Author's Note: Told you it wouldn't be much of a wait! :)


Chapter Twelve

I stopped in the kitchen to grab two coffees, intending to take one up to Robin as she had first watch tonight. I didn't get far before realizing that Grundy sat at the table, his own coffee mug in hand, which he was nursing with the pleasure of a deprived man. He'd been on that rock two weeks before I got there, so it'd been nearly a month since he'd had real food – or coffee.

He greeted me with a nod and smile. "Zoro. That blond cook of yers is a good 'un."

"I know it." It's one of the few reasons why I haven't killed him yet. I went to the coffee pot and pulled out my favorite mug and Robin's. Let's see, Robin prefers two sugars and a spoonful of cream in hers.

"That brunette is Nico Robin, isn't she?"

I froze. That hadn't been an idle question. I turned slowly and gave him a steady look. "What of it?"

Grundy leaned back in his chair as he met my eyes levelly. "Roronoa Zoro. When you told me your name, it took a while for me to remember who you were. Once I did, though, I put the rest together fast. Roronoa Zoro, First Mate to Mugiwara, one of the more famous captains from the new generation. Of course, in that small crew of his, is some pretty dangerous people with some hefty bounties on their heads. I've been rescued by quite a group."

My hand started twitching for the sword hanging at my side. Nothing he said sounded like a threat, but it made my hackles rise. "What's your point, Grundy?"

He shrugged, and when he did the heavy atmosphere disappeared altogether. "Nothing. Just wondering how you and Nico Robin got to be so close. Didn't expect a woman like to take a lover; not with her track record of taking out criminal organizations."

"We're not lovers, Grundy." Yet. I'm still working on that. I turned around and went back to fixing coffee.

"No? Way you look at her speaks differently."

I didn't respond at all to that. Taking up the mugs, I gave him a nod goodnight and left the kitchen. He could come to any conclusion that he wanted to. I didn't care.

I got a good hold on the mug handles before climbing one-armed up the ladder and into the crow's nest. Robin turned her head as I came through the hatch, and her expression lifted to a subtle smile when she saw me. I felt my heart skip a beat. "Coffee?" I asked, a little more huskily than I intended to.

"Please." She shifted on the bench enough to stretch out and take her mug.

I kicked the hatch shut after me and joined her, daring to sit a little closer than I normally would.

"Your burn looks better," she offered, a hint of a smirk tilting up her mouth.

I winced. "Anything would be an improvement." My first look in a mirror had horrified even me. I didn't know human skin could get that red.

She chuckled and took a long sip of coffee. "I'm glad you're back."

"Me too. It must been hard figuring out where I drifted to."

Her eyes took on a pinched expression. "Hard is not the right word. Horrendously difficult comes closer. Nami didn't have any charts of this area. We couldn't predict where you would wash up. We didn't doubt that you'd float, or find some way to keep your head above water, but we didn't know how long you could keep that up either. Nami had only an idea of what the currents were doing, and she didn't mark the exact place where you fell out, so it took us hours before we felt we were in the right patch of ocean. Then we had to do several experiments to figure out where the currents were heading. We used up almost all the oil doing it, too."

I paused in taking a sip of coffee. "Oil?"

"Oil floats on water," she explained simply. "It's the most reliable method of tracking water currents."

Huh. News to me. "So after you figured all of that out, you started sailing in the right direction?"

"No, actually, we sailed in the wrong direction first," Robin groaned. "There were two currents in the immediate area, both of them heading opposite ways, and we had a fifty-fifty chance of guessing which one had taken off with you. So of course we guessed wrong."

It shouldn't be funny, but I laughed anyway. "It's our usual luck in this crew. But you figured it out and came for me anyway."

"By that time, almost six days had passed, and Sanji was insisting that even you couldn't stay afloat that long." A hard look came into her eyes. "We had words on that."

I blinked. Oh, so his statement earlier about Robin insisting they come after me hadn't been just a joke? To have been a fly on the wall for that conversation.

"Of course, none of us expected to rescue anyone else." She eyed me over the rim of her cup. "Grundy P. Ballwacker. The name…sounds somewhat familiar."

Really? It didn't ring any bells with me. "What do you think of him?"

"A shady man," she responded promptly. "I agree with you. He is not to be trusted. He asks strange questions."

"Yes, exactly. He always sounds friendly when he's doing it, so you don't think much of it at first…"

"…but then the questions start to accumulate, and they form a strange picture," she finished, brows drawing together in a troubled frown. "I don't like the vibe that man gives off."

"Makes two of us."

Her eyes gave me a penetrating look. "He didn't do anything to you, did he?"

I blinked. Then blinked again, sure that my eyes were deceiving me. But no, Robin looked fiercely protective, a hard light in her eyes. I had no doubt that if I said 'yes' she would march straight down the ladder and Mr. Grundy P. Ballwacker would be promptly thrown back into the sea. Whether he had all of his limbs still attached when he hit the water would be questionable. It felt very strange to realize how defensive she was of me. Normally, I was the one being protective of her. "Robin. If he'd done anything to me, do you think I'd let him on this ship?"

She pursed her lips and thought about that for a moment. "That's not quite how I meant it. I meant, did he do or say anything that was threatening? Or…pressured you in some way?"

I thought I saw what she was getting at. "No. Like I said, I can't put my finger on why I don't trust him. I just don't. It's not because of anything he's said or done, exactly." I tried not to smile as I added, "So don't break any of his limbs or throw him back into the sea just yet."

Her eyes narrowed. "How did you know what I was thinking?"

"Oh, that much was obvious from that evil glint in your eye." I hid a smile behind my cup.

Those blue eyes narrowed a little more. "It amuses you?"

Well, yes, but I knew better than to admit to that out loud. "I like it. That you're protective of me."

Robin's head cocked slightly in bemusement. "I would have thought it would bruise your male ego."

I waved this possibility away. "No, I'm not that egotistical. Not after the, what, dozen times that you've gotten me out of a tight spot? We depend on each other, trust our backs to each other, so I can't very well get my feathers ruffled over the idea of you protecting me. I trust you to do that, if I ever need the help, just like you trust me to do so."

"Two years ago," she observed thoughtfully, "you would not have said that."

"Two years ago, I was cocky and full of it. I know better now."

She chuckled, low and rich. "I can argue with that."

"What, me being cocky or me now knowing better?"

"Yes." She arched a brow at me in challenge, smirk spreading.

Realizing she was teasing, I just chuckled while protesting mildly, "I'm not that bad!"

Robin reached over and patted me on the knee in a patronizing way. "If you say so."

ӁӁӁ

Just once, just once, I want my instincts to be wrong.

I woke up with a foul taste in my mouth, like some sea monster had crawled inside of it and died, messily. An ache throbbed right between my eyes and for some reason my vision was a little blurry, and I couldn't quite focus. I forced my eyelids up anyway and struggled to sit upright.

"Now, Zoro, don't strain yourself," Grundy said cheerfully from somewhere nearby.

My efforts were abruptly stopped short by a chain wrapped around my torso and legs. In fact, now that I looked down, I noticed that I looked like some sort of metal sushi roll because I was wrapped in so much of it. I lifted my head, and took a frantic look around. Every member of the crew lay near me, some of them chained up like I was, but not all. Luffy, Chopper, Brook and Robin were only wearing cuffs –sea stone handcuffs. I knew where he'd gotten them without asking. We kept several sets on board, for those odd moments when a Devil's Fruit user caused us trouble and we had to hold them somehow until we could figure out what to do with them. It didn't happen often, but often enough for Franky to take precautions and store the cuffs on board.

Grundy hadn't moved us far. We were still in the kitchen, lying on the floor near the table. The last thing I remember was drinking coffee after breakfast and then the world had abruptly gone black. It didn't take Robin's wits to figure out what happened. I let my head thump back to the decking fatalistically. "Drugged us, eh."

"I'm very surprised you're the first to wake up," he said offhand, coming over to crouch down next to me. "You've only been out a half hour or so."

"I'm stubborn that way. So, Grundy. Marine, pirate or bounty hunter?"

He grinned at me. "Bounty hunter."

"It figures."

Grundy shook his head, wondering. "You never did trust me, not from the minute you laid eyes on me. This whole crew watched me like a hawk, too. You won't believe how hard it was to set all this up and lace the coffee pot. It was the only thing I could touch that no one questioned. What gave me away?"

"Instincts."

"Instincts? That was it? Hooo, boy! You should have trusted your instincts more and left me on that miserable pile of rocks."

I nodded in sour agreement. "Luffy would have never gone for it, otherwise I would have."

"Is that right." Grundy rocked back on his heels and looked at Luffy, who was sound asleep and snoring right next to me. "You know, it was because of your captain that my crew mutinied. Don't look surprised like that. He's too rich a prize to pass by. This whole crew is. If I caught you and turned you lot in, well, I'm set for life. I kept insisting we go after this crew, but they thought I was crazy to take you lot on. They wanted to settle for smaller game. In the end, they caught me in my sleep and dumped me out in the middle of nowhere." He slapped his leg and threw his head back, laughing. "Joke's on them! I caught all of you because of what they did."

Running across a bounty hunter who was itching to take us in wasn't that surprising. I mean, odds are every port has at least one or two with that aspiration in mind. Luffy's too famous. But me being marooned with one? Well, that was just fate playing a little joke. A cruel one at that.

"Now." Grundy leaned in closer, tone dropping to a more conspiratory tone. "Zoro, I've seen how strong you are. Past week we've been sailing, I watched you train, and those are some mighty big weights you throw around. I'm thinking, if you're really determined, you'll get out of these chains eventually. We're still a few hours away from the nearest port, and I don't like you awake while I'm sailing. So I'm going to take Nico Robin up with me as a little insurance."

I jerked in panic despite myself. No!

"I can see ya love her, boy. It's plain as day. What you see in a monstrous woman like her, well, that I don't see. But that don't matter, I guess. You lay here still and quiet and I won't hurt your woman. Clear?"

I gave him a glare that should have, by right, sliced him in two.

He seemed to find that amusing, as he grinned at me before pushing himself back to his feet and turning to Robin. She'd been lying within arms' reach of me, sound asleep due to the drug's effects. With a grunt of strained effort, he picked her up and slung her over his shoulders before staggering out the door, heading no doubt for the helm.

So help me, if he harmed her in any way, I'd…—

"Zoro-bro."

My eyes snapped to the opposite end of the room. Franky was lying on his left side, and between the chair legs, we could see each other. His voice was little louder than a hiss, but his eyes were open and clear.

"Franky!" I responded in quiet relief. "You okay?"

"My system reboots when drugs enter it, I'm fine," he assured me. "Sorry it took this long to get back to wakey-land, though. Grundy did this?"

I growled in agreement.

"He's got Robin?"

"Yeah. For insurance, so I don't try anything." And for that, I'll cut his arms off. "Franky, can you break those chains?"

"Easy," he assured me. "It'll take a few minutes to do it quietly, though. We'll need to come up with a way to sneak up on himif he's got Robin."

I nodded in grim agreement. "Work as quickly and quietly as you can."

Franky extended his little hand out of the big one, turning it so that he could work the chains loose. I watched him work, waiting for my turn to be set free, and schemed.

When I got free, Grundy P. Ballwacker wouldn't know what hit him.

And if I found even a scratch on Robin, he wouldn't be making it off this ship alive.


Chapter Thirteen is already being edited. Chapter Fourteen is...about half written? So you're not going to be waiting long on the next two chapters. After that...is anyone's guess.