Second Wind

50

Fire. There was fire everywhere. It was all burning. The heat seemed to seep through her pores, under her skin, into her very being. She stared, wide eyed and trembling, at the omnipresent flames as they consumed everything and everyone in sight.

As they consumed Ohara.

The sights and sounds drove her to the brink of insanity. The blasting of cannons, the whistling of deadly artillery, the agonized screams, the raging of the insatiable inferno, the rising of the suffocating smoke...for what seemed like hours, it was all Robin knew.

"Run, Robin!"

The familiar voice broke her out of her horrified trance even as she felt a bone numbing chill spread throughout her body, overpowering even the heat of the all encompassing fire. She tried to move as the gigantic form of Jaguar D. Saul struggled to his feet. Perhaps to do as she was told. Perhaps not to. It didn't matter; she just needed to move.

But she couldn't. Try as she might, she couldn't even budge an inch. What was wrong with her? Had her legs been frozen along with Saul's? She closed her eyes and gritted her teeth as she willed her body to do as it was told. Move!

"Run, Robin!" the voice came again. But it was different this time. She opened her eyes in shock. Saul was gone. In his place stood the ever determined Monkey D. Luffy, frozen from the waist down. His fists tightened as Marine Admiral Aokiji walked leisurely toward him. His arm blackened to obsidian as he threw his fist forward, faster than her eyes could keep track of, but evidently not fast enough for his adversary, who caught his fist in an icy grip. Luffy grunted in pain as the rest of his body began to freeze over. He turned towards her as the ice began to cover his face, the cold seeping into every last vein. "You have...to run..."

She stared in pure, unadulterated terror as the ice enclosed around the remainder of his face, which was still turned towards her. Unmercifully, Aokiji raised a fist, ready to strike.

No.

The fist collided with the frozen statue, and the brittle structure broke apart on contact. Whatever force had been keeping her from moving seemed to shatter along with that which had kept her going all this time. The spell broken, she sank to her knees in despair.

No.

The Marine Admiral turned toward her, his face impassive as he began walking in her direction. She didn't run like he told her. She couldn't, not anymore. There was nothing to run to.

"Three weeks," the man spoke emotionlessly. "You're not breaking any personal records, Nico Robin," he said as he reached toward her.

No.

Robin woke up screaming.

"Robin!" There was a voice shouting her name. Hands on her shoulders, shaking her. "Robin!" the voice came again. It definitely sounded familiar. She reached up to the hand on her shoulder. The contact seemed to anchor her back to reality, and her eyes focused before meeting the concerned face of her bunkmate.

"Nami...?" she asked. The navigator sighed in relief.

"Holy shit, don't scare me like that," she said. "Robin, are you ok?" Robin managed to give a weak nod, but taking into account how shaky it was, she guessed that it wasn't very reassuring. She could hear the loud beating of footsteps from outside the room just before the door was roughly opened, and the crew's chef, sniper, and doctor fell over each other in a rushed attempt to get inside the room.

"Robin!" Chopper shouted in worry.

"What happened?" Sanji asked desperately, searching the room for anything out of the ordinary, but finding nothing.