"Like I already told you, my Robin is an enormous coward," Nami began explaining, raising one index finger instructively in the same way Luffy himself often liked to do. "The instant she feels that something is wrong, she immediately turns around and runs as fast as she can. And that's probably one of the main reasons she's still alive despite being so useless."
"You mean she ran now because she felt something was wrong?"
Usually Luffy was the one lecturing everyone and explaining different things, so the reversal of roles had Nami on the verge of floating above the ground with happiness. Or above the ship's planks, if one wanted to be annoyingly precise about details.
"My Robin is a useless coward whose entire life has basically been spent alone, surrounded by enemies and traitors, but she isn't stupid. She's started enjoying traveling with us. She's started liking the boys too, strangely enough, including you. You could even say she's become friends with Tashigi and Vivi. But most importantly, she likes me. And it isn't just simple affection anymore!" the smiling girl declared smugly. "In other words, Robin has begun getting attached to us, which is completely uncharacteristic for her. Her entire life has shown her nothing except death and betrayal. Accordingly, any attachment automatically becomes associated in her mind with inevitable betrayal in the very near future. Is it really surprising that she became so frightened she tried running away despite clearly understanding how stupid the attempt was? Her escape is nothing more than the final desperate lunge toward the surface by someone rapidly drowning. Like I said, if she seriously tried to run, then she's already finished. She's not going anywhere away from us ever again!" Nami concluded triumphantly.
It was not that Luffy could not have reached the same conclusions on his own, but it definitely would have taken him longer, and there would have been noticeable errors in his reasoning. The young man clearly understood that Nami now had a much better grasp of the 'cockroaches' living inside Robin's head than he did. And he trusted Nami enough to believe her words without any additional verification.
"Finished or not, going anywhere or not, she's definitely going to be punished!" Luffy said with exaggerated sternness after 'digesting' all the information. "We had an honest agreement, and she just went ahead and broke it. Something like that can't possibly go unpunished!"
"I completely agree with you!" Nami supported him. "Which is why she's definitely going to be punished—by me! You can tell her that too."
"...After hearing that, she might try jumping into the sea."
"Oh, stop dramatizing. My Robin wouldn't do that," the girl answered with a cheerful smile. But almost immediately afterward the smile disappeared and her face became serious.
No matter how one looked at it, such a sudden change of mood did not seem normal, involuntarily suggesting that the question she was about to ask would be unusual.
"Want to ask something?" Luffy reacted calmly to the shift in Nami's emotions.
"Isn't it time we talked about the elephant in the room that you've been so carefully avoiding mentioning?" she asked in complete seriousness. "I've already held back for a long time, but the more I learn about Robin, the more I want an answer."
"Hmm..."
As expected, Nami raised a very unusual subject.
"Robin carries information fully capable of destroying the entire world—or at the very least significantly changing the world order—and the World Government knows it. With all due respect to Robin's intelligence, she's too weak and too useless to successfully hide from the World Government for twenty years. Ordinary agents aren't a problem for her, but if they seriously wanted to capture her, all they'd have to do is determine her location and send someone reasonably strong after her. Instead, she's been running from the government for twenty years straight, while every single organization she's ever belonged to has ended up destroyed. From where I'm standing, all of that looks suspicious, to put it mildly. And although after everything I've already seen I won't categorically deny the possibility that curses exist, you yourself taught me not to multiply entities unnecessarily when there's a much simpler explanation for everything that's happening."
"If you've already figured everything out yourself, what exactly do you want to hear from me?" Luffy asked, judging by his expression somewhat amused by how serious Nami had become.
"Who is that person?" the girl asked directly. "Who simultaneously protects my Robin and repeatedly destroys everything around her?"
"I'm afraid you think too highly of me." Luffy lowered his head slightly so that the brim of his straw hat concealed most of his face, but his smirk was obvious.
"You mean you don't know?" Nami refused to believe him.
"Who do you think could shield Robin from the World Government while also directing its forces to destroy the organizations she joins?" As he so often liked to do, Luffy answered the girl's question with one of his own.
"Who could?" Nami repeated with a frown.
"Think."
"How am I supposed to know something like that?!" the girl protested irritably.
"You just answered without even trying to think," the young man countered.
Now Nami really did think. After a while she cautiously said:
"...If he can command the World Government's forces, then he clearly isn't low in their hierarchy."
"Think about Robin's importance," Luffy prompted with a smile, lifting his head. "Think about the importance of the information she possesses. Think about what it would take to keep the World Government from launching a full-scale hunt for our Robin..."
"That person would need to have extremely high status," Nami finished for him.
"Now think about who fits those parameters."
"..."
"Start from the very top," the young man prompted again.
"...The Five Elders?" Nami suggested cautiously.
"Five!" Luffy raised one hand and spread all five fingers.
"Commander-in-Chief of the Marines?" the girl said more boldly, beginning to understand the principle.
"Six!" One finger on his second hand joined the five spread fingers of the first.
"The Fleet Admiral and the three Admirals," Nami confidently increased the 'number of suspects'.
"Ten!" Luffy declared, spreading all ten fingers.
The girl thought for some time, then proposed another group of candidates, though once again without much confidence.
"...Vice Admirals?"
"Entirely possible," Luffy agreed with a nod as he lowered his hands, "but there are too many of them, and almost all of them are restricted in how freely they can move. You also shouldn't forget that Vice Admirals can't freely command other people's subordinates, which creates additional limitations when Robin is involved."
"So only ten possible candidates?" the girl clarified.
"Actually a few more," Luffy corrected her. "But now we should add extra parameters."
"Such as?"
"For example, which of them has reasons to help Robin?"
"Reasons?"
"There's always a reason! Otherwise a certain girl we both know, who hated pirates more than anything in the world, would never have become a pirate. Changes that drastic need a reason!"
"!"
"Robin is no exception."
"...You're right. Nobody watches over someone for twenty years without any reason," Nami agreed with a nod. "But what does that give us?" she immediately added. "How could we know details like that?"
"Already forgotten what I taught all of you? A correctly asked question contains half the answer."
"How could we know details like that?" Nami involuntarily repeated her own question, then immediately understood what Luffy was hinting at. "No! You meant nobody would watch over someone for twenty years without a reason! Meaning the reason appeared twenty years ago! Exactly when Robin's home island was destroyed and she became the only... That's it!" Nami's eyes practically lit up. "The person who saved her!"
"Has Robin told you about her childhood?" Luffy asked with involuntary curiosity.
"She tells me almost nothing about herself, especially about her childhood." Nami shook her head. "Every piece of information has to be dragged out of her with pliers, but sometimes she slips up or mentions different moments and incidents. There's definitely someone in her life she's extremely afraid of, and she met that person in childhood. Most importantly, besides fear she feels other things toward him too, including hatred, but at the same time her hatred and fear are nothing like what I once felt for Arlong."
"There you have an excellent selection criterion." Luffy snapped his fingers victoriously. "A person capable of not only saving a little girl from a surrounded island twenty years ago, but someone who had a reason to appear on that island in the first place. And influential enough—or someone who later became influential enough—to keep watching over her for the next twenty years."
"The Five Elders eliminate themselves," Nami concluded. "As far as I know, all five current members already held their positions back then, meaning they had no reason to appear on the island personally. That leaves the Commander-in-Chief, the Fleet Admiral, and the Admirals. Any of them could have had a reason to be at the scene and enough strength and authority to save my Robin and then keep an eye on her."
"There could actually be other possibilities, all the way up to the Revolutionaries," Luffy clarified just in case. "But you have to understand..."
"That we shouldn't multiply entities unnecessarily," Nami once again finished for him, just as she had not long before. "So the Fleet Admiral, one of the Admirals, or even the Commander-in-Chief himself might come against us?"
"My bet is on the Fleet Admiral or Aokiji," Luffy added.
"The Blue Pheasant? Why him specifically?" Now it was the girl's turn to show curiosity.
"As far as I know, Akainu is a soldier in the worst possible sense of the word. If Robin ran into him, he'd carry out his orders and snap her neck without much thought. Kizaru, meanwhile, probably just wouldn't bother. He might not kill her, but he definitely wouldn't watch over her. The current Marine Fleet Admiral and Aokiji, on the other hand, are entirely capable of taking pity on a little girl and then keeping an eye on her."
"...How do you know such detailed information about people that influential?" Nami asked suspiciously.
'Clear Sky' or not, the girl was firmly convinced that none of that organization's agents could possibly have obtained information like this. On the other hand, as Nami understood perfectly well, Luffy had always been suspiciously well informed about things he had no business knowing for a whole list of reasons.
"Not telling!" Luffy smirked happily. "Life without surprises is too boring, so I deliberately saved a couple for you in the future so you'll never have to get bored."
Nami could easily have pointed out that the young man himself was a walking surprise, which made getting bored around him impossible, but she kept quiet rather than waste energy on another pointless argument. She had no doubt whatsoever that an argument would follow. Give Luffy any excuse to talk and he could keep going for an entire day. Especially when he was in a good mood. Exactly like now.
"...All right, I'll go take a walk over to Robin," Luffy said, realizing Nami had not taken the bait and habitually switching to a new source of entertainment.
"Don't you dare hurt her!" the girl immediately warned sternly. "Otherwise we'll have a fight!" she added, deploying her strongest argument.
"Nami, you're cutting me without a knife."
"...Fine. Don't hurt her too much."
Robin certainly appealed to her, but Luffy hardly occupied an insignificant place in her heart either. Besides, Nami justified herself with the thought that Luffy could not be changed anymore, so the sooner Robin got used to his antics, bloodthirstiness, and idiotic sense of humor, the easier things would be for her in the future. The fact that they were supposedly going to part ways after Alabasta did not factor into the girl's thinking at all.
"No problem!" the young man brightened. "I promise this time there'll be no fainting and no broken arms!"
Not a bad start. Seriously, actually not bad! No sarcasm!
"Get out already."
"Hmm..."
Tilting his head back and closing one eye, Luffy froze as though listening to something, then nodded confidently.
"The situation has started changing."
"What happened?"
"Nothing special. The jokes are over."
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