It had been two weeks since you were matched, and a week since your voice left you. Your body was covered in light bruises from training with Mihawk. It was hard, it had been years since you exercised regularly in the first place, and second to that, Mihawk was a strict instructor. You had had your choice of Zoro or Mihawk, and had chosen the elder vs the younger, not because you thought Zoro lacked in teaching in any way, but because if you became frustrated, you didn't want to be frustrated at him.

Things had fallen into a comfortable routine, comfortable in the feel of it at least, not that it was a routine you wanted to see continue for any longer than it had to. You woke up next to Zoro every morning, had breakfast with him and Mihawk, started your morning training, cleaned parts of the house, ate lunch, then afternoon training, spent as long as you could manage soaking in the bathroom, and then relaxed a bit before dinner. Some days you cooked meals, most days you didn't.

Mihawk insisted he enjoyed cooking, but you were pretty sure he was making sure you had time to adjust in all manner of ways.

There was no new news on the arsonist, and your voice still wouldn't work. You'd gone to a doctor, Mihawk took you to some nice blonde man who told you to call him Marco, and not Dr. Phoenix when your voice returned. According to his tests there was nothing physically stopping you from speaking, which almost felt worse.

You had been reassured so many times you were almost sick of being reassured. You just wanted to scream at this point, and that made things far worse. If you could just bellow, you'd solve all your problems.

You were sighing to yourself and feeling generally down as you dragged the trash out. You weren't paying attention like you had been and when you dragged the bin out of the gate you didn't look to see if the police cruiser was there or not. You weren't technically supposed to step past the gate by yourself unless there was a patrol car outside, but looking for one was hardly habit, as you generally didn't go out past the gate in the first place.

You drag the bin to curb and look up and down the empty street. Something about it seems wrong, but your brain was lagging behind, as you turn and look another direction you could see smoke rising in the not-so-distant distance. A few blocks down the road maybe, and it looked like a big wood fire.

The sound of sirens finally registers, and that sound clicks into your brain that the cruiser was missing. It had probably gone to assist with the fire, and a cold chill grips your heart. You turn back toward the door and stop short as something flies by you.

An arrow lodges into the doorway, slamming the door shut with a sharp thud and bang. You stumble back a step and another arrow lands between the cracks in the pavement by your foot. Suddenly you didn't feel like you were being hunted, so much as you were being herded, or toyed with.

Your heart is pounding in your chest, but you're oddly calm – your mind is clear even though your adrenaline is cranked. You put your back to the gate and step backward toward it. One step, two steps, nothing came at you through the air. You took a step toward the door and felt that chill again, pulling your foot back away from the door as an arrow arched into view and skittered off the pavement, landing where your foot had been.

Okay, you weren't going to go through the door. You could open the gate itself, but it was heavy and there wasn't a way to get through it easily. For a long minute you didn't move, scanning along the distance, trying to figure out where the arrows were coming from. Maybe if you dashed across the street the trajectory would be bad. The first shot had closed the door, and the second shot had moved you toward the gate, so whoever it was didn't want you panicking and going across the street earlier.

There's was a terribly loud high-pitched sound in the air, and a new arrow literally screamed toward you, landing deep into the gate. It hadn't been anywhere near hitting you, but it had sounded like a scream.

It sounded like you could've been screaming.

Your stomach sinks straight down into your feet. Whoever was shooting the arrows wanted you to stay out here because they wanted someone from inside to come out and find you. You weren't screaming for help because you couldn't scream for help. They didn't want to hit you and risk killing you, they wanted you to scream, and since you didn't, that's why they used such a loud shot after the first three arrows were silent.

"..." You whisper. Your voice is impossibly soft, but you made a noise. "---! ---!" you weren't forming words, but you were making sounds. You were so close!

You ran for the door, ducking down as you felt something brush along the collar of your Gi, and crashing into the door. It didn't give entirely the first time you threw your shoulder and body into it, but the second time you did you were accompanied by an arrow.

Whoever was trying to stop you from going back in had panicked, and the arrow slammed into your Gi, and then into the door at almost the same time that your body did. The door broke under the continued assault, and you fell into the property with a grunt as the door splintered under you. Rolling off to the side, putting the main part of the gate between you and the – by the gods, a sniper, were you really entertaining the thought that some mega-star sniper was harassing you?

Yes, you were staying in a Dojo, and you were matched to someone who had developed a three-sword style of fighting, and the world was a wide weird wild place, and hells you had survived a SERIAL KILLER as a kid, so technically no, this was not the most unbelievable thing to happen to you.

You hear – and see – the front entryway door start to slide open, and your feet are moving before your body has fully understood the risks you were taking. There's a few feet of open air, even with the height of the gate, between where it's safe to stand and the door way to the house.

Clink, clink, clink.

You see the shining shimmer of three golden earrings and will yourself to move faster.

"ZORO!" You scream as loud as you can, and see his eyes go wide as he registers you barreling toward him as fast as you can.

The scream of the arrow means that the projectile's destination is already decided, but you have no way to know who it's suppose to hit. You, or him. Zoro has a better view than you do, and you see his entire demeanor change.

You've never seen him fight, you've only ever seen him practice or instruct, and even when he was practicing you gave him space and didn't watch him. What you saw now was such an alarming change in demeanor that you weren't quite sure that time was still moving forward for you.

Zoro steps forward and drops down to a knee, and there's a flash of something, you can't even see what, that flickers up from his waist to the air over his head. The screaming sound from the arrow ends in a shower of shattered wood. You can finally see the sword in Zoro's hand, as you dash past him and he closes the door behind the both of you.

There's a veritable rain of heavy arrows slamming into the front entry way of the house. The angle of the shots keeps them from getting into the entry way, but the bottom half of the door is a mess by the time things stop.

You stumble into the entry way, barely keeping your feet under you as you the arrows rain down on the house. Your eyes move from Zoro to Mihawk. They both look serious, and so calm that you feel a little like you're overreacting. Adrenaline is keeping you on edge, and aside from your heaving gasps as you try to catch your breath and calm down there's a long silence after the arrows stop.

There's a metal scraping sound and a clear chink! as Zoro sets the sword back down by the entry way, before turning toward you.

"Are you okay?" He questions, and the earlier demeanor is almost completely gone as he steps toward you.

Your mouth opens a couple times, and you shake your head, looking and back and forth between the two of them again for a minute. Finally, you pull yourself together enough to shake your head consciously.

"He aimed at you." You say finally, your voice is hoarse from lack of use, but you keep talking. "He – he could've killed me ages ago. I was taking the trash out front, and there's arrows out there too! He missed! He missed me on purpose like four times! He shot that screaming arrow cause I wasn't screaming, I couldn't! He wanted, he wanted," Tears over take the adrenaline and Zoro wraps his arms around you as you practically collapse into him. "You can't... you can't die, please. Please."

"I won't." He promises you, running his hand over your hair, holding you tight against him. "It's okay, I'm alive."

"You cut an arrow." Your voice was muffled as you spoke into his chest.

"I did."

"How?"

"Practice."

"You can do it again?"

"Yeah."

"You won't die?"

"I won't."

"... I believe you."

"(Y/N)."

"Yeah?"

"Are you okay?"

"... Yeah." You wrap your arms around him. "As long as you keep finding me, I'll be okay." You thought about it for a second. "How did you find me?"

The property was fairly large. There was almost no way to hear the gate breaking if someone was in the dojo, it'd be difficult to hear even from the kitchen, and near impossible from Zoro's room. If you were outside you might hear it, but there wouldn't have been a reason for him to go inside first to come to the front.

The arrow might've gotten his and Mihawk's attention, but it was so shrill it would be hard to say where the sound was coming from so fast.

"I just did." He replies, smiling down at you.

.
.
.
.
.
.

Smoker and Tashigi were back in the family room with you, Zoro and Mihawk.

Again.

The police had been processing the scene for the last couple hours and you had recounted what had happened so many times you were tired of saying it.

Smoke and Tashigi bowed when you were all done talking. "I would like to extend my apologies," Smoker began. "The cruiser that was assigned to you left to assist with the fire as you had suspected, and now that we know the two incidents are connected, I want to apologize for the oversight that caused such risk, Miss (L/N)."

"They did what they felt was right," you reply. "I can't fault that."

With that the two of them left and you sank into the couch. You could feel Zoro quietly fuming beside you, even if he wasn't saying anything. You weren't exactly sure what had him in a foul mood. He'd been happy to hear your voice again after a week of silence, but after you had recounted the events, he just seemed to get angrier.

"What's wrong?" You ask quietly.

"... I wouldn't have been fast enough." He says after a moment, his voice sharp.

"You're angry at yourself?" You ask, and he grunts. "I went outside without you; shouldn't you be angry with me?"

You look over at him after he doesn't grunt or respond. His face is red and turning redder by the second as you look at him.

"Zoro?" You prompt.

He flushes more than you thought he possibly could.

"I'd rather be angry at myself, than you." He says finally, his voice so quiet you barely manage to hear him.

You feel the heat rush up into your face, because it feels like he just confessed his love to you. You realize you're staring at him in shock when he clicks his tongue, and almost growls at you without turning to look at you.

"What?"

You shift on the couch, bringing your knees up under you and turning toward him. There's still an aggravated look on his face as he turns to face you while you're reaching for him. You lean in and kiss him as the words on his lips disappear into nothing, your hands cupping his face. You can feel him tense for a moment before his body relaxes.

You lean back a little, eyes shifting from his lips to his eyes. You can feel the cool golden spindles of his earrings against your fingers, you can feel the heavy pulse of his heart against your body, and the warmth of hands that are holding onto you.

"I'm alive," you hold his gaze. "You're alive." Your face flushes and an apologetic look covers your features. "I'm sorry I wandered off."

He sighs, setting his head against your chest and pulling you snug against him, your hands slipping off his face to wrap around his head. You run your fingers through his hair slowly, enjoying the warmth and comfort of his embrace. His fingers flex in the fabric of your clothes.

"It's okay," he says, after a long silence. "I'll find you."

A/N - It's getting a little more action/adventure than I had initially planned, but it's kind of been doing it's own thing for a while now, and I'm just holding onto the edges of the pages being dragged along by the cursor. So, we'll see what it does. (I'm sure it'll be a good adventure, as long as everyone forgives me for who the antagonist is in this >.> )