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dethoratsTitle: Allegiance
Rating: PG
Word Count: 284
Pairing/Characters: ZoLu
Topic: One Condition
”I’m going to be the world’s greatest swordsman! I’ll join you and follow you as my captain…but only if you promise to never stand in the way of my dream.”
It seemed so long ago, that day he uttered those words and a grinning young man in a battered straw hat had readily accepted, had agreed to kill himself if he ever prevented the fulfillment of his new swordsman’s vow. Did it still count, Zoro wondered as the first wave of agony tore through him, if Luffy didn’t interfere directly? The bleak humor of that thought made him laugh, a choking, rasping sound, or maybe that was just the blood surging up and out of his throat, forced from tortured lungs. Staring death in the face once more, he could only think of the choice offered to him back in East Blue and all it had meant since then.
Kuma wavered in and out of Zoro’s sight as his body spasmed and his jaw strained to hold in his cries. The shichibukai had given his word and Zoro intended to make sure he kept it. At least as long as he could, as his grip on consciousness wavered. But to keep his captain – to keep Luffy - alive, that was everything. His dream could wait. Could even if it meant he’d break his most important promise. And as the tide of pain swept over him and threatened true oblivion, Zoro couldn’t bring himself to regret his choice, the same one he’d have made before and that he’d make again if he lived to see another day. If Luffy wasn’t there to be his pirate king, the achievement of his own dream just didn’t matter.
Rating: PG
Word Count: 284
Pairing/Characters: ZoLu
Topic: One Condition
”I’m going to be the world’s greatest swordsman! I’ll join you and follow you as my captain…but only if you promise to never stand in the way of my dream.”
It seemed so long ago, that day he uttered those words and a grinning young man in a battered straw hat had readily accepted, had agreed to kill himself if he ever prevented the fulfillment of his new swordsman’s vow. Did it still count, Zoro wondered as the first wave of agony tore through him, if Luffy didn’t interfere directly? The bleak humor of that thought made him laugh, a choking, rasping sound, or maybe that was just the blood surging up and out of his throat, forced from tortured lungs. Staring death in the face once more, he could only think of the choice offered to him back in East Blue and all it had meant since then.
Kuma wavered in and out of Zoro’s sight as his body spasmed and his jaw strained to hold in his cries. The shichibukai had given his word and Zoro intended to make sure he kept it. At least as long as he could, as his grip on consciousness wavered. But to keep his captain – to keep Luffy - alive, that was everything. His dream could wait. Could even if it meant he’d break his most important promise. And as the tide of pain swept over him and threatened true oblivion, Zoro couldn’t bring himself to regret his choice, the same one he’d have made before and that he’d make again if he lived to see another day. If Luffy wasn’t there to be his pirate king, the achievement of his own dream just didn’t matter.
