Chapter 7
"Huh?" Zoro and Luffy asked together. Since Robin couldn't really see Luffy's face, she couldn't really tell his reaction, but she recognized the expression on Zoro's face. It was the annoyed face he made when he was suspicious that someone was tricking him or lying to him.
Robin smiled and looked over to Nami. She was still pretty sore and tired, so Robin gave her a small nod, and she understood. She rested her head back against the wall as Robin said down to Zoro, "Encantado. It's a nautical creature of Brazilian folklore originating in South Blue. I've done a bit of studying on the creatures of South Blue, so I know a little about them, myself." Zoro raised an eyebrow to her. "Would you like me to explain about them, Zoro-san?"
"I don't care about that, tell me about these things, Robin," Luffy said dismissively. Zoro narrowed his eyes, but shrugged.
Robin cleared her throat and thought for a moment in preparation before continuing on. "There are many things written about Encantado that is really only folklore, but there is also truth between the lines. Some people claim that they have the upper half of a man and the tail of a dolphin. That would just be a fishman or a sort of merman though, wouldn't it? I'm sure that we know better. Rather than a fishman, an Encantado is a type of shifter, but one of the ones with more limited abilities. Although the mind power may make up for this. They are originally dolphins who came from a underwater realm deep within South Blue. It's said to be a paradise, but of course no one has ever been there but the Encantado."
"Whoa, Robin we really need to go there later," Luffy raised his head and smiled up at her.
"Hmm, I'll try my best to find it for you later," Robin smiled, then straightened her face in thought to pick back up at her last word. "Anyway, what an Encantado itself is, is a dolphin that can morph into a person. There is really quite literally no way to tell a regular person apart from a Encantado in it's human form. They're also usually born in pairs, which is one of the many things that separates their early life from that of a young dolphin. Well, I really could continue on, but I'm going to assume you'd rather hear Nami's story than my knowledge of shape shifting dolphins, so I'll summarize the rest. Encantado are intelligent, tricky bastards." Zoro raised and eyebrow and a tight smile pulled at the corner of his lips, but Robin ignored him and continued. "They're really horrible, really. They torture everything for almost no reason. They've come to hate pirates from all the four seas, and would often trick them to their waters so that they could be kidnapped and tortured for various information. Although they say they despise pirates, they really are just pirates themselves. They're really, really awful. Sometimes, though, the more aggressive leaders of the pods will feed on humans and pirates, usually younger ones." Robin looked to Nami, now with a curious expression, "Hmm, now that I think of it, I'm puzzled as to why they were keeping you locked up but hadn't tried to feed off you. I mean, you ankle is broken, but all your limbs are more or less intact."
"Ah, well, that's true. I was wondering that a little myself, actually. Here, I'll tell you what I've been through, the last few days," Nami said, sitting upright, again. Luffy had lifted his head off of Robin's shoulder and was sitting a little closer to the edge of the bed, turned slightly to have a better look at Nami's face as she began her story. He still wasn't quite close enough to the edge for his feet to touch the floor, so he kicked them back and forth, reminding Robin of a child sitting on a tall bench. She smiled to him and ruffled his hair. She had been pretty worried for the crew's safety, now that she'd known what was looking around for them. She's glad Luffy hadn't been caught by this Calder person, because she knew he would have been instantly outsmarted. Robin was slightly less worried about Nami, though, she thought. Nami is quick and cunning, she was glad Nami made it away from them in the condition that she did. Luffy gave Robin back a familiar grin when she pulled her hand back to herself and rested it on the top side of Zoro's hand. She looked to Nami without words, but could see Zoro watching her from the corner of her eye. Even when Nami continued her story, he still didn't look to her.
"I was unconscious for a few days, I think. Maybe two days," Nami began. "And, well, since I'm not really the most physically strong among us, I was tied down pretty much with just ropes. But also hooks, I was hooked to the wall and also to the ceiling for some time," she shrugged. Nami held out her leg with the broken ankle and that looked like it had been rubbed raw. She pointed out to two splotches that were so dark red that they were almost black with dried blood. "Here," she said, gently running her finger across her wounds, "They had hooks here so I couldn't move my leg when he broke it." Then she rested her leg back down and pointed to the rip in her shirt where blood had spilled all down her front. "This. They had a huge hook. Like the ones people use in a meat storage freezer room, almost. That they use to hang animal bodies from the ceiling until they drain of blood. Yes, there was a day when I was too weak to stand and Calder put the hook through this shoulder, and raised the chain just high enough so that I would have to stand at attention on my tip-toes. I don't really remember too much of it, though. I was really in and out of my mind randomly for a time. I was whipped, and sanded, and cut..." she trailed off a little weakly, as if she was picturing it all over again in her mind. "Really, I don't think I've ever been so miserable and terrified."
Robin reached her arm around Nami's shoulder and carefully brought her into a awkward side hug as Nami hid her face when her eyes began to brim with tears. Everyone sort of sat together in silence. Nami's hair was still filled with filth, so Robin pushed it behind her ear.
"You're okay now, Nami," Luffy smiled, patting her hand a few times, "I won't make you go into details, since it seems like it's a hard thing to talk about."
Zoro opened his mouth to talk, but suddenly someone began pounding on the door with such force that the boxes in front of it were shaking, and the gas lamps up above shook slightly. Everyone went into immediate defense mode. Luffy stretched himself around Zoro and Robin until he was kneeling on the floor at Nami's feet, Robin brought her arm around and held it across Nami's stomach, and Zoro stood and twisted around instinctively placing his hand on his hip where the handle of his favorite of the three swords would be, but cursed when he remembered it wasn't there.
"Hey, guys are you in there?" a familiar voice asked loudly from the hallway. It was a voice Robin thought she recognized, but couldn't quite place where she'd heard it from. "I know you are, right? Come, now, we aren't playing games, are we?" With a bang, the two boxes toppled to the side, the door flying with them off the hinges. Luffy stood, fists raised. As soon as the realization laid on them all, they relaxed together, exchanging nervous glances.
Sanji was standing there in the doorway looking around at them all, resting one of his feet back to the floor, hands in his pockets, as they always were. However, he had an uncharacteristic grin stretched across his face. There seemed to be many things odd about him, but Robin couldn't place it. It was more of an instinct. Luffy and Zoro stood and walked over to him, but Robin was a little more reluctant. Something about him wasn't right, she could feel it just by the way he was looking at her. His eyes seemed unfocused and his form of speech was different than usual.
"Robin, my dear, why, so good to see that you're intact, yeah?" he twirled around Luffy, ignoring all of Luffy's questions about where he'd been and what had happened to him.
Zoro grabbed his arm and pulled Sanji back toward him, forcing Sanji to look him in the eye.
"Yes, hello, Zoro, it's really nice to see that you are in fact, safe!" Sanji said with his grin. He twisted his head around to see Nami. It seemed to Robin that his head twisted almost all the way around before he jerked his arm free of Zoro's grasp and made his way towards Nami. He looked back and forth with eyes that reminded Robin of an animal. That was it. This isn't Sanji at all. Well, it was Sanji's body, but what was inside wasn't Sanji. He had eyes that seemed glazed over, and were a deep purple, but the pupil was gone. Robin tried not to look startled as her head began to pound. Sanji's gaze stayed on her as he began to realize that she knew something was going on. His grin spread wider to a sickly smile as he slowly stood to face her. He began to have a faint neon glow about him, but Robin seemed to be the only one to notice any of this. His hair began to curl at the ends as if it were dying.
Sanji took her face in his palm. Robin looked around to the others, but they all stood motionless, as if they had been frozen. They couldn't see any of it, Robin realized, something had happened to them. Or maybe, something had happened to her. She looked up into Sanji's dead eyes anxiously. He barely even looked like Sanji anymore, but more like a monster formed after Sanji's image. Suddenly, Sanji moved his face forward and pressed his lips to Robins softly, and quickly pulled back. Robin felt angry by this motion, and sort of wanted to slap him. Even though he was kind a flirtatious all the time, he'd never tried anything like this before. Then, her mind began to feel fuzzy, and she realized it had caused something more. The senses in her body seemed to domino. She seemed to be losing control of her body; she couldn't move at all. When Sanji took his hand from her face, she fell to her knees, but before she could fall forward, Sanji grabbed her by a handful of her black hair and brought her face up to his and whispered in her ear. The words he spoke to her seemed to painfully echo through her skull, "Welcome to the dark carnival, my dear friend," he voice changed to a deep hiss, "You've just bought yourself a ticket."
He released her, and she fell face first to the floor, and as soon as her face met it, she was thrown into a deep state of unconsciousness.
A/N: Hey-o! So since this is a bit more of an explanatory chapter than much of the story, I decided to just put the beginning of the Sanji things and end it on a bit of a cliff hanger, oh-ho! I call it 'Sanji things' now because I can't really say what Sanji has been through, just yet! But it'll come later! So the next chapter will pick up with Zoro's point of view, since Robin is kind of out of it now, for the moment! Please look forward to Zoro's take on Sanji's actions, haha~ ;) (hinthint not good omg *wink wonk*)
