Awakening
Zoro sprawled on his back under a tree just above the high tide mark on the island Kuma had dumped him on, pondering the current situation. It was three days since the Marineford debacle and he had yet to see a newspaper that would tell him what was going on. All he had to go on was Fox' knowledge, but his lover had been elbow deep in Ace up until just a few hours ago, when she had determined he was well enough for her to be able to sleep without him dying on her. Which was why he was lying down here in the first place.
After a few hours of sensing Fox heal Luffy's older brother Zoro had determined that it was going to take ages and carefully moved the Flame Logia's soul down the connection and into the swordsman's own mind. Fox herself was too busy healing Ace to be able to drop everything should the other man wake unexpectedly and Zoro didn't like the idea of anyone wandering loose through his lover's head while she was pregnant and possibly messing things up for their child. So he'd brought Ace back where he could keep an eye on the older pirate. Pragmatically, as they were both male and didn't know each-other very well, Ace was less likely to seriously mess up Zoro's mind than he was Fox' own; Zoro also didn't have anything better to do than practice with his swords and maintain the odd half-trance that let him monitor both his surroundings and the alien presence at the edge of his soul.
Perona, the pink-haired Devil Fruit User who had found him when he landed here, was not too impressed by the antisocial habits babysitting Ace had caused Zoro to form, but seemed too pleased by the presence of another human being to complain too much. She had been very interested when she noticed he was capable of leaving his own body much as she did without ever having eaten Devil Fruit, but lost interest when the swordsman told her he could only go to one specific place.
Ace had not stirred once in three days, but now his body was well enough to sustain itself without Fox' conscious assistance his soul needed to go back. However as Zoro had it, he was the one who had to put it back. Fox had also warned him that having Ace attached to him as well as to her meant the swordsman would have his own, separate bond connecting him to the Flame Logia. It wouldn't be anywhere near as strong and clear as the bond he shared with Fox, or even the bond Fox now shared with Ace, but it was there and he couldn't get rid of it without damaging himself. Which was why Zoro was meditating under a tree on the part of the island closest to where Fox was; he was looking for that separate connection so he could push Ace back down it.
Sinking into his mindscape –which was ridiculously easy now– he landed in a small hollow not far from the round pool that connected him to Fox. This hollow was also where he'd left Ace, who was floating under a tree like a green-gold will o' wisp. Zoro had tracked the changes Luffy's brother had gone through the longer he stayed in the swordsman's mindscape and wasn't sure if they were a result of what Fox was doing to his body miles away on the Red Force or a result of how long Ace had been detached from said body. Rather than looking like he had in real life but with hands made of fire and a coating of flame on his skin, Ace now looked to be entirely made of green-gold fire with bluish-black flames where hair had been. He also didn't have any clothes anymore, just wearing that string of red beads around his neck which glowed like burning coals. Not that Zoro could talk; in his mindscape the only thing he wore that could properly be considered clothing was his haramaki.
When he'd first brought Ace here it had just been a hollow in the ground beside one of the little streams that ran out of the pool connecting Zoro to Fox, but now there were a dozen trees around it and smooth volcanic rock rather than grass immediately under the bubble. Zoro frowned. When he'd first visited Fox' mind there hadn't been a reef at all, just a slightly different patch of water, but the reef had emerged over time and the last time he'd stopped by there had been shingle on the top above the waterline and a few mosses. Probably there'd be an island eventually, an island that was his rather than hers. The trees around Ace were different to the ones dotted here and there on the rest of the swordsman's mental landscape: they belonged in deep jungle rather than on a grassy plain. The green-haired asura looked around, taking in the hanging vines, the ferns and the thick leaf litter. There was even a smell of rotting vegetation and wispy witch-lights hovering here and there. Yes, this definitely wasn't his. He'd never thought of Ace as a jungle kind of person. A desert person seemed more plausible. Shaking his head, he glanced through the trees; those ghost-lights went a lot further than seemed possible considering the size of the grove…
Ah. That had to be the way back to Ace' mind then. Follow the fire; logical considering his Devil Fruit. Zoro poked the fire-filled bubble with a careful finger, just to check whether it could be moved. It drifted a little in the direction he had pushed. Shaking his head at the sheer ridiculousness of his situation –not even Usopp could tell this story with a straight face– Zoro gently herded the bubble towards the ghost-lights, his clawed feet squelching slightly on the damp leaves underfoot. He didn't consider the impossibility of how the bubble moved between the trees without getting punctured when the branches and lianas were brushing against his own head and arms every other second; that way lay madness.
As the jungle grew thicker and darker and the sounds of wildlife began to echo above and around him, Zoro wondered if this really was a good idea. Ace probably wouldn't take kindly to a stranger in what he instinctively recognised as being private space. However he didn't have time to reconsider as the jungle opened out onto a steep, scrubby hillside covered with plants that burned well and regenerated quickly; Zoro had once visited a similar island where fires were a regular occurrence and the vegetation thrived on the charcoal that lay thickly on the ground.
Then he realised the bubble had popped and quickly glanced around with all three pairs of eyes for where the older pirate had gone.
This chapter just wanted to stop here. It's mostly metaphysical and abstract, with Zoro who doesn't think too deeply into things but is nonetheless very perceptive.