my gift to @werelichen for @op-secret-santa!! i can never a good frobin prompt so here's some art and a fic! i hope you enjoy and happy holidays!!
The moon rose high in the sky, bright and alluring. Robin stared up at it through the window, upside down in her view from her pillow. Around her, the crew (her crew) slumbered soundly, beds pressed tight together. Robin couldn’t help a fond smile as she sat up, seeing Luffy half-slumped out of the top bunk, arms stretching down onto Sanji, who was gently kicking Zoro in his sleep, Chopper squished between them, while Nami spread out like a starfish on her other side, hand curled around Robin’s own.
Robin should be asleep with them, but this wasn’t the first time sleep eluded her, nor would it be the last. A restless energy settled into her, begging for the crisp, moonlit night. And while she knew none of them would mind if she woke them up to keep her company, they deserved the rest.
She slipped out silently from the sheets, gently to not disturb her friends. Yet, the moment her feet hit the ground, there was a rustle, and Zoro’s head popped up, eyes barely open. “R’bin?”
“I’m just going for a walk,” she whispered to him. “I”ll be back soon, I promise.”
Zoro yawned and then nodded, like she said a fact instead of a reassurance. “A’right.” His head flopped back down, and shuffled around, turning to curl around Chopper and smacking Sanji in the face, who sneered at the hand in his sleep.
Robin breathed out a light laugh, careful not to wake anyone else, and then stepped out the door into the night.
She didn’t have a destination in mind, yet her feet lead her to one anyway. She stopped at the top of the stairs, and looked down onto the island of scrap. The skeleton of a keel and hull was starting to form by the shore, bare now but full of promise. She was too far up to make out more, but she could just see a hint of movement and the smallest flash of blue, still hard at work.
She smiled to herself. Oh course.
She headed down into the flattened junk, keeping her eyes down and using her powers to guide her, until she could follow the sound of metal scraping on wood. It grew louder and louder as she picked her way past the sleeping bodies of the shipwrights and dismantlers. She rounded one last towering pile of wood, and finally set eyes on him properly.
Franky was working on a large hunk of wood, a circular shape starting to take form from the rough edges. Shavings littered his feet as he bent over, smoothing the wood down with even, practiced strokes. His stance was firm, his movements confident, completely in his element.
Robin paused for a moment to admire him. There was a lightness to him that hadn’t been there before, and she thought it suited him wonderfully. A smile stole across her face. It was almost startling how fond she had become of him in such a short time but she couldn’t imagine it any other way. She almost felt like she could spend the rest of the night just watching him, but his company would be much preferred, so she stepped forward.
“Franky,” she called out, as she approached.
Franky startled, the scrapper tumbling from his hands as he whipped around, valiantly trying to hide his work. “Nico Robin! What are you doing here?”
She covered her eyes with her hand. “I’m not looking,” she said, a smile in her voice.
There was a moment’s pause, and then Franky sighed in defeat. “Nah, it’s alright. Not much to look at right now.” Robin uncovered her eyes in time to see him wag a finger at her. “But don’t you go snooping! I want it to be a surprise for everyone.”
“I won’t,” she promised, coming to a stop near him. She bloomed a hand out of the wood, and handed the fallen tool back to Franky. “Here you go.”
“Thanks.” Franky took the tool, but then set it down, giving her curious look. “What are you doing here?” He looked up at the moon like he was surprised it wasn’t the sun. “It’s late!”
“I couldn’t sleep,” she said. “I suppose I was looking for some company.”
“Aw, with me?” Franky chuckled, fiddling with the scrapper. “Did you miss me that much?”
Robin considered it. “Hmm. I suppose I did.”
Franky blinked, surprised at her genuine admission, then turned back to the wood, looking pleased. “Well, I’ll always welcome your company, Nico Robin.”
She crossed her hands, and brought over an unused stool for herself to sit on, settling a few feet away. Franky returned to his work, catching the tool on the wood and gliding it across its surface.
It was soothing, watching him. The repetitive rasp of metal cutting wood, the even wood shavings peeling up and falling gently to the ground. The crash of waves on the shore, the soft wind whistling through the abandoned ships. The movement of Franky’s arm, back and forth. It eased the restlessness inside her, bit by bit.
After a moment, Franky glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. “So…how are you doing?”
That was a question Robin had become quite familiar with the past couple of days. One she still had trouble answering. Her crew had done so much for her - she owed it to them to be honest. But, at the same time, she didn’t want to worry them any further. But with Franky…it was different. He had been a steady rock during the worst day of her life.
“A little overwhelmed,” she admitted, drawing her knees closer. “So much has changed so quickly, I still don’t think it’s sunk in yet. But…” She looked up, towards the city, towards the Galley-La Company where her crew rested, safe and secure and hers. “I’m happier then I think I’ve ever been.”
Franky straightened slightly, glancing over at her as he brushed wood dust from his shoulders. “Well, that sounds like a good problem to have.”
She smiled, resting her check against her hand. “I suppose it is.”
Franky glanced at her again, looking almost…hesitant. Which seemed at odds with his brash, confident persona. She met his eyes, and raised an eyebrow. “Yes?”
Franky hesitated for another moment, and then asked, “What were they like? Those scholars of yours.”
That was a question Robin had not been expecting. She opened her mouth, then closed it, as she thought back, wondering where to even begin, when Franky waved his hand through the air.
“Never mind, actually, forget about it.” He cleared his throat, looking away from her. “I didn’t mean to bring up bad memories, so just-”
“No! No,” Robin cut him off. “It’s aright. It’s just…been a long time since I’ve really talked about them with anyone, outside of yesterday. And, well.” She paused, and then sighed. “It’s been a while since I’ve thought about them in any context other than tragedy.”
Franky nodded, his eyes soft, tender. Understanding. He stayed silent, and Robin took a moment to look out at the ocean, the waves almost black and white under the moon, collecting herself before starting to speak.
“They were like a family to me. With my mother gone and my aunt, well. They were the only family I really had. They treated me like one of their own. They were such a caring, eccentric bunch.” She let out a soft laugh.
“Professor Clover always called them crazy old kooks when they acted up, even though he was probably the oldest, craziest kook of them all. He would make me tea with honey in between lessons and tell me about his adventures as an explorer. He saw so many wondrous things, made so many grand discoveries, and got in trouble with the Marines more times than he could count.”
“I’d bet he'd be pretty damn proud of you, then.”
“I think he would be, too. Rint would always tease him about being more of a pirate than explorer, but I don’t think he would have minded that. Not that Rint was much better. She never talked about it, but I’m pretty sure she was a pirate, when she was younger. Nothing seemed to phase her. She could drink everyone under the table and still win at poker.”
Franky glanced back into the scrapyard with an amused snort. “Heh, sounds like someone I know.”
“She would’ve liked you. She always had a taste for the wilder things. Oh, and Busshiri, you would’ve liked him. He was the carpenter of the scholars. Not a shipwright, but he knew his way around wood.”
“Sounds like my kinda guy.”
Robin nodded. “He always wore these shirts that would say bomb, boom, any explosive word you could think of. I asked him why once, and he said that he wore destruction to remember how to create. I think he made it up on the spot, though.”
Franky gasped, faux offended. “Dismissing his wise words like that! Nico Robin, you wound me, to let such a man go unappreciated in his time!”
Robin giggled at his teasing. “Roche said something like that at the time too. He was always teasing me when I got too serious. I thought it was so annoying at the time, but looking back, I think he just wanted me to enjoy being a kid. They all tried so hard to look after me…”
A surge of emotions swept through her, harsh and overwhelming, that familiar, complicated mix of grief and anger and hopelessness that plagued her for so long. She curled inward, instinctively. She forgot herself, and was that scared little girl again, forced to face the world alone, alone, alone-
“Nico Robin?”
And she was back here again, on the shore of the scrap island, the ocean heavy in the air, breathing uneven, body shivering. Franky hovered over her, hands outreached but not touching, face so openly worried, and something inside her loosened.
“Are you okay?” He asked, voice low and soft. His hand hovered closer and she leaned in, resting herself against his palm, arms looped around his wrist in the semblance of a hug.
“I’m fine,” she mumbled without thinking, so used to ignoring her hurt. Franky leveled her an unconvinced look, and Robin paused. Was she fine? Her body still shuddered slightly, but the emotions had dulled, softened, and there was a…lightness. Relief. Grief tempered by nostalgia and joy, by the reminder that she was no longer alone.
“I think I’m better than fine, actually,” she said, a smile blooming across her face. She squeezed Franky’s hand. “Thank you.”
Franky relaxed, and though she didn’t want to, she let his hand fall away, and he stepped back to lean back against the uncarved wood. She did follow him though, moving to stand next to him, crossing her arms to rest against the wood.
“You scared me there, Nico Robin,” he said, half serious, half teasing. “I get it, though. The past can be complicated.”
She tilted her head in a silent question. Franky shrugged, and then looked away, almost bashful.
“Me ‘n Iceburg…we used to be close. We fought almost all the time, but he was like a brother, ya know? And then I went and messed it all up. But when I came back, Iceburg, he was…still so mad but he missed me. He was happy to see me again, despite it all.”
Franky paused, looking back towards the partial built hull. “I’ve got a lot of good memories from back then. And they’re still good, but…they hurt now. And doin’ this now, like back then, with him…” He trailed off.
“You used to be a shipwright,” she said. That had been obvious but she can see the complicated emotions mixed up in it now - the grief and anger and almost hatred of something you still love and need so much.
“Not anymore,” Franky said, a touch defensively. “This is an exception.”
“...it suits you.”
Franky didn’t meet her gaze, eyes fixed past the shore of the small island. “Doesn’t matter. This’ll be the last one.”
She recognized what the lightness she had seen earlier was - he was happy, building ships. And that happiness scared him, like he didn’t deserve to feel it at all. That made a protective indignation rise up in her, a fierce desire to protect that precious happiness of his.
She realized that's what Luffy and the others had felt, standing on that government building, flag burning above them.
“You should come with us.”
Franky startled, whipping around to stare at her with wide eyes. “What?
Robin was startled herself. She hadn’t meant to say that aloud, but she had meant it. “Luffy is planning on asking you. To be our shipwright, that is.”
She saw it again - that mix of grief and longing and joy. He wanted that - wanted to say yes, to join them, to live his dream.
But still, he turned away. “I-I can’t,” he said, voice raw. “I owe this place too much.”
Robin felt that sharp protectiveness again, to take him anyway and make him hers, part of her crew, but she tucked that away for now.
Franky glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. “I’m sorry.”
She shook her head, “It’s your choice.”
Silence stretched between them, heavy longing and regret, but she savored it anyway. Part of her wanted to make it last forever, but her crew pulled her back just as strong. She couldn’t stay.
“If this is goodbye, then,” she started, turning toward Franky, leaning a bit forward to look up him through her lashes. “May I have a kiss to remember you by?”
Franky softened, expression incredibly fond, and he reached out, wrapping his hand around her waist and pulling her close. “For you, Nico Robin, of course.”
She smiled, and rose up on her toes, hand resting on his chest, his head dipping down until their lips met. It was soft and tender, passion nipping at the edges. The waves crashed behind them, matching their push and pull. He fit against her so perfectly, and she could imagine how perfectly he’d fit into her family too.
But that was a desire that would have to wait. She relaxed back onto her heels, pulling away just slightly, still close. She looked up at Franky, meeting his fond gaze, sad and sweet. Her hand lingered on his chest, machinery thrumming warm under her fingertips before finally pulling away, already chilled again by the night.
“I’m glad I got to know you, Nico Robin,” he said, his voice a low rumble.
“Me too, Franky,” she said. She couldn’t bring herself to say good-bye, so she ran her hand down his arm one final time, then stepped out of his embrace and walked back into the night.
~
As she slipped back into bed, next to Chopper and Zoro this time, arms wrapped around her and Luffy slipped down to snuggled into her side, still half-asleep. She ran her fingers through his hair, at his relaxed, open face, and decided she deserved to be selfish. She bent over to whisper to him.
“Franky looked so happy, building our ship.”
Luffy grinned, and she slipped her hand down to thumb at his dimples, just under his scar. “Good.”
“You won’t take no for an answer.” It was more a statement than question, because she already knew what he would say, but Luffy still huffed a laugh.
“Nope!”
Robin grinned. “Good. Now go back to sleep.”
Luffy dozed off again almost instantly. Robin settled down, wrapping her arms around him, safe and warm amongst her crew, and she slept.