That morning, Sanji woke up with the faint smell of steel and sweat in his face, and it slowly dawned on him that he wasn't on his back sleeping on a grassy plain. No, he was on Zoro's shoulder being carried like a sack of potatoes, his face dangling upside-down and facing the Marimo's back side.
He aggressively squirmed and pounded on Zoro's back, his legs swinging violently.
"Let me down, you oaf!" he shouted.
"Oh, you're alive. Looks like I didn't have to bury you," Zoro commented as he let down the cook. Sanji straightened his outfit.
"Where did you get us into?! Couldn't you have waited for me to wake up?!" Sanji stomped angrily as he started looking for anything familiar. None.
"YOU GOT US EVEN MORE LOST THAN YESTERDAY!" He shouted at him. His nose was flaring, a vein was popping out of his head, and he was seriously on fire.
"We're not lost, baka," Zoro argued almost pathetically. "I remember that tree!"
Sanji was starting to sound and act like Nami with the way he was grumbling and about to pull his hair out. He ended up kicking the tree that Zoro pointed to and it flew away.
The sun wasn't even visible, so he can't exactly pinpoint which was East. Not that that simple logic ever worked. Picking another direction which he guessed was the direction where they had come from, he started walking.
"Let's go this way. Come on." He mentally cringed as he imagined Zoro disappearing on him again. But thankfully when he turned around, the marimo head was still there.
"That's where I was bringing us a while ago, you idiot," Zoro muttered and with great reluctance, Sanji decided not to argue. For some reason he was starting to get really really tired. And he had just woken up, so what gives?
"Oi, shit cook. I thought you're scared of bugs," Zoro pointed out. Sanji glared at him. "I'm not scared of them. I just really hate them." He sounded a bit out of breath. Seriously, what was wrong with him?
"Well, there's a leech on your neck, if you consider that a bug…"
Sanji froze. Then he fainted.
"Oi, cook!" Sanji was lying on the ground on his face, the leech still sucking until it had released its lock on Sanji. It was larger than the normal size that leeches could grow. Upon closer inspection, Zoro noticed that there was no traces of blood on Sanji or the leech. And the leech was purple.
"What the hell..?" He started. Poking the leech with his finger, the leech shrinking every time he poked it. Before he could blink, the leech leapt onto his arm and started sucking into him. Observing it closely, Zoro realized that the leech was actually sucking his energy.
"Shit," he quickly pulled the leech off but no avail. Sighing, he used the tip of his sword to pry the leech off. It was a bit painful and it actually left a bleeding wound. He stepped on the leech to make sure they won't have the same problem again.
Sanji was still a lying heap on the ground so Zoro carried him bridal style, since Sanji hated how he carried him the first time. He started walking, as expected, to the direction further from where they had come from.
When Sanji woke up, he was in a soft bed. Warily, he opened his eyes to see if he was really back in the Sunny. Aaaaand, of course not. He was in an unfamiliar room with wooden walls and floor boards. There was a window beside the bed, and although the place looked homey, it wasn't homey for him.
"Where the hell am I now?" he muttered. Looking out the window, he saw that he was on the second floor of some kind of inn. The view was outlooking some part of a simple village. The sun was still high, probably around 3 P.M., and yet not a soul was seen wandering around the village.
He stood up from the bed when the door opened to reveal Zoro.
"Where have you brought us now?"
"I don't know. I found this village while I was walking through the forest," Zoro shrugged. "No one's here though."
"What? This place doesn't even look half-desserted," Sanji said, looking out the window once more. "Let's look around."
They roamed the small village that reminded Zoro of Usopp's village, or where he grew up. Some of the houses were unlocked, and upon inspection, it's like people disappeared in the middle of doing their normal routines. Weird.
"We should head back to the Sunny before the sun goes down…again," Sanji said. They headed back into the jungle. There was a single pathway that led in and out of the village.
"Oi, Marimo. Is this where you entered the village?" Sanji asked him.
"Well, I remember that rock…" Zoro pointed. When Sanji started grumbling, he chuckled. "I'm just messing with you cook. Yes, this is where I came from."
Sanji sighed. Well, that's one burden off of him. Zoro isn't being the complete idiot he was yesterday, or like always.
He was a bit worried as to how the crew would probably react to them not returning yesterday. If they've started a manhunt, their search party would most likely consist of Robin, Luffy, Brook or Chopper. Nami and Usopp are ruled out, and Franky will definitely stay with the Sunny if anything happens.
The thought of Robin having to trudge the forest to look for him worried him, since the forest wasn't very accommodating.
"I'm tired of this," Zoro grumbled. And before Sanji could see what he was doing, Zoro had done that tornado technique to wipe out the trees in random directions, making their visibility through the forest better.
"Wow, you still have brain cells left," Sanji commented. Zoro was about to retort but the sound of wood being broken interrupted him. Sanji was kicking all the trees he wanted, venting out his frustration.
"Wanna see who can destroy more trees?" Zoro smirked.
"Just make sure you're going in the right direction, shithead," Sanji smirked back. They ran to the direction where they were walking towards, kicking every tree that came their way. It was probably a waste of their energy, but Sanji didn't care.
His pent-up stress was keeping him from thinking rationally. Before they got further into the jungle, vines had crept through the ground and grabbed their feet.
"Shit!" Sanji immediately did his moon walk, getting as much space as possible from the vines in the ground. Zoro wasn't as lucky though, as he sliced all the vines coming towards him, but they just kept repairing themselves.
When Sanji lowered himself to help the swordsman out, it was too late. A wave of vines emerged from the deep jungle and pulled Zoro in until he was out of sight.
"Shit! Zoro!" he screamed. Examining his surroundings, all of the vines were aiming to do the same to him if he so much as floated within their range.
Sighing in defeat, he charged to the direction where Zoro was dragged off to, being consumed by the vines as he did so and disappeared into the dark jungle.
The vines retracted into the jungle as multiple crunching noises were heard.
"Oh! There's a village there! Maybe they're here!" Luffy pointed at said village before running. Robin looked around, taking note of the neatly sliced trees and trees that look like they've been kicked down.
"Chopper," she called out to their doctor. "Can you smell them anywhere?"
"No, I don't. Not a single trace," Chopper said sadly.
Robin cast one last look around her before following to where their Captain had run off to.