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Something crashed on the other side of the dock’s door, making the entirety of Tom’s Workers spin in their chairs. Kokoro’s voice rose about the cacophony to try and settle the troublemaker. Her best efforts didn’t seem to help. Iceburg opened his mouth to comment on the situation and Tom stood with a frown, but the office door burst in before any intervention could be made.
“You’re a fucking dick, Cutty Flam!” A young woman screamed from the open void. The back lighting illuminated her bright yellow curls and full cheeks that didn’t look nearly so cute when this enraged. The young shipwright immediately recognized her—of course he did. Cynthia, Kokoro’s daughter, a yagara trainer on the south end of Water 7. He’d gone out with her a few times but it hadn’t been a serious fling. She was a little younger than him, though he didn’t know by how much, maybe twenty or twenty-two to his twenty-five.
A compass whizzed past his head, followed by a few cargo logs. “Whoa there, little lady,” Tom stepped in to stop the fight as Cynthia readied an oil lamp. “What happened?”
“He ruined my fucking life is what happened! I hate you, Flam!”
The young woman’s composure had entirely flipped from the last time they’d seen each other. Cynthia usually held a super cheery disposition. Her wide smile had been one of the reasons Flam had wanted to ask her out in the first place. They’d gotten dinner on a handful of occasions, seen a show, had an impromptu little hookup in the yagara stables late one night. Just a bit of fun, really. Nothing he hadn’t done with plenty of others around town. In the end, something hadn’t quite clicked. She’d been too focused on work, he’d gotten sidetracked in the final stages of train track construction, the communication fell apart. They’d mutually agreed it was just a bit too messy getting involved through a work connection. It’d been a clean split, no drama, encouraged toward amicability by the knowledge that they’d see each other frequently enough at her mom’s curry nights. At least, that’s what he’d thought the few weeks before.
Flam leaned back in his desk chair, feet up on the table, looking at her upside down. “Uhhh, hey, Cynthia. What’s up?”
She screamed in white hot rage, unable to even meet his gaze. Instead of actually answering him directly, she spun on her heels to storm out. Unfortunately for her, though, Kokoro had stepped in to fill the exit, catching her daughter by the shoulders. “What happened, kid?” The secretary asked with firm direction.
Cynthia opened her mouth to scream again, but the only sound she could conjure was a long, sad wail.
“What were you thinking, boy? You’re smarter that this!”
“I didn’t know!”
“Yes, you did! And if you actually didn’t know, then you shouldn’t have been doing it.” Tom shot him one of the most stern expressions he’d ever made. “This is serious, Flam!”
“I know it’s super serious, you think I don’t?!”
Kokoro had taken the inconsolable Cynthia home and left the men to hash out the revelation on their own. Iceburg sat sprawled on the couch with an even more austere expression, though it kept inadvertently cracking into a little shit-eating grin. Their master shipwright paced back and forth with his hands behind his back in thought. “You need to be a man about this, Flam,” Tom said as a matter of fact.
“I ain’t marryin’ her! Cynthia’s nice ’n all, but I don’t like her like that,” Flam muffled through his hands over his face, still glued his chair, forehead to his knees. The curled posture looked practically…fetal.
“I didn’t say you need to marry her, I said you need to be a man about this. And if you don’t like her like that, then you shouldn’t have gone and slept with her!”
“Oh, like you’ve never had an iffy hookup before? You a hundred percent sure there’s no half-cowfish spawn between here and the Red Line?” The apprentice snapped back, immediately earning him a warning look from both Tom and Iceburg. “S-sorry. Didn’t mean it like that,” he mumbled as he shrunk even further in on himself.
“Did you know that Cynthia’s a half-mermaid before now?”
“No! It never came up! Didn’t see any scales or nothin’ when I was down there! I just thought she liked swimming and talkin’ to the yagaras and all that crap! Just assumed she was good at singin’!”
Tom stopped his pacing and tapped Flam to look up. The young man tried to surreptitiously wipe his eyes without catching suspicion, but the sniffles gave him away. “You’re not letting her go through this alone. She’s part of the Tom’s Workers family by proxy, so she’ll be around the entire time. Now, and after. This is your responsibility, Flam. You don’t have to be her boyfriend or her husband. But I’m not letting you abandon this guppy. You step up, you be the father that it needs. Understand me?”
“I—I—” Flam hesitated in the onslaught of emotions, but eventually nodded in agreement. “Yeah. Yeah. I ain’t leavin’ this kid behind. That would make me a fucking monster. I know what it feels like to be abandoned, and I don’t want to put that on someone else. I think I can work things out with her. Unless she kills me first,” he laughed through the squirming feeling in his guts.
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The sunset over the city turned the fountain into a cascade of fire. Cynthia locked up the yagara stables with a dark cloud above her head, made worse when she immediately caught sight of her baby daddy loitering outside the exit. “No,” she stated simply and raised her hand to push him away.
“You don’t even know what I have to say yet!” Flam jumped to the defense.
“I don’t care. This doesn’t concern you.”
“Hell yeah it does! It’s my mess, let me help take care of it.”
She ignored him and started to walk home through the winding backstreets. Several blocks passed before she realized he still followed behind her. “Leave me alone, Flam. I don’t want to talk to you about this. I have a plan. I’m dealing with this myself,” Cynthia shook her head. The setting sun cast long shadows over the alley.
“That’s super cool. But I still wanna be there for you. I got my job, I can give you money to help. The train line extension will be done in six months. Then, I’m back to shipbuilding. Burg’s been talkin’ some new business idea and I—”
“This isn’t about you, Flam! I don’t want to be a mom at twenty, I don’t want to leave my job, I don’t want to stop spending time with my friends, I don’t want to wreck my body! I do. not. want. this. baby. It doesn’t matter that it’s yours or not. I’m not even thinking about you, Flam. So just leave me alone! Back off!” Cynthia snapped back. She fumed as they walked until they’d reached the outer edge of the city.
“Wait,” Flam called. He moved to sit on the short, stone wall when they both halted. “So what are you thinking you’re going to do?”
She chewed her lip, though eventually shifted to join him. They turned to face out toward the sea where orange light glittered across the waves. “I don’t know, yet. Something’s got to give. I talked to my mom, she was saying I could put it up for adoption if I really needed to. I’m not sure if I want to do that, though. Things are better than when we were growing up, but this still isn’t a great city to raise a b-baby in. I was thinking, once the line extension is done, I could take the train to somewhere nicer. It’d be hard, but I’ll save up for a place, start from scratch. I’ve heard there’s some good schools in Saint Poplar. I don’t know. I don’t know the first thing about raising a kid.”
“Yeah, me neither,” he said as he stared off into space.
“You can’t even dress yourself, how are you going to take care of a baby?” Cynthia chirped, but her little smile and the nudge of her shoulder softened the insult.
“Super good point,” he chuckled, though it was tainted with a sorrow. “So, uh… How do you want this to work out?”
“I really don’t know, Flam,” she shook her head, eyes to the horizon. “But you’ll be the first I tell when I do.”
She kept her distance for the next seven months. Tom had been right, of course. Kokoro always worked around the office, so Kokoro’s daughter never seemed all that far away. Flam watched her grow from the sidelines. He fought every instinct to impose too much, but that didn’t stop him from asking at every opportunity. Cynthia gave him occasional details, but never expressed too much about the full scope of the pregnancy. Once—and only once—she let him go with her to a doctor’s appointment when her mom couldn’t take her. He took her out to get burgers after, but the awkward silence made him want to tear his hair out.
Cynthia never trusted him with the little things, never him touch her or feel the little kicks. He wasn’t asked for input on names. And that was…fine, he supposed.
Flam took all his pent, complicated feelings and mechanized them. The instinct to work through his frustration had always fizzed in his bones ever since he’d been a little boy and it wasn’t fading any time soon. His ex-situation made their kid. He made more Battle Frankies. The number of his battleships swelled as the days ticked on. He couldn’t stop crafting them every time the stress grew too overwhelming to handle. The guns got bigger, the turrets grew larger, and everything became much more deadly.
Cynthia had a way of always showing up right as he’d finished one ship, freaking him out again so bad that he’d turn around and start the next one. He quickly ran out of dock space, instead settling on just leaving the damn things around the scrap yard. That was probably fine, too, he supposed.
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Reality hit like a fucking train. Well, no. Reality hit in the form of a train. Cutty Flam floated in a sea of his own blood, sun setting in fiery hues across all that spilled crimson. He couldn’t help but ruminate over how much he’d lost in just a matter of moments. It’d all been his fault, a deserved hell of his own design. Tom had died. Kokoro and Iceburg would probably assume he’d died too. His life as he knew it had ended, a death in one way or another regardless. Everything had been ripped away. So had his left arm, both his calves, his nose and half his senses, from what it felt like. He’d need a damn miracle to survive.
But only one thought rang through his mind as he dragged his mangled body onto the deck of a derelict warship.
Cynthia would be due any day, now.
And she still hadn’t made up her mind.
Cutty Flam died that night without ever having met his daughter.
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A man named Franky stepped off his little makeshift raft to the confusion of the many dock workers. Water 7’s sands felt nice underfoot, or at least they would have if he’d retained feeling below his knees. Four years had passed in total isolation, and but none of that that really mattered to him any more. He meandered through the city, starting with a much needed bite to eat and ending at the entrance to a long-abandoned warehouse. The rusty lock on the door looked easy enough to break, and everything inside sat exactly where it had been left the day his life had ended.
He slept that afternoon on Tom’s dusty sofa. The world appeared bleary and dark when he awoke some time later. Too early to go back to bed, too late to do much else. Franky grabbed a wad of beri he’d stashed in his desk ages before and made his way out into the night. His city had changed so much over the years, but he wandered around until he found a bar. He didn’t even feel like drinking, simply needing to power up.
This new place, Blueno’s, seemed to have opened since he’d taken his vacation. The cyborg slid up to the bar, ordered a rum and cola, and told the tender to keep ‘em coming. Everything felt duller than it had before even with all new calibrated sensors. The city seemed bigger, sure, but not brighter. From the posters he’d seen, Burg now ran the whole damn joint. CEO and Mayor felt super excessive, but he wasn’t really one to talk. Anything looked excessively opulent compared to being undead and homeless, at the very least.
Someone hiccuped at the counter top to his left. Franky tried to ignore the sound, until the woman hiccuped a second time and unleashed an unmistakable laugh. “K-Kokoro?” He spun to soak the sight in, though he barely recognized her. “Damn, Granny, you look like shit.”
“You’re one to talk, stranger,” she winked right back.
Suddenly, the weight of the last few years lifted. For just a moment, he was once again the young dude hanging out in the Workers’ bunks catching up with the secretary while she cooked up a big pot of curry. Practically no time had passed. Kokoro told him all the new, salacious drama she heard out of the mayor’s office. He had no gossip to offer back. The more they talked though, the more they danced around one topic in particular.
“Where’re you ssstaying, kid?” She slurred through her words, though she then attempted to order another bottle of wine.
“Nowhere, yet. I broke into the warehouse, planned on crashing on the couch. Why?”
“Bullshit, that couch reeks. I’ve got a ssspare bed at the place we keep in the city. We’re usually down the line at Shift Station, but we like to come into town for supplies and things. You ran into me on a lucky day, kiddo!” Kokoro laughed with a slap to his bare chest, hollow metal ringing through the bar.
“W-we? Is, uh, is Cynthia still staying with you?” Franky asked, stepping carefully.
“Nah,” she hiccuped, “Cynthia left town years ago. Tom died, you died, and she had a choice to make. She wasn’t ready to give her freedom up. I can’t really blame her, just with how young she was. I was almost thirty when I had her, you know. And it never felt easy, being in two worldsss at once but never able to live fully in either. Ssso she boarded that train and left to lead her own life. I get letters every once in a while, but not too many updates.”
“Oh,” he nodded into his drink. “Can—can I ask if she left before or after she…well…you know…”
“After. Gave herself about a year to recover.”
Quaking iron lungs exhaled. “A-and did she end up putting ‘em up for adoption?”
“In a way. Things sorted themselves out in the end. She’d probably deny this if you asked her to her face, but she told me at the hospital that she wished you were there. If that’s any consolation, at least. Blueno! Another!”
“No way, you’re cut off for the night. Go home, Kokoro,” the imposing man on the other side of the counter answered with a shake of his head.
She sighed and hopped off the bar seat. “Fine. Let’s get out of here. You wanna meet her?”
Franky blinked. “Wh-who?”
“Chimney! Like I sssaid, she’s back at the little place we keep near the train station. It’s late, so hopefully she’s still asleep. She might look like her mom, but she’s got your attention span, that’s for damn sure. So, you wanna crash with us tonight?” Kokoro shrugged as she grabbed her coat.
“Y-yeah. That sounds super.”
They walked in silence across town as Franky mulled over everything he’d dreamed of saying in his four years of isolation. He nervously clicked and closed one of the mechanical latches in his fingers, again and again and again. Kokoro stopped him at a front door and pointed him into the apartment above the depot. “How much do you want her to know?” She asked with a raised brow and an unfocused eye.
“How much does she know already?” He countered.
“She thinks her mom’s having a big adventure across the Grand Line and that he dad is dead. You want to tell her?”
“N-no,” Franky sighed. “Maybe one day, but not now. I don’t know what my plan is yet, so I don’t wanna get her hopes up. I’m just an old friend visiting town, if that’s alright.”
“Understood completely. Let’s go, and try to be quiet. If you wake her up, you’re putting her back to bed,” Kokoro said as she pushed through the front door. They walked into the apartment, dodging around stuffed animals and empty wine bottles. Franky nearly kicked a glass over, still getting used to his extra height and bigger hands, but the old woman caught the cup at the last moment. She shushed him and pointed to an open door. A faint night light glowed through the opening.
He closed the gap, transfixed by the illumination. Kokoro asked him some question about sleeping on the spare pullout, but he couldn’t hear her. Gentle snores whispered from the child’s bedroom, though a bit closer in size to a closet. Franky filled the entire doorway; his eyes scanned for the curled form of his daughter. She lay under a soft quilt, dwarfed by an abundance of even more stuffed animals. Kokoro had been right. The little girl looked just like her mom and just like her grandma, though her hair grew barely a degree greener, genes mixed with a twinge of blue. He trembled watching her shoulders rise and fall with each gentle breath.
“You said her name was Chimney?” Franky whispered across the room, his voice warbling through the incoming waterworks.
“Yeah. Cynthia wanted to name her after something involving the train. For Tom. And you.”
“And you let her go with Chimney? Not Whistle? Smokebox? Superheater? Hell, if it was for me, it should’a been Cowcatcher, yeah?”
Kokoro nearly burst into laughter but caught herself when the little girl stirred. “Glad you’re still you, Flam.”
“Eh, it’s Franky, now. But then again, I guess shit names run in the family, ay?”
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He awoke on the sofa’s pullout bed to sun in his eyes and a sticky hand slapping his face. “Hey, mister guy! You dead?” Chimney asked from her perch in the middle of his chest.
“Wh-wha?” Franky mumbled as he faded into consciousness, realizing a moment he’d waited years for had finally arrived in the most un-glorified of means.
“It sounds funny here!” She hit his upper chest and giggled when he clanged like a bell. “Are you a big toy?”
“Nah, kid. I’m just a guy.”
“What’s’ya name, guy?”
“Fl—uh—Franky.”
“Hi Fluhfranky, I’m Chimney I’m four I like riding the train and one time the big train man said I could drive it so Granny let me go in the front seat and she held me really, really high up and I got to pull the whistle and also I like eating fries from the fries store do you wanna meet my cat?”
He blinked twice, brain buffering through a few million different emotions. “You got a cat?”
“Yeah! I found a baby kitty in the trash!” She giggled. Her little hand wrapped around one of his fingers, pulling him off the bed and dragging him to a cushion in the corner of the living room. It blended in well enough to the numerous stuffed animals that he didn’t even notice the small creature curled up on top. The little girl scooped the thing up, producing it with honor for her guest to see. “This is Gonbe he’s my best friend I found him in the trash he’s a really, really cute kitty ‘cept when he’s stinky you can pet him if you want to mister Fluhfranky.”
Franky reached out to pat the animal he knew for certain to be a rabbit, though it purred nonetheless. Tears threatened to overwhelm him for the thousandth time. He held himself together for the moment with all his steeled might.
“Kokorokokorokokorokokoro look!” Bare feet slapped over the sand and up the steps. The young boy stood proud, though he only wore his swimsuit and his goggles. “Look at this super funny fish I found!” He presented the slimy thing to his master’s secretary. Instead of grimacing, she laughed and leaned in for a better inspection.
“Flam, I think that’s a frog, not a fish,” Kokoro said.
“What’s’za difference?”
“Well, fish have to stay in water all the time, but frogs are amphibians so they can live on both the water and the land,” she stated, rubbing his wild, blue hair.
Young Flam thought hard, his eyes locked to the frog. “Is Tom an amphlibrian?”
“Not technically. Fishmen are different from animals. They’re people, so amphibian-ism is more philosophical. They live in the sea, but they can live on land if they want. Tom likes living here, just like how you like swimming in the ocean.”
“Uhhhhh does this frog know how to swim? Maybe I gotta teach him just to be super sure. Hey, buddy,” little Flam smiled, “you wanna be my best friend?”
Franky pet the rabbit a few times, then turned to pat his daughter between her braids. Something snapped inside his reconstructed chest and he pulled Chimney in tight for a hug. “I’m super sorry, kid. I didn’t—I didn’t want it to be like this,” Franky cried. He fought every instinct to kiss the top of her head, knowing the move to be inappropriate from a total stranger.
“What’cha sorry for, mister Fluhfranky? Gonbe’s really, really happy now that he’s off the streets and in a home and he’s gonna be so big and strong and happy because that he lives here with us. Hey! Do you live with us now? We only live here some days because other days I live at the island station and we wave to all the trains that come through and Granny says when I’m this many years old—” she held up both hands with all ten fingers splayed, “—then I can run the train station sometimes too. It’s me and Granny and Gonbe and we have another friend Yokozuna too but he gets hit by the train so he doesn’t feel good today.”
“You—” he hiccuped, wiping his tears before things got way too weird, “—you know Yokozuna? He got hit by the train?”
“Yeah, he gets up every day to try and fight the train I dunno why he tries to fight the train because the train is really, really strong but he still tries to fight the train and then he gets hurt so he swims home to us and we help him feel better but he’s sick today. I asked Granny and she says his best friend tried to fight the train once but the train won. She also told me that my daddy got in a fight with the train and he lost too, so every time the train comes by I look in the windows for my daddy because maybe he got better like how Yokozuna gets better and I look for my mommy too because she’s on a big adventure! I think if my best friend Gonbe tired to fight the train he’d go squish like a little pancake. Squish, squish, squish! Hey mister Fluhfranky are you okay? You’re crying really, really hard did you get an ouchie, too?”
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Iceburg found him not long after. Well, Franky poked at the Galley La front gate first, earning him a visit from the boss man in chief later that evening. They talked through the night and caught up on missed time much like how he’d caught up with Kokoro. Franky had to admit to being impressed by how much the mayor had managed to change in just a few years, though there seemed to be a lot of work still left to accomplish. The top of the fountain had been cleaned up, but not all the progress trickled down to the lower levels just yet.
“Are you staying here?” His step brother asked with an eye to the abandoned surroundings.
“Nah, but I’ll make it an initial home base. Kokoro said I could crash at her apartment while I sort things out. I’ve been staying on her pullout.”
Burg opened his mouth, but Franky saw the pullout joke coming from a league away and reached over to slap him. The heavy metal clanged against the much squishier man’s temple, making him crumple over. “Ouch, what the hell was that for?!” Iceburg complained.
“I don’t wanna hear it.”
“But if you’re staying with them, that means you have met Chimney already, right?”
“Yeah, course I did! She’s a little power generator, I got no idea how she fits so much energy in such a super tiny body. Yesterday, I just sat there watching her run laps around the station plaza while Kokoro went out for more, uh, supplies. And then the train pulled in and she insisted on showing the whole damn thing to me, engine to caboose. Told me every fact she knew about it. Super smart kid,” Franky said in response, eyes glossed in a thousand yard stare.
His brother moved seats to position himself closer on the couch. “Wonder where she got all that from,” he laughed. “How’re you feeling about everything?”
The cyborg sighed, shaking his head, “I…I dunno. I’m mad as hell that Cynthia just dropped the kid with Kokoro and left, but I sorta get it. I feel like shit that I was gone for all the super important stuff. Like, I can’t shake the feeling that I could have at least cared for her a bit if I hadn’t died, even though I know I wasn’t really ever going to be in the picture. I’ve definitely decided that I’m staying in this town until it’s built the way Tom wanted it to be, but…I feel like I can’t tell her who I am. I let her down already, I can’t just impose myself into her life. The person I’m the most mad at is me.”
“But Cynthia made her choice. She’s not coming back. It’s better for the kid to have one parent, even if he’s a bit late, right?”
“It’s more than that. If I’d just gotten hurt and recovered that’d be one thing. But I didn’t, I’m different. She’s like, the size of one whole fucking hand now. I’m still getting used to the machines and the life support. This shit’s more fragile than it looks. It’s a lot, I know it is. I got all these guns and crap. Just not in the state to raise a kid. This ain’t a dad bod. Chimney’s better off with Kokoro, even if I’m worried as hell about the drinking and leaving her unsupervised. I forfeited any claim to being her father when I died. I ain’t…I ain’t cut out to be that for her. I can’t take her away from the life she loves, and I can’t live down at Shift Station. ‘Least not full time. So I’ll do what I can from the sidelines. As long as she knows that someone out there loves her, then that’s okay by me.”
Iceburg clasped his shoulder, feeling the way the machine shuddered below. “You’re going to make a great dad,” he attempted to reassure.
“Nah. I’m already a shit deadbeat. But I’m gonna be the best damn uncle she’s ever known,” Franky laughed.
“Well, hang on, now,” his brother interjected, “because she’s already got one uncle that she loves a whole lot.”
“He probably did a pretty good job while I was away, but he ain’t super.”
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Life started to fall into a neat little rhythm. Franky cleaned up the warehouse, then cleaned up the apartment, then got started working on cleaning up the streets. Kokoro and Chimney stopped by for a night or two each week and he would watch his little girl so that the old woman could have some time to herself. Occasionally, she’d call him up to take the train to Shift Station to help out when business demanded she go out of town.
The patch-worked family held a little party in the Puffing Tom’s dining car for Chimney’s fifth birthday. They sat around a table in their tea time best, though that didn’t mean much for Franky, especially once his daughter insisted he wear a tutu over his swimsuit. She poured them sweet tea from her seat at the head of the table. Uncle Iceburg gifted her a plethora of plushes bought from every retailer in the city. Her dad’s gifts were smaller handmade toys and trinkets. Many resembled rabbits, though she excitedly declared them to be cats.
“Wait, I need to take a picture!” Kokoro insisted, pushing away from the spread. She retrieved her little Kameko snail and snapped a few shots of Chimney with her uncles. “Alright. And Franky, this next one’s going to be for Cynth’s upcoming letter. I always send her an annual birthday update.”
“Gotcha,” he saluted and pushed away from the table so that his brother and his little girl could take their snapshot together.
“No!” Chimney immediately protested, “Uncle Franky, come back. I want my mommy to see you at my birthday party! Please? Please please pleeeeaaaase?” Her eyes welled. She didn’t tend to cry much for a child, but when she did, she took after her dad.
“I—I can’t, kid. I’m, uh…” he looked to the others for an excuse, but no one offered any. “I’m a little camera shy. I want your mom to think I’m super cool, because you’re super cool. But I forgot to wear pants today, so she’s not gonna like me,” he lied with a grimace.
His daughter’s lip trembled. “You don’t like the tutu?”
“No! No that’s-that’s not it either. Uh…What the hell am I supposed to say?”
“Language,” Kokoro slapped his shoulder, holding her hand out for his beri payment. He handed her a bill from the wad he kept in his swimsuit, much to her regret.
“Pleeeeaaaase, Uncle Franky? It’s my birthday,” Chimney pleaded again. He couldn’t argue with her big, round eyes and puffed cheeks, so he relented and sat back down.
“Yeah, alright, kid. Your mom’s beat me up before, she can do it again.”
“You already know my mommy?!” She immediately brightened back into her usual sunshine. Kokoro used the candid opportunity to take a picture of the little girl, the two men on each of her sides, and the cat. A second shot, closer and more cropped on just the five-year-old, flashed in quick succession.
Franky nodded slowly, happy that the bullet of water works had been dodged. “Yeah. I knew your mommy from when we were growing up.”
“Cool! You know everyone don’t you, Uncle Franky? Do you know my daddy from growing up, too? Granny said he worked on the train a long time ago, and Uncle Iceburg worked on the train a long time ago, and you worked on the train a long time ago! That’s really, really funny, huh?” She giggled. Her grandmother moved to light the candles on the cake in the middle of the table. Once all five flickered, Iceburg held her close to blow them out.
“Make a wish!” Kokoro called.
The girl balled had fists, squeezed her eyes shut, and took a deep inhale. “Like how Uncle Franky does it! Ooo Doo Vent!” She declared before blowing at the candles as hard as she could. Franky, as he generally tended to do, wiped his eyes when she looked the other way. “For my birthday wish, I wish that my daddy up in the stars can get a photo from my party too, like how my mommy on her adventure is getting one! I wanna share or else daddy’ll cry and that’s when it rains but the rain means the train can’t go fast!”
The cyborg sniffled hard but reached for Kokoro’s Kameko. “Here,” he said, forcing a grin through his tears, his family in the sight line, “everyone get in close, I’ll take this next picture for him.”
A fifth birthday eventually became a sixth. Seasons and storms washed over the city. Tides went out, tides came in. People boarded the train every single day. Trains departed.
Franky built his home, just like he said he would. He’d had his eye on an ideal patch of beach just on the outskirts of town and quickly worked to create even more Family of his own, though a bit more figurative. Every brother and sister pulled off the streets mended something inside his heart’s rusty vessel. All that pent up, misplaced love couldn’t help but leak out of him through gaps in his plate armor.
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Mozu and Kiwi sat on the floor of his bedroom, equally upset. They couldn’t even look at each other, both firm in their righteous anger. “So,” their big bro began the deescalation process, “do you have anything you want to say to the other?”
“Just that Mozu’s a skanky bitch and the shirt she bought last week isn’t cute on her even though I told her it was,” the one in pink snapped as she crossed her arms.
“And Kiwi’s a stupid floozy who needs to back off on Trevor because I was there first!” The one in yellow upturned her nose.
“You didn’t get there first we met him at the same time! And I don’t even like like Trevor!”
“Oh, so you’re just flirting with him so that I can’t make a move?! That’s low.”
“I’m not flirting with him I just talk to him! It’s not my fault he likes me more than you! Maybe if you weren’t so weird, he’d think you were cool!”
“Maybe if you didn’t spill burger sauce on my new shirt, he wouldn’t think I’m a gross loser and then he’d go out with me! But you did! In front of him and all his friends!”
“It wasn’t even a cute shirt!”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Franky stepped in before the fight heightened even further. “Okay. Let’s all take a deep breath.”
“Why, so that Mozu can hog all the oxygen to herself?”
His voice raised a fraction higher, “AY! Stop that. I can’t even tell what you two are fighting over! Kiwi, do you like Trevor?”
“Ew, no way,” she blanched.
“Super! Mozu, do you like Trevor?”
“Uh, duh. He’s like, totally cute. I’ve liked him since forever, Ki knows that.”
“So what’s the problem with her going out with him?” He asked the pink sister.
Kiwi now hesitated. “I-I don’t know. But when I think about her hanging out with him without me, I feel all funny. Like…like if she has a boyfriend, she isn’t going to want to hang out with me any more. Our friends and Trevor’s friends hang out sometimes, and I like when we’re all together. But when I imagine everyone together except for me, I don’t feel good.”
Franky nodded between them, “yeah, that’s super understandable. It sounds like Kiwi’s afraid of being left out if you and Trevor start dating. What do you think about that, Mozu?”
“Left out?! Girl, you hang out with him all the time! You talk to him about stuff he doesn’t talk to me about. You’re always laughing with him and junk. You like more of the same music and movies and stuff, too!” Mozu tensed defensively.
“Mo, you and I listen to the same music and watch the same movies! But you overthink it every time you see him. I have an easier time talking to him because I don’t like him. You clam up and get like, super blushy. Just relax. He likes you, he told me that he thinks you’re cute. You have nothing to worry about, so just chill out,” Kiwi said as she finally turned to face her sister.
“It sounds like Mo’s feeling super jealous of your friendship, Ki. It ain’t always a logical response, but it makes sense,” their bro nodded sagely.
Mozu blinked. “Wait, he said he likes me?”
“Yeah! When we went to the show last week, and you were in the bathroom, he told me he thinks you’re cute but doesn’t think you’d like him back because you never talk to him. So I’ve been trying to gas you up all week so that you’d have the confidence.”
“I don’t talk to him because I get so nervous every time he’s around,” the one in yellow mumbled to herself, eyes wide in realization.
“Have I met Trevor?” Franky whispered to Kiwi.
“Yeah, lanky guy at the TD shop, sea serpent tattoo on his bicep.”
“Super big shorts, little tee shirt, locs?”
“Yes!”
“Ugh,” Mozu crumpled, “he’s so hot.”
“Hey, now,” he pat her on the shoulder with one huge hand, “I think you totally got a shot with him! You just gotta be yourself, let the real Mozu shine. You’re super, just the way you are. But he won’t know that until you let him see. Confidence ain’t bravery, it’s bein’ too stupid to realize there could be any adverse social repercussions and just going for it with your whole heart.”
“Big talk from the nudist,” Kiwi giggled under her breath, breaking her sister out of her funk. Any lingering tension evaporated in a nanosecond.
“See?” Franky laughed with them, even if he felt a little stung deep in his remnant squishy bits. “Now, do you have anything you wanna say to each other?”
“I’m sorry I called you a stupid floozy.”
“And I’m sorry I called you a skanky bitch. The top is super cute, I was just jealous when you said I couldn’t borrow it. There’s no way some guy gets to come between us,” the one in pink said to the other, smiling. Their big bro sighed in contentment and looked from side to side at both of the sisters.
“Thanks dad,” Mozu said with a bump of her shoulder against his. “I needed to hear that.”
“Oi, I ain’t your dad!”
“Well, the day you do become a dad, let us know. We need to poison your kid’s perception of the world as early as we can,” she shrugged.
Kiwi cheered, “yeah! The bad influence aunts!”
He laughed to himself, staring deep into the patterns on the rug, “eh. I think they said the next time they were coming into town wasn’t until Monday. I was gonna give Granny an afternoon to herself, so you can try to poison the kid as much as you can then.”
Both sisters froze mid-laugh and stared at him.
“Sorry, can you repeat that, bro?”
“Wait, you’ve already got a kid?!”
····☆··☆··☆····
Franky tugged on one last strand of hair, trying to figure out how Kokoro did the styling on the regular. “‘Old shtill,” he said with a hair tie clenched between his teeth and free hand brushing out what he could.
“Ouch! Uncle Franky, that’s not how Granny does it!” Chimney complained.
The cyborg finally finished braiding up his daughter’s hair, though each plait appeared more skewed than usual. She turned the moment he finished styling her hair to shoot him a look of childish scorn. The expression over the little girl’s sweet cheeks almost made him laugh. “Look, kid, symmetry don’t matter because you’re about to get in the water anyways,” he said with a point to the docking pool at the other end of his warehouse. The gate to the waterfall had been shut and bypassed, allowing for clam waters perfect for practicing her swimming in.
“I don’t wanna!”
“You gotta! If you want to go off on your own, you gotta learn how to swim so you don’t drown. There’s a lot of water all around us so we’re gonna practice. Ask my star pupil! Yokozuna, tell her she’s got to learn,” Franky prompted.
“Kero,” the sumo frog croaked.
“He’s a frog, Uncle Franky. He already knows how to swim, duh, idiot!” Chimney rolled her eyes.
Franky turned over his shoulder to secretly glare at the two sisters sprawled on his sofa. “When I said you could be bad influences I meant like, stickin’ it to The Man or lettin’ her say bad words or sneakin’ extra scoops of ice cream,” he hissed.
“Who do you think The Man is right now, bro?” Kiwi called back, earning a harmonizing giggle from Mozu.
“Look,” he continued, returning his attention back to his petulant child, “swimmin’s a super necessary skill. Once you get it down, you’re free to go wherever!”
“Train conductors don’t need to know how to swim,” Chimney protested with a stomp. “Tell him, Gonbe!”
“Nyah!” Meowed the rabbit.
“And if I go in, I’m gonna drown and die.”
Franky pinched the aching interface between his sinuses and facial prosthesis. “I’m teachin’ you how to swim so that you don’t drown and die, kid. And I’m tellin’ you, you’re gonna take to it super fast.”
She hesitantly followed him over to the dock’s edge. “How’d’ya know that, Uncle Franky? Like, how do you know?” Chimney mumbled, her eyes scanning the surface.
“Because,” he said as he dropped into the water. One of his hands extended for his daughter to take. “Your mama was a fish and your daddy was a boat, which makes you—“
“A mer-boat,” she gasped.
“Uh, sure. Yeah. So come on, guppy. Water’s warm.”
They stood like that in silence for a long breath. The little girl’s bottom lip trembled. “No,” she finally said.
“Oh for fu—uhhh—fine,” he sighed. “You wanna cut a deal?”
Chimney squinted, sizing up the giant gangster beaconing to her. “What sort’a deal, Uncle Franky?” She asked, gaze holding him at a distance.
“I’ll buy you Waterburger after swim lessons.”
Her eyebrow quirked. “With the Funky Fries?”
“The funkiest fries they got.”
“And a cola.”
“No way, caffeine stunts your growth. Um, usually. But I’ll get you a root beer.”
“Hear that, Mozu? Hear that, Kiwi? Uncle Franky’s gonna buy me beer! Deal!” Chimney shouted before breaking into a full sprint toward the pool and leaping in without a drop of hesitance. Her father startled at her sudden turn and swam forward to catch her. He arrived just a second too late, just as the hefty splash made waves. His little guppy breached the surface a moment later with arms that instinctually paddled and legs that held a tread like her muscles remembered their mer-folk heritage.
The two sisters, the frog, and the presumed kitty all clapped at her plunge, though her father didn’t look nearly as impressed. “Okay, rule one of swimming is we walk near the pool. And rule two is you tell me before doing something like that, got it? But—“ he couldn’t help but smile, his hand patting her between two very skewed braids, “—you’re super brave, kid. Good job.”
Chimney didn’t particularly seem like she could hear him, instead enjoying the sensation of every splash and spin in the water. “Oh, this is really, really easy, Uncle Franky!” She laughed. “Mer-boat! Mer-boat! Brrrrr!”
“See? You got this. Let’s start with a super basic front crawl.”
“Don’t forget my Funky Fries!”
“I’d never dream of forgettin’ the guppy’s Funky Fries. No way!”
Life was a funny thing. Years passed in the blink of an eye. His sisters grew. His Family grew. His notoriety grew. His House grew. His city grew. His augmentations grew. But most importantly, his daughter grew. Franky watched her become a proper person, one with wants and interests and preferences. By the time Chimney had turned eight, she was wicked smart and bolder than any other kid he knew. She always told him that she wanted to be free to explore like her mommy, then always followed up with a comment about not wanting to cry like her Uncle Franky, which only ever made the problem worse.
He could feel the storm in the air a week before it arrived, though. Change brewed on the horizon.
····☆··☆··☆····
“Oi!”
“Shut up,” Spandam spat.
“Don’t I get a phone call?”
“This isn’t that sort of arrest, Cutty Flam. Shut up,” the ratty little bureaucrat snapped from his desk.
“Nah, I’m at the court house, I want my damn phone call!” Franky shouted, rattling his chains. The woman hunched over next to him shot a look to just stop fighting, but with the gates of hell looming, he had a thing or two he needed to say first. “Just one fucking call, bro. Give me that?”
Spandam stood, pacing over to the prisoners. “Why the hell would I let a dangerous criminal like yourself call for help? There’s no one who can save you now, you coward. All you’ll ever be is a no good ba—“
The doors flew open and the rest of CP9 paced through. “There’s a matter we need your say in,” Rob Lucci called to the the weasel. “Something’s happened at the front gates.” Just as fast as they’d entered, half turned away, leaving only Kaku and Kalifa to watch over the captive pair. Nico Robin, the devil herself, didn’t say a damn word.
“Kaku, Kaku, man, come on. One call,” Franky begged a second time. “I just need to check in with the station to make sure everyone’s good after the storm. You can drag my ass to hell as long as I can make sure everyone else made it out safe. You ran the Aqua Laguna city repairs for years, you know the shit that happens. P-please? One super quick check in call”
The other prisoner next to him perked up ever so slightly.
Kaku seemed to think the words over, stretching his neck side to side. “One call, one minute,” he finally relented, grabbing the snail off of the desk and bringing it closer. “And if you tell them your location, I will hang up. Got it?”
Franky thanked him, even if he wasn’t particularly sure if there were anything to really be grateful for. He had Kaku dial the number for Shift Station. Any hope of a last goodbye disappeared when the ring went straight to the recording snail. Granny and the guppy had to have stayed on evacuation in the city a bit longer, particularly with the train out of commission. No way home. Damn.
So, despite the watchful stare from the devil at his side, one very armored man closed his eyes and recorded his final message for his daughter.
Franky fell hard and fast, as he tended to do. He’d been up all night, taken hostage by people he’d considered to be at minimum acquaintances if not real friends. He’d met the grown devil child, learned her heart, and witnessed her realize that she may in fact, want to live after all. He watched those super brave young dudes declare war on the whole damn world. And then he was pushed from the Tower of Law by that douche Spandam.
As he dropped toward the sea, he realized a few things at once. The first—that he was pretty sure he was in love with Nico Robin. It didn’t matter that he’d just met her. The second—how happy he was to see that his bros had survived the initial fight. The third—that he hoped Chimney and Kokoro got his message once they arrived home safe and sound after Aqua Laguna. Evacuation always made him worry, even though he trusted them to always survive. They were sturdy. He said a final goodbye in his heart to his little girl as he fell.
And then, for the second time in his life, his face met a sea-cowcatcher.
The Rocketman prototype launched, filling his vision, snagging him before he could meet an early demise, and driving him through a damn wall. Iron pressed his chest. Stones crumbled down his back.
By some miracle, the cyborg hopped onto his feet first out of the bunch, used to the impact by now. He stumbled around the debris of the crash in search of whoever had been driving that damn death trap train. What he found, though, filled him with terror. The world narrowed in at the sight of Kokoro and Chimney stuck halfway out from under the wreck.
“No, no, no, no. Get up, guppy. What the hell are you even doing here?” Franky shook the little girl, hoping to revive her, praying for her safety. “C’mon, c’mon. What the fuck?! It’s super dangerous!”
“Language.” The old woman awoke first, holding her hand out for more money.
“No way, what the hell?! You brought the kid to a war zone, what the fuck is wrong with you! And you pulled Rocketman out of storage?! It could have blown any moment and-and-and—” he freaked out as he lifted the girl’s little form up. Blood dripped from her face, spilling onto her jacket. “C’mon, kid. You’re sturdy, I know you are. You can’t die on me. You-you can’t. We still had so many places we were gonna go. C’mon, guppy.” He hugged her close over his shoulder, doing his best to not cry again.
“W-where ya wanna go, Uncle Franky?” Chimney mumbled as she stirred. “Whudda’bout the carnival?”
“Oh,” her dad caved, hugging her tighter once he’d heard her giggles. “Anywhere, kid. We make it outta here, I’ll take you wherever the hell you want. We’ll take the train as far as it goes, any direction. You okay? Anything hurt?”
“I’m okay! Our noses are just bleeding,” she and her cat shrugged, rubbing the back of their heads in sheepish apology.
Sturdy. Sturdy, he reminded himself. Just like her mom. Just like him. Maybe not fully armored, but definitely built to survive. She’d be alright. Franky exhaled, still holding her close. He kissed the top of her braids to dispel his worry and then released her back to Kokoro. The cat got a quick pet just to even out the scales. “‘Kay. You go with Granny. Stick by her side. Don’t wander. I gotta refuel and get to work. I ain’t gonna let anyone hurt you, got me, guppy?” He checked as he stood, dusting off and locating the rubber boy in the wake of the crash.
“Got it, Uncle Franky! You gonna make ‘em explode?”
“Yeah, kid. They’re all goin’ boom.”
And boom they went, indeed.
The tower fell.
Then, the bridge.
He’d managed to free Nico Robin from her cuffs, but the Buster Call launched in full swing regardless of best efforts. Their rebellious group temporarily reconvened on a ship they’d commandeered. The relief didn’t last long as wave after wave of soldiers attacked, but just knowing that Kokoro and Chimney had gotten out filled him with hope. For a second, Franky thought escape seemed possible. Then, he received the call that the rest of his Family had been wiped out. Terror and agony filled his veins, but he needed to keep his scope set on the family still around him.
No point in wallowing in the grief preemptively. Mourning turned to raw self sacrifice. He found himself more than willing to die here for the ones he loved. As long as the kid made it home, nothing else mattered. Well, the kid, and the Devil Child. And Straw Hat. And probably Kokoro, he had to admit. Maybe that crazy little deer, too. But mostly Chimney.
Enemies closed in on every side. Their path to freedom shrank as more and more and more of the bridge crumbled into the sea. Something exploded behind him, in the direction of the—
of the escape ship.
“No!” Franky screamed through another burst of his bullets.
A shadow appeared at his side, ready to snap necks. “What just happened?” Nico Robin asked above the chaos. Hellfire rained all around them.
“Shit, my-my kid was on the getaway ship!”
“Your kid? The little one? With the braids?”
“Yeah, you seen her anywhere? I-I promised I’d keep her safe and now…” He trailed off, losing the battle to the sorrow that brimmed from his heart. “She shouldn’t even be here, I don’t know why she’s here. I—I can’t lose my whole family today. My brothers, my sisters, and-and—”
A comforting hand, real and tangible, squeezed his bicep along a squishy segment he could actually feel. “She’ll be alright. Tether yourself to what hope you can find. There is a path forward. Love like yours holds power,” Nico Robin consoled. A smile he’d never seen before bloomed over her lips. Everything seemed so impossible and yet, out of everyone, the devil brought sunshine to the island where the sun never set.
“You don’t know that! I-I let her down, I let them all down and now everyone’s dead! It’s all my fault, it’s always my fucking fault! All I ever do is kill and destr—”
Two hands cupped over his mouth to interrupt his spiral. “She’s alright! Trust me,” Nico Robin assured a second time. She leaned in close despite all the carnage. “You didn’t let anyone down. You’re not the type.”
Suddenly, the Straw Hats’ cook burst through the flames with Kokoro, the cat, the gorilla thing, and Chimney all over his shoulder. And just as suddenly, Franky’s entire perception of the odd pervert changed. Took one to know one, he figured. They'd be getting along swimmingly once debts were paid in full.
“HEEEEEY!” Chimney yelled through the chaos of the fight. Sturdy, sturdy, sturdy little guppy. “What are you guys talking about?! That was a really big bang, Uncle Franky, did you see it? So cool!”
Within a matter of moments, Zambai and the sisters called to confirm their safety, too. By a miracle he did not feel he deserved, Franky’s love proliferated and returned to him tenfold. He could not believe his luck. He could not believe it even as the true tide of freedom turned. He could not believe that his little girl survived a trip to the gates of hell—the very same trip that had taken his master and taken his life on the first attempt at liberation—with only a scraped knee and a bloody nose.
And as he leapt into the sea, feet finding the firm wood of a miraculous little vessel, he could not believe he managed to catch Nico Robin, too.
····☆··☆··☆····
“Uh, Marco?”
“D. Pooooolooooooo,” Chimney screamed at the top of her lungs, making her father spin circles in the pool. The Straw Hats’ impromptu party ran late into the night, much later than the girl’s normal bed time, though her entire family agreed an exception could be made to celebrate one super brave child. Her returning shout prompted Franky to wade through the water in her direction with his eyes closed and palms serving as a secondary cover.
Nico Robin sat at a table watching the two play, her knees crossed and her chin in her palm. She couldn’t help but smile at the way Franky seemed to relax whenever he and his daughter were together. Chimney ducked beneath his wake just before he could catch her, swimming silently under the surface. Then, the child pulled herself out of the pool and walked with great speed toward the two nearby square sisters and the rabbit in their arms. They all talked for a moment before the crowd stood as one and made their way over to Robin’s table. Mozu and Kiwi both took a seat with her, squeezing the devil in on each side, mischief in their smiles and excitement in their brows.
“Ay! Kid, where’d ya—Marco?” Franky called in wild confusion when he did not find what he’d been searching for.
“D. Polo!” Chimney yelled back from the edge of the pool, her wet, bare feet slapping over the stones as she ran away.
“You even in the pool? That’s totally cheatin’, kid! Where the hell—Are you runnin’?! You gotta walk! Get back here!”
“NicorobinNicorobinNicorobinNicorobin!” The child whispered loud upon her approach. She grabbed her rabbit from one of the sisters and plopped the creature into Robin’s lap. Then, Chimney leaned in very close to the pirate’s personal space. “Here, hold my kitty, Nicorobin. Wanna know a secret? I’ll tell ya!”
Robin lifted her hand to scratch the kitty behind its long, lapin-like ears. Gonbe purred. “What’s this secret?” She asked the gathering crowd. Both sisters giggled.
“No, seriously, Marco!” Franky hollered over the sound of the celebration. Other partiers in the pool looked at him as if he’d gone mad.
Chimney cupped her mouth and whispered in Robin’s ear, “my Uncle Franky thinks you’re pretty but he’s too scared to say.”
Robin paused to think for a moment, though it wasn’t the direct revelation that inspired her hesitation. “U-uncle Franky?”
“Mmhm! Him, over there!” Chimney pointed to the man in question still spinning wildly. “You met him at the explode-y bridge.”
“Marco! Hello?! Guppy, are you okay—” He pulled his palm from his eyes when his final check met no response, only to realize that four of his favorite girls in the world all sat at a table together, staring, giggling, clearly gossiping with a singular subject at attention. One big hand rose from the water to sheepishly wave.
“Well,” Robin said, her eyes never straying from his drenched form, “if you want a secret in return, you can tell your Uncle Franky that I think he’s pretty, too. Maybe that will provide him with some courage.”
“Ooooo!” Mozu and Kiwi both delighted.
“Wh-what the hell are y-you talking about over there?” Franky asked over the din of the party. Fireworks lit the night sky in a rainbow thrill. Each explosion illuminated his flushed cheeks.
“I didn’t tell her any secrets, Uncle Franky, no way! Watch my kitty for me, Niconicorobin,” Chimney directed with another laugh before breaking into a full-blown sprint back toward the pool. “Super Ultra Battle Attack Rocketman Go! Cannonballs Away! Fire!” She screeched as she leapt into the water. A sizable wave splashed her father, and their game began anew. “Boom!”
“Uncle?” Robin asked the sisters. “She really doesn’t know?”
“Nah, it’s a bit too complicated, with his faked death and robot hands and everything. He says it’s easier this way,” Mozu answered first.
“Hm.”
“But he does what he can. It’s just a title,” Kiwi continued. “Anyone with eyes can see that he loves her. He can’t even talk about the kid without crying most days. They’re a super little combo, burger fries and a side of cola all in one, even if she doesn’t call him dad.” The three women and the cat watched as Chimney yanked her father down by his winch arm. She cupped her mouth in the same way she had just a moment before to whisper in his ear, too. Franky’s jaw dropped and brows raised, an expression that prompted even more laughter from the onlooking group.
“Is her mom…still in the picture?” Robin asked with unconvincing nonchalance.
“He’s single if that’s what you’re asking,” Kiwi snorted.
“She left a while back,” Mozu properly elaborated, “and I don’t think they were ever together for long in the first place. We’ve never met her. He doesn’t really talk about her much any more. Cynthia’s off having her own adventure, heard a rumor from Kokoro that she’s looking for her human birth dad, too…so he’s single, if that’s what you’re asking.”
As if on cue, Franky pushed up out of the pool and sauntered to join the ladies. His kid scrambled to hold his hand. Gonbe leapt to hold her’s. “Uncle Franky! Uncle Franky! This is her!” Chimney announced. “That’s Nicorobin, she says she thinks you’re pretty. Nicorobin, meet my Uncle Franky, he likes explosions and soda pop and rock-and-roll and you! And I’m Chimney! I like the train and I like riding the train and I like taking my kitty on the train and I like watching the train pass by and waving.”
“It’s very nice to be introduced, Franky,” Robin greeted with a laugh. “You know, I just heard the most fascinating secret about you.”
“Yeah?” He grinned wide. “Well, I just heard the most super little secret about you, too. Wanna go do something about it?”
····☆··☆··☆····
Much later, after a long week of hammers and nails and a return to ship shape, Kokoro and Chimney finally stepped off the train. Their return to Shift Station was met with a most un-triumphant silence. Everything remained where it had been left when they’d evacuated to the city from the storm. Their adventure had changed so much of their world, and yet, home remained.
“Oh. my. gosh, did you see the way they flew, Gonbe?! Woosh! Just like that! Right into the water! I didn’t know that Uncle Franky could fly! Pew! Wooompf! Pow! SLASH! And the cannons balls! And the—and the— They FLEW, Gonbe! Granny! Granny! When can I fly?”
“You flew in Rocketman, didn’t you?” Kokoro laughed.
“Oh that was really, really fun, YEAH!” The child cheered. “But Uncle Franky was so upset when Nicorobin pinched him. He cried and cried and cried, and not like he normally does.”
Kokoro unlocked the front door and let her granddaughter run into their home first. “So, pipsqueak, you want to talk about him going away with the pirates?” She asked.
Chimney finally fell silent, a contemplative look passing over her eyes as she grappled with an emotion too large for one so small. “I…” she began, then immediately paused to think again. “I like Captain Monkey Man. And I like the funny cook, and their little reindeer boy. And I really, really like Nicorobin! Hey, do you think they’re gonna have a baby now? Mozu said yes, but Kiwi said no because Nicorobin ripped Uncle Franky’s cherries off. But if they have a little baby then they could come back home and I could meet the baby and hold her.” Chimney gasped. “And then I’d have a little baby to show the train to! And I can braid her hair! She would be super cute and we can ride in the front car! We could have a tea party! Uncle Franky always says funny things like ‘ello, cheers mate’ when he drinks tea,” she said between giggles.
“Well,” Kokoro hesitated, reaching for the closest wine bottle, “I don’t know if Franky wants to have a baby. He might, and he might not. He’s a pirate, now, and his adventures are too dangerous for a little one at sea.”
“But he took me on adventures! And he said when he comes back we’re going to take the train everywhere! We—“ she suddenly froze, as the realization that he’d really left fully hit. “Oh. He’s…he’s not coming to my ninth birthday party, is he?”
“No, kiddo. He’s not coming back for a long time, and when he does, he’s going to be different than who you remember. Adventures change us. But that means you’re going to be different, too.”
Tears welled in the little girl’s eyes, quite a lot like her father at the end of the day. “Wha’d’ya mean, Granny?” She asked. “Different?”
“I just mean that you’re going to be big when he comes back, no matter how he comes back as or who he comes back with. But no matter where he is, though, just remember that he loves you a lot.”
“Y-yeah…Well, then I’ll have to have adventures, too! I’ll grow to be really, really big! He won’t even recognize me when I’m the conductor, and I’ll say ‘can I see your ticket?’ And he’ll say ‘yeah super old lady’ and I’ll say ‘silly Uncle Franky it’s ME! Chimney! Remember?!’ And then he’ll say—”
“Puru,” their message recording snail blipped with an alert over at the railroad command station.
Chimney jumped to her feet, all hint of worry immediately gone. She ran to the den den mushi with Gonbe in hand. “OH! A message! A message! Who d’ya think called?”
Kokoro said a little prayer in thanks for the recording that distracted her granddaughter at least for a short while. “Well, go on, play it,” the old woman prompted.
Chimney hit play with no semblance of hesitation.
“Uh, hey, kid—“
“It’s Uncle Franky’s voice!”
“I don’t have long, I’m super sorry. I, uh, I’m goin’ on a new adventure, I think. Somewhere I dunno if you can follow. I know I promised that we’d go see all those different islands. Please don’t hate me for breakin’ that promise. I wanna take you, you know I wanna. But I—I don’t think I’m gonna get to be there to see you grow big and strong any more, and—fuck, uh Kokoro don’t charge me for that one, that’s a freebee. Anyways just know th-that gettin’ to watch you grow up for the last four years, even if it was just four, has been the coolest accomplishment of my life. You make me so damn proud, kid. There’s so much I wish I’d gotten to tell ya. Stuff I should've said from the jump. But I’ll be gone for a long time, and right now sure ain’t the time to drop that bomb.
“I love ya so much, you lil' firecracker. If I happen to see your mama on my journey, I’ll tell her all about the radical lil’ lady you grew into, even though I don’t think I’ll catch her if I’m goin’ the way I think I’m goin’. And if somethin’ super bad happens to me and I—I see your daddy first, th-then I’ll tell him—“ Franky’s voice cracked in a choked sob, the tears audible over the airwaves, their snail starting to well, “—t-tell him the exact same stories. Next Aqua Laguna’s gonna be a hurricane of h-him and me cryin’ up a storm over how cool you are, kid. I hope more than anything that you’re safe from the storm tonight. I love ya. Granny loves you. Burg loves you. Hell, the Puffing Tom loves you. You’re gonna kick ass, I just hope I can see everything you accomplish for myself one day. But I know I’ll see you—see you again some day, kid, one way or another. That’s a Super Promise. Chimney, I’ve never been more proud of making anything in my entire life. I gotta go now. Bye, guppy.”
And then, the recording ended. The little girl blinked, cocking her head. She reached to rewind the message and start it back from the top. “What’s Uncle Franky mean by that? He made…me?” She mumbled in consideration toward her pet kitten. “Granny, does he mean—”
Kokoro sighed as she mentally prepared for a conversation eight years too late.
“—that I’m a boat?! Whoa, cool!”
“N-no, kiddo. You’re not a boat.”
“Uncle Franky says my daddy was a boat and my mommy was a fish. Wait, am I a robot, then?”
“No.”
Chimney thought hard to eliminate all other potential existences. “Oh, wait!” She brightened with a snap. “Am I a TRAIN?!”
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A quiet knock on the door broke Franky from his internal funk. He paced through the boys’ bunks to the source of the rap, only to find Nico Robin standing in the threshold with a sly grin upon her lips. “How’s your first night settling in?” She asked, taking his open posture as a sign to walk into the quarters.
“I’m, y’know, doing alright I guess. No, I’m fine. I’m super,” he lied with a shake of his head and a sullen shrug. In an attempt to look like he hadn’t just been nervously pacing, he picked up his duffle bag and settled in front of his new locker.
“Are you regretting coming with us?”
Franky thought for a long moment, the gears in his head clicking as he reran every scenario. “Nah, that ain’t it. I know this is the right place for me. This adventure’s been a long time comin’, and damn, do I wanna stick with Sunny. But…”
“But you’ll miss her?” Robin guessed.
He sighed as he unzipped his bag and started pulling out one tacky button up after another. A frown dragged at the corner of his lips, realizing he’d not been the one to pack the bag in the first place. Whoever had curated his wardrobe had only picked the brightest, the boldest, and the prettiest of floral patterns. “Of course I’m gonna miss her. But it’s more than that. I feel like I’ve finally become the fuckin’ deadbeat I was always meant to be. Shoulda known from the start that I was always gonna abandon her. She—“ he stopped to burst into laughter when he pulled at his next shirt, only to reveal the pink frilly tutu underneath. “—Ha! I think she packed my bag for me.”
Nico Robin reached down to begin hanging the pile of shirts with him. “Because she’s proud of you. You’re not abandoning her,” she said.
“I wish I could believe that. Guess I’m just like my old man after all. Pirate through and through.”
A hand blossomed on his shoulder to rake fingers through the slick sides of his ducktail. Franky and Robin hadn’t yet talked through what exactly they were after a too-short week of each others’ company. They’d gotten dinner on a handful of occasions, seen a show, had an impromptu little hookup in the half finished version of the room they now stood in. Just a bit of fun, really. Nothing he hadn’t done with plenty of others around town, and yet, this time had felt different. They clicked in a way that intrigued him. Her touch pulled the effervescence through his blood like nothing else. And now, they were a crew, a proper little unconventional family.
“Did you know,” Nico Robin said, her eyes cool and soft, “that I learned how to write because of my mom? She left before I really knew her, only a year old or so. By two and a half, I figured out how to write her letters. They weren’t perfect by any means, but they still gave me a sense of control when everything else felt so bleak. On bad nights when my aunt would send me to bed without supper, I would write her letters telling her about everything, all the terrible details, but also the happy ones too. I don’t know if she ever received them.”
“Did you resent her?” He asked, his hands still tracing the tutu’s ruffle.
“Mmm, some nights I cried, sure, but I never resented her. She had important work to do. Your daughter is her own person. She’s brave, and she’s smart, and she’s fiercely independent for an eight year old. I haven’t known her long, but I can tell just how surrounded by love she is. She isn’t alone. And even when her father’s far, off on his grand adventure around the world, I know she still cares for him. Even if she calls him Uncle.”
Franky picked up the next object his little girl had packed for him, a photograph from her fifth birthday, her proper uncle and grandmother on each side, smiling for a father she assumed to live in the rainfall and a father actually standing behind the camera. Tears filled his eyes and threatened to spill over. “I just…I knew I missed the train to be her dad as soon as I fucked things up with Cynthia, well before she was even born and every day since. Now it feels like my chance is gone forever. I’m gone forever,” he said.
Nico Robin stepped close to press a slight kiss into the corner of his lips, a gesture meant to comfort above all else. “Well, the delightful thing about the train,” she mused as she brought him closer into her embrace, “is that it tends to always arrive again. Maybe it’ll be here later than you expect it, but I know you’ll find a way to make the connection eventually.”
He finally caved to the bubbling geyser in his heart, sobbing into her shoulder until all that remained was the salt on his cheeks. The woman he’d once assumed to be the devil held him, sat with him, her fingers stroking his hair, her palms rubbing his back, her hands squeezing his hands. Her forehead nestled against his temple to absorb the machine’s shuddering. The room had grown dark by the time he’d settled. The sunshine may had disappeared, but it would only be a matter of time before it rose again. Right on time.
“I’m gonna miss my guppy so damn much,” Franky finally whispered once he could speak again. The exhaustion of a good cry pulled at his eyelids. He wiped his face but did not move to release the body interwoven with his. “Hey does, uh, does knowin’ I’m a dad change things? With us, I mean.”
Nico Robin only chuckled into his cheek. “I wouldn’t say so, no. In fact, I think it’s rather se—“
The door to the boys’ bunks flew open, filled immediately by the bodies of Sanji and Zoro.
“You’re being an obtuse idiot!” One shouted.
“No I’m not, you’d have to be a complete moron to not see it!” The other yelled right back.
“Ay! Franky! Help us settle a debate!”
“Why the hell are you running to him for? What, crap cook needs daddy for moral support? Get outta here, dumb ass and go back to the kitchen. Franky, tell him.”
“Oi!” Franky shouted over all the sudden racket. His arms dropped Robin to reposition akimbo. “What the hell do you two need? I don’t even know what you’re fighting over!”
“I won’t talk to the cook until he admits to being a moron,” Zoro said as he crossed his arms.
“And I won’t talk to the moss patch until he takes a damn shower,” Sanji spat back.
Franky sighed, his fingers pinching the interface scar between his brow bone and facial prosthesis. He turned over his shoulder to look Nico Robin in the eye. “What were you about to say?” He asked, knowing the caboose of their conversation had already passed but hoping to catch it again one day in the future.
She laughed, a heady toll that steadied him among the rocky waves, promising to keep him on track no matter the weather. “I was just going to say that it’s a good think you’ve already got quite a bit of parenting experience under your belt. Good luck!”
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