The follow-up to Denial, Rage, Rice Crackers, Acceptance, and has a similarly long title. I invite you to refer to them as Rice Crackers and Single Combat, respectively. It's easier.
A word on the AU: this is our world, only populated by One Piece characters. In my personal fantasy, Gol D. Roger was the replacement for Teddy Roosevelt. AW YEAH. That's why Japan and America exist (like all the rest of the countries), but you'll never hear any famous names from our world.
In this chapter, Zoro goes a little bit crazy. Again. And I'm sorry, ZoTa shippers, but it's really not shippy. Especially since Kuina only died recently in this AU, as an adult, this is not a good time for Zoro to find a romantic interest in someone who looks just like her. Which is kinda how I feel about it in canon, too, though I have less of an argument there. Sorry.
The air is thick as grease in a cooking pan.
The air is thick…
The air is…
The air…
…
It's friggin' hot. Zoro Roronoa gets tired when it's hot; it seeps into his bones and just keeps tugging at him until—
He wakes up, which is weird because he didn't feel himself falling asleep. He is spread-eagled on the carpet, stripped to the waist in baggy, rumpled khakis. He is slathered in sweat and everything tastes of salt. With an effort, he hauls himself to the wall and fumbles with the fan on the windowsill. The on switch can only take so many smacks before the tired little fan grumbles to life.
This is Zoro's air conditioning. It is crap.
"I could fix it for you."
It's a bit later, in the cool evening. This is Usopp, painting his lady-friend. She isn't even here but the dark-eyed, tow-headed girl must be very clear in his head because it looks pretty much just like her.
"You c'n do repairs like that?" Unspoken: For free? 'Cuz I'm in debt to the Witch.
"I'm a tinkerer. I tinker." Unspoken: It's my hobby. Whatever.
"Hunh."
Usopp's apartment always smells sharp like expensive markers form a richer friend and musty, acrid acrylic paint. Usopp is saving up cash from his children's books fro a real house, but this little space is already better'n Zoro's apartment, so he doesn't see the point.
"It's friggin' hot," he says, lacking anything else to say.
"And humid," Usopp adds, gesturing to the black, curly bush that is his ponytail.
"Cut it short like mine," Zoro suggests, not even bothering to look up and see the usual mute headshake. Someone likes it long.
He can respect that.
Usopp glances outside, where the burning red sun is soaking the city in orange. "You don't walk home now, it'll be dark when you're on the streets."
"What, you think I'd be in danger?" I am never in danger.
But accidents happen.
Accidents happen—you could trip and break your neck.
Shut up.
"I'm gonna grab dinner at the French place."
"The Baratie?"
"The French place."
"It's called the Baratie," Sanji protests; it is later again.
"Rice. Cold rice and cold wine. Wine with ice cubes."
"Wine with ice cubes?" Sanji sneers.
"Cold wine."
The plate of rice clatters onto the counter, grains scattering everywhere. "Ice cubes in wine is a sin, Watermelon-head!"
Zoro does not clean up the spilled rice. Sanji made this mess, so the cook can take care of it later.
"Improper chilling techniques—it'll get diluted—idiot! Wine with ice cubes…tastes like shit!"
"Cold wine is a sin?" Zoro prompts, and is rewarded by a bottle of it arcing gracefully towards his face from the kitchen. He catches it, checks the price tag and the quality as Sanji keeps ranting beyond the counter, slamming down a bucket of ice for his convenience.
It's Japanese. It's—sakai? Saki?
-"You're pronouncing it wrong. It's—"
"Sake," he mumbles. It's expensive, old sour rice wine, but it's…eh…Nikkyu. Kuina—
Kuina tried to teach him a little bit about Japanese culture once—food, manners, and wine. There's some wild, pop-music craziness there too, but Kuina lives in the old places, and she is in love with that side of their world.
Zoro doesn't understand the words, but he likes alcohol. The words for first, second, and third-grade wine stick in his head.
He came back from Japan from the funeral maybe two months ago. He's been in the right time zone for two whole months. But then something else jumps him, an accidental memory, and it's like jetlag all over again.
"…and of course you wouldn't know that, because you're an uncultured, green-haired bastard idiot!"
"Keep talking," says Zoro absently. He needs the background noise to keep his mind off the hole that just reopened in his chest, so familiar by now. He doesn't ask Sanji about the second-grade wine. Either it was an accident, or Dirty Cook feels sorry for him. Whichever, he'll just take the bottle back if Zoro calls him on it.
Cold wine tastes just fine.
At midnight, Zoro has finished drying the dishes and just in time, too—the power is out. Sanji's solar-powered radio says some big-name crime lord's flunkies kicked out a powerline downtown.
"I'm off, then," says Zoro, feeling his way towards the door in total blackness.
"Actually, why don't you wait here until the streetlights come on?"
This is very, very un-Sanji-like. Zoro casts a suspicious glance in the direction he remembers Sanji being in. "Oh, yeah?"
A sardonic, incredulous snort. "Uh, yeah."
"Why? You worried about me too? You and Long-nose!" If the Dirty Cook doesn't have an excuse, Zoro can hold this one over his head for a long time coming. Hell yes.
"Worried? About you? Nice try, seaweed boy, but I'm just pretty sure you're gonna get lost. I'm issuing a warning here, man."
Oh.
Bastard.
"My sense of direction is just fine," Zoro snaps. "Even in the dark. I just go out the front door here, down the street two blocks, and on 'till I hit my building." He puts one hand on the doorknob, confident and smug—
"That would be great—" his voice is strained, trembling a little—"—if you didn't—if it was—"
"What?"
"That's the side door, you shithead!" And the shaking cracks into a side-splitting guffaw.
The lights crackle on just long enough for Zoro to get his eye on the laughing cook, and then all hell breaks loose in the following dark.
Later, walking home with a bloody lip, a black eye, and one dubiously functional elbow, Zoro considers that it wasn't a bad fight overall.
The only light in the breathless, damp air comes from the moonshine and the occasional pair of headlights ghosting out of the murk. Down two blocks- was that the second one or the third one? He stops, conflicted, then decides to keep on down the turn. If it ain't his road, he can always turn back and try again.
As it turns out, this is the right road. Familiar landmarks loom out of the darkness, and Zoro, determined not to walk past Smoker's apartment block the first three times like he does every day, keeps a wary black eye out for the pawnshop across the street.
Pop-
He looks up, alarmed—
Pop-pop-ppppp-
It's the streetlights; Zoro jumpstarts his legs into a steady, rolling jog, heading for the nearest one.
If you're gonna get tangled in a streetfight, never ever run towards the light. Once it hits your eyes—BOOM—no more night vision. Zoro is very well aware of this and he learned the lesson the hard way—a knife to the gut.
But he's not going for a fight—he just wants a better look at his creaking, aching elbow. As he reaches the pool of dying orange light, though, there is the swiftest clatter of feet beyond its blinding domain, and Zoro instantly changes his run, knees bend, arms close to his body, and fighter's footwork takes him around into the street, where the lamppost will be a barrier between him and anyone on the sidewalk.
Pop-pop-p-p-p…
The world shakes and dances in the jumping orange glow. Pop-pop-pop—footsteps, getting closer.
And then she runs past. A flash of breath in the night, a flare of black hair, and everything goes dark again.
They say when something shocks you, time freezes. But it's just a lie. It was only the briefest glimpse, blurred and strobing in the erratic light, but Zoro's guts go cold and the sounds of the world shut out like someone pressed the mute button. The night sweats around him, soft humid blackness. He will not let his legs crumple beneath him; that would be weakness, and he can't stomach that.
Feeling sick like he hasn't in a while, Zoro stumbles home. He misses the apartment block three damn times before finally staggering up to his smelly little room, where he kneels with the utmost grace in the stifling heat. He can still taste the wine—its bitter aftertaste is almost like bile on the back of his tongue—
he throws up.
It has been one hell of a day.
It will only get worse tomorrow.
Zoro told someone once that there was nothing worth doing anymore, something like that. That night tasted of fish and smelled of smoke and glowed like half a dozen lava lamps. Tonight, Zoro is so freaked that he thinks even Luffy's comfortingly insensitive attitude won't be enough to tame his nerves. So he tries to sleep—
It will only get worse tomorrow…
-but it doesn't work.
In the misty pink morning, Zoro rolls limply out of bed, throbbing all over from yesterday's fight, covers tangled around his feet. He stretches, savoring the twinges and the stiffness, and then goes to do his morning katas. He's been working on one of his own for a while now—a piece for two swords. Zoro is trying to teach himself elegance. It isn't working.
Regardless, it's a good warm-up, especially considering that the Witch will have more work for him today. There's some mugger, almost got her the other night. Aw, no, it's not like she didn't stand a chance. If anyone's the victim here, it's the poor sod who tried to jump Nami. Zoro's just finishing the job, seriously. So he'll hunt the guy down, beat seven kinds of crap outta him, and tell 'im to get a job or something.
It's the hunting part he'll have trouble with. This is a big neighborhood, and it's unbelievable, the amount of avoidance maneuvering you gotta do to avoid cops, who would get him canned for towing around his priceless heirloom swords.
But that will wait until evening, when the cops are lazy and easy to spot. In the meantime, Zoro can finally pay his rent, because every-other-day construction work and the meager dishwashing tips from the Baratie have gotten him the amount in record time. It's a pretty good deal—heavy lifting and hard work aren't strangers to Zoro, so he might as well get paid for them.
Smoker is less than impressed; the last two dollars of the payment are in coins of various kinds, including about eighty pennies. However, once they're all noted and accounted for, even Zoro's picky cop landlord can't complain.
Or can he?
"I hear you've been whining about the air conditioning again."
"Zoro blinks, momentarily dumbfounded. "You what—I—what?"
"You heard me." Smoker doesn't like to repeat things, another thing Zoro can respect.
"I—well—I never said anything to you," he points out, and then huffs out a couple of faint coughs as his lungs rebel against the smoke-thick atmosphere.
"You started yelling about it two days ago. You disturbed several other residents."
"I'm two floors above you," says Zoro dumbly.
"I have very good ears. The AC stays as is."
"Hardly AC," Zoro grumbles, backing towards the door. "'S just some crummy little fan…"
"Roronoa!"
"Okay, I get it! I'm—"
"Watch where you're going!"
Zoro feels presence behind him, and spins, shifting away form them as he faces the person he nearly—
backed—
into—
Smoker says something muffled. Zoro has forgotten how to breathe, swallow, and blink. His mouth is dry, his lungs brimming with smoke.
She says something; her voice is not quite the same as Kuina's.
It is not enough.
Her nose is a bit longer, her face has a bit less Asian in it—Kuina was a quarter Japanese.
It is still not enough.
She puts on a pair of square, black-rimmed glasses, but the narrowed eyes behind them are still sharp, dark as lamp-black.
Her hair is a bit shorter, but it is not enough.
Then she gasps, and for one petrifying, beautiful moment, he thinks she's recognized him, even though he saw the body, helped dig the grave. But she's looking…down, at his left side, where the white sword hangs from his hip, forgotten.
"Wadou Ichimonji," she breathes, and Zoro puts one protective hand on the hilt.
"It's not a fake, I can see the tsuba! It's got the crest! Captain Smoker, it's the real thing!"
"Okay." Clearly, he's heard this before. "Roronoa, meet my new trainee. Tashigi, this is a tenant of mine."
She looks flustered, seeming to come to herself, and stretches out a hand to shake. Zoro stares at it mutely, the calloused fingers and battered palm…
And then he brushes straight past her out of the room without any greeting. Even if he'd wanted to say something, his throat has closed—his eyes are burning.
How the hell is this fair?
000
Later that night, Zoro is a mass of pain once again. It didn't stop at one mugger. It didn't stop at all. If there is a bad part of town here, Zoro for sure wandered into it. Blood is spattered in patches over his burning body; whether it's his or someone else's will be clear after a proper shower. This time, he stops in the light of the repaired streetlamp to clean Kuina's sword.
…Shit. He hasn't heard it called Wadou Ichimonji in years.
This time, he doesn't hear the footsteps before they're within three feet of him and when he does, his first instinct is flight rather than fight. But with the first jolt of movement, a puncture wound in his thigh splits open and while he's putting pressure on it, trying to staunch the bleeding, the Tashigi woman jogs into the light.
Zoro does not look at her.
"It's a bit late to be—you're bl—oh, my—that's a lot of—what have you been doing with that sword?"
The final tone is one of shocked disapproval, and Zoro knows what's coming before she does it. Which is why, when she reaches down to snatch the bloodied sword up off the concrete, he is already clasping it tightly to his crimson-soaked chest and glaring daggers at her.
A frustrated snort. Zoro grins, which makes a wound in his mouth start bleeding again. "I was bushing grmins."
She spares a moment in her righteous anger to look confused. "Huh?"
Zoro hacks a mouthful of blood onto the damp pavement. "Bustin' criminals."
"That's my job," she tells him coldly, and makes another grab for the sword. "It is certainly not something you should be doing with this!"
Zoro turns stubbornly away, and joints all over his body pop in a symphony of pain. A sound like microphone feedback pierces his head.
"Mister Roronoa." Her patience is wearing thin. Kuina wasn't a hothead…it is not enough. "I don't think you understand exactly how valuable that sword is. Now, if you could just—"
"I know egnagggn—" He spits more blood, this time near her feet. She moves back with a noise of shocked disgust. Zoro repeats, nice and clear this time, "I know exactly…how valuable it is. Damn sight better'n you do."
"Then why are you beating up thugs with it?" she almost wails, clearly fed up with his ignorance.
He's losing coherency fast, and patience even faster. "Well, I woulda used my other ones, but then I'da had to go back to Smoker's place and you woulda been there!" Zoro barks, unwarrantedly accusing.
"Is there a problem with that?"
Oh, shit.
Change the subject.
"Whatever. You can't have it, 's all I'm sayin'."
"Wait. Wait, did you say you had more?"
Oh. Shit.
"Don't think I said that, no." He is so bad at lying.
"How much are they worth?"
"Dunno. They were gifts." He is so damn bad at lying.
"I demand to see them!"
"Like hell! I don't trust you with any one of 'em, any further'n I can—" Another spatter of blood on the pavement. "—spit." Hopefully, they can stop jawing soon so that wound can close.
"What, you think I can't handle them? You know nothing about me! Just because I'm female, and younger than you, but you don't know me! I was trained by—"
"Stop it!"
It's more of a roar than a yell, and it sends bolts of pain all through his torso. He convulses, groaning, his body curled around Wadou's white scabbard.
"Stop what?"
"Acting—like—"
"I beg your pardon?" Oh, she is pissed. Damn it.
"You look just. Like—" Hack, wheeze. "—friend of mine, died—"
"Well, I'm sorry for your loss, but I was born this way!"
"Then stop acting like her!" This is a stupid thing to say, but he is low on blood and oxygen and it seems logical at the time.
She hits him.
Everything goes black.
000
When Zoro wake sup, it is morning and the confining summer pressure-cooker feeling seems to have abated a bit.
Thing…something…someone…girl, woman, looked like—
His sword is gone. His sword, Kuina's sword, it's gone.
Zoro snaps upright, bolting to his feet, but he's forgotten about last night, and his twanging muscles stretch to breaking point just with this one swift movement. Patches of blood have glued his clothes to him, and they tug painfully at the wounds beneath.
Later. Exactly six o'clock, and Smoker hasn't had his coffee yet. He looks like a man out of an old Western, grim and scowly behind his amorphous gray shroud of smoke.
Zoro is hanging on the doorframe, breathing like grim death and glaring right back at his landlord. He still hasn't showered, and even Smoker's smoke-dulled nose wrinkles at the smell of fermenting blood and sweat. "I'm telling you, tell her…to give. It. BACK."
"It was a legitimate confiscation," says Smoker, who clearly knows exactly what Zoro is talking about, but he is even more unreasonable than usual before coffee. Zoro hates him, has never hated him more.
"That sword," he grits out, trying not to move his mouth too much so he doesn't bleed on the carpet, "belongs to me. And it belonged to… Smoker, her father gave me that!"
"And you haven't taken care of it properly, have you?"
That voice will douse him in ice water every time he hears it. He hates her even more than Smoker right now, because she took that sword, because she looks like his dead friend but isn't Kuina.
"Give it back." He doesn't look at her.
"No."
"Give it back!"
She sighs, exasperated. "We've already been over this, Roronoa. No!"
For a moment, he honest-to-God sees red.
"That sword is the most important thing I own, and the most important thing she ever owned. It was an heirloom of her family for ten generations, so don't you act like you have the right to take that from them or me, 'cuz you're the kind of person who'll put a sword on a shelf to die and lose purpose, and I can't let that happen, so give her BACK!"
He's breathing hard, the haze in his vision clearing…that was more than he'd meant to say. He's facing her now, shocked at his own voice but relishing the astonishment on her face.
There is a
loooooong
moment of silence, during which Zoro collapses against the doorframe again, having spoken his piece, and Tashigi avoids making eye contact with him. Smoker shifts behind his desk. A grinding click and a sudden flare of yellow light beyond the veil says he has lit a fresh cigar.
"Her?"
Zoro stares at Smoker for a second, not understanding.
"…What?"
"You said, 'give her back.'"
Zoro stares some more.
"Not it."
"I said it." He did, he remembers… Didn't he? No, he won't give Smoker the satisfaction of hearing him admit a mistake.
"You said her," Tashigi informs him, quietly superior.
"Shut up! A sword is and it—I said it, dammit…"
"You have problems," says Smoker with all the delicacy of a sledgehammer.
"Says the addict," Zoro snaps. "You smoke even more than the—"
Wait.
An idea.
A stupid idea.
Zoro turns to Tashigi, face manic, black eyes blazing. "A bet."
"A what?"
"A bet to get my sword back."
"I don't—"
"Simple. Easy. You think you're not so like my friend?" He doesn't give her time to answer—he knows she thinks he's delusional. "Come and meet this cook I know. He was another…another friend of hers. If he makes the same mistake I did—"
"How do I know you haven't told him already?"
"Your boss knows I haven't been to the French place since I met you yesterday."
"Hn," says Smoker in affirmation. Zoro doesn't ask how he knows. Never question a cop.
"What does that have to do with Wadou Ichimonji?" she asks, defensive. Zoro doesn't know quite how to answer that one, but to his surprise Smoker comes to his rescue. He stands, mutters something in her ear, and then walks out, taking special care to ram Zoro with his shoulder on his way past.
Bastard.
The Baratie is busy today; cars are crammed into the parking lot's limited spaces. Zoro winds through the crowd and up to the counter easily. Behind him, it sounds as though Tashigi has almost knocked over a table and is attempting to rectify the damages. Zoro waits as patiently as possible for both her and the Dirty Cook to get their asses over to the counter. Sanji should show up anyway—the Baratie is almost always low on waiters.
As it happens, Sanji does get there first.
"You're early, Green Tea-head." He swabs the counter once, too brisk to show any great animosity yet. "Rice and wine again?"
"Just beer."
"Right. Coming right up." It's pretty evident form the cook's sarcastic tone that he really doesn't have time for serving beer to green-haired idiots.
"Dirty Cook. Hang on a sec."
"What? It's rush hour, Melon-boy! I've got five orders only I can cook, and beer on top of that, and you want me to—"
He chokes abruptly, and out of the corner of his eye, Zoro sees Sanji's face go white as paper.
"Hello." Tashig's voice, a couple of feet behind his right shoulder. Zoro lets one side of his mouth quirk into a humorless kind of smile.
"Wh…"
"I'm sorry, I'm not here to order anything today," says the woman—Sanji shakes his head mutely in response, still staring.
Wait for it…and… All he needs is for the Dirty Cook to say the name, say the damn name already…
"And what is your name, beautiful lady?" He sweeps a deep, flamboyant bow.
What?
Later. The crowd has thinned, Zoro is on his third beer, and Tashigi is gone. Also, Sanji has off-time.
"I just wanted my sword back, dammit…" Zoro groans, forehead pressed to the counter. His head resonates with the closeness of his voice; the wood beneath his face is smooth from years of scrubbing.
"It's just a sword, idiot. You can mooch cash for another one."
"It was not," Zoro growls, "just a sword. It was her sword."
Sanji has no reply for this.
"How did you know?"
"What?"
Zoro lifts his head, accusing. "How did you know it wasn't her?"
"Miss Kuina's bust size was much—"
He punches Sanji in the chin.
000
"It's just how he looks at things." This is Nami, holding a shotglass made of solid gold. She and Zoro are drinking early again—it's not even noon. Zoro, already floating on a pleasant buzz from the Baratie's beer, does not deny her the chance to get him even deeper in debt.
It smells of oranges and lilies in here.
"Zoro. Zoro, I now this is tough, okay, I get it, but since you know it's not her—"
"And what if some lady who looked just like your mom turned up? You think you wouldn't turn into some weepy little kid if you thought for a second she was…back somehow?"
For the second time today he watches all the blood drain from a face. Nami chews on her lower lip, then her upper lip, bringing a little bit of flush back to them. Then she heaves the shotglass at him. Zoro grunts as it bounces off his forehead and presses the heel of his hand to his temple.
"That stings…"
"Your debt is tripled, bastard. Go get drunk somewhere else."
Yet another thing he shouldn't have said.
Two days a go, he thought things were getting better.
Pain isn't so bad with alcohol burning in his blood, and the slurring, amiable softness gets him all the way into his apartment building, even if he does get a little bit…led astray on the way there. By now, the sun is sinking a little, dipping indecisively towards the horizon. Luffy should be in by now, back from whatever mysterious errands he runs while the sun is up, about to start the night-long hippie party that has saved Zoro more than once. He doesn't know when that kid sleeps, but it must be some pretty intense rest, because Luffy is never without energy.
Thinking blearily (or beerily, haha) that he could do with some of that energy right now, Zoro starts up the stairs towards the elevator. He's weaving a little, so the stairs take a bit longer than they should, but he does manage to find the right button on the elevator. A moment later, it chimes into place behind those impassive, stainless-steel doors.
He almost knows it's going to be her when it opens, and he stands to one side, eyes fixed on a point on the horizon. He waits for her to pass, and neither of them speaks a blessed word.
But he hesitates before stepping inside, and that is the crucial moment, because his head turns inexplicably and inexorably to look at her over his shoulder.
And he can see her, right by the stairs, about to take one step too far—
He remembers…not much. A wordless cry of warning ripping itself from his throat, a surge of adrenaline, pain and one hand closing around the collar of her terrible floral shirt—and then a feeling of gravity shifting (hopefully in the right direction)—and falling—
-THUD.
Zoro wheezes, because the fall kicked all the air out of his lungs and his heart, racing a mile a minute, really needs the oxygen. Tashigi, it seems, has fared better, though her face is all tight and she's rubbing the back of her head liked it hit the floor. At least she didn't hit it falling down those stairs, at least her neck didn't snap like a pretzel, like- His head is ringing. This was not how his day was supposed to go, dammit!
Zoro feels like he's broken his ribs again, like they were after that evil fight with Sanji over the prank call that wasn't one.
"Be more careful next time," he grunts, and then wheezes again, staggering to his feet. She looks at him like he's gone mad, and let's face it…he probably has.
Down the stairs, change of plans. Once again, this is beyond Luffy. (That's how he always feels, and he should go and see the kid anyway, but he doesn't.)
No, he has a better idea. He'll roam the streets 'till early morning, until Sanji's done the dishes on his own and left the Baratie for a good night's sleep. And then…
111
Sanji is always the first one to the Baratie, even before Owner Zeff. He gets the least sleep and does the most work, and it has been this way since he was ten. He's pretty proud of it, even though it's probably the reason why he smokes.
Zeff has never approved of this—cigarettes, he says, kills a chef's two most important senses.
This is probably why Sanji can't figure out exactly what the sour odor tinting the kitchen's air is until he gets a good whiff of the puddle slowly spreading over the tiled floor.
It's wine.
"Shit," says Sanji very quietly. Because he knows this can only be one person's fault—no one else would know where the extra key to the side door was stashed, so it must be…
"'Zat yoouuuu, duh—Saahhngggg…Dirty Cook, shef-boy?"
He has never seen Zoro drunk before. Not properly drunk, not filthy-stinking-slurring intoxicated. Zoro's tolerance for alcohol is beyond the limits of a normal human, so he must've drunk…
Shit…
…so much…
A bottle comes flying over a stove at Sanji's head. A reflex check tells him it's empty, cheap green glass. Later, he will regret shattering it with one cursory snap-kick.
Until then, he is too furious to care.
"Raaaash," Zoro drawls, and laughs deliriously. The sound echoes throughout the kitchen, and then trails off into something like sobbing. Sanji rounds the corner cautiously, ready to dodge or smash any more bottles.
"Rice," says Zoro plaintively, and breaks down crying.
He looks like shit.
111
Sanji really has to bash the idiot a bit for drinking the entirety of the Baratie's easy-open wine stocks. That's hardly all the wine in the whole restaurant, but it still costs about a thousand dollars, all told. Zeff is going to kill him, and Sanji will not let Zoro forget about this for as long as they both live—that is a promise.
Unfortunately, Zoro really can't stay on the kitchen floor of a gourmet French restaurant, so Sanji ends up lugging the swordsman into the street and down by the dumpsters, where he drops the guy because Zoro is freakin' heavy. He can wait there until Sanji has cleaned up Zoro's mess and, yes, called a doctor. The unfairness is stifling.
111
Zoro wakes up in a bed. Then he throws up. Then he goes back to sleep.
111
"We pumped your stomach," says an old-lady voice. Zoro does not open his eyes, but groans a long, heartfelt groan. Then he falls asleep again.
111
The next few days pass in a blur under the care of Cherry Hospital's (only) doctor, Kureha. She is old. She is scary. She is not afraid to break arms. Zoro learns this the hard way when he tries to leave and discovers the "We accept donations" under the Free Hospital sign is actually more like a "we accept donations, or else" sort of thing.
But he already owes Nami…and Sanji…and Smoker ain't too happy, either. It's too overwhelming to think about, so Zoro doesn't, and he is eventually discharged feeling marginally better than he did before he binged on the Baratie's best wine.
He still has no way to deal with his landlord's stickler cop-in-training or the fact that she's still hanging onto his dead best friend's most prized possession. And the little differences are not enough.
There is really nothing he can do; he can't go into the apartment block…he can't pay rent…at this point, maybe he'd even be better off on the streets. He considers it more than once—just walking out. He's never spent that much time in his apartment as it is.
There is nothing standing in his way…but that sword.
Fine. He can quite the building and steal it back later. The plan doesn't go any further than this, because Zoro doesn't do stupid things like looking before he leaps. So one day, just as clouds are obscuring the midday sun's fury with gray pallor, Zoro knocks on Smoker's door. (There is smoke leaking through the cracks, but no voices from inside—his landlord is inside, and Tashigi is not.)
"Come in."
Zoro does so, and he can't help a nervous glance to either side, hating himself for it. "…Just you."
"Were you expecting someone else?"
Zoro scowls at this, even though a lifetime of cigarettes has left Smoker with the vocal expression of an electric pencil sharpener, so he could have meant anything by the question.
"No," Zoro mutters, trying to pretend the bastard's ditzy sidekick doesn't terrify the hell out of him.
"She's cracking a drug ring," says Smoker shortly (the man is psychic—there's no better explanation). "How can I help you?"
This is said in such an unhelpful way that Zoro completely ignores it and rewinds to the previous sentence.
"But she's a total klutz!"
Smoker's scowl grows even more pronounced; a gash appears where his brows press together, as they so often do. "Can I help you, Roronoa?"
"You can't send someone like that out to—"
"Yes I damn well can, Roronoa!" Zoro almost takes a step back, surprised by the force behind the words. "Don't you underestimate her, understood? For a drunk and a masochist, you're too damn confident in your own swordsmanship to exclude her from your bracket for clumsiness!"
"A wh—a maso—a—" Zoro gropes for the right words and comes up with, "Where do you hear these things?"
"I have my sources. Is that all you wanted to say?"
No, I came to tell you I'm leaving this hellhole apartment 'cuz I have no money and I just felt like trying homelessness again so your crazy assistant can't bother me, and if I break in to steal back my sword, it's her own damn fault.
…is what he was going to say. But the words catch in his throat, and it comes out as a cough and a mumbled, "yes…"
No.
No, he's been thinking about this all wrong. The little things, the bet…no, of course it wasn't enough. She's a klutz, a geek, but she's also a swordswoman. There is only one way to settle this. He barely catches Smoker's impatient growling about "get out of my office now" over the buzzing in his brain. That's fine, though—that office isn't where he needs to be. Smoker shouldn't be around to hear this offer.
He waits for her with easy patience. It feels like a short time, lounging on the sidewalk outside the building, but it's evening by the time she returns. The sky is velvety lavender and the faint chill in his healing injuries tells him bad weather is coming.
Better close the deal quickly, then.
He stands, bones creaking, muscles twitching. Suddenly, he is feverish; he aches all over. He wonders how she'll react to a proper blow, what that familiarly strange face looks like right before losing. He's never seen such an expression on those features, and the thought is terrifying.
She is already bruised and bloody, but he catches no evidence of debilitating wounds, no hint of a limp or a defensive lean. She must really be better than she looks.
That's good.
"The bet was stupid."
"I beg your pardon?" She is tired, but icy.
"The bet. I was set on proving you were so much like her. It was stupid." (But he does not apologize.)
"Well." She gives him a mollified little nod, her glasses dipping a fraction of an inch down the bridge of her nose. "I see you're out of rehab."
Zoro wants to yell at her to fix them, put those black eyes behind glass again. But—
He completely ignores the 'rehab' jibe. "I have a better one."
"You what?"
He eyes her warily, itching to take a step back from her indignation. "Oi, hear me out. I want to fight you."
She pauses, caught off guard. "You—I—no!"
"I was thinking about it all wrong." Zoro knows just how crazy he must sound right now, but his throat is open and the mad words flow out. "It was the wrong kind of bet. You fight me. Real swords, no gear."
"If you think I'm going to go into some kind of death match…" She trails off, lost for words in the outrage of it all.
"Only to disarm," says Zoro, and manages to look her straight in the eye. "When I win, you will give her sword back."
She hesitates, losing the argument. She is stubborn, wants to crush his confidence, prove herself. Do it. Zoro lays the arrogance on thick, cruel with anticipation.
"You heard me. When I win. You're weak, inured. You're a woman." You might have been enough when we were young, but I was the one who told you to keep going before you...
Shut up.
Shut up, it's not her!
She is furious, red-faced with outrage. "And you? You're a bankrupt drunk with—"
He's heard this from Smoker already.
"Do you accept or not?"
And he knows she will.
111
Later.
The sky is boiling with unshed rain and greenish light filters through it as the last of the sun vanishes beyond the skyline. Zoro hurries, hating to be caught in the rain—he once almost lost a fight because his soaked pants were weighing him down.
Right now, he's in his old practice clothes, the ones he hasn't touched since Kuina left for Japan and the old dojo shut down. They've been a crumpled heap in the corner of his apartment for longer than he cares to think about, and they stink of sweat and a little blood. His pants are baggy and black, stopping just above his ankles. The tank top used to be white, but a couple patches are undeniably yellow now. The cloth is comfortable; the green-black scrap of his old ghi wrapped around his left bicep is heavy with reminders.
It takes him longer than it should to find the dojo itself, windows boarded over, door forbidding in its familiarity. He is both comforted and transfixed by the sight.
"Roronoa!"
He does well—he has been teaching himself not to flinch when he hears that—and turns to stare steadily at her earnest, angry face.
"What."
She's offended again. He can only assume his very existence is an affront to her as a policewoman. "You said nothing about intruding on an abandoned building! Breaking in on private property is not something I'm willing to do simply to satisfy your bizarre obsessions!"
"It's fine," he says, and snaps out one bare foot to knock down that door full of memories. The space beyond is dark, forbidding in the slight, stormy illumination from outside. Zoro steps inside, exhaling through his nose in subtle relief as his toes grip the varnished floor. It's like meeting an old friend for the first time in a long while.
Not like meeting her.
"Doesn't count as breaking in when it belongs to the guy knocking down the door, does it?"
And again, disbelief. "You own this place? You expect me to believe that?"
"I'll show you the deed after this is over," says Zoro distractedly. He could explain—my friend's father left it to me and restarted in Japan—but she doesn't need to know that.
She scowls. "If you can't—"
"—Then jail would be a nice place to nap," Zoro finishes for her, cool and snide even though his heart is beating a mile a minute with fury and sickness as he watches her draw Wadou Ichimonji from its sheath and try a few swings. Maybe she didn't hear hi, because she keeps swinging, bare feet squeaking softly on the wooden floor.
This is an arranged fight, he remembers. He's spent the last few years doing combat without a warm-up, and he'd almost forgotten he had the option. He stretches, taking care of all the important muscles, and then spares sixty seconds in nervy, ineffectual meditation. When he stands again, his legs are cramped and his sweaty feet stick to the floor, red from pressing to a flat surface.
When his blood is moving again, he draws Sandai Kitetsu and waits for her.
It only takes a moment, as it always did before—damn, he's doing it again, but she is not Kuina!
That's why it's so important that he do this, so that he can understand once and for all exactly who she is and who she is not.
Clearly, she is no stranger to this, so he doesn't bother to explain the rules before he attacks.
Zoro and Kuina were both aggressively offense-oriented in their 2000-plus duels, Kuina with greater ease and grace, Zoro with greater ferocity. Already, he knows Tashigi and Kuina's styles are different. Kuina was a genius, but he can feel the work and repetition in the strength of the blows he parries now. He also knows that Tashigi's tolerance for attack is much lower than Kuina's—at a certain point, a balance will tip and he'll be able to take advantage and go for a rush.
The sound of metal clashing in the old, echoing hall is nostalgic and fantastic. Zoro can't help the faint exhilaration rising in his throat, grim enjoyment as he begins to understand the gap between the two near-identical swordswomen.
Then the tip of his sword catches her across the cheek, dislodging her glasses from behind her ears, and the blood dripping down her jaw—
He goes loose, hands numb on Kitetsu's hilt, wondering with a cold feeling rising in his chest what she looked like freshly dead, lying broken at the bottom of the stairs—
He almost loses his sword as a neat twist wrenches at the blade; suddenly, he's on the defensive, muscle memory taking over as he wonders how he would have dealt with seeing that face dead and white for a second time. What exactly does he think he's doing? He's lost it again.
He's almost up to a stopping point. If he backed into the entry hall in the old days, he would have lost immediately. With an effort, he forces his muscles into conscious movement, compensating for finesse with brutality. A few calculated, powerful blows take them back to the middle of the room.
Are they on par? Is he losing? He can't be. This is his place, and her grip must be well-loosened from the pain of blocking those strikes. Yes, he can see her arms shaking, but there's no fault in her defense, no faltering in her steps—what is wrong? What is he doing differently, because this can't—
crash—he barely blocks, almost trips. The world swings around him (got to make a comeback) and he curses himself for over-analyzing, getting distracted.
Dammit, man, pull yourself together! TRY.
Try?
Steel rings and scrapes, and the noise stings his ears.
I am trying. I've been trying—
No.
He realizes…no, he hasn't.
"What's wrong, Roronoa?" She's backed off to a defensible distance, legs crooked, eyes sharp, breathing a bit too hard.
She looks like she thinks she's going to win.
"Can't you beat a woman? Were you expecting me to lose like your friend?"
She misunderstood.
For a feminist, Tashigi is making painfully demeaning assumptions about Kuina. She still thinks he's trying to prove she's like Kuina, and she doesn't know what Kuina the swordswoman was like… But it still makes him angry. He slides forward, toes working at the floor, shifting into cold, serious intent.
She must have noticed something, because she's instantly wary. Instinctively, he knows that won't be enough.
Somewhere inside, he deeply wanted her to win, like it would fill the hole. Part of him wanted to believe that if she won, Kuina would still be alive somehow.
But Zoro isn't that kind of man. He hates superstition, and this is about people. People and swords. He doesn't understand one, but he's devoted his life to the other, and that's enough.
It'll have to be enough.
She thought Kuina would have lost, and she expects to win against me.
DAMN it.
He understands enough to keep that anger in a cage, not let it control his attacks. Anger makes him sloppy and vicious, which is fine on the wild-beast backstreets at the city, but here he will not allow it.
He flows like water.
Tashigi is startled, then determined, then panicky. She's floundering a little—not very much, because she's better than that, but enough—and a few times he almost nicks her again as confusion slows her reactions. Zoro hasn't fought properly in a while, not like he used to in this very room, long ago—long ago, when he-
When he was a punk with a baseball bat and a deathwish, looking for a little fun where he could whack some bastards without breaking any rules.
Nothing went as planned for him then or since. She messed everything up, beating him that first time, and he had to stay, he had to lose and lose and lose until—
She died before he could beat her, but this is not his second chance—he understand now, he gets it. He can work without limits, and he does. And it feels…
…like a physical weight has been lifted off his shoulders as he sweeps around and locks her in, savoring the feeling of razor-sharp edges grating over each other.
This is the ultimate high. This is better even than toughing out pain. There's a deadly weapon six inches from his nose, hatred burning at him from beyond the crossed steel.
"You were right." He grins, showing all this teeth. "You're nothing like her." And a jab followed by a wrench sends Wadou clattering across the floor—he will apologize to the sword later.
"Kuina would have won."
He takes a moment to see the beginning of realization in her eyes, those eyes that only distantly remind him of Kuina now, and then he turns to let her take her defeat with honor. That's the best he can do. His fingertips brush the gleaming, silvery surface of Wadou's blade with reverence, and he is surprised at the sweetness of the relief that comes with that one touch. Behind him, there is a faint rustle, and he reaches back without looking over his shoulder—it's the white scabbard.
Zoro gathers up Wadou Ichimonji, pressing his forehead once to the cool, lacquered scabbard as he sheathes it again. Its weight is comfortable at his left hip—Zoro feels what might be happiness or might simply be satisfaction, which is usually as close as he gets.
At some point, it must have started raining. Zoro scowls out at the sheets of gray water, hating the idea of going out into it with two of the best swords he's ever owned. Maybe he needs a case…
He'll just run home. Better'n staying here, with the policewoman sitting silent and furious in the corner. He's not stupid enough to stay at times like these. He never will apologize to her.
Zoro is soaking, dripping wet when he arrives back at Smoker's place. The cop car is gone, so his landlord is probably out looking for teenagers to slam for speeding. That's cool—Zoro has a feeling this'll be his last night here anyway, the way his luck with money has been going.
Everyone is already in Luffy's apartment when Zoro arrives—"everyone" being Nami (drinking herself into oblivion), Sanji (pouring beer for Nami), Usopp (doodling in a corner), and of course, Luffy himself, sprawled next to his enormous radio. We All Live in a Yellow Submarine blares in the background. Zoro, heavy with water and weary, settles onto the worn shag carpet and falls backward, the scabbards at his waist clicking together. He is hungry as hell.
He considers his current situation—just how screwed-up his life is right now, how there seems to be pretty much no way to fix it. He felt worse after the prank call that wasn't, but how can Luffy possibly settle all his debts, get him out of this shitty old town, and give Zoro the opportunities for combat he lost when Nami stopped employing him? Because damn it, but he needs those brawls.
And those are the three impossible things he needs most. Luffy's just a rice-cracker-eating nocturnal hippy on an allowance that can't even afford him better than a huge, clunky computer that looks like it came straight out of the eighties.
He's working on it right now, patiently typing out an email with his forefingers and bobbing his head to Eight Days a Week, even though Zoro would bet good money he has no idea what the lyrics are about. At all. Luffy has been known to simply ignore people who try to interrupt his Beatles records, but with nothing else to do, Zoro thinks he might as well start up a bit of conversation.
"Luffy."
"Muh?" His mouth is full of some kind of meat. Zoro rolls his eyes and continues.
"Who's the email for?"
Luffy swallows with a colossal effort and shoots Zoro one of his huge, white-toothed grins. There are bits of meat still between his teeth, which distract Zoro while the kid answers. Looks like…beef…
"What?" He shakes his head like a wet dog, alert again—droplets of water fly from his sopping hair. To his left, Sanji complains loudly.
"I said," Luffy repeats with moronic patience, "it's to our first customer!"
Zoro laughs one of those confused little half-laughs you tend to hear around Luffy. "…Our what?"
"We…have…a…customer," Luffy repeats, serious and intense. Zoro pauses, trying and failing to find the logic.
"…Luffy, we don't have a business."
"We're a team of private investigators," says the kid happily, and goes back to typing.
The Beatles sound very loud in the silence that follows.
"…Beg pardon?" says Usopp in a slightly strangled voice.
"I don't recall ever volunteering for that," growls Nami, cynical in her drunkenness. "What's your friggin' problem, Luffy? Just think you can rope us in, huh? Just like when you—"
"Payment: fifty thousand dollars to start with," says Zoro, reading over Luffy's shoulder.
Silence again. "Eight days a week…is not enough to show I care…Love you every day, girl…always—"
"I'm in," says Nami, and settles back to drink again.
"I always did want to try something like in those old spy movies," says Usopp reminiscently, and mumbles something in a disturbingly perfect imitation of Capone Bege's accent in Cartel Boys. "Could be cool, I guess."
"I'm coming," says Zoro, amazed yet again by Luffy's bizarre charisma. Exactly what I need.
"Well duh," Luffy chuckles. "It was already decided!"
"You can't just go deciding things like that on your own," mutters Zoro, smiling faintly. This is a better day than it was before.
"Okay, then," says Luffy, supremely confident, "tomorrow we'll get in the Peacemobile and drive down to Texas!"
Silence again.
"Speaking words of wisdom…let it be…"
"Texas?"
"Peacemobile?"
111
Smoker gets back late, disgruntled and damp, wondering if a hairdryer will fix his cigarettes. Tashigi is already in his office when he enters, holding a crumpled, handwritten note and shaking. Something happened, but Smoker won't ask. If it's important, she'll tell him eventually. Instead, he takes the note from her unresisting hands and begins the arduous process of deciphering Luffy D. Monkey's handwriting.
Mr Smokey,
Me n my pryvat investigaton squad are gunna go to Texass. I now I gotta pay rent still but we will com back w/ 5000000000000000000 or something $ so dont wory
PS Zorro will pay to!
~LUFFY
"Tashigi!"
"Sir!"
Smoker bites his cigar in half, eyes fixed on a point somewhere beyond the horizon of human anger. "Pack. Your. Bags."
"…Sir?"
"We are going to Texas!"
But that's another story. Again. Yes, you should probably expect a follow-up. Everyone load up in the Peacemobile! Incidentally, it's necessary that you imagine Luffy pronouncing the two syllables of "Texas" as he writes them-separately, as "Tex-ass". Because he does. I'm sad that I only got to write a little Luffy this time, but he'll have plenty of screentime when I run the next one. The title is taken approximately from the stages of PTSD-I don't know if that really applies here, but it seemed strangely fitting.
I have to apologize for making Zoro behave as he did in this chapter. I know he comes across as a total jerk in some places, but like I said, he's gone a little bit crazy. They'll most likely have further encounters with Smoker and Tashigi in the next part, and he'll have gotten over the worst of his trauma by then.
Luffy's writing is based on every bad fanfiction I've ever read.