, and it wasn't until his throat inflated and his scream had been interrupted by a surprisingly loud crooooak that he stopped.
Nami was pretty sure he whimpered.
Zoro chuckled darkly, the widest grin Nami had ever seen plastered on his face. "Now your outsides match your insides, slime ball."
"I'M A FROG!" Sanji screeched, possibly not having heard Zoro and waving his (what were they called? Nami wondered absently to herself as Sanji began to hop around frantically, flippers? No, that's for fish.) dark green limbs all over the place. "Why am I a frog? How do I get back to normal!?"
Zoro pursed his lips and shrugged, before sticking his thumb over his shoulder at the madly cackling gentleman who had raged at Sanji for trying to flirt with his daughter and then – apparently – managed to turn the blond into a frog.
"You will never be human again until you find the true gem of your heart!" he cried, pointing at Sanji dramatically as he half-danced his way across the street.
"There's a ca-" Nami tried to call, but the car she'd attempted to warn him of beat her to it.
They all winced as he got hit, Nami's mouth dropping open and Sanji's eyes practically bugging from his head. Even Zoro looked taken aback by the sudden brutality and lack of human where there had been one before.
"Serves him right for walking in traffic," Zoro managed to finally get out, his usual unflappable manner returning, but Nami felt like shaking him for the comment, considering he'd done the exact same thing multiple times before too. Sanji let out another pitiful whimper, sinking to the floor and looking as though he were about to burst into tears.
"How am I going to turn back nooooow?" he wailed, sounding more than a little distraught, but Nami watched as a thought seemed to occur to him and he swooped from mourning his fate to trying to garner her attention again; his froggy fore limb rose into the air and he tried to grin charmingly at her. (The effect was rather off put by the fact his mouth stretched creepily wide) "Ah, but a kiss from a princess will surely break the curse upon me. What other gem of my heart could he talk about but the exquisite Nami-swaaaan~!"
"I am not kissing you." Nami said firmly, mouth curled in disgust, "Are you kidding? With how our luck goes, I'm probably going to be the next one who's a frog!"
"That, and she ain't no princess," Zoro added snidely, and Sanji tried to defend Nami's honour, hopping up and down to get into the taller man's face.
"Hey!" Nami yelped, offended by the comment, and she swatted Zoro over the head with a stick she picked up, crossing her arms unapologetically when he winced and rubbed at his head. "Look, Sanji, I am not the 'gem of your heart', and I am not kissing you. We'll just have to figure out some other way to turn you back."
"I'm not kissing him either," Zoro added, as though it had to be said, and Sanji immediately blew up, angrily ranting at Zoro – who took great delight in now lording his huge height difference over the cook and retaliating.
Nami growled, throwing her hands in the air and seriously considered stepping into the oncoming traffic herself. "Both of you shut up!" she ordered, eyes blazing fury, and thankfully for the two men they snapped their mouths shut. "Now," Nami said, smile faux calm but eyes still threatening that she'd disembowel them if they opened their mouths, "I've got a plan."
"This is a stupid plan," Zoro said an hour later, crossing his arms and staring at the badly made sign proclaiming, 'One and only talking frog! Admission is a dollar and you get it back if you kiss the frog!'
Before Nami could reply however, a teen had bounded up to the three of them, hands clasped around something. "Ooo, you guys have a talking frog too?" The hyperactive, straw hat wearing boy looked altogether too pleased to be asking that question, but Zoro could see in his cupped hands the cowering body of a tiny frog.
"I am not a talking frog," Sanji grumbled angrily, trying to cross his arms but failing miserably due to their new length, "I am a cursed human and a very pissed off one at that. Goddamn shitty magician asshole."
"You were saying?" Nami asked rhetorically, grinning sharply at him, and Zoro shrugged.
"I want him to stay a frog." Zoro said, expression blank, but as Nami watched a smirk tugged up his mouth. "Can tease him about being a slime ball that way."
Nami groaned, shaking her head, but placed her hands on her hips instead so she could stare down the dark haired boy. "Alright, have at it. Lemme see him talk. Sanji isn't kissing common pond scum."
"I knew you cared!" Sanji crowed joyously, practically floating behind the orange-haired girl.
Nami almost groaned again, but instead looked to be holding it back, beckoning for the frog to come closer. The boy eagerly shoved the frog away from him, letting Nami see into his cupped hands at the huddled mess of limbs. Her eyebrow raised, and for the first time Zoro actually detected something that wasn't jubilance on the teen's face. "C'mon Usopp, don't you wanna be human again?" the boy asked, gently nudging the frog with his thumb, and Zoro saw it swallow before opening his mouth.
"Ah- er- um- h-h-hi," Usopp stuttered, wiggling his little forelimb awkwardly.
Nami shrieked joyously, turning around and swooping Sanji off his tiny pedestal, placing him in the straw hat boy's hands and trying to prod him closer to the other frog. She wiped her slimy hands on Zoro's shirt, and the green-haired teen began to complain loudly, revulsion clear on his face. "Nami that is disgusting-" he growled, but she impatiently shushed him and he quieted, though still glaring angrily at her back.
"This is ridiculous," Sanji grunted, looking everywhere but at the tiny frog across from him, "This guy's a guy! He can't be the- frickin- jewel of my heart." The tone that Sanji spoke in held his obvious disdain for the situation he currently found himself in, but the other guy obviously didn't appreciate it, looking at first hurt but then gathering his backbone (or what existed of it, Zoro thought to himself) and huffing quietly.
"Sorry for existing," the other frog muttered at him, eyes narrowed just slightly in a glare, but when Sanji's gaze snapped to him he immediately yelped and tried to scramble away, pressing himself further against the teen's thumbs. "I mean- I was just minding my own business and then I get turned into a frog! I was lucky Luffy didn't step on me! And now I find out if I want to fix this I gotta kiss the guy who caused all this in the first place? The great Usopp has no time for such things, especially when this kiss shall be subpar compared to the rest of the harem that adores my every adventure. Why, they await-"
"Subpar?" Zoro's voice almost broke in the middle as he tried to hold off laughing, and Sanji's expression went completely horrified, then absolutely infuriated.
"I'll show you subpar," Sanji shot, finally getting over himself and grabbing Usopp's spindly shoulders, yanking the frog in for a kiss.
A golden glow immediately filled the air, making Zoro wince and squint his eyes shut, and when it faded Sanji stood in all his idiotic glory, still firmly kissing a rather surprised looking dark-skinned teen with untameable curls tucked under a bandana.
Sanji realised a moment later that he had human limbs back, and separated the two of them, giving a cough into his first. His pale skin was flushed a vibrant red, all the way up to his ears, and Zoro saw Nami sneak her phone from her pocket, quickly snapping a photo.
"Well," Sanji muttered awkwardly, rubbing at his arm and trying to hold onto the image of his 'coolness', "Thanks." Usopp still looked absolutely stunned, fingers brushing his lips, and Sanji coughed again, still looking uneasy and embarrassed. "C'mon guys, let's go."
Turning on his heel, Sanji had made it almost a meter away before he suddenly jolted a stop; then he was zooming backwards, heels digging in before Usopp and himself were in a waltz reminiscent position again, very little personal space between the two of them.
"You've got to be kidding." Sanji said, glaring at Usopp's sheepish attempt at a smile and trying to peel himself away from the dark-skinned teen but finding he could only get a few steps away before the same invisible force made them jolt back to each other again.
Zoro tried to hold in his laughter at Sanji's face.
"Guess this means you guys get to hang out with us more often!" Luffy crowed joyously at seeing the phenomenon, grin once again splitting his face as he practically posed, "I'm startin' a swing band!"
"O-our first-?" Usopp stuttered at Robin's question, his cheeks burning, but he still felt his lips tug upwards at the memory.
"Oh, our first kiss was magical," Sanji said, a large grin splitting his face, and Usopp gave a groan.
"You're incorrigible," he muttered, shaking his head but still knowing he was smiling idiotically at Sanji's pun.
"Everything after that was pretty magical too," Sanji added in a thoughtful tone, and Robin delicately covered her smile with her hand when Usopp whacked his boyfriend with his sheet music.
AN: Okay so I am probably never ever ever going to get to the part inbetween the 'it was magical' and 'are you kidding me' so here's how the plot would likely have gone!
They end up going with Luffy except Luffy is kind of useless about money and has a really crappy apartment he's been staying in with Usopp, so Nami takes over the funds and they stay in Sanji, Zoro and Nami's place until she buys them a better place to stay. Zoro and Sanji are originally both super useless at their instruments, because they picked ones that they thought they'd be ok at, having done a little as kids (Luffy isn't actually much better, he just loves to make music, but if you ask him to improvise something for you or something like that he's actually really really good.) but then Sanji and Zoro get into a competition and their skills sky rocket. Nami is their manager and Sanji helps with design and production and stuff like that, and while it's originally Sanji's free food that draws people, eventually they start getting a few invites to play in a club instead of busking.
While this is going on, Usopp (who's legit the only one who actually plays an instrument) and Sanji have to learn to deal with each other and the fact that they can't go very far from each other. (Nami makes lots of pleased jokes about being able to save money and letting them sleep in one bed) At first it starts out with them alternating but it starts getting colder so on one of Sanji's nights he's like yo just take my turn I got used to floor blah blah chivalry, but then Usopp is like no way it's your turn don't u pity me like that (even though he really really wants the bed) and Sanji's like take the freaking bed u shit head and gets on the floor, but they're both super stubborn and it isn't until their both freezing on the ground that they're like erm okay let's just share.
Vivi starts out trying to sabotage them because crocodile thinks that they've seen something that they shouldn't have (Nami saw baroque works agents stealing stuff,) but then defects and joins them instead. Usopp starts to feel irrationally jealous every time he sees Sanji flirting with the girls/any girl on the street (which he tries to justify by telling himself that he's just annoyed Sanji's stealing all the girls because he's so much more charming and cooler than himself,) but it eventually gets too much. He purposefully walks away from Sanji and claims innocence when Sanji is yanked to him and they end up super super close again, and Sanji gets really pissed off when Usopp does it for the third time.
They don't talk to each other for a while, and eventually fix it up (Usopp realises he has feelings) while having that conversation with Sanji, because he almost blurts it out but then is like shIIIT, and he lets Sanji go back to doing his stupid flirty thing even though now he knows why he hates it so much and starts to feel painful instead of angry-jealous.
One girl – a disguised Nico Robin – gets super close to Sanji, flirting with him and getting him to agree to go on a date, and Sanji's not listening to Usopp's suspicions (he's also torn between am I suspicious of her because I think she's bad or because I want Sanji's attention for myself?) and so he tries the walking-away thing that he did last time in efforts to drive her away, or at least distract Sanji from her…
Except this time it doesn't work.
This time he finds that he can leave, and he won't snap back to Sanji.
And while before he could comfort himself with friendship and the wording of the curse that had originally turned them both into frogs – you will never be human unless you find the true gem of your heart – if he isn't forced to stay with Sanji, than it means that Sanji likely wouldn't be forced to stay with him, and he doesn't want to be there and see it when that happens.
He is torn, for a moment – he could still pretend that they couldn't leave each other, but eventually decides that he's not going to do that to himself.
So while Sanji is distracted Usopp leaves, and Sanji doesn't realise until Robin excuses herself, and he tries to make plans but she escapes. And when he does notice, he has no idea why his stomach clenches so much, or why he almost falls into a complete and utter panic. Shouldn't he be happy that he wasn't being forcibly dragged along behind Usopp – who, while having proved himself and become Sanji's friend – was still rather negatively viewed because of the whole curse thing.
Sanji goes kind of crazy trying to find him, and goes home in the hopes that Usopp has wound up there (trying to whole while to ignore the little voice in the back of his head that is half screaming at him about how Usopp could have possibly left – and why did he leave). Vivi prompts so introspection, and Sanji begins to comb the city to try and find him.
Meanwhile, Usopp finds himself attacked by Baroque works agents, and then Robin shows up. He's not super sure about her loyalties – one minute, he thinks she's working with baroque works, but the next, she's saving him?
Of course all is for naught b/c she locks him up and tells him to stay put unless he wants to die because while he's her prisoner and she claims his capture, she gets the final say in things, but if he gets captured by baroque agents again they'll turn him over to crocodile who will interrogate him for Vivi's plans to bring him down and save her dad's company.
Sanji eventually manages to find Usopp, and they kind of argue – Sanji is frantically checking Usopp for injuries and stuff like that, and is angrily asking him why Usopp left etc etc
And Usopp is super confused because he was never sure of where he stood with Sanji, and he says as much when Sanji pressures him, and then feelings talk. Which could be interrupted by the baroque works agents?
Yeah, but that's about all I have.