"the ocean stretches on endlessly"

One, two, three, four, five
Once I caught a fish alive.

Zoro was just aware, with his last scrap of consciousness, of Luffy settling down for an afternoon of fishing. Vaguely hoping his new traveling companion would catch something, Zoro sank down into sleep and began to dream.

The dream was pleasant, as his dreams tended to be. He was back at the dojo, and Kuina was promising him that one of them would someday become the best swordsman in the world. It was daytime. Kuina was smiling, her face tired but glowing from a good round of practice. Zoro had just figured out how to balance a sword in his teeth. Now Kuina was laughing and saying she could still beat him, even if he did have three swords. Zoro was grabbing a third sword from the weapons rack - he never could resist a challenge - when Kuina kicked the side of the boat with her foot and said something about fish.

Zoro started awake and looked across the boat. Luffy, his new "Captain," was sitting along the side of the boat, beating an irregular rhythm against the planks with his foot and singing a silly little song to himself, his voice happy and slightly off-key. Zoro grunted and slipped back into his dream.

Six, seven, eight, nine, ten
Then I let it go again.

He was in a boat, all alone somewhere in East Blue. He hadn't been back to his village for many months. Kuina was dead and buried in the corner of the garden that got the best afternoon sun. Sensei had planted an apple tree over the grave, but Zoro had left while it still little more than a sapling. He hadn't been back to the village for many months. It was all right, though. If Zoro took his eyes off the distant figure of Mihawk, and turned his head, he could see the shores of his island, waiting for him. No matter which way he turned his head, there was the island. At first Zoro looked over at the island a lot, but gradually he turned his head less and less and concentrated instead on the silouhetted man on the horizon. It was all right. If he did turn his head, the island would be there, and he'd never have to worry about finding his way back.

Suddenly, Mihawk said, "Ouch!" which caused Zoro to jump a little.

Zoro came awake for the second time and looked around in some confusion. The sky was a deep summer blue, with gorgeous huge piles of white clouds floating along in it. A couple of seagulls flew past, cawing as they went. The ocean stretched out all around them. There was no island in sight.

Sitting up, Zoro reminded himself that it'd been Luffy, not Mihawk, who'd said "Ouch." He squinted at the other boy and asked awkwardly, "What happened?"

Luffy turned around, his usually sunny face rueful. He was sucking on one hand. "Had to let the fish go," he said with a quick, apologetic smile, and swung his feet across the side so that he was all the way back in the boat again.

Zoro could feel his brows knitting together. "Why did you let it go?" he asked, more gruffly than he intended. "We could have used the food."

"Because it bit my finger, so..." Luffy shrugged.

Don't tell me, Zoro thought. The guy who can take on a Marine regiment without a scratch can't catch one lousy fish. And he wants to be the Pirate King? Zoro sighed. "Which finger did it bite?" he asked. Why did he get the growing feeling that he'd signed on for a babysitting job instead of the piratical career advertised?

"This little finger, on the right." Luffy held out a slightly damp hand for inspection. Zoro passed a cursory eye over it. There were puncture marks, he had to admit, two neat rows of sharp-looking bites. "Looks like it was a pretty big one," he said grudgingly.

"Yeah," Luffy said, and laughed. "Guess we both wanted to catch something for dinner!" He threw back his head and carried on laughing in the odd, hiccupping way that shook his whole body, as if he wanted to enjoy the joke as fully as possible. It didn't seem to matter that they had no food, no water, and no idea of where to go. And it certainly did not seem to be a problem that Luffy was, for all intents and purposes, attempting to enter the Grand Line in a sailboat. With one crew member. After letting a fish go because it'd bit his finger.

Was this guy for real? Zoro stared at the hatted boy in disbelief. He really planned on being the Pirate King? Oh, he was serious about wanting to, anyone could see that, but... Zoro shook his head. He'd known men who'd have made good Pirate Kings. He'd hunted some of them, been offered employment by others. They'd all of them worked and thieved and killed their way to the top. That's what being the king meant, right? It was work, not some little-kid game you played after school. Being the Pirate King meant being the toughest, the craftiest, the most ruthless, the best. Zoro knew all about being the best, and Monkey D. Luffy, well, he simply did not fit the job descrption.

Just as Zoro was opening his mouth to voice his doubts on this whole venture, the waters underneath them heaved and sent the boat jerking violently sideways. Zoro swore, grabbed the side of the boat with one hand, and an instant after grabbed at Luffy's shirt with the other. The kid couldn't swim, something like that?

"What the hell is that?" he yelled over the sudden churning of the seawater.

Luffy, being jerked along with the boat and Zoro's unsteady hand, sat down with a bump. "Dunno," he said, blinking. "Maybe the fish went to get its mother or something."

"Don't be stupid," Zoro argued, even as he let go of the boat to fumble around for the oars. "Fish don't have mo - what the hell is that!"

Two figures broke the surface of the ocean, spraying water and foam everywhere. The smaller one was only the length of Zoro himself. The larger one was - well, much, much larger. And it did not look happy.

"Definitely the mother," Luffy said, nodding decisively even as he scuttled back towards the rear of the boat, away from the sea monsters. "That's just how Herbert's mom used to look when I hung him upside down from the roof."

"Forget Herbert's mom!" Zoro gave a powerful push on the oars and shot the boat just barely out of reach as the mother sea monster whipped her head down in a vicious, full-toothed stab. "What're we gonna do? I'll try to steer us clear while you find a good angle to punch -"

"Run away!"

"What?" Zoro did not stop rowing, but he twisted his head around to gape.

Luffy was laughing again, clearly enjoying himself. "Run away!" he gasped in between laughs. "We just gotta get out of their territory...sea monsters never chase you past their territory..." He collapsed back onto the bottom of the boat again in a fit of giggles.

"Fine," Zoro said, thoroughly exasperated. "But why am I doing all the work?"

There was no reply, and Zoro did not really expect one. He just concentrated on bumping the boat along one jawlength ahead of the vengeful oceanic matron. The thing was, something about Luffy's stupid laugh was infectious. Before long, Zoro found himself thinking it was kind of fun, playing Tag with a sea monster. And the cold saltwater splashing on his face cooled the strain of hard rowing. And the sheer speed - well, it made the ocean a little bluer, and the clouds float by a little faster, and the look on the sea monsters' faces when they got clear was absolutely priceless. Zoro wondered if Herbert's mother had ever looked like that too.

When the sea monsters had slunk sullenly back into the depths and the ocean surface was calm once more, Zoro heaved a sigh and looked over at Luffy.

The boy had stopped laughing, but a grin still hung on his face like a crescent moon, and he was singing that song again. Almost getting gulped by a fish could have been just a part of the day's routine, for all he cared.

He's going to get himself killed, Zoro thought. He wants to be the Pirate King, but pirates don't let people like him live. He can't possibly get to the top just on stubborness and a laugh. He'll have to learn to stop laughing, or he's gonna get killed...

But that laugh. Something about that laugh, and Luffy's strange, unblinkingly intense manner.

Zoro remembered the first time he said he wanted to be the best swordsman in the world. He'd been a child, hotheaded and angry at always losing to a girl. Big words from a small boy. He remembered the way Kuina had said the same thing, and how he'd hated the ache in her voice, the longing for something unattainable. He'd wanted her to say it in a different way, like it was possible, like she was going to do it. The way she said it in his dreams. The way Luffy said it. "I've already decided to make you my mate!"

Already decided. Just like he'd already decided to be the Pirate King. And Zoro had come along, hadn't he? Maybe because Luffy had already decided. Maybe because his laugh was like a wild welling up of something in the chest, and made Zoro feel like anything he wanted was bound to happen, just because he wished it.

He looked up as that very laugh erupted from the end of the boat. Luffy had picked the fishing pole up again and was swinging his legs back over the side. "Guess I'll try again," he said cheerfully.

That was when Zoro knew. He wanted to see that laugh through, all the way to the top. He was going to see that laugh through. If pirates were going to have a king, then Zoro wanted him to be Luffy, who didn't take no for an answer and who'd rather run away than punch out a mother in front of her kid. Zoro didn't want that laugh to ever die.

So he said, tucking his hands behind his head, "Better luck this time, Captain," and leaned against the side of the boat to watch Luffy fish. The sky was a deep summer blue, with gorgeous huge piles of clouds floating along it it. The ocean stretched endlessly out around them. Roronoa Zoro, First Mate of the Straw Hat Pirates, settled down to enjoy the moment.

- - - - -
notes: Kind of fluffy - for me, anyway. I wanted to write something about doubting Luffy. Though Zoro's loyalty to Luffy becomes unconditional fairly early on, he has his reservations in that first bit between the Morgan encounter and meeting Buggy, when he and Luffy are still sounding each other out. How does he go from joining for his own reasons (like everyone that follows does) to being unquestioningly and unconditionally Luffy's man? This probably isn't the most coherent interpretation, but... I guess I just really love Luffy's laugh.

Points if you can spot the rest of the nursery rhyme in the dialogue.