A potential story I'm planning, this is just the bare outline, though, of the general direction, and in Robin's POV, where in the potential story, everyone would have their POV.

Working Title: Family

Summary: Robin has no idea what she's gotten herself in for, adopting 6 children.

Setting: Mix of Fantasy with Historical England (particularly London) from around the 1800s.

Warnings: Human!Chopper, slight ooc, due to, y'know, being an alternate universe … Mentions of historical practices now frowned upon, like child labor and treatment of young single women without husbands. Also, use of Firstname Surname format, not Surname Firstname format. It's England, not Japan.

Robin Nico closed her eyes and leaned against the alley wall. She hated stealing, but the alternative was the brothel and she had promised her mother she would never stoop so low.

The house was half burned from the Great Fire, as it was now being called, and there was a small lamb's head knocker on the door. It would do for the night, and there might be valuables left behind she could pawn.

She was not expecting to be set on by 6 children, as dirty and filthy as herself, who demanded to know why she was in their house.

"I need a place to stay." She manages, and it baffles her when the two older boys glance at a small child with a bandage just below his left eye.

"Oh, okay, but don't steal our treasures."

"Luffy!" Another boy yelps, he's got the obvious youngest (who can't be more than 4 or 5) hidden behind himself. "Don't tell her we have treasure!"

"I promise." Robin interrupts. "My name is Robin Nico."

"I'm Luffy Monkeyed. That's Zoro Roronoa, Sanji, Nami," He points to a young girl in a sleeveless dress, with a horrible scar on her arm, "Usopp and Chopper." The boy that objected and the 4 or 5 year old shuffle closer. "You can sleep on the couch, if you want."

"Monkeyed? That's an odd name." Robin notes, and Nami tugs her over to the couch.

"I think it's my last name." Luffy holds up a piece of paper with a childish scrawl, and Robin has to smile. 'Monkey D.' is what's on the paper, and Luffy is just blending his middle name and the initial of his surname together.

"Are you and Zoro the only ones with last names?"

"We're the only ones that remember 'em." Luffy explains, while Zoro falls asleep on a cushion. The children have gathered around her.

"That's cause you two keep saying them. I think Zoro made his up, though." Nami tells Robin. Sanji suddenly walks up with a small plate of food- diced apples with what must be sugar.

"Here, ladies are supposed to eat first." He says more to Luffy who complains. Robin is saddened to realize that this must be an entire meal to these children, remembering all too well her own childhood after her mother died and her aunt and uncle kicked her out.

She keeps coming back to that house, occasionally bringing food, and she finds herself looking for an honest job that will take care of the need to buy food. These children need someone to look after them, and she will not condemn them to a life of poverty they would receive if sent to an orphanage. As the days pass, she's startled to realize she loves them as if they were her own.

No one will hire her, even when she says she has children to feed. She's not married, so they assume she's some prostitute that gave birth to bastards.

It's a couple of months of being together, of Luffy declaring them a family and her being dragged into childish games when not searching for a job, tucking them in with stories she remembers from her mother; when one day a man comes to their door. He's come to take her children, but softens only slightly when she begs him not to. (She's a little shocked at how her emotions rebel at the thought of having her children taken away, more so than the fact she calls them 'hers'.)

"They are orphans." He says bluntly. "You are not married, not even by a civil marriage, and this house is scheduled to be taken down with the rest of those damaged from the fire. You will not have a place to live. I will be back in a week." He adds, slightly softer. "But you understand and do what's best for them."

Robin wants to scream and rage at him, but can only nod brokenly, lest he changes his mind.

The children, as she knew they would, do not react well to the news.

"We're not going to the orphanage!" Nami yells, slightly hysterical. "They'll split us up!"

"Nami can't go to that sort of place!" Sanji cries out.

"They'll force Chopper into chimneys!" Zoro adds, holding a piece of broken metal as if he'd beat anyone who came near his youngest brother.

"This is our home! We don't wanna leave!" Usopp sobs.

"You're our mother! We love you! We don't want anyone else!" Luffy declares, hugging Robin's legs, and prompting Nami and Chopper to copy him.

Robin wants to cry. Not from the thought of the children going to an orphanage, but the declaration by Luffy that they love her. Because now she understands why she hasn't left them, when she's left almost every other place.

These are her children. She might not be old enough to be their real mother, but that matters little in the face of someone about to take her beloved children (because she loves them more than anything) away.

"I'm sorry, but without a husband, they won't let me keep you." And just like that, Robin's mind snags on the one way to save her children. She has to find a husband, someone willing to marry a 18 year old woman with six children, and to keep the six children.

It's a terrifying thought, because even if it's only a civil union, the man could use her and send the children away behind her back.

Robin looks at the children who have surrounded her on the floor (and when did she sit on the floor) and have fallen asleep despite their distress.

There's no other option, and Robin resolves that she'll let a man do whatever he wants to her if he'll just let her keep the children.

At age 18, though, she's almost an old maid, and finding a possible suitor in a week begins to feel impossible by the third day (4 days left, and she's told the children her plan).

By the fifth day, she wants to give in to the urge to take the children and run somewhere that man can't find them. But Zoro, Luffy and Usopp have gone missing, and she has to find them, leaving Sanji in charge of Nami and Chopper.

She finds them three streets away, in the worst debris of the Great Fire.

"Mother!" Usopp has a black eye, and a huge man is carrying Zoro and Luffy under one arm.

"Where were you, I was so worried- who are you?!" Robin demands, her cool head abandoning her in face of a stranger holding her two boys. She almost charges him, planning a kick to his crotch, but Usopp has a hold of her skirt.

"Call me Franky, your boys tangled with some pretty tough characters." 'Franky' explains. He's missing his right hand, she notices, and there's a carved wooden one in the shape of a fist where it once was.

"What, Luffy, what were you thinking?" Robin asks taking him from 'Franky', and Luffy blinks up at her.

"We were trying to catch a husband for you, since you were having trouble." He explains, and 'Franky' chuckles.

"They explained your situation to me." Franky says finally, after helping her by carrying Zoro home, and after the excitement of a new person has worn the children into sleep. "You've got some super kids here."

"I can't lose them." Robin whispers. "But no one would marry me."

"I would." Robin startles at the blunt statement. "My parents were worthless, left me as soon as they could, I only survived because a man took me in as an apprentice, despite me being years too young for an apprenticeship." Franky explains, glancing down at his fake hand. "If you don't mind a crippled ship dismantler for a husband, that is."

Robin can't quite believe it, but steals herself. "As long as I can keep the children, you can do whatever you want to me."

"Hold up there! I might be a pervert, but I won't touch you if you don't want me to, I want to do this for those kids." His eyes and expression are honest, and Robin feels the tears start. "You really love those kids."

Robin nods. "They're the best things to ever happen to me."

"We'll have to live at my place, it will be ready for you guys the day after tomorrow." Franky decides, and studies the old house they're sitting in. "I'm impressed this place hasn't fallen down yet."

It's the easiest thing, signing the paper. She almost giggles when Franky writes his real name, Flam Cutty. The judge is cheerful, and even signs the papers for them to officially adopt the children with a smile.

The ring on her finger is an unfamiliar weight, and one of Franky's sisters (who came with the rest of the 'family' to witness the marriage, Franky had neglected to mention he ran a guild of ship-dismantlers, who all called him 'Big brother' for giving them stable jobs) says they made it from some forgotten gold they found.

Usopp doesn't handle the idea of moving well, as the house they've been in was the former house of a friend. But Franky takes him aside and whispers something, and Usopp looks a little more reassured.

Franky just grins when she tries to ask what he said.

The house Franky brings them to is in another part of the city, and even has a small yard in the back. It has a lion's head for a knocker (Usopp is thrilled when he finds a perfectly carved replica of the lamb's head knocker on one of the closet doors).

"I was a carpenter, before I lost my hand." Franky explains as the kids rush to explore the larger house, shouting in joy at what they find (Nami is thrilled to find she has her own room). "I started this house then got the walls and roof up, but after losing my hand, I never had a reason to finish it till now."

"It's wonderful." Robin smiles, and Franky grins, picking her up and crossing the threshold. "What are you doing?"

"For luck." He says, still grinning. "Bad luck for a marriage if the man doesn't carry his wife over the threshold, y'know."

"Oh." Robin didn't know, but smiles as Franky puts her down inside the house. " … What do you want me to do?" She asks finally, because he said he wouldn't force her into sex to repay him for taking care of the children, and she needs to repay him somehow.

"Honestly, you don't have to do anything, but if you really want to repay me … let's just say you have to keep-house." Franky shrugs. "I, uh, don't know if you know how to cook, because I certainly don't."

"I can make a good sandwich." Robin admits, because she honestly never really learned to cook like her aunt. "Soup too. Sanji's actually been cooking for us." It had terrified her at first, seeing the 9 year old near open flame, but he had yet to hurt himself.

"Better than me." Franky chuckles.

They settle into a routine with an odd ease that Robin comes to love. While she does share the master bedroom with Franky, he had built two beds and a curtain to divide them. The man comes for the children, but leaves once Franky shows him both the marriage license and adoption papers.

Luffy has turned 10 and disappeared for half a day, which isn't unusual, but normally the others are with him. Robin only starts to worry when dinnertime comes, and Luffy isn't back. Franky gets ready to go looking for their missing kid, when Luffy returns, bringing back an elderly man with a dark afro threaded with silver and a cane, who is slightly drunk and obviously sick.

"He needs help." Luffy explains, and the older man collapses. "I couldn't leave him there." ('There' they soon learn, was an alley where the old man slept under trash.)

The old man finally recovers, and apologizes for disturbing them. Robin tilts her head as Luffy effortlessly pulls the man into a game, and looks at Franky.

"We're adopting him, too, huh?" Franky studies the old man, who looks on the verge of starvation and sees the way he looks ready to cry as Luffy and Chopper hug him. "Well, we've got the room."

The old man's name is Brook, age 48, and he was once a soldier. He's the last one left of his unit, and so clearly alone that it hurts to even think about letting him return to the alley. He's still quite spry and active and the children are thrilled when he starts playing them music.

"I put you into my will." Brook says one day, and Robin almost drops a plate while Franky chokes. "It's only right, after all you've given me, a perfect stranger." He won't change his mind, either. "Think of it as a gift for the children."

Brook teaches Zoro fencing, and the others the correct stances for when facing an opponent with their fists. He only knows enough to buy time for himself to get his sword, but Luffy just as quickly starts improvising.

A couple years pass, Luffy turns 13, and Zoro starts disappearing during the day and coming back covered in dirt and exhausted. The reason is revealed a month later, when Zoro deposits a small coin purse on the table before dinner.

"I'm working for the blacksmith." He explains, and Franky beams in approval.

Sanji is the next one to disappear during the day, and like Zoro he comes back from an absence with a small coin purse.

"Working at a restaurant." Is the explanation he gives, shoving his hands in his pockets.

"I'm proud of you." Robin says, and Sanji blushes.

Nami finds a job as a seamstress, but she doesn't care for it. She'd much rather find a job with a printing press, but they only want boys.

Franky starts to take Usopp with him to help dismantle ships, but Usopp is far more suited to creation, Franky admits one night to her, with the portioning curtain pulled back so they can see each other. He's considering looking up a friend who was an apprentice with him, and see if he'll take Usopp under his wing.

"What about Luffy?" Robin asks, and Franky sighs.

"Luffy gets distracted easily, he'll stop working when he finds something interesting, and sometimes he breaks things." Franky chuckles. "He's a good guard dog, though, beat some idiots who tried to mess with my sisters black and blue."

"But even that wouldn't hold his interest for long, he doesn't like waiting with nothing to do." Robin notes.

"He'll find something, how's Chopper doing?"

"Since Luffy still plays with him, he's alright. He wants to be a doctor." Universities were expensive, and while they weren't poor, they weren't capable of paying the fees. "I could get a job as a schoolteacher."

"You'd frighten those kids." Franky snorts.

"Perhaps." Robin chuckles, remembering how Luffy would always laugh at her morbid jokes while Usopp would stare at her in horror, back when they were seven.

Then at age 15, Luffy starts disappearing at night, returning with bruises and cuts, and the entire family is there to confront him about it a week after the first time, when he comes back with a gash on his shoulder.

"Luffy, please, we don't want to see you hurt." Robin grabs her son's hands, while Brook and Franky keep Zoro and Sanji from hunting down the culprit.

"I'm fighting." Luffy tilts his head. "I'm not smart, can't cook or play instruments, don't like taking things apart, and I'm no good with making things. So I'm doing what I'm good at so I won't be a burden, and that's fighting." Zoro and Sanji have stopped trying to leave, and stare at their brother in shock.

They aren't the only ones. Robin knows full well that their family is a little rough, with fights occasionally breaking out, and the frequent argument. Luffy was always simple, and the others often called him an idiot, which he usually laughed off.

"Luffy, you've never been a burden!" Nami practically yells, upset. "You're our brother, we love you, we wouldn't even be together if you hadn't found us!"

"I love you guys too, but I know I don't get all the lessons Momma Robin teaches us, and I don't really want to. You guys get it, so I don't have to." Luffy beams at them. "I'm good at fighting, the others in the ring say so, and I get paid even if I don't win, though it's not as much."

"Luffy …" Robin starts, but when he turns to look at her, she spots a glimmer of understanding in his beady eyes. "Please, make sure you come back to us."

"Of course, I'll always come back!" Luffy beams.

It's not the end of the argument, especially among the siblings, but Luffy comes home every morning, letting Chopper practice being a doctor on his wounds, if any.

Chopper is 14, when he comes home one day all but bouncing and telling them he's met a old woman who's a doctor and willing to take him in.

"A woman doctor?" Brook pauses during his tea, looking at the excited child. Robin also stops reading her book to look at her youngest.

"An old woman, she says she's over a hundred!" Chopper shifts in his seat. "I didn't believe it at first, but the soldier on the corner said it was true, she's the only woman to become a doctor, and she's one of the best. She says I have to be there early tomorrow if I want to be an apprentice."

"Then you should go, Chopper!" Luffy leaned over his little brother's seat, stealing a scone.

"I agree." Robin smiles, but something in her twists at the thought of her youngest leaving to pursue a career.

A year later, and Robin has the twisting sensation again, but this time it almost makes her ill. "Pressgangs?" Her voice doesn't shake, but she thinks her hands do. Her children are, for the first time in a while, all home, and Brook is griping his violin tightly as Franky nods.

"Some damn marine war, they're going around and grabbing men they think are strong enough." Franky looks at his missing hand. "It's entirely arbitrary when and where they've grabbed them, bars, streets, even homes, if Paulie is right."

Robin looks at Zoro, whose muscles are visible through his shirt, at Sanji, whose lean frame still shows strength, at Usopp, whose legs are shaking, and at Luffy, whose body is lanky but still muscular. In contrast, Chopper is smaller than his brothers, and slightly frail looking.

"It'll be alright." Luffy says, grinning. "Even if they take us, we'll come back."

Zoro and Luffy are both taken first, an informal letter informing them of their conscription. Usopp and Sanji are next, and Robin wants to scream. She adopted them so they wouldn't be taken away from her. Franky holds her one night as she utterly loses her composure, threatening to kill every last one of the damn soldiers who took her children and the higher ups that gave the order.

It's the first time they share a bed, because Robin cries herself to sleep still holding onto him. Franky for all his off-colored jokes and pride in being a male, does absolutely nothing save wrap an arm around her and awkwardly cover her with a blanket.

Robin apologizes in the morning, and Franky just chuckles. "Brook had to beat sense into me when I found out."

Chopper is never taken, mistaken for being much younger, and apparently the doctor he is apprenticed to is feared by the soldiers.

Dr. Kureha stops by one evening, and tells them she's sponsoring Chopper for the university.

"Brat's good enough, bit idealistic, but he's got skill."

"We can't ask you to-"

"Girl," and this old woman is probably the only one that can get away with calling Robin that, "you're not asking. I'm telling you, I'm sponsoring your brat. The only thing you're allowed to say is 'Thank you'."

"Thank you, Dr. Kureha."

Her four older sons have been gone for a year and a half when the first returns home. Nami's scream has everyone rushing to the entry hall to see a muscular man with left eye sealed shut by a scar, three earrings in the left ear, and carrying swords. But the hair is unmistakable, and Robin isn't the only one who has tears come to her eyes.

"Zoro."

"I'm home." He says, and Chopper is the first to rush in and hug him. They pile into the parlor, and Zoro has to put the swords against the wall as Chopper all but sits on him. "You're still small, Chopper, I thought with Luffy no longer stealing your food you'd grow."

"Jerk, you didn't even write!" Chopper won't let go of Zoro's arm.

"Where's Luffy? Have you seen Sanji or Usopp?" Nami demands, but is griping Zoro's other arm.

"No, haven't seen Luffy since they transferred him to another ship a week after they grabbed us. They took Sanji and Usopp?" Zoro looks annoyed at the information, and Chopper sobs.

"What happen to your eye?"

"Swordsman, your fencing lessons kept me from losing more." Zoro admits to Brook, who gives a soft chuckle. "Actually ended up on some Privateer's ship, not the Navy, seems whoever their opponents were, they were pulling every single resource they could. He was strong, though."

"What was Luffy's ship called?" Robin asks, she's been keeping track through newspapers of ships lost, practically memorizing the names in fear and morbid curiosity of the fate of her sons, and she prays Luffy wasn't on one of them.

"Freedom." Zoro answers, and then straightens as Robin flinches. "Mother?"

"Robin?" Franky grips her shoulder.

"That ship … was on the list last year." The name had struck her as one that Luffy would have liked. Nami and Chopper tighten their grip on Zoro.

"Oi, Luffy will come back." Zoro frowns at them. "He promised." Zoro reminds them, and Nami relaxes a little. "Luffy has never broken a promise to us since he found us, he won't start now. Usopp and Dartbrow will come back too."

Robin chuckles despite the tears, because Luffy really had kept every single promise he made to them, in spirit if not perfect letter.

"Yohohoho! Well, tonight is worth celebrating, one of our lost cubs has returned!" Brook beams, and starts playing the piano, and Nami rushes to get a plate of leftovers together.

Usopp arrives at the two year mark, followed by Sanji just hours later, both upset that Zoro made it back before them. Like Zoro, both have become more muscular and grown up looking, and Nami squeals as she hugs them both.

They haven't heard of Luffy either, but Sanji is distracted by the fact Nami has bloomed into a beautiful young woman and swears to brutally maim anyone that tries to court her.

Nami blushes as Chopper announces she already did that, and she got a job printing Almanacs.

They're settling down for dinner, and Sanji is happy to be in a normal kitchen again, muttering all the while about crappy galleys he's been working in, when a knock comes on the door before it's opened.

"I'm back!" Once again, they rush the entranceway, and see Luffy, a little taller, still lean but with noticeable muscle, but with a large scar just visible under his mostly open shirt. With him is a large man, older than Franky.

It's chaos, and the stranger is bewildered as an overenthusiastic Nami hugs him as well.

"This is Jinbei, he saved my life." Luffy says once they're all seated at the dinner table. He's grinning, and Robin feels her worries vanish like smoke. Not that the story isn't vaguely horrifying, as her son and Jinbei were captured by the enemy when their ship was sunk, and Luffy apparently took a near fatal hit protecting him while they escaped.

"Jinbei got hurt too, but those jerks wouldn't let us return home on a warship, so we had to hitch a ride with Tiger to an island where we stayed with Ray." Luffy finishes, and Jinbei hastily swallows.

"His name is Law Trafalgar, a privateer, he patched us up when the Navy thought it would be better to let us die, and we were able to recover with an acquaintance of mine. He brought us back once Luffy and I were healthy according to his standards." Jinbei says quickly, and Robin chuckles.

"We understood him, Mr. Jinbei."

"Oh." Jinbei blinks, and actually blushes. "I apologize."

"Another Luffy translator is good, though." Sanji brings out desert, and smiles. "Where are you staying?"

"I," Jinbei starts, but Luffy talks over him.

"He's staying here, he can't go up the stairs, though." Luffy informed them, ignoring Jinbei's startled exclamation.

"Okay, I'll get a bed set up in the parlor, we can move the study furniture upstairs tomorrow." Franky nods, and Brook laughs.

"Put it in the music room, I've got plenty of room in there." Jinbei's further attempts to protest are cut off by Nami telling Luffy of her new job making almanacs, and Chopper chiming in about university.

"I wouldn't want to intrude." Jinbei tries again much later, while Robin is delivering extra pillows to the spare bed set up in the parlor, and Robin chuckles.

"Luffy may be my son, but he is the heart of this family, Jinbei." Robin explains. "He found the other children before I found them, and it was his decision that I was family, he found Franky and Brook, and now he's brought you." Robin places the pillows on the bed, before standing. "You saved his life, Jinbei, and you brought him home safely, for that, you are already considered family by my children, and their father and I are inclined to agree." She smiled at him. "Welcome home, Uncle Jinbei."

They were all finally home and safe.

There was more to this, but I kept it short, maybe one day it will be a chapter story.

If I can come up with a better title, that is. Please, review and let me know what you think!