In the Eye of the Beholder
Author's Notes: Hello people. This is a rather random little twoshot story that came into being because I could not wrap my brain around the fact that Zoro came back from the time skip missing an eye and no one even commented on it. No one asked him what happened; which with the Strawhat's general policy about leaving the past in the past, that isn't incredibly hard to believe. However there are two members of the crew who I feel wouldn't have been able to let such a glaring change in their nakama go without some kind of comment or questions. Therefore I wrote them each a chapter so I could get my brain to temporarily let go of the question of how Zoro lost an eye in the first place (at least until Oda tells us). First up is Sanji, because I can't figure out why he hasn't made at least one comment about depth perception or cyclops or SOMETHING! That got me thinking of what could make him refrain from commenting...and this came out of it. Please review and let me know what you think. Thanks.
Disclaimer: I don't own One Piece. Zoro and Sanji are likely to be grateful that this is so.
Chapter One: An Eye For an Eye
Zoro reclined on the grassy deck of the Sunny; enjoying an altogether too rare moment of peace now that they had entered the deadly New World. He was pretending to nap as he listened to the unruly clamor of his reunited nakama.
Though Zoro wouldn't admit it aloud, it was a welcome sound after two years with only Mihawk's brooding silence and Perona's shrill complaining for company. Fishman Island and its troubles had been exciting, especially as a chance to see what everyone had learned; but the battles alongside his Captain and crew were not what he had missed during their long separation.
No, what he had missed was the clattering of Chopper's hooves on the wooden stairs as the tiny doctor rushed around checking up on his crewmates; his small voice admonishing Luffy for something and the Captain's laughing reply. Zoro had missed Usopp's muttering as the long-nosed sniper concentrated on some gadget he'd brought up from his cluttered factory to work on; mumbling that was accompanied by a cheerful violin, courtesy of their newest crewmate, Brook. Franky could be heard banging on some part of the ship he was either repairing or improving; though if the occasional outburst of "SUPER!" could be used as a gauge, Zoro had to guess it was the latter. He could faintly hear the occasional turn of a page from Robin, who was seated in a deck chair just a few feet to his left; with Nami's even breathing a bit further over as she sunbathed in the balmy weather. This was interrupted occasionally as the redhead shouted at the captain for his more boisterous antics.
Even the muted sounds of the Curlybrowed Moron drifting out the open galley door; they just added to the ongoing clamor that was life among the Strawhat Pirates. It sounded like home to the once solitary swordsman. He might even have been able to actually take his planned nap if not for one thing bothering him.
The crew had been back together for nearly two weeks...and not one person had said anything about his eye.
Zoro mulled over the oddity in the lack of comment that the very visible injury had raised. He would have expected Chopper to freak out and order him immediately into the infirmary for an examination but the little doctor had had his hooves full. For a while he'd had a nearly full time job keeping the stupid cook from bleeding to death every time Nami or Robin entered the room, not to mention the mess with the fishmen; so the excitable reindeer could be somewhat excused for his distraction.
Robin wasn't the sort to ask too many questions of any of them and Franky was too wrapped up in showing off his recent upgrades to do anything but exclaim loudly about how SUPER they all were. Luffy had his own new scars that he didn't seem keen on talking about. In fact, their beloved captain seemed to be doing his best to ignore the time they had been apart as much as possible; which may have explained his refusal to acknowledge his first nakama's new handicap. Brook's mind wasn't quite what it should be; he might have forgotten Zoro still had two eyes when the crew had been torn apart. Nami was wrapped up in charting the new and deadly hazards of the sea they had finally reached. Usopp had probably come up with a story far more interesting than what had actually happened and the sniper wouldn't want to spoil that with the truth.
Zoro shifted uncomfortably and opened his eye to glare out over the deck. He could rationalize most of his nakamas' silence away in half a dozen ways; distraction, fatigue, nervousness (in Usopp's case at least), etcetera. What he couldn't wrap his mind around was the cook.
Zoro had expected the curlybrowed bane of his existence to have at least come up with some lame comment about him being a cyclops by now. He waited for it in every fight they had, fights which were as frequent as they had ever been, but the jibe about his lost eye never came. It felt like the cook was...pitying him or...something. The blonde got a weird look in his eye when they fought these days, and to the straightforward swordsman it was maddening.
Zoro shoved himself to his feet and headed for the kitchen; suddenly determined to get this out of his head once and for all, or beat the blonde senseless trying. Either sounded like a good plan for the moment.
His other nakama paid him no heed as he stalked towards the cook's domain with a scowl on his features. Nothing in that was unusual. However, when he entered the galley and slammed the adamwood door hard enough to be heard all over the ship he did hear a muffled complaint from Franky and a screeched threat about his astronomical debt from Nami.
None of that mattered because the crappy cook was turning away from the pot on the stove; his ridiculous eyebrow raised in question at the intrusion.
"Problem, Marimo?" He said slowly; confusion tingeing his usual venom when talking to the green haired man.
Zoro nodded curtly. "What is your problem, Cook?" He growled furiously.
Sanji's distinctive eyebrow raised even further. "Baka, Marimo! I asked you first!" He snarled back; utterly perplexed by the sudden intrusion into his kitchen.
"Just say something about it already so we can get on with life!" Zoro ordered grimly.
Sanji was about to try putting his foot through the stupid green head in front of him, but confusion brought him up short. "What are you talking about?" He asked angrily. "Say something about what?!"
Zoro frowned; his fury abated somewhat by the genuine confusion in the cook's face. Still, once he set a goal for himself, he was all but impossible to dissuade from his course. "This." He said gruffly; jabbing a finger in the general direction of his scarred eye.
Sanji paled and stared at him for a long moment in surprise; before he leaned back against the counter and fished a cigarette and his lighter from his pocket. He took another moment to light the familiar vice and take a long pull; exhaling the acrid fumes before he spoke.
"What did you want me to say?" He asked evenly, looking up at the ceiling to avoid the swordsman's incredulous stare.
Zoro frowned at the lack of fight in the cook's tone and found his ire rising again at the perceived pity. "Just insult me for it already!" He shouted. "Stupid Pervy Cook! I don't need your pity!"
Sanji seemed taken aback by the idea. "Pity?" He mumbled around the smoldering stick. Then he did something that Zoro didn't expect; he laughed. It started off as a chuckle, which grew until the blonde cook let himself slide down onto the floor; nearly unable to breathe through his hysterics.
Zoro stared, his anger melting into confusion. "What the..." He was beginning to think the blonde had finally lost his mind.
Sanji finally caught enough breath to speak, clutching his ribs with one arm as he used the other hand to hold his smoke. "You thought..." He chuckled for another moment before clearing his throat in an effort to get his amusement back under control. "You thought I wasn't talking about your missing eye because...because I felt sorry for you?" He asked breathlessly.
Zoro nodded sharply, now beginning to wonder what other reason for the aversion he might have overlooked.
Sanji stood shakily; leaning heavily on the counter as he mastered his laughter at last. "I was just hoping you wouldn't bring up my hair if I didn't mention your eye." He said with a shrug.
Zoro blinked. "Your hair?" He eyed the lopsided coiffure thoughtfully. "You part it the other way now...so what? Why does that matter?" He asked gruffly, sitting down on the bench; feeling strangely tired now that the fight he was expecting had refused to present itself.
Sanji sighed; getting that uncomfortable look in his eye that Zoro had interpreted as pity in their previous fights. "Yeah. I've had the same hairstyle since I was a kid and I suddenly decided to change it. You ever think I might have a good reason for that, Moss head?" He asked sarcastically.
Zoro tilted his head at the blonde. It hadn't occurred to him actually; hair was hair. If it weren't the Cook's constant comments on his own oddly colored locks, he wouldn't give the stuff much thought at all. "What reason?" He asked flatly.
Sanji took a deep drag from his cigarette and eyed the door a little nervously. "You have to promise not to tell the others." He said slowly, as if each word was being dragged from him reluctantly.
Zoro raised his eyebrow at that, but nodded agreement. The cook had kept his secret from Thriller Bark; he owed him one, though he didn't mention that fact.
Sanji glanced once more at the heavy wooden door and the portholes beside it; checking for any sign of snooping from those outside, before he stubbed out his cigarette after one final pull and raised a long fingered hand to his bangs.
The concealing blonde curtain was brushed aside and the cook's gaze was focused carefully on anything but Zoro's face as he revealed the hidden half of his face.
Zoro grimaced as he took in the angry red scar the cook had been hiding. It ran from his hairline to just below his eye; or rather, where his eye used to be. Where the blue orb had been was an empty socket that looked almost melted. The familiar curl of his eyebrow was half gone; lost to whatever had taken the eye and it made Zoro inexplicably angry. "Is that...a burn?" He asked slowly.
Sanji grinned sourly. "Well...I found out I'm not the only one who can use Diablo Jambe; the guy called it something else but..." He tried for a light tone but it fell flat in the tense atmosphere. He shrugged as he trailed off.
Zoro snorted at the attempt at humor anyway; trying to dispel the churning in his gut that told him he'd failed to protect another of his nakama while they had been apart. It didn't matter that he had been who knows how far away and likely having the crap beaten out of him by Mihawk at the time; the guilt was still there to gnaw at him.
"Stop it, Moron." Sanji snapped, seeming to realize what the swordsman was doing, as he let his hair fall back into place over the damaged half of his face.
The swordsman shook his head to clear it and managed to scowl at the cook; albeit it was a weak impression of his usual glare.
"I mean it. Stop trying to blame yourself." The blonde spat distastefully. "I underestimated an opponent. I screwed up. I paid the price. I kept fighting and made it back here despite that. I don't need your crappy protection." The words were measured and clipped with anger; punctuated with emphatic gestures with a hand holding a fresh cigarette that the blonde wasn't actually sure when he had lit.
Zoro huffed as the truth in those words sank in. "I know." He said reluctantly. The guilt melted away as he considered his own scar and how he had accepted the loss of his eye as the cost of his training. The cook clearly felt the same way. "Have you had Chopper look at it?" He asked curiously, as the tension drained out of his rival.
Sanji snorted and took a puff from the new cigarette; his chain smoking the only outward sign of how uncomfortable he was with the whole conversation. "Have you?" He asked dryly in lieu of answering.
Zoro chuckled. "He hasn't asked. I'm not sure he's actually fully registered this yet." He said with a gesture to his scarred face. "I mean, with you bleeding to death every five minutes..."
"Oi, shut it, Cyclops." The curlybrowed man snapped, though his eye glittered with humor.
Zoro grinned wickedly. "Yeah, look who's talking." He shot back, feeling more normal than he had in over two years.
Sanji aimed a halfhearted glare at the green haired man and took a long pull of foul, comforting smoke into his lungs before he retorted. "Hmph, at least I lost mine in a fight. Considering your track record, you probably did it to yourself." He mused with a smirk.
Zoro felt a blush rising and he rose to his feet angrily. "It was an accident!" He shouted before he could think better of it.
Sanji's cigarette fell from his lips in shock. "You...you mean you really...?" He couldn't get the rest of the words out as his eye widened in horror. He'd meant the words as a joke.
Zoro scowled and crossed his arms as he sat heavily back on the bench. "I was practicing a new technique." He said sullenly. "It's not always easy to adapt techniques intended for use with one sword to three, you know." He grimaced at the admission but pressed on reluctantly. "I...misjudged." The words were like broken glass to his pride but it was better than the crappy cook coming up with his own theories about what happened.
"You misjudged..." Sanji echoed in a strangled tone of disbelief. "And it cost you an eye?"
Zoro grunted an affirmative. "Would've cost me my head if I hadn't dodged the brunt of it." He shrugged off the memory.
Sanji rolled his eye. "What were you learning to do?" He asked, doing his best to sound like he couldn't care less.
Zoro's good eye focused on his rival and he smirked. "You'll find out when I have a reason to do it." He taunted.
Sanji snorted. "Yeah, well maybe you should practice your blind fighting before you try it." He shot right back.
Zoro snorted. "I learned to do that too, but I don't plan on losing my other eye."
Sanji rolled his eye again. Of course the moron learned to fight blind. That was the sort of thing stupid swordsmen with no sense of self-preservation needed to know. "Yeah, probably better if you don't. You get lost enough already."
"I don't get lost." The swordsman muttered defensively. "Everyone else gets lost."
"Yeah, yeah." The cook agreed dismissively; unable to muster the energy to pick a proper fight at the moment. Instead he turned to check on the dinner he was working on before he was rudely interrupted.
The pair remained silent for a few minutes until a polite knock sounded. A moment later the galley door was hesitantly pushed open and their tallest nakama stuck his afroed head in cautiously.
"Ah, pardon me." The skeleton said sheepishly; his hesitation betraying his surprise at finding such a peaceful scene between the constantly fighting pair. "Nami-san requested that I investigate to ensure you had not caused each other any grievous bodily harm." He explained pleasantly, after he shook off the shock.
Zoro snorted. "More like she told you to make sure we weren't causing any expensive damage to the ship." He grumbled sourly.
Sanji started to jump to his beloved Nami-swan's defense but Brook's soft chuckle forestalled his explosion.
"Yohoho. She may have said something to that effect, Zoro-san. I was merely extrapolating her true concern." Empty eye sockets seemed to light with good humor as the musician tilted his head in a cramped bow from his position in the doorway. "I will go tell her that all is well." He announced cheerfully, before making his exit and pulling the door quietly shut behind him.
A moment later Zoro let out a quiet chuckle and Sanji looked at the green haired man curiously.
Zoro only laughed harder at his inquisitive look. "Neither of us can lose another eye, Baka Cook." He said through his mirth.
Unable to quell his curiosity, Sanji had to reply. "Why's that, moss for brains?"
Zoro shrugged off the insult and kept laughing; struggling to pull himself together enough to answer. "Because...because the crew is already down by four." He chuckled harder once the words were out.
"Four..." Sanji started to ask and then Brook's perpetually grinning visage drifted through his mind and he couldn't help but grin in disbelief. "Did you just...make a skull joke?" He asked as the first bubbles of laughter welled up in him as well.
Zoro caught a breath and held it for just long enough to consider the question before he nodded and released the guffaw he was holding back.
Sanji chuckled as well. "You really should go see Chopper." He said through the peals of laughter that filled the galley. "I think you damaged more than just your eye." He gasped out.
"Yeah...well at least I didn't try to cook...with my face." The swordsman managed to retort through his glee.
"Hmph. At least I've never kicked myself in the head." The blonde shot back through his own mirth.
"I didn't..." Zoro gasped out, tears streaming from his intact eye as he tried to quell the slightly maniacal laughter he'd let loose. "It wasn't one of my swords..." He clarified breathlessly. "It was shrapnel from something I cut."
Sanji laughed even harder at that. "What?! You got half blinded and maimed by what...a tree?" He cackled.
Zoro shook his head and managed to swallow his latest round of laughing with a cough. "No...it was a rock."
Sanji froze for a moment, staring at the stone-faced swordsman with his eye wide in shock.
Then the absurdity of the whole situation hit them both and they dissolved into mad cackling once more.
"Sanji!" A whine intruded on the scene as Luffy burst in the door. "I'm hun...what are you doing on the floor?" Their captain asked with a wide and innocent look of curiosity. "With Zoro?" He added, scratching his head.
Sanji and Zoro stopped laughing and looked at the puzzled rubber teen for a moment; each trying to figure out a way to salvage their dignity. Then they made the mistake of looking at each other.
Two single eyed gazes met across the small galley and two years of pain and frustration and worry just melted away.
It was no wonder they started laughing again. This time Luffy joined in, not caring that he didn't know what the joke was. Their captain was just glad to see his nakama happy.
Gradually the other crew members wandered in to see what was going on and more than a few bewildered smiles were shared as they spied the usually taciturn warrior and their curse spewing cook sitting helplessly on the floor; laughing madly at something only they seemed to understand.
The mirth gradually faded and the swordsman stood and offered the cook a hand up off the floor, which was waved off with a snort of mocking disdain.
"Thanks, but no thanks." The blonde said without his usual heat. "Now get out of my kitchen, Cyclops." He ordered with a grin.
Zoro grinned fiercely at the new nickname. "You can do better than that, Dart board." He said mockingly as he moved towards the door. "Perona started calling me that as soon as the bandages came off." He snorted at the memory.
Sanji waved a dismissive hand as he turned back to his cooking. He'd have to think about it but he was sure he could come up with enough creative insults to make sure the green haired idiot never thought he was pitying him again.
"Zoro! Why's Sanji calling you Cy...? OH NO! What happened to your eye?! Somebody get a doctor...oh!" The shrill, panicked voice of their youngest nakama drifted through the door. "Right that's me. Come with me! I need to examine you right away! Maybe I can fix it..."
The swordsman's grumbling protests could be heard being dragged inexorably towards the infirmary.
Sanji chuckled at Zoro's misfortune. "Bet you don't think my hairstyle is so stupid now, eh Baka Marimo?" He mused smugly to the empty galley.
To Be Continued...
Author's Notes: Okay. My brain is weird but at least it is sort of happy now. Thanks for reading my odd ramblings. I hope I have helped other crazy people like myself come to terms with "the eye situation"...and Sanji's new hairstyle. Yes, the laughing thing is a bit silly perhaps; but after two years of stressful training and worry for everyone a bit of hysteria doesn't seem too out of character to me and I feel the absurdity of the situation painted here might have triggered a bit of stress relief laughter. Please review and let me know if you agree, disagree, whatever you think. Thanks. The next chapter picks up where this one leaves off and focuses on Choppers reaction (now that he has finally noticed the injury).