Archive of Our Own

The day starts out so peacefully, is the thing.

After the hurricane of deadly ice chunks they’d narrowly avoided last week and the baby squid rain they’d gotten mired in the previous day, this particular day promises to be calm. Balmy weather, bright and cloudless but with enough of a sea breeze to keep it from feeling too steamy. Franky and Chopper had worked tirelessly to get the splatted baby squids off the deck, so the Sunny only smells slightly like rotting fish.

Breakfast had been a hit – mountains of pancakes drizzled with everyone’s favorite toppings and mimosas to celebrate surviving the squid storm. Sanji is feeling downright perky as he soaks the last of the syrupy dishes in the sink and gets some vegetables out to slice into a refreshing slaw to go with lunch. The cabbage scraps jog his memory, and he’s still humming a jaunty tune as he sweeps them and the other vegetable ends into a bowl for their den den mushis.

The small army of portable den den mushi are a recent addition. They’d gotten tired of losing track of one another during their many island adventures, so keeping a few to stay in contact seemed like a good idea.

Sanji’s still not sold on keeping them in the galley of all places. Before this, he hadn’t realized just how much snails poop. It’s downright unsanitary, and he makes up his mind to yell at Usopp again about coming up with a better home for them. Somewhere away from his kitchen.

And that’s when he sees… it.

--

”MARIMO!”

Zoro, previously sound asleep on the grassy deck digesting a truly excellent breakfast, is up on his feet and halfway to the galley before he’s fully awake.

The scream had come from the cook. It’s not a scream he’s heard before – a mixture of fury, sure, but also something high and screechy and distressed that he can’t place. Like he’s just seen something so horrifying that he can’t even begin to articulate the problem. Zoro can’t think of anything that would freak him out so thoroughly except maybe he accidentally chopped off one of his hands in the kitchen, though in that case he thinks he’d be screaming for Chopper, but maybe he’s worried that Chopper will freak out at the sight of the blood and displaced hand? But no, there’s something distinctly accusatory in that scream, like maybe Zoro’s done something to cause the distress, which is stupid, because Zoro’s been right here all morning, and he hasn’t done anything to the cook recently. He hasn’t even stolen more than one bottle of saké since yesterday.

He's not the only one summoned by the unholy shrieking. The rest of the crew isn’t far behind him, so it’s nearly everyone who storms into the galley to see the cook clutching a bowl of vegetable scraps and pointing with his other hand. His stupid face is pale and frozen in an expression of shock.

“Marimo, you – you -!”

“What?” Zoro looks around, but the cook has both hands and there’s no blood anywhere, and nothing seems wrong. The only odd thing is their makeshift snail pen on the floor, the one Usopp swears he’s going to move somewhere better soon.

The cook finally turns to him, and he nearly staggers from the vitriol in his expression. He steps into Zoro’s space and jabs an accusatory finger right into his face.

“You! Your snail is violating my snail!”

There’s a beat of silence.

Everyone clustered in the doorway leans over to look into the pen.

It’s not obvious at first, really, but… Yeah, his snail with the green-painted shell does kind of look like it’s… on top of the cook’s snail. They seem to be pressing their little snail heads together in a way that he doesn’t immediately understand but feels obscene somehow.

There’s the first quiet titter from someone – sounds like Usopp.

“Don’t laugh,” the cook shrieks, “This is a crime!”

“Seriously?” Nami scoffs, “This is why you freaked out?”

“Sanji,” Chopper says gently, like he’s talking to a small child, “I don’t think snails have a concept of consent like humans do. I think your snail is fine.”

“Fine? How is this fine? He’s being smothered by the gross Marimo’s snail!”

“Or she,” Usopp pipes up, still chortling, “Since it seems like Zoro’s snail is the one, you know, doing the deed.”

The cook’s pale face switches instantly to beet red. “Take that back!”

“Don’t shoot the messenger! I’m just saying, it looks kind of like your snail’s the girl here.”

“Actually,” Robin says, “I believe den den mushi are hermaphroditic. Having both male and female reproductive organs. If I remember correctly, they are also the type to possess what they call a ‘love dart.’”

Now everyone in the galley is looking at Robin. She smiles cheerily.

“A… love dart?” the cook asks.

Even Zoro’s feeling a little weird about the phrase. Especially with the chilling smile she has when talking about it.

“Yes, a love dart. Since they’re both hermaphrodites and becoming fertilized and laying eggs is more strenuous than simply inseminating the other snail, they prefer to be the ‘male’ in this scenario. They will shoot each other with the dart and the one who strikes more accurately will imbue the other snail with hormones that help the sperm make it away from digestive processes and into the fertilization pouch instead. It’s quite an interesting method of ensuring the continuation of one’s genetic line. It seems quite violent.”

They all take a moment to contemplate this.

“So, the one better at stabbing gets to be the guy, and the one getting stabbed is the girl?” Luffy asks.

Robin shrugs. “More or less, but again, they are hermaphrodites.”

The hilarity of the situation finally sinks in. His snail shot the cook’s snail with a love dart. His snail’s currently banging the cook’s snail. The cook’s snail is getting knocked up right this very moment. This is the funniest thing that’s ever happened. Zoro meets the cook’s eye and gives him his biggest shit-eating grin.

“All these years I’ve called you dart-brow, never thought it’d pan out like this.”

The look on the cook’s face is priceless. His right foot starts smoking. The temperature in the galley seems to be spiking, and the crewmates clustered in the doorway start promptly retreating.

“You better not finish that statement, Marimo.”

Zoro puts his hand on his sword hilts and stances up. This is going to be fun. “Just saying. Snail looks kinda like you. Curly brows. No wonder your snail’s the bottom. Target like that…”

He doesn’t get to finish his statement after all as a flaming foot crashes into his sternum.

It’s worth getting kicked through the galley wall and the scolding Franky gives both of them later to see the cook’s bright red, furious face. It’s kind of cute.

--

“But why our snails?”

Sanji lies flat on the grassy deck and stares up at the darkening sky.

Robin hums from his side, taking a sip of the tea with a splash of brandy he’d brought her. Nami just snorts from nearby.

“Are you really still worried about this?”

Sanji sighs again and lets his misery sink in. “I’m about to be a snail-grandfather. With gross little marimo snail grandchildren. Why did this happen to me? I’m still so young…”

“You’re an idiot is what you are,” Nami says.

Sanji sighs again. The beautiful day has darkened into a beautiful dusk. It could have been a perfect day, but no. He had to see snail sex. Snail sex in which his own snail seemed to be getting knocked up by, ugh, by Zoro’s. How can anything ever be okay again?

“I don’t even know how to take care of a pregnant snail,” he laments.

“I know Chopper is taking his new role as snail veterinarian very seriously. You won’t have to worry about it,” Robin says sedately.

“How can I not worry about it?” He rolls over onto his front so he can look up at Robin pleadingly. “Why did it have to be our snails? None of the other snails looked like they were getting frisky. Why’d my snail have to get involved with – ugh! – with Zoro’s?”

Robin takes another sip of tea and raises her eyebrow. “I have a theory, but you’re not going to like it.”

Oh, that sounds just lovely. He hears Nami’s sandals in the grass walking closer.

He closes his eyes briefly, but he can be brave. He manages to say, “Dare I ask what your theory is?”

Robin glances up to meet Nami’s eye over his head. They share some secret and devious silent female communication that mainly seems to be minute twitches of eyebrows and lips that convey an entire conversation’s worth of meaning. It’s intimidating, and he really needs to learn how they do it. They must finish, because she smirks and looks back at him. Her smile sends an instinctive shiver down his spine.

“Well, I’ve heard it said that den den mushi can pick up telepathic signals from their owners. There’s much we don’t understand about how their abilities work, but the fact that they take on and exhibit characteristics of those using them…”

He nods slowly. He has a sinking feeling that he knows where this is going.

“It’s entirely possible that your snail and the swordsman’s snail understood and interpreted certain subconscious signals from the two of you and decided to act them out.”

Sanji stares at her blankly.

Nami leans into his field of vision with a wide grin of her own. “What Robin means is that even your snails know that you two want to bang.”

Sanji jerks upright.

“Me? And the marimo? Us?” He laughs, high and nervous and shrill. “Far be it from me to discount the opinions of such well-informed and intelligent ladies as yourselves, but the idea, my swans, is – it’s ludicrous! Ridiculous! I mean – I can’ t speak for the marimo, but certainly I never…”

Nami gives him a pitying look.

Sanji backtracks. “That is to say… There’s no way that’s possible! I can’t – and then the snails – and Zoro’s snail stabbing my snail with a love dart, and – I can’t – I – excuse me, ladies! I need some air!”

Sanji leaps to his feet, handily ignoring the fact that his excuse is complete bullshit as they’re already sitting under the open sky. He nearly trips over his own feet on his flight to the safety of his galley. When he reaches the door, he spares a glance to the glowing light from the windows of the crow’s nest where he just knows Zoro is up there working out right now.

Zoro, sweaty and stripped to his pants, grunting and throwing weights around like they’re nothing.

He shakes his head wildly and darts inside. He isn’t thinking about that, because the idea is ridiculous and because he doesn’t think about Zoro like that and there’s no way his snail decided from being around him that his secret desire is to have a disgusting mossball crawling all over him.

He swallows heavily and leans against the door.

Of course he finds no solace here. The damned snail enclosure sits right in the way. He looks inside at where his snail is cheerily munching on a bit of apple peel. Zoro’s damned snail sits right next to it, sleeping. They look positively domestic.

Fucking hell.

--

Sanji avoids Zoro for the next few days.

It’s difficult to do on such a small ship, but he manages. He has practice from all the other times the swordsman’s pissed him off so bad that he didn’t want to look at his face because it made him want to kick it through another wall.

He doesn’t want to look at him now because Zoro’s going to continue to be an asshole about this, and he can’t look at him without seeing his stupid den den mushi cheerfully violating his den den mushi and the entire experience is too freshly traumatic for him to handle any kind of teasing about it.

Plus –

Robin’s ridiculous theory hangs over him like a funeral shroud. Fucking – it’s ridiculous. He needs to banish the thought from his head, because while Robin is so smart and lovely, in this particular case, she is wrong.

There’s absolutely no way his den den mushi picked up secret signals that he really wants to have the marimo all over him. That’s just not possible.

He can’t be attracted to Zoro.

It’s – it’s not even that he’s a guy, not really. Guys can like guys. That part’s fine. It’s that he’s seen how these relationships play out on ships, and he’s not going to put the crew through any weird relationship drama and breakups and loud fights just because he gets kind of lonely sometimes and Zoro is, in all honesty, unfairly pretty. The Baratie was a constat flux of rotating staff as some guys quit over the violent customers and still more quit because of jealousy and in-fighting and petty fights about who’s fucking who, and it was a huge headache to navigate all the time. One cook would have a messy breakup with a supplier and then bam! Trying to get their hands on flour became a struggle because the guy wouldn’t want to come by anymore. The closest he’d seen to a relationship between two men that wasn’t a complete shitshow was Patty and Carne, but they’d been together forever, and he figures they got most of that toxic shit out of their system when they were younger.

So, in short, he’s not going to give into some lonely, hormonal impulse and sleep with Zoro just so he can get his heart broken the next time they make port and Zoro runs off to one of his shore hookups. Because Sanji knows himself and he knows he can’t seem to get intimate with anyone until he’s half in love with them already, and he’s not going to serve his own heart up on a platter just to get it stomped on.

Besides, he likes their banter. He likes fighting with him like an equal. He doesn’t want to fuck that up with sex. Sex ruins everything, he’s pretty confident in that. He won’t be the one to open that can of worms and suddenly have Zoro expecting things and getting mad when he says no to stuff or looking down on him if he does say yes, because as he’s been taught, fucking a guy’s fine, but getting fucked is somehow shameful and bad. And between the two of them he’s pretty sure he’d be the one getting shamed if that were to happen.

Their snails are enough proof of that.

So, Sanji hides and he smokes, and he harasses Usopp until he gets a snail tank for the smaller snails set up in the aquarium bar where he doesn’t have to look at them anymore, just dealing with their one big snail they keep in the galley for long-distance calls. He doesn’t pick any fights with Zoro. It feels weird now.

He’s already ruining everything being weird, anyway, but what’s he supposed to do?

The stupid snail will have its stupid snail babies and then he’ll release the whole damn family into the wild and that will be the end of that.

--

The idiot cook is upset again.

Zoro peers down from the crow’s nest and frowns. He can see the moron dancing around serving afternoon snacks to the ladies. This is normally the time the cook would climb the ladder with a platter balanced on his head to throw water and a snack that’s practically a meal at him and deny he cares about him in particular even though somehow his afternoon snack is always packed with protein and carbs and fats in the perfect measure to complement his workouts. Now, though, he doesn’t look up and he doesn’t climb up to the crow’s nest. He knows, though, that if he were to walk into the kitchen right now, he’d find a platter of his typical snacks laid out on the counter and no cook in sight.

Moron.

It’s probably something to do with the snails. He’s so touchy about things, and always in inexplicable ways. Is it the gay snail sex? But Zoro’s seen with his own eyes the cook let butchers and grocers flirt with him just to get a better deal on supplies. He’s even seen him flirt back when guys buy him drinks at bars, though he’s also noticed he never goes home with any of them, and he never even disappears for a quick romp in the bathroom like most guys. He never seems to go home with women, either, so he’s not sure what the deal is. He’s just sure that if he’s upset about the snails, it’s not because the snails are gay.

Wait, are snails gay? Didn’t Robin say they were, like, male and female at the same time? Is that double straight or double gay or some kind of third option just for snails?

Focus, Zoro.

He lowers his dumbbell and drops it to the floor. He hasn’t seen the cook this upset since he accidentally slashed his favorite tie in half. He’d been inconsolable until they’d made port again and Zoro had bought him a new one. Then he’d still bitched that it wasn’t as good as his old one but then he’d thrown a fit when Zoro said fine, I’ll return it and screeched at him about trying to take his stuff away. The guy’s a fucking weirdo, but still, this is getting to be a bit much even for his standards of being a weirdo.

He could go down there and just ask the cook what’s going through his curly little head, but there’s a 50/50 chance that they’ll end up fighting so hard they break something or that the cook will just clam up and run away even more. He needs a mediator.

He waits for the cook to go back to the galley and then he climbs down to the deck. He scans over his options. Luffy’s on the figurehead, and Luffy’s pretty great at figuring out why people are upset, but he probably needs somebody else for this. He doesn’t see Robin, so she’s probably in the library. He hears violin music coming from the aquarium bar, so he could ask Brook, he guesses. But the snails are in there, and it’s kind of weird, still. So, no to the aquarium.

His eye lands on Usopp. Ah, yes. Usopp. Perfect.

He strides over and clearly and directly asks, “Oi, what’s the cook’s deal?”

Usopp tilts his head up so he can squint at him from under the brim of his hat. “Which one?”

Fair enough. Zoro snorts. “The one that’s got him acting like a loser.”

Usopp opens his mouth like he’s going to play dumb a little longer before he seems to decide to just spit it out. He glances around to see if anyone’s listening and then beckons Zoro closer. Zoro plays along, crouching so Usopp can lean in all conspiratorially-like.

“Sanji’s upset because Robin told him about her theory for why you guys’s snails decided to make little snail babies together, and I guess he wasn’t ready to hear it.”

Zoro blinks. “There’s a theory? I thought they were just horny.”

“Well, yeah, but why just your snails?”

Zoro blinks again. “I don’t know. They’re snails, Usopp.”

Usopp gives him a look like he’s particularly stupid. “I know that, but Robin’s theory is that den den mushi, with their weird mysterious telepathic snail powers, can do more than just transmit messages for their owners – they can transmit their feelings!”

“Bullshit.”

The sniper deflates with a pout. “Fine. But she really did say that the den dens might have picked up subconscious brain waves from you guys and acted them out. I’ve seen you checking Sanji’s ass out, so I’m inclined to believe her.”

Oh. Zoro lets that thought percolate in his head for a minute. He doesn’t even deny Usopp’s accusations, because of course he’s checked the cook’s ass out. His ass is objectively a really nice ass. Has he thought about doing stuff with that ass? Sure. But that ass is also attached to, like, his ultimate rival, so the possibility of actually getting to touch that ass is pretty slim. That’s why he spent so much time noticing the cook’s hook-up habits, hoping to figure out a pattern so he could slide himself in there, but the pattern seems non-existent. He’s sort of resigned himself to an intense friendship-rivalry where he just sometimes has a wet dream about his friend-rival and maybe occasionally thinks about him when he rubs one out, but that’s still within the realm of normal friendship behavior, he’s pretty sure. So if his subconscious desire to touch dicks with the cook is influencing his snail, then that’s one thing.

But that begs the question…

“But the cook’s snail looked like it was pretty into it, too.”

Usopp makes a face. “Yeah, well… Look, I can’t speak for Sanji, and the less I think about the snail sex – the snex, as I’ve been calling it – the better. Maybe it’s true. Maybe he’s harboring a secret desire to have your babies. Maybe Robin’s theory is bullshit and we’re reading way too much into it. Either way, Sanji obviously feels a certain type of way about it, and he’s avoiding you because… well, you know how he gets.”

Zoro nods. Squirrely as fuck. That’s how he gets.

“He’ll probably get over it on his own soon. Anyway, can you move? You’re blocking my light.”

Zoro shoves him over just to be contrary and stands up. Telepathic snail desire, huh? He’s heard of weirder things.

His feet carry him over to the aquarium bar. Brook rattles his jaw at him when he comes in, but he shakes his head and gestures for him to continue playing. He won’t be here long. He just makes his way over to the snail tank and peers in.

His snail’s taking a nap. The cook’s snail is cuddled right up next to his, napping as well. They look very comfortable and happy. It’s kinda cute.

Hm.

--

This is ridiculous.

“Everything would be fine, you know,” Sanji hisses. He throws the fruit peels in his hand with more force than necessary. He keeps his voice down lest someone overhear, but still, “I had it under control. But no, you just had to get frisky!”

The den den mushi in the tank look up at him with disinterest. They don’t seem to care what he’s saying or thinking at all. They look more excited about the peels he’s throwing them than anything.

Zoro’s snail looks particularly unrepentant. Much like its owner, it seems to enjoy sleeping and lazing about. It’s also, aggravatingly, almost always somewhere close to Sanji’s own snail. The two randy little traitors show no signs of any of their owner’s turmoil – Sanji’s snail, in fact, gives him an especially unimpressed look.

“Don’t look at me like that,” he growls, “I’m not the one who went and got knocked up!”

After a moment more of scowling at the den den mushi crawling over the new fruit peels, he’s struck with the realization that he might be… losing it, just a little.

He groans and drops the rest of the food so he can sink down into the aquarium bar’s padded bench. This is crazy. He’s gone insane. Why is this bothering him so much?

“This would be easier if I didn’t want him, you know?” He says aloud to the room. There’s no one here to judge him except the snails and the fish swimming around in the tank. He digs around in a cabinet until he finds the ingredients to mix himself a drink. If he’s going to sit around in the bar feeling sorry for himself, then he might as well lean into the experience. He takes a swig or two off the bottles and mixes things together at random. He keeps talking as he works.

“It’s just not the way I was raised. I was supposed to – well, I’d rather hoped that I would find a lovely lady to settle down with eventually. Someone nice and pretty who smells nice.” He haphazardly stirs his concoction – as there’s no one to impress, he can cut down on the presentation – and takes a sip. It’s rather foul, actually. His next sigh is heavy. “It just had to be him, huh? He’s not very nice, and he’s only kind of pretty, and he definitely smells like armpit all the time. I could do so much better.”

The snails say nothing.

“Oh fuck you, anyway. You wasted no time. Now everyone’s looking at me like… Like I’m some kind of trollop!” Maybe the liquor’s going to his head. He did have an empty stomach when he came in here, and it’s not like he was measuring the alcohol he took off the top of the bottles. Just how much has he had? Ah, well. He throws the rest of his glass back. His tongue feels heavy when he continues, “I’m not that kind of girl, you know! I have – I have standards! Not settling down with the first snail who comes my way!” He rummages for the rum and gives up on using a glass, chugging straight from the bottle. It’s good. Sweet and burning on the way down. He waves the bottle at the snails admonishingly. “Ruined my reputation! Just – just giving it away to stray marimos! How am I supposed to – he’s gonna ask questions, you know. And I don’t wanna answer! Stinky stupid marimo snail…”

The door creaks. Sanji woozily turns his head to see Usopp peeking in suspiciously.

“You alright? I thought I heard yelling.”

“I’m good as gold, Usoppy.” Sanji sets the rum down to give him a thumbs up.

Usopp makes a stink face. “Ah, of course. I just had to find you like this. Lightweight.”

“I’m not a lightweight,” he argues.

“Be more convincing if you weren’t all boozed up. Are you in here checking on the snails?”

“They’re whores,” Sanji says confidently.

Usopp blinks. “You’re… are you shaming the snails?”

“Just them. I don’t care about what people do. Just the snails. You could be a whore if you want to, Usopp. You’re so pretty. I won’t judge.” Sanji stumbles to his feet and attempts to pat Usopp on the shoulder.

Okay, maybe he is kind of a lightweight. The bar spins a little as he lurches to Usopp and misses. Luckily their sniper is quick on his feet and grabs him and throws his arm over his shoulder.

“Okay, bedtime for you, Sanji,” Usopp says as he hefts him up and makes for the door. “You’re going to regret this in the morning.”

“That’s fine, sweetheart, I always regret it in the morning,” Sanji mumbles.

“…Jeez. Okay, one foot in front of the other. No more sad drinking alone in the aquarium, okay? At least bring a buddy. Not me, though. I don’t want to have to drag you every time.”

“I appreciate you, Usopp,” Sanji says with as much gravity as he can, “You are my best friend.”

“I bet you say that to all the guys who drag you to your bunk.” Usopp snorts and keeps them moving. “If you want to make it up to me, then make those cold noodles with the crunchy peppers I like for lunch tomorrow, huh?”

“You got it.” Sanji projects as much confidence as he can into that statement.

They’ve made it to the bunkroom by then. Sanji gracefully accepts Usopp’s help in stripping off his shoes and jacket and tie before he flops dramatically into his bunk face-first. He hears Usopp mumbling unsavory things before he leaves, but his bunk is comfortable, and it’s nice, actually, to relax a little after all the stress. He kinda wishes it wasn’t because he’d taken several shots in a five-minute span, but hey, he’ll take what he can get.

Stupid snails, he thinks viciously before he nods off.

--

This has gone on long enough.

The cook’s in another mood today, squinting and griping and being short with everyone except the girls and, for some reason, Usopp. It looks a lot like his hangover face, and when he mimes drinking out of a bottle and points to the cook when his back is turned, Usopp nods to confirm it. Idiot. He knows he can’t hold his liquor. At least this time, he didn’t have to clean up any midnight vomit or listen to him try to compose poetry about Nami’s hair being like tangerines or something.

He's still not looking at Zoro or acknowledging his existence. Typical.

Since it doesn’t seem like the cook’s going to get over it on his own, Zoro’s just going to have to take care of it himself.

He’s got to wait, though. Breakfast doesn’t seem like the right time, and he gets a bit distracted, actually, by lunch, which is a plate of cold noodles with minced fresh vegetables and stirred together with a spicy sauce with bits of crunchy garlic and peppers, and he munches down on that so happily that he actually forgets that he’s setting out to settle this weird sexual tension or rejection or whatever this is with the cook. He’s all the way back out on the yard for his post-lunch nap by the time he remembers what he’s doing, and by that point, the galley door’s slammed shut with a vicious and resounding bang.

“Please tell me you’re going to talk to him,” Nami groans, flopping onto a lawn chair.

“I would’ve talked to him already, but he’s being a prissy little bitch about it. Is this really just because of some stupid theory about our snails picking up that we want to bone?”

She gives him a flat look. “Well, do you?”

Zoro snorts and lowers himself down to sit on the grass. “Well, yeah, but that’s not a problem.”

“It’s not?”

“Nah, Cook obviously doesn’t want to, so I just ignore it.” He nods at his own logic. It’s flawless. “I don’t know what he’s so worried about.”

“Well, Sanji’s… sensitive,” Nami hedges.

Zoro snorts again.

She groans. “Ugh, you’re hopeless. These things aren’t easy for everybody, okay? Imagine for a second that you’re not a weirdo who can compartmentalize to this extent. What would you do if you were attracted to your crewmate?”

“I’d tell him,” Zoro says confidently, “Worst thing he can do is say no.”

“You’re terrible at this exercise.” She gives him a flat look. “And I’m going to ignore the hypocrisy of your own statement, Mr. I-Haven’t-Admitted-I-Want-Sanji-To-His-Face. Most people are less confident than that, and Sanji’s… less confident than that, even. It’s not my story to tell, but sex stuff is difficult for him. You could try being a little less blunt.”

Zoro mulls that over. It checks out with what he’s noticed about the cook not hooking up with anyone that he’s got some hangup about sex. Is he just shy or something? Afraid to like guys?

“Does his dick not work?” Zoro asks aloud.

He’s not surprised by the fist that crashes into his head. “This conversation is over! I’m charging a fee for having to listen to this shit. Go figure it out with Sanji, and if you hurt his feelings, I’m raising your interest again!” She waves him away. “Go. Shoo. I don’t want to look at you.”

Grumbling, Zoro stomps off. He’ll probably have to corner him after dinner, when he’s too distracted by the dishes to run away.

He keeps this goal in mind as they steer the ship away from some kind of volcanic mini-island with a swarm of dog-faced bats swarming around it. It’s actually pretty fun trying to steer the ship while fending off the rabid bats away from their more vulnerable crewmembers. There’s even a moment where, caught up in the excitement, he and the cook fall into their normal rhythm of fighting side by side and heckling each other that continues well into them getting out of the volcanic blast zone and killing the last lingering bats. He thinks he might have gotten out of having to confront the cook altogether, but then the idiot suddenly realizes he’s meant to be ignoring him and runs away again.

Damn cook.

Zoro doesn’t give him a chance to run. The second dinner is over, he scoops up an armful of plates and heads to the sink.

“I can wash those,” Sanji snaps.

“Nope. I’m doing it.”

“Fuck off out of my kitchen.”

“Nope.”

The rest of the crew scatters. Zoro keeps the plates in his arms as a shield against the cook’s kicks, because he’s not going to smash his own plates. Even Sanji’s not that stupid. He’s stupid enough, though, that he steps closer as Zoro dumps the plates in the sink.

“Leave them. I’ll wash them myself.” He’s so close that Zoro can smell the stale tobacco on his breath.

Welp, all or nothing.

Zoro spins around before Sanji can react and slams their bodies together. Sanji goes crashing backwards into the kitchen countertop. He makes a little ‘oof’ sound. Zoro brackets his arms around him and presses them chest to chest so he can’t run.

“We’re talking,” he declares.

“No the fuck we’re not.” Sanji tries to wriggle away, so Zoro shoves forward again. He grits his teeth and hisses, “Get the fuck off me, Mossball.”

“I don’t give a shit if you want to bang,” Zoro states bluntly.

The cook freezes.

“I don’t know what weird shit you have going on in your head,” he continues, “but cut it the fuck out. So our snails want to fuck. It’s not a big deal. What, you want some kind of snail child support or something? Ask the witch. I’m broke.”

“Deadbeat,” Sanji mutters. He’s got his eyes averted and his fingers tapping nervously against the counter.

“What the fuck ever. You don’t have to be so goddamn squirrelly. It doesn’t mean shit.”

“Easy for you to say!” Sanji finally lifts his head and shoves at him. “You’re Mr. Manly! I don’t see your snail getting knocked up!”

“Who cares?!”

“I care!” Sanji shoves again and almost escapes.

Zoro responds by grappling him. They’re at an impasse here – Sanji’s too strong in the legs to get held in place, but Zoro’s too strong in the arms to get dislodged. He ends up dragged around as the cook tries to wriggle away.

“Fucking squirrelly bastard,” Zoro growls. He squeezes him with his arms to try to get him to hold still. “Who do you think is judging you for having a pregnant snail?”

“Everybody!” Sanji strains away from him again and then gives up. He huffs some stray hair out of his left eye and gives Zoro a nasty look. “You especially. I bet you think it’s so funny that your snail knocked mine up.”

“I literally do not care.”

“Of course you do! Guys like you always care!”

He nearly wiggles loose again before Zoro manages to get him in a headlock under his arm.

“You keep saying shit like that,” Zoro pants out, “but I still don’t know what the fuck you mean. There aren’t any guys like me – there’s just me. And I couldn’t give less of a fuck if your snail wants to bang, or if you want to take it up the ass, or if you wanna dress like a clown and do a funny little dance while I take it up the ass. I just want you to stop fucking worrying about it!”

Sanji’s hands slap ineffectually at his arm. “Lemme go! You’re not fucking funny!”

“Do you see me laughing?” He shakes him a little for emphasis. “I’ll let you go when you chill the fuck out.”

“Fuck you!”

“Not ready yet, then.”

Sanji grunts and tries to escape again, but he’s got him now. Zoro just tightens his grip and considers whistling to really drive in how little effort this is now that he’s got him under his arm like this. He’s trying to be a little less asshole-ish, so he decides not to.

“Fucking asshole,” Sanji gripes.

Zoro hums.

The galley door creaks open. Zoro feels Sanji jolt under his arm. He turns to look, but it’s just Nami paused in the doorway with her magazine under her arm.

“Oh, good,” she deadpans, “you’ve still got your clothes on.”

Sanji sputters and starts trying to stammer out an explanation, but Nami cuts him off by raising a finger.

“No, no, I literally do not want to hear a word from you two. This is compromising enough. I’m just grabbing some juice.”

Zoro turns as she walks so that he and Sanji can both stare at her as she makes her unhurried way over to the cabinet and grabs a glass. She takes her sweet time punching in the fridge door code. She grabs the pitcher of mikan juice. Slowly pours a glass. Shuts the door. She takes a slow sip.

“Delicious as always, Sanji,” she says.

Sanji mutters something complimentary, muffled into Zoro’s arm.

Nami exits the kitchen and walks to the door. She turns just before she can open it to say over her shoulder, “Franky keeps condoms and lube under the couch in here and in the right cabinet of the bar. Try not to be too loud, okay?”

With that, she opens the door, leaves, and slams it shut behind her.

“Good to know,” Zoro says into the silence.

Sanji wriggles again. “You gonna let me go?”

“You gonna run off?”

“No.”

Zoro waits, but Sanji says nothing else. He considers it, and finally unclenches his arm and lets Sanji slip out. The cook stands to his full height and busies himself straightening his suit and smoothing down his hair and ignoring the flush on his face.

“Got it out of your system?” Zoro asks.

Sanji gives him a Look. He looks away immediately afterward. He fiddles with the cuff of his jacket.

“Yeah, whatever,” he mutters.

Zoro crosses his arm and waits.

Sanji glances back at him after a moment and sighs. “Fine. You’re right. I’m being weird. I’ll get over it. It isn’t a big deal that the snails… did that. But you’re wrong. There’s…”

He pauses and seems to think a moment. He glances at Zoro again and sighs, stepping away to tap out a fresh cigarette. He lights it up and sits on the couch. After a second, he reaches under and feels around until he comes back out with a condom box.

“She wasn’t kidding,” he says.

Sanji gives the box a disgusted look and stuffs it back under the couch. He leans back and takes a long drag from his cigarette and exhales smoke into the room.

“You good now?” Zoro asks.

“…Yeah. You serious?”

Zoro raises an eyebrow. “Which part?”

Sanji looks away. “All of it, I guess. You really don’t care about that stuff?”

“Nah. Sex stuff’s just sex.” Zoro shrugs for emphasis. “Doesn’t mean anything unless you want it to. Feelings and shit, or whatever.”

“You have the soul of a poet, Marimo.”

“Shove it.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Sanji says nothing else. He just smokes his cigarette. Finally, he stands.

“I’m going to bed,” he says.

Zoro holds a hand up. “You gonna ignore me again?”

Sanji gives him another weird look and then shakes his head. “Nah, I’m done. We good?”

“I’m good. You good?”

Tellingly, Sanji doesn’t answer. He just waves the question off. Zoro allows him to walk out and run from the conversation again. At least they’ve had a conversation this time.

Now it’s just time to wait.

--

Sanji broods about it for a day and a half before he finally decides to do something about it.

He’s been turning it over in his head the whole time. Zoro’s nonchalance. How utterly incapable of picking up weird nuances he seemed to be. It must be nice. To live so utterly on your own terms as to not give a shit what other people think.

That’s never been a luxury he’s been afforded.

So, Zoro apparently doesn’t care if he wants to bottom for him.

Utterly confounding.

Plus, he’s now got these incredibly intense and filthy ideas about Zoro being the bottom. He’s thought about fucking guys before, but he’s never thought a big beefcake like Zoro would go for that. He wonders what that looks like. Zoro letting someone in. Zoro enjoying being fucked.

Nope, can’t think about that too hard, or he’ll pop a boner before afternoon tea, and he’s not sure his little waiter apron disguises the problem as much as he hopes it does.

He waits until after dinner and Zoro’s turn at first watch before he makes his move. He goes for an approach he thinks Zoro would appreciate.

“I’ve had sex with a guy,” he announces as he slams a bottle of saké on the floor of the crow’s nest.

He doesn’t look up. He pretends climbing through the hatch takes all of his attention. He’s got a tray of snacks – only a heathen sits around drinking straight liquor without something to munch alongside it. He sets the snacks down beside the bottle of booze and slides them both away and crawls up and secures the hatch.

When he looks up, he finds Zoro not working out as he expected, but rather sitting on one of the benches looking out over the sea. Huh. Actually watching while on watch. Novel. He picks up the tray and bottle and joins him.

“Congratulations?” Zoro deadpans.

For wha – oh. Right. Sanji pulls some glasses from his suit jacket and pours. Zoro takes his cup with a murmured thanks. Sanji knocks his back for some liquid courage.

“Everybody was fucking everybody on Baratie,” he says apropos of nothing.

He can feel Zoro giving him a weird look. He ignores it.

“Seriously, the place was a shitshow,” Sanji continues. He finishes his cup and pours himself another. He grabs a cracker to nibble on. “All the time. Cooks fucking each other, cooks fucking vendors, guys hooking up in the damn bathrooms – I swear, everywhere you turned there was some asshole fucking someone else. And if that wasn’t bad enough, they’d always fuck things up with the vendors all the time, make running the restaurant a fucking nightmare.”

“What’s that got to do with anything?” Zoro gives him another weird look. “You were fucking those old guys?”

Sanji sputters around his mouthful of cracker. ”No! Most of those guys knew me when I was, like, ten! That’s fucking gross!”

Zoro rolls his eye. “Then where the fuck is this story going?”

“Wait for it, asshole.”

Zoro flips him off and grabs the bottle of booze. After a moment of performative silence, he gestures impatiently for him to continue.

Sanji finishes his cracker and reaches for another to mess with. Fuck, but this is awkward. He takes another sip of booze. “Anyway, obviously, being gay was kind of just normal there. The guys liked ladies, too, a lot of them, but there weren’t a lot of ladies who stuck around. Zeff wouldn’t hire any ladies, and a lot of the vendors were, like, married or widows and stuff, so they didn’t want a bunch of crusty old sea cooks. So fucking guys was fine. Everybody did it.”

“Yet you’re being weird about it.”

“You said you’d shut up.”

“You’re not making sense. So who were you fucking?”

“I’m getting to it!” He’s tempted to throw his cracker at Zoro’s head, but he can’t waste food. He settles for crunching on it aggressively. “Anyway, it’s like I said. Fucking guys was fine. Getting fucked, though? Only faggots and sissies did that.”

Zoro’s brow furrows. Sanji holds up a hand to forestall him.

“Look, that’s just what I was told. Like, a lot. They said it all the time, so I believed them. It made sense, I guess. At the time. I don’t know! But yeah. So… I always loved the ladies, but there weren’t very many ladies around except the ones dining there, and those ladies were usually already on dates, so it’s not like I had lots of time to romance women. So… I ended up…”

He trails off, embarrassed. Zoro’s eyebrow raises. Sanji looks away.

“Fuck you,” he says weakly out of reflex. “It was the spice vendor. His name was Masato.”

“…Was he an old guy?”

“No, he wasn’t an old guy, asshole!”

Sanji toys with the rim of his glass. He doesn’t like to think about Masato if he can help it. The whole thing’s left a bitter taste in his mouth, but he’s already talking and he’s already said enough. Zoro’s going to dog him until he finishes.

“Masato was only a little older, and he smelled better than a lot of the sailors who came by, and he was nice to me… at first.” Sanji knocks back another measure of saké for courage. He doesn’t talk about this shit, and it’s weird to talk to Zoro about it, but they’d kind of maybe talked about fucking already, so it’s fine, right? And he’s never told anybody this before, so it feels like the words are wrenched out of him from somewhere raw and angry and he can’t seem to stop himself.

“It was cool at first. Just… hanging out when he made deliveries. I’d feed him some shit, you know. Then he came onto me, and we started making out sometimes, and then, y’know… hand stuff. Mouths. Normal shit.”

Zoro grunts in agreement. Alright, so it is normal shit, Sanji makes a mental note. Good to know.

“Then he wanted to do more,” Sanji says. He watches Zoro take another drink and then pours himself a little more. “And I didn’t want… You’re not supposed to let guys do stuff like that to you. So I told him no, and he was a huge dick about it. So even if I maybe did want to do it, I sure didn’t want to do it with him after that. What a fucking prick. I told him we were done and to get the fuck off my ship. I’d find somebody else to sell me some fucking basil and shit.”

“Good. He sounds like a dick.”

“Yeah, well…”

Sanji drinks his saké and rubs the back of his neck awkwardly. This is the really shitty part, the part that sticks in his craw and makes the whole thing suck all that much more.

“Didn’t matter, anyway,” he says.

He feels Zoro looking at him, but he pretends he’s really invested in straightening his display of crackers, cheese, and sausage on the plate.

“He was an asshole. He told all the chefs who’d listen that he did fuck me, and he made up all kinds of bullshit lies about how I was in bed.” A mixture of real things, actual intimate moments he’d shared with the asshole and a bunch of really embarrassing fake stuff. He feels his face flaming even thinking about it. “It didn’t matter what I said. Enough of those guys believed him, or thought it was funny to pretend they believed him, that it got over the whole ship. Everybody was convinced I was some kind of pansy and into weird shit and it fucking sucked. I kicked so many asses, but it didn’t change anything. Still had half the cooks talking shit and trying to make fun of me to my fucking face over something that wasn’t even true. It only stopped because Zeff said he was gonna fire the next person who talked about my ass and that he didn’t want to hear that shit.”

Zoro hums thoughtfully. Sanji sees him reach for a piece of sausage and take it to his mouth to chew.

“What’d the old man say?”

Sanji hunches his shoulders. “Nothing. Just chewed me out about having to find a new spice vendor.”

“Hm.”

There’s silence for a minute.

“You kick that guy’s ass?”

He scoffs. “Nah. Never saw him again. Good fucking riddance. Should’ve fed him his teeth.”

“Should have. That was an asshole thing to do.”

“Yeah, well…”

“So that’s it. Just him?”

Sanji shrugs a shoulder. “He was the only guy. There’s been a couple of ladies since then, but… Yeah.”

“Hm. Well, fuck him.”

Sanji looks up. “Excuse me?”

Zoro shrugs. “Fuck him. Guy was a dick. And all those old chefs were dicks, too. I’ve been the bottom a bunch of times – you think I’m some kind of sissy?”

He scoffs again. “No, you’re the fucking ‘Demon of the East.’ Nobody’s calling you a sissy.”

It’s Zoro’s turn to scoff. “Fuck off, that’s not what I meant. Didn’t they teach you anything on gay island?”

“For the last time, it wasn’t gay island, and I should never have told you about it!”

“It was gay island.”

“Fuck you. I was too busy running for my fucking life and trying to learn recipes to help you assholes to have tearful heart to hearts with those bastards about sex!”

“Maybe you should have.” Zoro slams back some more saké and gestures broadly. “Because fuck’s sake, Cook, it doesn’t fucking matter. You think having a dick up your ass really means something?”

Zoro leans closer, and Sanji’s hackles raise instinctively. He’s got that look in his eye, the one he gets right before he throws down the gauntlet and starts another fight that breaks something around the ship.

“You’re that worried about it, then why don’t you try it?”

He’s being baited. Don’t fall for it, Sanji.

“What’s the worst thing that can happen? You find out you like it? Being too afraid to try is what makes you a wuss.”

“You take that back!”

Fuck. Fell for it.

Zoro’s grin stretches savagely across his face. “Oh yeah? I bet you couldn’t do it, anyway. It’s not as easy as it looks.”

Sanji surges to his feet, caution be damned. “I can do anything you can do, Marimo! You took it up the ass? I bet I could do it twice as easy!”

Fuck, what is he saying? Zoro’s just grinning wider.

“Fine,” he says, “let’s do it, then. You and me. Right now.”

Sanji feels his self-righteous flames cool. “Right now?”

“Yeah. You chicken?”

Sanji takes a step backwards. “We can’t do it right now!”

“Why not?”

“You’re on watch! And you haven’t taken a shower today! And – and it’s gross! I’m sweaty!”

Zoro has the audacity to shrug. “That’s fine.”

“It’s not fine!”

“Fine, then.” Zoro stands, too. He steps forward so they’re nearly chest-to-chest. “I’ll finish my watch shift. Meet you in the showers. We can both take a fucking shower, and then you can find out whether this shit is for you or not. Stop stressing about it.”

“Fine!”

Zoro blinks. “Really?”

Sanji blinks, too. “Yeah? You were serious, right?”

Zoro firms back up again. “Right. I’m serious. See you in two hours.”

“Fine. See you then.”

--

This is not fine.

Two hours is a long time to regret impulsive decisions.

The saké buzz has worn off. The adrenaline head rush of getting goaded by Zoro, gone. Sanji’s had too long to regret his choices.

The first thing he does after leaving the crow’s nest is make a trip to the bathroom. That seems important. He’s never done anything with his ass, but it seems to be good form to make sure he’s not… yeah, he’s not going to think about that too hard.

Long story short, he makes sure he’s clean.

After that, he stands by the mikan trees and chainsmokes half a pack of cigarettes. That also seems like the thing to do.

After that… he still has another hour to go.

Sanji does what he always does when he’s nervous. He cooks.

Quick stuff that will keep. He sets up some overnight oats for breakfast. Whips together a batch of cookies to hide to bribe Chopper with later. Artfully lays out a ham on the tabletop so Luffy will think, later, that he’s managed to steal something. Keeps him off his case if he thinks he wins one occasionally.

As he does this, he wonders. Is he doing this for the right reasons? Is he just trying to prove a point? To who? To himself? To fucking Masato? To the chefs and Zeff, to Zoro?

What does any of it matter, really? Does he really want to do this?

And then he thinks a little harder and thinks about Zoro, and he thinks about being at the center of his attention, about holding his focus and having his sword-calloused hands on his skin, and he breaks out into goosebumps that are decidedly not disgusted chills.

If he can be honest with himself, he does want to do this. And he wants to do it with Zoro.

“I am a man of weak will,” he tells the snail on its shelf.

The snail blinks at him slowly.

“This is all your fault. Not you, specifically,” he amends, “but that randy little bastard in the aquarium. Fuck all you guys for making me do this.”

The snail blinks again. Sanji shakes his head.

“I’ve lost it. Talking to snails again.”

Ten minutes before shift change, he heads to the bathroom. He doesn’t want to run into Usopp coming up to take his place in the crow’s nest. It’s not unusual to find Sanji prowling around this time of night – he’s a notorious insomniac – but this particular night, he doesn’t trust his poker face to hold up at all. He’s nervous and he’s sweating again, and Usopp’s going to know immediately that something’s up.

Nope, he’s not going to risk it. He makes his escape to the safety of the bathroom and waits for Zoro.

And waits.

He’s not shocked the guy gets turned around even with the enticement of sex.

Ten minutes later than they’d agreed, Zoro enters the bathroom.

“Took you long enough,” Sanji gripes.

“Usopp was chatty,” Zoro says dismissively.

Sanji feels his palms sweating. He’s nervous. He doesn’t want to admit it, but he is. Zoro looks relaxed. Fuck, why’s he always so cool-headed?

Zoro sets his swords aside and drops his pants without ceremony.

Ah, Sanji thinks, that’s right. It’s because Zoro’s a savage.

“What are you doing?” he asks.

“Taking a shower.” Zoro rolls his eye and loses the rest of his clothes. It’s nothing Sanji hasn’t seen before, but he feels nervous and tongue-tied with the new context. Zoro has no such qualms, simply stepping to the shower area. “C’mon, scrub down. We’re going to take a bath.”

Sanji kicks off his shoes and loosens his tie. “A bath?”

Zoro starts the tub and then kicks the showers on. “Yeah. Thought about it after you left. You’re a tense motherfucker. I bet you spent the whole time with your ass clenched worrying about it. Nothing’s getting in there if you don’t relax.”

Sanji opens his mouth, offended, but Zoro’s already moved on to shoving his head under the spray to wet his hair down. He puts his energy into stripping so he can join him.

“Fuck you,” he says when he sits on the shower stool, “my ass isn’t that tight.”

Zoro shakes the water from his hair and gives him an unimpressed look. “I don’t buy it. Bet you’re tighter than Nami’s wallet right now.”

Sanji shudders. “Leave Nami out of it.”

Zoro scoffs loudly and starts scrubbing himself. “Thought maybe you’re loosen up if I talked about her. You pant after her enough.”

“I do not pant, I appreciate her as the delicate beauty that she is.”

“Whatever. Less talk, more scrubbing.”

Sanji makes a nasty face at him, but he does, for once, do as he’s told. He pours his anxiety into scrubbing himself. He feels Zoro’s attention on him even if Zoro’s not really looking at him. It makes him self-conscious. He needs to wash his ass and balls, and how’s he supposed to do that knowing that Zoro’s thinking about him like that?

Zoro grabs a bar of soap and unceremoniously starts soaping his own dick.

Oh. Yeah. Savage.

Sanji rolls his eyes and takes his own bottle of body wash and washcloth to his nether regions. Zoro doesn’t seem to give a shit. He just finishes washing his hair and hoses himself off and goes to check on the bath, leaving Sanji to finish up.

With the showers off, the bathroom feels too quiet. There’s the drip of water from the faucet, but once the bath’s off, it’s just the light howl of wind against the outer wall and the quiet slosh as Zoro settles into the tub.

“Relax, Cook.”

Sanji bristles, but… he forces himself to relax. He saunters over to the tub and lowers himself down. Zoro doesn’t bother to watch him. He’s too busy relaxing with his eye closed and head tipped back.

Sanji sinks down into the hot water with a hiss. He never realizes how much tension he’s carrying until he gets in the tub. His sore feet immediately feel less strained, his lower back eases some of its tightness, he feels aches and pains he didn’t notice start to melt away. Zoro’s poured some eucalyptus and spearmint concoction into the bath, and it’s actually rather… pleasant. He can almost forget that they’re here because he agreed to let Zoro fuck his ass.

Almost.

“So…” Sanji begins.

“You’re still too tense,” Zoro says without opening his eyes. “Relax.”

Sanji huffs.

“Just come sit next to me.”

Slowly, he does, sidling through the bath until he takes a seat on the bench beside Zoro. Zoro still doesn’t move. He just sits there looking for all the world like this is a normal and relaxing bath.

Sanji sits back and slowly, slowly begins to relax, too.

“Feel better?”

“Fuck off,” Sanji says. Which isn’t really what he wanted to say, but it makes Zoro snort out an amused laugh, so he counts it as a win.

“You’re such a dick,” Zoro says. If he didn’t know any better, he’d say he sounds fond.

Sanji twists his fingers together nervously. There’s another awkward silence.

“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to,” Zoro says.

When Sanji looks up at him again, his eye is open. His expression is mild.

“Seriously. We can just take a bath and go to bed. There’s no rush.”

Sanji shakes his head. “No, I want to – don’t make me say it.”

“I think I need you to say it, because I have no clue what you want.”

Sanji feels his already flushed face burning. He looks away. “Fuck you. I want… I want to see what all the fuss is about. On both ends. Because all these fuckers made it sound like such a big deal, but…”

He doesn’t continue. He’s not sure how. It still feels like a big deal. Like he’s going to be fundamentally shifted if he does this. But he is tired of the mystery and tired of worrying.

“…Alright, Cook. Come here.”

Sanji feels hands on him now, gently tugging, and he follows them until Zoro has him arranged in his lap under the water. The swordsman’s hand comes up to cup his cheek in his hand in a move that’s so tender that it hurts something in his heart.

“We’ll just see where it goes, okay? Tell me if you want to tap out.”

Sanji nods. He feels tongue-tied. He’s finally getting what he’d dreamed about, getting to experience being loved by Zoro, but already his head is clouded with doubts. Because he knows himself, and he knows he’s already in too deep to back out again. If he lets Zoro do this, it’s over. His heart’s going to be pulverized when Zoro decides to move on.

He can’t stop himself, though. He wants the taste too badly.

In his dreams, he imagined Zoro being rough and demanding, but reality proves him to be just as steady and calculating as he tries to be on the battlefield. His hand slides from Sanji’s cheek to thread his fingers into the hair at the base of his skull, and that’s how he tugs him gently forward into their first kiss.

Sanji leans forward more eagerly to meet him. He’s dreamed about this, and the first brush of skin on skin is enough to ignite his passion. If this is the only taste of Zoro he’ll get, he’ll milk it for all it’s worth. He presses himself more fully against him, skin sliding wetly through the warm bathwater. Zoro’s lips part in surprise, and Sanji presses in, lightly nipping at his lower lip before their kiss evolves into a slow, filthy, open-mouthed exploration. He grips onto Zoro just as desperately as the man’s beginning to hold onto him. The room fills with the sounds of the water sloshing, the jingle of Zoro’s earrings, the wet sounds of their mouths.

“Damn, Cook,” Zoro grumbles as they slide back for air, “Warn a guy.”

Sanji scoffs and kisses along his jawline. “Surprised?”

Zoro’s expression softens. “Not really. Damn Love-Cook.”

Sanji hums, and then Zoro’s kissing him again. It’s his turn to jolt in surprise when he feels Zoro grab onto his cock loosely.

“What – What’re you doing?” Sanji pants. For all of his surprise, though, he’s already bucking his hips forward eagerly into Zoro’s hand.

“Helping you relax,” Zoro murmurs against his mouth. “Trust me.”

He trusts Zoro. He nods.

Zoro keeps kissing him as he works his hand over him under the water. It feels electric to be under his laser focus, to have every twitch and sigh catalogued by that sharp grey eye. It feels like one of their spars. Every reaction noticed and assimilated, like Zoro’s building a strategy in his head for making him cum. It’s ridiculous. It’s endearing.

For his part, Sanji has a meal before him, and he takes the opportunity to feast. While Zoro focuses on him and his pleasure, he indulges in every smitten thought he’s ever had.

He threads his fingers through Zoro’s hair and delights when he groans when he tugs. His cock rubs against Sanji, ignored for now, but just feeling his interest makes Sanji feel insane. He’s doing this. Zoro wants him. He presses his lips to his skin, bites and mouths and tastes him. He finally gets his hands on his meaty pecs, relaxed now and soft compared to how rigid they seem when he’s flexing and fighting. They’re almost like tits, just flatter and with less give. He feels his nose start running as he massages them, as he finally gets to touch those dark nipples.

“Stupid pervert-Cook,” Zoro teases.

“Shut up.”

He can’t even be embarrassed by the nosebleed, by how crazed he feels right now. Zoro’s skin is too good, his mouth too intoxicating, the feel of his grip tightening and speeding up. He hangs on the precipice.

“Zoro, I’m gonna come,” he gasps.

Zoro’s free hand grips the back of his skull and yanks him forward into a kiss. He twists his hand while he strokes, and Sanji cries out into Zoro’s mouth as he comes into the water between them.

Gross, he thinks idly, but the thought is fleeting, because he’s still panting like he just ran a race.

“Good, Cook?”

Sanji opens his eyes to glare at Zoro’s smug face. “Yeah, it was alright.”

“You’re such a bitch.”

“Fuck you.”

Zoro laughs. It’s a good laugh, warm and kind of affectionate. Sanji feels like he’s won something.

Zoro continues bluntly, “You still want to try anal?”

Ah, yeah. That. Sanji swallows and nods. He’s still pretty relaxed, but he can already feel nerves creeping in. He’s not backing out now, though. He juts his chin out stubbornly and meets Zoro’s eye directly.

Zoro squints at him suspiciously, but he must pass muster, because he nods, too. “Alright, lets get out of the water. C’mon.”

Sanji lets Zoro help him up – to make Zoro feel better and not because his legs feel a little wobbly – and lead him over to the bench. Zoro throws some towels down to cushion them, and then beckons Sanji to join him.

“C’mon.”

Sanji hesitantly sits down on a towel and lets Zoro arrange him to his preference. He manhandles him until he’s got Sanji pressed against him and full access to his ass. He’s practically sprawled in Zoro’s lap at this point.

“You comfortable?”

“Um… yeah. I’m good.”

“Alright.”

Zoro pulls a little bottle out of one of the towels where it’d been folded over. Sanji watches with a little trepidation as he squirts some lube out and rubs it between his fingers to warm it.

“You sure you’re still feeling good, Cook?”

Sanji grits his teeth, but… “I’m a little nervous.”

“You want to stop?”

Sanji shakes his head. “No, I’m fine. It’s just… new.”

Zoro leans down and kisses his forehead. It’s an oddly affectionate gesture. Sanji blinks, but he doesn’t have time to worry about it, because he feels Zoro’s slippery finger touching his asshole.

He tenses up.

He feels Zoro sigh.

“I’m not going to just shove it in. Relax.”

Sanji bites his lip, but he trusts Zoro implicitly. He focuses on trying to relax.

“You’re thinking too hard. Just… close your eyes. Don’t think about relaxing. Think about how you feel.”

Sanji nods jerkily and closes his eyes.

He feels… weird. The bathroom’s warm, so he doesn’t feel too cold even though they just got out of the tub, but Zoro’s skin radiates heat. He’s always so warm. He’s pressed so close he can feel his chest move as he breathes, can hear the slight jingle of his earrings clashing when he moves his head. He can feel his dick touching him, too. His erection seems to have flagged, but that makes sense. Sanji hasn’t exactly reciprocated that much. He wants to feel something about that, but then he feels Zoro’s fingers on him again.

“Cook? How are you doing?”

“It’s slippery,” he says.

“Yeah, that’s the lube. What about now? This okay?”

Zoro’s fingertips are wider than his own. The callouses make them feel a little rough even with the layer of lube on them. It’s not unpleasant. He rubs against his asshole, not really pressing hard or anything, just massaging at it lightly with his slick fingers.

“Feels weird,” he says.

“You ever played with your ass?”

Loaded question. He wasn’t supposed to. Real men don’t do stuff like that. But – he’s trying to move past that idea, because it’s bullshit. He’s a pirate. Why does he give a shit about what anyone thinks? He can do whatever he wants.

“A little,” he admits. He sounds shyer than he’d like.

“Good,” Zoro says. He shifts a little, like he’s not sitting comfortably. Before Sanji can ask, he says, “I’m going to try pushing a little more, okay?”

“Okay.”

He keeps his eyes closed and tries not to tense. Think about what you’re feeling, not anything else. Zoro’s fingers massage a little more, and then he pulls away for a second to get some more lube, and then he brings his fingers back. Just the tip of one slides in past the ring of muscle.

“Still good?”

Sanji opens his eyes and peers up at Zoro’s expectant face. “Feels weird,” he says.

“Still want to keep going?”

Sanji nods. Zoro’s pupil looks huge. His face is a little flushed. He shifts slightly, and then he’s brushing against Zoro’s dick again and – oh. He’s into this. Sanji feels a little amazed. Zoro’s getting worked up just fingering his ass?

“I’m going to keep moving,” he says.

Sanji nods and relaxes again. It does feel weird. Not bad, but very new. Zoro’s finger massages him from the inside until he relaxes more and lets out a deep breath. As he does, Zoro slides in deeper.

“Good, just like that.”

Zoro adds more lube – probably more than he needs, it’s squelching, but at least it doesn’t hurt as he works his finger all the way in and starts pumping it in and out. The weirdness is getting a little better. It’s starting to feel… kind of good.

“I’m going to try working in another finger.”

Sanji hums agreement and lies there bonelessly as Zoro slides another finger inside of him. The stretch feels weird, but it’s not bad, and Zoro presses around like he’s looking for something.

“What are you - ah!”

Zoro just – did something.

Sanji stares up at him with wide eyes. “What was that?”

Zoro grins smugly. “I don’t know what it is, but it’s good, right?”

He – what? Zoro slides his fingers against that spot again and Sanji makes another embarrassing noise as it sends a jolt of pleasure through him and right to his dick. There’s a secret G-spot inside men’s asses? Why didn’t anyone tell him about this?

“Fuck, Zoro – what is – ah! Zoro!”

Zoro – now that he’s found what he’s looking for – presses relentlessly against that spot as he fucks in and out of him with his two thick fingers. All Sanji can do is hold onto him and moan as he forgets everything else he was worried about.

“Ah – ah, Zoro, I –“

“Shh, I got you, Cook.”

Sanji keens quietly as Zoro’s other hand slides down his side until he takes his cock in hand.

“Zoro!”

“Yeah, Cook, I know.”

He jerks his cock, and it’s a little too rough and a little too dry, but it’s somehow still just right as he pumps his fingers inside of him and slams into that spot over and over again. Sanji’s fingers dig into Zoro’s skin, scrabbling for purchase as his knees go weak.

“I’m – ah, aahhh –”

Sanji can’t garble out any more of a warning as his body seizes up and he clenches down around Zoro’s fingers and comes in hot spurts onto the tiled floor of the bathroom.

Zoro fucks him with his fingers for another moment before he gently slides them out and just rests his hands on Sanji’s hips.

“Your brain still work, Cook?”

“Fuck… you…” Sanji manages.

Zoro laughs. Sanji tries to get his senses together. Then he hears the sound of Zoro jacking off.

“Wait, what are you…?”

Zoro cracks his eye open. His face is flushed. “I think you’ve had enough today, Curly. I just gotta –“

“No!”

Zoro’s eyebrow raises. “No?”

Sanji staggers up and slides down onto his knees in between Zoro’s spread legs. Fuck him, he’s not going to be some kind of pillow princess and let Zoro wring two orgasms out of him and then finish himself off with his hand. Fuck that.

“Cook, what –“

It looks like he was at least using the hand that wasn’t up Sanji’s ass to jerk off with. Sanji bats his hand away and tucks his bangs behind his ear.

“Fuck off and lemme work,” he slurs.

He’s not some blushing virgin. He’ll show that bastard. He feels like he owes him now that he’s shown him that apparently the asshole chefs at Baratie were just holding out on him and not letting him know about the secret ass G-spot and keeping it all to themselves. Fuckers.

No, he’s at least got experience with this.

He wastes no time. He gets to work, wetting Zoro’s cock down with his spit, licking and kissing up and down the shaft. It’s a pretty cock. Not too long, but thick. He thinks about taking that thing up his ass, and he shivers, but he’s already excited enough thinking about how his jaw’s going to ache wrapping around this thing. He feels Zoro’s hand – thankfully, again, the one that wasn’t up his ass – clutch his hair.

“Cook –“

Sanji glances up, but he doesn’t look like he’s asking him to wait. He raises an eyebrow. Zoro nods down at him dumbly with his mouth hanging open.

That’s all the encouragement he needs. Without preamble, he wraps his lips around the head of Zoro’s dick and starts sliding down.

“Fuck! Cook – Sanji!”

If he were able to, he’d smirk. He’d worked hard to tamp down his gag reflex. He shows off now, sliding down all the way and relaxing his throat so Zoro’s cock can nudge inside.

“Fucking hell, Cook. You’re insane.”

He preens under the praise. He gets to work – he’s wanted to suck Zoro’s dick for years at this point. He’s not going to waste the opportunity now. He bobs his head a few times, taking him deep, before he slides back up with a wet slurp to toy with the head of his cock with his tongue.

Zoro’s fingers tighten in his hair, and he only preens more. The swordsman’s panting, and there’s a flush building over his chest.

“I’m not gonna last if you keep doing that,” he says.

Ah, what a shame. Sanji raises an eyebrow again and then sinks down again. Zoro’s hand clenches painfully in his hair.

“Fuck!”

Sanji grips Zoro’s hip and tugs on him to encourage him to fuck his face. Zoro hesitates only a moment before he lets go and starts thrusting. When Sanji just takes it with only a frown of concentration, he keeps doing it, keeps fucking his throat like a man possessed.

It feels good. He likes knowing Zoro’s feeling good, likes letting himself be used like this. His whole world seems to narrow down to Zoro’s cock pressing inside of him, filling him up, clogging his senses with the feel and taste and smell of him.

“Cook, I’m coming!” He relaxes his grip so Sanji can pull off if he wants to.

Sanji just doubles down and swallows. That last clench of his throat muscles sends Zoro over the edge. The swordsman comes with a bitten-off shout. Sanji swallows down everything he can and pulls off to lick the rest clean until Zoro’s taps him on the head.

“Hey, enough,” he says.

Sanji nods and sits up. Zoro looks wrecked. He stares at Sanji wild-eyed.

“You even have a gag reflex?” he asks.

Sanji smirks. “Not really.”

“Fucking Love-Cook.”

Zoro tugs on him and pulls him closer to hug onto him and press a lingering kiss to his mouth. After a moment, he sits back.

“Let’s clean up. I’m tired.”

Sanji can concur. He stumbles to his feet – his knees went a little numb from kneeling on nothing but a couple of towels on a tile floor – and Zoro steadies him and walks him to the showers. Sanji scrubs off while Zoro wipes up the mess and throws the towels into the hamper before joining him in to wash his hands and give himself a quick scrub-down.

“Bedtime,” Sanji says tiredly.

Zoro nods. They dry off and redress and make their way down to the bunkroom. It’s the dead of night. Quiet and still. It feels like they’re sneaking around with all of the other boys already asleep in bed. Zoro kisses Sanji one more time briefly before they part ways and head to their separate bunks.

Sanji has the fleeting, insane thought about joining him, but he pushes it down. He’s already gotten more than he ever thought he would. He’ll be content with what he has.

--

The cook’s acting weird again in the morning.

Zoro’s not surprised, but he does feel a little tired at this point.

Breakfast the next morning was normal. The cook served oatmeal and fruit and breakfast meats. He’d met Zoro’s eyes briefly, but he’d said nothing. He doesn’t blame him. The others are going to be annoying as fuck once they find out.

But then he’d gone back to being squirrelly.

Zoro hefts a weight and scowls. He doesn’t want to go back to being squirrelly. He just had the best head of his life after getting to finger the cook until he was squirming desperately in his lap and moaning his name. Call him greedy, but he wants to do it again. As soon as possible.

He could wait him out and see if he finishes sulking soon… or he could force the issue again.

He chucks the weight to the side and wipes the chalk off of his hands with a wet towel. He’s not going to be blueballed for another week while the cook worries himself in circles about something that probably isn’t even happening. Not this time.

Nami and Robin give him a matching set of unimpressed looks when he descends the crow’s nest. He raises an eyebrow.

“Next time you hook up in a shared space, can you at least wash the cum out of the bathtub?” Nami snarks.

Oh. He’d forgotten to drain the tub.

“Being considerate is imperative to maintaining a good relationship with the crew,” Robin chimes in. She gives him a serene smile. “If you need alone time, you can simply ask. Just clean up after yourselves, and don’t forget the condoms Franky keeps stocked.”

Zoro rolls his eye. “Yeah, yeah. I’ll do better next time.”

“Are you and Sanji at least better now?” Nami asks.

“He was rather distant this morning,” Robin adds.

“I’m gonna talk to him right now,” Zoro says.

“Please don’t do anything near the food.”

“I’ll let the others know to give you some privacy,” Robin says with that same casual expression.

“Thanks.”

The cook would probably be mortified to know that everyone knows when he’s getting laid, so he’ll keep this to himself for now. Zoro’s not above getting a free promise of uninterrupted sex time, though. He’s a practical guy, and it’s not like there’s anything to be embarrassed about.

With that in mind, he climbs the stairs and sneaks into the galley, shutting the door with a click.

“Dinner’s not until later,” Sanji snaps from the stove.

Zoro hums dismissively and comes to stand at the edge of the kitchen. He doesn’t seem terribly busy. He’s got all their vegetable ends and fish bones in a stock pot to simmer down, and he’s got his notepad out with their inventory lists instead of anything too complex. He can afford to be interrupted.

“You planning on being weird?” Zoro asks.

Sanji’s face flushes. He sets his notebook down with a slap onto the counter. “I’m not weird.”

“You’re the weirdest fucker I know.”

“Fuck you.”

“You say that a lot. You really think about me and fucking a lot, don’t you?”

Sanji whirls on him with his face an unattractive shade of tomato. “Don’t be an asshole!”

“I’m not being an asshole. I just want to know if you’re gonna be weird, or can we fuck again.”

Sanji’s expression falls, and he turns away to pick up the pen he’d dropped onto the floor in the first volley of insults. He doesn’t look back at Zoro.

“It was nice,” Sanji mumbles, “but maybe we shouldn’t do it again.”

Zoro crosses his arms. “Really.”

“Yeah. We… Thanks for helping me understand some things, but we shouldn’t so that again… It was a mistake…”

“A mistake.”

“Yeah… sorry…” Sanji rubs the back of his neck awkwardly.

“Why’s it a mistake?” Zoro steps closer. “Did you not like it? You seemed to like it.”

“No, it was good! I just don’t want…”

“Don’t want what?” Zoro probes.

“I don’t want to just be some kind of cheap entertainment,” Sanji snaps. He finally looks up, and for all that his tone is angry, he looks more frightened and sick than anything. “Look, I know you like to hook up with guys when we land at islands, and that’s fine, but I can’t… I just know I’m going to get upset when I watch you do that, and I know that’s my own damn problem, so I’m trying to save us both some trouble now and cut this off before I fall in too deep. We need to be able to work together for the crew’s sake, and I can’t do that if…”

Zoro closes his eyes briefly and prays for patience.

“I do that when I’m single,” he says bluntly.

Sanji’s steam seems to run out. He stops and gapes at Zoro like a fish.

“I hook up with guys sometimes to get it out of my system, but why would I do that if I’m with you?” Zoro tilts his head inquiringly. “I’m not some kind of asshole who’s going to cheat on you in front of you.”

“Ch-Cheat…?”

“Cheat. On this relationship. You and me?” Zoro gestures helpfully between them.

Sanji looks like a tomato again. His voice is a squeak when he says, “Relationship?”

“Yeah? When two people only fuck each other and they kiss and hang out and stuff? Is this not a relationship?”

Sanji still seems to be stuck at the beginning. “You… want to have a relationship… with me?”

“Well you don’t see me fingering Usopp in the bathtub, do you?”

Sanji ignores that. He looks flummoxed, still. “But…”

“Cook, our snails are building a family together because they picked up that I like you,” Zoro says.

“But – they – they picked up that I like you!”

“Oh, so you do like me.”

“Yes! I mean – yeah, kind of,” Sanji hedges, trying to save face. He takes a step closer to Zoro and further from the hot stove. “You really mean it? A relationship?”

“Yup.”

“Exclusive?”

“Yeah.”

“You and me?”

“No, me and Brook.” Zoro rolls his eye. “Yes, me and you. Did you hit your head recently?”

“Fuck you.”

“If you want to.”

Sanji’s face lights up crimson again. Zoro grins and steps closer, fencing Sanji in and herding him towards the door of the pantry.

“Shit doesn’t have to be that complicated,” Zoro says. He finally backs him into the door and presses closer. Tellingly, the cook doesn’t push him away. “You worry too much, Love-Cook. I like you. You like me.”

“We’re snail-grandparents,” Sanji says nonsensically.

“Sure. That, too.”

He reaches for the buckle of Sanji’s pants. The cook still doesn’t stop him, so he undoes the buckle and buttons and pulls them open. He’s a little rough yanking the tucked shirt out of the way and the pants down, but he silences Sanji’s complaints with a kiss. The cook’s head knocks against the pantry door, and Zoro starts to back off, but Sanji’s hand comes up to grab the back of his head and pull him back.

Zoro tugs his own pants down and presses closer. Sanji brings one leg up to brace against the wall and open himself up invitingly so Zoro can press himself flush to him. He’s already half-hard when Zoro reaches inside his pants and brings his cock out.

“Don’t complicate things,” Zoro mutters against his mouth.

Sanji makes an incoherent noise, because at that moment, Zoro presses his own stiff cock against Sanji’s and ruts them together.

“Fuck, Marimo –“

“Less thinking, more fucking.”

“More fucking. Right. Good – good plan,” Sanji says, sounding dazed.

Zoro grunts in agreement and grinds them together. Sanji keeps frantically kissing him and pawing at every part of him he can reach. Zoro kisses him back just as fervently even as he wraps his wide hand around both of them and strokes them together.

“You mean it?” Sanji asks out of nowhere.

“Mean what?” Zoro says distractedly.

“You really like me?”

“Yeah, idiot, I like you.”

“Ah – ah! Alright. I – I like you, too, idiot.”

Zoro hums again and kisses him breathless. He can feel Sanji’s nails scraping his scalp, flicking his earrings so they jangle together. He thrusts them together again and swallows the helpless noise Sanji makes as they writhe together until Sanji spills over his hand with a sudden, surprised cry. Zoro’s quick to follow, grunting through his own orgasm.

They catch their breath as Sanji continues to pepper him with small kisses. Zoro feels something warm in his heart from the feeling of it.

“I’ll tell you as many times as you need to hear,” Zoro says to him.

Sanji laughs breathily and reaches out with his hand to snag a hanging kitchen towel. “You better. We’ve got kids on the way, you know.”

Zoro rolls his eyes and accepts the towel. Guess they’re never getting over the snail thing, huh?

--

“It’s happened, guys!”

Chopper’s shout alerts the crew. There’s a thundering of feet on the boards as everyone rushes to the aquarium.

“How many is it?” Luffy asks.

“Are they cute or weird?” Nami calls.

“Make way! Grandparents coming through!” Usopp yells.

Zoro shoves Usopp good-naturedly as Sanji ducks past. Chopper gives the both of them a beaming smile and points into the tank.

“They must’ve hatched last night! Aren’t they cute?”

Sanji peers into the tank at the tiny little things. They’re so small he can barely make out details. Just slimy little things with soft shells that are nearly see-through. His own snail looks pleased as punch about this, swarmed all over as it is with tiny baby snails. He swears Zoro’s snail looks up at them with a smug expression.

“They’re kind of ugly,” Zoro says.

Sanji gasps aloud and punches him in the chest. “You take that back! Those are your grandchildren!”

“They’re just snails, Cook.”

“They’re too little to release right now,” Chopper interrupts. He pats Sanji’s snail gently on the eye stalks. “They’re at a huge risk for predators while they’re little! So we need to keep them safe for a little longer, okay?”

“That’s fine, Chopper!” Luffy says. “Good job!”

“I – I didn’t really do anything! Bastard! It was nothing!”

“You hear that, Mosshead? You need to keep supporting this family.”

Zoro scratches his ear. “They’re snails.”

“You’re a deadbeat!”

The crew scatters again as they tumble out of the aquarium in a frenzy of kicks and backhanded sword blows.

“Get a room!” he hears Nami call.

“Zoro needs to pay his child support!”

“They’re snails, you idiot! You feed them garbage!”

“They are a family, and they need support!”

It’s a stupid fight, and it ends with Sanji’s foot planted threateningly on the wall by Zoro’s head as his katana presses against his chest. Sanji ends the fight by leaning in for a quick kiss.

Zoro grins up at him. It’s a beautiful day. Even with the jeering he hears in the background, Sanji still feels that’s true. He steps back to let Zoro up and laughs aloud when he sheathes his sword and yanks him back in for another kiss.

Yeah, it’s all alright.