let's try that again 10
Sanji waits quietly for Zoro to wake up, there’s no one else that he can talk to after all. The green head is curled up under the blanket that Sanji used to sleep under, in the bed that Sanji used to sleep in and in the room that he had called his own before he’d died.
His old man had put him there and is now sitting in the corner watching Zoro carefully as the young man sleeps. Zoro’s breathing is easy and steady, it’s almost hypnotic to Sanji. He’s sitting intangibly on Zoro’s shins like some kind of ghostly guard dog.
The psychic looks small under the covers, he looks tired and wrung out. There are dark circles under his eyes despite sleeping for the entire night without so much as stirring. Sanji can’t help but wonder if his possession of Zoro had drained more energy out of the man, just like Usopp had. He hopes not, that can’t be good for him. Still, it was that or let the moron get shot, so Sanji doesn’t regret his choice. And he got to have a proper goodbye with Zeff, he can’t regret that either.
Sanji’s mind churns in the half light of the morning as he watches Zoro continue to sleep. He had seen Zoro last night, when he had come out of Zoro’s body he’d seen him floating there as clear as day. Why had Zoro been out of his body? Sanji is fairly certain that he’d not killed Zoro, however briefly, his ejection from Zoro’s form had felt more like a rejection from some metaphysical immune system rather than Zoro’s body dying on him. So why had Zoro been there? The other guy that Sanji had possessed hadn’t been floating around. He’d have to ask Zoro about it.
Sanji can hear the familiar ungraceful boot thumps up the stairs that he’s associated with Patty and Carne since the awful duo first came to work for the Baratie, a restaurant that might as well have advertised itself as being both an eating establishment and a workplace for lost souls. Hm, funny that, the Baratie helped lost souls find their place, figuratively speaking, and Zoro helped them do so literally. He knows that Zeff will keep his promise and let Zoro stay, he just wonders if the marimo will accept the help.
The bootsteps hesitate outside the door, clearly their owners have deduced that Zeff must be in here and they don’t know what to do. Zeff’s eyes are open and curious in that shifty way that only the old geezer can manage, they’re both wondering what the two will do.
It occurs to Sanji that Zeff looks almost… normal. Not that he knows what he was expecting, in a selfish way he’d almost expected everything that was part of his living life to have stopped when he died. Sanji isn’t sure whether he wants to speculate what Zeff has been like after his death. How did the old man grieve him? Sanji already knows that Zeff continued his work with food donation, something that touched him deeply, but other than that he knows nothing. He doesn’t know if Zeff was sad or angry, he doesn’t know if the man cried or became distant, he knows nothing.
Finally Patty seems to get the stones to knock on the door and pokes his head around it into the room, he seems to take in Zeff first before his eyes stop on Zoro, causing his face to rearrange into a scowl.
"Who the hell is this?!" he demands loudly gesturing at the sleeping Zoro.
"That’s Zoro. He's helping prove that Sanji didn't kill himself." Zeff answers in a disinterested monotone.
“How’s he doing that?” Patty asks, his eyes narrowing suspiciously.
“Never you mind, idiot. What do you want anyway?” The old man replies gruffly.
“What, is he like a detective or something? How old is he anyway, like, fifteen?” Patty snorts derisively.
“Hey, why’s that kid in Sanji’s bed?” Carne asks, apparently choosing this moment to also poke his head around the door and peer in at Zoro. Sanji rolls his eyes, the two of them are hopeless and always so loud and annoying. …he misses them. God, there has to be something wrong with him but he actually misses the two blockheads. That is until Carne says what’s probably the worst thing possible.
“Are you just replacing Sanji with some other guy?” Carne asks with a faint tone of accusation in his voice.
Sanji winces at that. He knows that it’s not the case at all, and that Carne is probably just speaking from a place of hurt himself, after all he lost Sanji too. But it’s almost certainly the most hurtful thing that he could have said. Zeff’s body is rigid with rage and Sanji is suddenly glad that he’s intangible and can’t suffer from the pain of that kick that he can see building.
Evidently Carne has enough sense to see it too and leaps backwards, dragging Patty with him. Zeff’s false leg slams into the door hard that it rattles the hinges it sits in. There’s even an impression of his shoe in the wood.
“Uh… so… do you want us to open up since you’re uh… busy up here?” Patty’s hesitant voice calls through the safety of the door. Zeff snarls angrily in response and Sanji hears the morons scuttle away.
Zeff turns back to face Sanji and his face suddenly shows surprise, it’s then that Sanji realises that Zoro’s legs have moved out from underneath him. He turns to look as sees that the green haired psychic is doing his best to plaster himself to the corner of the wall at the head of Sanji’s bed, the farthest in the room that he can get away from Zeff. He’s gone shockingly pale and his expression is one of mortal dread.
Oh god, Zoro doesn’t have any memory of when Sanji was in his body. The guy that he possessed in the car didn’t remember so why would Zoro? And the last thing that Zoro remembers about Zeff is Zeff pointing a shotgun in his face and now he’s woken up in some strange bed, of course he’s freaked out.
“Zoro! Zoro, it’s okay!” Sanji blurts out hurriedly to his friend. Zoro’s dark scared eyes flick from Zeff to him and back again.
“Easy kid. Sanji told me everything.” Zeff says calmly, holding his empty hands up as a peace gesture. Zoro’s brow furrows dangerously and his gaze snaps quickly to Sanji.
“I might have… borrowed your body. You were going to get shot, I had to do something!” He says in his defence. Zoro glowers at him but relaxes enough so he’s no longer in danger of fusing with the wallpaper.
Zoro slides back down so he’s only sitting up in the bed and Zeff sits back down in his chair with an elderly grunt that worries Sanji a little inside. The two men sit looking at each other in silence. Great. Sanji should have known that this would happen, neither Zoro or Zeff were especially big on initiating conversation unless it involved pissing Sanji off, so left together they clearly were just going to sit quietly.
“Well, someone say something!” He says exasperatedly.
Zoro’s eyes flick to him with a hint of agitation, but clearly Zoro isn’t going to tell him off with Zeff sitting right there. Even if the old man does know the truth it’d sound a little weird for Zoro to be effectively talking to himself.
“He’s here isn’t he?” Zeff asks suddenly, clearly having caught the direction that Zoro’s gaze was going in. Zoro straightens up at that and his face takes on an almost embarrassed expression, as if Zeff had caught him doing something naughty. Sanji suspects that Zoro does think of his powers in the way - as something bad.
“I- uh… yeah.” Zoro answers uncomfortably, glancing down uneasily and pulling at the sleeve of his hooded top.
“I suspected as much. I guess this sort of thing is your main deal with seeing ghosts huh? Putting people back in contact with their families.” Zeff muses, stroking his plaited moustache. Mutely Zoro shakes his head and fiddles with his sleeve again.
“No, people don’t believe me. Or they get angry and try to shoot me.” Zoro mumbles and chews on his sleeve. Sanji gawks at Zoro, it’s as if the slightly awkward but funny guy that he knows has just disappeared to be replaced with this unbelievably anxious socially stunted guy. He supposes that any conversation that Zoro doesn’t have planned or isn’t with someone he knows fairly well is uncomfortable for him. It certainly explains how all of Zoro’s clothes seem to be frayed, he must worry at them when he’s nervous. His wasn’t this bad last time he saw Zeff, although he was a bit weird. But perhaps Zoro felt like he had a little more control in that conversation.
An idea of Zoro’s life flashes through his mind, Zoro being already isolated with his unusual and terrifying gift, a gift that Zoro has insisted creeps people out around him. And when you consider that the few people that Zoro has let past his defences have met untimely ends it reveals upsetting things about his life. The only people Zoro can seemingly be his normal self around are dead. It seems so out of character for Zoro but… perhaps the way that Zoro behaves around him is technically against his usual character.
“Yeah, sorry for trying to shoot you.” The old man apologises after a moment.
“I’m used to it. The last lady I passed a message onto threw a phone at my head.” Zoro shrugs and gestures to the almost healed gash on his temple where Kaya’s big heavy phone connected with Zoro’s face.
“Then… how do you earn a living if no one believes you?” Zeff asks looking at Zoro with some surprise.
“I work nights at a convenience store.” Zoro shrugs, his tone conveying the disinterest that he has for the job and the people that he works with.
“It must be hard finding a job where you can just run off to investigate people’s deaths all by yourself. Especially if it involves breaking and entering.” Zeff muses, giving Zoro a slightly sharp look. Zoro awkwardly looks away and silence falls over the two again.
“Did… did you have that bottle of Sanji’s? It seems to have vanished and-” Zoro begins with a little more certainty.
“And it could be motive, I know. Sanji told me. You really don’t remember any of it do you?” Zeff asks interestedly. Zoro shakes his head mutely at that.
“Well, no. I don’t have it. If the police had given it to me I would have kept it, but they didn’t.” the old man answers.
“That’s because the police didn’t get it either. So whoever killed him took it before he died.” Zoro states firmly before swinging his legs out of bed. He finds his shoes on the floor and starts putting them on. From this angle Sanji can see that Zoro’s shitty converses even have holes in the soles.
“So what are you doing to do now? What can I do?” Zeff asks insistently, his eyes wide with purpose.
Zoro looks up at the old man with a slightly startled expression, of course no one’s probably offered to help him before, not if Zoro meant it when he said that no one had ever believed him before. But Zeff does believe him, and now that Zeff knows that Sanji isn’t playing some golden harp and flirting with angels he clearly feels that he needs to help. And he doesn’t even know the worst of what could happen to him if Zoro doesn’t help him in time, he doesn’t know about the decay. Zoro seems to get this though and relaxes a little.
“I’m going to go and stake out Creuset’s house, it’s a lot easier when one half of your team is invisible. I don’t need you to do anything right now, if I do I’ll let you know.” Zoro states. And Sanji sees a glimmer of the man that Zoro is supposed to be, quick witted and confident, strong and kind. Zoro isn’t supposed to be the anxious, awkward worrier that this life has made him into, but Sanji can see the real him under there and he wants to see more of it.
Zeff watches as Zoro shrugs into his hoodie and gets ready to leave, he gives him a slow considering look, the kind that Sanji knows from experience means that he’s thinking deeply about something.
“Kid, if you need a job… somewhere that’ll understand if you need to run off to do what you do, then let me know.” Zeff says suddenly, startling Zoro who’s halfway through the door already. Zoro looks at the old man with a surprised look on his face which eventually settles into a small scowl.
“Sanji put you up to that didn’t he?” the green head says suspiciously.
“Does it matter?” Zeff asks challengingly.
The two stare each other down for a while, neither saying anything nor making any move. Sanji doesn’t even dare say anything himself either, he wants Zoro to accept the offer, he wants Zoro to be somewhere safe.
Instead the marimo huffs in irritation and turns his back on the old man.
“I have a murderer to catch.” He says and lets himself out of the door, down the stairs and out the back door without so much as acknowledging Patty and Carne as he breezes by them. Sanji guesses that spending a lifetime being ignored gets you pretty good at pretending that people aren’t there.
Sanji scowls at Zoro as he floats along behind him in the alleyway.
“You’re kind of an asshole you know? Zeff doesn’t exactly make offers like that regularly.” He snaps at him.
Zoro freezes in his tracks and spins around to Sanji, his face a picture of fury.
“I’m the asshole? You took over my body without my permission and used it, clearly enough to make me pass out if the way I feel is anything to go by. Then you let me wake up somewhere strange without so much as a word of warning that the guy who just levelled a shotgun at me isn’t trying to kill me anymore! And on top of that you’ve clearly talked me up as some charity case to your old man to get him to offer me help like some stray dog! And I’m the asshole here?!” Zoro snarls at him, making Sanji recoil.
“You were going to get your face shot off! I had to do something!” He argues back defensively.
“I managed perfectly fine before you came along you know!” Zoro retorts.
“It SHOWS!” Sanji shouts at him. It turns out to be one of those moments where you hear the words tumbling out of your mouth and wish instantly that you could yank them back in because Zoro’s face instantly flashes hurts before the defensive walls slam down over his expression.
“I didn’t mean that.” He blurts out too late.
Zoro turns on his heel and strides off out of the alley and into the street with his hands in his pockets and his shoulders held tensely. Sanji flies after him guiltily.
“I just… I know that you’re going to find out who did this to me. And I don’t like the thought that when I go… wherever it is that we go, that you’re gonna be all alone. I was just trying to pay you back for helping me.” Sanji explains but Zoro is ignoring him, either that or he’s not talking because they’re in public now, he has a feeling that the people around aren’t making any difference though.
He follows Zoro in silence until they come to Creuset’s house. It’s set in some fairly large grounds, not so much as Kaya's was but it certainly shows of the cook's wealth. It also gives Zoro somewhere to hide. The skinny guy shimmies along a branch and lies down with a pair of binoculars and peers into the house.
"It doesn't look like he's in." Zoro states, speaking for the first time since their argument.
"It's not like he could see me if he was." Sanji points out.
"Either way, go in and see if you can find your bottle." Zoro shrugs and goes back to looking at the house.
Sanji hesitates, if he leaves now then he may never see Zoro again, it wasn't like Usopp got a lot of warning before he became a glowing gold ball of light.
"I wanted to say sorry, if I was an asshole to you before, or ever really. I really regret being dead and not getting a chance to meet you properly." Sanji apologises, rubbing the back of his ghostly neck uncomfortably. Zoro gives him an irritated little look at that last bit.
"We're never going to agree on that last bit. But you're ok for a curly browed dead guy." Zoro grins at him. Sanji sticks his tongue out at the psychic and almost leaves before something else occurs to him, something that Robin said that he's never had the guts to bring up.
"Zoro, why were you on that ledge? You didn't see me until I called out to you, so you weren't there for me." Sanji asks quietly. Zoro looks away uncomfortably, he won't meet Sanji's eyes.
"Does it matter? Don't you have an afterlife to be going on to?" He says evasively.
"Not if I think you're going to be following me right away." Sanji answers coldly. That gets a reaction out of Zoro, the man tenses and sits up, he's still unable to meet Sanji's eyes though.
"It's not really any of your business." Zoro mutters.
"I'm not leaving until I get an answer Zoro." he states flatly, folding his arms.
"I don't- look, my life has never been great. But... I'd always felt like there was some...thing that I was searching for, something worth it. But the last month or so it's as if that light went out of the world and there wasn't a place for me here anymore. I can't really explain it." Zoro answers, staring off emotionlessly into space.
"But you can't! You could do so much with your life, I know you're alone right now but there are gonna be other people out there that'll like you! Zeff meant it when he offered you a job! Or, you could find someone else like you, someone who understands the whole 'seeing dead people' thing!" Sanji insists desperately.
"It's not your life." Zoro answers flatly finally looking Sanji in the eyes and giving him a hard look.
"No, mine was taken from me and I'd do anything to have it back. Don't throw yours away." he pleads.
"Sanji-" Zoro starts with a sigh but Sanji cuts him off.
"I'm not leaving until you promise me that you won't kill yourself! Even if I have to stay here and rot!" He shouts at the green head. Zoro looks startled at that but he doesn't dismiss Sanji or tell him that he doesn't know what he's saying, he has that much respect for Sanji at least. He floats up so that he's level with Zoro and leans over, touching the man's jaw with his hand.
"I care if you're alive, you moss brained idiot. I promise that if you stay alive I'll come back and tell you what the other side is like." he promises quietly.
"Fine." Zoro mumbles unhappily. He's a man of his word and he knows that Zoro will uphold that promise no matter what.
He leans forward and finally gives into his temptation to kiss Zoro, he presses his lips to Zoro and... feels him. There's no other way of explaining it, in the same way that he could feel Zoro's body like his own when he possessed him he can feel Zoro's... soul. It feels vast and deep like an ocean but Sanji feels familiar with it, as if he's walked its shores many times before. He can feel the man's sense of honour, of right and wrong, he can feel his tendency to unwavering loyalty and devotion. He feels that the surface of Zoro is new but the deeper waters are the same as ever, like the changing weather over the same ocean. Most of all though he feels the pang of loss from what he should have had and can't now because he's dead.
He opens his eyes slowly and pulls back, he swears that he sees a flicker of red in his vision but it might just be Zoro's reddened cheeks. The other man's eyes are slightly misty and he looks at Sanji with a look of such loss and mourning that it burns Sanji to the core.
"I think," he says shakily, "you might have been right. I think we were supposed to be... I think we were meant to..." Zoro trails off and rapidly blinks the moisture out of his eyes. Zoro sniffs sharply and looks away, making Sanji smile fondly, stupid proud marimo.
"Don't you have somewhere to be?" he asks gruffly, covering for his emotional overflow.
"See you later." Sanji smiles and flies off to Creuset's house, trying to ignore the feeling that he's leaving something unspeakably important behind.
It seems like Zoro was right, Creuset doesn't appear to be home. Sanji wanders around his house aimlessly looking for his bottle but not seeing it anywhere. That said he can't really look in cupboards. It's pitch black when he sticks his head through them and he doesn't want to go opening things in case he's interrupted. On the doormat there's mail for Creuset, a few things that looks like bills and something that's marked as being from "Vegapunk Chemical Laboratories".
It's just as he's leaning over to inspect that letter that the front door swings open, swinging through him and bringing Creuset striding into his home followed by a pretty blonde woman that he recognises from Zoro's files as being Creuset's agent.
"It's here!" Creuset exclaims and snatches the letter up, hurriedly running off with it to the large well equipped kitchen.
"What's here?" the agent asks with a puzzled expression on her face.
"The analysis, now we'll have proof." Creuset says dismissively and opens a cupboard and pulls something out. He turns and places it on the counter next to the envelope.
It's his black bottle.
And he remembers.
He is still fuming from his argument with Zeff, he had stomped Creuset tonight, wasn't he allowed to enjoy himself a little? God, he needs a smoke to calm his nerves, he probably was little too sharp with the old geezer, he'd smoke and calm down a little then say sorry. He shoves the sash window up and leans out of it, he should really go down to the ground floor and smoke - there are signs all around the building saying not to inside - but it's freezing out there and they're on the millionth floor or something. He rolls himself a smoke with quick practiced movements and lights it with the lighter in his pocket. He replaces the lighter and leans out of the window.
"How do you taste a fucking thing doing that?" A dark voice questions behind him. He startles a little but turns around to look, it's Creuset, he's standing with his fists balled angrily at his sides.
"Oh this?" Sanji asks holding up the cigarette. The angry flash in his ex-competitor's eyes tells him all that he needs to. Zeff told him before that smoking would ruin his sense of taste, clearly this guy believes it too.
"Clearly I manage well enough." He shrugs with a grin.
Creuset is practically shaking with rage, he must be really torn up at losing to him. Sanji shifts and sits on the windowsill fully, the crown of his head resting on the upper half of the opened window.
"You've no goddamned respect you punk kid." Creuset growls.
"Get over it man, I won. If you want you title back then go up against me next year, fair's fair." Sanji frowns with irritation.
"It's not fair though, you cheated, I saw you!" Creuset snaps, his eyes blazing fiercely. Sanji straightens angrily at that, the guy can be as bitter as he likes but he's no cheat!
"I don't know what you think you saw you shitty bastard, but I never needed to cheat to beat some old washed out "star" like you." he snaps angrily.
"We'll see about that, I've got proof now you fool!" Creuset shouts wildly and snatches Sanji's bottle of herbs off of the windowsill and clutches it manically to his chest.
"Oi! Give that back!" He exclaims trying to get his bottle back from the crazy cook.
"Ah-hah! Not so cocky now are we? What did you put in here to win then? Some kind of drug?" Creuset laughs shoving Sanji backwards hard enough for his thighs to hit the windowsill and his head to painfully bump the edge of the raised window.
"What helped me win is something you can't bottle, talent." Sanji growls angrily.
Something unhinged and crazy flares in Creuset's eyes and some part of Sanji's brain senses danger from the other cook for the first time. He senses that the cook isn't just some paranoid has-been but is genuinely unhinged and dangerous. Before he can react though Creuset's open hand slams into his chest, hurling him backwards through the open window without so much as time to grab the edges of the frame.
He turns catlike in the air, fear and adrenaline coursing through his veins as he hopes to land on his feet but he's traveling fast, much too fast. He's not able to get his legs under him in time and instead he lands hands first, the pain as his wrists and all the bones in his hands shatter is both mental and physical. The first thought is that if he ever survives this he'll never cook again, and in slow motion as his broken arms crumple under him he realises that he won't survive this at all.
Sanji jolts back to the present in horror and looks at the last face that he ever saw as Creuset excitedly tears open the envelope. Creuset's little piggy eyes narrow as he reads the letter, his face contorts with that unhinged rage again and Sanji spots his agent flinch back from him, she's scared of Creuset too.
"It's just goddamn herbs!" Creuset snarls, slamming his fist with the scrunched up letter in it on the surface so hard that the bottle jumps and falls over.
"You- you can't keep that here Creuset! What if the police were to-" His agent insists timidly as she eyes the bottle and the chemical results.
"They wouldn't do anything! It's not proof of anything! Anyway, I have an alibi don't I?!" he snarls at her.
"Of course you do but, it's just..." She whimpers recoiling from the mad cook.
Sanji stares at his murderer, invisible and powerless to speak to him. And as much as it pains him to admit it, Creuset is right. The bottle is circumstantial evidence at best, this bastard killed him and he's going to get away with it! A cold hard feeling settles inside him, not anger or rage, something colder and darker than that. He refuses to let this happen to him, he refuses to let Creuset go unpunished for what he's done, he refuses to allow justice to go unserved. Zoro's gentle understanding voice runs through his mind, his earnest dark eyes looking up at him and asking Sanji why he's still clinging onto this world. Now he knows.
He turns and strides through the walls of Creuset's house, out across the grounds and towards where he left Zoro. The green haired guy's face is buried in his arms, he's curled up on the tree branch like a kid sitting up in bed after a nightmare.
"Zoro." he calls up to him. The marimo jumps and looks down at Sanji in surprise with red rimmed eyes. Sanji realises then that Zoro hadn't expected to ever see him again, he'd expected him to move on and never see him again.
"You... You're back." Zoro says dumbly.
"Not from the other side though." Sanji answers Zoro's unspoken question.
"I've got my memory back, Creuset did it. He murdered me, he's completely insane, you were right though - he did think that I'd cheated." he says harshly, remembering his terrified fall.
"I need justice Zoro! He killed me and he's going to get away with it! But we’ve got no proof, nothing that the police can use!" he yells furiously, kicking the tree trunk in his rage.
"I have an idea about that." Zoro smiles down at him as the disturbed leaves drift down around him from the tree branches.