AN: A random mutant Zoro and Sanji thing I came up with on Tumblr a while back.
Using the rough edge of a scaly knuckle, he carved another line and drew it straight through four others in a diagonal cut. 145 days since they'd grabbed him off the street and locked him up here away from sight. He was hungry but food scarcely arrived. He hurt but no one would give him pain meds to soothe it. He was tired but sleep was scarce too considering the man in the cell beside him looked like a walking nightmare.
They'd clearly worked on him, much like they had worked on Sanji, but this... no man could surely survive what they did to him. Sanji had asked for his name once and only once, the guttural snarl he'd got in response was an answer enough, so he'd stuck with 'marimo'- a name that much suited the cropped spiky green hair atop his head.
Every other week they'd come into marimo's cell and drag him away and not once did he ever try to fight them. Sanji wished he would because it was getting hard to tell if the guy was actually alive anymore because he barely moved as it was, laying on his side on the cold floor of the cell. Only the irregular movements of his chest told the blond he was still breathing.
This time though, when they threw him back in, Sanji was certain marimo was dead. Tanned hands and chest were bound with red spattered bandages and a heavy amount of gauze and tape was stuck fast over his left eye. He lay there limply on his back and didn't move.
"Oi..." Sanji croaked, clearing his throat, "Oi, marimo?"
Marimo said nothing and Sanji's chest tightened. He was dead. No. No, they wouldn't have hauled him back if he had died, so he must still be alive even if just barely.
The blond crawled his way over, too tired to pick himself up, and let his scaled feet and lower legs drag after him, scraping on the ground. He reached out at the bars that separated their cells and held it in a taloned grasp.
"Marimo?" He asked again, trying to hold the tremor back. If they'd killed marimo then there was no telling what they'd do to him next. His long claw like nails clacked on the metal bars, "Don't be dead..." He muttered, "Please don't be fucking dead."
He shook his arm though the sturdy bar did not give in to a rattle. He looked at marimo's chest, gaze intense, and no matter how hard he willed it to there was no steady rise and fall. Sanji's claws scraped down the bar as his hand, flecked with scales, slid to the ground, "No, marimo..." He breathed. Sanji barely knew the guy, didn't even know his name, but with marimo dead something still tore out of him. Perhaps it was his will. His will to fight every time the guards grabbed him until he was forcibly knocked out with drugs. There was no point in fighting them anymore because if they could kill someone as strong as marimo then they could easily kill him too. He let out a shaky breath and looked down at his hand which lay reached out into marimo's cell, a short distance away from the man's body. Sanji blinked, an idea forming in his head.
Gathering his feet under him Sanji leaned forward so that his shoulder joint was pressed in between two bars and he could extend his arm at full length. He patted around until his clawed hand met what vaguely felt like an arm and he hooked his fingers underneath, holding on tight before pulling.
His arm ground in its socket as he pulled and Sanji hissed in pain. Damn, this guy was heavier than he looked... He pulled, eventually dragging marimo's body to a distance where he could get both hands around the arm and tugged him in close so that his bandaged side pressed against the bars and Sanji could put his arms through and fit his head through the middle- the bars were only about a heads width apart. Resting his palms on the man's bandaged chest, he placed his hands on top of each other and rose up on his knees to push down.
1...2...3...4...5...
He leaned his head down, craned his neck, and moved his hands up to open the man's mouth and sucked in a breath before forcing it into the man's airway.
"Come on shitty marimo..." He growled before repeating the whole thing again and again until the green haired man gasped and spluttered, hacking violently, and Sanji fell back in relief as he watched the man slowly but surely turn from deathly pale to more of a healthier hue.
He waited for the man's ragged breathing to ease slightly before asking, "You alright?"
"Do... I... fucking look it...?" The man panted, screwing his non bandaged eye shut and Sanji stared as for the first time in 145 days the man had spoken to him. He had a deep voice although it was a little hoarse and an accent he couldn't place. Marimo tried to sit up but Sanji's hands darted back out and pushed him down.
"You need to rest."
"Like hell you can tell me what to-" Marimo paused at the sight and feeling of Sanji's talons pressing against his chest, "They got you too, huh?" He asked.
Sanji thought of how long marimo would be unconscious for most days and how he was hazy and disorientated other days, so of course he wouldn't have seen what hell they'd put on the blond's body. Slowly he pulled his hand away, his once flawless hand now marred, ruined, by black chunks of scale, "Yeah... Got me too."
"I'm... I think I'm gonna... gonna pass out..." Marimo slurred slightly, and Sanji saw the distant look in his one eye. The green haired man coughed, "Don't go anywhere..."
Sanji could hear the underlying plea of 'please' but said nothing by it. Perhaps some time ago he would've no doubt been snide and called this man weak for needing someone, but that was then and this was now. Now he understood true torture and pain and this man had been brave through all of it and had endured and lived on.
He looked at marimo's limp hand and picked it up and held it in his own, "I won't go." He said.
Marimo hummed thoughtfully, "It's Zoro, by the way."
Sanji nodded, smiling slightly, "Sanji."
Zoro said nothing in reply and when the blond looked up he had passed out. He held the limp bandaged hand tighter, he wouldn't leave and if they came for him he would fight the whole way through the corridors. He would fight them all. Sanji sighed, "I'll find us a way out, Zoro. I promise."