Chapter Text
At this point in their adventure, the whole crew knows that despite the monstrous strength and skill the 'demon' swordsman of the straw-hat pirates displays in combat, inside he was as soft and warm as a teddy bear. Zoro scoffs at the comparison. Ridiculous. If anything, he’s closer to a stuffed tiger but everyone laughs at him when he tries to reason and correct them, and he isn’t going to subject himself to more humiliation. ‘A stoic, grumpy, alcoholic teddy bear’ is what Chopper called him once before yelling at him to slow down with the drinking for the sake of his liver. He doesn’t listen, of course. Chopper is exaggerating, his liver is perfectly fine.
Outside of the straw-hat pirates, most people fear him, as they should. When he gets angry and is pushed to his limit (in a non 'improving oneself' way) people get cut down and the occasional head flies—though not as often as one would think. He doesn't believe in unfounded violence nor unnecessary killing. Sometimes, people piss their pants when they realise they need to face him and he emerges often enough from a fight with his white shirt drenched in so much red no amount of soap, vinegar, baking soda (they tried to the cook's dismay), heck, not even Usopp and Chopper's bubbling chemical stuff—It’s called hydrogen peroxide, not ‘stupid white thing for blood’—was capable of salvaging it. Nami and Robin have started buying darker articles of clothing when they shop in his stead.
Yet, despite knowing the devastating extent of what he could do, his nakama never feared him, they even egg him on as a fun pastime activity because, at the end of the day, when all those sharp teeth and fangs are directed at the crew, they rounded and soften, slowly slowly until the 'demon' was as mean and scratchy as a new-born kitten.
He is well aware of all of this, of course, of how soft he was, is, to the crew. How can he not? Self-reflection and self-awareness are important skills for a swordsman and he takes his training too seriously to discard them for the sake of vanity or pride. To improve, one must be honest to themselves and objectively, he is kinda, soft, to his crew. Though they'll have to pry those words out of his cold, dead lips.
He loves them, every member of his loud and boisterous crew with their own weird and admirable personalities. He loves and cares about them in his own way and they know it. In turn, he knows that they know it judging from how often they would crowd around him and include him in whatever disastrous or silly idea they plan on doing. If others can't see that, he couldn't care less. If he has any say in this, his nakama shouldn't bother about such useless crap too, but here they are.
"I can't believe they think Zoro would ever hurt Usopp if Luffy's not here!!" The day is calm, the sky is blue, and Chopper yells, all upset from where he is perched atop Robin's lap, reading the newspaper in the sitting area around the main mast on Sunny's grass deck.
The tree above him gets blown by the breeze and he likes the sound the leaves make as they sway and rustle among each other. Normally he would already be asleep. Zoro lifts his single working eyelid lazily.
"How could they! Zoro is the best big bro! We need to show them, prove them wrong!"
Robin sprouts a bunch of hands on the grass and passes him the paper before he says anything which may or may not confirm his theory that she can grow one of her eyes inside a person's head. The offending news didn't make the headline or one of the big articles that takes up an entire page, but it has a decent presence with a palm-sized photograph which to some might be incriminating. It’s a scene taken after a battle on the last island a few days ago. Usopp had asked him to spar with him to practice some short-range fighting skills after the marksman was almost taken down by an enemy who managed to slip close enough to use a rather large battle axe. It is ridiculously titled: ‘Internal Strife within the infamous Straw-hat Pirates: The Demon of the East Blue bullies friends and foes.’
He snorts.
Chopper pouts. “It’s not funny, they think you’re a bad guy.”
It is kinda funny. Just about anyone will agree with him if they take a closer look at the picture. 'Bully' his ass. Usopp’s eyes are burning with obvious fighting spirit and he looks like he gave as much as he took. People are blind if they can't see that. But then again, most people are easy to believe whatever bad thing they say about a pirate crew as notorious as theirs.
"Oh, I didn't know you could read, marimo."
He glances up at the appearance of the annoying swirly brows and is severely tempted to swipe his leg and make him fall on his ass but the cook is carrying a tray of afternoon snacks and tea for the perv’s beloved ladies as well as a chocolate shake for the little doctor, and Zoro doesn't want to risk Robin's rage for making chopper upset or give Nami who is heading their way any more reason to stack up his outrageous fake debt that she no doubt plans to collect one day. Sighing, he lets it go and returns to the stupid article. For now.
"Fuck off, perv."
“Oh, I know! You're just pretending to read! Understandable to want to look like you got an actual brain instead of the bundle of roots of the moss growing on your head in front of the lovely Robin-chwan.” He laughs, walking away to deliver his drinks. Zoro waits in a test of patience. Any second now.
The tray is set on the table next to Robin and he is up in no time with a sword in his hand clashing against the sole of the cook's shoes. Finally. They go at it, oscillating their attacks and defences across the deck. He has sheathed one sword and is ready to catch shitty cook’s ankle when the witch shows up and takes a hard swing on both of their heads.
"Stop it now!"
"Yes, Nami-swaaaaan~~"
“Tch.”
And just like that the little mock fight is over. He huffs and goes back to his spot while rubbing his sore scalp. The paper has gone from where he left it, now in Nami's hand.
"I can't believe this bullshit." She sighs, taking a long sip of her tea in her usual seat next to Robin.
I can, he thinks but doesn’t say. They’re the Strawhats. Shit like this happens often and they got blamed for destroying islands even though they took down the people who were destroying said places once every few months. How are they still not used to it?
“MAN OVERBOARD!” Yells Usopp, followed by a big splash. In a split second, his swords are resting on the grass of the Sunny and he is glancing around in mid-air trying to locate their dumbass captain who, to his defence, contributes greatly to the abhorrent state of his shirts with the sheer number of times he has to do this in a week alone. So really, the witch should talk Luffy's ears off instead.
He sees the hint of Luffy's strawhat before it submerges and dives down to haul the body to which the hat is attached. When they surface, the dumbass captain coughs, glances up at him and beams. “Hi Zoro!”
“Damn it, Luffy!”
The rubbery, giggly mess tilts his head, face scrunched while thinking hard. As if. “I'm sorry?”
He scoffs. “Don't say things you don’t mean.”
“Shishishi.”
Zoro rolls his eyes, throws the captain over his shoulder and climbs up, ready to resume his nap. He automatically gets into the rhythm of things, having fished his nakama enough time for a routine to kick in. He usually sets Luffy—weak-limbed and still giggling—down, takes his shirt off, wrings all the water off, and lays the said crumpled shirt spread on the grass under the sun to dry before he goes back under the tree and let the nice warm wind blew the moisture off his skin as he naps. He does most of those things aside from the last because when he returns, this time with a clingy Luffy in tow, the entire crew has gathered.
“But Zoro was helping me train! That's not fair!” Usopp yells exasperatedly at the offending newspaper.
So they're still talking about that. Great.
“What is it?” Luffy asks from behind Usopp even though most of his body is still clutching onto Zoro’s leg.
“Luffy, you have to see this!” He turns around. “The paper is saying that— GYAAAAAAAAAAAA! You scare the crap out of me! Stop doing that long wiggly neck thing, it’s creeping me out!”
“Shishishi.”
“Anyway. Look!” The crew’s designated liar starts explaining everything from the beginning again and Zoro thinks he’s heard this whole thing thrice now which is three times too many. Chopper even repeats his ‘this is not fair’ spiel and everyone seems to be in agreement. Some of them say absolutely nothing, knowing there is no need to fix whatever the marines are thinking about them. From a tactical perspective, it might even be a hidden advantage during a battle if everyone believes it enough, but he lets the others do their thing and have their fun coming up with increasingly ludicrous scenarios he wants no part in. He’s going to nap in the meantime.
The weather is nice if not a little hot and the tides are steady enough to gently rock him to sleep. He inhales slowly and exhales with every small crashing of waves, feeling his muscles relax.
Slowly, slowly.
Inhale.
Exhale.
The world blurs a little.
The sleep bubble coming out of his nose grows bigger ever so slightly.
He’s drifting, drifting…
“Oh! I know!” Chopper squeals and the snot bubble pops. He wants to be mad at the little reindeer—who is no doubt raising his hand cutely for attention—for disturbing his sleep, but he knows he has a soft spot for the little guy. He simply can’t. “They just need to see us when we're not in a fight. Maybe when Zoro doesn't look as scary, they can finally see just how much he cares and loves us.”
Zoro pretends not to hear that because it isn't something he can deny. Because he knows he's never very good at talking so he goes out of his way to show his appreciation to his nakama through other ways.
“Will it work? I mean, Zoro naturally looks intimidating.” Nami says. Zoro doesn’t need to open his eyes to know that Usopp is nodding aggressively.
“The marimo has the face of a serial killer, Chopper. There's nothing we can do about it.”
“He looks kind when he's helping others!” Chopper insists. “The other day when we were walking around together, he saved a cat and her kittens from a rabid coyote who strays from the forest to town and the cat continues singing him praises for fifteen minutes! She even brought her kittens to his arm because she thinks he can keep them save. Zoro is the best!”
The crew oohs and ahs and coos at him.
His cheeks start to burn. He hates it.
“Ah, Zoro-san is a kind and gentle man.”
“That's so manly!”
“Are you crying, Franky?”
“I can’t help it!”
“Truly, a man among man.”
“Chopper, you should've taken a picture! Something like that would've worth a fortune!” Her eyes sparkle with beri signs.
“We don’t have a camera?”
“Ah, right—"
“Aww, such a soft moss.”
His forehead twitches.
“Shishishishi, that's why I choose Zoro. Zoro is a good guy.”
He lets the whole thing slide.
“See! That's why we have to set things straight!” Chopper rallies.
For whatever stupid reason they have—Chopper wants to defend his name, Usopp wants an image change because ‘bulied’ isn’t really suited for a brave warrior of the sea, and he is sure almost everyone else is in it for the entertainment value—a unanimous decision has been made, excluding him who was still pretending to be sleeping (not really) and now they—by ‘they’ he means mainly Nami and Chopper who whole-heartedly believe that Zoro will never lay a harmful finger on them all—are outright bothering him, pleading (and in Nami’s case, threatening) him to agree and play along with their plan.
“Quit bothering me!”
“If you play along, we will.”
He can hear the smirk in the witch’s voice. He glares at her.
“Play along?”
“You know, act like you care so much about us.”
He stares pointedly. “You want me to pretend to care about you all?”
She winces. Serves her right.
“That came out wrong, sorry.” He hums calmly. “I mean,” she sighs, “I guess, do what you always do, just maybe somewhere more people can see? And if you see a camera, don't destroy it."
He breathes, considering her suggestion. It's easy enough. He never cares who sees what he’s doing unless it’s important for a mission or unless it endangers the crew. Other than that, it essentially means that he just needs to keep doing things as per usual as though there is never any plan at all.
“Fine.”
The crew cheers and Usopp raises a fist in the air. “We’re commencing operation ‘Show the world Zoro is a good bro’.”
“We’re not fucking calling it that. Who comes up with that anyway.”
“Me?” Chopper smiles guiltily. “Do you not like that name? Should I change it?”
He’s going to hell.
Robin coughs and smiles.
“Keep the name,” he gruffs.
“Oh! Okay!” The little reindeer bounces back happily and he has a strong feeling that he has just narrowly avoided a very painful death.
Next to him, twirly brow snorts and mumbles lowly only for him to hear. “Sap.”
“I’ll skin you alive!”
The cook cackles madly as he retreats into the galley.
***
He forgets about the whole thing for a while.
In between running away from the marines and toppling yet another disillusioned, corrupt dictator, the stupid operation he doesn’t give a shit about never made it on his list of priorities. It doesn’t even cross his mind when a low-spirited Usopp, drunk from the ale and throat sore from all the stories and impromptu Usopp-songs he performs, sits next to him, slumps onto his shoulder and sobs about what a burden he’s being on the crew.
It isn’t the first time and Zoro doubts it will be the last. Most time the liar puts on a brave front and some of those time (Zoro is proud to see that the number is increasing) it isn’t a front at all. Still, occasionally, his guilt and insecurities come back fuelled by a sense of worthlessness, and he needs a little hand to help him push them away so it doesn’t consume him and get in the way of his growth. It’s a similarity he shares with Nami, Robin, dumb cook— a good portion of the crew, really.
There is usually a trigger for this like seeing a familiar object that reminds Usopp of a certain event or a nightmare. This time, the trigger is significant, heck, if the same thing happened to Zoro, he would probably be moping too right now. In the most recent fight, not only has someone managed to sneak up on the sharpshooter again, but they evaded Usopp short-distance offence technique that he had cooked up when he was training with Zoro and landed a hit on Nami who Usopp was supposed to be protecting. It was a shallow cut on her temple, so shallow that Chopper already declared that it wasn’t going to leave a scar, but it painted her face red as headwounds tend to do and it immediately sent Usopp spiralling.
In situations such as this, Zoro does what he does best: he listens and calls out bullshit when he hears it. Usopp has gone a long way from when he came to Zoro for this the first time. He stops insisting on his lack of value bullshit as much and maybe Usopp starts to believe him. When the mumbling and the ranting begin to die out, he does as he always does and forces the longnose to train with him because if he does something about it and sees how much he’s been improving, then maybe it'll lessen his self-doubt a little more permanently.
Zoro stuffs a big slice of sandwich one of the villagers was handing around earlier in Usopp's mouth and shoo-es him away vaguely threateningly. He also makes him drink lots of water to lessen his upcoming hangover if he wants to be able to train in the morning; though he doubts the sniper could wake up before noon judging by the state he is in. But his nakama is full of wonderful surprises because not only is he the first to arrive at breakfast, with Zoro being the second, but he comes wearing the weighted practise suit he and Franky made many weeks ago for any crew member that wants to train their speed and strength. Usopp eats his egg with a look of determination. Zoro subtly grins around his fish and rice.
They decide to do combat training on the vast deck. They could use the crow’s nest but it is a little claustrophobic for someone so used to fighting their battle with a range as wide as Usopp so they will have to ease into it, give the sharpshooter more room to breathe and create distance. And they will get there now that Zoro’s in charge, but for now, open space is preferred.
“Shall we start?” The younger man asks clear and determined despite the slightly trembling hand. Zoro smiles and makes him run laps around the Sunny until Usopp is cursing under his breath. Then he makes him do push-ups. Then planks. And when Zoro senses that he is tired enough—if he guesses correctly, it will be around lunchtime—only then will he let him take a break.
The younger man slumps down, huffing roughly and the cook announces lunch a few seconds later. Zoro has done this on his own more times than he cares to count after all.
They return to the deck an hour after they finish eating to give Usopp enough time to tend to his plants and Zoro to wash the dishes and bring whatever he needs from the storage room and the crow’s nest.
“Let’s start our training.” Zoro announces.
“We weren’t even starting yet?” Usopp gawks.
“That was endurance and a bit of strength training. Now we’re training for actual fights.”
“Oh,” he says as if he understands, and Zoro lets it go.
“You see those?” He points at the haphazard pile near his napping tree. It’s a stack of different, mostly bladed, weapons from a random spear they found in the Sunny’s storage that someone had left behind to a dagger that pisses him off because it reminds him too much of the Mihawk’s infuriatingly tiny blade. “I’m gonna come at you with those and you won’t know what I’ll be using against you. Even if I’m holding a spear or a long sword, or a metal rod, I might choose to close in and use my fist. You think you’re up for it?” He adds a devilish grin for a touch of intimidation. Robin once asked if it was his way of training the crew to build up their haki resistance. He's not fluent in the concept of Haki but willpower and determination can pierce through any sort of intimidation, and it is a skill that can be beneficial, haki or not.
Usopp gulps and nods. “Bring it.”
When the light sparring ends, Zoro glows with sweat and pride at the progress he is seeing in front of him. There is still a way to go, sure, but it applies to everyone including himself, and though it is very subtle, Zoro notices that with every round, it gets more and more difficult to disarm the man. What impresses him the most is the fact that at the start of the exercise, Usopp would think that the round is over when he gets his slingshot knocked out of his hand, but now, he keeps fighting, kicking and punching until he gets it back or until Zoro announces a break.
They call it a day a few hours before supper. Usopp needs to rest if he wants to do this more often than once every two weeks. Zoro watches as the sharpshooter walks towards the men’s quarter and he goes to the galley to talk to the cook about Usopp’s training regime and his new calorie intake before climbing up the ladder to do his own daily training.
He thinks about the younger nakama in the silence of the crow’s nest, about the determination in his eyes and the relentlessness. The self-proclaimed liar might still come to him crying and drunk in the future, feeling small and worrying about himself. But Zoro isn’t worried. From what he sees today, Usopp will be fine. He might even be closer to achieving his dream of being a brave warrior of the seas than he realises. After all, today he faces Zoro, the so-called demon of the east blue whose presence has made much bigger men shit their pants, and he faces him without any fear in his eyes.
Good for him, he thinks.
The day after, Zoro finds himself napping under his tree after lunch to the sound of waves and gentle breeze. It’s quiet and peaceful and everything he pictures when he thinks about the perfect naptime.
He’s drifting. Slowly, slowly. Drifting—
Whoosh.
“Really? It's gone up again?! Tell your boss if this keeps happening, I'll stop buying the damn newspapers. Got it?”
A squawk.
A pair of wings flap away. Nami walks and sits on the swing attached to his tree.
The gentle sea breeze sweeps across his skin again.
Gentle, gentle.
He's drifting—
“Pfft!!” Then Nami sprays her orange tea all over him. Gross.
“What the hell, witch!”
She ignores him and cackles like the witch she is before calling for all crew on deck, accidentally scaring Usopp and Chopper who slam the door open as they run out because ‘are we under attack?’
“Attack? Where?”
“No,” she gasps, placing the paper on her lap. Another bout of laughter hits and she clutches her side. “Come here, you have to see this!”
Zoro sits up as most of his nakamas gather in a circle around him — there is still no trace of the cook aside from a distant ‘be there in a minute, Nami-swannnn~~’ less than a second after Nami’s summon. There goes his chance of napping, for now.
“Check this out.” She unfurls the newspaper in her hand, flipping some pages out of the way and lays it spread in the middle, on his lap to be exact, and backs off, leaving him to the vultures flocking towards him.
“Oh my.”
“Zoro-bro, that's so super of you.”
“This bromance is touching my heart though I don't have a heart! Yohoho—” He pauses, interrupting himself. “The organ of course, I do have a heart, I’m full of warm-blooded love even though I’m supposed to be a cold-blooded pirate—"
He pretends to ignore the walking, talking skeleton’s amusing rambling (hiding the rising corner of his mouth) and diverts his attention to the paper. It's already sitting there on his lap, he might as well look.
The picture itself isn’t inherently bad. It's a decently sized, blurry, low-quality picture of him and, is that Usopp? He squints his eye and tilts his head to get a better look. He snorts in amusement. It's a stupid photo of a tired, drunk Usopp sleeping against his shoulder, taken at the opportune moment because he is sure just a minute before that, Usopp had been loudly and very drunkenly sobbing and sputtering bullshit about how he isn't good enough to be part of the future pirate king’s crew. The article itself seems to be shorter than some of the others on that page with photos nowhere near that size, not saying it is objectively short. Though the title— He almost groans when his brain recognizes just what it is he's seeing. The ridiculously long title says: ‘Kiss and Make Up: The demon of the east blue is a bully turns lover?’
Of, fucking, course.
Still, they are both lucky the apparently damning photograph wasn't taken a minute after that when he carries the sleeping man in his arms or even later on when he tucks Usopp in at the town's temporary-and-only-for-the-party communal sleepover area next to the few members of his crew who have passed out.
Chopper snatches the paper for himself and gasps. “Zoro! Usopp! Is this true? Why didn't you tell me?” He pouts.
Zoro resigns himself to the annoyance and goes back to napping position.
“Of— Of course it's not true!” Usopp pulls on his hair, blabbering in panic looking like he’s a second away from sobbing. Everyone else in the crew is having the time of their life.
“It's not?” The little doctor turns to the navigator who says nothing but smiles, entirely endeared, and pats his head.
“What's the big deal?” Luffy says, hanging off of Usopp. “Zoro’s a great guy! He takes care of us. Why is everyone being weird?”
“Luffy, read the heading!”
He pauses to do so.
“Shishishishishi, they think you two are in love~”
Usopp bangs his head repeatedly on the grassy deck and whines, collecting bits of grass in his curls in the process. “Zoroooooo, what should I do?!”
“Huh?!”
“Everyone's gonna think we're together! Everyone we know! My village, Kaya—"
“Dumbass. Call her, write her a letter. Hell if I know.”
“Shit! You’re right! Good thinking!” He runs, leaving Zoro alone in his cool shadow under the tree. “Nami! I need fancy paper and a pen! I need to tell Kaya I’m not hooking up with the demon of the east blue!”
Zoro grins in amusement and falls asleep as the group disperses to do their own thing.
“Nami, can I have the newspaper when you're done with it? I want to keep the picture and save it in my album. I believe it's a memory worth saving, one that we can look back upon fondly,” Robin says.
“Will do.” Nami replies before turning to Chopper. “By the way, where's Sanji-kun?”
“Oh.” Chopper’s eyes lit up. “He said he'll be joining us soon. He was finishing up his pies and didn't want that last batch to burn.”
The galley door swings open.
“There he is.”
Zoro forcefully shakes himself awake, grabs Sandai Kitetsu, and shreds the cursed newspaper so finely it becomes dust floating in the sky with a single blow of the wind.
A shrill shriek.
If the witch adds the newspaper cost to his ever-growing debt, so be it.
And if he keeps the picture—and only the picture—intact in his haramaki, no one aside from the archaeologist needs to know.