This was done as a part of an exchange-thingey with my friends. It's a bit long for a drabble but I didn't want to post it in dA nor make it into it's own story.

Gone.

They were all gone.

Sanji had been spending the past five waking hours trying to comprehend that alone. With little success, as it was.

They were gone. His nakama, his family. Luffy, Nami, everyone.

Zoro.

Zoro was gone.

When he had woken up in the hospital, his first thought had been if the swordsman had seen the axe-wielding Marine come up behind him. His first words had been where are my friends?

Are they okay?

The nurse had given him a sympathetic look and said that there hadn't been any others.

You were caught in the Marine's crossfire. Remember?

No, no he insisted and started to get up. He was still clothed. He had only been knocked out. I was there, with my friend. He had gestured futilely, and fought back as the nurse tried to restrain him, make him lay down again, with repeated wordings of sir, calm down, you're still hurt-

But what about my friend? Sanji insisted. If you found me, you must have found him, too. Where is he?

Sir, try to understand. The Marine's had already collected away the bodies-

It had hit him then.

The Marine's had taken the bodies. Bodies. Corpses.

They had killed Zoro.

He had run away then. Unchivalrious as it might have been, he had knocked aside the nurses and ran, out of the building, out to the city, to the docks. That were they had been ambushed. As soon as they had weighed anchor, the Marine's had swarmed them, earth and sea.

He and Zoro had hopped ashore to keep them at bay. He didn't know what had happened to Sunny and the rest of the crew. There had to be a clue in the battlefield.

There hadn't been a battlefield left. The dock had been cleaned, scoured. There weren't even blood splatters left.

He had wandered in a daze down to the beach. For hours on end, he sat there, staring out to the ocean.

They were gone.

Zoro was gone.

And what is worse he was realizing slowly you never told him.

Zoro felt rotten.

He had run away from a fight and left Sanji behind.

He had run away.

He deserved to be hopelessly lost.

After the Marine's had dropped Sanji, he had been at a disadvantage. He couldn't have fought and protected Sanji at the same time, so he took a third option and led the fight away from the cook.

Daring, yes. Stupid, very.

When he had finally securely shaken the Marine forces, he ended up at the shore, utterly lost. After a moment of vicious cursing, he had resolved in washing the Marine blood off and stealing some clothes off a convenient clothes line, and set off in a search of his crew and his cook.

So far he had only been managed to become further annoyed by his own incompetence. He now knew that he should've stayed behind, fight to the death to protect Sanji, if necessary. Instead, he had run away.

He could even be dead.

He could've been killed, and all you did was run away.

Zoro felt his stomach lurch highly unpleasantly at the thought, but he trudged on nevertheless.

He needed to find his nakama.

The file of shore was rather beautiful. The high tide was passing, and the sea was calm, the air was warm. The lone slumped figure on the sand was bathed in the day's last warm sunlight. His shadow stretched along the waterline.

Another shadow approached it, slowly but steadily.

It stopped a few feet shy.

"Well aren't you a grand mess, cook."

The blonde turned, looking like a man who was still half asleep, and looked up to the green-haired man with an empty look.

"Zoro?"

The other twitched his lips into something of a smile.

"Yeah, it's me. Disappointed?"

Sanji's smile was leisurely and disturbing. "I thought they had killed you, you know."

"Well they didn't."

"Right." The blonde turned back towards the ocean. "Right you are."

"Something wrong, cook?"

"Yes. You left me. Went off and got yourself killed. And here we are." He grinned bitterly. "Come to take me along, too?"

Zoro was quiet for a long while. Then he muttered I don't know what you're talking about, cook and reached down, and grabbed Sanji's slack hand tightly. "Come on. Decide later if I'm real or not."

Sanji startled and looked up again, looking like he actually saw Zoro for the first time. The swordsman smiled and pulled his hand. "Come on. Let's go find the others."

*headdesks* WELL WASN'T THAT CONVOLUTED apologies for not knowing how to do this anymore.