Breathless, a contingent of Straw Hat Pirates arrived at the scarred wood and iron door. "She's here, right? This is the one he said?" Luffy cried out in victory.

Still recovering from the near constant enemies, Nami could only nod with hands on her knees.

"Sweet Robin, your knight is here to—"

Zoro pressed his palm to the door. "No."

Luffy, Nami, Franky, and Sanji looked at the swordsman, shocked. "No? What the hell, Zoro? You don't want her free?" Luffy shouted indignantly.

"Of course I want her free. I just don't want the idiot cook waltzing in there to God knows what."

The crew looked confused, upset, and Sanji especially appalled.

Zoro sighed. "Sanji-san," without derogatory epithets, Zoro's words were unexpected. He had Sanji's full attention. "Do you see that?" Zoro nudged the small door near the ground with the toe of his boot. A plain latch, simple. He bent down and fingered symmetrical leather strips that had been run through holes drilled in the stone. "Do you know what kind of room this is?"

Sanji raised an eyebrow. "A prison room?"

"More than that. This is a special kind of cell. It's called a gloriette. Old French. Heard of it?"

Sanji silently shook his head, a feeling of foreboding curling in his stomach.

"It's designed this way specifically. It's for a particular purpose. A prisoner, usually a woman, is put in a gloriette to…" Zoro paused. "I've seen them in a few parts of the world. It's a dual purpose, money-maker and torture."

Sanji gulped. "Torture?"

"Depraved scum pays the jailer for a front row seat. The prisoner is forced into all kinds of…"Zoro looked up, searching. "I guess there's no easy way to say this. Sex torture. They're raped. Beaten. It's sexual gratification for the people watching, it's death to the prisoner, eventually."

"All the more reason to save her right now," Sanji whispered.

"Cook, I know she's a damsel in distress for you. And maybe she is. But at this point…nine days in…she may also be a body."

A look of horror swept over the faces of the other crew members.

"Nine days is a long time in a gloriette. Let me go in. I've seen the worst humans can do to each other already. If she's alive, I'll bring her out. If she's not…I'll bring out whatever's left. She at least deserves that."

Sanji slowly nodded and stepped back from the door, hand over his mouth, dread, rage, and disgust in his eyes.

Zoro kept looking at the others for another moment, until he was sure there were no objections to him entering alone. He then turned and surveyed the door. It was heavy enough, but it didn't seem to be locked, merely closed. He pulled the twisted iron handle and grunted with the effort. The massive door swung slowly open. He slipped in as soon as there was room, and closed the door behind himself. Better to not let them look if curiosity got the better of them. Probably, this would be bad. He steeled himself. It was true that he'd seen gloriettes and had seen the victims, those who still lived and those hauled out as corpses. He knew what to expect. But this was Robin, not just any murdered stranger, however heartbreaking the circumstances. She had never deserved this. No one did.

At first the room was so dark, he could hardly see a thing. As his eyes adjusted, he first saw the smear of blood trailing from the wall-mounted harness to the far corner. He couldn't see into the corner yet, and took a slow step forward. What met his ears caused his soul to both soar in hope and shatter in sorrow: a hoarse whimper, a half sob. "Please. Please, not again. Please, not yet. Please." The words were slurred and as he approached the figure chained to the wall, he sucked his breath in with shock, despite any past experience.

The blood registered first. It was everywhere; pooling beneath her, smeared on her nude body, dried and crusted between her legs, slicking her hair in dark ropes. Her right eye was so bruised it could no longer open, blackened skin reaching to her swollen and split lips, more dried blood clinging below her nostrils where sure hits had landed. Her neck was littered with fingertip bruises, evidence of near strangulation half a dozen times. Her left shoulder hung oddly; likely it was dislocated, chained helplessly above her head. He looked at the manacles and saw her ragged, torn fingernails; she'd already lost two and would likely lose more. She had probably dug them into the stone in desperation. "Robin," he whispered. Her breasts were covered with bruises and burns, her abdomen darkened by a bruise shaped shockingly like the sole of a boot. Her legs and pubis were painted with dried blood and semen, extending to her knees, rivulets to her toes. Burn marks indicative of low-level electrical currents appeared as raised white welts in every sensitive area.

He reached for her face. "No. Please. Please, not yet. Please." Her one open eye was blank, staring. She looked empty. God, had they come too late? Was she lost in their torture?

"It's me, Robin," he whispered. "It's me. Zoro. I'm here, okay? We're going to get you out of here. Donal is dead. The…the keeper of this place. His giant lackey is gone. The rest ran away. It's going to be okay, Robin. I'm going to take these off you." He babbled in whispered timbre, hoping she might understand the general tones of what he said, even if she couldn't yet understand the words. Had anyone spoken to her in anything but cruelty in nine days? Not likely.

He raised his eyes, evaluating the manacles. No problem. With a brief jab of Kitetsu, he broke the chain binding her to the wall. Her arms seemed to fall in slow motion. As they did, he realized that he was right in guessing her shoulder had been dislocated. He'd have to take care of that before he could move her. "Robin, your shoulder. I have to fix it. It'll hurt for a minute, but only a minute. I'll be so quick, and we can get out of here, okay? I'm sorry for this." He grasped her arm firmly at the wrist, realizing as he did that her wrist was roped in abrasions, raw and slick with blood, sensitive skin rubbed off from struggling against the handcuffs. He moved his hands up to her forearm. God, was any place on her body not completely destroyed? He braced his foot against her ribs near her armpit, strengthened his hold on her forearm, and pulled fast and firm. He felt the resistance of stiff tendons, then a pop and click as the joint snapped back in place. Any strong man would've cried out at the sudden pain of external joint reduction. Robin hadn't made a sound. A wash of horror waved over Zoro as it occurred to him that this was probably child's play compared to the pains she'd endured lately. He swallowed the lump in his throat. "Now," he said, his voice cracking like a teen. "Let's get you out of here." He slipped his left arm under her bent knees and his right under her shoulder blades, shifting her weight upward to rest her head on his shoulder before turning.

Her eyelids fluttered and her swollen and bloodied lips formed one last, breathy, "no…please" before her eyes closed and her muscles went slack in his arms. Mercifully, Robin had at last passed out.

Zoro moved a few quick steps to the door, before he realized he'd have to set her down again to open it. As he lay her gently on the stone floor, he realized too that she was nude. With her injuries and the urgency of the situation, it hadn't crossed his mind to cover her, but as he was about to carry her out to her waiting crewmates…he removed his haramaki. The cloth was deceptively large, folded as it was around his waist. He shook it open and wrapped it around her, handling her with a gentle touch. Surveying his work, he saw that the sash was firm around her body, her eyes remained closed, he opened the door. Sanji had been waiting, nearly in the doorway. Color drained from his face as he saw the still, bloodied woman. Zoro silently picked her back up, ensured her head was supported against him, and exited the room, pushing past Sanji.

"Is she—"

"She's alive. Let's get out of here."

The others followed wordlessly. After a moment, Nami spoke—"This way," correcting a wrong turn Zoro had begun.

At last they emerged into sunlight and Robin's injuries became more glaringly obvious. Zoro tried not to look too closely yet. The ship wasn't far; Chopped could examine her head to toe and catalog all that needed to be fixed. In her body, at any rate. Nine days of what she had endured…Zoro could not imagine the wounds that must have been inflicted on her soul.