Clarity

Fox had healed Zoro enough times now and of sufficiently severe injuries to get a vague reading on his emotions on top of being constantly aware of his location and physical health. She therefore knew he had been eavesdropping on her chat with the Shandians and had left in a huff when Wiper kissed her. She could understand why –he didn't know much about her yet– but had no intention of letting him cool off before confronting him. In her experience, 'cooling off' was just another way of letting something fester. Better to have an epic shouting match and get it over with, like she did with her father.

Hunting the swordsman down however was tricky, as he had gained an awareness of her presence and was trying to avoid her. In the end she resorted to Haki, ambushed him when he went to get another drink and dragged him off to a moderately private ruin.

"I know you were there," she said bluntly as he glared blackly at her. "Just say it."

"What did you kiss him for?!" Zoro exploded. "You-"

Fox cut him off, her hand shooting out to muffle whatever he had intended to say next. "I'll explain and then you can decide what you want to do, okay?"

"Fine," Zoro muttered, slumping back against the wall and fingering his swords. "Whatever."

"First, I was trained as an assassin from the age of eleven. The man I was entrusted to was supposed to teach me to dance, sing, serve at table and generally behave in a manner that was demure, proper and discreet. He did all of those things, but he also taught me to kill. The womanly arts require a person to become what their host demands of them, so I was already being taught to deceive, dissemble and conceal. I learnt to lie with my words, with my body and to hide the deception so deep even I was barely aware of it. I was also taught patience, to wait, to let cruelty and pain wash over me like oil over a stone: unheeded.

"That is what makes a true assassin: Deceit and Patience. Once you are a master of both physical skill and strength become superfluous." She paused. "I know this doesn't seem relevant so bear with me."

Zoro grunted.

"Being taught to lie so well that it was never even noticed destroyed my faith in other people. After all if I could do it, why not them as well? So I found it very hard to trust others with my true nature and my private struggles. Then I was forced to eat Devil Fruit and suddenly I could feel other people. Not just their physical health, but their feelings as well. It was like…" Fox struggled for a metaphor, "like the weather. From inside a cabin you can see it through the window but it doesn't affect you unless it is very severe; that is how other people's emotions are normally, right?"

"Yes," Zoro admitted cautiously.

"Whereas I am standing on deck and I can feel the sun on my skin, the wind in my hair and when it rains it chills me. However unlike Nami I can't read the weather; I don't know what each gust and flurry means except in a very general way. Does that make sense?" Fox took the nod as agreement and continued, "So I learnt through experience that while people do lie –and about the oddest things sometimes– not everyone does. I made friends and grew attached to people, especially people I had healed as healing them made me more aware of them and enabled me to actually read them like Nami reads weather after a certain number of times."

"So you can read me?" Zoro asked.

"Barely, unless I'm touching you skin to skin," Fox admitted candidly, "and then you'd probably get a reading off me too, but my owner had me use my skills to patch up the slaves who fought in gladiatorial combat for his entertainment, so I healed a lot of potentially fatal wounds on a regular basis. If you keep getting almost killed and I keep fixing you, we will reach the point that we can communicate with each-other clearly without speaking out loud, no matter how far apart we are. I got that close to several of the fighters, which came with the disadvantage that I became aware of their injuries as they received them. It didn't hurt, exactly, but it wasn't pleasant."

"Go on."

"Well, my owner was the eldest son of one of the main scions of the World Nobility and his father was invited to join the Gorosei, the world rulers, when I was fifteen," Fox continued, now speaking very quietly, "and to celebrate my owner had his top gladiators fight to the death in the arena. I felt each one of them die; it was horrible. Like being torn into pieces and burned alive all at once. It drove me to shut down and take steps to eradicate those I perceived as having caused that pain."

"Hence your bounty," Zoro said quietly.

"Yes. I'm not sure how I got out of Mariejois afterwards, but I did manage and a friend of my mother's found me and sent me into hiding until the fuss died down. Well, specifically she dumped me on one of the first Islands in the New World and told me not to kill anybody," Fox snorted, "as if I had it in me then. I just wanted to die."

"Is this where the story from earlier comes in?"

"Yep; Sako found me. He was how I found out that while skin contact gives me an impression of people's superficial feelings, a kiss grants an instant of connection to their heart, past the white noise of the everyday. Nobody who kisses me can deceive me as in that instant I can see their true intentions and feelings. Even a little peck on the cheek gives me a brief insight; a proper, true kiss gives me so much more than that."

"Which is why you let all kinds of people kiss you." Zoro determined, frowning.

"Yes; I still have dreadful trust issues and kisses reassure me that circumstances have not changed since the last time I met someone. Of course they also feel nice and reassure other people that I care too, which helps as I'm so good at lying now I often don't notice how much of myself I am hiding away."

"You talk to me," Zoro pointed out.

"You're an exception; I've never told anyone about my bounty before or all of this stuff. Most people who know either worked it out for themselves or were there when I was working it out for myself." Fox paused. "I have no real idea why I trust you this much other than you just feel right to me on so many levels it is hard to remember that we don't actually know each-other very well. So bear with me, please?" Another nod. "This is related to why I'm so extremely tactile with some people but won't let others near me; some people are just too volatile for me to feel comfortable with and others set off my instincts in all the wrong ways. Take Chopper for instance. He's very naïve and doesn't know how to distinguish between something startling and genuine, life-threatening risk and being exposed to erratic bursts of a sense of impending peril would have me killing things that really don't need killing.

"Nami is very emotional and blows hot and cold all the time, like a little weather system all her own. Even sitting near her is wearing on the nerves because she projects like crazy. Usopp is terrified of practically everything and would have my nerves like taunt wires and the deck soaking in blood before breakfast. Robin… there's something broken in there. Not quite sure what yet but somebody did a number on her. Luffy barely thinks at all so he unnerves me as I can't see the changes coming; he's like that cyclone that came out of the blue when Nami was sick, acting at the very moment he sees something. Sanji… well he's better than the rest of them but the way he flutters grates on my nerves sometimes. I'll eat anything he puts in front of me, I trust him to watch my back in a fight and care for me when I'm sick but he sees me as a woman first and in a lot of ways I'm a killer even before that." Fox sighed. "You on the other hand just seem to get it. You know I'm a killer and you don't care, your day-to-day emotions are steady and disciplined and you are totally trustworthy. Plus, my father clearly thinks you have potential so I don't think he'll try to cut you out of my life like he's done to quite a few others I tried to get close to."

"Like Sako?"

Fox snorted. "Sako survived. The other eleven didn't."

Zoro paled visibly.

"Well, anyway I hope I've explained why I kissed Wiper. I'm sorry it upset you but I'm not sorry I did it," Fox concluded.

"I got that," Zoro said dryly, rising to his feet and walking over to her. "It's part of who you are. Well, this is how I feel about it-" He pounced, one arm snaking around her waist as the other cradled the back of her head and pulled her face down to his.

Jealousy. Protectiveness. Desire. Hunger. Passion. Longing. Resolve.

Fox surfaced, gasping for breath as her heart tried to pound its way out of her chest and she leant her forehead against Zoro's. "You don't do anything by halves, do you?" she managed to say.

He smirked darkly up at her. "Never."

Zoro gets his act together.