Chapter XVI: A Prelude to War

"Welcome, pirates!" Most of the Straw Hats looked on in confusion as the entire town met their ship at the docks, waving, whistling, and cheering.

"Welcome to the Grand Line!"

"Welcome to Whiskey Peak!"

"Welcome, warriors of the sea!"

"A town that welcomes pirates?" Sanji asked skeptically. "The Grand Line sure is a strange place."

"We should probably sleep with our eyes open," Zoro commented. Sanji and Usopp thought he was joking of course. Unbeknownst to them, Zoro was half serious and Nami was already planning on doing just that. Sanji quickly forgot his skepticism as multiple women waved and blew kisses at him, and Usopp was a lost cause after the warriors of the sea comment. A tall man with freakishly curly hair met them at the docks once they dropped anchor, and greeted them cheerfully.

"Welcome, pirates! I am Mayor Igarappoi. This is Whiskey Peak, the Grand Line's most hospitable rest stop. We invite you to take a rest from your courageous and weary adventures to enjoy the food, drink, music, and cheerful atmosphere before you resume your journey." There was a moment of pseudo-hesitation before Sanji was flirting with a multitude of women and Luffy and Usopp were dancing through the streets as the townsfolk cheered them on.

Nami facepalmed and sighed. "Are they all idiots?" she whispered to Zoro. He shrugged.

"Either that, or they're much better actors than the people in this town." Nami frowned in thought. Now that she thought about it, Luffy was usually more insightful than this, despite his cheerful and carefree persona. She didn't have much hope for the other two, but could Luffy just be going along with it? He was being very convincing if he was. She decided to go with the flow as well, resolving to milk the situation for whatever it was worth once given the opportunity. There was no way anything could happen with Zoro on guard at the very least.

But she still found it strange. Zoro had made that comment in a lazy tone, but she somehow got the feeling that he had been referring to Luffy to begin with. She frowned again as she thought about the nature of the two's interactions. She sometimes felt like they could communicate telepathically or something. Her eyes widened as she remembered their lecture on Observation Haki. Masters of the skill could apparently read thoughts via the emotions that drove them as long as those emotions weren't being suppressed, so in theory, Luffy and Zoro could communicate nonverbally in a limited fashion. That was how they always held conversations without a single word. They were speaking with each other through conveyance of emotions.

But something like a conversation still wouldn't be possible with emotions alone. Something like that needed context. She thought back to that day in the bar in Shells Town and the first interaction she had witnessed between the two. For the first time she wondered when they had met. Did they really know each other so well that they could make an educated guess as to what the other was thinking and only need a quick confirmation using Observation Haki to signal messages? If they really deserved the credit that she was giving them right now, then there was really no doubt that Luffy was acting. If Zoro knew, Luffy knew.

Suddenly, the thought of what her two crewmates could supposedly do made her self-conscious. She peeked at Zoro through the corner of her eye and tried to get a read on him. If he was reading her emotions right now, he didn't show it. It wasn't that Nami didn't trust them with that kind of knowledge, but it would take quite a bit of restraint for her to not exercise a power like that liberally if she could use it.

As they continued walking, Nami turned to Zoro, her curiosity getting the better of her. "Hey, Zoro? How long have you known Luffy?"

Zoro looked at her curiously, but responded truthfully, "About two and a half years."

That made sense. Bonds like that could be developed in less time depending on the circumstances. This simply confirmed her suspicions. Luffy and Zoro knew each other as well, if not better, than they knew themselves.

Once Luffy had cleared all the food from the premises and caused the chefs to faint, their hosts started a drinking game with a prize of 100,000 Belly. Nami readily took part, and Luffy and Zoro followed suit, staring each other down from across the table. Once it started, it really started. The three Straw Hats had the rest of the participants puking and passing out in a matter of a minute, and they continued to chug, eventually abandoning the cups in favor of the bottles, as it was taking too long to pour. As the drink-off continued, the mayor seemed to be more and more troubled by something.

Inwardly, the mayor was fuming. The three should have passed out long before now. They had been strengthening the concentration of the alcohol in their drinks discretely until they started drinking right from the bottle and taking away the opportunity. But even without that added punch, they should have passed out ages ago. What were these three made of? He signaled to Miss Monday to initiate plan B, and she rigged the next batch of bottles with sleeping drugs. It was right as the swordsman and the Straw Hat kid got ready to chug those bottles as well that they finally collapsed to the floor. The woman seemed to frown at the sight. What was that about? Was she disappointed in them? No, it was more like…confusion. Mr. 8 filed away the observation as irrelevant as the woman passed out as well. He scoffed. What an annoying coincidence it was that they had all passed out right after they'd taken the effort to rig the booze. Mr. 8 would facepalm in embarrassment when he thought back on this later.

It wasn't long before the other two pirates had fallen asleep as well, content expression on their faces. Too bad those won't last, Igaram thought grimly. He met up with Miss Monday, Mr. 9, and Miss Wednesday and described their victims to the 9 couple. The two seemed to be disconcerted when they saw them, but they didn't voice it, so Mr. 8 ignored it.

"Was all this necessary, Mr. 8?" Miss Monday asked in a slightly annoyed tone. "We could have taken care of them at the port. It was only 5 people."

"You should know well by now not to carelessly underestimate our victims, Miss Monday," he said as he pulled out two wanted posters. Three pairs of eyes widened to epic proportions at what they saw.

"A total bounty of 73 million Belly?" Miss Wednesday whispered in awe. "Them?"

"Looks can be deceiving," Mr. 8 said simply. Miss Monday nodded apologetically. "No matter. Hurry and search their ship while we restrain them. It's preferable to take them alive. The rewards will be 30% less if we kill them."

"Sorry to interfere with your plans," a new voice came, and the four bounty hunters stiffened as they turned toward the roof of the nearest building. "But would you mind letting them sleep for a little while longer? They're pretty worn out from our trip here."

"What in the world?" Mr. 8 exclaimed. "How is that swordsman still conscious? How did he escape? What happened to the idiots who were watching them!?"

"Oh, those guys were guards?" Zoro asked lazily. "No wonder they attacked me." He scratched his head, and then a cold, bone-chilling smile stretched out across his face. "They've…seen better days."

"It seems this man has seen through our fabrications," Miss Monday assessed calmly. "We will simply have to kill this one." Mr. 8 nodded grimly.

"Hmm, too bad," Zoro said. "As a rule I don't like cutting up people who give me booze, but I can't have you killing me, now, can I?" he paused. "So, I guess I'll take you on." He raised one sword out of three and pointed at the four of them. "Baroque Works."

Mr. 8's breath caught in his throat. "How…how did you know?" he asked in horror.

"I know a lot of things," he said simply. "Some of which I could use to kill every one of you without having to lift a finger. There are only about a hundred of you. Taking into account the size of your organization, you all seem pretty expendable to me." Mr. 8's eyes widened as he actually started to feel an irrational fear of the man's words. Was it because he had hit the nail on the head? But what more could he possibly know? Zoro's smile turned menacing as he pointed off to the distance. Mr. 8 slowly followed his finger to a nearby tree, and his fear multiplied. There, perched in a tree, were an otter and a vulture. The Unluckies.

"I wonder what would happen to you all," he began, "if I revealed the identity of Mr. 0 to you here and now."

The terror on the four number agents' faces grew with every word as the Unluckies listened on intently. Mr. 8 felt his heartbeat in his throat. He knew the answer to that question. He habitually calculated the risk of knowing who the head of the organization was every day. But how could this man possibly know who their boss was? He wasn't even part of the organization. It was impossible. And yet, he already knew so much that he shouldn't. Who was he? "Of course," Zoro continued, "It won't have to come to that, will it?" His smile vanished and their blood froze as he glared. "After all, this is just the Grand Line's friendly local rest stop, right?"

They all gulped at the open threat. If they let these high bounties go, their standing within the organization would be at risk. But if they pressed on and it turned out the man wasn't bluffing, they were all as good as dead. Mr. 8 gritted his teeth in frustration. They couldn't take a risk like this. Not now.

"Call off the others," he said quietly. "These pirates leave unharmed." Mr. 9 and Miss Monday looked at him like he was insane, while Miss Wednesday just nodded slowly in understanding.

"It seems you can be reasoned with. Smart choice," Zoro said smugly. Mr. 8 turned to the still staring agents.

"What are you waiting for!? Go wake up the pirates and tell them they can't stay any longer!" he shouted. Realizing that he was leaving no room for argument, Mr. 9 and Miss Monday left in a hurry. They arrived back where the pirates were being kept, only to find not one, but three of them missing. They seethed. Would their humiliation never end? They quickly ran back out to locate them, and found the kid with the straw hat, the one with the higher bounty, standing on the docks with his back to them.

He was pissing in the water.

No, it was clear that their humiliation would not end anytime soon. "Hey, straw hat kid!" Mr. 9 yelled. The kid ignored them as he continued emptying his load over the docks. Mr. 9 recoiled at the sheer idiocy of the situation and was about to shout again when the kid finally turned around and faced them. "You know, you really shouldn't disturb someone who's trying to take a piss," he said. "Now that I'm done, what is it?"

Miss Monday looked like she was trying extremely hard not to kill the kid right then and there. Mr. 9 took a deep breath. "I'm afraid our town cannot accommodate your crew any longer. We must ask you all to leave."

Luffy hummed thoughtfully. "Well, that's too bad. The food and drink here are really good. At least when they're not sabotaged." The two agents' eyes widened at the implications of the statement. The kid smirked. "So, I guess Zoro talked some sense into you guys, then? Don't feel too bad. It's not just you. A lot of people think he's scary."

Their minds were going haywire. How many of them had seen through the charade? What was it about this crew that continued to blow their expectations to the wind? "I'll go wake up my crewmates," the kid continued. "Thanks for the party. It was fun." And with that, he walked back into the building where his comrades were located.

Mr. 9 and Miss Monday ran back to meet Mr. 8 only to freeze upon their arrival. It seemed their bad luck just wouldn't run dry today. Standing across from Miss Wednesday and Mr. 8, who by all rights should have been suffering from an aneurysm by this point, was their collective death sentence in the form of a couple by the codenames of Mr. 5 and Miss Valentine.

"Mr. 5," Mr. 8 choked, barely getting the words out, "we can explain! There's a reason why we've failed our mission this time!"

"Failed your mission?" Mr. 5 asked in a bored tone. "I can't say I really care about that. We're here for a different reason."

"A different reason…?" Mr. 8 repeated dumbly. Miss Valentine laughed mockingly.

"You didn't really think we'd come all the way to the beginning of the Grand Line just to supervise your unimportant mission, did you?" she asked.

"Then, why are you here?" Miss Wednesday asked carefully.

"We've been assigned a mission by the boss," Mr. 5 answered. "His exact words were 'someone knows my secret.'"

Miss Wednesday and Mr. 8 had both adopted expressions of horror once again, while their partners just looked back and forth between them in confusion.

"Now, I don't know what that secret is, but I do know that Baroque Works is an organization sworn to secrecy. If someone were to find out something that the boss didn't want them to know, they'd have to be eliminated. Isn't that right, Miss Wednesday?" He smirked. "Or should I say, Princess Vivi of the Alabasta Kingdom?"

Mr. 8 reacted immediately, launching a series of bombs at the pair. Miss Valentine jumped into the air while Mr. 5 took the blast head-on. "Igaram!" Vivi yelled in worry.

"Run, Vivi! Take the Eternal Pose to Alabasta and flee this place! I'll hold them as long as I can!" The smoke from the blast cleared to reveal Mr. 5 standing completely unharmed.

"It would seem you fools know not your place," he said calmly, as he pulled out a small pistol and brought it up to his face. "Breeze Breath Bomb," he mumbled, before blowing into the gun. The pistol shot the volatile air towards Igaram and Vivi. Vivi ran, but Igaram was slow to react, and couldn't get out of the way as the explosive breath flew in his direction…and hit two people in front of him.

Igaram and Vivi looked on in horror as Mr. 9 and Miss Monday took the full force of the blast for their old comrades. Vivi felt tears escape her as their bodies fell lifelessly to the ground. If they took another hit like that, they wouldn't make it. Mr. 5 just scoffed at their stupidity and shot off another round of breath bombs at Igaram, who was engulfed in a series of fiery explosions.

"Igaram!" Vivi screamed in desperation. The explosions continued, and Mr. 5 spoke up.

"The Bomu Bomu no Mi. It turns my entire body into a bomb waiting to go off," Mr. 5 explained. He stilled though, as the explosions suddenly died out. Vivi looked on in amazement. The spot where Igaram had been standing was now engulfed in a dense whirlwind that seemed to have overfed the flames from the inside of the blast. Mr. 5's eyes widened under his sunglasses the whirlwind dissolved to reveal Mr. 8—or rather, Igaram—completely unharmed. In front of him stood a green-haired man with a sword drawn at his side and pointed at the ground.

"Wow, what a night," Zoro said with a grin. "Sorry, but for reasons I can't reveal, I can't let you kill them," he said as he faced Mr. 5.

"No need to apologize," a voice said from above. "That just means you'll die with them." Miss Valentine floated above their heads with an amused smile on her face. "Surprised?" she asked. "The Kilo Kilo no Mi. I can change my body mass from one kilogram to 10,000 kilograms at will. It makes for a pretty deadly fighting style, if I do say so myself." She smiled widely. "10,000 Kilogram Press!" She dropped through the air like an anvil, aiming to drop down on Zoro's head.

Zoro casually tilted his body to the side, and Miss Valentine completely missed him, getting stuck in a small crater in the ground. Zoro turned to Vivi and Igaram and scratched his head. "Hmm, what should I say?" he wondered aloud. "I guess I didn't really think this part through very well. Well, whatever. I think I can speak on behalf of my captain when I say we'd be willing to give you a lift to Alabasta." Igaram's eyes narrowed.

"Why would you go to such lengths to help us?" he asked in well-founded suspicion. Zoro shrugged.

"If you need a reason, then let's just say it's to thank you for the sake. We could have gone without what happened afterwards, but you guys couldn't have killed us even if you tried. So, taking into account that you didn't even try…we'll be forgiving."

"That doesn't explain why you'd go out of your way to help us though," Vivi said cautiously. Zoro tilted his head. What should I say to get them to trust me? he idly wondered, before a loud shout broke him out of his thoughts.

"Zoro!" The voice of his captain pierced the air, and Zoro turned toward Luffy. "Oh, hey, Captain," he said. "I thought you'd still be sleeping. Since you didn't wake up earlier, I just assumed you'd leave this to me. What's up?"

Luffy's hat shadowed his eyes. After a few seconds, he raised his head and a wide, mischievous grin spread across his face. He raised his fists in the air and shouted. "You bastard! I'll kick your ass!" Zoro didn't have much time to try to puzzle out this statement before his reflexes screamed at him and he moved his head to the side to dodge a punch that sent ripples through the rock formation behind him and shattered the stone, toppling nearby trees in the process. Luffy's stretched-out fist rushed back to his body, and Zoro pulled two swords out, his mind finally catching up to just what the hell was happening right now.

Oh, he cannot be serious.

Luffy was very much serious. Zoro watched as his arm took on a reddened tint and steam started rising from the limb. "Gomu Gomu no…" Zoro got his swords at the ready. "Jet Pistol!" Zoro blocked the attack using a cross formation with his two swords. His feet gave way and he slid back a few inches, but he was unharmed.

The strongest attack he's used since coming to the past. And he's using it on an ally for shits and giggles. Sometimes, his captain really frustrated him.

"Why are they fighting? Aren't they comrades?" Vivi asked in confusion. Suddenly, a new voice spoke up from behind them.

"Hey, Miss!" Vivi turned to face the new arrival. It was the two pirates that had easily fallen for their tricks.

"So, it's you," Usopp said. "The weird lady who we met inside Laboon." Before Vivi could ask what they wanted, as she was extremely pressed for time, the other one spoke up.

"We have no idea what's going on here, but our captain has ordered us to protect you. Would you please come with us, Miss?" Sanji asked politely.

"More fools show up to die," came the annoyed voice of Mr. 5. "When will you no name pirates learn not to get in our way?" He raised his pistol to his mouth again and Sanji's eyes narrowed. He didn't know what that was, but anyone could tell it was a hostile move. It was a shitty pistol. He quickly kicked Usopp out of the way and grabbed Vivi as the man fired, jumping out of range of the following explosion. He set Vivi down and turned a scathing glare towards Mr. 5. Before the numbered agent could blow into the pistol again, Sanji jumped high into the air, performing a series of front flips. Mr. 5's eyes widened as he approached with surprising speed. He raised the pistol a second too late, and Sanji's downward spinning heel connected with the dome of his head, shattering his sunglasses in the process.

"Mutton Shoot!"

Mr. 5 slumped to the ground in obvious pain while Miss Valentine watched in mix between shock and rage. "You bastard!" Vivi looked on in awe. The Mr. 5 pair had never lost to any pirates as far as she knew. Who were these people? Miss Valentine proceeded to perform another 10,000 Kilogram Press, which Sanji hopped out of the way of. She didn't stop though, continuing to jump into the air and attempt to flatten Sanji. Sanji continued to hop out of the way as Vivi watched in shock and Usopp in annoyance.

"Hey, Sanji! Why don't you attack back at some point?" the long-nosed man shouted, but Sanji just yelled back, telling him to shut it as he continued to avoid the blows that were making numerous craters in the ground.

"You'll have to do more than dodge if you want to beat me!" Miss Valentine said, still seething.

"Sorry, Miss. I don't kick women," Sanji replied. "Would you consider not trying to crush me anymore and perhaps cradle my head against your chest instead?" He asked the question in the most innocent of tones, but that just seemed to infuriate the woman more. Suddenly, she stopped, taking a deep breath. Then she started running in Vivi's direction. Usopp yelped and held out his slingshot with a frightened expression, and Sanji's eyes narrowed as his code of chivalry clashed with his captain's orders.

Usopp shot a flame star at Miss Valentine, only for her to jump over it and soar high into the air. She was directly above Vivi before she increased her weight again and crashed into vacant ground once more. Sanji set down Vivi carefully and frowned, knowing he wouldn't be able to keep this up forever.

"One Sword Style: Bird Dance!" The wind blade, which Luffy dodged, continued on past its target and hit Miss Valentine dead center. She gasped as blood seeped from the wound, and fell to the ground, breathing heavily. Sanji rounded on Zoro.

"You bastard! That had better have been unintentional!" Zoro paid him no attention, though, still locked in his ongoing fight with Luffy. Vivi got over her shock at seeing the Mr. 5 pair defeated, and turned to Sanji.

"Why are those two fighting, anyway?"

Sanji blinked. "Oh, them?" he asked nonchalantly. "They're idiots," he said as if that explained it all. It was that that Mr. 5 recovered and looked at Sanji in fury.

That fucking hurt, he thought. If it weren't for my Devil Fruit giving me increased resistance to blunt force, I'd be out cold with a concussion.

He ran toward Sanji in frenzy, attempting to take the man out with an explosive punch. Sanji raised his leg in preparation for another assault.

"Gomu Gomu no…Whip!" Zoro jumped over Luffy's leg, which crashed into Mr. 5 and sent him soaring through the air before he finally crashed into a rock, and didn't get up again. All eyes turned toward the escalating conflict. They seemed to be at a temporary standstill.

"Fine," Zoro said. "If we're gonna do this, then I hope you're ready, Luffy." He unsheathed his third sword and placed it in his mouth before tying his bandana around his head. Luffy grinned widely, and his entire form seemed to redden as steam slowly rose from his body.

"Three Sword Style…1080 Caliber Phoenix!"

"Gomu Gomu no…Grizzly Magnum!" A large, dense wind cannon shot towards Luffy at the same time his arms blackened to obsidian and grew to the size of houses before their eyes. He threw his arms forward and met the wind cannon head-on. Everyone in the vicinity was blown off of their feet as the ball of condensed air ruptured from the force of the blow.

"That's new," Sanji commented. Luffy's arms were blown backwards, and quickly shrank back down to normal before he leapt into the air. Zoro barraged him with a storm of large, fast, deadly wind blades, and Luffy danced through the air, weaving through them gracefully as his blackened arms blurred out of sight and rebounded off of Zoro's swords. Zoro quickly sheathed two swords as Luffy landed.

"One Sword Style…Lion's Death Song!" Luffy leapt out of the way of the deadly blade, whistling as the buildings behind him were cleanly sliced in half as a side effect of the swing. He landed behind Zoro and prepared his own attack. His blackened arm erupted in flames as he reared it back and launched at the swordsman.

"Gomu Gomu no…Red Hawk!" Zoro too jumped out of the way, and Luffy's arm left a long explosive trail in its wake, reducing the buildings that had already been cut in half to rubble.

Zoro sighed in exasperation. "Are we done here, Luffy?" Luffy shrugged.

"I guess, unless you wanna get serious. I don't feel like destroying the island, though."

Zoro sheathed his swords, and Luffy grinned with mirth.

"Well, if Zoro's done messing around, what do you say we take a princess to her kingdom?" he asked.

"I'm gonna kill you one day," Zoro mumbled, and Luffy burst out laughing. Sanji and Usopp just watched with blank expressions, used to their antics, while Vivi and Igaram continued to wonder what the hell was going on.

"Princess?" Sanji asked. He turned to the only female that Luffy could be talking about and observed her carefully. Then he shrugged. "I wouldn't mind bowing down to you," he said casually.

"Would someone please explain what on earth is going on?" Igaram asked in frustration, his head in his hands.

"Sure. One sec," Luffy said. He turned in a random direction and shouted. "Nami! You can come out now!" The orange-haired woman appeared out of the shadows of a nearby building, an extremely annoyed look on her face.

"I finish looting their treasure, and I come to see you two destroying the town? What the hell do you think you're doing?" she asked.

Igaram looked at the bag slung over her shoulder, and his head sagged. It was the treasure they'd looted from the previous group of pirates that had passed through. So, she'd seen right through them as well? Were they that pathetic?

"Hey, Nami, guess what? We're escorting Princess Vivi of the Alabasta Kingdom to her home country so she can prevent a civil war and overthrow the leader of an underground criminal organization." Vivi's eyes widened with each word. Not just the swordsman, but him too? Why did they know so much?

Nami stared at Luffy. "Why?" she asked bluntly. Luffy shrugged.

"I'm a little curious myself, Luffy, was it? Why are you so willing to help us?" Vivi asked.

"Because we know about the situation in Alabasta and what Baroque Works is doing there. If we don't get you there, hundreds of thousands of people will die over a misunderstanding. We want to prevent that." Vivi just stared at him for a second, and Zoro stared right back. It wasn't a lie. They did want to prevent it. But it was mostly for Vivi's sake. He couldn't exactly tell her that, though.

"Are you really pirates?" she finally asked. Luffy smiled.

"The best you'll ever find," he said confidently. Some crews came close in Luffy's mind. The Whitebeard Pirates, the Red Hair Pirates, the Heart Pirates, etc. But the Straw Hats were obviously the best. Vivi was still confused but nodded slowly.

"If you're willing to take me, I would highly appreciate an escort to Alabasta. Just be aware that Baroque Works will be sending officer agents after me the whole way through," she said.

"They won't be a problem," Zoro said nonchalantly. Nami asked again why they were doing this, and Luffy told Vivi to explain the full situation in her kingdom as well as the structure of Baroque Works. After hearing the story, Nami sighed and relented, knowing Luffy had made up his mind anyway.

"So, who is this Mr. 0 really, then?" she finally asked. Vivi started sweating and insisted that she couldn't say, lest they be targeted even after they dropped her off.

"It's Crocodile of the Seven Warlords," Luffy said. Vivi's jaw dropped, Igaram collapsed onto the ground, Nami punched Luffy over the head and started shaking him by his collar relentlessly, Usopp shrieked in fear, Sanji blinked, and Zoro laughed.

"Well, now that that's out of the way, let's get going." Suddenly they heard the sound of scribbling, and looked over to find the Unluckies sitting across from them. Vivi and Igaram paled at the sight. They showed them 5 neatly drawn pictures, one of each of the Straw Hats, and then started to fly off, but they suddenly fell out of the air and onto the ground unconscious.

Zoro turned to Luffy with a raised eyebrow. Luffy shrugged. "They look tasty."

"All right, what's with the otter and the vulture?" Nami asked.

"The Unluckies report directly to Mr. 0," Vivi said with a shudder. "If they had gotten away, you would have been targeted immediately. We would have been in horrible danger."

"I fear we still are, Vivi," Igaram stated. "Without a report from the Mr. 5 pair, Mr. 0 is likely to send either the Mr. 3 or Mr. 4 pair next." Vivi's eyes widened at that.

"Then what should we do?"

Igaram suggested a plan in which he acted as a decoy and Vivi boarded the Straw Hats' ship. Luffy and Zoro reluctantly agreed, knowing what would happen. They were pretty sure the man wouldn't be killed, but decided to keep a close watch on his aura anyway…as well as any potential killing intent in the vicinity.

When Igaram's ship departed, they braced themselves for what was about to happen. They still couldn't sense any intent to kill, so they kept silent. When the large explosion engulfed his ship and covered the waters in flames, Luffy and Zoro dragged everyone onto the Going Merry. Vivi had a tormented expression on her face, and Zoro reassured her.

"Don't worry. He's not dead," he told her. Vivi's eyes widened.

"How do you—?"

"We can tell," Zoro interrupted. "We'll talk later. For now, we need to go."

"Wait, I can't leave without Carue!" she remembered as Zoro climbed onto the ship.

"Would Carue happen to be a giant duck?" he asked. This surprised Vivi, and she climbed onto the ship to see Carue already there.

"All right, if that's everything, let's go," Nami said, worry evident in her voice. As the ship sailed away from the island, Nami breathed a sigh of relief. "All right, it looks like we're in the clear," she said.

"Good thing, too. Baroque Works would have been here soon," a voice said.

"Yeah, good thing we escaped," Nami answered.

"Watch out for the shallow water so you don't damage the hull," the voice suggested.

"Right, you can count on me," Nami said confidently. After a few seconds, she turned nervously to Luffy. "Um…was that you…?"

Luffy shook his head and pointed over his shoulder with his thumb. All eyes turned around to see an unidentified woman sitting peacefully on the railing. Half of the ship's occupants immediately panicked.

"This is a nice ship," the intruder said with a serene smile. Luffy turned to her.

"Glad you like it." Vivi ignored the informality and shouted.

"Why are you here!? Miss All Sunday!"

The intruder continued smiling, resting her face in the palm of her hand. "Hello, Miss Wednesday," the woman greeted, completely ignoring her question. "I ran into Mr. 8 not too long ago," she said, as if she was commenting on the weather. Vivi quickly became enraged.

"You…what did you do to him!?" she screamed. Suddenly, she felt a hand on her shoulder, and turned to face Luffy.

"It's OK. He's still alive," he said in a reassuring tone. Vivi wanted to believe him along with the swordsman, but how could they be so sure? Miss All Sunday was wondering the same thing, but the smile never slipped from her face.

"Who is she?" Nami finally asked. "Which pair does she belong to?"

"She's part of the Mr. 0 pair, Crocodile's partner," Vivi whispered. Nami looked extremely worried now, and Usopp was visibly cowering, though to his credit, he did have one hand on his slingshot. Sanji was busy admiring her beauty, and Luffy and Zoro were suppressing the familiar pangs of guilt in their stomachs. They should have gotten use to this by now, but their survivor's guilt seemed to affect them separately for each individual comrade they had failed to save.

"She's the one I trailed to find out Mr. 0's identity," Vivi continued.

"Correction," the woman said. "I'm the one who let you trail me."

"I knew," Vivi whispered. "And you're the one who revealed us to Mr. 0, aren't you?" Her voice rose. "What are your intentions exactly?"

"Who knows? But you were so serious about it. I just had to let you follow me. Still, a princess infiltrates an underground criminal organization in a desperate attempt to save her dying country. It all seems a bit much, don't you think?" she said in a straight tone of voice.

"Stop mocking me!" Vivi screamed.

Nami and Usopp drew their weapons, getting ready for a conflict, before a sudden blast of Conqueror's Haki diffused the situation. The two stiffened and looked at their captain questioningly.

"Enough," Luffy said. The command, for it could be mistaken for nothing else, was obeyed. Miss All Sunday was looking down at Luffy curiously as a bead of sweat slid down her cheek. Despite this, she kept smiling. Luffy looked her dead in the eye. "You're on the losing side of this game, Robin."

The woman's composure instantly slipped away along with her smile, and her eyes widened slightly. There was a moment of silence before she regained her bearings and spoke. "So, you know my identity. You've piqued my curiosity, Monkey D. Luffy."

"Well, you look just like the wanted poster," he replied. Miss All Sunday smiled again, but Luffy could sense her discomfort.

"I see," is all she said. It wasn't a lie. She did look strikingly similar to her 8-year-old self. "It would seem you might have earned your reputation, Straw Hat Luffy. However, you won't make it to Alabasta," she said after a while. "Even if we do nothing, your next destination…is Little Garden." She didn't offer an Eternal Pose this time. Zoro suspected that much of the amusement she found in this had just died. As she jumped off the ship and onto a rather large turtle, she turned towards them one last time. "Good luck, I suppose," she said before leaving.

"To Little Garden, then," Zoro said when she was gone. The crew went about their business, and not for the first time, Vivi wondered what kind of pirates she had involved herself with.