A/N: Rate and review, and all that stuff! And again, thank you for your support!

If Sakura knew how often she was going to encounter fire as a pirate, she would have needed more time to make the decision of making Luffy her captain.

First had been that stupid attempt of making a cake that led to her setting a pot on fire. One look at the raging flames on the stove was all it took to send her scurrying. At least it was only Sanji who had found her cowering underneath the kitchen table. Not too embarrassing.

Then it was the explosion at Whiskey Peak, and all the weird looks from Zoro and the nightmares and the tears. If it really was Miss All Sunday who had caused the incident, Sakura really wanted to go up to the lady and slap her face with an elephant tuna.

So when she looked up and saw the cloud of smoke emerging from the tops of the jungle greenery some distance ahead, Sakura wasn't sure if she felt more fear, dread, or annoyance.

"Think that's fire?" Sanji called from ahead.

"Best assume it is," she called back. As she ducked and wove through the greenery, her hands unconsciously grasped at her necklace charms and traced their delicate shapes.

Strangely, Sakura felt the fire before she saw it.

She first just thought she was heating up from running so fast. However, the very air seemed to be drying out, and it wasn't long before the sweat on her skin evaporated, and she could barely take in another breath. Her heartbeat echoed in her ears when a blazing orange glow finally could be seen through the trees. She skidded to a halt and almost tripped over a protruding root, her eyes watery from her refusal to blink, and her chest heaving from exertion.

She couldn't do it. She just couldn't keep going.

"Sa-chan!?"

Sanji had stopped too, probably having heard her near trip fiasco, and was now staring back at her in concern. Even if he didn't know about her fear, he could probably see how different she was now than from her usual hardened self.

"I-I'm fine," she replied, a little too quickly.

Sanji took a few steps towards her and then stopped, his eyes widening. "Sa-chan, you're-"

"YAAAAHHHH!"

Both Sakura and Sanji turned towards the fire. Not a single word is exchanged, because they both knew: it was the unmistakable sound of a terrified Usopp.

Sakura took in a shuddering breath and felt her hands clenching into fists. The dread within her began to change into something different, a boiling white ball of anger that engulfed her completely. She didn't know why they would be here, but if Usopp was here, that probably meant that Nami was in danger too. Fire or no fire, nobody was allowed to harm her nakama.

With a shriek of rage, she charged past Sanji, her hands already lit up with a pink glow, and burst into the scene.

Oh, how Sakura had underestimated her fears.

It was like being back in her nightmare. The towering flames seemed to surround her, and the previous anger and determination fizzled out, replaced with a terrible blind panic. Her knees buckled below her, and she sank to the ground in a heap. Her nakama weren't here. Nothing was here but the fire that consumed everything in its path.

She was standing at the top of a hill, Keri sitting in a wheelchair beside her, as they watched the town blossom in flames. Screams filled the air, thick and unrelenting, and before her very eyes, the fire began to grow, until there was nothing but heat and smoke.

"Sa-chan? Sa-chan!" A voice was calling to her, but it sounded so far away…

She was kneeling in the center of the town square, Keri's in her lap, and the crying, cowering townspeople around her. The fire surrounded them, lighting up the night sky in a wave of heat and chaos.

Keri's eyes were glassy, and the blood glistened on her lips. "Sa-chan…"

She was sobbing and sobbing and sobbing, but her hands stayed glued to her sides, useless and unmoving no matter how hard she tried to lift them, as her sister's life ebbed away before her eyes, and the flames drew closer, laughing and teasing with their flickering tongues.

The world was fire and smoke and she was nothing but a twig, destined to burn and be destroyed...

"CHIBI!"

Something jerked her up and the flames were interrupted with a brilliant flash of green. Splotches of white intermixed with gray ashes on dark, brown skin. Something was gripping her shoulders so tightly that it hurt, and the continuous shouting.

"CHIBI! MOVE! COME ON!"

Yelling and yelling, and being forced back. Sakura was stumbling, a flurry of scrambling limbs, but it was insistent, refusing to release its hold for even a second.

There was even more screaming and shrieking, and it sounded so much like her own voice. Bright pink sparks danced around her, seeming to mock her struggles. Were the sparks coming from the fire? Then why did they look so different from the color of the flames?

"DAMMIT! SAKURA, JUST MOVE!"

The force continued to push her, a suffocating cage of iron, and then she was nine years old again, and Kaihana was in flames around her, the townspeople and Keri on the ground, so bloody and broken. The pirates were surrounding her, trapping her in their arms and she just needed to get out.

A pink flash of light filled the hot, thick air, and then her bindings were gone and she was free. Her vision filled with orange and red and yellow, hot and smoky, and all she could do was run to nowhere in particular.

There was nothing. Her nakama were gone and the everything she loved was all destroyed. Fire always burned the brightest, and she was nothing but an insignificant gnat in its path, doomed to be destroyed.

*BAM*

Something slammed into her and together they crumpled and stumbled and collapsed. Again, the shrieking and screaming started. Was it her? It really did sound like her. Pink flashes here and there, and then…then...

Nothing.

"Sa-chan? Hey, Sakura!"

She was sleepy, so so sleepy.

"IS SA-CHAN DEAD?! OI, NAMI NAMI NAMI-"

"Shut up, Luffy, she's not dead!"

"Her eyelid twitched. That means something right? Right?"

"Would a rice cracker help?"

So many voices, and a painful throbbing in her head accompanying every one. A bright light was beginning to flood her senses, washing away the previous black calm. It wasn't excruciating, but it wasn't comfortable either. Something poked her cheek, and she managed a small groan.

"Hey! It worked!"

"Poke her again, Luffy, and I'll slap you."

"Oi, chibi, you done napping?"

With that, her eyes jerked open, before wincing at the sunlight, strong enough to make her head throb impossibly more. A multitude of heads were leaning over her, her faces arranged in varying degrees of worry and confusion. Nami. Usopp. Sanji. Zoro. Luffy. Vivi. Even Carue.

How was everybody here?

Nami's face lit up in delight and she wasted no time in hugging Sakura to her chest. "You finally woke up! We were so worried!"

Why was the navigator only wearing pants and a bra?

"SA-CHAN'S ALRIGHT! I THOUGHT I WAS GOING TO DIE FROM WORRY!" Sanji wailed.

"Shut it, curly cook."

"WHO YOU CALLING CURLY COOK, SHITTY MOSSBALL?!"

"Hey, Sa! Do ya' want a rice cracker?"

Rice cracker?

Sakura's head was still too muddled to process what was going on, so she just managed a, " Uh, thanks, Nami. Why aren't you wearing a shirt?"

"It burned in the fire," Nami replied nonchalantly, before pushing Sakura away to look at her from an arm's distance away. "How much do you remember?"

Sakura frowned. A big fire. Red and orange and yellow. But...green and gray and white. And lots of screaming. So much screaming. "Uhhh…"

"Zoro found you screaming your head off in the middle of the fire apparently," Usopp explained, "The rest of us were scattered everywhere, so we didn't see you until after the fire died down."

Now that she thought about it, there had been yells of 'chibi' amid the screaming, and there was only one person who consistently called her that. Oh, shit. That was so fucking embarrassing.

She peered sideways at Zoro, but the swordsman was pointedly staring at the ground, away from her curious gaze.

"He tried to move you away, but you ran away," Nami continued, hesitation in her voice, "And then...you just collapsed."

"Well, I mean, you took out Mr. 5," Usopp cut in, "Apparently you ran into him, and then went full blast with your Devil Fruit powers."

Sakura blinked once. "I...what? How did everybody get here? Why was Mr. 5 here? Why was there a…a fire again? And please tell me that you guys can also see the two giants over there."

"Oh, you mean Dorry and Broggy?" Usopp asked, gesturing towards the towering giants behind them, who smiled and waved happily, "They're friends, don't worry."

"I'm Broggy!" one of the giants rumbled.

"And I'm Dorry!" the other grumbled.

Oh, yeah…she was definitely losing it.

"I'm dreaming. I'm dreaming and I'm gonna' wake up soon but there are not giants in front of me and I...I don't even...what?" she muttered, staring blankly at her hands.

"Oi, is she gonna' faint again?" Luffy piped up, while poking her cheek once more.

"Cut that out, shithead!" Sanji growled, sending a sharp kick toward his captain's head.

"Guy, please!" Vivi protested.

Oh man. Was the ground supposed to be wobbling like that?

"Oi, give the chibi some space!"

...Was that...Zoro?

Everybody immediately quieted, and Sakura looked curiously at the swordsman. He was still refusing to meet her gaze.

"Why don't we start from the beginning then?" Nami finally offered, "We got a lot of explaining to do."

"Lemme get this straight. You met some giants, Dorry and Broggy, who were locked in a century long battle against each other, and then somehow ended up in a fight with Mr. 3 and Miss Goldenweek, but you all somehow managed to defeat them by setting the entire place on fire."

"So you get it!" Nami exclaimed.

"She's taking it surprisingly well," Usopp remarked.

Sakura sighed in defeat. "It's the Grand Line. I shouldn't be surprised about anything at this point."

The giant (Broggy?) let out a booming laugh and leaned forward. "It's nice to meet you, Sakura."

"Uhh...yeah sure. Good to meet you too, I guess?" she muttered, unconsciously shrinking towards the ground.

Luffy bounced around and patted Sakura on the back. "Dorry and Broggy are really cool!"

"Uh...yeah, they sure look like it," she replied with a smile.

"Sanji already told us about how you guys found the hideout and talked to Mr. 0," Nami added in, "Apparently you were really cool with pretending to be Miss Goldenweek!"

Sakura send a glare at Sanji before tugging at her bangs. "It wasn't all that good. He didn't sound completely convinced with what I was saying."

"Still better lying than what Usopp does," Sanji remarked.

"Hey! Nobody can beat Captain Usopp!"

Sakura felt her cheeks heat up with embarrassment and ducked her head down. Seeing that she was in no danger of blacking out again, the rest of the crew seemed to become much more satisfied, and she heard the distinct sounds of Luffy, Usopp, and the duck messing around, some rumbling laughter that probably came from the giants, and Sanji praising Nami for her show of skin.

A slight pressure was suddenly felt on her knee, and she looked up to see Vivi watching her anxiously, her hand on Sakura's leg. Instinctively, she shied away, and Vivi retracted her hand and sat back.

"I'm...I'm really sorry, Sakura-san," the princess murmured, "The Baroque Works agents were only after us because of my actions, so it's my fault that the whole fight started and the fire broke out. I wanted so badly for you to trust me, but I guess that's just not going to happen."

Sakura watched Sanji twirl around Nami, heart erupting from his eyes. "You really are more trouble than you're worth, princess."

Vivi ducked her head down, but otherwise stayed silent.

"But," Sakura turned and offered a smile, "You did side with us today, or so I'm told. And...you smell and look like burnt rubber, which isn't very princess-y."

She offered a hand, which Vivi hesitantly took.

"I...I don't trust you completely yet," she continued, "But I was wrong about certain things for sure, and I am willing to try to get to know you, if that makes a difference."

Vivi's smile was as bright as the sun. "That means a lot to me, Sakura-san!"

"But piss me off, and I'll never forgive you," Sakura warned, though her smile stayed on her lips.

"You're being a lot nicer than usual, Sa-chan," Nami remarked as she took a seat next to them, with Sanji continuing to twirl around her.

"I guess that's what being knocked out does to me," she replied, before glancing at Sanji, "And I gotta' start sometime."

Sanji stopped his twirling and stared at her with an open mouth, before his face lit up in understanding of what she was trying to say. "Ah."

Sakura was trying. It was awkward and totally unlike her, but she was going to follow Sanji's advice as well as she could.

"Ummm…I see," Nami said. Both she and Vivi looked slightly confused at her word choices, but happy all the same.

"Hey, Vivi! Sa-chan! Want some rice crackers!" Usopp called out.

"QUAACKKK!"

"That's my cracker, Carue! Give it back!" Luffy whined.

"Where did you even get these?" Sakura asked as she scooted over and took a cracker.

"The girl, Miss Goldenweek, had them," Usopp explained while tugging a cracker away from Luffy.

"Well, we do want to repay you for saving our lives!" one of the giants boomed. Was that Broggy?

Sakura looked questioningly at Usopp, who explained, "They got caught in a trap set by Mr. 3, but we were able to help them out."

"Who knew that world government was still after our heads?" the other one, Dorry, laughed.

"Is there any way you can help with the Log Pose?" Nami asked.

"Having to wait a year for it to set is no joke." With a start, Sakura realized that it was Zoro who had spoken. The swordsman had remained quiet and to the side the entire time. And...was that blood all over his ankles?

The giant Dorry shrugged his shoulders. "I'm afraid that's the one thing we can't control. You'll just have to wait for the Log Pose to reset."

The crew visibly sagged with disappointment. Sakura chewed on her lip. So it would take a year before their Log Pose was ready for the next island. And without a working Log Pose, they couldn't keep going. Unless…

She rummaged through her clothes and pulled an item out. "Would an Eternal Pose help?"

Nami snatched the object from her hands and gazed at it in shock. "You had an Eternal Pose this whole time and you didn't say anything?!"

Sanji perked up. "Oh yeah, we found that at Mr 3's hideout place, didn't we?"

Shrieking with happiness, Vivi tackled Sakura in a hug. "The Eternal Pose will help us get out! I thought we were going to be stuck here forever!"

"Oh, uhh, no problem," Sakura muttered, cautiously giving the princess little pats on the back. Hugs weren't really her thing.

"I HELPED HER WITH FINDING IT! DO I GET A HUG, TOO, VIVI-CHWAN?"

"Just give up already, Sanji."

"Yosh! Let's get going then!" Luffy cheered.

"You must be in a hurry," Broggy noted.

"We wish you the best of luck with saving your country," Dorry rumbled.

As the crew moved to get going, Sakura once again noticed that Zoro was keeping to the side, and pointedly averting his gaze, his expression guarded. Evidently, Sanji seemed to notice as well, because he yelled out, "Oi, mossball! Are you lookin' so mopey because you forgot to catch something for our competition? Sa-chan and I found a huge T-Rex!"

Was it her imagination, or did the riceball's frown deepen at the mention of her name?

"I shouldn't be the one worrying. The rhino I found is probably even bigger," he still countered. He and Sanji continued to bicker, but something else caught Sakura's attention. Blood was still trickling down Zoro's shoes and staining the ground.

"Your ankles...Riceball, what happened to your ankles?" she murmured. A slashed wound wrapped around each one, almost as if…

As if somebody had tried to cut off his feet.

Zoro scowled and seemed to close off from Sakura, turning away and straightening his swords. An awkward and very obvious tension filled the air.

"Say, Sa-chan, why don't you go help Zoro patch up his ankles at the ship? We can worry about the competition later," Sanji suggested.

"I'm more likely to lose my feet if she helps," Zoro replied gruffly. Jeez, it was almost like she had killed his mother or something.

"You guys really hate each other, huh?"

"Shut up, Luffy."

"But, Sanji-"

"I said shut up."

Impossibly, the awkwardness seemed to grow.

"I've stitched up my own wounds whenever I got hurt at Loguetown. I won't mess up with this, I swear," she promised. If she had done it before, she could do it now.

But dammit, what was this tension between them? How was she supposed to talk to the guy if he wouldn't even look at her?

"So it's settled then!" Nami said hurriedly, "Sa-chan, take Zoro back and we'll follow up with you guys later!"

Could it get any more awkward?

Zoro let out a growl and walked away. As Sakura wrung out her tattered shirt with her hands, Nami sent her a comforting look.

"I don't even know what's going on between you two, but you guys need to talk it out, because it does look like you genuinely hate each other," the navigator said.

Sakura frowned in thought. Was this just a continuation of their previous spat before coming to Little Garden? Or was it something more?

She gave a small nod of acknowledgement and smiled. "I'll figure something out. Sorry about this."

Nami laughed. "No problem. And Zoro?" The swordsman turned, his scowl still evident as Nami pointed in the opposite direction of where he was headed. "The ship's that way."

"Will you stop squirming, rice ball?!"

"Like I said, you don't need to do this! It'll heal on its own in a few days!"

"Or you could lose both of your feet!"

Sakura firmly grasped onto Zoro's leg, preventing him from moving away even more. With a sigh, she peered closer at her work, before continuing, carefully closing his ankle wounds one stitch at a time.

"How do you even know how to stitch wounds?" Zoro muttered, studying his fingernails.

"I was a street rat. If I picked a fight, I fixed myself up," she replied, dabbing away some blood with a piece of gauze. She couldn't fish or shovel snow, but handling slashes and gashes were fine. Of course.

Zoro only grunted in reply, but his fidgeting seemed to calm a little, and they lapsed back into silence. Sakura chewed on her lip nervously. Sanji had told her that just talking to the riceball would help, so she had to try something.

"You never told me how you got these cuts," she said, trying to keep her voice casual.

He let out a huff of breath. "I got stuck, so I tried to cut off my feet to get out."

If Sakura had heard that from anybody else, she would have declared them insane, but this was Zoro, the unbelievably rash riceball who always insisted on taking the shortcut, no matter how stupid it was. "...And how useful would you be fighting against those Baroque Works people if you didn't have your feet, riceball?"

"Still useful enough to help you when you were screaming your head off."

Her hands twitched, and she listened to Zoro hiss in pain as the stitches moved with her. Still trembling, Sakura swiftly cut the thread and set the needle down in the tray alongside the bloody gauze. "Thanks."

Zoro shifted ever so slightly away from her. "You know I don't mean it that way."

"We both know exactly what you mean." she said tersely before standing. "Look, forget it, go fix your own damn wounds. "

The swordsman stared at her. "What?"

Sakura could feel a lump forming at the back of her throat. "I'm trying, okay? And I know that we hate each other and shit, but I'm trying to follow Sanji's advice and just talk to you but I don't even know what I'm doing and obviously this just isn't working and now you're mocking me over the one personal thing I tell you and I just can't do this!"

"Wait, wait," Zoro tilted his head in confusion, "You went to the pervy cook for advice?"

*SMACK*

He stared in surprise at Sakura's outstretched hand as a red mark began to grow on his cheek.

"That's not the damn point!" she growled, "This whole fucking time, I've been terrified that I don't belong on this ship, and that you guys will all hate me once you know who I am! And the one person I ended up telling my fears to happens to be the idiotic rice ball who sees me as some weak piece of shit and now won't even look me in the eyes!"

Zoro let out a sigh and to her surprise, focused his gaze right at Sakura's eyes. She instinctively shrunk back and swallowed. Hard.

Had his eyes always been so fierce?

"There. I'm looking you in the eyes," he said calmly, "As for the weak shit part, do you know what it's like to be attacked by your power?"

Her power? Well, yeah, her power stemmed from her own emotions, so it was obvious that she would have an idea of the impact she could have. Sakura was about to snap back with a sarcastic answer when she noticed something flickering in Zoro's gaze.

There was fierceness and steel and fire in his gray eyes, but something else too, a raw element that bordered on pain. It was well hidden, but Sakura knew it well enough.

The same element always stared back every time she looked at her reflection.

"What did you see?" she asked softly.

The question was so out of the blue yet made perfect sense, and bile crept into Zoro's throat.

When he had first heard the chibi's rushed explanation of her powers back at Loguetown, he had sneered, because how could one be defeated just from feeling love? How was that even a bad thing?

Then the water had burst into flames at the damn cactus island and the stupid girl had dropped to the ground like a stone, and when he had reached out to pick her up, she had lashed out with pink flares and sparks.

And suddenly, he wasn't looking at the chibi anymore, but a girl who was even smaller, with short dark hair and a cool smile that always seemed to be criticizing his swordwork. A white-hilted katana was strapped to her side, the end of the scabbard almost brushing the ground, but that didn't make sense because Wado Ichimonji was strapped to his own hirameki and that girl was supposed to have died from an accident so long ago so then what the fuck was he even looking at?

An ache was spreading through his chest, and a part of him wanted to retreat, snap at her for being nosy. But Zoro thought back to their spats and fights, and the chibi's wide, terrified eyes as she revealed her fear, and the name came tumbling out of him.

"Kuina."

The chibi showed neither surprise or confusion at his mention of an unfamiliar name, only nodded and asked, "Who is that?"

There were so many ways Zoro could have defined Kuina. A childhood friend. The daughter of his sensei. His late rival. But, when he thought of the context and the way the chibi looked at him, almost like she already knew what he would say, none of those answers are enough.

"We used to train together. We...we made a promise. One of us would become the greatest swordsman in the world."

Her eyes flashed when he mentioned his dream, but the anger in them was gone to be replaced by something else. Curiosity? Surprise?

"And where is she now?" she asked, but again, it was like she already knew the answer.

Of course she knew. What he had seen would have stemmed from her own emotions, her own memories. There could only be one answer.

"Dead."

The chibi nodded again. He saw no pity or sympathy in her eyes, and Zoro realized that it would have only made him angrier if he had. It wasn't her place to sympathize about someone she didn't know.

He studied his ankles, one neatly stitched, the other still weeping blood. "The things I saw, where did they come from?"

"What do you mean?"

"I thought they were memories," he said quietly, "But if they were, they didn't happen like that."

Because the chibi had been screaming in the fire, and if what she was feeling then could be compared in any way to what Zoro had felt when he had seen Kuina at Whiskey Peak, then it didn't matter how annoying and stupid she was, he had to get her out.

With every spark that leapt off of her skin and onto his, Kuina's smiling face would appear, and an aching pain gradually spread through every fiber of his body, until she had let out that ear-splitting shriek and then...

He was a child standing under a night sky filled with blinking stars and the unblinking moon, grass tickling his bare feet. Kuina was across from him, and he suddenly remembered what would happen next, and the life that was about to be taken away.

"Don't leave," he tried to say, his voice high and unbelievably childlike.

Kuina tilted in her head in confusion. "Why not?"

She would die if she went. She would trip on the stairs and break her neck and die, and the promise would be one-sided, and it couldn't work like that.

But how was he supposed to say that?

So he watched as she walked away. This time he knew she was going to die and he still couldn't do anything about it.

That memory was so terrible because it wasn't even his. That night...it hadn't happened like that. But if it wasn't Zoro's memory, then whose was it?

He watched as the chibi grasped at her necklace charms. Her hands were trembling, but when she spoke, her voice was calm. "When I lost my sister and my home, it felt like everything that I knew had disappeared, and I was powerless to stop it. That's what I feel every time I see fire, and...that's probably what I made you feel, too. But different people see different things...so you felt what I felt...just saw something that fit you more. It's not really a memory...just...a vision. Something that connects to the emotions you're feeling."

It was such a strange explanation, yet Zoro understood perfectly. He had not seen the flickering flames and dying older sister that caused chibi's screaming, but something that fit him so much better.

"It...It usually doesn't happen. Most people don't actually see anything," the chibi continued, "But if the emotion can relate to something personal…"

Personal. Of course it was personal. Because Kuina, his powerful rival who had the skills of a master swordsman and could best him in 2001 duels, had died from something as simple and sudden as falling down the stairs, dammit, and he hadn't done anything to stop it. Zoro unconsciously gripped the edge of the table he was sitting on, and the chibi must have noticed and understood, because her eyes grew wider.

"That's why you won't look at me," her eyes darkened with guilt, "I made you see…"

She didn't finish her sentence, but his answering sigh was enough.

There was a part of him that wanted to hate her for bringing back the pain and memories. Hell, it was even worse than seeing that ditzy marine swordswoman lookalike from Loguetown. But now Zoro thought back to the weeks following Kuina's death, and the tears and the screams of agony. He thought of the nightmares from a time long ago and the numbing pain in his chest when he saw the visions of his late rival and her walking to her death. He thought of the flickers of pain on the chibi's face whenever she used her powers, almost like she was feeling whatever emotion she was using, and she must be because that would explain how her powers came so easily when she saw fire. And he suddenly knew.

"You're not weak."

The chibi frowned at that, confusion evident in amber gaze. "What?"

But Zoro only looked back at her, and she must have seen the haunted look in his eyes, because her confusion faded to become something like understanding.

"You're not weak," he repeated, his voice strong and sure. Tension seemed to almost visibly leave her body, and he knew now why she had been so angry at him before. She needed that confirmation, to know that when Zoro looked at her, he saw more than a pitiful fear of fire.

"Thank you," the chibi softly replied, and he knew that she believed him.

Sakura was a lot of things, some good, some bad, but no matter what, she was not weak.

They had both lost somebody important, somebody who was supposed to help them achieve their dream, somebody who was a part of their dream, and were unable to do anything to stop it. But if Sakura had to undergo what he experienced in his visions every single time she attacked, and still insisted on fighting for her crew, then she was surely a force to be reckoned with. Maybe even more than himself.

So when he looked at her, there was fierceness and steel and fire and just a hint of pain in his gaze, but also something that he never imagined he could feel for the stubborn, naive chibi in front of him.

Respect. And maybe a little admiration.

When Zoro looked at her like that, she knew that they had come to an understanding. And for once, Sakura was happy with what her powers could do.

It would probably be one of the hardest things she would ever do, but if they could see eye to eye now, they could do the same in the future. She had to keep trying.

Zoro was the tough swordsman, yes, but also a man with an identity that was so much more, and a dream that was bigger than him, but still his to achieve.

With a huff, she picked up the needle and thread and moved to his other, still bleeding ankle.

This time, he didn't shrink away.

A/N: Thank you NMTD for helping me as I battled my way through this long and tough chapter! Please leave feedback on how this chapter turned out everybody (I officially finished it a few hours ago whoop) Again, thank you and much love for all!