…In which Zoro apparently has poor eyesight, and Sanji has been way too well-trained by the studio to kick stuff reflexively. (Sorry this took so long, Stardew Valley ate my life ._.)
The atmosphere in the room changes in an instant. They're not standing on the remnants of Thriller Bark Mansion, but Sanji is there, ankle-deep in the rubble and dust clouds with the massive, cracked mast casting a shadow over the dressing room floor.
Some sort of switch flips behind Zoro's eyes, and his gaze breaks away from Sanji's to lock onto an invisible opponent up in the ceiling in front of him. As always, he's ready at the drop of a hat. He recites Sanji's cue with the same grave tone that he's used a hundred times before, as if it's as second nature as breathing. "Luffy will be the one who becomes the pirate king."
"Hold on a second, you bastard!" Sanji doesn't think before the words come out; his reflexes take over, and he takes a firm step forward. It vibrates the wooden planks underneath them, echoing loud enough to be picked up by the microphones—were there actually any around. He's tired all of a sudden, so tired, which makes his performance all the more believable as his feet drag him toward Zoro with a slight limp and a stagger. "What'll happen if you die?!" he snarls, a real scowl pulling at the corners of his mouth. "What happened to your ambition, stupid?"
It feels strange, going over lines that he'd already resigned from his memory as being old, useless information—like he's pulling it up from a fresh grave. He can't shake the feeling that there's something buried in this passage that they need to settle; at the very least, that would explain Zoro's behavior. And if that's what it takes to get them back to normal, he's willing to look deeper into the feeling.
Zoro watches him approach with a dark expression, gritting his teeth. "Why, you…" he grunts back, but his tone is more torn up than it is threatening. His hand shifts toward his vacant hip, over the empty space where the hilt of Sandai Kitetsu would normally sit. Did he actually think the swords were there for a moment, or is he just showing off his acting skills? Well, two can play at that game.
"Hey, big guy!" Sanji says, spinning on his heels to the invisible opponent up in the ceiling that Zoro had been eyeing before. He throws his arms out in a wild gesture, shielding Zoro from the momentous threat that isn't there. His legs nearly buckle under the stress of the sudden movement, although the action is mostly for show. There's a squeak of rubber soles against the floor behind him as Zoro jerks forward in surprise, likely thinking that Sanji was actually going to collapse, and he smirks to himself. "...Instead of taking that moss-headed swordsman's life—"
To his shock, Sanji is cut off by the sound of snickering behind him. It's muffled, and Zoro is trying at least a little bit to hide it, but Sanji would know that noise anywhere. What the hell happened to their agreement? No laughing for a whole day, and he'd make the man dinner; that was the plan. And he'd been doing so well until now, too.
"I thought we had a deal, idiot."
"That only counted during recording, right?" Zoro says, still trying to pull himself together. "Keep going."
Sanji snorts under his breath, giving his tense shoulders a quick roll. Fine. He's nothing if not gracious, even with idiots. After a moment to clear his mind, he settles back into his stance. Where had he been before being so rudely interrupted? Right, the part where he offers himself up to be slaughtered. Lovely. "...Instead of taking that moss-headed swordsman's life, take mine!"
"Wha-" Zoro tries to interrupt him, as the script says he should, but Sanji raises his voice to speak over him in perfect rhythm.
"The Marines still don't think much of me now. But, before long, I'll be the most dangerous member of this crew." Straightening his back—and making it look as physically taxing to do so as he can—he stands tall, bringing one of his outstretched arms back to point a thumb at his chest indignantly. "I'm Blackleg Sanji!"
In the silent moments that follow, the desire to glance back at Zoro is overwhelming, but Sanji holds his ground, maintaining his stance. After a long, heavy silence, he takes a step forward and sticks his hands into his pockets. "...Now, kill me! Don't take his life, take mine. I've always been prepared to sacrifice myself for the others. This is where I die an honorable death!"
The bulk of his monologue is over, but it's still not time for Zoro to cut him off. He's doing an awfully good job keeping silent; for a moment, nothing but the whirring of the air conditioner fills the room. Sanji would give anything to see what sort of face he's making right now. Since nobody else is watching, in theory, Zoro could easily be flipping him off right now and he would never know. The thought, for whatever ridiculous reason, brings a smile to his face.
Shit, he really enjoys this, doesn't he?
"Hey," Sanji starts again, in a lighter voice than he'd usually use for this part—and, to his surprise, he can feel the telltale signs of tears welling behind his eyes ever so slightly. He misses the beat to come in for his next line, and lets out a quiet sigh to buy himself more time. This part always gives him some trouble, but running it in the privacy of the dressing room is affecting him more than he'd thought it would. "Please... give everyone my regards. Sorry, but you'll have to search for another cook." God, he hates that line. The very concept of his brings a bad taste to his mouth.
As soon as he falls silent, he tenses by reflex. Zoro's swords are stashed away on the other side of the room, so logically, there's nothing for him to be shoved in the stomach with. But he knows Zoro—the man is extremely good at improvising. It's better to be safe than sorry. So he waits, and waits some more, for the pain of being struck to come. But when he feels the gentle hand taking his, he nearly jumps out of his skin. He spins around and finds Zoro standing far closer than he's used to—close enough that he almost attacks him out of sheer habit.
"Wh—...y-you bastard," Sanji starts in a less than perfect attempt to continue the scene to his last actual line, unsure whether Zoro is interrupting him or improvising. "What the hell do you think you're doing...? I'm trying to make a dramatic sacrifice here."
"That's a load of bullshit and you know it," Zoro says with a frown, lifting Sanji's chin with his free hand to solidify eye contact.
Well, that did nothing to fix his confusion. "Bullshit? What is?" Sanji asks, heat rushing to his cheeks and ears as his heart nearly bursts out of his ribcage. His mind is running a mile a minute; but the only thought he can piece together is that, if Zoro were to do this during the real filming, the director might actually have an aneurysm right on the set. Is this still part of the scene? He can't for the life of him pinpoint which Zoro is doing this to him. But making a fool of himself by taking it the wrong way is the last thing he wants to do, so he clears his throat and continues responding as vaguely as he can. "Everything I've said is fucking true."
"No, it isn't," Zoro insists frustratedly, tightening the grip on Sanji's hand. "That garbage about finding another cook—never say that again, alright?"
A jolt courses through Sanji's chest and settles heavily in his gut at that. Slowly, he reaches behind himself with his unbound hand to stub out his spent cigarette in the tray atop his wardrobe. "...What kind of stupid shit are you on about now?" he says as calmly as he can. "Come on, you guys can find someone else if you need to." That's the idea behind the line he'd had to say, anyway. But the concept of being replaced is something that he doesn't want to spend much time mulling over. Besides, he has a contract, doesn't he? So the likelihood of that happening is negligible at best, anyway.
"That's not the point!"
"Then what is?!" Part of him was still doubtful that there was ever an actual point to this exercise. What about this is so important to Zoro that he'd actually feel the need to go this far?
"You are!"
"For fuck's sake, marimo, you're not making any sense!"
Zoro grabs both of his shoulders in a vice grip, and for a second Sanji thinks the man is going to shove him back. But his fingers curl into the fabric of his jacket instead, pulling him in close enough for their foreheads to press together—another familiar motion that tugs at Sanji's overdeveloped instincts to attack him. But he doesn't, staring back with wide eyes instead. "Listen, curly-brows, I don't give a damn if we could find someone else or not. It can't be anyone else. It has to be you—there's nobody else that gets under my skin like you do, or pulls off fight scenes as well as you do, or smiles the same, perfect way you do all damn day! Nobody in the world is more suited for this than you. You think you're expendable?! No replacement could hold a fucking candle to you!"
Had... had he heard that right? Zoro said "fight scene", didn't he? That must mean that he's speaking from the heart to him right now. Sanji swallows thickly, one of his hands subconsciously drifting up his side to thumb at the bottom of the man's shirt. Just how much had this been eating at them? Probably since the first time they read through the scene themselves, but he hadn't noticed until now. But Zoro had told him exactly what he had needed to hear, even though he hadn't even known he needed to hear it. And if the warmth knotting Sanji's stomach is anything to go by, he did a good job doing so.
"That's… a lot of compliments to process, marimo," he says slowly, idly rubbing the thin fabric between his thumb and forefinger. He hadn't noticed it before, but the freshly laundered scent of Zoro's clean clothes and the faint smell of his hair gel blend very well together.
"Yeah, well, I've got all night." Zoro doesn't move, his stare demanding eye contact. It leaves no accommodation for Sanji to look away, but he can't even bring himself to try, too caught up in studying the thin lines of the man's contact lenses around his strikingly brown irises. How long has he been wearing those for? In all the years they've worked together, Sanji has never seen him with glasses—he didn't even know he needed them—but he finds himself extremely interested in the idea. "Take all the time you want."
The heat returns to his cheeks, and he's sure Zoro can feel it radiating off of him. Suddenly, the man's hands feel a lot heavier on his shoulders. "It's not a matter of time, idiot. I just… don't know what to say to something like that."
They're used to sharing their feelings at close quarters like this—often practically eyeball-to-eyeball and much louder, however—but Sanji finds it harder to breathe than usual this time. The atmosphere is different, very different, and he's hesitant to admit the reason why. He's been down this path before, and he's told himself not to do it again, damn it.
After a moment, Zoro speaks again. "I need to know," he says, his frown visible in his eyes as he speaks. "Are you planning on leaving?"
The question makes Sanji's breath catch in his throat, and he leans back a fraction of an inch out of reflex. It's hardly enough to change their distance, but he can feel the warmth from Zoro's skin start to vanish. "Leaving? What?"
Is that what he had been getting all worked up about? The idea is ridiculous at first, but Sanji gets it; it makes sense that he would worry about it, considering that they had come about as close to that as they possibly could have, as far as their production's story is concerned. In fact, the same thought had occurred to him a few times too. But, like he'd said before, he'll probably die before his job in this place is done—and he means that. "...No, never. " He couldn't. Not with Zoro there; not when they have so much left to do.
Zoro takes another half-step forward, and the press of his forehead against Sanji's returns as quickly as it had disappeared. "Promise?" he asks, his voice low and even.
"Yeah," Sanji says quietly and nods, the slight movement disjointing their connection in a clumsy way that makes his heart twist. It causes Zoro's nose to graze his, and his leg twitches up from an involuntary, aggressive tick—he takes in a sharp breath, and grabs at the fabric stretched over Zoro's chest without thinking. It takes him a second to realize that, in the movement, his line of sight had shifted from the man's eyes to his lips, and he looks back quickly, only to find Zoro glancing heatedly to his as well.
He can feel the air conditioning blowing down on him, but he could swear the room is smoldering hot. They're not at the afterparty for the shooting in Alabasta this time, but Sanji almost feels like he's there again, with the sand in his shoes and nothing but Zoro on his mind—like the entire world has melted away for a moment, and the only thing he wants to do is close the narrowing distance between them for good. And, for the first time in what feels like forever, he chooses not to deny himself.
He tugs Zoro forward, throwing caution to the wind as he kisses him with all the fervent passion he's been keeping to himself for far too long. Strong hands squeeze his shoulders by reflex, but quickly move to embrace him, eagerly pulling him close in a way that offsets Sanji's balance. Zoro's lips respond with an equal impatience, forceful and excited as he showers him in brief, hungry kisses. Each one is more intense than the last; he can feel the man's arms snake down around his waist to bring them even closer together—if that were even possible. But the sudden momentum pulling his hips forward and forcing his head back sends his body backward, and his feet out from under him.
Dragging Zoro back with him, Sanji's shoulders collide with the inside of his wardrobe, and the wooden sides scrape his elbows as his falls down inside it. Some of the clothing on the hangers fall off onto him, fabric landing his head and messing with his hair, with crumpled sleeves cascading over his shoulders. But he can't bring himself to care about the trivial details when Zoro kisses him harder, a hand gripping the back of his head as they slide to the floor. His lips never leave Sanji's, muffling every noise they make as they grab at each other for support. Sanji wraps his legs around the man's hips to keep his back from bending strangely, and Zoro groans into his mouth before biting at his bottom lip. A churning knot in his stomach begs Sanji to open up to let the man in, and so he does, catching a deep, cool breath of air before Zoro's tongue ghosts over where he'd bitten and accepts the offer.
The wooden structure creaks around them as Sanji shifts to free his arms, and he wastes no time burying his fingers in Zoro's short, fake blood-matted hair as he deepens the kiss. As much as Sanji loves the feeling of Zoro's tongue practically committing his mouth to memory, the desire to do the same is too much to ignore; so he pushes back, meeting Zoro in the middle before taking the plunge himself. The taste of Zoro is even more enticing than he remembers, and he finds himself chasing it as the man shifts back. Sanji's entire body goes with him, lifting from the base of the wardrobe and the dressing room floor and clinging to the man's body like he needs it to breathe—which, who is he kidding, is not far from the truth. Zoro hardly budges under the sudden extra weight, only letting out an appreciative groan and sliding a knee under Sanji's ass to help keep him up.
His lips burn from the pressure and friction when he finally pulls away, his breath uneven and face in flames. The almost imperceptible line of saliva connecting their lips disappears as he leans back against the back wall, with a pile of clothes still on top of him, partially obscuring his face. He can taste Zoro all over the inside of his mouth—a fact that, now that the heat haze clouding his mind is gradually clearing, both pleases and horrifies him. He looks up at the man on top of him like a deer in headlights, waiting for some sort of sign as to what Zoro is thinking now—for any sort of sign telling him how badly he may or may not have royally fucked up.