Warrior's Purpose
Rating: K
Zoro-centric
This is my first story in a while, and I agonized over the beginning a lot before getting to this (and I'm still not completely satisfied with it). Anyway, it takes place after the Straw Hats get defeated on Sabaody Archipelago, focusing on Zoro. It is sort of looking at what kind of thoughts Zoro might be having after consecutive defeats at the hands of the Shichibukai, Kuma. Then he gets some encouragement from a very unlikely source. I actually wanted to use it as a means to get used to using the character Ryuuma, but I'll save that for later. Thoughts welcome as always. Enjoy.
After a long bout of training, Zoro made his way up a crumbling flight of stairs, coming out on the roof of a worn out looking tower. Pulling his swords' sheaths from their place at his waist, the green haired swordsman dropped into a sitting position beside the nearest wall, his head resting against the weathered and slick stone.
Leaning more heavily against the gray material, he took a deep breath, trying to shake off the bit of tension that had crept into his body after his muscle training. A cold breeze blew across the face of the castle, rustling his hair and the earrings on his left ear as it passed him by. The cold brought the hairs on the back of his neck to a standing position, small bumps appearing on his tough skin.
Bringing his right leg up towards his chest, he rested his arm on the upturned appendage, his mind wandering a bit as he propped his trio of swords against his shoulder. A slight rumbling echoed in his ears from his stomach, casually brushing his hand against the source of the noise. Neither he nor his reluctant ally on the deserted island were particularly skilled at cooking, and he grudgingly found himself wishing to enjoy one of the perverted cook's fancy meals.
Tilting his head up towards the green tinted sky, he watched the moon, tinted red through the greenish fog, a wistful and regretful feeling passing through him. Almost unbidden, his eyes closed, playing the now familiar scene over again behind his eyelids. His muscles tightened as he recalled the image of the towering figure, one well deserving of his nickname.
"The Tyrant, huh?" he said, his jaw squeezing the words out as he again watched the mist flow quietly around him. A small pain made its way through his strong body as he recalled the spectacle on Sabaody Archipelago. The ease with which the Shichibukai had been able to handle the entirety of the Straw Hat crew was embarrassing, both as a swordsman and more basically as a man.
'But that wasn't even the real one, was it?' he asked himself, the pain intensifying at that thought. They had been pushed to the brink of destruction by the fake Kuma, the Pacifista, before the genuine article had decided to show himself. The helplessness he had felt still remained, and the usually confident swordsman could only look at his fingers, spacing out as he wondered if there was any future for him.
After losing to Mihawk he had sworn that he would never lose again, words that made him laugh at in a dry, defeated tone at this point. Losses seemed to stack themselves one on top of the other as they progressed further into the Grand Line.
'Ah, that guy must be something pretty amazing,' Zoro's eyes widened, his body shooting into a standing position as he looked around. A ghostly, eerily familiar voice hung in the air, its tone almost a match for his. Looking all around him, the green haired man left his hands clutching the handles for his swords, ready to strike whoever had decided to appear on this island.
"Who's there? Show yourself!" he shouted, his heart beating intensely in his chest at the prospect of putting himself into battle once more. It had only been a few days since his encounter with the overwhelming opponent, and he knew his wounds had not had a chance to heal.
His eyes nearly bulged out of his head as he noticed a soft, almost imperceptible glow from his right side. Involuntarily, his body leaned away from the vision, his mind racing to try and make some sense of what was happening.
A white kimono with oddly familiar black marks on it, and an eerily familiar face. Tracing his thoughts back, he wondered where he had seen the characters on the sleeves before, before realizing that THAT wasn't the weird part here. Gradually the form took more concrete shape, a tuft of black hair pulled into a samurai's topknot and a right arm resting on an upturned knee.
"W-who the hell are you!?" Zoro asked the man at his side, his boots clicking against the hardened stone of the roof as he stood. The apparition blinked a few times, seemingly also struggling with the odd situation at hand. After a moment, the near mirror image smirked like Zoro had a tendency to when he found a strong enemy.
'Well, that should be easy enough for you to figure out. We met not too long ago, don't you remember?' the young man asked, chills moving up Zoro's spine at a conversation given him with his own voice. Then he knew where he recognized the characters on the kimono from, and he weakly looked to the newest of his three swords, its handle a bit warmer than that of the others.
"The samurai, Ryuuma? But, how?" Zoro asked, momentarily losing his sense of impossibility about the situation. On one hand, this was hardly the craziest thing he had ever encountered since joining Luffy's band, and on another he figure it might just be that he had snapped from his time in this depressing island.
'Hmm. That's a bit harder to explain. I guess you could say I was responding to your 'warrior's soul',' the samurai said, a straight expression passing onto the man's face. Looking him over more closely, Zoro could tell that this vision looked nearly double his age, laugh lines apparent on his stern looking face.
"My warrior's soul?" he asked, his brows furrowing at the seemingly ridiculous explanation given by his imagination. The samurai didn't flinch, simply nodding his head in agreement with the assessment.
'Yes. I sense that there is some doubt, some fear within you,' Ryuuma replied, his eyes deep and empty as he gazed at the 'master' of his sword. Zoro's body tensed, not wanting to admit such a thing to anyone, least of all himself. But somehow, he knew he didn't need to say anything.
Silence passed between the two of them, and Zoro let the chill of the night seep into his heated body, an almost invisible wisp of steam coming off of his body from the difference in temperature. But he didn't feel the cold at all. He was simply mystified by the situation at hand, unsure how to respond to it.
'A samurai is just a man, before he takes the title of samurai,' the spirit spoke, his topknot swaying slightly as his head tilted towards the blood red crescent moon overhead. Zoro found himself wondering how a spirit's hair and clothes fluttered in the breeze.
'What makes a man strong?' Ryuuma asked, shaking Zoro from his moronic thoughts. He knew he had been spending too much time around Luffy to be wondering such pointless things. He took the man's words to heart, wondering what he was getting at.
"Training," he said simply, sitting in front of the white clothed samurai. The black haired samurai smirked, an action that somehow irritated Zoro.
'Alright, let me ask you this. Your leader, he is a capable enough warrior, is he not?' Ryuuma asked, figuring that another tactic might work better. Zoro thought, wondering how this spirit seemed to know about his life.
"I guess that's one way to put it. He's the strongest person I've met," Zoro said, leaning backwards against his hands as he looked through the green mist, watching the reddish light pass onto the ground.
'Does he do a lot of training?' Ryuuma added, sending Zoro's face into a bit of confusion.
"Well, I don't think I've ever seen it, but that doesn't mean he doesn't train, right?" Zoro asked, feeling a bit silly having an actual conversation with an apparition of someone who died hundreds of years ago.
'So then if he doesn't train, why do you suppose he is so strong?' he asked, to which Zoro had no real answer. He had a feeling, but it wasn't the kind of thing he could really tell to someone. 'I have never met your friend, but I would imagine that he knows what it is to be strong. To protect what is important to you is what gives a man strength,' Ryuuma replied, giving Zoro a sense that he was somehow being insulted.
"But I can't be like that idiot," Zoro responded, wondering if the answer was really that simple.
'Nobody would expect you to. For each person, what they hold important is different. If you don't want to lose again, you need to find that thing that is most important to you,' Ryuuma answered, his voice crackling a bit as the mirage began to fade.
"What do I want to protect?" Zoro asked himself, as the white clothed samurai began to fade away. Zoro felt a reassuring hand on his shoulder, and he looked up into the bright face of what could easily pass for being his ancestor.
'That's something you have to find for yourself, my friend. I have faith that you can find that answer, because you are after all my master,' he said, his voice clear and deep before fading out. 'I would have loved to have fought one as strong as yourself,' he said, before disappearing completely, leaving Zoro with his own thoughts.
With a start, Zoro's eyes shot open, the morning Sun shining down on his face. Eyes blinked a few times as the sleep began to dissipate from his senses, his right hand rubbing at his forehead. As his head cleared, he looked up towards the morning sky, no traces of the usual greenish fog present around him.
Looking towards his Shuusui, Zoro wondered if he had dreamt the whole thing. "What do I want to protect, huh?" he asked, before clasping his hands together behind his head, contemplating a return to slumber. For the first time since he had arrived on this dreary island, the young swordsman found himself thinking about the other members of their pirate band.
Luffy, Nami, Usopp, Sanji, Chopper, Robin, Franky and Brook's images each passed through his mind. "I wonder what those guys are doing? I hope they're alright…" he said to himself, bringing back the words the previous owner of Shuusui had said to him.
'You must find what it is that is most important to you.' The words hung in his mind, and Zoro knew the answer. Placing the trio of swords in place at his waist, the young man hurriedly leapt from the tall tower, a loud crashing sound echoing off the crumbling walls as he landed in the courtyard of the abandoned tower.
He knew that as important as his promise and his goal were, that there was something more important he had to protect. He needed to be there for his nakama. So with his new determination, he set out for that day's training.
"Now I just have to figure out how to get off this damn island," he muttered, a sarcastic humor in his voice as he focused on the task ahead.
So, there's that. I recently read the collection of stories 'Wanted' for the first time, and I loved 'Monsters' most of all. I thought of making a whole story based around Ryuuma, with a Ryuuma x Flare pairing (maybe) but I felt it would be weird since it would be populated with all OC's, given the limited material to go on. What do you all think? Also, I am thinking of the beginning stages of a longer story as introduced in Luffy x Robin Halloween. Thoughts on that are also welcome, as are ideas on what characters you might like to see involved in that.