Wine for Your Sake [Zoro x OC]

25. Future

(POV: Juniper)

I hear it all. No, I can't physically hear words streaming from his mind. One moment, my head is blank. The next, they are flooded with thoughts that are not my own. It all comes at once and strikes me like lightning. They all contradict each other. I'd always wondered what exactly he felt, and now that I was feeling it as it came with its full force of overwhelming presence.

He wants to defeat and protect me? He wants to see me defeat everyone? He doesn't want to see my face? He wants to learn from me?

He wants to kiss me.

Suppressing a smirk, I grab him by the collar of his shirt and pull him closer to my face. "Kisses only, please."

As my lips meet his, I feel his hands hover over me hesitantly. But at the same time, I sense his arms snaking around me and exploring every inch of my skin. He's thinking of it, and I can feel it all.

In a gentle attempt, Zoro rests his hands on my hips and presses his lips harder into mine. I can even feel the tension in his restraint, his temptation to give up on caressing me lightly. However, he decides to remain still and buries his head next into my neck.

Then, a foreign entity manifests in my Haki. I notice it blanket the whole room, taunting me to reach out for it. As I do, a vision invades me. Yes; I am in this room... the Crow's nest, but something is very different.

This is the future, I realize.

It is more than a dream; it's real. Somewhere in my gut, I know that this future that I am seeing will happen. Zoro is still here with me. His hands are in my hair. His lips are tracing my collarbone. The silk of my coat is slipping down my body.

There was another thing I was sure of. This future isn't a minute from now. It isn't even a day from now, nor a week. I'm seeing the distant, distant future.

Why am I still on the Sunny?

But before I can dig for more, my concentration breaks and I am back in the present.

Zoro lifts his head and observes me, a straight expression fixed on his face. "You saw something."

I nod once.

"Do I need to know?"

My skin sizzles from this new power; it's as if I can count every particle in the room and predict where each one will be in a year. My craving for that rush again - the one I felt a few years back hunting that 290 million beli bounty - floods in stronger than ever.

"All you need to know is I'll be able to beat you now."