Disclaimer: I don't own One Piece. Also, this is rated M. Don't read if you aren't "mature." I think that's pretty clear, but just to reiterate, since fanficiton apparently thinks this isn't so obvious.

A gunshot. A loud, echoing, unmuffled gunshot.

Zoro tore down the hallway, leaving his phone on the bed which was emanating the sounds of Smoker's shouts demanding "What the bloody hell is going on there? Roronoa!" He didn't respond, though, already rounding the corner to the kitchen, crying out,

"Sanji!"

There were two figures in the main room, one on the ground, twitching and writing in pain, the second grinning at Zoro, his foot on the other man's face. It was Sanji who was standing, smoking a cigarette, rubbing his bare feet into the intruder's stubbled cheek. The cook was shaking his finger at the man, as if berating a misbehaved child.

"You broke my fucking arm, you psycho!" the man cursed.

"Well," Sanji responded. "You were trying to shoot me with that arm. I had no choice, now did I?" He looked at the far cabinet in distaste, as it had a bullet hole running through the beautiful mahogany. "And you shot one of my cabinets. There is nice china in there. I won't appreciate it if any of my plates are broken."

The cook looked up at Zoro and moved his foot to step on the man's broken arm, eliciting a cry of pain. "You'd think with the rent we pay for this place, they'd have better security, right, marimo?"

Zoro shook his head. "You scared the shit out of me, cook."

Sanji chuckled. "Worried your breakfast would be ruined? Don't worry, it's on a low simmer, the omelet should be fine."

"You know what I meant," Zoro said, walking over to get a closer look at the man who broke into his home. The man appeared to be a typical thug, torn jeans, oversized hoodie, and his 9mm scattered a good ten feet away from his right hand, which was still clutching at the ground, attempting to reach for it. He ceased his reaching when his eyes found Zoro's face.

"Shit," he cursed. "I wasn't paid to deal with you. They told me you'd be knocked out until noon at least."

Sanji moved his foot back to the man's face, pressing down on his jaw until the man began to splutter and choke on his tongue. "You wouldn't have stood a chance either way, buddy, now be a good boy and shut your shitty mouth."

The man spit out blood. "I don't want to be lectured by you faggots."

Zoro was unsure what the term faggot meant, but he picked up that it was a nasty insult, judging by the tone it was spoken in and the rage that it invited on to Sanji's face. The cook drew back his leg and slammed his heel into the man's side, sending him flying across the room into the far wall, clutching his gut and crying out in pain. "My fucking ribs," he cursed. "You broke my ribs, you faggot!"

Sanji marched over to him and snatched one of Zoro's swords off the shelf. "Say that word one more time and I'll show you how much of a faggot I can be with this fucking sword, got it, bastard?"

The man shut up and didn't move.

Placing Zoro's sword back on the shelf without using it, which Zoro greatly appreciated, Sanji turned to him and pointed to the bedroom. "You were on the phone?" he asked. "Finish the call and then come back in here, it's time you and I had a little chat."

"Don't order me around, cook," Zoro said, but in spite of his words, he went back down the hall and picked his phone off the rumpled bedspread. Smoker was still on the other line, cursing up a storm.

"Oi, oi, shut up," Zoro said. "Everything's fine."

"Bullshit," Smoker growled. "I heard a fucking gunshot."

"Just some thug, he's been taken care of. But I guess you were right. He said he was sent after Sanji."

"Damn it all to hell, Roronoa. Do you have a friend's place you a blondie can head to while I work my way to the bottom of this?"

"Yeah," Zoro said. "But we probably won't go. I'd like to have breakfast, I have a headache. It's been a hell of a week."

Smoker stuttered on the other end. "I-I-I just can't...I can't fucking work with you! Shit! You get hurt and I'll kill you, you hear me? I'll kill you with my bare hands!"

"Sure thing," Zoro replied. "Call me when you know who I need to cut down so I can sleep in peace." After this, he hung up the phone, tucking it in his pocket in case Smoker called back sometime soon.

Zoro walked back to the kitchen to see that the intruder was already gagged and bound, propped up against the bookshelf in the corner, glaring at them with his beady brown eyes. His 9mm was sitting on the coffee table, looking more like a paperweight than a deadly weapon. Sanji was standing at the stove, putting the finishing touches on two omelets, and then chopping up a selection of fresh fruits.

There was a knock at the door, which caused both Zoro and the tied up man to jump. "Get the door, would you?" Sanji requested. "It's Ace and a friend, I asked them to come over and take out some trash." He pointed with his spatula to the gagged man on the ground, who started to writhe in a panic.

Zoro walked to the door and looked through the peephole. Sure enough, Ace's freckled face was grinning back at him. He opened it and let the eldest D brother as well as a slightly older man with a tuft of blond hair on his head inside. They shut the door quickly behind them, and glanced around the apartment.

"Zoro, meet Marco," Ace said, gesturing to his friend. Marco reached out and shook Zoro's hand. His grip was ridiculously strong. "Marco, this is my friend Zoro and you know Sanji, right?"

Marco raised two fingers in a salute to Sanji who nodded back at him. "Sure thing," he said. "So is this the trash you want taken care of?" He pointed at the intruder, as if he really were just a black garbage bag.

"Yeah," Sanji said. At his confirmation, Ace crouched down in front of the man and looked him in the eye.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk," he berated, shaking his head. "What have you gotten involved in this time, Zoro-kun?"

"I've been wondering that myself," Sanji said as he dished out the breakfast on to two separate plates, giving Zoro a meaningful look.

"Uh..." Zoro rubbed the back of his neck, trying to remember what Smoker had called it. "Human traffickers. Apparently they discovered my identity."

"Human traffickers?" Ace asked. "What ever happened to the good old drug cartels? When did you switch venues?"

Zoro shrugged. "It got local, so I went and took care of it. Haven't climbed all the way up the ladder yet, though, so I still need to finish the job."

"Well as long as you don't get involved in the underground weapon dealers, it's really none of my business," Ace said.

"Speaking of that," Sanji added, munching on a strawberry. "There's a 9mm on the table, if you want it. We'll have no use for it."

"Bleh." Ace stuck out his tongue. "I'd rather use a BB gun."

"I'll take it," Marco said. "I'm sure we'll find a use for it somewhere." He snatched the gun from the table and tucked it into the belt of his jeans. Meanwhile, Ace bent down and started to untie the man, speaking softly but clearly to him.

"My name is Ace," he said. He gestured to his blond friend. "This guy's name is Marco. We're not your friends. We're going to untie you and lift you gag. You say one word, and we'll kill you. You make a move, and we'll kill you slowly." He finished untying the man, but before he removed his gag, he said, "And I don't like to throw my weight around, but just so we're clear, let's see if you've heard of me. They like to call me Firefist."

At the last word, the intruder's eyes widened and he suddenly appeared rather pale and in danger of passing out. Retaining his consciousness by a thread, he nodded loosely, and when Ace removed his gag, he did not even make a squeak.

Marco reached down and helped the man up like he was helping up a friend who had just taken a tumble. Wincing, the intruder stood, gripping his side with his good arm, but he didn't dare to complain. He just leaned against Marco's supporting arm and followed him to the door.

"Toodles!" Ace chimed, leaving with both Marco and the man, who would likely leave on the fastest train out the city the next morning if he was alive enough to do so.

Zoro turned to Sanji, who pointed at the plate he had set on the counter for Zoro. "Eat," he insisted. "You must be hungry. I'll explain my side as you do so, and you will talk after."

The swordsman sat and began to eat ravenously, devouring the omelet in three bites, and Sanji pushed another full plate in front of him, leaning back against the counter and lighting a cigarette. He sighed and glanced out the window for a moment, looking at the tall steel buildings that seemed to pierce through the sky with the heavy fog that was out this morning.

"Ace and Marco work for Whitebeard, one of the largest crime lords in the country, hell, probably the world. Sabo works for a man named Dragon, and Luffy works on his own, but they all run in the same circles: casino robbery, bank robbery, and even good old fashioned piracy," he grinned at Zoro. "You never knew about it, which is why it was so ironic when you woke up a couple of days ago insisting we were all pirates. They certainly don't sail the seven seas, but they'll interrupt a cargo ship full of weapons on its way to a drug cartel down south with a speedboat, no problem."

He tipped the ash that had gathered at the end of his smoke in the tray beside him, saying, "Which, besides the fact that I was genuinely terrified for your life seven days of the week, was the other reason why I encouraged you to quit your assassin work. God forbid you ever got a call to take out Luffy or something, you could imagine what a mess that would be."

Zoro nodded, finishing his second plate by this time, now picking at the fruits that Sanji had laid out for him. They were all sweet and in season, the finest pick of the bunch.

"Now, here's what I don't know. I don't know when you started working for Smoker again, and I don't know when you got involved with human traffickers, and I don't know when nor how they figured out who you are. So, if we're going to get out of this mess together, I need you to tell me the truth."

The swordsman sat down his fork, feeling fully satisfied. The news that Sanji had told him did not overly surprise him. In fact, the only curious thing the cook had mentioned was unrelated to manners of this world, and that was that Sabo worked for Dragon, which meant he worked for Luffy's father. Did Luffy know this? Did Dragon? Did Sabo? And if there was a Sabo is his own world, was Sabo working for Dragon there, a revolutionary? Still, he wasn't about to fall for Sanji's tricks.

"You said you'd tell me everything," he said. "You haven't told me everything yet."

Sanji pulled deeply on his cigarette. "I know," he said, "but I will. But that's going to take a lot of talking, and we don't really have time for that now, do you understand? I promise I'm not keeping things from you on purpose any longer, but we need to deal with these assholes if their gonna keep shooting up my cabinets."

Zoro didn't think it was the cabinets Sanji was concerned about, but then again, with the cook you could never truly tell. "Fine, at least tell me what a faggot is and why it made you so mad."

The cook laughed. "Well, let's see, it's a word for a bundle of sticks and slang for a smoke in some places...but the way he meant it as was a nasty, dirty name for men who sleep with other men."

"Oh," Zoro said. "Me, I guess."

"Well," Sanji said, "As far as I know, you're bisexual."

"I told you that?" Zoro asked.

"What? You've never told anyone else?" He shook his head. "Figures. Yes, you told me. It's no big deal."

Zoro shifted in his chair slightly. It explained why Sanji hadn't been surprised when he caught him kissing Saga, and hadn't demanded an explanation for that man-on-man act in the morning. It was a relief to know that the cook had obviously accepted Zoro's sexuality in stride, since he was still living with him and treating him the same as always.

Zoro conceded that they had to deal with the matter at hand first, and he explained to Sanji how he had gotten a call from Smoker, and how he had went to Brooklyn two days ago under the guise of Ashura, taking out Peterman and his men, and how he was apparently connected to a dangerous fellow named Doflamingo, and then the contents of the call he had gotten from Smoker the day before and this morning. He also added, "And I don't think it was her, but a girl that was captured by Peterman recognized me. She said her name was Caimie..."

"Caimie-chwan!" Sanj's eyes lit up and he became as limp and wriggly as a wet noodle, his hands on either side of his face, holding his cheeks in delight. "I can't believe Caimie was in trouble, how awful!" Then he stopped his squirming to glare directly at Zoro under the fringe of his hair. "How dare you steal rescuing a damsel in distress from me, you shitty swordsman!"

Typical Sanji. Zoro just rolled his eyes. "But what I don't understand," Sanji pressed on, "is why you felt the need to take on these jobs after you retired a year ago. Do you have any idea, or not?"

Zoro scratched the back of his neck. "Ah, well, the money for the jobs is going into a separate account. Smoker mentioned I was saving up for something, but it's not like I could ask him what."

Sanji studied Zoro's face, as if trying to see if he was telling the whole truth. Once satisfied, he turned away quickly, but just before he did, he saw his face fall. "I don't know what you're saving up money for in secret, either, marimo." He kicked the cabinets below the stove lightly enough so that way they did not break. "Fuck, you don't even know what you were hiding from me, it makes it so messy!"

"In fairness," Zoro said, "it sounds like you were hiding a lot more from me for a lot longer."

"Yeah," Sanji agreed, "but...it wasn't my secret to tell."

Before he could reply, the flat was filled with the sound of a phone ringing. Zoro reached for his pocket, but it turned out that it was actually Sanji's phone. He waved it in Zoro's face to show his was the one ringing before answering.

"Hello?" He paused, listening intently. "Yes, this is he. How may I help you?" Then his eyes grew wide. "Oh! Oh yes, yes, we'll be there for our appointment next week." He nodded a couple of times, throwing in his consent to the person on the other line. "Of course. Of course. Yes, we're very excited to come in. Thank you for your time. No, no, thank you. Okay. Take care."

The cook hung up, and turned to Zoro with a giddy grin on his face, but as soon as he met Zoro's eyes, his expression seemed to fall right off to the ground below him, that he looked down at defeatedly. "Who was it?" Zoro asked.

"Uh...just some place I've been dealing with lately. Food stuff, you know."

"Uh-huh," Zoro said. Worst lie he'd ever seen.

"Well, I don't have work today," Sanji said, changing the topic uncomfortably fast. "And I don't know if it's a bright idea for us to go out. I guess Smoker wants us to evacuate the premises, huh?"

Zoro nodded. "But fuck him, I'm tired as hell. I want to just go back to bed."

Sanji looked out the window for a second, glanced at his phone, and then pressed the off button gently. He gathered all the dishes and placed them, still dirty, in the sink. "You're right," he agreed. "I don't feel like being responsible. Let's go back to sleep, Zoro."

The swordsman raised his eyebrow in shock. "You're gonna leave the dirty dishes?"

Sanji shook his head. "Don't make me change my mind, marimo-kun."

"But what if another intruder shows up?"

The cook shook his head. "Once Ace and Marco finish up, they are going to watch the apartment. They'll probably want to raid the fridge, too. If I'm sleeping they'll have no choice, and unless they bring Luffy along, they'll be too polite to bother me. They can watch movies and let us rest. I've done the same for them in the past before."

"Three steps ahead, again, cook?" Zoro smirked. "But they'll bother me, asshole, I sleep on the couch."

Sanji frowned. He rubbed the back of his head and sheepishly shuffled his feet. "About that...uh..." He smiled cheekily up at Zoro. "We may actually share the bed. Sorry, seaweed-head, it was just too good of an opportunity to miss."

Zoro jumped off the barstool, declaring, "I'll kill you, love cook!" But Sanji had already taken off down the hall as fast as those long, pumping legs could carry him, laughing all the way. Zoro chased after, skidding around the corner and flinging the door to the bedroom open to see the blond had already jumped under the covers and was lying there as if pretending to already be asleep.

The swordsman was not about to have it. He growled and jumped on the bed, and although the cook tried to struggle out of the way, Zoro had the upper hand and was able to pin his thighs with his knees and he grabbed his skinny wrists in both hands, pinning them above Sanji's head.

"Now I have you." He grinning his bloodlust smile. "And if we have nothing better to do all day, you might as well tell me the whole truth."

"And nothing but the truth so help me God?" Sanji said. "You'll have to make me."

Zoro wasn't one to back down from a challenge. He stretched his legs to pin the cook's ankles with the heels of his feet and placed his one free hand around the cook's thin neck. "Think I wouldn't?" he teased.

Sanji gasped. "Dare you," he bite out under the pressure on his throat. Zoro pressed down even harder, but the cook was fast to retaliate, thrusting with his hips to dislodge Zoro, a powerful thrust that sent the swordsman tumbling on his back, and the agile blond was soon on top of him, one leg above Zoro's head to keep his hands down, the other a threatening knee in the groin. His hands were free to pull Zoro head back by his hair, baring his throat to Sanji involuntarily.

Before the cook could enjoy his victory, Zoro kicked up and unsettled the cook enough to free his hands, which he used to snatch the man's leg and send him flying through the air before he crashed back down on the mattress, his head landing as roughly as it could atop a mass of pillows. Sanji growled and cursed, Zoro's one hand holding him again, his legs completely pinned, and the other hand pulling at Sanji's hair. As the swordsman felt the cook's struggling intensify and risked loosing control of his hands, he brought up his right from Sanji's hair to completely pin him.

"I win," he growled.

There was a moment, where the two men stared at each other, blood still pumping from their wrestling match, when Zoro's eyes met Sanji's and he suddenly found himself taken aback by what he saw in them. First, he realized they were blue, a beautiful blue that reminded him of both the sea and the sky of the Grand Line, and impassioned color that still retained a cool calmness about them. But at the moment, they were about to consume the swordsman whole, as if the waters they represented were too deep, too wild for even one of the strongest pirates of the sea to handle. He felt himself leaning in, sinking deeper, the same feeling he got when he was on the verge of drowning and desperately kicking up toward the light shining on the surface of the waves.

But the moment was gone, and Sanji's eyes were gone too, because he was no longer sinking below the surface - he was on the waves, tossing in the tide, and the tide was a pair of demanding, hungry lips, pressed against his with a force that no other man he knew could muster, taking like the pirate he was in his blood.

"Sanji," Zoro breathed, but he hardly had time to think before the cook thrust his tongue into the swordsman's mouth, teasing at his own tongue, smashing their jaws together with enough power to bruise. It was unexpected, it shouldn't be happening, but unlike when he was drugged and kissing Saga, there was no voice in the back of his head insisting everything was wrong. If anything, the rational front of his brain was rejecting the circumstances, but the back of his mind had a different idea. It whispered that it was right, it whispered that this is what he had always wanted.

And that was when Zoro lost control and began pressing back, biting at the bottom of Sanji's lip and kissing him back with all his might, pressing him deep into the mattress below him. He pulled himself from the lips and began to kiss down the cook's sharp jawline and found the perfect spot on the side of his neck where his lustful pulse was pounding and bit down, sucking and nibbling as the blond pressed up against him from beneath, his warm body setting every nerve in Zoro's alight.

The cook's hands, which Zoro had freed without meaning to, were pulling at the fabric on Zoro's back desperately, and Zoro moved in tandem, allowing Sanji to rip the shirt from his chest in one swift motion. He paused for just a second before he began to tug on the buttons on the shirt Sanji had changed into, his thick fingers fumbling until each one of them were free. In the meantime, he vaguely noticed that Sanji was rubbing his long, delicate fingers over Zoro's abs and chest. Once he shirt was unbuttoned, Sanji dug his nails into Zoro's back, which caused the swordsman to gasp, and pulled his down into another hungry kiss.

The kiss quickly turned gentle, though, which unsettled Zoro. His muscles grew weak and nearly buckled as Sanji nibbled at his lip and softly licked the curve of his ear, breathing heavily into it and igniting a deep, animalistic urge in Zoro's groin. But as he did so, Sanji changed paces rather quickly, flipped the swordsman so he laid beneath him, the cook straddled over him, hands resting on his pectorals.

Sanji grinned devilishly before lowering himself to Zoro neck, lightly grazing his skin with his teeth but never truly biting, moving lower and lower until his tongue snaked out to run a circle around one of Zoro's pert nipples. The swordsman could not bite back the moan that escaped from his mouth. Sanji slowly trailed over to his other pectoral and teased the nerves there, before nipping at the tight bud at the end, and in the same motion, grinding his own hard length against Zoro's.

"Fuck, cook," Zoro gasped. "What are you doing?"

Sanji looked up for a moment, his eyelids lowered in the haze of lust, his cheeks flushed ever so slightly, his blond hair tousled. When he spoke, his voice was gravelly and low, saying "I'm going to blow your shitty mind, marimo."

Zoro nearly came then and there, gripped the sheets below his fingers, begging for self control as the cook's tongue travelled down to his navel, dipping his tongue in for just a moment, and then licking down the thin trail of hair that led below the belt. Sanji did not immediately remove Zoro's pants, but instead stuck his fingers in the elastic waistband, stretching the material in a teasing motion, and then he slowly lowered both the sweatpants and the boxers Zoro was wearing, exposing his hard length to the atmosphere.

Zoro's breath had completely caught in his throat. He watched with wide and unsure eyes as Sanji hummed in a low tone to himself, before lowering his mouth to hover right above Zoro's head. Then, like a deft and agile snake, his tongue snuck out between his lips and licked just the tip of precum off of Zoro's arousal. Zoro groaned, deep and guttural, from the very depths of himself, both his hips and his length twitching.

Sanji glanced up again, and while still holding eye contact with Zoro, he opened his mouth and lowered the warm, concealing inside of his throat to the tip of Zoro, and then pulled back slowly, puckering his lips to come off the end with a pop. His swift and pointed tongue ran down the vein that worked up the middle of Zoro's hard length, and it continued down low, below the base, down until Zoro's balls were both encased in the most heavenly, perfect warmth. He felt a swift tongue swirl across them and they were sucked on lightly, the pressure just enough to make Zoro buck his hips forward once more.

Then Sanji pulled back up and this time he send kisses down Zoro length. The swordsman wanted to beg the cook to please, please stop teasing him, but at the same time, he didn't want to man to stop entirely, so he stayed silent, hands still bunching the sheets beneath his fingers, watching as the cook lifted again and this time, yes, this time, he lowered his mouth over Zoro's head and kept continuing down, slowly, as Zoro remained still, the cook going down until his lips brushed the soft patch of dark curly hair around Zoro's privates. Then his lips clamped down and he moved up, all the while running his tongue along the bottom and then finishing up with a swirl around the top.

It was too much for Zoro. He removed his hands from the sheets and ran them deep in Sanji's hair, not pressing at all, but just gripping needfully as the cook began to lower himself and pull up faster and tighter each time, humming deep in the back of his throat, the vibrations sending delicious friction through Zoro's sexuality. it was nothing the swordsman would have ever imagined and yet it was so much better than anything he could have imagined. Sanji was gorgeous and yet handsome, he was strong and yet gentle, he was rough and yet meticulous. He was everything Zoro never knew he wanted.

And it was in this moment, Zoro gasping out the cook's name, his hands tangled in his blond strands as he bopped his head up and down on his sex that Zoro's eyes fell upon the one truth he constantly forgot about in this world, the one truth that he was duty bound to not ignore any longer.

The tan line on his left hand from where his ring had been.

Suddenly, Zoro pulled fiercely at Sanji's hair, ripping the man upward off of his length, which protested to the cold and dry air. Sanji winced at the pain and battered Zoro's hand away.

"What the fuck, asshole?" he demanded.

"Say that to yourself!" Zoro said, shoving him aside with his foot and pulled his pants over his still hard self. "What the hell are you playing at? Whatever it is, I'm not interested." He waved his hand in Sanji's face. "You may want to forget it and never tell me about it, but I was wearing a ring for a fucking reason, and I'm not doing anything that would betray this person, whether or not I know about it!"

Sanji kneeled up on the bed and fiercely shoved Zoro back down into the mattress, but it was not sexual in nature this time, merely aggressive. "Sorry," he snapped, "Guess Saga didn't count though, right?"

"I was fucking drugged!" Zoro cried, shoving back at the cook, which toppled him over likewise, but he pushed himself back up again.

"Have you ever thought about how it would make them feel if you saw them, knowing that you don't even remember loving them... knowing that..." Sanji pulled at his hair desperately. "How it would feel when you looked at them in pity, like I know you fucking will, shitty swordsman?"

"If I married her, I love her, end of story, shitty cook!" Zoro barked. Once the words left his mouth, a sharp sting ran across his check and his face was sent flying to the side. Rubbing his jaw, he looked up to see Sanji kneeling before him on the mattress, eyes stormy, hair a wreck, shirt still unbuttoned and hand raised. He had backhanded Zoro.

"Fuck you, Zoro. You are so fucking dumb. You don't have a wife."

"Then what's the wedding ring for, bastard?"

Sanji fell back, resting himself on the heels of his feet. "For your husband."

A/N: Oh, blue balls! Oh no! Read and review, I got this out super fast so you guys should love me.. =]

Oh, and I don't know about all these rumors about fanfictions being deleted, but I'm a young, politically active, college educated American woman and I'm not about to sit by and let my rights and freedoms be infringed upon, regardless of my controversial tastes. And I'm not about to be intimidated either, so I'll keep updating like nothing's changed, thanks.