Warnings: Future fic, AU, language.

Disclaimer: One Piece belongs to Oda-san. I make no profit.

Theme 23 Replacement

He was a little under five foot, ten inches tall with dark hair that was too soft to be fake. The outer skin was tanned and thin, with superficial scars that were carved delicately into the silicone. Inside he was made up of wires and electronics and whirring mechanics.

Sanji stood back and watched as the blue haired man peeled the fake skin off the bot's lower back, revealing a panel held in with tiny screws. Franky reached into th tool box at his hip and pulled out a case of small screwdrivers, picking out the one with the flat edge.

"How long will it take to repair him?" Sanji asked the mechanic, glancing briefly at the clock on the wall. They'd been in the middle of washing dishes when one of Luffy's chips fried, the one that controlled his left arm. The cup he was holding was shattered all over the floor, but the blonde man had been too worried about his bot's well-being to care about a simple glass. He'd just clean the mess up later.

Luffy was on stand-by mode now as the blue haired cyborg tried to assess the damage. Franky unscrewed the panel and pulled it off, setting it next to him on the carpet.

Sanji looked away from the site of the wires and machinery and focused on the hands of the clock. Sometimes it was hard to remember that Luffy was mostly machine and could break down at any moment. He'd been functioning for the last sixteen years without a problem, but he'd started to need more and more parts over the last few months.

"Have you ever thought about dating a flesh and blood man instead of this?" Franky asked, his voice curious as he dug around in his toolbox for a different tool. The mechanic was half machine himself-a cyborg-so he didn't really have an opinion on the matter, but the question still made Sanji's lip curl in disgust.

He'd been with Luffy for sixteen years already and for that entire time, Franky had been the only mechanic Sanji trusted. Being married to a human woman and half-machine himself, the older man had readily accepted Luffy as his partner.

"Luffy is irreplaceable." The blonde said simply, glaring at the clock face as the hands slowly ticked away the minutes. From his peripheral vision, he could see Franky's hands sunk into Luffy's back, pulling up wires to get to the fried chip. A shiver went up Sanji's spine.

"These bots weren't meant to be long-time companions, Sanji. As much as I love you guys, I won't be able to fix him forever. The parts he needs are expensive and I just can't afford them anymore." Franky muttered, glancing up at Sanji for a minute with a frown on his face. His hands were still at work, disconnecting soft wires that were meant to be Luffy's sense of touch. "The Ds are top of the line bots and Luffy is the oldest model. Sooner or later, you're going to have to replace him."

"You said that last time, too, shithead. Either stop fixing him or stop complaining." The blonde snapped at him, crossing his arms over his chest and glaring full-on at Luffy's mechanic. He couldn't count how many times he'd had this conversation with the cyborg.

Franky didn't say anything this time, instead focusing on finding the chip that had fried. He frowned as his fingers brushed over the chip for the left arm, confused to find that it felt as smooth as the day he put it in.

"You said his left arm stopped working, right?" Franky said distractedly. pulling his hands free of Luffy's back and reaching for the iPad beside his toolbox. He took one half of the USB cable and slipped it into the slot in the back of Luffy's neck - the other half went into the iPad. "I have a bad feeling, man. The chip for his left arm is still working properly."

"Something else is wrong." Sanji sighed, a pang of fear stabbing into his belly. He backed up towards the couch and sat down heavily, his mind going through every nightmarish scenario it could think of.

Frank grunted an affirmative and ran the diagnostics program that would help him figure out the exact problem. After a few minutes of awkward silence, Franky finally let out a soft curse and rolled his eyes up towards the ceiling.

"I can't fix him this time. There's too much-" The blue haired cyborg cut himself off with a grunt, his eyes falling back to Luffy's prone figure on the carpet. The bot was so blissfully unaware that is time on Earth was slowly coming to an end.

Sanji sucked in a breath and held it, willing himself not to panic because that was the last thing he needed.

"There's nothing you can do? Nothing you can't replace?" He asked in a strained voice, his fingers curling into the couch cushions. No, no ,no. Can't lose Luffy like this.

Franky rubbed his hands over his face and looked at the blonde for a few minutes. Luffy had a lot of problems - glitches - with his programming, but all of that could be solved. All he needed was a new mother chip and a fresh program sweep. There was a drawback, though, that he knew Sanji would never go for. Not after the last sixteen years.

"I can fix what's wrong now, but it'll cost you." Franky said grimly, disconnecting his USB cable from Luffy's neck. He was exhausted and sometimes he just really hated his job. "The parts alone are gonna cost at least fifty grand, but that's only the tip of the iceberg." he sighed.

"Wh-what is the tip?"

"Even if we came up with the money, I would have to wipe his programming. That means everything he's done, seen, said, or felt - all of it will be gone. He won't be the Luffy anymore."

That was the final nail in his proverbial coffin. Sanji snapped up from the couch and stomped into the kitchen, his breath heavy and his heart pounding so hard he thought he was going to have some kind of conniption. Luffy couldn't be fixed, not without erasing who he was. Luffy can't be fixed.

Franky quietly screwed Luffy's panel back in place and sealed his skin up to cover it with a brush of his fingers. There were a few mechanical clicks and then the bot opened his eyes, looking for all the world like he had just woken up from a nap.

For the first time since Sanji had first brought the bot to life, Luffy was completely silent, his eyes following the pacing, red faced man in the kitchen. It always startled Franky how human Luffy had turned out, even though he was made of silicone, metal, and plastic. Most of the bots he worked on stuck to their programming and didn't know a thing about human emotions, but Luffy expressed them without a thought.

"Why can't I be real?" Luffy whispered, turning his eyes to Franky, a frown on his face. A expression like that - utter sadness - wasn't something a bot would have on its face. Luffy was one of a kind.

The bot got up from the floor and went to join the blonde in the kitchen, where they shared words and embraced each other. Luffy's left arm was working again and Franky had to stop and wonder if maybe something else was going on - something that wasn't mechanical.

Hell, if Luffy could feel, then who's to say he couldn't live as a human as well. Like Sanji said, there was just no replacement for Monkey D. Luffy.