“I am going to kill him,” Sanji growled in a gravelly voice that was not his, hanging from the rigging in a body that was not his, glaring down at the lunatic grinning up at him in a body that was his.
The Sunny creaked at her moorings, tied fast to the dock of a nameless spring island somewhere between Punk Hazard and Dressrosa. They’d been forced into port thanks to a catastrophe involving Franky, a bowling ball, and the crew’s cola reserves.
The island itself sprawled green, all rolling hills and crooked stone walls, sheep grazing along the slopes. Smoke curled from cottages tucked into the valleys. The dock bustled with fishermen unloading nets slick with silver, merchants shouting prices, gulls wheeling sharp overhead. Whisky barrels rolled across the planks, a faint drone of pipes drifted from a tavern up the slope, and mist hung over the ridges like a damp shawl.
Sanji had been in the galley, minding his own business, finishing up his shopping list, ready to slip off the Sunny and find a market. He’d pushed the door open to spring air that smelled of peat smoke and sea brine, gulls shrieking overhead, the whole harbor alive with fishermen and vendors.
Half the crew were already off the gangplank, eager to explore port. Luffy latched onto Law like a limpet, cackling loud enough to drown the gulls. Zoro was up in the rigging, coming down to join the foray onto the island. One stride, and Sanji'd been free to hunt down additional stock to ensure they had more than enough for most emergencies.
But Law’s patience had snapped.
“ROOM.” The word cracked the air, blue light spilling wide across the Sunny.
Sanji had just enough time to curse. “Oh, for fu–”
The world twisted. His stomach bottomed out, skin pulled inside-out, horizon spinning like the ship had capsized beneath him. When it righted–
Rope seared his palms. Wind slapped cold across his cheek. Canvas thundered overhead like a living beast.
He was in the damn rigging.
“Shit!” he exclaimed in a gravelly voice that wasn’t his. Law had switched him into Zoro.
Thick arms with corded muscles and rough, scarred hands clung to the rope. An even thicker chest tried to bust out of a navy t-shirt – no wonder Zoro had switched to a shirtless long coat – and trousers pulled at the seams. Dense muscle changed the center of gravity. Sanji felt heavy, weighted down, and the swords at his side tipped it even further. How the hell does he fight in this meat tank?
Below, the harbor stretched wide, docks lined with crates, vendors calling out prices over the slap of waves. By the gangplank, his own body leaned at the rail, Luffy’s grin stretched across its face. Zoro’s scowl twisted from Luffy’s frame, rubbery arms crossed tight, the sight so wrong Sanji’s skin crawled.
Luffy laughed, clapping like a fool. “Sanji’s Zoro now!”
Sanji bared Zoro’s teeth, and the growl that rumbled from his chest felt like thunder. “Switch me the hell back, Surgeon of Bastards!”
Law didn’t blink, only adjusted his hat and walked away.
“See you later, Sanji-Zoro!” Luffy yelled, and then he looped an arm around his own body’s neck and Sky Walked off the Sunny. Of course, the bastard would be able to Sky Walk without issue.
“Luffy! Come back here with my body!” Sanji shouted, but it was no use. Luffy and Zoro were gone.
Cursing Law, Luffy, and life in general, Sanji descended the rigging. His balance was completely off, top heavy and not nimble. When he was about twenty feet up, he dropped to the deck. It felt like the entire ship dropped a foot beneath the waves with the impact. He thought about hunting Law down and castrating the man, but they weren’t staying long on the island and he wanted to shop while he had the chance.
He knew that Kin’emon and Momo were remaining on the ship with Usopp and Robin. Everyone else had been given three hours to do what needed to be done in town. With his body under Luffy’s control, there wasn’t much Sanji could do until everyone was back on the ship. He heaved a sigh – which caused his entire chest to rise and fall like a mountain – and tramped off the ship.
The markets weren’t far, close to the port on the small island. Stalls ringed a square, an old stone well set in the center. Carts lined the edges, stacked with fruit, breads, and salted meats. The smell of yeast and fish was heavy in the damp air.
Sanji tried to keep to his usual pace, sliding through people the way he always did. Except now he felt like he had to angle sideways, shoulder turned, to make it through a crowd. Sanji felt bulky. Like he was taking up three times his space. He and Zoro were the same height, but the difference in width was ridiculous. How did Zoro even fit through doorways? And the katanas at his side took up even more room.
Except… nobody touched him. Nobody brushed past. People cleared the way before he could even think of shifting. Feet stepped quickly, heads ducked, mutters dropped into silence. A few glanced up at him with tight eyes, fear there just for a second before they broke off fast and hurried down another path.
Sanji looked down. Everything on Zoro was tucked away, shirt unripped, haramaki snug around the waist, swords where they always were. No blood, no obvious stains of violence. So why?
Then, he approached a vendor, a lovely lady with even lovelier melons both for sale and on herself, and he put on the charm. “Good afternoon, my beautiful swan,” he cooed.
Her body froze before he finished. Smile gone, fear flashing across her features. She yanked her shawl tight across her chest, eyes dropping, and ducked straight behind the stall, out of sight.
Sanji blinked. That was… odd. He turned his head, scanning the crowd. No marines, no bounty hunters, no threat creeping up on them. Just a normal island bustle. He turned back to the melons, reached for his pouch, then realized there was no one left to take his coin. He muttered under his breath and walked on.
At the next stall, the vendor, a man this time, stiffened the second Sanji reached out for a piece of fruit. His mouth tightened. He stepped back, hands raised. “Don’t want any problems.”
Sanji’s brow furrowed. “Why would there be a problem?”
The man eyed him once, then again, quickly. “You got that look about you.”
Sanji stared, confused, before the thought hit: he wasn’t in his own body. He was wearing Zoro’s face.
He moved on, jaw tight, irritation creeping higher. The next vendor acted the same, eyes darting, voice short. The woman after that flinched when Sanji smiled, pulling her child behind her skirts. The one after turned her head away before he even opened his mouth.
It wasn’t just once, or twice. It was every stall. Men watched him with suspicion, a few with open distaste. Women shrank, or hardened their faces, or ignored him completely. The ones who didn’t do any of that just looked at him like he was thick as bricks.
Sanji’s chest pulled tight, heat rising behind his ears. It stung more than he wanted to admit. People avoiding him, treating him like danger, like dirt, like he wasn’t worth speaking to. He hadn’t changed. The only difference was the body he wore.
Zoro’s body.
Sanji stepped closer to the well, watched as people skirted past him as quickly as possible. Did this happen to Zoro all the time? Every damn place he walked into?
But no, that couldn’t be. He’d seen Zoro talk to people, hadn’t he? At parties and celebrations after the Straw Hats liberated something or another. Of course, those people usually knew what they’d done, so it was possible it was gratitude, not friendliness.
Sanji finished purchasing what he’d wanted, keeping himself to short, polite business before moving on. He decided to stop by a tavern – Zoro’s natural element – and see if that changed things.
He grabbed a stool at the bar, bags tucked around his feet, and ordered a drink. The bartender didn’t look at him any differently than anyone else. There was a man sitting two stools down from Sanji and he attempted to strike up a conversation. Sanji struck up conversations with random strangers all the time. It’s how he found out all sorts of information about the town, the best places to eat, where he might need to be if shit went down to help out the crew.
Sanji cleared his throat, pitched his tone friendly. “So, what’s good to eat around here? Any place actually knows their way around a spice rack, or am I stuck with boiled mutton and bread?”
The man looked up. His eyes flicked once at Sanji – at Zoro’s face, really – and then darted back down to his drink. “Plenty of food.”
“Yeah? Where?” Sanji pressed. “I’ve been to the market. Wouldn’t mind finding a good place to have a meal.”
A pause. The man took another swallow. “You from the ship that docked this morning?”
Sanji smirked. “What gave it away, my charming manners or the swords?”
The man’s jaw tightened. He stared into his glass. “Not looking for trouble.”
Sanji blinked, heat flaring in his chest. “I’m asking about dinner, not a duel. Don’t tell me every swordsman that passes through this port ends up wrecking the taverns?”
The man shifted, uneasy. “Not every one. Just the kind with your look.” He pushed back from the bar, left half his pint, and walked out.
Sanji stared after him, Zoro’s scarred hands tightening around the glass. His reflection glared back at him from the amber surface, broad-shouldered, one-eyed, heavy-jawed, unapproachable.
“Charming,” Sanji muttered, downing the rest of his drink in one swallow.
He didn’t like this. Didn’t like the idea that Zoro got treated like bad news just because of how he looked. Zoro could be a right bastard, but he was a good guy with a dumb sense of humor and loyal to a fault. He had patience with Luffy, helped out anyone who asked – even Sanji, though he bitched about it – and spent hours listening to Chopper. He could be gruff and forthright, but there wasn’t anything wrong with that. That was just him.
Sanji pushed away from the bar, frown on his face, and gathered his bags to return to the Sunny. As he stood, a couple of patrons shifted on their stools. One man pulled his drink closer. Another turned his back. Voices dropped to a quieter murmur. Eyes slid away. He could feel the attention. It wasn’t welcome or friendly. It burned under his skin.
He left without another word. The door closed hard behind him, shutting out the murmur of the tavern. For the first time since the swap Sanji wished he was back in his own body, not because he was irritated, but because of how the world looked at him now.
He set his jaw and started back toward the Sunny.
Sanji plated the sea king onigiri, grabbed the bottle of sake, and headed for the rigging. Law had switched them back once they Sunny was again underway. Sanji got his revenge by telling Luffy that Law was hiding meat under his hat before disappearing into dry storage to arrange his newly acquired stock.
They’d reach Dressrosa in a couple hours, but until then, Sanji had time to do something he wasn’t looking forward to – actually talk to Zoro. About feelings. The idea made his stomach churn, but they were nakama, and how he’d been treated as Zoro really bugged him.
Sanji pushed through the hatch to the Crow’s Nest and spotted Zoro meditating on a cushion. The crow’ nest doubled as Zoro’s training room. Weight lifting equipment took up a majority of the space. A bench ran the perimeter of the room, with windows facing in every direction.
Sanji set the plate and sake beside Zoro on the floor, then pushed open a window and lit a cigarette. He took a seat, one foot on the bench, to wait. He could see Dressrosa on the horizon, growing larger as the Sunny sailed on fast wind. He had a feeling that shit was going to hit the fan, which was why Sanji didn’t want to put this off.
He knew Zoro knew he was there, and it was only a matter of time before he was acknowledged. Sanji had gotten almost to the filter before he heard Zoro shift behind him, and then mumbled, “Thank you for the food,” like he said every time before he ate.
Sanji finished his cigarette and crushed it out. He didn’t bother hemming and hawing – he knew Zoro preferred to get right to the point. “Do people always treat you like that?”
“Li’ wha’?”
“Don’t talk with your mouth full, you ill-mannered ficus,” Sanji snapped, before sighing with regret for actually caring about the green ape. He turned to face Zoro, who had his cheeks full of onigiri, like a happy chipmunk. “Do they always treat you like you’re someone to be afraid of?”
Zoro swallowed before speaking. “I am someone to be afraid of,” he smirked.
Sanji gave him a look. “That’s not what I meant, and you know it.”
Zoro shrugged. “I guess they do? I try not to pay attention to it anymore.”
And that was what had Sanji tied in knots. “Doesn’t it hurt?”
Zoro’s brow climbed, as he picked up his second onigiri. “Care about my feelings now, cook?”
Sanji ground his teeth. “Maybe I do, you fucking asshole. Even when you try to make it impossible.”
Zoro studied Sanji as he ate his onigiri. He shifted his legs on the meditation pillow, crossing them the other direction. Sanji held his gaze, not budging on this. Zoro mattered, whether the bastard liked it or not.
“It hurt for a long while,” Zoro finally said, after he’d finished his second treat. “Then, I told myself the opinion of strangers doesn’t matter. Only how I act does. Now, it just is what it is.”
Sanji brought his hand up to his mouth as if he had an invisible cigarette. He could understand what Zoro was saying. Sanji wished it was that easy for him to dismiss others. But he cared deeply what other people thought, how he could make their lives better, even in the smallest way. He sighed. “Still sucks that people treat you like crap.”
Zoro lifted a shoulder again, reaching for the third onigiri. “You treat me like crap.”
“Tch. That’s because I know you and know you deserve it.”
“Heh.”
Sanji glanced back out the window at the island in the distance. “Feels like something shitty’s coming.”
“Nothing we can’t handle,” Zoro said confidently.
“Hn.” Sanji stared at the island for a beat longer, then turned away. He rose, took the empty plate and headed for the hatch.
“Hey, cook.”
Sanji paused on the ladder.
“Thanks.”
Sanji nodded, hearing all the words unspoken. Thanks for asking. Thanks for caring. Thanks for being nakama.
He disappeared down the rigging, to see if Luffy had gotten hold of Law’s hat yet.
End