Siren's whined and screamed just above Sanji's metal bunk, bright neon red lights illuminated the cabin.

"Rise and shine, brat. All Blue's been assigned a mission."

Sanji grumbled but none the less climbed out of bed, waking up had never been very difficult for him due to his previous work as a chef, but it wasn't exactly something he looked forward to. He clasped his hands together and stretched them above his head, several vertebrae in his back popped loudly, then he turned his head slowly to the side to earn a few satisfying pops in his neck.

After he pulled his pants on, he grabbed each arm by the elbow and pulled inwardly to pop his shoulders, rolling his back happily as his stiff limbs began to relax.

"That's disgusting." His drift partner, his adoptive father Zeff, said in disgust. "Hurry up eggplant, you're taking too long."

Sanji threw on a large puffy coat and pulled at the heavy cabin door to hop out into the hallway, heading down ahead of his partner to get suited up.

When he opened the door to the equipment room, he stopped in his tracks when he saw that none other than Roronoa Zoro stood in the room, grabbing a piece of his perfect white armor and slapping it onto his forearm.

"Oh, hey dart brow."

"What are you doing here?" Sanji asked cautiously, opening his own compartment that revealed his deep blue armor proudly waiting for him. Zoro's sharp brow lowered in confusion.

"Haven't you been briefed yet? You're on a mission with me."

Sanji's heart stopped. He blinked twice, frozen in place.

"Come again?"

"Two Kaijus in the same place needs two Jaegers to fight them. You guys are supporting me and Kuina." Zoro informed him.

"Oh, okay." Sanji managed, refraining from fist pumping the air and struggling to keep the smile that threatened to stretch across his face down.

"You feeling okay?" Zoro asked, a slight look of concern appearing on his stoic face.

"I'm fine, bastard. You don't need to worry about me." Sanji snapped quickly, trying to calm his fluttering heart. Zoro frowned in annoyance and went back to strapping on his suit, Sanji did the same.

"I wasn't worried about you, I'm worried about how your Jaeger will do on the battlefield." Sanji just rolled his eyes at the sarcastic remark. Fully suited they both stood, just as the intercom called for Jaeger pilots to report to their positions in five minutes.

Zeff strolled into the room just as Sanji and Zoro left it together, shooting Sanji a curious look.

"Bet you I kill more Kaijus than you, Curly." Zoro teased as they made their way through metallic gates. Sanji pushed him in response, the other man's pure white suit reflecting the red flashing lights from above head onto Sanji's face.

"That's almost impossible, moss head. There's two of them and two of us." He snapped, throwing his helmet onto his head and separating from the man at the fork in the hallway.

"We'll just have to see, won't we Dart brow?" Zoro called after him. Sanji just waved him off over his shoulder, entering the port to his Jaeger. He'd show that moronic plant-for-brains bastard, just because he was newer to the game didn't mean he couldn't play: he knew he could earn Zoro's respect.

Sanji entered the empty cockpit, the whirs and beeps of the engines starting up buzzed in air. He lovingly ran a hand down a metal beam of the All Blue, keeping his hand there for a minute and soaking in the vibrations he got that proved his dream was alive. He looked over at the relaying screen at the front of the room, images of his Jaeger and Zoro's covered the screen: this was his first mission with the other man, and he wouldn't disappoint.

He heard his drift partner shuffle in, the doors slamming shut behind him.

"Ready to rumble, old man?" He joked as he pulled down the attachment gear from above, flipping various keys and panels on.

"Who you calling old man, eggplant?" Zeff grumble, reaching his leg over to shove Sanji. Zeff may not have been as young as Sanji, and they weren't technically related, but they had great drift compatibility. They both had that same incredible temper that was matched with undying passion.

"This is a big one, category 4. Our job is to take out the category 1 that had been sent out of the breach just a little bit before the second." Sanji informed him.

"Big, small, it doesn't matter, we're still going to kill it." Zeff grunted

"That's the spirit."

They pulled into the drift, memories Sanji had seen so many times passed before his face.

A young Zeff biting off more than he could chew in a street fight. Getting the ever loving snot kicked out of him and then being left there on the curb.

Then, Zeff got older, tougher, a regular street rat. Sanji saw him paroling down the street with his gang members, a gang that Zeff would one day be the head of. Though he was older Zeff still walked around like he did as a teenager, chest puffed out with pride and confidence, daring anyone to cross him.

The first Kaiju attack Zeff had ever saw, seen through the static of a faded old TV in horror. Jaeger's hadn't been around to save anyone back then.

Then, the attack of the Kaiju that had brought Sanji and Zeff together: trapped in a Kaiju shelter, the walls had caved in and only he and a sniveling pitiful little kid had survived. He saw himself and Zeff sit in that dark, hopeless tomb; every time he saw this memory it made his stomach ache and his throat dry to remember that hunger, that desperation.

The memories jumped, showing him growing up in a sad little town with Zeff, learning how to cook, and opening their restaurant.

They came back to the real world faster than before, the time it takes to fall into the drift becoming shorter and shorter for them as each mission brought them to a higher compatibility level.

"Alright boys, we're deploying. Good luck out there." Sounded over the intercom. They prepared themselves for impact and Sanji kept his eyes on the city in the distance.

"All Blue are you responding? Hunter is down! I repeat, Pirate Hunter is down! Their Jaeger shut down and we can't confirm survivors." Blasted into Sanji's intercom, adding to the whirlwind mesh of angry blaring noises all around him. He looked over at his partner, who hung limply in his suit, his leg no doubt broken.

"I read you control. Zeff is unconscious, I can't bring him to and the drift is breaking. I'm going to check on Hunter." Sanji strangled out, his vision bleeding in and out fuzzily, shakily guiding his Jaeger forward.

"All Blue you get your ass out of there! You can't pilot that thing by yourself! Sanji?! Sanji you moron get out of there!" Sanji blearily ignored the message and shuffled the Jaeger on.

His heart like it had been ripped out of his chest: he found Pirate Hunter crumpled sadly against a building, an arm missing and its head missing chunks like a smashed watermelon. The Kaiju they had been fighting had left, followed by a destructive trail of smashed cars and flames, moving on to wreak havoc on the city.

Sanji shifted All Blue into a crouch and then pulled himself out of the drift. He carefully unhooked Zeff, pulling him into a secure fireman's hold and carried him out through the top of their Jaeger. With shaking hands he managed to grip each battered rung down the emergency hatch of the metal hull, having to make a slight jump to get passed a few completely smashed steps. The acrid smell of burning asphalt and rubber sank into the back of Sanji's throat with each difficult breath, his lungs crying out to him.

When his tired body finally hit the broken ash slick ground, he fell to his knees, slumping Zeff off his throbbing shoulders. He could feel something hot and sticky trail down his cheek from his eye, but he didn't remember crying, and then realized he'd ruptured a blood vessel in the eye. The distant roars of the Kaiju echoed through the buildings of the city, a reminder that they were still in danger,

He dragged Zeff over sloppily but carefully to the foot of Pirate Hunter, gently placing him there to rest. He looked up at the smashed visor of Pirate Hunter weakly and sighed before getting a running start and leaping onto the wreckage. He pulled himself up gracelessly over the scorched and torn metal body, nearly falling off the rickety ruins before reaching the Pilot's chamber.

"Zoro?! Kuina?! You guys okay? Hello?" He called out into the dark room. A few steps in, he found the huddled shapes of the two pilots. Zoro had Kuina in his lap, her body bent in a sickening way, Zoro's head in defeat.

"Oh shit…" He hustled over to the pilots, kneeling slowly when he reached them. It was then he realized that the unmoving Zoro was actually breathing, wrecked and shallow breaths but breathing.

"Zoro…" He whispered, pulling his navy blue helmet off and placing it to the side.

"She's gone…" Zoro choked, barely audibly, he shook when he spoke. "Yubashiri broke, we didn't see it coming. She hit her head in the impact… She was just pulled out of the drift and she was gone."

Sanji knelt down in front of Zoro, keeping his head bowed. With shaking hands Zoro slowly pulled off Kuina's battered helmet, her dark short hair flowed into his lap while some random strands fell into her pale face. Zoro's face was twisted in agony, the more he looked at her still face the more desperate he appeared, he looked like his chest was about to concave as each ragged breath managed to escape his lips.

Sanji was paralyzed before the two Jaeger pilots: Kuina was dead. Sanji's hero was dead.

"Zoro."

The other pilot didn't move.

"Zoro Roronoa, we have to go." Sanji urged, refraining from touching the other man who clearly needed space to mourn, but this wasn't the place. "Zoro."

Zoro merely nodded, scooping his sister into his arms and following Sanji to the mangled escape hatch. Carefully and slowly, the two silently made their way down. As soon as their feet touched the ground Zoro pulled his Kuina into his arms and his body folded to the cement, no tears or words, his agonized face shadowed.

Sanji turned away, his head lowered with his helmet hanging in his arms. His throat felt like it was going to swell shut, his chest burned. They had all failed tremendously, and this is how they paid for it.

There was a heavy quake in the ground below them, rattling the broken asphalt and strewn pieces of building debris lying in the street. Then it stopped and everything stood still. The shaking retuned. And it stopped. Sanji's eyes grew wide in comprehension and he whipped back to where Zoro sat in mourning.

"Zoro!" He screamed in a scraggly voice. The other man only glanced up, his narrow eyes red and angry. "We've got to get the fuck out of here that shitty fucker is turning back!"

Panic lit up Zoro's face, turning his head to look distantly down the ruined street, in the distance the shadow of the massive monster was growing, its neon yellow eyes glowing through the rubble and dust; no wonder it had been nicknamed 'hawk eyes'. He looked back at Sanji and Sanji knew they were both thinking the same thing: there was no time to get away with both Zeff and Kuina to carry.

Sanji watched Zoro take a deep breath and give a final sad squeeze to Kuina's body. Zoro delicately placed her cold body next to Zeff's unconscious one, and then he ran over and grabbed Sanji's suited bicep, pulling him away from their drift partners. Sanji dug his heels in and stopped them both, struggling to release himself.

"I'm not leaving them behind you bastard." He screeched, tears starting to well in his eyes, mixing with the blood that stung and leaked from the right. Zoro returned a fierce look and Sanji swore that those dark eyes were on fire.

"I'm not leaving them." His voice was raw and rough. "I don't know about you, but I want revenge."

With that, Zoro went back to running, in the direction of the All Blue. Sanji spared a glance to the two bodies laying at the foot of Pirate Hunter, then at the approaching Kaiju, before breaking into a sprint to catch up to Zoro.

"This is fucking crazy." He mumbled to himself as he followed Zoro up the steep ladder to the cockpit. When they reached the top, Sanji twisted his head to the side to spit out blood that was collecting in his mouth, wiping the blood that started gushing from his nose with a cold metal sleeve. Zoro was already hooking himself in, his eyes locked forward on the Kaiju through the visor screen. Sanji did as Zoro did, fastening himself into place, pulling his helmet on top of his sweat drenched head.

Zoro rose a hand up, ready to pull the switch to force them into the drift together, shooting Sanji a look of concern.

"Well this is going to fucking suck." Sanji groaned, Zoro shrugged in response. "It was nice knowing you, shitty marimo."

"Same to you, swirly brow." Sanji looked on as Zoro did at their target, exhaling an uncertain breath as he heard the switch click.

He knew he was screaming but he couldn't hear himself, tunneling through a ghost world of Zoro's thoughts and memories. He saw who he could only assume was Zoro's father, teaching at the Dojo where Zoro came from in Japan. His heart wrenched when he saw Kuina with him, sparring with Zoro, training in the art of swordsmanship those two knew so well.

The view shifted slightly and it turned to Kuina pinning Zoro down smugly, laughing as Zoro struggled under her.

Sanji could hear a whisper of their voices 'We'll be the greatest Jaeger pilots one day.'

Images of meeting Luffy and Ace, the D brothers, pilots of Dragon's Son.

Talking happily with that scaredy-cat techie Usopp late at night in the man's tiny workshop, going over details for Pirate Hunter.

Images of Zoro's first Jaeger fight, with the Kaiju nicknamed 'Pearl shield'. Sanji knew that one, he had been there; the beast had threatened to destroy his home, kill both him and his father, but Pirate Hunter had saved them. He didn't have time to wonder if Zoro was seeing this memory through Sanji's eyes as more images trailed on.

Meeting Sanji.

Sanji didn't remember feeling as confident as he looked there, he looked so well kept through Zoro's eyes. His hair looked like it flowed just right, his small smirk had a mischievous draw to it. In reality, he had been a nervous wreck when he met his young hero Zoro, he thought he was going to have a heart attack.

The moment Kuina died. Ripped away from him, leaving him cold and empty in the broken cockpit of his defeated Jaeger.

The drift spat them back out to reality in what had only been a fraction of a second, gasping and panting, their limbs shaking slightly.

"Holy shit." Sanji whispered to himself. The Kaiju was almost upon them. They both took a hesitant step back, widening their stance for more balance.

"You ready to fight, Sanji?" Zoro's husky voice called over to him. Sanji took a deep breath and together they brought up the Jaeger's arms into fighting position. Adrenaline shot through his veins, his limbs didn't feel like lead anymore: Sanji could feel Zoro's wrathful energy and bloodlust flowing into him.

"Let's beat this fucker down."

A/N

This was my own one shot, I wrote this a while ago but just hadn't published it. I'm actually considering continuing this one, before I had planned to make it a whole multichapter but I wasn't sure.