Kida stretched as she regained her balance, looking over the hustle and bustle of the desert people. She hadn't been with the Straw Hat Pirates all that long, and it was still fascinating to her to see the different people and their ways of life. The unbearable heat, the constant need to ration water, it was all natural for them. She giggled to herself, wondering if it would ever stop feeling so new to her. After a few moments, she smiled and returned her attention to the crew, inwardly sighing with relief now that Sanji had focused his attention on Vivi and Nami instead of herself. However, she couldn't help but feel like she was being watched.

Zoro stared at the small girl in front of himself, too lost in a world of thought to comprehend anything going on around him. All he could think of was how unique she was. Unlike the other two girls, she didn't have to spend time worrying about how she looked; her focus was always on other, more important things. But even so, she had a natural beauty. Her eyes, when he could see both of them, were as deep and magnificent as a sapphire and emerald, but shone brighter then any star when she smiled. He constantly felt the need to be close to her, to protect her. But he always questioned why...

Suddenly, a loud crash and shouts broke Zoro unwillingly from his trance. A loud groan escaped from his lips as he watched his captain being chased by a mob of Marines. "Nevermind about looking for Luffy..."

The other crew members blinked at the first mate and turned, their mouths gaping open until a loud and happy shout came from the captain. "Hey!" Kida laughed as they ran away from the hunted rubber boy, reminding herself that with this crew every minute is an adventure.

-----

The day came and went, and the Straw Hat Pirates were on their way to Erumalu. The Merry Go was about as silent as it ever was, as the crew was no where on deck, except for one lone girl seated above the galley on the night watch, with nothing to keep her company but a violin in hand.

A young man strode sleepily out of the men's quarters, not really caring if anyone saw him shirtless, as he normally was when he trained, while he walked into the kitchen. Rubbing the back of his head, he grabbed a bottle of grog and jumped as he saw a silhouette of someone near the table. "Ace!"

Fire Fist Ace looked up at the once sleepy swordsman and grinned, tipping his hat. "Sorry to startle you. Just enjoying the sound." He smiled, leaning back in his chair.

"The sound? The sound of what?" Zoro asked, until he heard it. A soft, bittersweet tune that could only be described as some kind of beautiful. Without a word to Ace and leaving behind his grog, he walked out of the kitchen, and onto the deck. His black eyes darted around the moonlit deck until he looked up, two feet dangling from the roof of the galley.

There she sat, her normal clothes on, as the night had taken the warmth of the day from the sea, a violin seated on her shoulder and a bow in her other hand. Her eyes were closed as she replaced what she felt from the night air and the gentle toss of the waves into an eerily stunning song. As he leaned against the rail, he watched her as the song took her over and she sang along with the tune. However, she used no words, just merely vocalized the harmony from the violin. Zoro gaped at the girl above him, noting that she had pulled her bangs behind her ears, and the moonlight shining upon her smooth skin looked almost like a halo to him. Honestly, he hadn't known that she could sing, as she had never done in front of him before. Normally, she simply played her violin and left it at that. A moment after she played the last chord of the song, the first mate cleared his throat.

"Zoro!" She exclaimed, jumping slightly and nearly falling off her risen seat. "Wh-What're you doing up here? I thought everyone was asleep!"

He smiled, shrugging his muscular shoulders. "Don't worry, I'm the only one up...and Ace." Zoro looked up at her and crossed his arms across his chest. "Why didn't you let anyone know that you could sing?"

She blinked a few times, then set the violin down in it's case beside her. "I...I just never really do in front of people. It makes me nervous." She watched as the green-haired man walked up to the roof and sat down next to her. "Besides, the caregivers at orphanages never really cared about singing or trying to make yourself feel better." She laughed sheepishly. "So I just got used to singing at night when everyone else was asleep."

Zoro nodded slowly, beginning to understand about the girl a little bit more. "I see. We'll have to break you out of that habit then." She blinked up at him and smiled, giving him a single nod in agreement. He looked over at her, seeing her about to pull her bangs back over her eye. "Why do you do that?"

She stopped, looking up at the black eyes of her nakama. "I-Well...Most people don't exactly like to see a person with two different colored eyes. Kind of makes them edgy, you know?" Her eyes widened slightly as he raised his hand to the side of her face, hooking the small piece of her hair that had started to fall in front of her face back behind her ear.

"You don't have to worry about that anymore. You're not there anymore." He smiled, letting his hand fall back to his side. "You're one of us now...it's okay to just be yourself."

She smiled, and nodded slowly. "I guess you're right, Zoro. I'll try to lighten up a bit." Kida leaned back on her hands and watched ahead of the ship, while Zoro just watched her. Without warning, all he could see was himself and her, embraced in a shy first kiss, his hand resting against her cheek as their eyes remained closed. An odd feeling of uncertainty rose in his stomach, and while he wanted to make his short fantasy a reality, he wasn't sure why he felt that way. Clearing his throat, he stood up quickly.

"I better get back to bed. I'll see you tomorrow." He mumbled, getting back down to the deck, leaving a confused Kida behind.

"O-Okay...goodnight."

"Night."

-----

Kida awoke the next morning in her hammock, the sunshine already beaming down upon her resting body. She groaned softly as her limbs began to follow her instructions again, and took a well-deserved stretch. Glancing around, she noted that Vivi and Nami were already up and about, so it was probably pretty late. Sliding out of bed, she slipped on her desert outfit and blinked at the table, seeing her toothbrush and a mug of water. Silently, she thanked Vivi for thinking of her and brushed her teeth clean before heading out towards the kitchen. "Good morning, KidaChan!"

She smiled sleepily to the blonde chef and sat down at the table, noticing that Ace was still seated there. "Have you been here all night, Ace?"

The tall pirate shook his head slowly. "No, not all night." He looked up at her from beneath the rim of his hat. "No need to worry about me, either." Ace smiled and rested his chin on his palm. "I've been doing pretty good out there on my own."

Kida laughed as Sanji set down her late breakfast in front of her. "Of course, of course, my mistake." She looked up as she saw Luffy running past the door, yelling his head off about how he could see land. Shaking her head and laughing, Kida stood up and walked out onto the deck, carrying a small bit of her food and munching on it, staring out at the approaching blob of land. "Almost there, guys!"

Zoro grunted, pretending to be asleep on the deck. In all actuality, he just didn't know how he was going to respond to Kida today...or really any other day. 'So much for not letting things get awkward...' he grumbled in his head, until he felt someone shaking his arm. He grunted again, trying to move his arm away. "What is it?"

"We're almost there, Zoro." His eyes shot open as a familiar voice, one he wasn't expecting, informed him of what was going on. The first mate shielded his eyes as they met with a pair of different colored ones. "You should probably get up soon, huh?" She asked sheepishly, and he couldn't help but notice her hair pulled back out of her face. He sat up slowly, propped up against the rail.

As Nami dropped the anchor and they made their way to the shore, Zoro watched as Kida slipped on her cloak and covered her head, looking over at him and giving a thumbs up. "You ready for this?"

He smirked, recognizing the competitive game they had played since the day they met. "Always ready for anything. Are you ready for this?"

Kida grinned, stepping onto the hot sand. "If you're ready for anything, then I'm ready for anything." She watched as Nami and Vivi climbed onto Eyelashes' back, although not bothered that she was the only girl who would be walking. In fact, she almost wanted to walk.

"Kida, we can switch positions when you get tired." smiled the princess. She blinked when the small girl held up her hand and shook her head.

"No worries, Vivi, I'm fine. Besides, walking's good for me." Kida smiled brightly and looked back at Chopper, who looked like he would already pass out from the excruciating heat. "Chopper, you gonna be okay, buddy?" The tiny reindeer nodded his head, falling over into Kida's leg.

"I-I'm sorry, Kida..." he apologized, trying to straighten himself up. She smiled and patted the top of his head, letting him know that it was okay, she understood. They gathered their supplies for Luffy to drag behind, although Kida didn't have anything other then the clothes on her back, as she had left her violin on the ship. However, she figured that she and Zoro were probably going to have to split dragging the doctor behind them.

"LET'S GO!" Shouted Luffy, ecstatic despite the fact that he was going to be dragging a large load of packages behind him.

-----

The day was long, hard to walk in, and hot. Ungodly hot. Kida was exceptionally grateful she had left her violin on the ship, due to all of their supplies getting stolen. But now they sat around a fire, nothing to do but talk amongst themselves. Zoro had tried not to notice, but it was difficult not to, that Kida had made her seat between him and Chopper and even though Chopper was giving off a lot of heat, she was shivering like mad.

Much later that night, after everyone, including Ace, had gone to sleep, Zoro awoke with a start from a dream. He let out a soft groan as he looked around, seeing that one crew member, as always, wasn't present anymore. Standing, he glanced around until he saw a glimmer from a short distance away, a reflection of the moonlight from a sparkly shirt.

Kida smiled while she stared up at the billions of stars gleaming down at her, lying on her back with her hands propping up her head. She jumped slightly when she heard a noise and sat straight up. "Who's there?"

Two pairs of hands were the first thing she saw, followed by a coy smile. "Your worst nightmare? Nah, just me." He smirked, sitting down next to her. He leaned back on his arms as he looked up at the stars, wondering why she always seemed to do it. "You're too much of a dreamer."

Kida raised her eyebrow and smirked, looking back up at the stars. "No, you were right the first time. Just my worst nightmare." She playfully punched his arm and shrugged at his final comment. "What's so wrong with that?" Zoro rolled the thought through his mind, then looked over to her, meeting her eyes, feeling lost in them again.

"Nothing's wrong with that."

Zoro blinked a few times as the girl scooted closer to him, noticing that she was shivering again. Unsure of what to do, he leaned back against a large rock, patting the spot next to him. "Warmer here. Speaking of which, where's your cloak?" She crawled back and looked down, for a short time forgetting that she wasn't wearing the cloak.

"Well...I figured that Luffy probably needed it more then I did. He was suffocating Chopper!"

Zoro laughed with her good heartedly. She was so different then any other girl he had ever met, which, given, wasn't that many, but still. He watched as she shivered, staring up at the night sky, while her only means of warmth was lying around someone else who she had felt needed it more. Without warning, or really any conscious thought, he had his arm wrapped around her shoulder. When she looked up at him with those different colored eyes, a small piece of her hair falling back to her face, he felt his stomach throb with the unsure feeling that had made him so nervous before. Almost automatically, his hand reached up and softly brushed her hair away, leaving it on her cheek as he leaned in. She slowly met him in between and their lips met. Zoro smiled to himself as he saw her eyes slowly close, and his was soon to follow.

After a moment, they slowly pulled their lips away from each other, and Kida smiled up at the green haired pirate. At first, she was tempted to make a comment like "took you long enough" or something of that sort, but she felt that her actions spoke loud enough. Smiling, she watched as he leaned back against the rock, feeling very proud of himself. Kida rested her head upon his chest, and his arm felt a perfect spot on her side.

"This is going to be hard to explain tomorrow..." he murmured to her, taking his cloak from his shoulders and slipping it over the blonde girl next to him.

She yawned softly and rested her hand on his chest, closing her weary eyes. "I'm willing to risk that." she mumbled, yawning.

He smiled and gently patted his hand on her side as he felt her drifting into sleep. "I am too." It wasn't long before he, himself, followed her into a fitful sleep.

-----

Luffy, oddly enough, was the first to wake the next morning, most likely due to the excessive heat of Chopper, the bright desert sun rising over the horizon, and an extra cloak around him. He stood up and stretched, letting Kida's cloak fall down onto the small reindeer doctor. "Hooo! What a good sleep I had!" he exclaimed, looking around at the sleeping bodies around him. "Hey! Why isn't anybody up yet?" he shouted. The crew was slowly awakening with the yelling of the overexcited captain. Chopper squirmed beneath the extra cloak, soon starting to get nervous.

"Why is everything dark!" he screamed, kicking off the makeshift blanket and blinking as light finally hit his eyes. "Huh? What was that doing on me?" Chopper blinked, picking up the cloak. "This is Kida's..." He announced, taking a few sniffs of it.

As the crew became more conscious, they noticed that not only one other person was missing, but two. "Has anyone seen Zoro?" asked Usopp, who looked like he was already thinking the unimaginable had happened to the two. Ace, who said nothing, although he had a good idea where the two had gone, sat up and rubbed his face free of sleep.

Luffy, on the other hand, was still trying to grasp the concept of this cloak ordeal. "Huh. Kida's cloak is here. Think she got too hot overnight?"

"THAT'S NOT WHAT WE'RE WORRIED ABOUT, LUFFY!"

"Hey, it's alright, I think I found them." announced the cook, who gestured in the general direction of the two, who were still dead asleep.

"What're they doing all the way out there? I'm gonna go find out!" Not listening to the protests of his crew, Luffy stretched out his arms. "Gomu Gomu No...ROCKET!"

Kida stirred slightly in her sleep, hearing some commotion a bit in the distance. Lifting up her head, she saw a speck of black and a hat headed right towards them. "LUFFY!" She yelled, which woke Zoro up just in time to get smashed by the Captain. After a few moments of getting over the shock, Zoro started yelling at the black haired boy, who simply sat on the shattered rock laughing his head off.

Shaking her head and laughing, Kida rubbed her cheek sleepily. "Good morning to you too, Luffy." She managed between laughs.

"Hey! What are you two doing out here? And did you get too hot last night?" He asked Kida, who raised her eyebrow at him, unsure why he was

if she was too hot the night before.

"We were sleeping, Luffy! Would it really be too difficult to walk!" Zoro yelled, while Kida tugged on their shirts, bringing them back into the camp where they were all warmly greeted with some food that Sanji had somehow managed to make, although no one really wanted to know where the meat came from. Kida smiled to herself as she thought, 'Just another day...' before her eyes met with Zoro's, and they shared a smile.