Supervision

With every step Zoro took through the town, the sound of hoofs clomping along followed him.

Every. Single. Step. And he was sure he'd passed by at least three medicine shops already. But without the slightest lingering or even a single comment, it followed him all the way to the sword shop. Inside, he did his best to look at swords in any direction but his crewmate. Having a hard time with this (not to mention focusing on his business while being hovered over) he didn't stay long.

The sound followed him just as precisely back to the Going Merry.

The same crewmate didn't go to sleep until Zoro did that night.

When the swordsman climbed into his hammock, he noticed a rope tied ridiculously tightly between his own hammock and another. If he were to get up in the middle of the night, the motion would swing the other hammock and wake up a certain occupant who had been rather annoying lately and had no doubt set this up.

The rope even had a bit of tension so the other hammock would swing anyway if the rope was cut. Clever. Zoro made a mental note to kill Usopp for teaching the reindeer stuff like this.

"Hey Chopper! What's going on?"

No reply. Not even a glance. And it'd been weird enough for Luffy to see Chopper sitting on the deck doing nothing this time of day. Normally he was reading medical books or working with medicine right about now. "Chopper?" Luffy poked his nakama in the shoulder. Still getting nothing, he looked at Chopper's face.

Chopper was... angry? No, just very serious. Focused. Luffy traced Chopper's hard stare to Zoro, who was doing his routine weight training. The captain's expression lit up. "Oh cool! Zoro's gonna do a trick, isn't he?!" Luffy sat down cross-legged next to Chopper. "I wonder what will happen? Is he going to throw the weight and bounce it off the clouds?!"

Moments later, Usopp walked by and looked from his sketch pad to Luffy and Chopper, eyebrow raised. "Uh... what are you guys doing?"

"Zoro's gonna throw the weight and bounce it off the clouds!" Luffy replied, giving the marksman a giant grin.

"...Not all clouds are like in Skypea, Luffy."

"Oh." Luffy turned his attention back to Zoro. "Well then I dunno. But he is gonna do a trick."

"Cool," Usopp said, sitting to join the row of spectators.

At this point, Nami noticed Luffy, Chopper, And Usopp actually in the same vicinity and sitting down in a semi-organized fashion. The virtual paradox powered her curiosity to find out what was so interesting about Zoro's training today. Of course, Sanji followed her down the steps. Robin didn't move from her chair nearby, but was coaxed enough by the growing nakama throng to look up from her book at the spectacle.

Zoro felt all the stares gorge into his back, and started counting every time he lifted the weight in his head to attempt ignoring the group. 1462, 1463, 1464...

Then there was the talking (a good half of it being Luffy).

"All right! A trick!"

"Oh, is that what's going on?"

"Trick! Trick! Trick!"

"Are you sure he's gonna do something?"

"Sure I'm sure! Chopper said so!"

"When? He seems kinda quiet, come to think of it... You okay Chopper?"

"Come on Zoro! Do the trick already!"

"Yeah, hurry up so Nami can get back into the shade of the sail!"

"Uh... thanks Sanji, but I'm fine."

"Woohoo! Trick!"

Snap.

At last, Zoro turned to face the rest of the crew. "Enough!" He screamed, immediately shutting up the entire group.

With a swing of his free arm so firm that it seemed to have an anger all its own, Zoro directed his gaze and pointed index finger at Chopper.

"All right! You win! I'll stop taking off my bandages when you're not looking! Now would you just leave me be already?!"

Chopper grinned.