"What are you doing?"
The hunter didn't spare a glance back, having heard the man coming from two blocks away. His employer was not built to move quietly, and in this mud even a cat would make noise. "This is my job. All you have to do is wait."
"Wait," his employer rumbled. "Your target is Strawhat Luffy. Or did you forget?"
"You know damn well I wouldn't." The hairs on the back of his neck prickled at that name. "I haven't found him yet.
"So I'm just supposed to wait, while you waste your time with his weakling crew."
"They aren't...they're strong. They're..." He stopped, uncertain, finally concluded, "stronger than I was expecting."
"A girl, a kid with a slingshot, a deer--"
"Reindeer," he corrected.
"Are they too much for Pirate Hunter Zoro? They're not your targets. Forget about them."
"I can't."
His employer's face, shadowed under his hood, twisted with something difficult to read; maybe concern, or surprise. Zoro had been taken back himself by his own vehemence. Usually he had better reign over his emotions. Usually he wouldn't have any particular emotions--they were only a pirate crew. He had fought enough of them before. But they..."They're a problem," he explained, to himself as much as his employer. "They'll interfere with our fight, when I find him. They'd all be in the way.
"Besides, I've already taken care of some of them. Nico Robin is gone--"
"She is?" his employer demanded. "Where? What'd you do with the body? She's bountied--"
"She's out of the way," he growled. "She wasn't my target either. And the other one might be dead by now, that sharpshooter..."
--Usopp. The name came so quickly and easily it was dizzying. He didn't even know when he had heard it--the monster had shouted it, and the red-headed girl. Except it was already familiar then. Someone must have mentioned it to him before, though usually he didn't bother trying to remember the names of pirates, except his targets, and then only while hunting them.
The man was right; they weren't his prey. He shouldn't allow the distraction. Any of them, the sharpshooter, the monster, the girl. That blond cook, who he hadn't fought before, and yet his kicks were too easily predicted. And a fight so simple should not have raised his blood the way it had, anymore than the terror in the reindeer's dark eyes, or Nami's cry... "I can't have them in the way."
"Don't let them distract you," his employer rapped out, angrily, but then he drew a breath and calmed himself. "Roronoa Zoro," he said, and his voice grated on the hunter's nerves, that weirdly flat, patient tone as annoying as the dripping rain. Zoro's stomach turned, gut twisting painfully and bile rising. "Who's your true goal? Who do you hate, Roronoa Zoro? Remember who you hate."
"Monkey D. Luffy." He swallowed back the sickness, let the familiar rage burn away that ill discomfort.
"The only pirate to escape your blades," his employer said, in that same sickening monotone. "The worst monster of them all. Whose fault is it that you're a wanted man now?"
"Monkey D. Luffy."
"Remember Whiskey Peak, Roronoa Zoro. Remember how you fought him there."
As if he could forget. Just entered the Grand Line, and there he had met Monkey D. Luffy, not the first time, but the first time they had truly fought. That night had been dark as this one, but dry, dusty streets, instead of this ceaseless rain and mud. And all the bodies, those failed bounty hunters...they had blamed Zoro, had put a bounty on his head for that crime, but what reason would he have had to attack a hundred bounty hunters, when he was one of their number?
Monkey D. Luffy's fault; Monkey D. Luffy, who he had fought that hot night, in that dry hunter's town, fought with all his strength, and yet it hadn't been enough to win. He remembered how angry he had been, the same frustrated rage that smoldered in his belly now. The same--hatred--
"A swordsman cannot hate," his master had told him, years ago. "A sword wielded with hate, swung in anger, will never be the strongest."
--but surely there must be an exception made, when one is fighting a monster. The worst pirate of all, the one who would be pirate king.
Roronoa Zoro is one of Luffy's crew, that damn cook had said, mockingly, it must have been. As if he were such a coward that he would bow to that monster. Son of the devil, Zoro had called him, their first encounter, and it had been a devil's bargain he had offered. To join him, or else die. Of course he had refused. Served his sentence and earned his rightful freedom, but that bastard had seen that he paid for it eventually all the same, as he had also made his present employer pay. They both had reason enough for their hatred. That was why this man trusted him now, because he had also seen it, had understood.
As if he, Roronoa Zoro, would ever have accepted such a deal, ever become a pirate, one of those weak, bullying criminals that he hunted. There had been other lives at stake then, too, that boy who dreamed of being a marine, that little girl--he couldn't remember exactly how, but they had been in danger; he could still taste that bitter wrath and helplessness, striving to protect them. It must have been the pirate; who else? A monster who would threaten the life of an innocent child...
There had been a child here, too, another little girl, hiding in a dark house, with the rain rattling on the roof. He had drawn his swords to protect her, and then she had run to him, thrown herself at him, so he had had to catch her--
His employer was speaking, had been for a couple minutes, and Zoro shook his head, angry with himself for being so preoccupied by nothing more than his own thoughts. He couldn't even recall exactly what the man had been saying--reminding him of what he was here to do, why he must do it, as if he needed the reminder. This was why a swordsman could not afford to hate; such distraction in battle could be fatal. He must stay focused, could not allow himself to be sidetracked.
Strange that this close to his prey he would find it so difficult to concentrate. When he was fighting it was all right, and he missed that surety now, the straightforward action and reaction of battle. Usually his thoughts wouldn't drift so easily, even outside of the pure, reflexive demands of a fight. But there was something not quite right here, something about the town, or the island, or the night. More than just the obvious danger of the pirates, and he knew better than to ignore the instincts he had spent years tuning.
"What happened to the girl?" he asked suddenly, and as he said it there came a sharp certainty that it was important, somehow--if nothing else, let her be safe, or else it wouldn't have been worth it at all--
"What do you mean?" his employer asked.
"There was a child," he said, but even as he said it, that sense of conviction slipped away, as completely as the apprehension of an indefinite threat did vanish, leaving him confused. As if there were a menace just behind the dark curtain of rain, barely glimpsed out of the corner of his eye, but whenever he turned his head toward to look at it direct, nothing was there, like he had only imagined it.
Unable to recall what exactly he had realized, he struggled to at least remember the words he had been intending to say. "The child in the house--the girl you...I was trying to..."
For an instant his employer appeared to freeze, his expression for that moment seeming one of anger, or maybe even fear. But it must have just been the chill of the rain, for then the man only shook his head, frowning. "What are you talking about, a girl? There was no girl. You've met no one on this island but me and the marines, and those pirates."
Of course he hadn't; of course there had not been. Perhaps he had only dreamed it; he must have, the way it was so unclear, but for a single vivid moment--those little arms thrown around him, that whisper, "I'm sorry," and then a sharp sting...
His hand rose unconsciously to his throat, rubbing the wet skin--smooth, except for a little bump, like an insect bite, but there were no insects in this rain--
A big hand fell heavy on his shoulder. "Are you listening to me?" snarled his employer. "We're wasting time. Do you want to lose your chance?"
"Your chance as well," Zoro growled back automatically, but the man only laughed, harshly in the rain.
"I can't rely on you, then? You're not strong enough?"
It was all he could do not to pull his swords on the man. He kept himself perfectly still, damming back the surge of ferocious rage. There was no reason for it; a true swordsman pays no heed to words. It was only because he was so tense already that he was reacting this fiercely. He had no reason to hate this man. "I'm strong enough. Leave it to me, however I choose to do it." He made himself unstiffen enough to raise his head to look the other man in the eyes. "Whoever I decide to fight, don't get in my way again."
The man's hand lifted from his shoulder, slow and deliberate, like the caution one moves with around a rabid dog. "As long as you remember your true target, Roronoa Zoro. As long as you do it--you're going to, aren't you. You will. Tonight, you will kill Monkey D. Luffy."
Zoro didn't reply, didn't bother to answer, just turned and walked away. A swordsman has no need to state his intentions; words don't matter, only deeds. He would find the pirate; he would find them all, all that were left. That red-haired girl, that blond cook, the reindeer--all their faces, he could see as surely as if they were standing before him now, their eyes turned up toward him, and the man they followed. He would fight them all, and win. Even against their captain himself, this time, he would win.
He didn't look back to watch his employer's departure. Hopefully he would stay away; Zoro didn't need the distraction. The man didn't matter, nor his price. Nothing mattered, this night, but his hunt.
So he ignored those retreating footsteps, as he ignored the coldness of the wind blowing the rain against him. Ignored the echo of the man's voice reverberating in his head.
You will kill Monkey D. Luffy.
Deja vu; he almost could remember hearing that command before, in that same harsh, flat voice. Could almost remember himself replying--but it was vague as a dream, and just as absurd.
"You will kill Monkey D. Luffy," the man said, and his own voice answered, just as flatly, "Never."
But he would win, this night. One hand curled around the reassuringly solid reality of the white katana's hilt, Zoro continued alone down the street, seeking the harbor.
to be continued...
AnimeFreakPerson - 'good reviews'?? Don't apologize, I won't allow that! What you say is not a good review is infinitely better than the review I too often leave - that is, none at all, because of time, because of laziness, because of whatever. I don't respond to all reviews because that'd make these notes insanely long, and also I often don't know what to say; constant repetitions of "glad you enjoyed" and "thank you so so much" get awfully monotonous. But really,