Author's Notes:

Here it is, guys - the last chapter! I can't believe I've actually finished a fic and can say I'm happy with the way it turned out. I hope I don't disappoint any of you with the ending, though... alright, enough wallowing in doubt.

Enjoy the last chapter~

"Sanji-kun! Move over, I can't hear anything!"

"My deepest apologies, Nami-swaaan~!" Sanji noodles to the left a bit, hearts bulging from his eyes.

Nami sends a threatening glare his way, because the words are said far too loudly. It's pretty damn hilarious how quickly Sanji launches back into serious mode.

Robin smiles softly and squishes the blue-nosed reindeer in her arms further into her chest, nearly suffocating poor Chopper with her giant breasts in the process. Giving a small nudge to their sniper, who has his face glued to the floorboards in order to listen better, she whispers, "Usopp-san, you may want to join us up here. There's a possibility of Zoro cutting your nose off or Luffy grinding it into dust if they see it poking through that crack."

With a huffed laugh, Usopp surges up, for once not greatly disturbed by Robin's graphic descriptions (he swears she does it on purpose by now, and specifically for his horrified reactions). He crosses his arms and leans against the door frame in an I-know-something-you-don't stance, smirking for reasons to be revealed. "Ah, but you can't actually see what's going on in there right now, can you?" His smirk widens. "I can. And let me tell you personally, Robin, you're missing out on some juicy, yaoi-blog-worthy pictures right now. Big ti-"

Chopper squeals. His eyes widen dramatically and he just barely contains a loud yelp as Robin tightens her grip on him dangerously. The ship's doctor is then thrust at Usopp with enough force and speed to give the reindeer whiplash.

"Please take Chopper. We are trading places." Her deceptively sweet smile says it all.

Usopp is snatching their tiniest crew-mate and zipping to the back of the kitchen faster than he's ever avoided anything in his life.

"Oi! What's going on? Dammit, I wanted to listen, too!" Franky whines from his place near the stove, too big for Nami to allow him to huddle by the infirmary door with the rest of the Straw Hats. Brook laughs boisterously beside him, having chosen to stay with Franky so he wouldn't be alone.

Sanji narrows his eyes into slits, curly eyebrow scrunching together like a caterpillar. "Shut the hell up! I really want – no, I need to hear this."

Robin looks up briefly from the door's crack, her curious eyes locking with Nami's. Nami speaks up for the both of them, "Why are you so interested, Sanji-kun?"

Realizing it's a woman speaking to him - his dear Nami-swan, no less - Sanji subdues the urge to bite another head off for daring to open their goddamn mouth. "This Marimo might just be the biggest idiot here, excluding Luffy. He's revealing all kinds of deep shit I never dreamed that he could, or would, even on his death-bed."

Nami just shrugs at Robin and returns to pressing her ear against the door.

Zoro stares blankly at the ceiling. There's no way he can look at Luffy, so he tugs him closer and feels arms wind around him in return. "You already know that Kuma showed up, right?"

Luffy just nods.

Zoro closes his eyes. "Nobody could do anything about it; all of our attacks just bounced right off him. One attack from him, though, and everyone on our side was down – the whole crew plus the people living on Thriller Bark – they were all dead or knocked out. He kept offering to spare our lives before that, but-" Zoro clenches his teeth "-but he wanted your head in exchange."

"Zoro-"

"We flat-out refused, so naturally, he bombed the place. I was awake, by some miracle, and I saw Kuma going straight for you. He even got ahold of you for a second, but I'd be damned if I let him walk away with my captain, so I took a slice at him and managed to land a hit.

"It didn't do any good. The guy was made like Franky is now; a whole lot of metal and weapons. Pacifistas are a pain in the ass, and I could hardly even make myself move at that point. I asked him why he had to take your head, and his shitty answer was that it was as far as he was willing to compromise. I wouldn't fucking stand for it. No way was he taking you from us, and he would just kill everyone if some other kind of compromise wasn't reached anyway, so I-"

Zoro stops, unsure if he should continue. It's not too late; he hasn't gotten to the root of this whole mess yet, and he's only one sentence away from spilling his secret. Luffy's been surprisingly quiet at his side throughout the whole explanation, and when he does speak, Zoro can barely hear him.

"I saved him, you know."

It takes Zoro a moment, but then it clicks. "You mean Ace."

Luffy squeezes his hand. "Yeah, Ace."

"But didn't he…"

"Die? Yeah, he's dead." Luffy smiles and Zoro wonders how he can do that while talking about the loss of a brother. "I got him out before that though – saved him, Zoro – but then he decided to save me." The bright smile turns into something far sadder, something that makes Zoro ache. "Did you know that magma is stronger than fire? They're both so hot that I didn't think it could be, but… well, I found out the hard way that that wasn't true."

"Luffy, you know you don't have to-"

"But I need to tell you something, Zoro." Luffy nudges him on his aching torso and Zoro stifles a gasp.

"Okay, okay, go ahead, just don't do that again."

"I really missed you, even if you like to snap at me." Luffy grins.

"Idiot," Zoro retorts, too fond to be insulting.

Luffy grins wider. "Well, you guys brought this idiot back. After Ace, I was ready to just give up. Didn't even want to be Pirate King anymore, if you could believe it, but then Jimbei said something and I remembered how you and the others were all waiting for me and… that was it, I knew I could keep going if I just had you."

"Y-you... fuck, you are so-" Zoro stammers, at a loss for words, and heat crawls up his neck as Luffy merely tilts his head in confusion. "Goddammit, stop doing that!"

"Doing what, Zoro?"

"Making me want to spill my guts to you!"

"Just do it then and maybe I'll stop!"

Zoro finally just spits it out: "I made a deal! I convinced Kuma to take my head for yours!"

Luffy goes rigid. "Zoro…" Luffy's livid in the next second, and Zoro is amazed that he hasn't already been punched in the face. "I didn't ask you to! I didn't ask Ace, either, and now he's-"

"You were more important, okay? You had your dream and mine just suddenly – I didn't care about it. I didn't care about being number one if you weren't there to climb to the top with me."

"That's not what you said when we met; if I got in your way, you had every right to kill me. And I did, so you should've just let Kuma-"

"Things change, Luffy! I'd fucking follow you into hell if you asked m-"

"Shut up, Zoro!"

"No, you wanted me to talk, so I'm talking," he glares. "I mean, what kind of first mate can't even protect his captain? And the others needed me to do something just as much as you did. I was stubborn and wouldn't let Sanji do shit when he woke up, so I gambled on surviving Kuma's test, took in all the pain you went through for myself and I lived. I'm here, I'm alive, you're alive – that's the end of it." Zoro drops his head back, sighing, because that's not the end of it. He wants to scream to the world how glad he is that Luffy's alive, that he's right here, in his arms, fierce as the day Zoro met him.

Luffy's glare crumbles, his soft tone holding more pain than his screams when he says, "You still could've died."

Zoro's own voice drops. "But I didn't."

Luffy slumps against him again, apparently sick of fighting.

"Zoro, I'm going to punch you if you don't stop belittling what you did."

Or maybe he's just done with the verbal kind of fighting.

Zoro rolls his eyes. "I'm not belittling- ow, shit! What the hell, Luffy?!"

Luffy withdraws his fist and shrugs. "I did warn you."

"I didn't even say anything!"

Luffy doesn't look at him. "It was payback, then, for Thriller Bark and earlier today. Stop trying to get yourself killed over me."

Zoro can't promise that he won't, stubbornly keeping his silence.

"Oh, and Zoro?" Luffy taps at Zoro's collar bone and loosens his grip as he sits up.

"Wha-" the word gets swallowed by an open-mouthed kiss. It's over too quickly - he barely has time to enjoy it after the initial shock - and Zoro's left staring at midnight black irises in a daze.

Luffy's face is calm when he tells him, "That was a thank you."

"Do you ever get the feeling that the world's just stopped, like it doesn't exist?" Zoro blurts. He doesn't mean to say it at all, and the question is so totally out of place that he wants to run outside and jump overboard.

Luffy's alarmed look makes his outburst even worse. "Zoro... what?"

Well, fuck, now he has to explain or suffer endless pestering.

"You know, like the whole world has just stopped and gone away," he explains, squinting at the ceiling like it's done something offensive, "and there's nothing but where you are, or who you're with, or what you're doing. Do you ever feel like that?"

"Hmmm, no." He shakes his head, back to tracing circles on Zoro's chest. "But when we kiss or I'm just lying down, here, with you - then yeah, I think maybe I have."

Zoro can't stand waiting another second. He hauls Luffy up towards him, without protest surprisingly enough, and kisses him for all he's worth. Zoro wasn't wearing much to begin with, but he decides that Luffy is wearing far too many clothes. He slides his hands under the red fabric of Luffy's open shirt and attempts to slip it off his shoulders, not expecting to have his hands slapped away before he's even really done anything.

"Nope," Luffy says cheerily, jumping off the bed, "Zoro's injured."

Zoro gawks. "You can't be fucking serious."

Luffy only laughs at him and heads for the door. He swings it open and instinctively sidesteps as Nami and Sanji lose their support and dog-pile onto Robin, who lets out a soft gasp as she's suddenly sandwiched between her crew-mates and the deck.

Luffy cackles at their predicament, but Zoro blanches. "How long have you guys been there?"

Sanji looks at him from upside down, having landed that way. "Long enough, shitty swordsman."

Robin manages to use her powers to lift Nami and Sanji off of her and help the two of them to their feet.

"Nami," she says, "Luffy and Zoro tried to eat each other's faces; you owe me 100,000 beli."

Nami dissolves into tears. "My money!" she wails, but then grows neutral frighteningly quickly as she walks out the door. "Fine, whatever, a bet is a bet."

Zoro wants to die. Or kill someone. "You were betting on us?"

Luffy keeps laughing, like this is the most hilarious thing in the world, and Zoro glares at him before turning back to Robin. "How long?!"

"Since Franky joined the crew."

Luffy snorts loudly. "Zoro! She could've won so much earlier than this if all we had to do was kiss!"

"That's not the point."

"We did sooo much more than kissing-"

"Shut. Up."

Robin smiles to herself. Zoro catches it and- oh god. Oh god, his suspicions about her perviness were dead-on. She knows exactly what Luffy's talking about.

Usopp pokes his head in the doorway, sees Zoro's murderous expression as Sanji and Luffy both roll on the floor in laughter, and promptly leaves to go hide with Franky and Brook. Today is not his dying day, no sir, it is not.

Eventually, and shockingly, Luffy kicks them all out of the infirmary.

"We're good, right?" Zoro asks, breaking the silence.

Luffy whirls around and gives him one of those grins that has Zoro falling in love all over again. "Of course!"

We really are okay... And Zoro lets his head drop back against the wall with a small smile at Luffy's unhesitating words, because when all was said and done, that was really all that mattered anyway.