Sanji's internal body clock stirs him into wakefulness, he knows it's time for him to start cooking breakfast for the crew as surely as he knows his own name. He rolls out of his hammock with practiced ease and lands on the floor with bare feet, however smooth his landing is though it jolts his wrist. The pain in such a personal area wakes him fully like a bucket of ice water in the face. He had almost forgotten about his injury. One handed he slides into his black slacks and buttons them with a little difficulty, after that he shimmies into a t-shirt rather than go through the hassle of buttoning a shirt one handed.
He knows he's not supposed to be up and cooking but he doesn't want to sleep right now, his dreams are anxious and unpleasant. In all honesty he'd do anything to not have another dream where he ends up covered in Zoro's blood. He had another dream in the night where he and Zoro were cooking and everything was as it was a few days ago, until suddenly Zoro dropped to the floor in a heap. When Sanji turned him over there was blood pouring like a river from the back of Zoro's head. When he woke up in a cold sweat he actually had to check that the hot dampness coating his skin was his own terrified sweat and not Zoro's hot sticky blood. No, he'd rather be awake.
Hoping to leave his nightmare behind he comes up onto the deck and goes into his kitchen but finds it already occupied by Robin, she looks up from where she stands at the open fridge and gives him a smile.
"I think you'll find that you're off cooking duty at the moment cook-san, no matter how sneakily you try to get in here." Robin says knowingly.
"I can't help it, I always wake up now to cook, I couldn't sleep if I tried my flower." He sighs and joins her at the fridge.
"All the same, no cooking for you. Not until your wrist is better at least." The archaeologist says firmly. Sanji glances down at his wrist and pulls the supportive bandages back. The bruise that Zoro gifted him with has turned a nasty purple colour and spans quite a distance. His wrist is sore and stiff, but not as bad as it was the other day.
"I'll be cooking this morning, but… I suppose if you'd like to tell me what you had planned then that would be lovely." Robin adds with a hopeful note to her voice.
"Of course my angel!" He smiles happily.
"I'd planned for a full English breakfast, Luffy will certainly be happy with all of the meat." He exclaims, pulling the ingredients out of the fridge. He has those lovely herbed sausages that they picked up on the island before last that he'd gently thawed from the ship's freezer to preserve their texture, as well as some lovely smoked bacon that he knew from previous batches crisped just so. He also takes down a few dozen eggs from their home in the little egg rack in the cupboard, he doesn't particularly like buying eggs and he's tried to talk Nami into letting them buy a few chickens for the ship, they'll give them fresh eggs regularly and if worst comes to worst they can always eat the chickens themselves.
He darts to the pantry next and removes freshly baked bread that he made just the other day, a good thing too as with his wrist the way it is he's unlikely to be kneading dough to make more any time soon. He sets that on the side for toast and removes some lovely flat mushrooms from their dark hiding place within the cupboard, he needs to use them this morning because they're just on the cusp of going shrivelled, indeed tomorrow they'll be far less appetising and he'd need to hide that in some kind of sauce. Not that he doesn't enjoy being resourceful with his food to stop anything perishing but he'd rather use his ingredients at their best if he can. By the time he's gathered the last of the resources for breakfast the counter is positively overflowing and Robin is watching him with barely hidden mirth in her eyes.
"I always thought that you were at your best when you're like this Sanji. You see it with the rest of the crew too, Nami at the helm of the ship in a storm or Zoro in his trance like state of training, but you get like this every day. Every time you cook you seem to become very… zen." She says softly with a trace of admiration in her voice.
Sanji's face flushes at such a genuine compliment, something less explicit might have caused him to flutter and ask Robin if she was falling for him but that… it's almost too real.
"I- well… thank you Robin-chan." He stammers out, making Robin laugh daintily behind her hand.
"What first then, head chef?" the archaeologist smiles playfully.
"Always preparation first. I've got some nice breakfast tea to serve with this as well as some orange juice for those on our crew that avoid tea, this gets busy quite quickly as a meal so it's best to get that out of the way first." He says knowledgeably.
"Okay then." Robin nods and pulls the large teapot out of the cupboard along with the nice loose leaf breakfast tea. Being an avid tea and coffee drinker Robin knows where all of those supplies are by heart, she happily fills the tea ball with the leaves and pops it without the water into the teapot and places it on the table. Disembodied hands fetch glasses from one another and set them out onto the table along with the proper cutlery. Sanji watches with a smile and thinks that Robin could well have missed a calling here. What Zeff and the other cooks back at the Baratie would have given for the ability to have so many hands at their call.
As she's doing so he pulls a knife free and settles the onion and mushrooms on the chopping board, it's only when habit prompts him to start chopping that his wrist twinges painfully and makes him stop.
"Sanji." Robin says in a warning tone and bumps him aside with her hip, taking the knife from his hand.
"Sorry, habit I guess." He apologises quickly.
"Tell me what to do." She says simply and looks at him from her place at the chopping board.
Sanji finds himself struck with a sudden chord of longing, not for Robin though. Some part inside of him fiercely wishes that Robin was Zoro instead, and ain't that fucked up? He's always longed for more of Robin's attention but right now with her cooking with him he wishes that Zoro was here instead, cooking silently at his side, miming or stitching together words to question him or mock him. He longs for Zoro to be here and not trying to snap his bones under a fierce grip but instead to be working with him. But that's not going to happen now, he had to sacrifice that to keep Zoro safe and alive, but it doesn't mean he doesn't still want it.
"Ah, if you could take the ends of the stalks of the mushrooms off that would be wonderful, and finely chop the onion. I'll set the sausages out on the grill." He says quietly and grabs the sausages with his good hand. He sets them out onto the grill and turns the grill to the right temperature to slowly cook them all the way through without burning their outside. With his good hand he pricks their skin to allow the fat to drain out as he cuts the sausages from one another.
"I understand Zoro was a good assistant in the kitchen." Robin remarks conversationally as she chops the mushrooms.
"Yeah, yeah he was." He agrees slightly sadly, that won't be happening again. He holds in the sad sigh that he can feel building in his chest and instead slides the sausages under the grill.
"I had been thinking that it was nice, how even out of terrible things like Zoro's injury there are still good things to come out of it. Your growing friendship was lovely to see and then… somehow it all went wrong." Robin remarks. It's not a question, not really, but the implication that he should somehow provide some explanation is there all the same. He doesn't want to talk about it though, so instead he fetches the potatoes for the hash browns from the fridge and takes a large mixing bowl from the cupboard.
"Usopp seems to think that the situation is like his fight with Luffy. That somehow you did something to warrant your treatment, I have to concede that it would explain your not fighting back, but I can't imagine that you'd do something so terrible to make him want to hurt you like that." The archaeologist continues smoothly.
"Zoro's my nakama, all I want to do is to keep him safe, I don't want to hurt him but I'd rather he was alive and upset than happy and dead. That onion looks good Robin, if you could put it in here please." Sanji says, blending together his answer and his request in the hopes she'll drop the subject. Robin slides the chopped onion into the bowl and takes the grater from Sanji as he hands it to her.
"Why would you have to make that choice?" she asks cleverly. Oh, Robin always was so clever wasn't she? Of course she'd notice.
"I'd rather not talk about it. It can't be undone and it's already past so really there's no point. It's fine, really. Could you grate these cold potatoes into that bowl for the hash browns please? I'll go get the salt and pepper." He says and walks off to get them.
"You don't need to talk to me about this if you don't want to Sanji, but you should at least talk to Zoro. I'd hate to think of this fight getting worse when you could just talk it out." She says in a carefully neutral tone.
"Last time I tried to talk this out with Zoro he nearly broke my wrist, so I'd rather not my dearest. Could you mix these together please?" He asks as he adds the coarse sea salt and crushed black pepper into the hash brown mix.
He takes the eggs and with his left hand breaks them easily and one handed into a clean bowl, he also breaks two into Robin's hash brown bowl as she mixes. He breaks egg after egg neatly into the bowl and then adds a few glugs of milk into the bowl, it makes the eggs a little creamier and makes the eggs stretch a little farther too. He picks the whisk up with his left hand, it's odd for him to whisk with his non dominant hand like this but he doesn't have a choice.
"So, you're just going to leave it like this forever?" Robin questions him in surprise.
"No, Zoro will get lonely without talking to anyone sooner or later. He'll calm down and come back, I'll apologise for hurting his feelings and we can go back to teaching him to talk again." He answers with a shrug.
"You think things will just go back to how they were? Zoro wouldn't be so brutal with you over something small enough to shrug off like that, for Zoro to hurt you the way he did suggests anger and hurt that he will be unlikely to simply let go of. I'm not sure he will come back." Robin says seriously, turning him to face her with her disembodied hands.
"What choice does he have?" Sanji answers, shrugging out of her touch and putting a pan on the hob along with two frying pans.
"He's a resourceful man Sanji, I don't think you should forget that." Robin warns him. Sanji looks at his own injured wrist and knows full well just how "resourceful" Zoro can be.
"I couldn't if I tried Robin." He replies. Robin seems to let the subject drop then and their conversation from then on is perfectly pleasant and consisting mostly of directions of what to do. He talks her through shaping and frying the hash brown patties and she even holds the pan still with a hand attached to the work surface so he can scramble the eggs himself. Robin fries the mushrooms and, with a little direction, manages to get the bacon to crisp lightly. He's impressed that at the same time she's able to cut bread and put it into the toaster without even moving, she passes butter to the table and cold juice too. Sanji's always been happy with his multi tasking abilities in the kitchen, even now he's frying the tomatoes, watching the beans cook and scrambling eggs all at once but to be able to just have more hands like that… well, perhaps he's a little envious of Robin's power.
"They would have loved you at the Baratie Robin, being able to do so much at once." He smiles at her.
"Ah, cooking doesn't hold much interest for me unfortunately. I do it but it doesn't make me light up like it does you. Anyway, you would usually cook all of this by yourself, and you only have the one pair of hands." Robin beams back at him.
"With a lot of running around and practice though!" He laughs warmly. His pleasant mood is shattered though when he feels Zoro's presence as he enters the room. The swordsman is accompanied by several other of their male nakama, Luffy running about excitedly trying to steal food. His mood drops and his anxiety levels skyrocket. Zoro doesn't seem interested in maiming him though; in fact he's thoroughly ignoring him, sitting in his seat and listening to Brook talk about something or other.
For all his confident talk about Zoro changing his mind the swordsman seems pretty set on being cold towards Sanji, he won't even look at Sanji as he sets the swordsman's generous plate down before him. Sanji sets out milk for the now brewing tea just as the others take their places. He nervously sits in his seat opposite Zoro and finds himself acutely aware of the other man as he eats his food with the chaos that is the strawhats at breakfast time.
Franky is telling some joke a few seats down from Zoro, his attention on Brook and Chopper, it's some long winded and slightly off colour thing but the punch line draws a grin from Zoro. Even so, the swordsman seems… lonely somehow. While the others laugh along and remark on the joke, Usopp even begins his own joke in reply, Zoro is unable to join in with the conversation in any meaningful way. He's on the outside looking in and he looks the same way he did when he first woke up, he cares for his nakama but his condition stops him from really being with them. He doesn't want Zoro to be lonely like that, but if it means that Zoro will come back to him then he begrudgingly welcomes it.
At the end of a well received and quite pleasing breakfast Nami and Robin shoo him from the kitchen, he might have been permitted to help cook with one hand but he can't wash or dry with just one and they won't let him get his bandages wet. Zoro seems to have disappeared though, along with Chopper. Brook isn't on deck but from the faint strains of music he can guess that the musician is down in the aquarium as he often is.
He shrugs to himself and settles under the tree on deck with a cookbook that he'd been meaning to look over for a while. He finds himself so absorbed in it that several hours fly by without his noticing and it's only when Nami pops a sandwich at his side that he realises that lunchtime has come and gone. She lets his apologies wash off of her though and instead takes his hand gently in hers and feels his wrist, asking him how he's healing. In truth with a bit of rest some of the swelling has gone down, though the abused joint still feels quite stiff and sore.
He eats his sandwich alone and in silence, Luffy and Usopp are fishing over the back of the ship, the quiet hum of their conversation just about reaching Sanji's ears. He can hear Robin and Nami in the kitchen talking and laughing together along with the faint sound of running water that suggests to Sanji that they're washing up. Everyone else though seems to have vanished.
Muted music is still winding its way through the air though so, his curiosity getting the better of him, he gets up and follows. As he enters the corridor to the aquarium he can make out Franky's guitar playing along with Brook's piano, the two play together sometimes but not all that often as their music styles are quite different. Surprisingly they seem to be playing some sort of simple country type tune, in fact Sanji's sure that he's heard it before. He hums along with the next few notes and knows that he has, an old kids rhyme or something perhaps? It's a simple repeating tune so it's likely.
"It needs to be something that Zoro already knows the words to though, it's no good us teaching him the words, it needs to be from memory." Chopper says from inside the room. Sanji halts, what's Chopper doing in there? And if he's talking about Zoro like that… is the swordsman in there too?
Cautiously he peeks around the door frame and then ducks out of sight. Zoro is in there, sat at the piano stool next to Brook, his head resting on his folded arms on the top of the piano. Franky and Chopper were sitting on the bench off to the side. What's going on in there?
"It's okay Chopper, I've picked up the tune now. So this time Zoro just has to tap along with the beat?" Brook asks.
"Not with the beat, with the syllables of the lyrics. He's supposed to be training himself to tap along with the syllables of words." Chopper explains.
"Though in fairness with this song it's more or less the same Brook." Franky chips in.
"Okay, ready?" Brook asks, probably to Zoro as he gets no verbal reply. The musician begins with Franky playing along on his guitar. Now that he's listening for it he can hear a faint tapping, Zoro's nails rapping on the black gloss of Brook's piano probably. Sanji knows that he knows this song, it's an old ditty, something about a woman who died he thinks.
The song ends after a little while but Sanji still can't remember the words himself.
"Okay, that was very good Zoro, you obviously knew what the words were. So this time around I want you to sing the words, and I do mean sing. You need the rhythm in the words to link them with the music in order to get the right parts of your brain using language, that way we can bypass your injury." Chopper says in his gentle doctor voice.
From his hiding place around the corner Sanji's eyes widen. No way can Zoro sing, he can't even really string a sentence together yet. How can he sing the words to a song? Especially as no one has sung the words first, how can Zoro possibly copy?
"So Franky will sing along and I want you to as well, however loud or quietly you need to, just don't stop if you get words wrong, miss them out or get surprised by being able to sing them. The point is that you get through the whole song, and remember to tap. Got it?" Chopper says seriously. He hears Zoro make a noise of agreement in his throat.
"Okay then." Franky says happily and begins strumming.
The shipwrights voice floats out in the hall to Sanji and he can hear that tapping again along with the words that Franky is singing. The shipwright is enthusiastic about the lyrics as usual.
"In a cavern, in a canyon,
Excavating for a mine,"
As soon as the second part of the first verse kicks in though he can hear Zoro's voice, it's faint but it's there. He can't make out though if Zoro is just making noise along with Franky's singing or if he's actually making words, but he can hear Franky's.
"Dwelt a miner, forty niner,
And his daughter Clementine."
As soon as Franky begins the chorus though Zoro's voice comes through clearly, singing the words flawlessly, so much so that the shipwright dials back his own volume a little to let Zoro's voice take over. Sanji shivers to hear Zoro's voice, clear and perfect as he sings the song.
"Oh my darling, oh my darling,
Oh my darling Clementine,
Thou art lost and gone forever,
Dreadful sorry Clementine.
Drove she ducklings to the water,
Every morning, just at nine,
Hit her foot against a splinter,
Fell into the foaming brine.
Oh my darling, oh my darling,
Oh my darling Clementine,
Thou art lost and gone forever,
Dreadful sorry Clementine."
Verse after verse comes through clear as day with no hesitation, no mangled words and no flaws at all. Zoro actually… has quite a nice singing voice, deep and melodious. But Sanji's barely thinking of that, Zoro's singing all by himself and he's… cured.
"Ruby lips above the water,
Blowing bubbles soft and fine,
But, alas, I was no swimmer,
So I lost my Clementine.
Oh my darling, oh my darling,
Oh my darling Clementine,
Thou art lost and gone forever,
Dreadful sorry Clementine.
In a churchyard on a hillside,
Where the flowers grow and twine,
There grow roses amongst the posies,
On the grave of Clementine"
As the song finally ends, with Franky's guitar strings still ringing and the final notes fading from Brook's piano keys Sanji's heart finally starts beating again.
"That was amazing!" Franky laughs happily.
"Indeed! And a lovely baritone you have there too Zoro." Brook agrees.
Zoro must pull some expression at that because Brook continues speaking.
"Your singing voice, it's a baritone. It's to do with the level of note that you use. I- never mind, it's very nice." Brook says with a laugh.
"That was far more successful than I'd dared imagine Zoro! Could you try saying something for me Zoro?" Chopper says hopefully.
Sanji bites his lip and listens, not sure whether he wants to hear Zoro speak or not. Zoro's voice doesn't say anything though, but he hears that strained strangled noise from Zoro's throat that says that the swordsman is trying to force out a word that simply won't come. To his shame he breathes a sigh of relief, so Zoro can sing but that's no good at all if he can't talk, Zoro still needs him.
"Hey, shouldn't you be trying that tapping thing? Wasn't that the point? So that it carries over into when you talk?" Franky questions.
"Yes, Zoro try saying something again, anything. But make sure that you tap along with the syllables." Chopper instructs him again.
"Oh." Zoro says quietly, it's more a noise than a word though so it doesn't really count. Zoro hums thoughtfully.
"Anything." Zoro says clearly, a soft tapping on piano wood accompanying his word.
"Haha! That's brilliant, well you told him to say anything!" Franky laughs at Zoro's joke and this time Zoro laughs along.
"Wonderful! This could well be your road to recovery Zoro!" Chopper cheers happily.
Sanji slips back up on deck with a sick feeling in his gut. He should be happy for Zoro, the swordsman should get better but… well, Robin was right wasn't she? He was naïve to think that Zoro wouldn't try some other means of learning to talk. Zoro was never going to come back to him now, he didn't need him. That was his only ace up his sleeve gone, Zoro could well ignore him forever now.
The rest of his nakama react to the news of Zoro's newfound speaking abilities with appropriate joy. It's not a miracle fix, that's for sure. Around large numbers of people or if Zoro seems to be feeling anxious Zoro can't speak at all, more tellingly Zoro seems either unable or unwilling to speak when he can tell that Sanji is actively listening. He doesn't know if he puts Zoro in such a heightened state of emotion that he's not able to or if the swordsman is simply spiting him.
Still, he knows from the others that Zoro's recovery of words is patchy at its most charitable. Unless the swordsman is singing a song that he knows by heart he finds it hard to get words to come forward. His speech, though oddly musical in quality, is broken and frequently wrong. Zoro will often land on a similar sounding word, though he obviously knows that it's wrong. His grammar is all fucked up too, using words with the wrong tenses and pluralities all over the place. The others are often able to grasp his meaning though, and if not Zoro is able to mime enough to fill in a lot of gaps.
He watches what he can though, subtly as possible so that Zoro isn't aware of his surveillance. It seems that their nakama aren't as good at understanding Zoro as he is, sometimes what Zoro is trying to say is patently obvious to him but they just don't get it. Moreover their handling of it is all wrong, not understanding Zoro embarrasses or frustrates them which only agitates the swordsman and deteriorates his ability to speak even further. Sanji wants to leap in and tell them that they need to be patient and casual with Zoro, to not make him feel like he's doing it wrong, that's what works best. But he won't risk his own skin to do so, especially if maybe Zoro might come to him for meaningful conversation. The exchanges Zoro has with the others are largely superficial and really only stuff that Zoro could have mimed, he's still stuck with the conversational ability of a small child, not like how he was with Sanji.
He hopes and prays that Zoro will realise this and come back, but the stubborn swordsman seems determined to avoid him at all costs. Still, he has to try. He leaves it two days from when Zoro first sang, hopefully he might have calmed down a little. He arranges it so that he manages to subtly bump into Zoro and takes the opportunity to ask a casually innocent question. He figures that perhaps instead of going through all of the overtures of a big apology and making it all a big deal he'll just act almost as if nothing has happened, thus inviting Zoro to simply go back to how things were, it's a great idea.
"Oh, Zoro. You wouldn't have seen my knife sharpening block would you?" He asks innocently as he bumps into Zoro in the hallway outside of the men's bunkroom.
Zoro stops in his tracks and stares at him. It's not a stare of surprise, or a questioning stare, simply a blank and cold look. Sanji feels the urge to fill the silence and so he begins to babble.
"I just- you know, I've misplaced it and I thought you might know where it is. Do you?" he asks further.
Zoro says nothing, he doesn't even attempt to say anything. Nor does the swordsman move from his position by the door of the men's bunkroom, he was headed past Sanji initially and whilst Sanji isn't obviously blocking the way Zoro still has to move past him to get up on deck.
"Not that I'm saying that you've moved it or anything, that's not what I'm… wanting to imply." He adds nervously, squirming under the heavy weight of Zoro's stare.
"I was just hoping that you might be able to tell me if you'd seen it." He squeaks meekly as Zoro's eyes bore into him. All of the hairs on the back of Sanji's neck start to stand on end and he swears he's starting to sweat like a sinner in church, Zoro's gaze is unrelenting, seeming to question not only Sanji's sanity in beginning this stupid plan but perhaps even his very existence in the world. It's making him unreasonably uncomfortable and after a few more seconds he crumples and flattens himself against the wall to allow Zoro to pass with ample room and squeaks out a pathetic "never mind!". The swordsman passes him silently and heads out above deck on his own.
Sanji slides down the wall with shaking hands, grateful to have escaped that scary encounter uninjured. He really doesn't want to fight Zoro again because he refuses to do just that, he won't fight so all that will happen is Zoro will injure him out of anger once more. He avoids Zoro for the rest of the day, ducking out of his sight with a level of cowardice that even Usopp would find shameful.
What else can he do? He's tried apologising to Zoro and he's tried acting like everything is fine, nothing seems to work. Maybe he just needs to accept that his relationship with Zoro is never coming back. That the easy comfortable bond that they'd managed to start was dead before it even really began, he misses Zoro's company and now that he's had it he just wants the swordsman to forgive him. His mind recalls the feeling of Zoro's gaze on his mouth and Zoro's fingers on his lips. Despite the distance of the memory his body shudders and a tug of wanting curls in his belly, his mind rushes to the fore with fantasies of kissing Zoro, of the swordsman's hands on his body and-
He sighs and shakes his head. Zoro didn't want to share the same air as him let alone a bed. That was never going to happen now. He's in the kitchen alone at night, hoping to pass the time before Zoro goes to bed so that he can sneak into his own room like a thief and sleep. Not that he's getting much sleep at the moment, and the sleep that he does get is haunted with memories of Zoro's accident or echoes of it, where a seemingly normal dream will suddenly end in blood, panic and fear. All things that leave him gasping for breath in the small hours of the morning, his system flooded with adrenaline.
It was all so soon to be over though. He'd not even decided whether to pursue his feelings for Zoro before everything had come crashing down. He'd not considered where he could take Zoro on a date to try to woo him, he'd not spent time studiously working out what Zoro liked so as to devise a perfect gift for him. All he had was a doomed desire for the other man, one that would be best to give up and die because Zoro was more likely to kill him than to kiss him right now.
He checks the clock, it's eleven at night. Zoro doesn't have watch, he hasn't been entrusted with a night watch since his injury as he'd find it hard to alert his nakama to danger in time. And as Zoro's swords are still confiscated and he's still banned from alcohol lots of the moss head's pastimes have been taken from him. So… Zoro should be in bed asleep, the only hobby that Zoro's still allowed to indulge right now.
He yawns into his hand and quietly makes his way into the boy's bunkroom. Usopp is reading by a dim light on his head, a little reading torch that he'd rigged up. Luffy and Chopper are snoring softly in the same hammock in the corner, Luffy holding onto the little doctor like a stuffed toy, his face buried in the other's fur. His eyes find Zoro straight away though, sprawled messily in his hammock with his face tilted away from the light and one arm and the opposite leg hanging out of the hammock. As Zoro has the bottom hammock his hand is resting on the floor in what looks to be an uncomfortable way, as if he's just stumbled into the hammock rather than got into it.
Some anxiety flares through Sanji, bright and hot. What if Zoro hadn't just fallen into bed haphazardly to sleep? What if he'd passed out? Dizzy with worry he stumbles quietly as he can towards Zoro and crouches down. He's not bleeding or anything but the swordsman is awfully still and now that he's closer the way that Zoro's hand is resting on the floor looks awfully unnatural, he's more and more convinced that Zoro must have lost consciousness or something.
"Usopp, did you see Zoro get into bed?" He whispers urgently. The sharpshooter turns to him in puzzlement, his weak light illuminating Zoro and making the light shine on the plate in his head.
"No, he was like that when I came in. Why?" Usopp asks suspiciously. Sanji looks back at Zoro, is it just Usopp's light or does Zoro's skin have a pale pallor to it that it's usually there? He leans in close and can't actually make out if Zoro is breathing or not. He holds his breath in terror as he watches Zoro's chest for breath, what if he's had some kind of haemorrhage or something?! THERE! Zoro breathes in and out softly, his breath ever so shallow. Sanji breathes a huge sigh of relief and he notices Zoro's breath deepen as well, he even shifts slightly.
At once a shudder runs down his spine, like someone walking over his grave and all the hairs on his body stand on end. He leans back and sees that Zoro is not asleep, not anymore. The swordsman is giving him a sharp glare that could even put hawk-eyes Mihawk to shame.
"Zoro!" He gasps in surprise, Zoro's look becomes darker and more threatening.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you. You just looked… I thought maybe you'd fainted or something, I thought you might be hurt." He explains in relief. He realises however that his sentence implies that Zoro is some fainting damsel of olden times or something, but it's too late to unsay it. Zoro's expression however ratchets up from threatening to fucking terrifying and the hand that was so unnaturally sprawled on the floor clenches into a tight fist.
"Sorry! I didn't mean to upset you, I just- I was worried!" He squeaks, backing away. Now Zoro looks like he wants to rip out his throat with his teeth. A feral growl slips from Zoro's lips and it's so deep and threatening that every part of Sanji's brain, every bit of his DNA that has survived through a finely honed fight or flight reflex passed down through millions of ancestors is telling him to get the fuck away from Zoro right now before he dies.
He dashes to the other side of the room with a strangled good night and leaps into his hammock fully dressed, he daren't get out or even look back in Zoro's direction for fear of brutal murder that he'd be completely unable to defend himself from, not without hurting Zoro at least. He squeezes his eyes shut and forces himself to fall asleep and not think of the dark eyes of the swordsman staring so malevolently at him.
Franky's music drifts into his ears, it's echoing around the cavernous cave that they're sitting in. It's some familiar tune but Sanji can't quite place it. He gets up and walks to the entrance of the cave, leaving the shipwright strumming along on his guitar inside. At the edge of the cave Nami is sitting on a rock eating wedges of fruit in the sunshine. The sun hits his skin and makes Sanji feel relaxed and happy.
"Isn't the canyon beautiful in the morning like this?" Nami asks him with a smile as she peels the fruit in her hands.
"Yeah, it is." Sanji agrees. The walls glow in the morning light, showing layers of differently coloured rock.
"What time is it anyway?" He asks curiously, he doesn't actually remember going to sleep. And… actually… he can't remember when they got to this canyon at all.
"Just at nine." Nami answers strangely. That's on odd way of putting that…
His train of thought is interrupted as Brook tunes his violin and tests out a few notes. Seemingly satisfied the skeleton begins playing a little familiar melody, the same one that Franky had been playing as a matter of fact. What was the song? He swears that he knows it but he can't place it.
"Clementine?" Nami asks him, holding out the orange fruit.
"Isn't this a mikan?" He asks with a frown, taking it from her.
"No, Clementine." She says shaking her head. An itch of familiarity prickles at Sanji's skin, this… it's all so similar to something.
Distant quacking gets his attention and a flash of green hair makes him realise that it's Zoro he can see just beyond the rocks.
"Zoro!" He calls and jogs in his direction. Zoro is heading downhill though, herding… ducklings? Why is he doing that? He's having the dart this way and that to drive them all in the same direction towards the river. Wait. Wasn't this like that song? Something about… a woman? Somehow Brook and Franky's playing seems to pick up and reach him even there by the foaming and frothing river.
A sense of foreboding steals over Sanji and he rushes to Zoro, but before he can get there Zoro trips on a branch and tumbles into the seething water.
"ZORO!" He yelps and dashes to the water's edge. He can still hear Franky and Brook playing but their music has taken on a fast paced and almost sinister quality to it.
"I can't swim!" He cries, the words falling from his mouth without even passing through his brain. Out in the water Zoro struggles, and dips below the surface, a harsh undercurrent sucking him under briefly before returning him gasping to the surface.
Wait! What was he talking about? Of course he could swim! He runs along the river bank desperately trying to keep up with the river dragging Zoro down. He sees Zoro hit a rock in the river and disappear once more below the foaming water. He leaps and dives into the water and reaches the rock right away.
"ZORO!" He yells, clinging to the rock and searching the water with his eyes. He pulls his hand from the rock and sees that it's covered in blood, Zoro's blood. It slides down his forearm and into the water, it blossoms suddenly in the river and spreads like wildfire, turning the water around him into thick churning blood.
A hand wraps around his ankle below the surface and pulls him under, he can only hold his breath for so long though and when he gasps for air he finds himself… not under water, or under blood either. He's on the edge of a cliff, teetering on the edge with Zoro's hand wrapped bruisingly hard around his wrist.
"Let go!" He shouts unthinkingly, and this time Zoro does.
His stomach drops as gravity takes hold of him, sending him plummeting off of the edge of the cliff. He turns in the air and sees the beach below him, clear except for one solitary rock, headed right for him.
Sanji jolts awake with a yell, the dreamed impact still stinging on his skin. He sucks in deep trembling breaths at the nightmare fades. His hands are shaking uncontrollably and that damnable melody is echoing around the inside of his skull. He glances Zoro's way in the darkness and swears that he sees the swordsman's dark eyes watching him in the night, he shakes his head and looks again but the swordsman is sound asleep.
Still shaking down to his core he gets up and stumbles out of the bunk room, it's only three in the morning but there's no way he wants to sleep again tonight, not with horrors like that lurking behind his eyes.