Disclaimer: "One Piece" and its characters belong to Eiichiro Oda. I make no profit of this work and never will, more's the pity.

Notes: These are a collection of one-shots that I wrote for various people. They're kind of awkward because some of them aren't characters or pairings I usually think to write, but some of them turned out pretty well, I think. It was refreshing to make a mental switch from my usual work. And I swear to God I am still working on my longer works - 'Snow Queen' especially

Interests and Intentions (written for ironpuncher2; pairing is Franky/Robin; prompt is "love is friendship set on fire"; no spoilers)

It looked so easy when the others did it. How did they do it?

It wasn't as if they talked about anything interesting - leastways, he amended hastily, probably very interesting to themselves but undoubtedly much less so to a woman of Nico Robin's constitution. The bossy li'l Miss chattered on about clothes and hair and shoes without end. Chopper-monster went on almost as long about medicine and diseases. What kind of lady wanted to hear about that? Sniper Bro's stories could be pretty super, but all day? All the time?

And still, without looking up from her book, at some opportune lull, Robin would always say some quiet thing to give Nami or Chopper or Usopp or Luffy or Sanji or hell even Zoro some new burst of enthusiasm for the conversation. That never happened when Franky talked to her. He'd make some remark, and she'd make some remark, and he'd kind of say something lame like "Yeah, I know what you mean," and she would go back to her book and he'd have to wait around until one of the kids came crashing by and jump-started the party again. It was weird. Franky was a friendly guy. People liked him. He'd never had trouble shooting the breeze with his Family. Maybe there was more to this 'nakama' business than Mugiwara had let on. If he couldn't even be friends with Nico Robin, then forget about being - well.

Oh sure, they talked plenty back in Enies Lobby, and in Water 7 someone was always ready to jaw around a cold mug of beer. But there had been, well, context. Pretty lady down in the dumps, wanting to throw her life away - sure, a guy would dig any flavor of cola out of his ass to cheer her up. Not so easy when the lady was back with her crew and he was the new guy. What was he supposed to talk about now? Hey, remember that time you got blackmailed by the World Government? Pretty wild, huh?

So not super.

The trick, Franky thought, lay in turning the tables. The Art of Conversation or whatever Iceberg was always going on about. Don't talk about your interests, talk about hers. But what the hell was Robin interested in? He decided to ask around.

"Lacy underwear," Sanji said firmly.

Franky looked at him blankly. "Where am I gonna get lacy underwear from?"

That was when the cook got some kind of weird nosebleed and had to run to the bathroom before he bled all over the lettuce.

"Perfume," Nami said. "Dresses. Floral patterns. Nice jewelry."

Li'l Miss wasn't an airhead - Franky knew that - but damn if she didn't sound like one right now.

Zoro gave it the most thought, his brows furrowed in concentration as he raised those giant steel weights once, twice, five hundred times above his head. "Barbells," he said finally.

"Barbells," Franky repeated.

"Yeah."

"That's what you like!"

Zoro stared at him. "What's the difference?"

"I ain't even touchin' that one," Franky muttered as he made his way up to the crow's nest for a last-ditch effort. The hell was the matter with these kids? Been through hell and high water with this woman and didn't even know what she liked?

"Oh! But that's easy!" Chopper took his eye away from the spyglass and smiled happily up at Franky. "Books!"

He stared back, nonplussed. "Yeah?"

"Yeah!" Now Chopper sounded positively rapturous. "Whenever we land at an island Nami gives us some money and me and Robin go to the bookstore and stay there for hours!"

Huh. Franky thought that over while he slid back down the mast. Books, eh? He wasn't much of a reading man, but it sounded a lot more plausible than barbells.

Which was why, the next time they paused at an island for supplies, Franky found himself walking nervously into a bookshop on the main street. It was cramped and nobody talked above a whisper. He kept trying to tuck in his arms, in case he was taking up too much space.

Think, man. Walk a mile in her shoes. You're a beautiful woman. You're twenty-eight. You're wearing knee-high boots. You've survived two Buster Calls and you can snap a man's spine in half. What kind of books do you like?

In the end he chose a book about piranhas.

He came out of the shop scratching his head, and was even more embarrassed when Nico Robin emerged from a store across the street. He hadn't noticed there were two bookstores facing each other.

"What a nice surprise," said Robin, and sounded like she meant it.

"Yeah, well..." Franky made some vague gesture. "Where's Reindeer-Bro?"

Robin started down the street, and Franky rushed after her. "Mr. Doctor has a question for the storekeeper," she said. "But I noticed you leaving and thought we might walk back to the ship together."

"Really?" Franky felt his face get hot. "Aw, you don't gotta do that, Nico Robin, I can walk back fine -"

"May I see what you bought?" she interrupted him, and bashfully he held out the book about piranhas, which Robin took with cool fingers . "Fascinating creatures," she said thoughtfully, leafing through the pages. "Truly one of the wonders of the aquatic world."

"I heard they eat cows," Franky replied doubtfully. "Uh - what'd you get?"

In reply, Robin held out the volume in her own hand. Franky took it gingerly. "'A History of Battleships,'" he read aloud. "Hey! This sounds really super!" He ran a heavy thumb through. "It's got pictures and everything!"

"Yes, it looked interesting." Robin smiled at him.

"I ain't much of a reading man," Franky said absently, absorbed in the blueprint of a galley ship, "but this looks really great. Didn't think you'd be much into this kinda stuff, Robin, ya know? Everyone else was saying you like perfume and barbells and shit."

Robin laughed. "I'm interested in many things," she said. "And if you wouldn't mind, I'd love your opinion on the book."

It was almost enough to make Franky's legs stop moving altogether. As it was, he had to pretend the falter in his step was just due to a loose cobblestone. "Ya mean that? You wanna talk about battleships with me?"

"Of course. We're friends, aren't we?"

Nico Robin reached out and laid a hand on his arm. And though Franky's sense of touch wasn't what it used to be, what with the nuts and bolts and layers of metal, he was old enough to know what it meant.

So he slowed his gait a little more to match hers, and offered her his elbow, and as she took it with that funny little smile he even began to think that a cyborg and a hundred-armed woman could really work things out. Because after all, they were already friends, and they had no shortage of things to talk about.

--End--

notes: So far I have resisted the Franky/Robin because it interferes with my other favored pairings: Robin/Zoro and Robin/Aokiji/Bicycle XD But it always looks really cute when other people present it, so I wanted to capture some of that. It was hard writing from Franky's POV because for me, his character still feels very scattered - he changes his mood around so much. So I made him a little self-conscious about it and kind of feeling that age gap. Feedback is very much appreciated :D