Chapter Text
Sometimes, days on the open sea tended to blend together. Franky didn’t mind, of course. He wouldn’t trade the freedom of sailing for anything in the world. And yet, his mind aways felt a little grey on the long stretches of endless blue between islands. The Strawhat Pirates could occasionally go days, weeks, months between destinations; he was never quite sure how long it took in total.
A dull mist was present in his mind when he woke up slowly. The shipwright groaned as he waded into consciousness, much too aware of all the other boys sprawled out around him. He’d made bunks for a reason, dammit, but that didn’t stop the ball of fur from itching his eyes, the scaly palm from pressing his cheek, the bony hand from poking his ribs, and the long nose from snoring right into his ear. Franky sat up slowly, elbowing Jinbei off of him. One of his big metal hands rose to nudge Usopp back into his hammock, and his other picked Chopper up off of his face. Brook rolled to the floor with a rattle of ivories.
The sun was shining bright through the windows, but it wasn’t particularly late in the morning. The cyborg’s internal clock read close to seven fifteen, day three thousand seven hundred forty. Ten years since he installed his calendar counter in his many enhancements, eight hundred sixty days since he joined the crew, one hundred seventy two days since getting to the New World, thirty three days since leaving Wano. He wasn’t sure how many consecutive days in a row they’d been at sea, but the tick of the mechanical device helped him to keep steady time. The metronome in his heart nudged him to his feet and out into the sunny morning.
Franky took a moment to rejuvenate himself and scrub the rust of sleep from his eyes in the bathroom. He then passed through the galley, trying his best to not get in the way of breakfast preparations, and picked up a cold beverage to properly wake himself up. The rest of the crew slowly shuffled into the kitchen for food not long after. Thick bacon and spiced sausage were the only primary motivators in waking their captain up this early in the morning. Sanji had apparently been in a bit of a baking mood; steaming muffins and puffed up pastries were piled in the middle of the table. He ladled hollandaise sauce and gooey poached eggs onto fresh biscuits for the ladies, but slapped away Luffy’s greedy fingers.
Chopper and Usopp talked excitedly through mouthfuls of waffles about their adventure the day previous. The boys, accompanied by their captain, had gone hunting for cicadas on the beach and brought a number of them back onto the ship. Wait, had that been yesterday? Franky could have sworn it had been at least a week since they’d made landfall, but he’d also spent the day before down in his workshop. Everything felt grey and fuzzy as he attempted to recall where they had gone, but specific details escaped him.
Luffy hopped up from his seat and sprinted away from breakfast with a slap of his sandals. They must be some super fascinating bugs if he was willing to leave his bacon behind in order to retrieve them. Sanji did not look pleased when the rubber man returned with a mesh cage of large, screaming cicadas.
“No bugs at the table!” The cook shouted and pointed for their captain to return the critters to wherever he had brought them out from.
“But look how cool this one is!” Luffy opened the hutch’s door to retrieve one, but accidentally released all the insects in the process. The small swarm flew from the open hole and scattered around the kitchen.
Nami shrieked, “ew, ew, ew get them off!”
“See?!” Sanji frowned, “this is exactly what I was talking about! What the hell, you’re freaking the ladies out!”
“They resemble locusts, devouring our crops and leading to a mass famine. I wonder if any of these cicadas are infected with the fungus that turns them into zombies?” Robin mused as she bat one away from her coffee with an extra hand.
“Zombie cicadas?!” Luffy sparkled.
Jinbei made a gesture across the room for Franky to help him start collecting the bugs. The precision hands came out and each jeweled creature was painstakingly returned to the hutch. As they worked, the engineer considered improvements he could make to the insect house so that they would not have to experience the issue again. The re-catching process was slow going, but the rest of the boys helped to make it as easy as it could be, given the circumstances. The navigator took her plate of food out to the deck to eat alone without bugs in her hair, but the archeologist stayed behind to lend an extra eye and a hand or three. Robin laughed and pointed to a cicada climbing up the wall behind the big cyborg's head, but he grew too enraptured by the sound to catch the critter in time. Brook managed to pluck it out of the air as it flew away, returning the bug safely home.
Franky had lost much of his appetite by the time all the cicadas had been located, so he excused himself and disappeared down into the hull. Days ending in a round multiple of ten meant it was time for body maintenance. The sooner he started the process in his day, the sooner he could move on to more fun activities. His initial diagnostic check didn’t pull up any red flags, though one of the relays in his left leg didn’t seem to be operating at its full capacity. The cyborg re-soldered the wires under his knee cap just to be certain, then turned his attention to the more standard routine. Oil was dabbed on his elbow joints, coolant was refilled in his fridge, and the pins in his right hand were tightened into place. The fine detail work was probably overkill, but a guy could never be too sure.
He had just started to work on replacing the light bulb in one of his nipples when the ship’s intercom system screamed to life. The helmsman announced that enemy ships had been spotted off the starboard stern, gaining quickly. Franky had just barely put his tools down and closed his hood when the first wave of cannon fire rocked his ship. He ran down the hall and up the ladder with haste.
The deck was already busy with the battle by the time he poked his head out of the hatch. Jinbei shouted orders from the bow and Nami had a storm brewing overhead. The cook and the swordsman took turns returning the cannonballs, pausing in between shots to bicker. Franky ran to the cannons as he surveyed the scene. The attacking ship seemed to be a crew of bounty hunters, though they didn’t look particularly threatening for the fight they had just picked. Where the combatants lacked in quality of fight, they excelled in annoying quantity. Too much time was sacrificed to mowing down leagues of goons, and the entire crew’s focus stayed locked on the crappy warship.
It wasn’t until the next cannonball cracked through the opposite taffrail that Franky noticed the approaching marine vessel. He spun and gave the command to divert attention off the port side. Cannon fire was returned in ample measure, but the military was clearly packing heavier artillery than the band of bounty hunters. Luffy and his wings few off in the direction of the first ship to finish the job quickly, while the rest of the crew defended against the soldiers. The initial fight had drawn too much attention, and the faster they could wrap this up, the better. Sunny was already looking a little bruised, and the shipwright’s whole focus shifted to minimizing the damage further.
Jinbei sent a signal from the helm that they’d need to get a Burst ready to go for the moment the Monsters returned, and Franky was all too happy to oblige. He ran through the lounge and into the cola storage room to ready the barrels. Another hit rattled his ship, but he trusted his friends to take retribution in his stead. It wouldn’t be too many fixes, just some railing and a bit of patchwork to the side shiplap. A window was smashed in the galley, too, but it wouldn’t be too tricky of a fix.
Wait. No, that couldn’t be right. He hadn’t passed through the galley, and he hadn’t seen the glass get taken out. Maybe he was imagining things, but the list of repairs felt exceedingly familiar. Now wasn’t the time to linger on the idea. The shipwright shook his head and snapped the final barrel into place. His machine whirred to life, pumping pent carbonation through the intricate tubing. He couldn’t stay long to watch it in action and admire his own handiwork. There were others relying on him.
By the time he sprinted back onto the main deck, the captain, the cook, and the swordsman had already touched back down on grass. Everyone gave final approval, Zoro tossed the navigator a well sized bag of gold and jewels, and Franky sent Jinbei the signal that it was time to fly.
Everyone could finally relax once a good distance had separated the Strawhats from their aggressors. The women disappeared up into the library, the swordsman left to take a nap, the cook started lunch preparations, and the doctor made his rounds checking that everyone had escaped the battle without too many scratches. Franky grabbed his materials from below deck and conscripted Usopp into helping him patch Sunny up. The work would probably not have taken long, if not for the cyborg’s meticulous eye for detail. The two labored until the sun was low in the sky and the lacquered wood sparkled like new. He wasn’t about to let some marine assholes dent up his baby in a petty skirmish like that. The sniper was never a super huge fan of the bosun’s chair over open water at top speed, but the other man was not nearly as scared. Franky hung off the side of the ship in his harness watching the orange sunlight glimmer through the waves as he hammered new boards into place. Usopp repainted the railing with little complaint.
Just before supper, something could be heard shattering in the galley. Zoro’s laughter floated out over the deck and all eyes snapped to the commotion. Sanji’s screams followed, insults flowing from his lips. The cook’s tone only prodded the swordsman further. Aggressive jeers volleyed back, until the two had devolved into a maelstrom of equal rage. They collided, bouncing off of each other, landing kicks and blows. The two men had always fought, but their latest bouts had escalated in hostility. A meat tenderizer crashed through one of the galley’s windows. Franky blinked as he realized he’d need to fix the glass after all. Super weird.
The whole crew gave the two space until the cook had called them all to dinner. Zoro stayed slumped in the corner, nursing an extra bottle of sake or two. No one seemed particularly happy as they ate quietly- the third meal of the day to carry an odd atmosphere. The tension was palpable. Chopper kept looking around hoping that someone would give a reassuring word, but no one offered any. Jinbei seemed like he wanted to say something, but never offered his thoughts.
Luffy looked to be sick of the fraught air and declared that they’d be having dessert out on the lawn. He egged Brook into playing for everyone, though the bard needed no such additional encouragement. He was always happy to perform. The starry night gave the crew a chance to breathe outside of the humid dinner. Franky offered to do the dishes after the cook’s arduous evening. His precision hands did their best to handle the ceramic plates with care and he smiled at the tune that wafted through the open door.
“Hey!” Nami shouted from the ladder above, breaking the cyborg out of his own head, “the hot water in the bath house isn’t working, can you come look at it?”
“Hot water? That’s super strange, I thought I just fixed that. Yeah, I’ll be up once I’m wrapped up with the-.”
Sanji was already at his side, shoving him out of the kitchen. “If the lady needs hot water for her bath, go and fix it for her. I’ll finish washing dishes. You help Nami!” The cook declared with a sharp point.
There was no reason to argue, so Franky lumbered up the ladder to look at the hot water system. His brain had already proposed a solution to the issue before he’d even seen what was wrong. Sure enough, his first instinct was correct. One of the valves had gotten a little bent out of place in the fight and it just needed a minor adjustment for the hot water to start flowing again. The navigator gave him a big hug before she kicked him out of the bath house and locked the door behind him.
Franky climbed down into the library, only to meet the bemused chuckle of the ship’s archeologist on his way out the door. The big man spun with a smile.
“What’s so funny?” He asked as he leaned against the doorframe.
“The whole crew’s kept you busy all day. You never have time to relax,” Robin smiled without looking up from her book.
“Eh, that’s every day though. Super normal. Someone needs somethin’ from me all the time. It ain’t a bother. You need any help while I’m here?”
“Mmmm, not at the moment, no.”
“Aight. Totally get’cha. I can tell when I’m not needed,” he sighed with overdramatic dejection and a low laugh.
“Well, I wouldn’t say that. Ask me again tomorrow, I may have a different answer for you,” her bright eyes finally snapped up over the top of her book.
“Lot can happen in a day. I might be a whole new man tomorrow!”
“Oh? Then we’ll just have to see what tomorrow brings.”
“Hopefully not more marines and big bugs. I mean, I ain’t scared of either, but I can see how both might be super harrowing for someone else.”
“Then that makes two of us. I always enjoy when something exciting happens to spice up the open sea doldrums. Maybe tomorrow we’ll encounter even bigger insects, that could be fun.”
“Oh yeah, super good target practice. I’ll squash ‘em super flat,” Franky laughed with a nonchalant flex of his mechanical arms.
“If you cover the ship in cicada viscera, you’re cleaning it up. And you’ll be the one to console the captain when he sees your pile of bug corpses.”
“He’ll be super devastated, but at least we’ll be safe to sail another day.”
“Very true,” she laughed. “Goodnight, Franky.”
“Night,” he waved and left her alone to read in peace.
The cyborg joined to rest of the crew for remnant wafts of music beneath the night sky. He briefly considered breaking out his guitar, too, but the toil of the day had already begun to pull at his remnant human parts. Peaceful violin drifted on the sea breeze and relaxed his iron shoulders. These sorts of days were stressful, but he liked the routine of them. His nakama gave him a structure that helped him to feel like part of a system. Even as days greyed one into the next, they were never truly rote. It was fun. They always kept him on his toes.
Maybe she didn’t need him now, but he was welcome to ask again tomorrow.
Days like today always made the sweetness of adventure taste better.
Brook’s tune shifted into a magical little lullaby, and the iron man lowered his guard enough for sleep to lap at his ankles. Tingling relaxation massaged his human bits, and everything else shifted into low power mode. The summer air wrapped the cyborg in a tight blanket, and his ship rocked him soundly into slumber.
He’d ask again tomorrow.
Franky floated comfortably into the still of the night.
It was super wild how days on the open sea just faded from one day to the next. Not that it totally mattered to Franky. He wouldn’t ever give up the freedom of sailing for all the cola in the world. Still, on some days in the interim between destinations, he couldn’t help but feel a little dull. His nakama sometimes went long stretches without making landfall, and the waiting period made him antsy.
That gnawing sensation chewed on his brain when he woke up to sunlight pouring into the boy’s bunks. Half the damn crew had fallen on top of him in their sleep, and he sighed in his efforts to free himself. Usopp’s nose had pressed right against his ear, Brook’s skeleton hand prodded his side, one of Jinbei’s webbed paws smacked right in the middle of his face, and Chopper was practically choking him under all that fur. None of the men seemed all that bothered as the cyborg peeled them off of him, though Jinbei blinked awake.
It was a super clear day, not a cloud above to dampen the stark beams of sunshine. Franky’s clock in his machinery read a little before seven fifteen, day three thousand seven hundred seventy. Ten years since he installed the counter in his enhancements, eight hundred ninety days since he joined the crew, two hundred two days since getting to the New World, sixty three days since leaving Wano. Had it really already been two months? Damn, time flew. They’d been at sea for a few weeks now between islands, but the metronome of his internal calendar helped the cyborg to keep time with the rest of the band. He’d crafted it back on his four years alone in the warship as he rebuilt himself, just to serve as a reminder that time was moving, even if it was a struggle for him. It had been a total lifesaver in Vegapunk’s cave. He rolled to his feet and stumbled out into the bright summer’s day.
Franky made his way up to the bathroom to take a quick piss, brush his teeth, and pick out the day’s hairstyle. He really needed to program something new, the salon’s variety was starting to feel a little stale. After he’d refreshed, he made his way down into the kitchen to top up on his energy supply. The women were already at the breakfast table, receiving hot drinks from the cook. The shipwright waved to both ladies, though his eyes lingered on one for just a fraction longer than the other. Crap, he had something he had been meaning to ask Robin, but he couldn’t remember what it was. Whatever, he’d recall it eventually. The rest of the crew filed into the galley in a few short minutes. Luffy burst through the door demanding steak for breakfast, but the massive glazed ham was enough on its own to appease him. Sanji had apparently been in a bit of an eggs mood that morning; fluffy custards and steaming omelettes were plated along the bar top.
Luffy sat at the head of the table recounting the tale of his previous day’s adventures. Usopp angled next to him, providing color commentary about all the bugs they had caught on the beach. Hold up, had the shipwright really been so focused in his workshop that he’d missed them stopping at an island? He knew he had a tendency to get in the zone, but he didn’t think he was that focused. The crew hadn’t made landfall in over a month, and it would have been nice to get out and really feel the sand between his toes, y’know? They’d gone long stretches between ports before, but this journey was starting to push it.
The captain, the doctor, and the sniper grew titillated as they spoke, and soon they ran out of the mess hall to retrieve their buggy treasures. Those bros always got like this, riling each other enough that the rubber boy was even willing to walk away from his honey glazed ham. The sound of boots, sandals, and hooves signaled their exuberant return.
“What’s the rule? No beetles when we’re eating!” Sanji snapped his dish towel over his shoulder.
“They’re not beetles, we caught cicadas,” Luffy shook his head. “Beetles are an entirely different type of bug.”
“Actually,” Robin spoke up from her seat, “cicadas in the Hemiptera order are the only technical ‘true bugs.’ Beetles are insects, but not bugs.”
“No whatever-the-hell-that-is at the table!” The cook repeated.
“Not even this one? It’s really cool! Look!” The captain reached into the bug cage to pick one up, but the rest of the insects used the opportunity to fly out the door. The hoard filled the kitchen, scattering all over the breakfast table.
“Oh my god!” Nami screamed as she bat the cicadas away from her food.
“You’re scaring the ladies!” Sanji shouted with a flap of his towel. “This is what I meant, do you know how unsanitary this is?!”
“Plenty of cultures eat cicadas a variety of ways, we could have them stir friend or candied for breakfast?” Robin offered with a laugh.
Luffy looked at the bugs intently, weighing the desire to play with his creatures with the desire for a snack. One of the cicadas landed in the archeologist’s dark hair, but Jinbei pulled it off with a gentle palm. She smiled and thanked him as he returned it into the hutch. Not to be outdone, Franky stood and started to carefully collect each jeweled critter. It’d be super bad if one of ‘em fell in the syrup and got all sticky. The faster they contained the mess, the happier everyone would be. Nami was already long gone, declaring she was going to finish eating in the lounge downstairs. Robin, on the other hand, stayed behind to help catch as many as her phantom appendages could pick up. Fingers began to blossom to capture the cicada behind Franky’s head, but he spun quicker and snatched the iridescent bug before she could grab it. She laughed as he turned back, probably because she definitely though he was super cool for catching it himself. He didn’t know how he’d known the insect would be there, just that it would be. Maybe he was developing midlife clairvoyance.
The cyborg’s refrigerator of a stomach didn’t have much need for food after all the bugs had been cleared away. Everyone else began to disperse, too, so he felt fine with retreating into his workshop. It was a day that ended in zero on his counter, which meant it was maintenance time. He didn’t like getting into the under-wiring with an audience around. Nothing seemed super bad on his initial check, though his joints were starting to feel a little funky. Wapometal didn’t rust, but he still couldn’t shake the strange feeling in his limbs. Franky realigned a few receptors in his calf, then recalibrated the pins in his left pinky just to stay in peak form. He topped off his fluids and lathered himself in gun oil to keep everything flowing nicely. It was the little things about maintenance that he liked the most, even if today’s session took a little longer than it had in the past. Just a part of getting older, he shrugged.
He had just turned his attention to drafting up a new weapon design when the buzz of the intercom interrupted his thoughts. Damn, bounty hunters. Again. They’d been swarming worse than cicadas ever since Onigashima. A cannonball hit his baby, making the walls shake. Oh, those assholes were in for a beatdown now. The cyborg readied his weapons and climbed the ladder onto the deck with haste.
Everyone was already doing what they did best by the time he’d arrived. Jinbei dove off of Sunny’s starboard side and used the sea itself to overwhelm the annoying troop of bounty hunters. The fishman’s direct nature was growing quickly on Franky. That meant he had more time to fend off the marines. Marines? What marines?
“Marines to port!” Usopp shouted from the roof.
Oh, those marines. Damn, the fight never ended, did it? Another cannonball splintered debris over the deck. Just more to fix, like the other hole and the window that was going to break later. Another flash of the dull fog crept at the edges of the cyborg’s mind. His head swam, and the boom of cannons made his ears ring.
“Franky! Focus!” Someone screamed, though the voice sounded a thousand miles away. He needed to be doing something. He had a job. What was it?
They needed to fly.
Yeah, that was it. Time to run.
Luffy, Zoro, and Sanji made their way to the marine ship to take it out quickly, and the shipwright ran as fast as he could to the fuel storage room. He had a job to do. He could do this, he could do this. The barrels were locked into place and the machine prepared for whenever Jinbei got back into position. The fog in Franky’s brain still toyed at his periphery. They’d fought thousands of inconsequential fights against bounty hunters and marines before, so why was this one feeling so strange? It didn’t matter. The shake of his carbonation machine centered his wandering mind back into his body. His nakama needed him focused.
The cyborg made his way through the aquarium bar and back out onto the deck. Everyone turned to him as he emerged through the door into the bright afternoon light.
“Franky! Can you set the Burst up? We need to escape!” Jinbei bellowed from across the deck as he got in position. The captain, the cook, and the swordsman all landed back on the grass with arms full of dry supplies. Everyone looked to be present and accounted for.
“Already on it, brother! Pull that lever as soon as you’re ready to rock!” He answered.
“Excellent fore thinking!” The fishman’s wide grin flashed.
Time to fly.
The entire crew relaxed substantially the moment they hit the water a kilometer away from the marines. Nami and Robin both left to take naps, the doctor began to patch a small wound on Usopp’s forehead, and Brook sat down to pluck out a jaunty tune on his guitar. The cook and the swordsman were still running hot from the battle, and snippy comments soon festered into an all out brawl. Jinbei was able to intervene and separate them out before it got ugly, but the argument was only postponed. They’d be screaming again by dinner. Franky shook his head as he readied his tools.
Usopp tried to use the cut on his brow as a reason he couldn’t help with repairs, but Chopper immediately sold him out and said he was fine to work. Not even a little concussed. The shipwright put his little bro on rail repainting duty, knowing there was no way he would agree to getting in the bosun’s chair with a cut on his head. It wasn’t a battle he was itching to start, either. Franky spent the whole afternoon on the details, making sure his dream ship looked her best once more. He smiled out at the setting sun. He’d never get tired of the sunsets out at sea, that’s for sure. It always looked super stunning, and there hadn’t been a cloud in the sky for a long, long time. Super great luck for the infamously fickle New World.
Right before dinner was ready, a glass shattered in the kitchen. The swordsman wasn’t taking the incident particularly seriously, and that only served to enrage the cook. Soon, as predicted, their argument boiled over with a fury. Both men screamed insults back and forth at each other in the galley. The rest of the crew tried to look preoccupied as they mulled around the deck. A nasty tension lingered in the air. Then, something heavy was thrown through one of the kitchen’s portholes. It was bound to happen sooner or later, Franky shook his head. The strangeness of his prediction took backseat over his worry for his fighting crew mates. Arguments had risen in frequency and hostility over the last few weeks. They were probably starting to feel a little stir crazy, too.
The aura of animosity remained even after dinner was served. Nami and Robin did their best to try and brighten Sanji’s spirits; Luffy and Chopper aimed to help Zoro. Jinbei was attempting to shoot Franky a look for advice on how to assist, but if he was being honest, the cyborg wasn’t sure if this was a bitterness he could help alleviate overnight. It’d probably be best to talk to the dudes in the morning, once everyone had had the chance to sleep on their feelings a bit. Probably.
The cook brought out dessert, but the captain insisted they eat their treats on the deck. The cyborg and the fishman both hung back to help clean up dinner. They couldn’t fix whatever was going on between the other two, but they could help in little ways. Jinbei washed dishes, while Franky dried the plates one by one and put them away in the cabinets.
One sticky fork needed a second rinse, and the shipwright dropped it back into the suds of the sink. Warm bubbles. The hot water worked down here, but it wasn’t working in the bath house. He’d need to fix that once he was done with the dishes. It was always breaking. Damn, he thought he did better work than that.
“Hey big brooooo?” Nami poked her her head down the hatch from the upper floors of the ship. “The hot water isn’t working in the bath. Do you have time to take a look at it?”
“Yeah, totally! Just gimme a minute to wrap this up and I’ll adjust the valve!” He shouted back.
“It seems you already know the fixes you need to make!” Jinbei laughed next to him. “Go, I will be fine. There are not many more to wash, and I would very much like to take a warm soak later tonight, as well.”
Franky conceded quickly and ran upstairs to get the valve dealt with. His brain puzzled over what he could make to keep this from being more of a reoccurring issue. Fixing the same valve so often was starting to blow, but at least it was always a quick repair. Nami expressed her thanks, ruffled his hair, and then promptly kicked him out of the bathroom.
That wicked sense of deja vu steeped into his mind. The grey fog of confusion enshrouded the big man. He stared down at the tile floors of the library, lost in a sea of his own thoughts. The damn pipe kept breaking. It’d need reinforcements. Had he already tried that? He’d install something stronger in the morning.
“What are you thinking about?” A dark voice asked from her reading nook.
“Hot water keeps breakin’ at the same time every day,” Franky mumbled in answer, not really thinking his words through.
Robin couldn’t help but smile. “How strange! It was working when I took my bath this morning. I’ll keep my eye on it tomorrow. Perhaps it has something to do with the way our navigator bathes?”
“Eh,” the big man shrugged as he dusted the cobwebs from his brain and head to the door, “I don’t think it’s her. But it’d be a super big help if you’d let me know if it’s workin’ okay in the morning, yeah. Thanks.”
“If you wanted,” the devil woman shifted to cross her legs, “it might be easier if you joined me yourself? That way I could know what exactly I’m meant to be looking out for. And you could have the opportunity to see all that hot water and steam in action?”
“Me? You want me to join you? In the bath?”
“If you wanted.”
He laughed crisp and clear in the night, “don’t joke like that, Nico Robin.”
“I’m not joking.”
Franky froze halfway out the door. Her offer sliced right through his hazy thoughts. They’d bathed together with the rest of the crew in mixed company before, sure, and they were known to playfully flirt for as long as they’d known each other. It had never meant much, just witty banter between close friends. Yet, something just a little different hung in the proposition.
“Uh, sure. Okay. I’ll check out those pipes myself in the morning. Come find me when you’re ready, yeah? I’ll be, y’know, around. Wherever, I guess,” he shrugged in an effort to try and play the advance off in a cool fashion.
“I’m looking forward to it. It’s a date,” she hummed and returned to her book.
“It’s a date,” the big man echoed before leaving out the door.
Robin called after him as he departed, “Goodnight, Franky!”
“Night, Nico Robin! See ya in the morning,” he waved back before leaving the library behind.
Most of the crew still lingered on the grassy field doing their own activities while Brook noodled on his guitar. It looked so fun that Franky couldn’t help but break out his own instrument and join in. The two guitars played in harmony, even if one wasn’t nearly as precise as the other. Each little missed note of off-rhythm beat kept him feeling human. Despite the fights and the maintenance, it had been a nice day. Tomorrow’s plans were already shaping up to be super, too. He knew it was most likely nothing more than two friends checking out some questionable pipes in the hot steam, but the idea still made him grateful for the big acoustic guitar that covered his thighs.
His nerves and the excitement got the better of him and he tapped out of the jam session early. Franky escaped into the boys’ bunk room to try and get some shut eye. The sooner he fell asleep, the sooner he’d wake up, the sooner he’d get to take that bath. Despite his best efforts, slumber stayed elusive. No matter how tight he shut his eyes, the cyborg simply could not relax. Ideas and inventions and his own imagination betrayed him and kept his brain spinning. Dull fog attempted to pull at his brain’s grey matter, but it didn’t mean much to him.
Tomorrow couldn’t come fast enough.
Hopefully the streak of good weather would last.
Maybe the summer sun would last forever.
There’d be worse fates.
Franky finally drifted into slumber with a big smile across his face.
The future was lookin’ good.
He had a steamy little spa date tomorrow morning.