Robin has seen him before.
She's not sure how the campground is rented out, never having had occasion to inquire, but he always comes to the same site, the one at the very edge of the cliff that overlooks the moody ocean below. The cliff is all rock, crumbly and treacherous, yet one enormous tree somehow manages to spread its thick roots right up to the edge.
Perhaps he is a poet who appreciates the harmonious coexistence of the three elements of tree, rock, and sea. Perhaps he is a pirate, here to guard some treasure he's buried under the gnarled roots. Robin occupies herself with such idle thoughts as these while she hides in the woods. She doesn't have much else to do as she watches, waits.
He doesn't seem to have any possessions but the clothes he's wearing and the swords at his side. Somehow he doesn't seem any worse for the lack. He has no tent, no bedding, but he seems perfectly happy to sleep on the rocks or against a tree.
Robin finds that she can get close enough, when he's asleep, to look into the mouth wide with snores. She's disappointed not to see any gold fillings (she has always wondered if they hurt, or tasted funny), but she doesn't dare get any closer. She's seen him go from asleep to alert in a heartbeat when danger approaches. Some animal burst out of the woods that morning, intent on what must have seemed like easy prey. The sword flashed out of nowhere, deflecting outstretched claws with ease. While the animal looked on with bewilderment, the man yawned, barely awake. And then, maybe because the beast lurched forward, or maybe just because the man decided he was hungry, the sword pierced the creature's flesh.
Robin doesn't know what it is, the animal. Despite the wide array of books she's read, she can't identify most of the creatures on the island. Whatever the species, though, the meat smells heavenly as it crackles and sizzles over the fire. The carcass is large, even skinned, and she's nearly sure he won't be able to eat it all. She'll just wait for him to fall asleep, and then she'll eat. She's learned to be very quiet, and he hasn't noticed the food missing in the past. Her empty stomach seems to like this plan; she just hopes it won't growl and give her away.
Meanwhile, as the food cooks, he trains.
She doesn't know much about swords, but she's pretty sure most people only use one. When she first saw the man with three swords, she assumed that the extras were in case he lost or broke one. It still seems like a pretty sensible idea, which is probably why she is so surprised when, in the middle of his training, he draws a second sword.
He doesn't move like a man with two swords, though; he moves like the swords are a part of him. It's not so much graceful; that suggests dancers and acrobats. It's as much steel as it is grace, and the sunset glints the cutting edge a bloody vermilion. The swords are not beautiful, because she's seen how they can wound. He's the beautiful one, flowing the swords in their—okay, maybe it is a dance after all, a miracle of acrobatics. He's the graceful one, the shining one. Death spins around him without grazing him. She stands in awe, and she wants to be there, in that circle he has created that the blades cannot touch.
He stops, suddenly. Does he need a break? She realizes that she has stepped out of the safety of the forest-shade, and scurries back, heart thundering.
For a moment, she's ready to flee if necessary, but he's not finished with his training. He wipes sweat off his forehead—one side but not the other, why is that?—and ties a dark bandana over his hair, so that his eyes are shaded and grim and he looks a little like death after all. He places the white sword between his teeth and draws his last blade. No extras, she realizes, and then doesn't think anything at all.
By the time the swords complete their dance, the sun has set completely. He sheathes his weapons in the flickering light of the fire, unties his bandana, and walks over to inspect the meat, which has burnt a little. Even in the darkness, she can see the face he's making, but he turns the spit anyways, tears off a generous portion, and retreats to the far side of the fire to sit under the one tree.
"You can have some, you know. I don't mind."
It's the first time she's heard him speak, and for a moment, she doesn't realize that he's talking to her. She looks behind her, but there's no one else there. She backs away slowly; she doesn't think he'll give chase.
"Or you can wait until I'm asleep again," he says, taking another bite. It's hard to be intimidated by someone who has to enunciate around a mouthful of food. "It's your choice, really. I just thought it'd taste better hot."
She creeps timidly out from the forest, ready at any moment to bolt. She's been practicing with her hands; she thinks she can escape if she needs to. She thinks that she'll run as soon as he stands up, but he doesn't move, just continues to chew. Did he deliberately sit himself so far from the fire? The meat is hot under her fingers but tender between her teeth. It's lightly scorched, but she eats it all anyway. He waits until she takes another piece before speaking.
"Are you lost?" He's finished eating, so his hands are free, but he deliberately keeps them in plain view on his lap, open and relaxed. His voice is just as casual and unthreatening as his posture.
Robin shakes her head. The silence is tense; she eats quickly, just in case.
He stretches languidly, taking care to keep his motions slow and readable. He leans back against the tree, arms forming a cushion behind his head. His hair is green, and three golden earrings dangle from one ear. There is still sweat glistening on his forehead and neck, either from his workout or from the fire. She can cover his eyes, if she needs to. She thinks she can get two hands around his throat, though she might need a third; her hands are really quite small. She doesn't even consider touching his swords. Though he's placed them aside for the moment, trying to take them would be as cruel as amputating a limb, and just as difficult.
"Is there anyone looking for you?" he asks, unaware that she's already plotting how to hurt him. Then the words register, and she nearly spits out the food.
He means parents, she tells herself. Why would he ask a little girl in the woods if there was a bounty on her head? "I'm an archaeologist," she finally surprises herself by saying. "I'm continuing my mother's work."
"Oh?" he grins. It's not a friendly grin, but he doesn't seem to mean it as a threat either. It just seems to be the way he smiles, more like shark than human. "That's nice. What are you looking for?"
And though it's the exact reversal of his other question, it hurts just as much. My mother. Saul. Nakama. She can't say these things. "I'm studying the Poneglyphs," she says instead, which is arguably much worse. Somehow, her mouth won't stop. She hasn't spoken to another human being in weeks, and now that she has started, she can't seem to stop. "I want to learn the True History that is written on them. I'm looking for one now."
"Poneglyph, huh?" he gives her an assessing look, one that she doesn't understand. "Can you read those bizarre characters, then?"
"You've seen a Poneglyph?" That's impossible. Unless, Robin allows herself to hope, he's an archaeologist too?
"Sure. On the Grand Line. All sorts of crazy people were after it. They said it was the location of some ancient weapon."
"That's not it," Robin sits up straight, and her hands clench of their own accord. "It's not a weapon. It's the history, the True History. I'm going to find it, and I'm going to read it." For the Professor. For my mother. For Ohara.
He just looks at her for a moment, and she realizes that she's glaring at him like he's the one obstacle between her and the next Poneglyph. She pulls back, startled at her own vehemence, but he seems amused, maybe even impressed.
"It's good to have dreams," he muses, tilting his head back, as if checking the leaves over his head for stars. He doesn't seem to be mocking her.
"What's your dream?" she asks, in a flash of inspiration.
"My dream?" A breath. "I have two. I want to become the world's greatest swordsman. And I want to beat death."
"Beat death?" Robin parrots. She's slightly disappointed, despite herself. She's met and sometimes worked for people obsessed with immortality in the past. They all died—some thanks to a helping hand, so to speak. She hadn't taken the swordsman for the sort of megalomaniac who believed the world would be bereft without his presence.
"The only clue I have is a book," he says wistfully, unaware of her inner monologue. "I have to find a book called Rising Dawn. The answer should be there."
"Rising Dawn?" She's curious. "But why do you want to live forever?"
He shoots her a blank look. "Live forever?"
"Isn't that what you said your dream was?"
The fire crackles between them. Little sparks fly into the air as the firewood pops and groans. The sun is gone, the moon is a mere sliver, and the flames light up his face eerily. The atmosphere is ripe for ghost stories. Instead he says, "Have you ever heard of an island called Arabasta?"
"Isn't it an island on the Grand Line?"
"Yeah, it is. There was this whole deal with a princess and a secret organization. My nakama and I went there to beat up a bunch of people who were trying to take over the country. Luffy, our captain, managed to defeat the organization's leader." He smiles suddenly, and it's not the shark smile at all, just a gentle curve of the mouth so faint it's like he doesn't even know he's doing it. "Of course Luffy beat him. That guy always pulls through."
Robin doesn't know what to say. There's more to the story, that much is obvious, but she doesn't want to drag him back from wherever he's gone in his head. It looks nice there.
He comes back by himself, after a moment. "Luffy died there, in Arabasta. One of the weapons Crocodile used was poisoned. Our doctor said there had to be an antidote, but no one knew where to find one, and by the time we pulled him out of that tomb, it was already too late. We all split up after that. I guess we couldn't stand to see each other anymore. Nami went to South Blue to continue her map. I think she's also looking for Shanks, to give him back his hat. Love Cook went back to his restaurant." His eyes suddenly snap up, haunted; looking into them is like cutting herself on a thousand slivers of glass. "He doesn't believe All Blue exists anymore."
"All Blue," she sounds out, trying to make sense of at least some of what he's saying. "That's the legendary ocean where all fish exist, isn't it?"
He shakes his head, as though to focus. "Yeah. Look, there's no point telling you all this. The thing is, I'm still here. I'm still looking. Luffy…" He shakes his head again. "I just have a feeling it wasn't supposed to go like this. They keep telling me it's just grief, but I know Luffy wasn't supposed to die like that. He's the man who's going to become Pirate King. He's the kind of guy who always gets the antidote, you know? Somehow."
"So you're looking for that book? Is there any particular reason you're here?"
"I… feel like it should be nearby. I just followed my instinct wherever it took me."
She tilts her head. "So basically, you're lost."
"When I find it," he ignores her. "I'm going to go back to Arabasta. Listen," he leans forward, as if about to impart some deep secret. "Arabasta is where I saw that Poneglyph."
"The Poneglyph…"
"One thing that Luffy taught me was that you can't do everything alone. If you come with me, once I find that book, I'll take you with me back to Arabasta. You should read the Poneglyph. Crocodile thought it said the location of an ancient weapon, but then again, he couldn't even read it, and plus he was all sorts of crazy. Maybe it'll mean something different for you."
His earrings glint in the firelight when he moves his head. "When you talked about the True History just now, you looked just like Luffy. It's the look he got when he was about to do something incredible."
"Are you asking me to become your nakama?" Robin breathes. She remembers Saul, frozen forever in order to give her his last message.
"What's wrong?" he puts a hand on the hilt of the closest sword. "Think I'll slow you down?"
Robin takes her time to answer. She tears another piece of meat and eats the whole thing, chewing slowly. If he's about to chase her away, then she might as well be full while she runs. Finally, when she's swallowed the last bite, she stands. "I'd better tell you now," she says, meeting his eyes with a challenge. "My name is Nico Robin. There's a 79,000,000 Beli bounty on my head."
"A kid like you?" he stares. "You're what, eight years old?"
"I'm eleven!" she snaps, because her birthday is coming up soon, after all.
"Well," he says. He looks away, and Robin is glad, because she's starting to tremble a little, though she doesn't know why. Finally: "I can't believe we got beaten by an eleven year old." He shakes his head ruefully. "Luffy's bounty was only 30 million. Then again, Crocodile's was something like 80 million when Luffy beat him, so I can't say I'm scared."
"Your captain has a bounty? Why would he…?" Robin trails off as realization hits. "You're a pirate?"
When he grins, she can count every one of his teeth. "Not without Luffy, I'm not." And then, to her shock, he closes his eyes and turns his head. Within moments, he's snoring again.
"Hey, kid. Robin. Wake up. Are your parents Marines?"
Robin opens her eyes at the word parents and bolts upright at Marines. "What?"
"I mean, if Marines were looking for you, would you want to go with them?"
She looks up. A neat row of torches is proceeding through the woods, stopping at each tent to wave a piece of paper at whoever sleepily emerges. If she distracts the swordsman with her hands, she can run. There's no way down the cliffs, and the torches are coming closer and closer, but there's still enough room for a small girl to slip around the edges to safety. She doesn't realize she's shaking until the swordsman picks her up.
"I'll take that as a no," he says. "Hang on." And then he tosses her up into the tree like she weighs nothing.
Reaching out desperately, she manages to grasp a tree branch. She realizes that she's nearly sitting on it, and shifts back so that the leaves aren't in her face.
"Your foot is showing. Keep quiet," he instructs. He walks over to the campfire, which she put out after he fell asleep. She has to wonder what he would have done if she'd just walked away: the whole forest could have burned down. With a huge yawn, he scuffs absently at the ashes. The swords are at his waist once more, and he has a hand on one hilt. As the light of the torches comes near, he thumbs up the guard so that an inch of gleaming blade rises from its sheath.
Two Marines and a civilian walk into the clearing. She recognizes the last man as the owner of the campground. He looks flustered and harassed. "Excuse me, sir," he says to the swordsman, holding up a wanted poster. "Have you seen this girl? She's an extremely dangerous criminal."
"Sorry," he says. "Can't help you."
"Please keep an eye out," the owner says, and turns to the first Marine. "I'm sorry, Captain, but nobody has seen her. I'm sure those reports were just—"
"Hey," the other Marine says. "Aren't you Roronoa Zoro, Demon Bounty Hunter of East Blue?" As soon as he finishes speaking, he covers his mouth with both hands. His eyes are horrified.
"I'm Roronoa Zoro," the swordsman agrees, and Robin can feel the ground collapse from under her. She can't believe she allowed herself to believe that her new nakama would protect her. She realizes suddenly that she's falling from the tree, but she doesn't care. A bounty hunter. He must have been ecstatic when she told him about the bounty. Jackpot. Roronoa Zoro. A bounty—
"Watch out!" Roronoa catches her moments before she hits the ground. When he comes back up, three rows of marines have emerged from the woods. Three rows of guns point at the two of them. She thinks the closest ones are trembling, though that might just be her.
"It's Roronoa Zoro and Nico Robin!" a Marine proclaims. It's important to state the obvious in the Marines. Otherwise things never get done. "Stop them!"
"Well, this sucks," Roronoa mutters, to a counterpoint of rifles being cocked. He looks down at Robin briefly, pulls her up against his chest, and without further comment jumps off the cliff.
She's pretty sure this is not how bounty hunters are supposed to catch their targets. The posters do say Dead or Alive, but how are the bounty hunters supposed to get paid if they themselves die?
They land in the ocean with a sharp crack, Roronoa's back meeting the water first. He lets out a groan, arms loosening from Robin's shoulders. "Not such a great idea. You can swim, right?"
She can't answer. She's struggling to stay afloat, but no matter how hard she beats against the current, the water just sucks her under. There's a distant curse somewhere over her head, and then Roronoa scoops her up again.
"This is nostalgic," he says, as she coughs up water. "At least you don't have some important hat I need to keep track of."
"Actually, I kind of like hats," she mumbles between coughing. "I don't know if we can get one at the next town."
Roronoa pulls something off his arm suddenly. It's a small, purple-brown octopus. It waves a tentacle at them, and with an expression of absolute disgust, he winds up and throws it out to sea.
"What did you do that for?" she asks, coughs.
"No clue," he says. "I just hated it for a moment."
"I don't get it," Robin says. "I kind of hated it too."
He shakes his head and pulls her further out of the water, checks that his swords are still secure. "Good thing you're both so light, anyway, or I'd never be able to carry you." So saying, he begins to awkwardly swim across to the shore. He stops to let her climb weakly onto his back, then starts up again.
So he's not turning her in after all. She sags against one large shoulder, a source of warmth even through his wet shirt. From where she stands (or dangles, really) it certainly looks like he's beaten death. How many people fall from a hundred-foot cliff and then get upset over small cephalopods? Not many, she thinks drowsily. Not many.
Their second campfire is far enough, Roronoa estimates, that they won't be found before sunrise. He peels off his sodden shirt, and Robin stares at the jagged scar that bites across his torso. When he takes off his boots, she can see more scars, one winding around each ankle, like some sort of gory jewelry. He stops there for modesty's sake, and plunks down in his sodden pants; Robin can only imagine how horribly scarred the man's legs must be.
"So, what kind of Devil Fruit power do you have?" he asks conversationally. He dangles his wet shirt uncertainly in front of a fire and waves it a few times, like a bullfighter. Robin hopes he doesn't expect the shirt to dry just like that, though from his irritated expression, that seems to be exactly what he expects.
"I can make my hands grow on any surface." Hands sprout out of Roronoa's and take his shirt, passing it down to more hands waiting on the ground. Robin carefully lays the shirt out in front of the fire, and smoothes out a wrinkle.
"They're so small," he says, and she's suddenly aware how tiny she is compared to him. "That's a whole lot more useful than being made of rubber," he adds quickly. "Thanks. Is it just hands, or can you do any part?"
"I don't know," she says, still confused about the rubber comment. "I've never really experimented with it before. People always called me a freak."
"Our doctor was a freak too, in his village. He was just waiting for the right nakama." Roronoa lies down, and Robin can't believe he's about to go to sleep, since she definitely couldn't if she tried. Her heart is still pounding too hard; if it's trying to get out of her rib cage, she's pretty sure it's almost there.
She sits staring at the fire, waiting, but he doesn't move. She listens to the sound of his snoring for a long time before the fire burns down to ashes and her eyelids finally lower.
"Do you think that old man was telling the truth?"
"Who knows?" Roronoa does another push-up.
"How can a book be in a tree?"
"No idea."
"We'll have to go back to the campground then," Robin murmurs.
"Guess so."
"The Marines might still be there."
"Not like we have a choice."
"Do you think we're close?"
Roronoa sits back suddenly, gives her a long, serious look. "I have a feeling," he says slowly. "I feel like we're near the end."
"I feel it too," she says, pulling her knees to her chest and tucking her chin down. "But I don't think I want to know how this ends," she whispers as an afterthought.
"Happily ever after," Roronoa offers. "Isn't that how it usually goes?"
It ends with a trap. She tries to get his swords back to him, but there are too many Marines in the way. They step on her hands, and the swords fall with a clatter. He doesn't fall with any sound at all.
She hides behind the tree Roronoa cut down. The book is there at its center, and she pulls it out, clutching it to her chest, his precious white sword still clasped in one bruised hand. She's holding a dead man's dreams in her arms, she realizes, and wonders if she shouldn't go search for this Luffy, if she doesn't owe Roronoa at least that much.
The title of the book is picked out in gold letters: Rising Dawn; at least that much was accurate. When she opens the book, though, the stiff binding cracks as though brand new. She rifles through blank page after blank page until she can't bear to look anymore. The Marines are encircling the tree stump, and she backs up until rocks crumble under her feet. Even without looking, she can feel them falling a great distance before they meet the ocean below. She wonders what happens to dreams when the dreamer dies, but there is no response, no answer, as she takes one more step back. Gunfire sounds overhead, but if she's hit, she doesn't notice. This time there is no one to catch her at the bottom.