Title: Strength
Theme: #27: Gate
Claim: Zoro
(Words:) 2,951
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Blood and fighting...I think that's it?
Disclaimer(s): I do not own, or pretend to own, One Piece or any of its subsequent characters, plots or other ideas. That right belongs solely to Eiichiro Oda. I do not own the prompts either—those are assigned by 30_OnePiece.

Nami still wasn't certain how all nine of them managed to get captured. The past six hours had been a frightening, exhausting blur, and she at least had been captured so quickly and efficiently she could barely remember it. She'd been one of the lucky ones; some of the other Straw Hats had been injured when they were taken, or gotten beat up more than a little with the military's subsequent bullying.

But it wasn't the Straw Hat way to sit still and quietly let the end come. And true to form, Luffy finally managed to engineer a breakout, with timely intervention and extreme luck, not to mention the military severely underestimating him—seastone handcuffs might cancel out his Devil Fruit powers, but he was a monstrosity even without them. In short order the crew had shed all their restraints, collected their weapons, and promptly proceeded to force their way out of the massive marine base where they'd been in holding until they could be transferred to Impel Down.

Escaping was reassuring, but they weren't back at the Sunny yet, and it would be more difficult than Nami would have liked to reach it. The base only had one entrance or exit, a single heavily guarded gate; it would be impossible to escape any other way. Once they were out of the enormous complex they'd get away scot-free, with the Sunny hidden so carefully. But until then they were up against a fully armed marine base and hordes of military opponents, and things did not look good.

Still, it went well enough at first. Luffy, Zoro and Sanji managed to force a path for the rest of the crew through the majority of the marines, and against all odds they made it out of the main complex and started pushing their way across the encircling parade grounds without too much trouble. The single gate was up, leaving the way clear to the world beyond, and without hesitation the Straw Hats made for it as fast as they could.

That was where things turned sour. Luffy smashed his way past the gate's guards first, and immediately set upon the waiting reinforcements outside, unleashing his considerable force to clear a path for his crew and keep them safe. Zoro, Sanji, Robin, Franky and Brook managed to plow through as well and help with the effort, and for a moment it really did seem like they'd get away without too much incident.

Except that their group had been somewhat divided. Nami was a little behind the others, with Usopp and Chopper at her side. The three of them had been particularly exhausted by the day's events, especially since the marines considered it easier to pick on the weaker members of the crew than trying to threaten the likes of Luffy or Zoro or Sanji, and they'd had trouble keeping up for the entire escape. That didn't mean they were completely helpless, and the path the other crew members had cut was significant enough that the swarms of marines weren't too much of a threat as long as they were careful.

But the gate was another thing entirely. It was a solid steel contraption, consisting of thick metal plates that not even a barrage of cannonballs would be able to break down. The gate was designed to drop down to seal off the complex, and had a number of two-foot-long metal spikes at its bottom to gouge holes in the dirt and make it even more sturdy under fire. It looked ridiculously heavy, and Nami could see an entire crew manning the walls near the gate just to maneuver the enormous thing. It was possibly the most intimidating door she'd ever seen—and to her complete horror, it was dropping down at far too rapid a pace, cutting her, Chopper and Usopp off from the rest of the crew and in the complex.

Usopp cried out in a panic as the gate started to drop, and Chopper wailed frantically alongside him. The gate was dropping slowly, in a controlled measure that wouldn't break it, but even so the three pirates would never reach it in time to break out. Once that gate dropped completely, they'd be cut off from their friends. Luffy would doubtless do everything he could to come back for them, and while Nami didn't doubt for a second that Luffy would find a way to break through a cannon-resisting door eventually, what she did doubt was that he could do it before her, Usopp, and Chopper were taken again—or even killed.

They were going to get separated, and they were going to die. It was a frightening thought, and she added her own panicked cry to the mix, and the three of them screamed uselessly at the gate to stop and let them out.

The gate didn't listen, or care, but somebody else heard them. Zoro was in the middle of helping Luffy and Sanji beat on the majority of the reinforcement marines outside the complex, but at the frightened cries of his crew mates he turned to see what was going on. His eyes widened as he saw the dropping gate and his nakama too far away from it, and he assessed the situation with shocking speed. In a sudden blur all three of his swords had vanished back into their sheaths, and leaving the rest of the Straw Hats to deal with the waiting marines, he darted back towards the complex and hurled himself under the gate.

Nami screeched frantically at the sight, and she heard Usopp and Chopper echoing her, even as they continued running forward. They expected to see Zoro squished into a bloody pulp, but were shocked to find him still standing upright as the gate came down on his shoulders. He was situated mostly in between the spikes on the gate's bottom, but two of them sliced deeply and painfully into his shoulders and back as he raised his hands above his head to grip its edge and shove.

Almost immediately they could see the bulge and strain of his muscles as he caught the full weight of the enormous steel gate and fought it. The heavy contraption pressed down violently, struggling against its unexpected opposing force, and the spikes stabbed deeper into skin and muscle, staining his shirt a vibrant red. Even at this distance Nami could see the sheen of sweat suddenly appearing on Zoro's brow, or the stiff way his jaw was locked, with a grimace of agony baring his teeth. It looked positively excruciating, like the weight of the world was literally trying to crush him and slice him open simultaneously, but not once did he cry out in pain or try to withdraw; just held steady, looking determined, and waited for them.

They didn't intend to disappoint. Nami, Usopp and Chopper poured on the speed, desperate to get out of there while they still had the chance.

They were maybe halfway there when the gears of the gate's mechanism ground painfully, and the enormous iron contraption started to drop again with a low screeching noise. For one terrifying moment Zoro's arms and shoulders and legs trembled alarmingly against the cold presence of the steel gate as pressed down unrelentingly, and for the first time that they could remember it seemed as though Zoro's strength would finally be overpowered by another's. But then with a determined snarl he shoved upward, and with an almost surprised-sounding screech the gate clanked its way upward another foot and came to a shuddering standstill.

His whole body seemed to shiver warningly after that, and Nami could tell easily that he was probably pushing himself too hard; he'd been injured earlier that day, and he was hurting now, and on top of that doing something completely impossible. But he didn't give up, just looked determined and watched and waited, and it was almost like watching him fight a legitimate enemy, the way he took it so seriously. And no wonder—Zoro took protecting the crew very seriously, always, and if he lost this battle now three of them would probably be lost forever.

By now the marines had caught on to the new development, and were desperately trying to intervene. The gate crew on the wall, at least thirty men by Nami's estimate, were working with the mechanics that lifted and dropped the gate frantically. Nami could hear the gate screeching alarmingly as the marines tried to use the machines to force the gate down, but although Zoro's legs trembled at the additional force and the blood pools on his shirt from the spikes spread still wider, he held his ground, and the gears ground in frustration once again as the contraption failed.

With physics and mechanics unreliable, they tried attacking next. Zoro was a sitting duck at the moment—he made a perfect target, unable to move or defend himself and significantly weaker, and the marines knew it. Several of the reinforcement marines from outside the gate managed to slip around the Straw Hat escape and make for the swordsman with their own blades drawn, with the intention of killing him or—at the very least—forcing him to drop the gate. Zoro barely glanced at them before returning to his task, putting all his effort and concentration into keeping the gate suspended.

The Straw Hats would have none of it. Usopp screamed his attack names frantically as he sniped the swordsmen off Zoro's back, and although they got a few superficial slashes in—and a few much deeper, but not fatal—Zoro was, for the most part, unharmed. But the gate did sink a few more inches as Zoro's knees started to buckle, and they realized that his strength was starting to run out now, and not even he would be able to hold out forever.

The marines saw their marginal success, and kept trying. Usopp kept sniping the swordsmen whenever they tried to attack, even as the pirates pushed themselves still harder for the gate. And when the marines wised up and tried to shoot Zoro instead, Nami provided a few wind gusts—not as efficient as Luffy's rubber body for deflecting bullets, but it did push them off course a little bit, leaving Zoro with only grazes instead of a hole through his chest.

Until at last they were there, and just barely in time. The gate had crept steadily downward for all of Zoro's efforts, until he almost looked like he was doing a squat with one of his enormous dumbbells, substituting the gate across his shoulders instead of his weights. This close, Nami could see his hair was damp with sweat at the effort, and blood was trailing from the corners of his mouth—he was worse off than they'd thought. They had to get out of there fast.

Getting under was a bit tricky—they couldn't walk out, or even duck out, with it so low. Chopper was able to wriggle through with only a little difficulty in Brain Point, but Usopp and Nami had to toss their weapons underneath the gate and then belly-crawl their way out between the spikes. In the end her shirt was absolutely ruined by all the dirt ground into it, and she'd slashed her arm open on one of the spikes when she'd wriggled too close—but she was out, and thank God for that.

"We're okay, Zoro!" Chopper said frantically, since Zoro was stuck facing into the complex. "We're out, let's go!"

There was a rasping pant from the swordsman, and then Zoro said through grit teeth in a voice that sounded very pained, "Can't."

"What do you mean you can't!" Nami shrieked frantically. But then she noticed that the shaking in Zoro's limbs had gotten stronger—the combined weight of the gate and the mechanisms forcing it down, plus his own injuries and fatigue, were taking their toll and rapidly becoming too much for him to handle. And with the spikes impaling his shoulders and back, he couldn't just slip out at the last minute, or be pulled out by them. He was well and truly stuck, and that wasn't a good sign.

"We can't just leave you here!" Usopp said, frantic. "Maybe if we help?" He tried to grip the edges of the thick gate to add his own strength to lifting it, and Chopper leapt forward as well in Heavy Point to add his own efforts, but the gate didn't so much as budge an inch.

"Maybe we can break the gears," Nami offered, "or damage the gate, or—"

"Just keep going," Zoro managed to rasp. "I'll break out again later—"

"There is no way you'll be able to escape on your own after this much strain," Chopper said anxiously, staring at the impale wounds. "You need medical treatment immediately as it is!"

Zoro grit his teeth and gave another attempt at a shove upwards, but the gate barely budged half an inch before its grating gears rang out, and it forced its way back down again. "Just go," he ordered sharply, panting now. "They'll catch you again. Look, I'll be fine—" He interrupted himself with a wet-sounding cough, and when the anxiety on Chopper's face increased Nami knew they were out of time.

"If you don't break yourself out right now, I'm going to fine you five hundred million beris," the navigator declared frantically. Zoro snorted at that, and then groaned slightly when the gate sank another half inch, screeching alarmingly.

"Luffy won't forgive you if you go and die like this!" she added sharply, looking around frantically for the rest of the crew; but Luffy and the others were well ahead, clearing out the last of the marine interference, and probably didn't even know this whole fiasco was going on.

"She's right," Usopp said. "And I mean, c'mon, squished by a gate? That is the worst ending for a story about the world's greatest swordsman ever. Even I wouldn't tell that one!"

"Come on, Zoro, please," Chopper begged, eyes watery, reverting to Brain Point. "Just try one more time, please."

Zoro coughed again, wet and ragged, and spat something dark out onto the dirt, but then he nodded tiredly. "Fine. I'll try one more time. If it doesn't work, you guys run. Okay?"

"Deal," the three of them said immediately. They were all lying through their teeth, and every single one of them knew it, but if it got Zoro to try...

Zoro went silent now, and his breathing became less ragged. After a moment he took a single deep breath, let it out slowly, and closed his eyes, concentrating. His limbs shivered alarmingly, and the gate began to creak downward again ever so slowly, but then Zoro's eyes snapped open and with a sharp grunt he heaved upward once more. The gate screeched in cracking protest as it was forced up and up again against its mechanics, and Zoro strained hard to unfold from his crouch to something approaching a stand, growling wordlessly, fighting inch by tired inch to gain a little more ground.

He forced the gate up a stunning foot and a half before he gave an abrupt, pained gasp, and his eyes widened, unfocused, as his head swayed and his whole body trembled. The gate began sinking again, faster than before, and Zoro had finally hit his limit—

Chopper worked like lightning, expanding to Heavy Point so fast it was a blur. He forced Zoro down faster than the gate, dislodging him mostly from the spikes at its bottom, and he, Nami and Usopp seized hold of their swordsman and pulled him back frantically. There was a wet ripping noise as the spikes sliced even larger holes in Zoro's body, and then the gate snapped shut with a ringing clang that set all three of them temporarily deaf.

But they'd deal with a few moments of ringing in their ears, because Zoro wasn't flattened to a pulp or sliced to ribbons. He was barely conscious and exhausted, sure, and bleeding from a dozen very serious injuries, including the two thick impale wounds, but he wasn't dead and was lying on the right side of the gate at their feet.

"You idiots weren't going to run, were you," he said, rather dazedly, looking very close to passing out.

"Not without you, we weren't," Usopp said, with a cheerfulness that wasn't entirely forced. "Luffy wouldn't be happy at all if we left you behind!"

"Yeah, well," Zoro started, and promptly crashed into unconsciousness then and there from the combination of blood loss and exertion. They could have lectured him about sleeping in the middle of a battle, or doing stupid life-threatening things to himself, but considering he'd just risked himself to save them, they decided to be charitable—just this once. Chopper scooped Zoro up in his Heavy Point's arms, and the three of them dashed off down the marine-strewn path Luffy and the others had made towards blissful freedom.

Hours later, when the marine higher ups demanded an explanation from the complex for the Straw Hats' infamous escape when they had been so carefully captured, the officers from the base were at a loss for words as to how to explain things. After all—they themselves still had trouble believing that a man had single-handedly forced up a gate that normally took thirty men to lift, with the machinery, and had managed to hold it in place long enough to allow the rest of his pirates to escape while injured.

Some pirates, they reasoned, were thoroughly terrifying—especially when you messed with their crews.

Partially inspired by one of my favorite Zoro scenes to date, back in the Buggy the Clown arc, when Luffy is in that cage and Zoro decides to just pick up the whole cage and leave with it even though he's been stabbed in the side in a suspiciously vital area. And that was before he was seriously devoted to Luffy too. Zoro loyalty is fun stuff.

~VelkynKarma