My mind is going to run wild, so I'll have to apologise before hand if whatever I'll be saying in the next couple of lines seems way too out of context or fantastical to the current events we have in the manga.
The PH staff said "no one is going to be missing pirates" or something along those lines. This might actually be a slim foreshadowing to a minor/ major change to any of the strawhat pirates that have been taken as hostages. I would incline towards sanji, nami or chopper being part of a scientific experiment as franky is already a cyborg, though an extra tweaks here and there could come SUPER!!.
We haven't had the experiment goes awry event yet, nor the crew has been badly affected throughout the journey, obviously I'm setting aside Ace's death and the crew's separation events which can be addressed as difficult times that should, have and must be overcome. I could only imagine what would happen if one of the SH got into an experiment that changed him/her "for good". PLease do not read this as "I want them to have yet another upgrade from an experiment explossion" it may well be the opposite,a handicap to one of them that could affect the crew's interaction; regardless the reason, an incident of this nature could lead to even further information on what Vegapunk is planning and what she/he is doing.
Having a former strawhat badly affected by vegapunk (instead of the "add new character" affected by X formula) would also add flavour to the general interaction, as we have Franky who has been to his/her homeland and "praises him" and, of course the Kuma issue. I would like to note that I'm not in for the "damsel in distress" formula, but an experiment that for any reason was actually carried out.
So I'm looking forward to what the "punkhazardians" have in store for us. Also, if they're actually with vegapunk that could be another reason to have Franky stay on the Sunny instead of going to PH.
One more thing. After seeing all the crazyness that only one island carries I expect from the SHs to find a devilfruit sooner or later. Regardless of what they do with it (Sell it, eat it or give it in compensation for something or just start a collection lol). I just find it weird that in a world "full of devil fruit users" we haven't seen any fruit besides the ones that kalifa and Kaku ate. So if the users are uncommon but not that rare why are these fruits so scarce?
I hope I didn't bore you, and if I did… then you just wasted 30 secconds of your life:ninja: