When he felt the solid ground disappear from under him, Sanji expected to land suddenly and painfully, as he had the previous times. But the only thing that met him as he braced for impact was air, all around him, and the sound of waves too close, too loud. Panic squeezed his heart, and then doubled as something barreled into him. Arms around him – Zoro? Falling too, now, and Sanji's face was pressed into the swordsman's chest by a strong hand, all of him held tightly, plunging down where the air was heavy with spray, and then a solid impact which he felt through Zoro's body against his. They had not stopped falling yet; there was another short drop, slower than the first, and then a great fist of water smashed into them.
"Hold on!" Zoro's shout was almost lost in the turmoil of wind and water and sharp new pain. Salt water soaked through his bandages and clothes in an instant, got into his mouth and his eyes and battered every raw inch of his skin. He was on fire, cold fire burning him to the bone, and he couldn't breathe. He gasped and only got a mouthful of icy water, swallowed it, choking. Something tugged at his hair, a small pain hardly worth noticing, and then there was air.
The current tried pull him under again. He could feel it grab hungrily at his legs, and he kicked violently to avoid being tugged down. There were waves breaking against rock somewhere very close, but he had no idea which direction the sound was coming from. All he knew was that he needed to get away from it. He kicked his legs out, using them to propel him forward, and found himself pulled back by an arm looped around his torso. "Wrong way!"
Zoro could see, but the shock of the fall had injected Sanji with new energy, and moving in the direction of the swordsman's pull he now swam by his own power. Another wave struck, and Sanji grabbed at Zoro's arm to keep it from pulling them apart. He needed Zoro, or he would be swimming blind, and that would be terrifying. He wasn't sure that he could even tell up from down anymore, not with the sea battering him from all directions. It was awkward like this, and more than once the waves pulled them under, but Sanji kept propelling them forward with strong kicks, and Zoro's arm was a solid band around his chest and under his arms that not even the storm could break.
He could not tell how long it was before he felt something other than water against his kicks, only that his strength was flagging. Sanji clung to Zoro as his crewmate fought the waves, managing to stand firm against their monstrous blows. The sea snatched angrily at them as Zoro dragged them out of its grasp, making his determined way across what felt like sand.
The water Sanji had swallowed made the tight ache in his chest even worse, and no matter how tightly he clamped his jaw shut he couldn't fight the ravaging cough in his raw, stinging throat for long. At first it tore through him in a silent shudder; then he could feel liquid rising at the back of his throat, bitterer than even bile, and he heaved. The spasms shook him so badly that he thought he would fall, but there were hands on his shoulders holding him, keeping him standing as he tried to draw a breath without choking on blood and seawater. Spitting out the last of the terrible harsh and coppery taste from his mouth, he drew a shaky breath. He could feel his throat constricting around it, but at least some of the desperately needed oxygen found its way to his lungs.
"Why aren't they here?" Zoro said, an edge to his voice that Sanji couldn't quite place. "Here, sit." The hands on his shoulders pushed at him, but he refused.
"They're not here," he rasped, "'cause this is the wrong beach." Not enough air for an insult. Damn. Or volume, for that matter. He hoped Zoro could hear him over the freezing wind that was rapidly sucking all the warmth out of him through his soaked clothes. Another of the blasted coughs scratched at the back of his throat, but he gritted his teeth, fighting it down.
Zoro was strangely silent. It was only by the hands still resting on his back that Sanji could tell the swordsman was there at all. That, and a faint but rapid metallic chiming – the storm playing with the golden ear cuffs.
"Come on." The swordsman's hands pushed on Sanji's shoulders, urging him forwards. Sanji had gotten so used to the routine by now that he was moving before he had even thought about what he was doing, and why. He was afraid to relax his clenched jaw – the consequences had been less than pleasant last time - but he was even more desperate to know where they were going. He didn't have the faintest idea of where they were, except that it was somewhere sandy right on the sea, and near a cliff that took time to fall from, making it pretty tall.
When he spoke, it was with carefully measured breath. "Where… to?" Unfortunately careful measures to keep a cough at bay did not leave much room for articulation.
"The cliff's right up ahead. It's getting dark, but I think I can see a cave. Or at least some kind of ledge. There's room underneath, don't know how deep. It'll have to do." Zoro's terse explanation was still more detailed than what he had offered Sanji before. Now that he knew what he was listening for, he could pick up the strangely hollow sound of the waves' booming echoing off the rock face in front of them.
Sanji was more exhausted than he had imagined possible. It was not quite like anything he had felt before, his bones whole, but this heavy weight pressing on his chest, every muscle in his body quivering with tension and threatening to let him collapse like a wet rag. His head felt too heavy for his neck, and his eyelids were like lead over his closed eyes. The promise of shelter from the biting wind, somewhere to sit down and rest for a moment, was extremely tempting. But it was not the ship, not the Going Merry where Nami waited for his return. "No," he protested. "Get to the s-ship." Not even his tongue was obeying properly, so to emphasize his point he stopped walking. He didn't want to go to Zoro's cave – with their luck, it was probably home to all kinds of nasty creatures already, and he was not some shitty walking snack. Really, he wasn't.
"There is no ship. There's nobody here, just us. It's the cave or nothing, okay?" Zoro said, in that frustrated voice he only used when someone was doing something unusually stupid. "Come on, don't make me carry you."
"Bastard." He really wanted to let the damn seaweed-head know that anybody who tried to pick him up would quickly find their head kicked around the wrong way, but that enervating cough with its impeccable timing struck again. The way it constricted his chest reminded him vividly of his last fight at the Baratie, of taking blows dealt by solid iron spheres. At least then there had been an enemy, someone he could fight. Now there was just the pain – his own body betraying him, and nothing he could do except struggle for breath and ride it out.
When it was over, he was trembling like a leaf in the storm. There was blood in his mouth again, and his throat felt like someone had rammed a grater down it. The cold whipped at him from all directions save one. At his side was a solid presence that blocked the biting wind. An arm draped across his shoulders, a hand gripping his arm, holding him upright. And no matter how much he wanted to, no matter what his pride and prickly annoyance with the swordsman told him to do, his body refused to reject that support. To feel even a little warm, to stand without falling, those were the things that mattered right now. So he did not fight the support, only concentrated on breathing, slumping against Zoro's wet shoulder. Just a little while, he told himself, then he would be able to trust his legs again, and they could find the ship.
The hand tugged at him irritably. "Come on. You can't fall asleep here."
"'m not sleeping," Sanji muttered. "I'll sleep… on the ship."
"Shit, I told you already. It's not here, nobody's here - it's the wrong damn beach."
A very small part of Sanji crowed in triumph at that. Wasn't that what he had been saying all along? But his disappointment at not having that much-needed sleep within reach easily overwhelmed the satisfaction. He was getting as bad as that damned swordsman. All he wanted was a nap.
"'m not sleeping in a hole," he mumbled between short pants, shuddering. "No."
"I'm sorry." Before the words had quite managed to penetrate Sanji's haze of pain and exhaustion, Zoro had changed his hold and was half carrying, half dragging him over the sand. Sanji tried to find his feet, but the shuddering was growing worse instead of decreasing, his right foot refused to bear any of his weight, and he could only barely keep himself upright anyway.
Something was different about the wind now. He hadn't thought it possible, but it was even colder than before. Maybe because it was wet. That was it. It was beginning to rain, the drops hitting him almost horizontally. He had to strain to hear it, but underneath the dull booming of waves was the rustle of fat water drops on sand, rapidly turning into a muffled patter. The water was achingly cold, and smarted where it rapped against his skin, and what trickled down his face into his mouth was tainted with salt. This rain would not bring any relief from pain.
"Here. Careful now, we need to duck to get in." Trying to keep track of what was going on without being able to see anything was getting quite straining. The barrage of sensations against his skin had distracted Sanji from the changing melody of the sea's echo and the rain. Right in front of him was a blank silence, the echo distant, the rain gone. He raised his free hand, using it to feel ahead while he did what Zoro asked. It met empty air, but when he felt higher up, over his head as they moved, his fingers touched smooth rock, damp and cold. The sound of their movements was amplified by the hard surface under his feet. Sand gritted between the soles of his shoes and solid rock. It was cramped and cold, but at least it was dry, and the wind's howl no longer threatened to engulf him. As long as they didn't get eaten now, they had shelter from the storm here.
Zoro gently let him slide to the floor, and he collapsed with a wet squish. He leaned back against the rock wall, resting his burning head carefully against its cool, even surface. Next to him, Zoro arranged himself shoulder to shoulder with Sanji. He squished, too, and his katana sheaths clattered. They were both dripping.
Sanji could feel his pulse racing, too fast, just like his breaths. Too fast and too shallow. The blood rushed in his ears, louder than the sea, drowning his thoughts, and when he tried to relax his muscles refused, clenching up in a spasm that arched his entire body. There was one second of absolute clarity, when he knew what must come but was unable to stop it, then his head slammed against the rock behind him, hard. An explosion of fresh pain sent him spiraling over the edge of unconsciousness, and there he felt nothing.
He was rudely pulled back by someone shouting his name. Distant and hollow at first, it gradually grew closer and more persistent.
"Sanji!"
He blinked – bad idea. All he could see was darkness, and needles of pain stabbed at his eyeballs. So no opening eyes. But - hadn't there been rock where he was sitting? His memories were foggy, but the rock stood out particularly. Now there was something warm and much softer than rock propping him up. Better to sleep on, except he couldn't doze off with that voice cursing him out.
"Sanji, wake up, you asshole. Come on."
"Shaddup." He hardly had enough breath to spare for that, but he really wanted Zoro to stop saying his name. Something about that was waking him up much more than he wanted to – most of the pleasant fuzzy edges on everything were fading away now, leaving only sharp pain and nausea.
"Sanji! What the hell did you go and knock yourself out for, you stupid love cook?"
"Ah? D-didn't." Sanji tried to shift, only to find that he wasn't just leaning back – something was holding him, too, strong arms wrapped around his shoulders. Which was good because it was warm, even if rather damp. The working parts of his brain disagreed with this, and told him it was bad because it was most likely not Nami or Robin suddenly showed up to cradle him lovingly. Which left only Zoro. That would explain the voice in his ear, and why he could feel no nice soft curves anywhere. It also made him intensify his efforts to sit up and get away.
"Stop that," Zoro said, annoyed. "Just be still and breathe."
Sanji frowned. "'m… breathing," he gasped.
"Oh, yeah? Could've fooled me."
Zoro was right. It didn't exactly feel like breathing should, what he was doing. But nothing else on him felt exactly right either, not the quivering or the heaving in his stomach or the whole not being able to see, so why should this be any different? He scowled. Now his head hurt, too.
"Ow." He tried to move his hands to feel the back of it, but his arms were stuck. "Leggo."
Zoro ignored his request, but seemed to get what he was trying to do. "Don't worry. You really do have a thick skull, you know."
"Dun feel fine," Sanji wheezed. Again, he tried to yank his hands free. It was the principle of the thing more than anything. Not that principle got him far. Zoro wasn't budging an inch. Annoying bastard.
"Well, your sorry excuse for a brain probably got a bit scrambled. Maybe you shouldn't try to crack rocks with your head, idiot."
"I wasn't!" It was the principle of the thing that made him want to fight back when the stupid green-hair was annoying him like that, but it sapped at his rather insignificant reserves. "Told ya… should've… stayed in the forest," he retorted.
Even with the tremors coursing through him, Sanji could feel Zoro tense at that. Oddly, no more insults followed.
In the silence that ensued, Sanji's body, being a bit slow on the uptake of late, decided to inform him in no uncertain terms that he was freezing. He had been aware of that in a general sense for a while now, but not like this. It was as if he were fully drained of any heat, ice water in his veins instead of blood, frost knifing his very bones. The air was raw and bitter cold, painful to gulp down, and he couldn't stop shivering violently. It felt like his skin was trying to shrink away from the clammy touch of his icy wet clothes, without much success. Everywhere except at his back, his shoulders – there was warmth to be had there. Its source was unexpected and not enough, as it was Zoro, and Zoro had been drenched too, but it was all he had. He was forgetting all the reasons why it had been so important to resist it, relaxing to lean against it, soaking up all the warmth he could get.
A cough surprised him, rattling his chest once, and he tensed and swallowed in an effort to fight it back. It was the last thing he needed right now. Zoro's arms tightened around him. But it would not stop; no matter what he tried, he couldn't hold it back, it just got worse. It wasn't just his chest constricting – his entire body shuddered, coughs wringing him out like he wrung dirty water from a dishrag. It was wasted energy when he no longer had any energy to spare, air going out instead of in.
Again it felt as if the world was disappearing around him, until all that was left was the cold and the ache in his chest and that comfortingly solid warmth, holding him steady. He was grateful for the scant heat, even though he wished it were a quieter place to fall asleep. Zoro of all people should understand the importance of naps, and not yell at him like that. He was no longer shaking, so he was just going to rest his head for a moment, just a little while, because his eyes were already closed and the noise was going away. He could finally sleep.
To be continued...