Archive of Our Own

Sanji walks alone beneath the shadow of flat-leaved aspens, carrying a pie in two hands.

If you go to the woods, be prepared to leave something behind. Otherwise, the spirits might never let you leave.

A village grandmother gave him this advice, then took his arm and guided him away from the forest's edge. When he returned later that day, she told him he'd done well with his choice of offering.

The trees in this wood used to bleed sap like water. You could put your mouth beneath a spigot and drink your stomach full. But they've bled out all they can now, and want something to feed themselves on. Every living being gets hungry.

And well, Sanji couldn't argue with that.

Truthfully, her story alone would have been reason enough to venture out if he wasn't already interested. The syrup sold in the central market, praised as a local delicacy, tasted strange to Sanji: like butter cut with cheap oil, melting away too quickly on the tongue. He wants to taste the source, to see what of it he can bring back to the village that bears its name, to refine it into a purer, richer mouthful that might satisfy the cravings of his crew.

Sanji walks for an hour or two, not sure where he's meant to leave his offering. With each step, he grows more skeptical of the grandmother's warning. Do spirits have mouths? Can they really eat peaches and brown sugar glaze?

Eventually, he sets the pie down on a fallen log and sits beside it to think.

It's quiet out here in the wood, quiet in a way his life has not been for a long time, since before he cares to remember. There are always voices shouting in his ear now—demanding, excited, eager—and he cherishes every one of them. Some people might find the quiet a relief from all the noise of his rambunctious crew, but to Sanji, it's silence that feels oppressive. Like loneliness given presence: a weighty absence that presses inward, occupying space until the world narrows down to the circumference of his chest.

To break the stillness, he raps his knuckles against the log beneath him. The wood makes a dull, dry thunk: not exactly the cheerful sound he was hoping for. He stands and walks over to another tree, this one tall and unmistakably alive, and raps his knuckles again. The tapping reverberates within its trunk, echoing back towards Sanji, as if the living tree is as hollow as the dead. Confused, Sanji peels back a patch of bark and presses a nail into the greenwood: a tiny drop of moisture oozes out. He places the bead on his tongue.

Sweet, but thin.

When he turns around, the pie is gone.

Sanji quickly walks back over to the fallen log. Did the pie slip off the log and fall into the leaves? It's recently turned to autumn on this island, and drifts of red and brown have already begun to gather. He pushes his hands through the leaves. They crackle like dried insect husks beneath his palms. No sign of the pie.

He sighs to himself: an animal must have gotten it. It's a waste, but he silently hopes that whatever creature stole his baking abandons their prize after a bite or two. He'd hate to think he accidentally poisoned an unsuspecting deer or wolf with a treat too tantalizing to resist.

It's getting late anyway, and his search has been fruitless so far. None of the trees look any different than the ones near the coast. Maybe he'll ask a local for help tomorrow.

Night gathers quickly this time of year, and the tides haven't yet pulled the moon overhead. Sanji can barely see his own feet as he trudges back towards the village, hands lighter but heart heavier. His mind had been filled with all the imaginary dishes he'd craft from this lost delicacy, all the imaginary expressions of delight Nami would have worn as she took her first bites. Tomorrow's pancakes have already lost their savour. But the least he can do is make it back in time to cook a midnight snack for his friends.

He's so determined to keep a good pace, he doesn't notice a tree root creeping up beneath him till he's tripping over the knobbled wood. Sanji spills onto the ground, scattering leaves as he tumbles in the brush. Groaning, he pushes himself up on dew-damp hands and grasps blindly for a branch. A dozen present themselves; he chooses the closest and hauls himself back to his feet, glad that Zoro isn't around to mock him for the fall. But as he gets up, he hears something strange from the woods behind him: a soft, withdrawn cry, like a child rocking itself to sleep.

He looks towards the village lights, faint through the cover of the trees. They've been winking out one by one as the evening lanterns are extinguished. Then he looks deeper into the forest, to where the cry is coming from.

He's never been able to ignore another person's distress.

Sanji turns around and follows the sound.

The cry turns into a keen as he comes upon a thicket of dense, dry twigs. Sanji breaks apart the bramble cage and pushes through to the clearing on the other side. A young man, maybe a year or two younger than Sanji, crouches against a tree trunk, arms wrapped around his thin body as he sways back and forth. His shoulders are bare beneath his dirty overalls. As Sanji stares, a tear rolls down the end of his long nose, then another, making a quiet patter of rain on the dry earth.

The stranger startles at the sound of Sanji's approach. His dark curls shift to reveal bright, curious eyes, shining even through his tears as his head shifts in Sanji's direction.

"Hello?" the stranger says, reminding Sanji that he's not just a bewildered witness to this strange tableau, but someone who should be helping, so he steps into the pale light of the clearing. The stranger's eyes widen.

"What are you doing out here?" Sanji says as he walks forward and offers him a hand. His bones crack like brittle wood beneath Sanji's stronger grip.

"I got lost," the stranger admits, scrubbing his arm over his eyes to clear away the last of the tears. His nose is still red-tipped, but he manages a watery smile. "I'm so glad you found me. These woods are scary when you're on your own…"

"Are you from Syrup Village?"

The stranger blinks up at Sanji before giving his hesitant answer. "…Yeah. Um, sort of. That's where I came from. Yeah."

Sanji nods, glad he won't have to make another long detour to some other part of the island. "We're not that far from the village. I can walk you back."

The stranger flings himself forward and grips Sanji's arm, eyes wide with gratitude. "Please. Oh god, please don't leave me here. I've been stuck in this forest forever."

If Zoro or Luffy or Nami were around, he might balk at how tightly the stranger latches onto his arm, how closely he presses himself to Sanji's side. But no one else is around to see, and the stranger seems so relieved to have another person to cling to. It's always gratifying to be a shelter for someone else, even when that someone is a little more male than the people he usually jumps in to protect.

Once they've exchanged names—Usopp, Usopp, he repeats a few times in his mind, committing the name to memory just as he did with Baratie guests back in his waiter days—they set off.

They make good progress for a while, but before long, a fallen tree rises up to block their path. Sanji's not sure if it's the same log where he put the pie down earlier: between the detour and the late hour, he's lost track of exactly what direction he first wandered.

Sanji means to take the lead as they traverse the log, but Usopp clambers up first, sure-footed despite his earlier distress. He drops down on the other side, momentarily disappearing from sight. For the first time that night, Sanji feels a flicker of real anxiety at how dark things has gotten. He quickly follows Usopp over the log, relieved to find his new acquaintance dusting himself off on the other side. He doesn't need two unexplained disappearances in one night.

"We should see the village lights from here," Sanji says, but as he peers through the trees, he can't see a single glimmer. The last of the lanterns must have been extinguished already.

"I don't see anything," Usopp says, worried fingers clutching at Sanji's arm once more. "We're lost again, aren't we?"

He hates to admit it, but they probably are: the light is gone, and with it, any sense of the village's location. Gratification slips into annoyance as Usopp moans about spending another night in the wood. Sanji could have been back in his own galley by now, whipping up a late-night batch of hot chocolate and prepping his meal plan for the next day. Instead, he's stuck out here with a stranger who, despite being from the village they're searching for, is apparently completely helpless to find his own way back. He turns to Usopp, the words whose fault is that? already sharp on his tongue.

Usopp is shivering. Even in the moonlight now beginning to creep through the trees, Sanji can see gooseflesh running down his bare arms. Sanji's ire melts away: is he really going to yell at a thin, trembling boy for the crime of being lost and cold and alone? He has a temper, but he isn't cruel.

Sanji shrugs off his jacket and tosses it over Usopp's shoulders. The boy reaches up to touch the fabric, then stares at Sanji with wonder in his eyes.

"Thanks," he whispers. "You're being so nice to me. Why, um—why?"

Sanji clears his throat. "I've got my shirt," he says, ears tingling with embarrassment. "You might as well take the jacket. Not being nice, just practical." Usopp smiles shyly at the deflection.

"You're definitely nice," he corrects, "and we're definitely lost." He walks back over to the fallen log and sits down on the ground. "We should probably wait here till morning. It's way safer to stay put than go wandering around in the dark. What if there's a hole and we don't see it? What if one of us breaks a leg, or falls into a ravine, or—I don't know. There's so much that can go wrong. "

Sanji looks off into the blackness. They aren't making any progress, and it's a big forest. Maybe it is better to try again in the morning than to veer even further off course.

Sighing, he kneels down at Usopp's side and starts gathering twigs and small branches from the outskirts of the log.

"What are you doing?"

"Starting a fire," he says. He snaps off a larger branch and adds it to the stack by Usopp's feet. "You're cold, right?"

Usopp hugs his knees to his chest. The jacket falls over his shoulders like a cape, covering everything but his well-worn boots. "That's a bad idea," he says quietly. "They won't like it."

Sanji grits his teeth as the next branch bends, but refuses to break off in his hand. "Who?"

"The trees," Usopp says. "They already hate me. That's why I've been trapped out here so long."

Sanji frowns, twisting the branch back and forth to try and get a better angle. "They're trees. They don't have feelings. How is something that doesn't feel supposed to hate you?"

The branch gives way, but not without a price: at it rips free, it leaves a long, jagged scrape across his palm. Sanji hisses and drops the branch.

Shit.

"It's easy," Usopp whispers, but Sanji barely hears him, too busy picking splinters out of his skin. The last thing he needs is a painful scar across one of his two precious implements.

"Fine," he says, kicking the branch aside and dropping down to the ground beside Usopp. "No fire tonight." Not a big one, anyway. He pulls a cigarette from his pocket and lights it. Usopp stares at Sanji intently through the cloud of smoke, like he's seeing him for the first time. Maybe he is: the cinder light is the most they've had since they met.

"How long have you been lost?" Usopp asks.

A long, long time, he wants to answer. For years. I've only recently found my way. But that's too much honesty for someone he's just met, so he says, "A few hours."

"Oh, good. That's not too long." Usopp lays down and curls his back into the narrow space between the log and the ground, drawing Sanji's jacket up to his neck like a cherished blanket. There's something about the gesture that makes Sanji's heart ache: a memory of tucking his mother's sheets to her chin, doing his childish best to protect her from the fever chills that constantly ravaged her body.

"How long have you been lost?" Sanji says, but he asks too late. Usopp is already asleep, leaving Sanji to sit a familiar vigil on his own.

Morning arrives drowsily, reluctant grey light seeping through the tree limbs and down onto their shadowed faces. When it's bright enough to see his own hand—thankfully, the scrape doesn't look too bad in the light of day—Sanji reaches over and shakes Usopp's arm.

"Wake up. It's time to get moving."

The boy murmurs a protest in his sleep, but he doesn't pull away from Sanji's touch. Sanji is the one who breaks contact, cheeks flushing despite their lonely state. They're about to head back to civilization: back to his crew and Luffy's cheeky grin and Nami's beautiful smile and Zoro's derisive glare. He can hear their teasing already, and he reacts to the imagined jabs as strongly as if they were there to mock him in person. He stands up, putting a little distance between himself and Usopp.

But then Usopp's stomach growls audibly, and yet again, Sanji's better sense disappears, superseded by a far more pressing anxiety.

"When's the last time you ate?" he asks, staring down at Usopp's fragile frame in the new-grown light. What he thought were shadows last night look more like fissures, the clefts between bones horribly visible beneath his skin. He's not just thin: he's skeletal.

"Yesterday," Usopp says with a shrug as he takes Sanji's hand a second time. "But there's not much to eat here. I mean, besides fruit, but it's not all that filling. Better than nothing though. Wanna try some?"

Usopp walks over to a tree and shimmies up into the branches with an ease that belies his frail appearance. From a hollow in the trunk, he pulls out a greenish-brownish fruit a bit bigger than his palm. Usopp drops down to the ground and holds it out to Sanji to peruse.

The skin looks rough and inedible, but he knows well enough that ugly exteriors often hide delicious innards. Proving the point, Usopp digs his fingers through the skin and tears the fruit in half to reveal a jewel-like interior. The inside is a brilliant orange: brighter than papaya, richer than uni. Its flesh shines with a watery liquid that pools between the seeds at its centre. Usopp lifts one half to his lips and hands the other to Sanji.

"'s still good," Usopp mumbles through a full mouth. "Just not really substantial, you know?"

He's starting to get hungry too, and the fruit is undeniably tempting. Just the sight of the juice leaves him parched. Sanji lifts the fruit to his lips, but something gives him pause: maybe it's the smell, which grows sweeter and more pungent as he brings the fruit closer to his nose, or maybe it's the colour, whose intensity is a shade off natural. It reminds him of a poison frog's skin, the vividness a warning to all other creatures: do not swallow me if you want to live.

Usopp is from this island, so his body is probably accustomed to its food. But every ounce of chef's instinct that Sanji possesses screams that if he eats this fruit, he'll be sick.

"I'm alright," he says, and hands his half back to Usopp. The boy shrugs and devours the rest. Sanji resolves to feed him something with protein when they get back to the village, but hopefully this will be enough to keep Usopp on his feet.

They head off again with Sanji in the lead, Usopp stepping quickly to match Sanji's long strides, like he's afraid he'll be left behind if he doesn't keep up. At every unexpected noise, his hand clutches at Sanji's shirt, tugging him back a few steps. Sanji rolls his eyes the first couple times it happens, but after a while, he starts to appreciate that single point of warmth against his back. The trees don't allow much sunlight to filter through, and he's only got a button-up shirt to protect against the autumn breeze. It feels cruel to ask for his jacket back now that Usopp's finally started to warm up.

They walk for an hour in Sanji's best guess of the village's direction, but soon it's clear that the forest is only growing denser with every step. The occasional clearings turn into squeezes between tighter and tighter copses of trees. Branches scrape at Sanji's pants, catching in the fabric like fishhooks, trying to reel him back the way they came.

"I told you," Usopp says. His hand tightens in Sanji's shirt as they turn away from yet another impassable thicket. "The trees don't want us to leave."

Maybe it's the exhaustion of a sleepless night talking, but he's almost starting to believe Usopp. As incredible as the idea sounds, it's not like he hasn't seen countless strange things since he left the Baratie, even things that would have fit right into the storybooks he devoured as a child. Why not trees that move on their own?

Sanji brings them both to a halt. "We aren't getting anywhere like this." Usopp's face drops, and Sanji tries to reassure him. "Don't worry. I've got friends out there who'll come looking. If we can't find our way out, they'll make their way to us."

He believes his own words. Luffy probably set out the moment he realized Sanji wasn't there to make his typical smorgasbord breakfast, and Nami is a world-class navigator: if anyone can find their way out of these woods, it's her. He just hopes one of them is babysitting Zoro during the search, otherwise they might have two lost crew members on their hands by tomorrow.

"Friends?" Usopp says quietly. He lets go of Sanji's shirt and clutches the jacket tighter around his shoulders, expression more nervous than hopeful.

"Yes," he says. He does, doesn't he? Sanji… has friends. What a strange and wonderful concept. Was it really only a couple months ago that he was still at the Baratie, dodging the scornful eyes of his fellow cooks? And now he has a whole crew of friends who'll drop everything to bring him home. It's impossible to accept some days.

"I don't know if they'll be able to find us," Usopp says doubtfully. "Won't the trees stop them too?"

"I found you, didn't I?"

"…Yeah, you did. Huh." At last, his expression shifts back into a hopeful smile. Sanji wishes the grin would stay put longer: he's never met someone who looked so perpetually on edge. Then again, being lost in the woods by yourself probably isn't the best recipe for a calm temperament.

"Then let's trust them to find us too."

It's odd. The moment they stop actively searching for an exit, it's like their feet find the right path. The trees thin as they walk, pace slower now with no particular destination in mind. But Sanji's stomach jolts when he spies a familiar fallen log in an equally familiar clearing. Have they really been going in circles this whole time?

He swallows, then runs his tongue over his dry lips, gathering the flaky whiteness at the corners of his mouth. Food they can do without for another day before they really start to feel the absence, much as he dreads the thought, but he hasn't had anything to drink since the round of ale Zoro bought for lunch yesterday. He's more of a wine drinker himself, but he'd take even a cheap mug of grog right now to sate his thirst.

"Hey, Usopp, are there any streams near here? Some place we can get fresh water?"

Usopp shakes his head. "Not that I've found."

Sanji blinks at him, incredulous. "How are you still alive if you haven't found water?"

Usopp points at the trees.

"The fruit's pretty juicy," he explains. "Doesn't taste like much, but I guess water doesn't really taste like much either. Want me to get you some?" he says, bounding off towards a tree before Sanji can protest.

This time, he returns with two fruits instead of one. "Here!" he says, lobbing one at Sanji, who catches it by reflex. "It was really nice of you to let me eat the whole thing last time, but these are all over the place. You don't have to worry we'll run out or anything."

Politeness, thirst, and an instinctual worry that the fruit will go to waste once plucked compel Sanji to give the strange fruit a second chance. He peels back the rind, looking over the bright orange flesh carefully. Maybe he was just overthinking before.

But the colour and the scent are still as off-putting as ever. He dips a finger in the juice at the centre and holds it up to the light. The juice is more viscous than it appeared at first glance, and coats his finger in a dull sheen.

When he looks up, Usopp is watching him, staring at his finger as a bead of juice runs down its length. "Aren't you going to try it?"

Sanji shakes his head and wipes his hand on his pant leg. "All yours," he says, passing the second fruit back to Usopp.

"Oh. Um, okay," Usopp says. He sounds embarrassed, and Sanji's resolve wavers—it feels awful to refuse food, especially food so freely and eagerly offered—but it's already starting to get dark again, and Sanji doesn't want to spend his second night on the forest floor curled up with stomach cramps or vomiting up what little liquid he still has in his body.

"Just give it a few more hours," he says. "My friends will find us, and then I'll make you the best meal you've had in your life. No more raw fruit: we'll have a feast."

Usopp's eyes widen. "You promise?" he says, and Sanji's heart swells in the way it only does when someone shares his appreciation for food. "You'll make something just for me?"

"I promise. As soon as we get out of here, you'll have anything you want."

That night, he's too tired to sit up and watch over Usopp. The lack of sleep catches up with him in a barreling rush of exhaustion, and he drifts off almost as soon as he closes his eyes. But as his consciousness slips away, the optimism he offered to Usopp starts to slip too. In its place, a grim worry haunts the edges of his restless dreams.

If Luffy and the others are coming, shouldn't they have found them by now?

Another day passes with no sign of rescue. Usopp, buoyed by the promise of food, tries to keep their spirits high as they wait. He chatters on about the plants in the vicinity, regales Sanji with stories of what the village was like when he was a kid: "there was this huge manor, and the family there built ships! I thought I would own one of them one day, or, you know, work on one—no, definitely own one—but then some things, uh, some things happened, and I don't know if the shipyard is there anymore, but anyway—"

Sanji half-listens, half-frets. The anxiety is swiftly becoming overwhelming: if Luffy and the others haven't found them yet, something must have happened. They wouldn't have just left without Sanji. Right? No, of course not. They're his friends. They wouldn't abandon him. He's only known them a month or two, but he knows them that well at least.

Unable to sit still for longer than a few hours, Sanji suggests a new tactic: walking parallel to where the trees grow thickest. It seems to work, at least for a while. They don't get stopped as often by entangled roots and unwelcoming thickets, though Sanji still can't tell if their progress is bringing them closer to the forest's edge or its heart.

Regardless, their progress is still slow, and with nothing in his stomach, his attention keeps slipping off the path ahead and upward to the treetops. Sanji recognizes the fruits by sight now, can see their rough hides peeking out from the branches overhead like children playing hide-and-seek, barely trying to stay hidden.

Usopp plies him over and over again to at least try one of the fruits, and though he continues to refuse, he doesn't feel like he can hold out much longer. At noontime, he catches himself staring at Usopp's wrist as juice drips down from his palm, transfixed by the liquid shine on his dark skin. Close to delirious from thirst, he fantasizes about taking hold of Usopp's arm and pulling it to his mouth, lapping up the precious droplets before they spill.

He comes back to himself in a dizzying rush. Sanji forces the image from his head, but it keeps returning, even once they're back to walking. He compromises by not looking at Usopp at all.

He can't explain to himself why he's resisting so hard, let alone to Usopp. This has gone past discomfort into necessity: even if the fruit makes him sick, he'll die without something to drink. But his mind keeps flashing back to the weeks he spent trapped on that miserable rock, to rainless days where he stared down at the roiling sea and ached to fill his stomach with its salty, treacherous abundance. Thirst can transmute deadly poison into the sweetest nectar, but the poison will kill you just the same. He survived the rock by sheer endurance, and he can endure now.

His friends are coming. They are. He can wait that long.

They come to another clearing just as the day's light is starting to fade. Sanji's bleary eyes spy paper lanterns in the boughs overhead, and his heart momentarily leaps with excitement—did they finally make it back to the village?—before he realizes that the glimmer is only in his own spotty vision. What he thought were lanterns are just more pieces of fruit, ripened and unfurled to reveal the glowing orange hearts within.

The shock of disappointment is too much for his weakened body. He tilts his head towards the sky as he sinks to his knees, too dizzy to stand. All he can do is watch as blue and orange kaleidoscope above him, praying for a blur of red to cut through the noise. Usopp is saying something, shouting something, but his ears are filled with old memories: Zeff's snarl, Luffy's laugh.

Isn't someone coming for him?

Drink.

He's too weak to resist the command. He opens his mouth and syrupy juice coats his tongue. He swallows without thinking, without questioning. Why did he refuse before? He's never tasted anything this sweet, this nourishing, this overwhelmingly good. The supply is never-ending: another fruit is pressed to his lips the moment he sucks the first dry. He reaches out blindly for Usopp's wrist, keeping him close as he gulps down another mouthful. He might cry if Usopp took the offering away now.

His stomach aches with each swallow, liquid pooling heavy as stone in his empty gut, but his tongue still feels parched. When the juice is gone, he tears into the fruit's flesh, biting chunks with his teeth until his mouth is overfull. Stickiness gushes down his chin as the fruit turns to mash between his eager teeth. He's lost all awareness of where he is, of the fact that he's rooting in Usopp's hand like a desperate, starving animal. He needs more, needs more, and—

The sickness hits him all at once. A painful, twisting nausea curls up his throat, his eyes whiting out with the force of it. Sanji has just enough presence of mind to turn away from Usopp before his stomach heaves, but nothing comes up but a thin stream of drool. He heaves again, spitting mucus into the leaves as he falls on all fours, but his body refuses to give up the meagre sustenance after days of deprivation.

He's vaguely aware of a hand rubbing circles in his back. The only person who ever rubbed his back like this has been dead for a decade, and he can't help but arch into the sympathetic touch, forgoing all dignity for the sake of comforting touch.

"I should have told you to slow down," comes Usopp's distraught voice. "I'm so sorry, I should have—I'm sorry. You just looked so awful, and I didn't want you to… to die."

Sanji presses his forehead to the cool leaves, discarded rinds nudging his cheek as he tries to breathe through the cramps. The hand disappears, and he's momentarily alone before a familiar weight lands on his shoulders.

His suit jacket.

"You— don't have to—" he forces out before another wave of nausea hits him and he clenches his jaw shut. Usopp shushes his protests.

"You've done a lot for me already. Let me do a little for you, ok?"

Slowly, Sanji relents. He lets Usopp guide him to the base of a tree and settle him against its roots. Usopp's hands start rubbing nervously over his shoulders, soothing away the chills as his body continues to fight against what he just swallowed.

"Sorry," Usopp whispers again. Sanji wants to tell him to stop apologizing, but it's like his mouth is gummed shut, his tongue moving through treacle. A few words are all he can manage.

"Don't let me—me…"

Choke.

He passes out before he can finish the warning.

Sanji dreams of roots curling around his waist like a mother's arms, tugging him backwards into a warm, beating centre. He leans against the heat, savouring the closeness to another breathing thing after so many years without any touch at all. He could open his eyes, but he doesn't want to. He wants to imagine that the presence at his back has golden hair and a kind smile, that her warmth is wrapped in a white nightgown that smells of safety as much as antiseptic. He wants to live in the dream a little longer: a dream where he's cared for and loved and needs do nothing more to earn it than lie still and let himself be held.

But the morning comes, as it always does, and with it his adult body and his adult worries. The only thing that doesn't return is the cold. He opens his eyes to find his legs have disappeared, buried deep in a pile of dead leaves and mulch. He can barely wiggle his toes beneath the heaviness, but he isn't shivering. He twists experimentally, but he can't dislodge himself.

That's when he notices Usopp dozing behind him, his body a barrier between Sanji's back and the rough bark.

Sanji freezes. A different sort of heat begins to flood through Sanji's body as Usopp shifts behind him, hips and chests and arms tangled together in a clumsy embrace. He tries to shimmy away before Usopp fully stirs, but his legs are still buried. He's stuck in place, no choice but to endure the warmth that surrounds him.

"Get off," Sanji finally snaps, with a harshness is born more of alarm than actual anger. The dream alone would have been enough to leave him out of sorts, let alone waking up in a position he doesn't recognize. Usopp's eyes, which had begun to flutter, fly open, and he quickly scrambles away.

"Ah, sorry, sorry," Usopp says, rocking back and forth on his heels. "You were just shivering so much, and I thought maybe if I kept you off the ground, it would help? But I shouldn't have—I know it's weird, we're strangers, that's probably too much—"

Usopp's eyes begin to mist with a muddle of hurt and familiar self-recrimination. Whatever alarm he felt is replaced by shame at being the cause of so much distress.

Didn't Usopp take care of him? Comfort him? Feed him? And in return, he's lashing out at the only other person he has—the only person who's been at his side since he entered this forest.

(Where are my friends?

The thought is a faint whisper, gone before it takes hold in his mind.)

"It's ok. It's fine. Don't apologize," he says, gentling his voice as he starts shoving dirt and leaves off his lap. He's never seen anything vulnerable he didn't want to protect, and Usopp's vulnerability is pouring out of every crevice, raw and inescapable. Once his legs are free, Sanji scoots over to Usopp and wraps an arm around his shoulders, an awkward approximation of the comfort Usopp gave to him. He melts into the embrace, clutching at Sanji's shoulders like he'd been starving for exactly this for an age.

"Please don't hate me," Usopp whispers.

"I don't," Sanji says, confused. Usopp sinks further into his arms. "Why would I hate you?"

Usopp's eyes go dim. "Everyone does."

"That can't be true," Sanji says, though he wishes he didn't know how Usopp feels. At nearly every point in his life, the number of people who hated him far outweighed the ones who didn't.

"The whole village hates me. Everyone… they don't want me back. I can't go back."

"We're both going back," Sanji reminds him, worried by the defeat in Usopp's voice. "We just have to keep walking."

They had another plan—something they were waiting for? or someone?—but Sanji's mind is still fuzzy and exhausted after another awful night of sleep. Now that the stomach pain is gone, hunger is starting to creep in again, and it makes it hard to think for longer than a few seconds. Maybe it will come back to him once they get moving.

"You're not going to leave me behind, right?" Usopp says quietly. "Not all alone out here?"

Sanji shakes his head. "We're in this together. I'm not the kind of person to leave a friend behind."

Friends. Right. That's what he was waiting for: a friend like Usopp. He's been lost for so long, but he finally found a friend.

Despite the worry, Sanji smiles to himself. What a strange and wonderful concept. Sanji… has a friend. Was it really that long ago, that his only friends in the world were mice? It's a bizarre twist of fate to find one wandering in the middle of the wood, but he's grateful all the same.

And the last thing he's going to do is leave him behind.

They walk on, heedless of direction. All islands have an end by definition, Sanji reassures himself: if they don't find the village, they'll find the sea.

Usopp walks in front now; Sanji is still weak from the bout of sickness to lead. When Usopp offers to bring him more so he can build his strength back up, Sanji listlessly shakes his head. He'll try again if it's between that and starvation, but until then, he still hasn't given up on finding other options. He leaves Usopp to his lunch and goes off to forage, careful not to wander too far in case the trees decide to play any more tricks.

If it came down to it, he could stun a squirrel or a rabbit easily enough with his heel. If only he could find a squirrel or a rabbit. It's been a while since he's even heard a bird sing: are there no animals in this part of the wood at all?

He turns his eyes to the ground, looking for mushrooms or tubers or anything that he recognizes as edible, but all he sees are endless drifts of leaves: a desert of red and orange. Whatever food is hidden beneath will take too much energy to find.

The trees here are larger than any he's seen so far. Towering firs loom over Sanji's head, with broad roots that arc out of the ground before piercing back through the dirt. The most striking feature of the area is a gemels pair: two trees grafted together by long cohabitation, now growing as one. They meet a few feet above the ground, bark and wood impossibly fused into one living entity, somehow both alive and stronger for the paired existence. Their roots are entangled so heavily that they form a shadowy cave in the space between the two. Inside the cave, Sanji at last spies what he was looking for: a beautiful hen-of-the-woods mushroom, blooming full and large in the protective shade of its twin guardians.

His mouth waters at the sight. He drops to his knees and crawls into the crevice, shoulders brushing against roots as he pushes forward. It's a tight squeeze, but he's always been slight, and the last few days have thinned him out further. The ground is hard against his knees, especially after the leaves disappear and leave nothing for cushioning but dirt. It's taking longer than he expected to reach the mushroom, but while he still has the white glow of its nourishing flesh in sight, he can't do anything but keep going.

By the time his fingers brush its delicate folds, the squeeze is so tight he can barely breathe. But it doesn't matter. He doesn't need to breathe to eat. He tears the mushroom from the earth and bites into it, not even bothering to brush away the dirt from its skin. Particulate and rubbery flesh crunch between his teeth. The earthen smell clogs his nostrils, drying out his throat. It takes three tries to swallow the first bite, and even then he still feels a lump, like the mushroom didn't make it the whole way down. He swallows again, but there's no moisture in his mouth: he can't clear it.

And then, like an answer to a prayer, he looks down and a fruit is right in front of him, nudging his hand. It must have rolled off a tree and into the gap between roots.

He shouldn't. He knows what will happen if he does.

But thirst is just another kind of hunger, and the call of the sea is too tempting to resist. He grabs the fruit and tears it open. The juice is thicker than he remembers, the scent even sweeter and more overripe, but he doesn't care. It clears the dirt from his tongue and washes the rest of the mushroom down. He takes another bite: maybe if he's quick, he can get more sustenance down before the nausea hits again.

And it does come again, but weaker this time, like his body is slowly growing accustomed to the foreign substance and pushing past its initial rejection. His stomach cramps, but he doesn't heave. He even manages to take another sip of the juice to wash the second mouthful of mushroom away.

Only after he finishes the mushroom does he guiltily remember that he should have saved some to share with Usopp. It's too late now: all gone, even the bulb at the bottom that was buried to the hilt in dirt before he brought it to his lips. He swallowed everything.

Sanji tries to turn and leave, but the space is too narrow to twist his body around fully. His only choice is to crawl backwards, but he only makes it a short distance before his feet hit resistance. He kicks out with his heel, but the root in his way refuses to budge. He tries again, harder this time, and hears the splinter of fractured wood. He starts moving backward again, but after a few moments his feet again meet resistance. Sanji manages to flip himself onto his back so he can glance at what's blocking his path.

What he sees is a horde of roots, wriggling and alive, closing over the entrance to the cave. He watches in uncomprehending horror while they stiffen and straighten into cage bars, leaving only thin slits of light as the rest of the crevice is plunged into darkness. His breath quickens, a familiar panic overtaking his chest.

No, don't lock me in here, don't leave me alone in here—

Sanji kicks out desperately, shattering one bar, but another takes its place within seconds. Around him, the walls of roots start to constrict, squeezing his body like an embalming shroud.

The sound of the wind is gone, and the bars are closing in, and he's cold and alone and he can't breathe, he can't—

Don't leave me here, Father, please—

"Sanji!"

There's a hand on his ankle, dragging him forward an inhuman strength, and the bars are gone and there's only Usopp ahead of him, only Usopp's arms tugging him up into a tight embrace as he bursts into sunlight. When he looks over his shoulder, terrified to see the horde of roots reaching for him, the gemels trees are as they always were: just two trunks leaning against each other, motionless, as if they've been that way for decades.

"What happened?" Usopp says, frantic. "You passed out, oh my god, I thought you were dead, Sanji, you can't die, please, you can't leave me—"

"I'm not dead, Usopp," he mumbles into Usopp's chest, though he feels as shaken as if he nearly was. "Didn't you see… the trees, they were—"

Usopp clutches him tighter. "You weren't trying to leave, right?"

"No," Sanji says. "No, the trees—"

"You can't die," Usopp says. "You have to stay with me. You promised."

He's still shaking, but Usopp's fear is more palpable than his own. Sanji swallows down the remaining panic and tries to get his heart rate back under control so that Usopp will calm down too. "It's ok. I'm fine. I'm not leaving."

Usopp lets out a shuddering breath and buries his head in Sanji's shoulder. "I'm so glad you're here," he mouths into Sanji's neck, lips brushing just below his ear, and Sanji's heart rate speeds again. His body feels electric, overstimulated, but he lets Usopp cling as long as he needs to.

That night, Sanji isn't surprised when Usopp crawls over to him and wordlessly wraps Sanji in his arms. He was expecting it. Whatever embarrassment he once felt at being so close to another man is slowly fading. It's dark, and the night is chilly, and the memory of his isolated cell in Germa is still fresh enough that he's desperate for any reminder that someone else is nearby. Sanji presses a hand to Usopp's forearm as it wraps around his chest. The bones aren't as pronounced as he thought they'd be: Usopp's flesh is warm and soft and gives a little beneath Sanji's grip, like he's gained weight in the last few days. Maybe that fruit is more filling than Sanji thought.

He sinks into Usopp's warmth, enjoying the shelter while he's awake. But when he dreams, he's back in the cage of roots. He tries to kick his legs free, but the roots transmute to iron bars before his eyes. He squeezes them shut, trying to block out the sight, and when he opens them again, he's in a bed with the faint scent of antiseptic tickling his nose. His legs are heavy, wrapped in thick hospital linens. His mother lies across the end of the white-sheeted bed, her body curled toward him. He can't kick his way free without hitting her.

Why would he need to escape, anyway? If she's here, he's exactly where he wants to be.

When he wakes from the dream, Usopp hasn't moved from behind him, but his legs are buried in the earth, only knees peeking out through the soil.

Even daylight feels like dreaming now. Sanji's body has stopped rejecting the fruit, and he licks his fingers as he walks, clean away the last drops of their lunch. The juice clings to his tongue like molasses, thick and cloying. Maybe if they get out of here he'll make pancakes and turn the juice into some kind of syrup. Usopp would enjoy that, wouldn't he? He's always wanted to cook for a friend.

Usopp is telling him another story, he thinks. He missed the beginning, but he tries to focus, tries to think of something other than their next meal.

"—was going to be a doctor. I used to climb up to her window—"

He floats again, drifting another few paces before his gaze settles on the back on Usopp's neck. A bead of sweat hangs below his ear. It almost looks like syrup in the right light. Sanji licks his lips.

His mouth is dry again.

"Hey, Sanji? Are you hungry?" Usopp asks. It might be a few hours later, or a few days. The answer is always yes.

He takes another fruit from Usopp's waiting hands. Their fingers brush. His eyes linger, fascinated, on the place where their bodies meet.

He dreams that night of a beautiful woman with red hair and fierce, familiar eyes. She climbs into his lap, effortless and alluring as she leans down to press her lips to his. It's a dream he's had before, though he can't remember when. He opens up to her without hesitation, bodies arching as one as his mouth receives her eager tongue.

She melds into him, deepening the kiss until his mouth is aching and filled with the sweetness of her. He leans back and she chases him forward, scarcely giving him time to breath before her hands are on him again, cradling his head, dragging him in for another kiss: deep, desperate. He answers her desperation in kind, chasing the contact he's longed for all his life, when someone finally sees something in his body worth cherishing.

He doesn't complain when her hands become rough and scrape at his skin, or when the tongue in his mouth stiffens into something turgid and slick and unlike human flesh. He's lost in the fever of being wanted. He'll let her do anything to him.

The thing in his mouth grows thicker, sliding forward to press against his uvula. He doesn't gag, even as the thickness breaches his esophagus and passes into his throat. His stomach has learned to stop resisting what it's offered. His mouth burns from being stretched so wide, and his chin is sticky with something slick and sweet. The same substance pulses down his throat, so deep that all he can do is swallow the honey down.

He reaches out for the woman, but his hands only meet hard, gnarled wood. A root catches his wrist and brings it gently down to his chest. More roots reach out to embrace his body, drawing him close, touching even the parts of himself that he hates. He is loved entirely.

He wakes up exhausted, drooling spilling from his lips onto the pillow of Usopp's lap. His throat aches, raw like it used to feel after he cried his way through a nightmare as a child. Thankfully, all his dreams are sweet now.

Something feels different, though it takes him a moment to realize what the change is.

Cradled here in Usopp's lap, he doesn't feel hungry anymore.

Sanji walks empty handed beneath a smattering of warm sunlight. Green grass springs back beneath his feet; there were leaves before, but they've all gone away now, and the world smells of new growth. Usopp is farther ahead and Sanji follows, though he doesn't feel the need to rush. Usopp won't abandon him. They only have each other.

He joins Usopp in the clearing ahead. The ground is covered in honeysuckle and bluebells, and every step releases another burst of sweetness. Usopp looks up towards the canopy of the forest.

"This would be a good spot for a treehouse," he assesses. "I always wanted one as a kid. Did you?"

Sanji doesn't think he knew that treehouses existed as a kid, but he probably would have wanted one if he did. He was always looking for a place to hide, some secret spot where nobody else could reach him. He imagined locking himself in a castle spire sometimes, like a princess from the fairytales, but he couldn't enjoy such a lonely fantasy for long. Eventually, a prince would have to come along and rescue him, or what was the point?

"I think we should build one," Usopp decides, and Sanji's heart warms to the idea immediately. A place to hide, but not a lonely one. It's perfect. He doesn't want to sleep on the ground anymore anyways, and he's always wanted a house: a small one, study and simple and safe, with someone he loved.

He used to have other dreams too, but he doesn't really remember them. That's fine though. He has everything he needs to be happy right here.

Usopp goes off to gather wood for their new project, and Sanji sits among the flowers, gathering their leaves and placing them on his tongue. The petals go down easy: not filling, but when has eating ever been simply about hunger? He eats for pure pleasure now, filling his stomach with yellows and blues and every other colour the forest has to offer. He sees how dull his life used to be before he came to this place, before he and Usopp found each other.

"The trees let you take that much?" he asks, curious, as Usopp returns with an armload of wood. He's long stopped seeing the trees as a malevolent force: all they've really done is keep him here, and here is exactly where he wants to be. But he still wonders that they'd let Usopp cut off pieces of themselves without protest.

Usopp smiles and lays the wood down at Sanji's feet. "They know it's for you, so they don't mind," he says, like that explains everything, and maybe it does. Usopp is the plant expert, after all. He knows the trees better than Sanji ever will.

Together, they fashion planks from the boughs, using sharp rocks as smoothing knives. Whatever they need, the clearing provides, and soon enough Usopp is climbing up to the sky and stringing their new home together. Sanji passes him planks and Usopp hoists them with ease. His muscles have filled out: gone is the skinny boy Sanji met all those… days? weeks? months?… ago. His strength leaves Sanji breathless, hungry for something other than food.

Eventually, the treehouse takes shape: three sturdy walls, with the fourth formed by the trunk of an enormous tree. Usopp tells Sanji to wait to come up till everything is finished, and Sanji doesn't argue. It's easy enough to drift for hours while Usopp works. He vaguely remembers that his life used to rush by, an indistinct blur of plates clinking and orders shouted over his head, but it's lovely to have nothing pressing to do in a day.

He sleeps until Usopp rouses him. There's a ladder hanging from the treehouse to the ground now, its ropes made of braided roots. He clambers up after Usopp, excited to see the interior of their new home.

Usopp pulls back a curtain of leafy fronds and Sanji steps inside. The single room is sparsely furnished: no beds or chairs. Those can come later. But at the centre of the room is a low table, just the right size for two to sit across from each other. And in the middle of the table, surrounded by a bouquet of fresh-picked flowers, is a pie.

"I wanted to wait till we could share it," Usopp says. Sanji swallows back the lump in his throat and hugs Usopp wordlessly before kneeling on the floor to examine his gift. It's as fresh as if it just came out of the oven, peaches rich and unspoiled in a flaky crust, the brown sugar glaze twinkling cheerfully on the latticework top.

They eat with their hands, uncaring as crumbs spill onto their laps and the floor. Sanji watches Usopp as he eats, and Usopp's returning smile is open and guileless. He looks back at Sanji with so much love that Sanji sets his piece down half-eaten. He's too hungry to wait.

With sticky hands, he takes Usopp's bare shoulders and lays him down on the floor. Usopp's mouth tastes of peaches but his skin tastes of sawdust, their flavours intertwined into a taste unique to them. Sanji gathers it all on his tongue while Usopp gasps beneath him, kissing him back just as eagerly.

Hands find buttons, buckles, pulling each other apart until only skin and flesh remains. His hand slips down to grasp Usopp, hard and ready, and taking him in hand feels as natural as touching himself once did. He strokes velvety skin until Usopp spills between them, then tastes that too, trading gasps for one of his own as Usopp's hand finds him in the same way.

They fall asleep naked and entwined, and for once, Sanji dreams of nothing at all.

Sanji blinks the sleep from his eyes sometime just before morning, limbs tingling and heavy. He's sitting with his back against the tree wall, but when he looks down, he sees more root than skin. His legs are almost entirely encased in twisted wood. He tries to turn his head, to look around for where Usopp went, but his neck won't move. Cool bark presses down on the crown of his head, keeping him facing forward. His arms are similarly caged at the elbows, grafted to the tree at his back.

Usopp finally appears at the glass-less window. He perches on one of the outside branches, head cradled in one hand as he gazes at Sanji with so much love and adoration Sanji almost forgets his predicament. Around his head hang dozens of orange fruits, like the paper lanterns Sanji once mistook them for, glowing bright as cinder fire in the twilight.

"She looked like you, you know," Usopp says dreamily. Sanji's chest clenches in confusion. She? It's only ever been Sanji and Usopp, Usopp and Sanji. Who is she? "Same hair, same eyes. But she didn't stay with me."

Sanji struggles, trying to reach Usopp so he can see his face more clearly, but he can't move at all.

"You did, though," Usopp says. He clambers through the window and walks towards Sanji, still naked as he kneels in front of Sanji's bound legs. "You didn't die. You stayed."

He takes a breath before reaching out to touch Sanji's cheek. Sanji leans into the touch, heart pounding with a fear like a first kiss: nervous, exhilarated.

"Kaya was the only one who didn't hate me. After she died, they threw me out, you know? The village. Nobody wanted me. But you did." He presses his thumb against Sanji's parted lips. "You want me," he breathes.

Sanji nods despite the unease creeping up his trapped throat. "I want you," he says as Usopp traces his lips with his thumb. "I promised I'd stay. So… so you can let me go. I won't leave."

Usopp shakes his head. "I want to take care of you," he says. "If I'm the one taking care of you, you won't die. You'll let me, right? Let me take care of you?"

It's the sweetest thing anyone has ever offered Sanji. He can't nod, but Usopp seems to understand by the look in Sanji's eyes.

He climbs into Sanji's lap and reaches down between them. His hand is slick with syrup as it wraps around Sanji, stroking him before he sinks down. Sanji groans at the unexpected heat as he enters Usopp. What little skin was left exposed, Usopp covers with his own body as he rocks against Sanji.

Sanji closes his eyes and leans back, and surrenders.

How wonderful it is to be loved this much: that an entire forest would bend itself to your shape, wanting to hold nothing else but you.