This was inspired by my beagle, who drools like a gastropod leaves slime. And smells like a trashcan. Yeah.

Any true molluscophobes will want to stop here. T for language only. If you're looking for snail porn... you have problems. ;)

"So they tried to pull me up, right, but my arm kept stretching out, and Sabo was panicking because the path was starting to flood and my head was stuck between the rocks! And then Ace snapped off a big dead branch and threw it down at the rock, and it knocked one of them off to the side and set me free, but with how hard Sabo'd been pulling on me, there was so much tension that I just snapped right up and whacked him in the face, and we both went flying across the treehouse and hit the other wall!"

The room was in stitches, including the one telling the story, who continued through his own laughter. "Ace laughed so hard at both of us until part of the roof caved in and soaked him through! So the next ten minutes, he's chasing us around, dripping all over the place, until we all just fell asleep in a big tangled pile. And that's my story."

He finished with a proud little smile, and a snickering Usopp spoke up. "I'm honestly shocked there's a normal kid that could keep up with you two."

"I know!" Sanji agreed, holding his stomach, which was surely aching from the onslaught of

stories from the others. It was raining fiercely outside- though not in danger of turning into a storm they should worry about, Nami said- and thus, most of them were bored out of their minds. So they'd all gathered in the galley, and somehow got to swapping stories of their lives before the Strawhats, which then turned into a storytopping contest, with each ony trying to best the last in hilarity.

The only one who had yet to go was Zoro. And they were all nagging him to tell them something beyond what Johnny and Yosaku had told four of them, because he was the only one with a completely ambiguous past. He didn't mind sharing bits about his life, but there were parts he'd rather avoid, and he'd taken the time gained by having the others go first to figure out what part to recount.

"Come on, Zoro, your turn!"

"All right already. I think I got one." He sighed. "You guys from East Blue know Autumn Island, right? Right at the edge of the arctic circle?"

"Yeah."

"Right. That's where I'm from, the village is called Shimotsuki."

"Have you seen the northern lights?" Chopper interrupted, starry-eyed. "I heard they're really pretty!"

He smiled at the reindeer's enthusiasm. "Yeah, plenty of times. Maybe when we go visit East Blue someday you can see them."

"Really? That'd be so cool!"

"Hey, back to the story." Nami jabbed him in the side. He smacked her hand away.

"Fine." He snapped. "Anyway, there's this mangy old stray dog that likes to hang around the place I grew up, and we let him inside when the weather's really shitty. Thing is, he drools everywhere, and the stuff's like slug trails, or the sticky crap those things leave behind." He gestured at the denden mushi on the table in the corner, which then gave him an appalled, scandalized look.

"Aw, Zoro, now you've hurt its feelings!" Usopp said, trotting over to the bench and stroked the little creature between its eyestalks.

"What, by comparing its trail to dog slobber? It's true."

"Actually, I think he's more insulted that you compared him to a slug." Chopper chimed in.

Zoro snorted. "Same thing."

The denden, which had migrated to Usopp's arms, blew a raspberry at him, which sent the whole room into hysterics.

"Tha- heehee!" Chopper giggled uncontrollably. "That means, 'see if I ever work for you again, jackass'!"

"Yeah, I got that." Zoro drawled. The denden closed its eyes and turned haughtily away, leaning into Usopp's hand. Zoro just snorted at the thing, and continued telling his own story, purely to fulfill their curiosity and make them stop pestering him. Though, he had to say, when he finally made it to the punchline, it was satisfying to see them all laugh.

Little did he know, his life was about to become a living hell.

Over the next two weeks, things just got worse and worse by the hour.

Denden mushi were just half-mindless little creatures with machines strapped to them. Just modes of contact, and that's all. At least, that's what he thought. He found out that, not only were they intelligent, they were also proud little creatures, and knew how to hold a grudge.

He also never thought they could be so evil, but they were proving him wrong in a very, very big way.

The one in the crow's nest that was hooked up to the intercom only worked right for him when there was an enemy ship coming. However, when there wasn't, it had taken to making these aggravating squawking noises at him at the least opportune times, such as when he was concentrating or meditating or, once, trying to balance a weight, and the thing scared the living fuck out of him every time. His right foot was still bitterly sore from where he'd dropped a weight on it- thankfully, a lighter one, so he hadn't broken any bones. He'd tried to meditate elsewhere on the ship, but they'd somehow gotten word even to the little ones, which had escaped their little enclosure and hidden around the ship, and emitted higher-pitched versions of the cacophony the intercom one did. The little bastards fled up the mast or down the sides of the ship and out of his reach when he tried to catch them, surprisingly fast for creatures that were stereotypically sluggish.

And that was the thing that had started it all. They were pissed at him because he compared them to slugs. Which they were. Just with shells on their backs.

They only made noise at him when he was alone, so he started sticking to the others more. They generally didn't bother him during things like meals, though he could feel the daggers being glared at him by the one in the corner as it munched away at its own food, courtesy of Sanji. He was training on the grass deck more and more often, around the others, and that had worked for a day or two, but they devised a new tactic- inching up to high places and then jumping on his head.

Not only was it extremely disconcerting and and startling for a mollusc to take a flying leap at him, it left him with sticky shit in his hair that took forever to wash out. Sanji had laughed and said maybe they confused his head with the grass, which had started a fight that ended when Nami bashed both of them upside their heads and toted the little monster back to its post in the galley, or the cabins, or wherever his attacker that day was supposed to be. This, needless to say, had interrupted not only his training, but also his naps, so he hardly slept at all during the day, because he was on edge and expecting another snail assault.

And, as if that wasn't enough, the one stationed in the men's cabin that wailed at the top of its lungs whenever the person on lookout pressed the panic button in the crow's nest, was even more devious and, perhaps, murderous. He'd dreamt one night about suffocating or drowning or something that had to do with not getting enough air, and woke up to find that one plastered over the lower half of his face. It leapt off of him before he had enough awareness or oxygen to whack it, and landed on Sanji, who yelped like a little girl and shrieked something about spiders, flailing madly in his sleep, which woke all of the others. That had not been a good night. And neither had any others when he either found the thing slithering around on him, or woke up covered in sticky snail goo.

The others had come to the conclusion that he was going insane, because when Usopp looked at him like he had three heads and asked why he was covered in slime, he confided in the sniper that the denden mushi were out to get him, but they conveniently reined in their snaily bloodlust whenever they had an audience. That no one believed him only made it worse, and encouraged the little bastards into finding even more insidious ways to drive him as mad as his nakama thought he was.

So, he was understandably frazzled by the time they next made port. No meditation, negligible sleep, and constantly interrupted training had made him a very cranky, paranoid swordsman, and he was dead-set on sleeping in town, at an inn, with no denden mushi in sight. It would take the log about three days to set, and he planned on catching up on his sleep for every last one of those. His negligible amount of spending money was just barely enough to afford three nights, not even leaving any leftover for food, but that was a non-issue as far as his sleep-deprived mind was concerned. He'd packed a change of clothes and a toothbrush and a few other things, checking his bag at least six times for stowaways before going off-ship.

And now, as the icing on the cake, the town had somehow moved and left a grassy meadow in its place, leaving him right smack in the middle of East Bumfuck, Nowhere. He hadn't brought a baby denden mushi along because he didn't need it- read: it would just spit at him when he tried to use it anyway, because all of the little beasts had turned against him- so he had no way to contact the others, and no idea where he was.

At the moment, he was warring with the urge to bash his head into a tree. Or maybe spend the night in one, muscle aches be damned. He was that fucking tired. He ambled aimlessly through the little meadow, which was sickeningly bright and sunny and cheery, complete with colorful flowers, butterflies and a rocky little freshwater creek winding through it. He decided to follow it, reasoning- sensibly, for once- that it might lead him to town. He walked along the bank, switching sides when one became too impassable, as it joined with other little creeks upriver and turned into a larger stream. It was just before sunset by the time he heard the roar of a waterfall just beyond the trees, and slashed the last few tree branches in his way with his katana.

The waterfall came off of a deep bluff and splashed into a clear blue pool beneath, with small, colorful fish darting around in it. He knelt down at the bank and dunked his head underwater, both to try and wake himself up enough to make it to town, and to take a much-needed drink after his meandering walk.

He surfaced again and shook the water from his head, feeling a bit more clear-headed. He scrubbed a hand over his face, and sighed before opening his eye. And then he froze stiff.

...They were everywhere. All over the rocks and trees and the bank, even the reeds and cattails. Wild denden mushi, in their natural habitat, milling about and swaying happily under the splashover from the waterfall. How had he not seen that before?

He stood up, very, very slowly, and began backing toward the way he'd came. Suddenly spending the night in a tree sounded like heaven. Who needed the town, if he had to go through this kind of gauntlet to get to it?

Just as he was on the edge of the woods, he felt a sudden cold sliminess in his hair, and did not make a noise like Sanji did when within ten meters of a spider, nor did he flail madly and swat the beast off of his head. It landed on the ground in front of him, and he abruptly recognized it as one of their baby denden mushi. The little bastard had managed to stow away in his bag anyway, and was now free. Not that Zoro gave a fuck. By this point, he'd gladly live with one less hateful little monster out for his blood.

Out of nowhere, they all snapped to attention, like dogs hearing a whistle pitched too high to be audible to humans. After several seconds of odd stillness, they each blinked independently, and the baby that had hitchhiked on him turned around, with a positively devious look, as the rest of them narrowed their eyes at him.

"...Oh, shit."

Helixia was supposed to be one of the most peaceful isles in the New World. A spring island, it was a bustling tradepoint, a territory of the Whitebeard Pirates- and thus welcoming ground for the Strawhats- and also very pleasant to vacation on.

Of course, one would not like to be having a picnic anywhere near the stampeding denden mushi currently chasing one green-haired, sprinting swordsman halfway across the isle.

He was running for his life, quite frankly. He knew they could jump after him, and he knew there were only more at his destination which he might not even be able to find because people just loved moving the ship to fuck with his head even though the surroundings all looked the same when he finally found it again, but he didn't care. He'd rather deal with seven tamed, domesticated ones than several dozen feral ones.

There! He'd almost made it to the abandoned cove where Sunny was anchored, he was almost in the clear. He could make it, he just had to look back over his shoulder and-

See that they were gaining on him, leaping through the air, and one particularly angry one jumped far enough to hit his face with a slimy splat. At that point, it was all over. Unable to see where he was running, his foot caught on a rock and he hit the ground hard, still trying to crawl forward blindly, but they had caught up with him and now trampled all over him, swallowing his entire body under a tidal wave of gastropods. He fumbled with the one on his face, detaching it with a disgustingly wet splurch, and gasped for air, trying and failing to pull himself out from under the mass of snails. He managed to get his face above most of them and breathe, and saw the six denden mushi belonging to the Strawhats lined up on the railing and grinning evilly, nodding their eyestalks approvingly at the seventh, the traitor that had tattled on him to the feral ones currently attacking him and now sat proudly next to them.

It all hit him at once. The exhaustion, frustration, anger, everything. And he finally caved, willing to do anything to get them the fuck off his case.

"I'M SORRY, ALL RIGHT? YOU'RE NOT SLUGS! I GET IT ALREADY!"

Suddenly, the assault stopped. The ones slithering all over him and- eeww- under his shirt fell still immediately, and then sedately meandered off of him, and back into the brush. He was sticky, slimy, and altogether uncomfortable all over, but when he looked back up at the monsters that started it all, the one he'd personally wronged simply nodded its eyestalks in haughty approval, and he and the other two adults magnanimously nudged the rope ladder over the edge of the ship for him to climb.

He stood up, shrugging off his slimed-up shirt-coat-thing and draping it over his equally slimy arm, and dubiously boarded the ship again. He skirted around the creatures, never facing his back to them, and backed right up to the staircase to the aft deck.

"...I'm going to take a bath. And I don't want any of you bothering me." He declared. The little creatures just dispersed, heading back to their posts, without a care in the world. He eyed them mistrustfully, backing up the steps until they were out of sight, and then dashing to the bathhouse and locking himself in.

After a long, hot, solitary bath, which he very much enjoyed with no humans to interrupt him, nor snippy little snails with an axe to grind, he sleepily made his way to the bunkroom clean, groggy from the steam, and completely undisturbed by the formerly enraged denden mushi which he knew were still lurking around. Upon arrival, he slithered into his bed, with a happy sigh, and was unconscious within seconds. He slept through the night, with no disconcerting dreams of suffocating or having everything in his world covered in gluey, slimy snail goop, and didn't wake until raised voices and noises from the deck around noon roused him, of the others beginning to stock up for their impending departure in less than two days.

His contentment was cut short by the cold, slimy feeling on his head. He opened his good eye and glanced blearily at the table where his nocturnal assailant usually resided, finding it empty. He then tried to glare at the snail on his head.

"I thought we were even." He muttered, voice low and gravelly from sleep. The little gastropod just gave a wriggle without responding.

"Zoro? Did you sa- oh." Chopper edged around the footboard of the bunk, and pressed a hoof to his mouth to stifle a giggle. "Is- is this what you meant when you said the denden mushi were trying to drive you crazy?"

He sighed. "Right. I'm gonna be the butt of that joke for a while. Can you ask 'im why he's sliming my hair up?"

Chopper looked at the denden mushi, which just wriggled again. He tried and failed to restrain a smile when he looked back at Zoro. "He says he likes the way your hair feels. Maybe you can be friends now, right?"

The denden mushi squealed a bit, wriggling disturbingly again. Zoro sighed deeply, pressing his face into the pillow in defeat.

He would never have clean hair again.