Disclaimer: See disclaimer from Chapter 12.

~ Witch on the Waves ~

Chapter 13

The next morning, Nami decided that since Vivi was now temporarily part of the crew, and since she had told Robin already, to let Vivi in on the secret about magic. The Straw Hats had already set sail, following the Log Pose, and Vivi had been curious about Nami's mysterious "alternate mode of transport". So Nami told her the Fidelius secret, showed her the flying carpet, teleportation, and a few other tricks.

"Wow. So you use this for your mapmaking? Nojiko told me your goal is to make maps of the entire world."

"Yup, that's part of the reason I'm not fully part of Luffy's crew. I'll be teleporting off and mapping islands a lot of the time when the Going Merry is sailing on its way somewhere. I'll join up with Luffy and you guys for fights and other adventures, and anytime you visit a new island, so I can map it. And of course I'll be there to help beat Crocodile and his minions when you get to Alabasta. But my mapping just wouldn't work out if I was on the ship full-time. So technically I'm an allied pirate captain. I just don't have a crew under me and I have a flying carpet instead of a ship."

"That makes sense. And thank you for helping with Crocodile."

"You're welcome. It won't be the first time we've taken out pirates who prey on people. It's kind of what we do. Speaking of Crocodile, I'm working on getting Robin on our side. Let's just say she's got her own reason for working with the guy, and his goals are not her goals. I believe I will be able to help her get what she wants without dealing with Crocodile, and after that I think she will help us."

"Really? That would be a huge help. She's his second-in-command, she might be able to help expose Crocodile."

"Maybe. I actually didn't spend much time talking about Alabasta with her last night."

"Yeah, you were talking about… history. I get the sense that it wasn't really a date, was it?"

"Well, kind of. I would have asked Robin for a private talk even if she'd been an old grandmother, but I honestly do find her attractive, and I sense a bit of attraction in the other direction as well. Not like you; you're straight right?"

"Yes. Is that more of the Observation Haki Nojiko was telling me about?"

"Yup. Basic emotion sensing. Very useful both in a fight and in general. But anyway, what I really wanted to talk to Robin about was a bit of history related to magic, and since she's studying a related obscure area of history, it really grew from there."

"I remember history lessons. Do you know how much history a princess has to learn? It was horribly boring. This king enacted that law, that king had an arranged marriage with some princess from whatever kingdom, such-and-such minister was assassinated because he was having an affair with some rich guy's wife from another kingdom which started a war, ugh."

"Hey, your family is one of the twenty monarchies that started the World Government, right? Doesn't that technically make you World Nobles, even if you don't wear the stupid-looking fishbowl on your head?"

"Sort of, but not really. When the other nineteen kings decided to 'ascend' to Mariejois, the Nefertari's turned them down because… Oh, no, no! You are NOT getting me into a discussion about history! NOJIKO! Tell me more about Haki. How do you learn it?"

Vivi literally ran away, leaving Nami snickering.

~ Witch on the Waves ~

In the late morning, Nami left the Going Merry (which was now well on its way to the next island) to meet up with Robin, picking her up from Whiskey Peak and setting out to fly to Alabasta at full speed, following Robin's Eternal Pose.

Nami prepared Robin along the way by telling her about her standard stealth spells, and what to expect while using them. Robin matched by explaining how she could use her Devil Fruit power to spawn eyes and ears within a limited range to spy on people and things.

"Is that range limited by distance from your physical body, or by the limits of your perception or something else?" asked Nami.

"Distance from my body. I have tried spawning eyes at my limit, and then using those eyes to spawn further. It doesn't work. If I spawn something, and then walk away from it, there's a sense of mental strain when it reaches my limit, and then it just dissipates."

"That's probably a limit of the enchantment itself. It sounds like extremely advanced transfiguration-type magic, combined with a two-way connection to use the senses of the spawned limbs. But it's probably a lot more complex than that. Have you tried spawning something larger than a limb? Your head, for example?"

Robin grew thoughtful. "I have not."

"You said it's called the Hana-Hana Fruit, meaning 'flower' or 'bloom'. Flowers reproduce. Theoretically, you might be able to clone yourself fully."

"Not thinking about the other method of reproduction?"

Nami looked Robin in the eye and grinned. "I'm a witch. Anything is possible."

That had Robin going wide-eyed and falling silent for a while. What? She was an avid follower of literature. Writers get creative.

Then she noticed Nami smirking, and she rolled her eyes. "Oh, like you aren't going to think of the other uses of me being able to clone myself."

Nami actually blushed a bit. There were some fantasies Harry Potter had never truly explored, and Nami did have the hormones of an eighteen-year-old.

"Anyway, back to Devil Fruits!"

It was Robin's turn to grin, but she allowed Nami to continue.

"And as far as I can tell, Devil Fruits seem to be based more on a concept than on magical spells that I'm aware of. I'm not sure if whoever created them simply built a huge amount of possibilities into each fruit that you have to unlock, or if you have the ability to actually create new magical spells based on the concept. It does seem limited to that concept, but I've heard of examples of Devil Fruit users really stretching that concept. Bartholomew Kuma, for example, with the Paw-Paw Fruit, which he uses to 'paw things away'. This whole 'based on a concept' idea is one of the clues that makes me think Devil Fruits were actually designed by a god, because gods themselves are based on concepts. God of the sea, god of time, god of justice, you know."

"You talk like you know of actual gods," said Robin leadingly.

"I do. But I can't tell you much more about them. Literally can't. The information is under a geas. Not that I really know much about gods, I just can't tell you what I do know."

"Okay. But gods are real."

Nami nodded.

"So yesterday when you asked about legends of gods, you weren't looking for magicals like yourself who have been referred to as gods due to their abilities, but actual, concept-based gods."

"Yes," confirmed Nami.

"Well that's a paradigm shift if I ever heard of one. What about demons? Are they real too?"

Nami shrugged. "No clue. I imagine they would be like dark magic, filled with malice, but I'm not sure I could identify one given the reputation for deception."

Then she looked at Robin, who was carefully concealing her emotions from her face. "Wait. You're not seriously thinking about that label the World Government gave you? 'Devil Child'?"

Robin flinched.

"Robiiiiin."

"You don't understand. Every crew or group I've ever joined has come to a bad end. It's like I've been cursed!"

"Robin, you're smart, I'm sure you know this, but I'll say it anyway. It's not your fault. Just because the World Government has it out for you doesn't mean there's anything wrong with you."

"I know, but accepting that emotionally is a lot different from knowing it intellectually."

Nami sighed. "Yeah. I do understand that. If you like I can run a diagnostic ritual on you to prove that you don't have an actual magical curse of bad luck or something. Actually, I'd like to do that anyway, I've never had the chance to do the diagnostic on anyone who'd eaten a Devil Fruit before. Luffy wouldn't be able to sit still long enough."

"A ritual?"

"Yes, though this one's more like a one-time-use runic array. No sacrifices."

"Is it safe?"

"It's not painful and it won't affect your health. As long as you don't mess up the runes in the magic circle while they're powered up. That would make it explode. Badly."

"Sounds interesting. Alright, let's do it. Maybe not today though, finding this Poneglyph is going to take most of the remaining daylight despite how fast your carpet flies."

"Great, thanks! I've done this on an actual Devil Fruit before, but the enchantment on a Devil Fruit is so complex that I haven't been able to figure much out. I've done it on a prisoner, but when they're unconscious it's different from when someone is awake and connected with their power."

~ Witch on the Waves ~

Nami and Robin reached Alubarna, the capital of Alabasta, about three hours later. The palace was obvious to find (big and in the middle) and they quickly dismounted the flying carpet into an upper window so they could enter, invisible and unnoticed. Nami had keyed their invisibility spells to each other and set up linked communication spells, easily done out of long practice with Nojiko. Then they descended to the ground floor of the castle to search for the Poneglyph that was supposed to be beneath the place.

Not bothering to search for a secret entrance, Nami used detection charms to carefully confirm that there was a large enough space below, then pulled out her flying carpet again. They both got on, and Nami teleported them blind, directly into the chambers beneath.

It was pitch black, but a Lumos charm took care of that, and they found they were in a basement filled with pillars, sand covering the ground. Looking around, they discovered that it was actually a tomb, with statues and crypts lined up along the far wall they could see between the pillars.

"Now let's see if my theory was right…" Nami cast a general magic-detection charm and quickly found a source of magic not far away. She directed the carpet to take them in that direction, and there was the Poneglyph. It was a large stone cube about four times their height, inscribed on one side with a language Nami did not recognize.

"There you go, my lady, one Poneglyph as requested." Nami's joke fell flat, not because it wasn't funny, but because Robin wasn't listening. She was already fully focused on reading the Poneglyph, notebook in hand.

Nami shrugged and started casting detection spells and examining it up close. She found that the material it was made of was indeed magical, some kind of blue stone that glowed with magic yet was not actually enchanted. She theorized that the makers might have simply used the same extremely hard stone to do the actual carving. There was nothing magical about the letters themselves, so it was certainly not a runic language as she had thought might be the case.

"It's not here," said Robin, her voice filled with depression.

"What?" asked Nami.

"The history of the Void Century. There's nothing about it here. Crocodile was right, this only talks about the ancient weapon Pluton. It was all for nothing."

"Hey, hey, Robin," said Nami, grabbing the older woman by the shoulders and looking her in the eye. "So this one doesn't tell us what we want to know. There are more Poneglyphs around the world. You know that. I don't know how many, but you can't give up until we've found all of them."

"But it took years just to find this one. This is only the third I've ever seen."

"And now we have clues to find more! This one was in an ancient kingdom, one of the twenty that made up the World Government, so maybe we need to search the other nineteen. One of Roger's crew was a descendant of the family that made the Poneglyphs in the first place, so there's a good chance that Roger's travels hold some clue to the Poneglyphs. And you have me! I'm interested in finding out the hidden history just as you are.

"In fact, now that you're done reading it in the original language –" Nami turned to the Poneglyph, waved her hand, and cast a translation spell. The surface of the Poneglyph shimmered, and the writing suddenly faded into modern language.

"What? Just like that?" Robin gaped.

"Yep, translation spell, just like that."

"I don't know why I bother being surprised anymore."

"Me neither. Now let me read. Huge warship… mass destruction… yadda yadda yadda, superweapon capable of destroying whole islands, pish, any of the Admirals or Emperors can do that, yadda yadda, hidden in… you know what? I bet it's not even there anymore. It could even have started decaying by now. From a historical perspective this is interesting, but from a military perspective it's mostly useless.

"I still wouldn't go spreading this knowledge in case the weapon is still in that location and functional, but my guess is that there are multiple counters for that weapon even if it does surface. If Crocodile did manage to discover the infamous thing he'd suddenly find half the world descending on him with more firepower than you could possibly imagine."

Robin laughed.

"Now if this Poneglyph said that the weapon was capable of completely reforming the planet's surface, then I'd be worried," said Nami.

Robin suddenly looked highly interested. "You said that like it was something you were expecting."

Nami looked at her seriously, then she conjured a blue sphere and started drawing on it.

"There are not many maps of the entire world, no matter how rough they may be," said Nami, "and almost none of them visualize the planet like this. But the world is a globe, divided near-equally into the East, West, North and South Blues, by the Red Line and the Grand Line, which are nearly straight, perfect circles placed perpendicularly to one another. Think about it for a moment. Doesn't that strike you as highly artificial?"

"Holy shit."

"Even the organization of the Grand Line itself, with an entrance, progressively harder-to-travel seas and conditions, Calm Belts perfectly covering either side, and the way it has an entrance and an ending enforced by the necessity of traveling by sailing ships. The Grand Line may be full of random craziness, but it too is organized on a large scale. You see why I'm considering the possibility of gods interfering with the world's development?"

"Wow. Was this the shape of the world before the Void Century?"

"I have no idea, Robin. Even the World Government, so far as I've infiltrated, doesn't seem to know. Yet another reason to hunt down the hidden history, is it not?"

"Yes indeed."

~ Witch on the Waves ~

"So tell me Robin. Have I succeeded in my cunning plot to seduce you away from Crocodile?" Nami grinned, playfully seductive.

"Hmm… Not enough chocolate, I think," said Robin with a straight face.

"Curses! Foiled for lack of chocolate! In all seriousness, though, Robin, would you help us take down Crocodile, now that you no longer have a reason for helping him?"

Robin sighed. "My original plan, the reason why I let Vivi find out about Crocodile, was to somehow trigger a big enough ruckus that the World Government would come and investigate, which would lead to them stopping Crocodile while I escaped. But are you sure you and the Straw Hats can really beat Crocodile?"

"Yes, absolutely. The only question is how messy it's going to get and how many Alabastans will get involved in this civil war he seems intent on triggering. Robin, how much do you know about Haki? You recognized Zoro and Nojiko's use of Observation Haki yesterday."

"I know some of what can be done with Observation and Armament Haki, and I've seen both in use several times. And I've heard rumors of Conqueror's Haki. But I've never met anyone willing to teach me how to use Haki."

"So you know that Armament can be used to counter Devil Fruit powers?"

"Yes."

"Luffy unlocked his Armament Haki a few days ago and used it to beat a Logia user. I'm hoping that he'll be able to train enough that he can beat Crocodile over the two or three weeks until he reaches Alabasta. And if that fails, well…" Nami demonstrated by using Armament: Hardening to turn her entire body a shiny pitch black, including everything she was carrying and wearing. Only her sclerae and teeth were left eerily white as she grinned. "There's me."

"Okay," said Robin, controlling her reaction through years of experience in dealing with scary people, "I believe you. Why do you want Luffy to fight Crocodile? Why not just do it yourself?"

"Honestly, it's mostly because Luffy is the one who promised to help Vivi, and I want to let him do it," said Nami, reining in her Haki until it was once again out of sight and only covering her skin beneath her clothes in her default training mode. "There's another benefit to doing it that way. Luffy is already going to make a splash and earn the attention of the World Government in the worst way, so this way it's his skills that become known to them. Since his ability with Haki is currently quite a bit lower than mine or Nojiko's, the Government's estimation of our threat level will be that much lower. But if it comes down to it and the situation here in Alabasta comes to a head before Luffy makes it here, I'll do something about it."

"That makes sense. So back to my part in this whole thing. I think I would be most useful staying in Crocodile's circle and feeding you information and sabotaging whatever I can."

"That's risky. Are you sure you haven't blown your cover already? We could make do with whatever knowledge you have already."

"I think Crocodile is expecting me to betray him, just as I expect him to betray me once I am no longer useful to him. But he still needs me, so he will deal with a certain amount of suspicious activity on my part. And it normally takes a lot longer than we've been to travel back from Whiskey Peak to Alabasta, even directly. So if you drop me off part of the way in between, there will be no evidence of anything wrong."

"Okay, but I'll set you up with something so you can request an emergency extraction if you need it. And I think you should come back with me to the Going Merry and explain things to the crew and Vivi. They need to be able to trust you in order for this to work."

Robin winced. "That's not going to be easy. We did just break into her family's tomb chamber and learn a secret that they have probably been protecting for centuries." She waved around at their surroundings where they were still standing in the hidden basement of the palace.

"She'll have to deal with it, unfortunately. It's not like our intentions were malicious or that we actually have any interest in Pluton. And we are going to help save her country."

~ Witch on the Waves ~

Robin and Nami appeared beside the Going Merry the way Nami usually teleported in, invisible on her flying carpet. After checking for unexpected visitors, Nami dropped the stealth and they stepped onto the ship.

"We're back!" shouted Nami.

Laughing, Luffy used Geppo to descend from the crow's nest. "Hi Nami! What's Robin doing here?"

"Luffy! You figured it out. Or did Nojiko tell you?"

"Nope, I figured out that using Haki makes me strong enough to use Geppo. Flying is awesome!"

"Sweet. Now we can spar properly while the ship is sailing. Anyway, Robin here is going to help us take down Crocodile. Could we gather everyone up and explain? We need to do a bit of planning."

"Okay. I'll get Nojiko and Zoro!" Luffy dashed off, air-walking above the sea to where Nojiko and Zoro were sparring on the water's surface.

"Your crew has some unusual abilities," remarked Robin.

"Geppo is actually a technique I stole from the Marines. Nojiko and I weren't strong enough to use it at first, but Nojiko had the idea to use the same principle on water, which is much easier. That's what Zoro is doing right now. I can tell you how to learn it later, but be warned it requires a lot of physical training."

Sanji came out with a tray of drinks. "Nami-swan! And the beautiful Robin! O happy day! I, Sanji, have brought you drinks to refresh yourselves after your journey!"

Nami and Robin accepted the drinks with a simple, "Thank you Sanji," which was apparently enough to make him swoon.

Vivi and Usopp came around from the other side of the wheelhouse, where they had apparently been talking. "Miss All-Sunday," greeted Vivi a bit frigidly.

"Princess Vivi. Why the cold shoulder?"

"She found out that you're a historian," explained Nami mischievously.

"Oh? It seems you've had an encounter with a historian of the wrong type. Perhaps a teacher? Fear not, Princess, we will soon educate you on the delights of history."

"Why, we might even be able to turn you into a historian yourself!"

"Prepare to be assimilated!" said Nami and Robin at the same time. They had actually prepared this joke beforehand, Nami having explained Vivi's dislike of history.

"Oh my goodness," announced Nojiko, coming up from behind. "They're already speaking in unison. Was the second date that good?"

"For our second date…" Robin started, then lowered her voice to sepulchral levels, "we visited a tomb."

"Oh, come ON!"

Nami and Robin laughed. Which caused Sanji to swoon. Again.

"Okay," said Nami, "what's with Sanji? He seems to be kind of… out of it today."

"He was all mopey and jealous up until about noon," explained Nojiko, "and then he realized that it was two women together and it suddenly turned into… this."

"Seriously? It took him that long to realize? Isn't that like, fantasy number two for boys?"

"You would know better than I," said Nojiko with a half-lidded stare at Nami.

"MOVING ON! Robin is here because she's agreed to help us take down Crocodile. She's planning to go back in and be our spy on the inside, help us figure out how to expose him, stuff like that."

"Not that I'm ungrateful," Vivi spoke up, "but why? You've been part of Baroque Works for years."

Robin sat down on the gunwale and spoke to everyone. "Ever since I was little, it's been my dream to discover the true history of the Void Century. Does everyone know what the Void Century is?"

"Void Century?" "Nope." "Never heard of it." "Quack."

For some reason the response was divided precisely along gender lines. Vivi and Nojiko had heard of it from a history teacher and from Nami, respectively, and the boys, including Vivi's pet duck Carue, responding in the negative.

"Okay. Fortunately for Vivi, this will be a short history lesson, because we know almost nothing about the Void Century. It's a period of one hundred years, spanning between about 900 to 800 years ago. The World Government came into existence during the Void Century, so it's an extremely important and relevant period, yet it's a complete void in the history books. We don't know what happened, and the World Government has prohibited research into finding out.

"Now, it's said that the true history of the Void Century can be found on a certain artifact known as the Rio Poneglyph. The Poneglyphs are indestructible blocks of stone with an ancient language written on them, and they are hidden all around the world. As far as I know, I am the only one in the world today who knows that ancient language and can read the Poneglyphs. My goal is to find the Rio Poneglyph, read it, and learn the hidden history."

"So what does this have to do with Crocodile?" asked Vivi.

Robin gave a pained smile. "Crocodile wants to find and read a Poneglyph for a different reason: he believes that on a certain Poneglyph, there is recorded the location of one of the Ancient Weapons, Pluton. It's an extremely powerful weapon that he wants to get a hold of. Anyway, the point is, Crocodile and I had an agreement that we would find that Poneglyph and I would read it. He believes it will lead him to Pluton and I had hoped that it was the Rio Poneglyph. Unfortunately it's not.

"The reason I needed Crocodile's help to get access to the Poneglyph is because it's hidden under your father's palace."

"The palace?! Wait… the tomb? You snuck in and found it? Nami!" Vivi glared at Nami.

"Sorry Vivi," said Nami, "but I'm interested in the Void Century for my own reasons. I told you about searching out the history of magic this morning, remember? I promise we didn't hurt anyone, damage anything, or wander near the actual graves. Your family has probably been protecting that Poneglyph for the exact reason Crocodile wants it, because it contains the supposed location of an Ancient Weapon. We're not interested in that."

Vivi glared at Nami for a bit longer, then huffed. "Fine. But next time, ask first, okay?"

"Will do."

There was silence for a minute, then Luffy spoke up.

"Hey Robin! Join my crew."