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The multicolored lights of the underground lounge welcomed Doflamingo the moment the door was opened for him and the rest of his men. Smoke rose through the artificial chill of the place, and the others whispered among themselves as they watched them enter. In only a few years they had earned a decent reputation in the underworld, the Donquixote Pirates and, more importantly, the Joker. His identity was not directly connected to himself at this moment, but at twenty years old, Doflamingo knew better than that.
The heavy atmosphere of the place did not affect him beyond a faint sense of amusement hidden beneath a smile, walking through the crowd directly toward the private room where he would hold a meeting with a powerful group involved in slave trafficking. Music blared throughout the entire place, some corners filled with men groping women while others sat drunk, intimidating everyone around them. This was still a center for nightlife entertainment, one that very few people knew existed and that served perfectly for conducting business beneath the table. Every now and then one could spot a Celestial Dragon around these parts, and Doflamingo was perfectly content with them not showing up today.
Today would be the day he closed that deal.
With a little easy conversation and several alcoholic drinks intentionally laced just enough, Doflamingo was able to loosen up the people from the other group. Poor fools drunk on power who believed they could do whatever they pleased, trying to walk over him without him noticing. He was still a new name, and he would not deny that, but being underestimated because of his youth irritated him far more than it should have. He would not say it, and instead simply draped one arm over the other man’s shoulder and whispered:
“Well, I’m sure you haven’t shown me everything this place has to offer, or am I wrong?” Taking a cigar from the table, the other man laughed casually and offered it directly to Doflamingo. Both of them knew this place existed for more than business alone. It also served another kind of entertainment, and the pole standing before them in the center of the room told Doflamingo everything he needed to know. It could be interesting.
“I didn’t know you were into that sort of thing,” the man commented, motioning toward one of the employees. “But I think they’ll have something you like.” The lecherous grin of the man, somewhere around forty years old, meant exactly what Doflamingo assumed it did. “Bring her out!”
In a good mood from the success, Doflamingo settled back against the sofa and took a sip from the same tampered drink he had given the man. It created the trust he knew he needed, and his men watched him from the corner of their eyes after seeing his actions. The underworld was a hell Doflamingo had grown accustomed to inhabiting since childhood, surrounded by garbage where luxury had once existed; and now inside a venue filled with bright lights and seductive signs of women displayed behind glass.
Outside the establishment, obscene jokes spilled from the mouths of citizens while tourists laughed excitedly at the wickedness around them, because this place was not what it appeared to be. Doflamingo listened to everything absently, his Observation Haki alert for any distraction because in truth things were more complicated than merely meeting with a bunch of old men to watch some random woman dance.
While the smuggling groups gathered in different corners and glasses clinked together, the adjoining hallway began to stir. Doflamingo listened carefully, the confident footsteps moving between the walls. There was something beneath the surface, beneath the reinforced cement and the muffled moans buried underneath it all. One heel, then the other, and new glittering lingerie beneath flickering light.
Doflamingo’s smile disappeared instantly, turning his head toward the door in front of the small stage and whoever stood behind it.
“I think she’s about to come out, they say she’s the best around here.” The man said, taking a sip of champagne between yellowed teeth. Rings clinked against the glass, and Doflamingo suddenly seemed interested. He believed he could be, for some reason. “Her alias is Crocodile. An interesting choice, if I may say so.”
Doflamingo laughed in response, as he always did. And in the reddish darkness of the place, the silhouette finally appeared. The first thing Doflamingo noticed were her dead gray eyes, strangely dangerous, reflecting the red light of the stage and swallowing everyone’s attention the moment she entered.
Her black high-heeled boots pressed against the floor to the slow rhythm of the music as she began walking across the stage. The same sound pattern Doflamingo caught onto, and now he was definitely interested. The others in the room quieted their conversations for the main act, and the woman smiled in response, directing her gaze toward Doflamingo’s.
His eyes narrowed as he watched the woman slowly let her black feathered coat slide from her shoulders. One arm first, then the other, exposing herself gradually beneath the whistles of the crowd. Revealing her chest tightened beneath black lace of the same color. Lower, across her abdomen, a cord tied around her waist connected to the lingerie resting at the edge of her hips. Her legs moved toward the metal pole, and the harness wrapped softly around her thighs was attached to those same high boots above the knee.
The woman noticed Doflamingo’s eyes traveling over her from head to toe, and when she turned her head he was able to see the stitched scar running across her entire face. Her features were sharp and severe, even more so once her body began to move against the pole. Her ass pressed against the metal, her back arching to deepen the curve, and Doflamingo let out a low laugh while quickly raising his glass with the other man.
The slow music was hypnotic, and that woman knew how to do her job, climbing the pole and spinning to the rhythm of the suggestive melody. Her long gloves brushed tentatively with her nails and she spread her legs in the air. Using the strength of her arms, she flipped her body upside down and held herself there. The short black hair still perfectly in place, jewelry chiming together while that small hoop continued swaying along with her.
Doflamingo knew it had been worth it when, a few minutes later, that woman crawled across the entire stage toward him. The other men booed in disappointment that she had chosen who she would entertain that night, the most important man in the room, the others had said at some point. She held his gaze through Doflamingo’s glasses, sliding her arms across her body all the way down to her pants.
Right after, she lowered one heel from the stage and then the other, positioning herself directly on his lap. The size difference did not displease Doflamingo in the slightest, and the woman’s legs had to spread wide enough to sit comfortably over him. She looked bored of him the moment they were face to face, and that only made her more interesting.
Running his hands over the woman’s body, Doflamingo pulled her closer until her breasts pressed against his chest. Some people seemed slightly surprised, especially his subordinates, since it was uncommon for Doflamingo to stray beyond his original objectives. However, he knew that she knew exactly what she was doing. Because instead of reacting to his actions, she simply continued the act without any issue.
She was a strange woman, if she had managed to hold Doflamingo’s attention enough for things to reach this point. Throwing her head back in a circle so the others could admire her, her exposed collarbone and hips pressing even closer. Moving her spine in one fluid wave.
After that, she continued and bent directly to his ear to whisper something that the others interpreted as some filthy phrase. Her nails scraped against his scalp beneath the leather gloves and she curled the purple feathered collar around her fingers, her lips sticky with lipstick and the smile audible in her voice.
“Meet me outside in two hours. I have a surprise for you.”
Not only had he managed to close the deal, but he had also managed to find something even more entertaining.
…
The nape of her neck, Crocodile as they called her, pressed hard against the wall of the private room, letting out a low moan as she felt Doflamingo thrust into her in a single motion. Her hands gripped the other man’s neck, pulling him closer and closer until Doflamingo was losing his mind from the intoxicating sensation. He ran his tongue along her neck, feeling at the same time her racing pulse and her perfume filling his nose. Her lower back arched easily into a clean curve when Doflamingo slid his hands over her buttocks and spread them further apart, fully intent on breaking that haughty woman who had presented herself in front of all those men just hours earlier.
Doflamingo was no fool, even though many assumed he was the first time they met him. As soon as her act ended, he knew the woman was serious by the complicit smile she gave him before disappearing down the hallway again. And the others knew exactly what was going to happen after seeing that exchange between the two of them. It seemed Crocodile had taken a special interest in him, and he wasn’t going to let it slip by for some stupid reason. He hadn’t actually been with as many women as everyone assumed. That much was clear from the punches to his shoulder Trebol gave him when he announced he was staying.
He didn’t regret his actions at all, and even less so having waited two hours in an outside alley just to be let in through the back door by her. Navigating through the crowd until they reached the private rooms that clearly had only one function. Doflamingo didn’t mind her taking control for a while, especially if a few minutes later she would be the one moaning on top of him. She was provocative, more so than the previous ones.
Crocodile—if that was even her real name, which he doubted—didn’t resemble any of the other women he had known before. She wasn’t the typical woman who would throw herself at him with a silly smile and an innocent attitude that sold itself to the most perverse. She seemed like one of those fearsome women who clouded one’s consciousness and reality until you could only focus on her, only on her.
With her abdomen tense and glistening as she rubbed her clit against him while he thrust her forward with force. With her bare shoulders, her prominent clavicle, and her pale skin. With her long fingers, sharp nails, and coal-black lashes lowered, her wet hair slick with gel and her lips parted to moan without any restraint; proud of her lewd and shameless acts. The man with whom she had closed the deal had told him he was lucky because that woman didn’t pay attention to any other man, and Doflamingo understood that he really had been very lucky.
Not just anyone could have her like this, with her face turned to the side and touched again and again by strange hands before. Now covered from end to end by Doflamingo’s fingers, who easily tended to become more and more aggressive during sex until he lost all necessary restraint. Just as he was with people—truly low on patience and with an absurd impulsiveness to consume the other. He covered Crocodile’s face with his spread fingers, from one cheek to the other, until only her needy eyes remained fixed on him. She didn’t seem interested in who was in front of her, but in herself, and that selfish stance made him grip her harder.
So that she would stick out her tongue and lick the space between his fingers, running her teeth over his knuckles until she swallowed them whole. Until Crocodile lifted her hips so Doflamingo could go deeper and her body trembled in strange angles, as soon as his saliva-covered fingers pinched her nipples. The view was good, and Doflamingo would probably remember it for a long time. The black harnesses tightened around her body and her bra was pulled aside to expose her breasts to the air. Her panties were shoved to the side and soaked as well, with her on top of him while he lay back on the couch. He needed nothing more.
He could break her neck, her ribs, her pelvis, and her knees and leave her completely ruined, as sometimes happened to him. But then he wouldn’t be able to come back to her, and he didn’t want this encounter to be the only one; he told himself that that night. Feeling her insides clench tightly around him as she came, her mouth sighing and asking for more with that same absurd confidence he hadn’t been able to break.
He would come back for her, and he was sure he would eventually break her.
“Have you ever had a threesome?” She said, smiling to him, and he returned the gesture.
It would be fun.
…
Surprisingly, Doflamingo didn’t stop at all. He kept coming back every so often—once every two weeks or so—and each time he would find her. Crocodile, with a smile or a mocking look fueled by the lust that consumed him. It was easy to understand, or at least somewhat, when she clearly despised lustful men to some degree. However, she herself would moan in Doflamingo’s ear during those continuous encounters that she didn’t want anyone else but him. That he, specifically, was one of those men whose lust was steeped in real power.
Consumed by lust, Crocodile would display herself as she was used to doing and then blur the line by sleeping with Doflamingo every time he returned. Even her own subordinates were starting to suspect that there was more than just business going on in the place, especially because of the photo in the display windows: Crocodile leaning against the wall with her fingers inside her mouth and her head thrown back in a gesture of artificial pleasure.
“There’s no one like you,” she told him once, with one leg over his shoulder and the other thrown across the couch. Her belly tensed with every thrust as Crocodile stared at him intently. He knew those words were a lie, and that only made him press harder and deeper to rip them out of her. To make her stop lying to him as if he were just any other man, because he knew he was different. “Yes,” Crocodile gripped him tighter, “I need you to do it harder.”
Doflamingo thought about her more and more often, almost every day, with half-lidded eyes while humming some silly song that played in the underground club. Similar to the ones they used to listen to, remembering another moment pleasurable enough for him to keep it actively in his memory. Crocodile would lean against his shoulder, arch her back forward, and rub her ass against him to the rhythm of the music. She’d pick up the pace when she felt Doflamingo’s fingers slide deeper, fingering her in the middle of the crowd without anyone noticing—or if they did, they wouldn’t do anything about it. That was what they came for, after all, and no less than Doflamingo himself deserved the grand prize.
“I…” Crocodile whispered, unable to finish the sentence, feeling the friction against her clit somewhere between her legs while his other hand squeezed her entire breast. Taking advantage, Doflamingo told himself, with the constant rub of her lifted dress and his own deep red wine-colored suit. “I—” Doflamingo interrupted her again by curling his fingers, pushing her into a discreet orgasm right in the middle of the crowd.
If Crocodile were any other woman, maybe these kinds of exchanges would mean more than what they truly were. He wouldn’t lay her on the bed and run his tongue all over her wet pussy, her thighs squeezing his head while her hand pulled his hair to make him go faster and deeper. The smoke she sometimes shared with him, even while her body was lying on top of his, would mean something more. If she were any other woman, the messy kisses and constant visits wouldn’t mean anything to Doflamingo. Neither would the pleasant feeling of running his cold hand over Crocodile’s hot body just to see how she reacted.
And it would be casual, truly. Pinning her against a wall and lifting her into the air, her heavy breathing in the exit alley and her nails scratching his clothes until they tore. He wouldn’t care, and he’d laugh about her with the others like any other lustful and powerless man. He wouldn’t bother paying attention to her body while she undressed, tossing her short shoulder-length hair back so she could suck his cock from tip to base. Pulling her hair, putting her in different positions? At this point, anything.
But she wasn’t, and that’s why Doflamingo found himself watching her as she touched herself with need, putting on an obscene show with her legs crossed and her boots covering what he had known for several months. She wouldn’t tilt her head toward him on the stage during her pole show, nor would she promise to wait for him next time.
He would come back, even if it meant losing a bit of focus and increasing his spending on condoms. Even if it meant gaining more fame in the underworld for slave trading rather than trafficking. It didn’t matter. In the case of a woman like her, nothing was entirely off the table.
However, when he returned to the club for business two months later—six months after their recurring encounters began—and asked for her with a smile, there was no trace of that woman left. She had disappeared without a trace:
Crocodile.
…
“Crocodile? The girl you used to fuck?” Disco said, taking a sip of whiskey while groping some girl around twenty years younger than him. He laughed lightly, as though something about it amused him. “It’s a shame, she’s not around anymore.”
Clicking his tongue, Doflamingo leaned back against the sofa to look at the uncomfortable girl sitting beside Disco; Crocodile would not cry. “We’ll have to replace her with the mermaid I brought, but it would be better if she didn’t kill herself in a few months. She’s worth more alive, though dead works too,” he finally declared.
Disco sighed in amusement, looking at the image on the television and then at the mermaid crying in chains in one corner. “As long as she doesn’t make the kind of mess the other one did. She was hot, but way too unpredictable.”
“Oh? And that’s because…” Doflamingo tried to say, prompting him to continue:
“She murdered a client and disappeared, without leaving a trace.”
…
The execution of Gold Roger made the entire world tremble, people booing at his words, some shouting excitedly and others remaining completely silent like him. Doflamingo, only seventeen years old, watched the reactions of the others from a corner with growing interest. The era would definitely change from now on, and he knew the Marines had altered history for their own convenience once again. Roger’s small act of revenge before unleashing everything left a pleasant taste in his mouth, like a slight satisfaction he knew would be fulfilled in the coming years.
Right now, he only had to return to the ship and continue on his way with his men. They still had cargo to deliver, and with all the chaos that would erupt in the New World over reaching the One Piece, everything seemed to be moving spectacularly. The Marines would be busy controlling the most obvious and loud pirates chasing their goals, while he could handle things underneath it all.
Turning around, he made his way calmly through the crowd. People whispered fearfully about the recent event and the violence of seeing the greatest pirate of all time executed, while others simply let him pass because of his imposing height. That was, until he walked directly into someone smaller, their head colliding against his shoulder. Someone fairly tall, then.
Turning with a dangerous smile, ready to confront whoever had been careless enough to do that, he watched the young woman continue walking forward without even reacting to the collision.
“You should watch where you’re going next time,” he said calmly despite his slight irritation. This place was crawling with Marines and he had no intention of becoming the second person executed today, so he would refrain from making a scene. But there was nothing wrong with bothering someone careless a little.
The woman turned briefly, and now that Doflamingo thought about it in retrospect while lying in bed staring at the ceiling, he did not understand how he had failed to recognize her. It was probably because he had forgotten, but the fact remained obvious. The clear disdain, and on top of that, the rude gesture of showing him the middle finger without apologizing at all. Of course it had been her, and Doflamingo had been a fool for not realizing it until after he stopped seeing her. He laughed at himself until his stomach hurt and he threw a glass of wine across the floor. Until the carpet was stained and he had to kneel down, because he was an idiot. He had already understood why he had been chosen that night and the nights after, why she had gone directly toward him.
That woman had been Crocodile, amusingly enough.
…
It felt as though he were back in that damned place again, as though he were fleeing from those damned Celestial Dragons once more and nothing had changed. Rage poured out of him like the fire that had burned him so many years ago, more rage than he had ever thought he could contain and endure. It was sickening and lethal, the restraint he had been forced to maintain until reaching the ship and throwing everything across the room. It filled the edges of his vision in darkness and cracks, as though he were made of shattered glass.
Murdering his own brother, a disgusting traitor he had always known was exactly that and had lied to himself about it. With Rocinante’s corpse thrown into the snow, his makeup smeared and tears staining his face. He hated him, hated him and hated everyone else. His fingers curled against the edge of the table until it splintered apart, his Haki unstable and that absurd need to regain control once again. No one had seen him affected at the entrance nor on the way back, and that was how it had to remain. If that boy had survived, it was not important right now — let him rot at the bottom of hell for all he cared.
Now he had no one, the others were just the others and it was not the same. They would never know, and if someone had asked him tomorrow or even a few seconds ago, he would say his brother deserved it because it was true. He was weak, just as his father had been and his mother too, dying in a bed without a shred of dignity left.
There was no one else, and people only proved more every day how pathetic they were. He brought a hand to his chest, the tachycardia unbearable as he gasped; suddenly remembering the heavy breathing against his ear. The long, elegant hands grabbing at anything they could reach, sweat sticking to his skin. Like a damned truth, he remembered it. What she had said while holding his face and blowing smoke into his mouth, their lips brushing together:
“It’s the powerful who decide, the ones who get to choose.”
…
Doflamingo had heard about him; he was not some fool incapable of noticing that there was someone with the same name, the same physical description, and the same characteristic attitude as the woman he had met almost ten years ago — the one he collided with at seventeen. Rumors in the underworld moved quickly, everything functioned through influence and Doflamingo did not let this fact go unnoticed. A man, apparently with the same name as her, was now becoming famous throughout the world.
They called him Mr. Crocodile. Specialized in trafficking illegal substances or materials, Devil Fruits sold at irrational prices, and unofficial weapons distributed to pirates everywhere. It was not necessarily bad because he did not interfere in the area Doflamingo worked in, that was what he told his men when they asked why they were not attacking his known base in Alabasta. Besides, he was not going to go see the man with his own eyes and leave room for further speculation. That was what he told his men, without any additional questions.
And so, somehow, he found himself visiting the streets of Alubarna in a short amount of time. The sand and the heat, the streets full of colorful fabrics and a casino that informed him its owner was unavailable at the moment. Several days passed, and the man did not return. That made Doflamingo think he was not completely insane, and if it had been an ordinary situation he would have assumed it was simply some weakling incapable of facing someone like him. Anything else — but he knew better than to question the possibilities of a world like the one they lived in.
He should not question them, only laugh about it because he truly found it amusing how fate seemed to work. Bringing him back to the same place over and over again, in a similar situation.
Taking a walk through the sand dunes, enjoying the view because he had deliberately gone without his men or his family, Doflamingo finally saw him. In the middle of the sand, the wind moved his fur coat and the short black hair — the same haircut as always — swayed along with it. The cigarette in his hands had been replaced by an expensive cigar and where his left hand used to be there was now a heavy golden hook. He was different, now he was a man and that was what mattered the least to Doflamingo in that moment.
His gray eyes observed him from above, with the sun behind him and an ironic smile that told him everything he needed: it was the same person.
The old compulsion he had set aside many years ago, the obscene memories he carried and the frustration easy to disguise but difficult to forget came back to him. Doflamingo did not consider himself someone more impulsive than rational, it was a constant balance that always remained within him without any problem. Because of that, in any other occasion he would not have tried to pull out a string and catch him without thinking.
But before the Haki-infused strings could reach him, Crocodile disappeared into the sand.
…
Crocodile was someone who spoke few words, and when he did speak he did not say things he did not mean, even while lying. And sometimes the things Doflamingo said were not really what they meant, but rather the things he left unsaid; the things spoken through the tilt of his eyes and the predatory smile during their first meeting as Sichibukai. The tone of his voice, dragging itself around without truly saying anything just to watch the minimal reactions of the man sitting across the table. With the cigar clenched between his jaw and an irritation that made everything worth it, regardless of the slightly strange looks from the other Sichibukai such as Jimbei. Mihawk had probably noticed too but did not mention anything, and Boa Hancock was only annoyed in her place because she had already started hating him from the very first minute.
He did not care in the slightest, nor did he plan to make friends in that place, and the title served him well enough to extort the World Government. That, and it served him for other things too. He only focused on the pretentious indifference Crocodile had to construct in front of him, the one who seemed genuinely uncomfortable with the fact that he now had to share the title with someone like him. Crocodile did not say things he did not mean, and that was something Doflamingo knew. And so, when Doflamingo followed him through the halls of Mary Geoise — with comments full of obvious double meanings that would have been clear to anyone listening — he was surprised by Crocodile’s response.
Or not really, it was the most expected thing and Doflamingo had simply become too accustomed to how predictable everyone else was at this point.
Grabbing him by the shirt to throw him inside a locked room, Crocodile entered after him and stared directly at the Marines terrified by the presence of both of them. “Get out of here,” he said, and it only took a few seconds before they were alone again. Doflamingo would not lie, years ago he had not predicted their next encounter would be like this, but that fact did not bother him in the slightest. Leaning back against one of the tables, Doflamingo lowered his head to look at Crocodile’s new face with the recognition it deserved.
The face was even squarer now, his chest had become pectorals and the once revealing clothes were now completely hidden beneath layers and layers that Doflamingo only wanted to rip off all at once. If the position remained the same, Crocodile looking up at him with that irritation that so easily turned into absurd lust. He looked more tired, in a good way, with more experience of the world than someone at twenty-five would have had back then. Doflamingo tapped the table to contain himself, and Crocodile’s sigh nearly made him laugh at the situation; if he was not already doing it.
“What a surprise,” Crocodile said, obviously not surprised at all. Doflamingo felt a stab of satisfaction at knowing perhaps Crocodile was someone even worse now. The rumors were explicit in the way he acted, the tortures he inflicted and the threats with which he ruled the underworld. “Of all the holes where I expected to see you again, I did not think this would be one of them.”
“You already knew I’d come, don’t play hard to get with me. We both know that didn’t work last time.” Passing his hands over Crocodile’s waist, he suddenly seemed surprised by the mention of the past. Probably no one else ever brought it up, Doflamingo suspected. Even so, sliding his hands over the now angular and muscular body, it was more than obvious the things that had happened would never leave Crocodile’s mouth.
“I knew you’d want to return to the old pattern again, but I’m surprised by how easily you do it.” Taking a step forward, Crocodile made space for himself between Doflamingo’s legs. Who pressed him harder once his hands reached his lower back. “Aren’t you surprised? By this.” He gestured toward his body as though the implication were obvious. “I thought you only liked women, honestly.”
A snort came in response, his hands now moving along the entire broad back. The rounded shoulders, the wide collarbone, the hard pectorals and the abdomen shaped by strength. The shiver spoke for Crocodile, who remained the same. Doflamingo had been with men from time to time throughout his life, and although it was not usual for him he had no issue opening the vest a little further. The buttons came undone easily, and the white light of the monitors in the darkness reminded him of those days in his youth.
“Hmmm, I can’t say it bothers me at all.” Doflamingo hurried to cut off the heads of the surveillance Den Den Mushi, leaving them completely alone. “But hiding from me all these years?”
“Are you angry?” Crocodile said, his voice neutral while looking at him with those unreadable eyes.
Doflamingo studied his face for a moment. “And you?” His hands ventured to remove the heavy coat, muscles tense. The constant buzzing of the still-active televisions crossed the room, the silence heavy and Crocodile did not move. The hair not slicked back with gel fell into his bangs.
“Not particularly,” he answered, passing his hands over Doflamingo’s open shirt and looking at his face. “At least you stopped wearing two pairs of glasses at once, you looked ridiculous.” In Doflamingo’s defense, at twenty years old one makes certainly strange stylistic decisions, and he would not regret them at all. “But don’t speak to me in public again, or I’ll murder you.” The words were slow, as though it were not a simple threat but a fact Doflamingo had to follow; commanding him and giving him orders from years ago, months ago.
“Deal, then.” Doflamingo pressed him against the door and noticed the way the other studied his face, as though trying to relive those memories that made him weak. His legs tense and Doflamingo’s hand touching his erection, groping him in a place where anyone could arrive. Some habits did not disappear so easily. With Crocodile pressing his lips together beneath him, and suddenly he looked very much like that girl he had met: composed and barely restrained.
The only question was who Crocodile was right now, who Doflamingo himself was. A man driven by his instincts or something lower than that. A rejected Celestial Dragon with the taste of trash-ridden worms on his lips or with his lips pressed against the open mouth of a Warlord. Doflamingo combined all of those things into the deformed monster he was now, because there should be nothing left of that frightened child who never showed it. He would always return to being the same one who beat slaves at five years old.
The same one who simply took the things he wanted without asking anyone for permission because no one would tell him no. Who let lust take over his body in the few moments he allowed it, even if the excuse of some cheap reproductive instinct no longer applied. Crocodile no longer had the soft hips of a woman, but instead the protruding bones of a man. A hard cock in his hand demanding attention when he pulled it from his pants, he was still the same as always, demanding he make it quick because the others could arrive at any moment. That Crocodile whose real name he never learned.
Who no longer had a fragile neck but a thick one rising above him, the waist twisting beneath overflowing pectorals. With hardened nipples and a deep voice that softened slightly in the air in the way no one should hear them this time.
They were no longer nobodies the world did not know, and both of them understood that.
With his chest trembling and eye contact unbroken so as not to hide in the slightest, Crocodile came in his hand after a few minutes. Gripping his shoulders tighter and tighter so Doflamingo could understand the reasons behind everything he would never tell him. How difficult it had been because now his cock hurt, the place was too small for people their size and things after this encounter would become harder for him in a way Doflamingo would consciously choose to ignore.
Taking a few steps forward without waiting for a response after finishing and leaving through the door some seven minutes later, Doflamingo continued watching him. Walking behind him with his hands in his pockets, his feathered coat still poorly adjusted.
Crocodile continued forward through the expensive, spacious hallways, sunlight illuminating his features when he pulled out a cigar and proceeded to ignore Doflamingo as though he did not exist there. His former arrogance had transformed into some sort of obvious narcissism Doflamingo would recognize anywhere.
Was this Crocodile crueler? he wondered, because he was definitely more powerful. Before, he had not even possessed a Devil Fruit to begin with. Were the sharp words of contempt he occasionally threw at him more truthful now, layered beneath lies like his past? The things he hid and consciously chose to conceal.
Doflamingo was not accustomed to this new attitude, where he was no longer someone else’s instrument. Now, Crocodile stopped while walking toward the entrance of his ship and cast a complicated glance over his shoulder, as though expecting to see someone there. In Doflamingo’s place or behind him, through him. Doflamingo stayed silent, watching Crocodile’s back and now he could see many things he had once deliberately chosen to ignore.
He could see the burn scars beneath the sleeve on his left arm, for example, or the set of sixteen stitches covering cheek after cheek. A story in every part of his body, and he wanted to know more; more and more each time because it was never enough.
“Do you want to join me?” he asked.
“Of course not,” Crocodile replied, turning around again to be greeted by his men aboard the ship. He too had somewhere to be, actually.
Doflamingo smiled and assumed there were things Crocodile had not been capable of avoiding either.
…
Doflamingo moved through the casino in the darkness, through hallways no one else knew and where he had earned trust throughout the years in all his occasional encounters with Crocodile. His footsteps struck the floor, his shoes against the polished material and the secret passageways that allowed direct access to Crocodile without needing to announce himself. Crocodile’s mansion beneath the water was equally dark, and he breathed slowly through uneven pulls while standing before the doors. The horrible need had returned, and he needed to go back.
His strong hands entered the room and found Crocodile standing in the middle of it, a glass of whiskey in his hands and slightly surprised to see him walk in. If he had not detected him with Haki, then that meant he was distracted enough for it to happen. The reflection of the water framed his face, quickly irritated by the intrusion, and Doflamingo used several Haki-infused strings to pull him toward himself.
Stumbling slightly forward before recovering his posture, Crocodile frowned. “What are you doing here again? The last time was two weeks ago.” he said, while Doflamingo positioned him against the large table in his dining room, spreading his legs on either side. The back of his head struck the expensive wood harshly, and the impact made him turn his head before Doflamingo placed a hand there to prevent the loss of eye contact. “Needy fucking lunatic.”
And it was true, Doflamingo had realized that thing he had forgotten over time because he had needed to manage more and more things. To begin with, and in every possible way, he had always been a needy, selfish fucking lunatic incapable of having everything he wanted. Things were defined by power and he was capable of having power over the people he wanted, and over the one who had returned from the darkest corners of the world. The kind no one else reached and no one else wanted to reach.
It had started again, but with a cautious restraint Crocodile had not shown back then at the club. Now he had a reputation to protect, and he had made that clear, yet he still kept giving ground more and more. It was no longer just about jerking him off or touching each other occasionally after a Sichibukai meeting, nor was it about possessing him again after so many years of waiting. About having him all to himself, now in an expensive private bed where before they had only had a filthy alleyway. And the dynamic had not changed, but it was different in the way Crocodile processed it and Doflamingo registered it.
Because this time, as things escalated in the usual but unsurprising manner, Doflamingo was quieter than usual. That did not mean he was gentle, but entirely focused on Crocodile beneath him with an almost different quality. Which made it pleasant, even amusing for him, to watch how Crocodile was more accustomed to constant words and not to Doflamingo’s silence. It was funny, truly, to think people could become destabilized so easily. Even if Crocodile was not exactly one of those cases.
His body was imposing, threaded through with pain. Strong and disciplined in a way he could not fully show when he was a woman. Doflamingo understood that, briefly and without needing to ask because other people’s histories were never truly important to him.
People existed entirely as a mass, a sort of one-sided relationship where Doflamingo saw them and they did not see him behind the smile. Where they would scream and writhe without understanding why any of it happened, why Doflamingo did all these deranged things. And it was pleasant for him, again, to feel that Crocodile could not be defined within that same blurred mass that characterized everyone else. Feeling the same hand grip his wrist tightly as he wrapped it around his neck, pressing lower to hear the deep growl Crocodile let slip unintentionally.
Truly, being above Crocodile was like being capable of taming even the proudest human being he knew. And he had seen the capacity of the outside world, sometimes he understood that he was not physically stronger than others but superior in mind. And Crocodile was not the exception, because choking him in his own dining room while pulling down his pants was exactly what proved otherwise.
Crocodile was not in this place to remember who he had been, and that was why the punch he threw at Doflamingo made him react. Even so, there was no remedy if he would end up arching his back anyway at the feeling of Doflamingo’s tongue running over his bloodied fist and pushing two fingers inside him.
“Do it properly, damn it. Stop playing around.” Crocodile said, curling his fingers to spread himself open and let Doflamingo drag his tongue over his entire body, moving down his abdomen to the tip of his cock.
“Hmmm, I don’t want to.” Doflamingo only took him halfway into his mouth, and Crocodile grabbed him by the hair to force him all the way down. With those same hands he used to torture, to kill others, to dry entire wells and count dirty money. Opening Doflamingo’s mouth so he could take him whole, with that same mouth he used to spit diatribes and nonsense, to smile when other people screamed.
They were not the same, and Doflamingo knew it because his own story had not begun where everyone else’s did. And in Crocodile’s case, he probably would never truly know.
Even so, he thought he saw Crocodile tilt his cheek to the side and try to remain still. With his black robe now loose at the sides, Doflamingo’s fingers spreading him open to thrust inside hard, just like in the old days and just like in the present now.
It had been a shame for Doflamingo, having to wait so long, almost an entire decade for these encounters to return to their place. For Crocodile to actually be alive, and for them to be fucking on the dining table without any issue because Doflamingo had simply found it too difficult to drag them all the way to the bedroom. In his opinion, it was Crocodile’s fault for making this place so damn large.
To the greatest extent one could blame Crocodile for this situation, because Doflamingo was good at understanding that things were his fault and feeling absolutely no guilt over it. Which had become a blessing in a world like theirs, where it was impossible to avoid falling into a tangle of lies. Lies that would end in situations like this, watching Crocodile’s eyes glaze over in the reflection of the water. Thanks to their gray color, under this lighting they looked almost blue themselves. So damned beautiful that Doflamingo could only continue, because Crocodile needed to know what all these encounters had meant to him. These years in which he would not admit the truth even to himself.
And it was difficult, because Crocodile maintained silence in different ways under every possible circumstance. Because he found quick and efficient sex more effective than something full of foreplay, slowness and the endless stream of words Doflamingo preferred to give. In order to unravel Crocodile into a haze of sensations and make him more accessible to his mind, the way everyone else was. If someone screamed because he had murdered their entire family, enslaved someone or prostituted them, it would only become unnecessary noise.
So it was better for him to hear Crocodile breathing heavily and trying to speak. The expensive fabric rubbing against the wood with every thrust, or the traces of precome mixed with saliva. Being a man could be different from being a woman, and although Doflamingo doubted he would ever experience it himself, he did not think it changed who that person was. Because Crocodile, somehow, was still the same as before.
“Tell me who you belong to, who’s been there all these years.”
Because they were no longer the same people, they were not. The rhythmic heels were left behind, the shared cigarettes behind the club were left behind and Doflamingo preferred it that way because that person had never truly been Crocodile. He wanted the real one, to stand above everyone else, just as his teachers in Mary Geoise had told him every time he studied the outside world he should never have known.
Doflamingo dragged a hand over the other man’s abdomen, smearing the trail of dried semen he had left on Crocodile there, sticky and pale.
“Don’t do that, it’s disgusting.” the other complained, and Doflamingo found it amusing that Crocodile tried to draw the line at that point, specifically with him. Because sometimes, when he was with Crocodile, everything felt almost suffocating, even more so when the wood creaked in the silence from Doflamingo pressing his body down harder against it.
Rising from his place to position himself completely over Crocodile, Doflamingo placed his knees on either side of him. Bent over the dining table as well, like some starving animal. Then he brought a hand to his chest as though something hurt. As though he, of all people, could be hurt by the implication. In Doflamingo’s opinion, it was worse that he was still inside him, but everyone had their own standards.
“Are you saying I’m disgusting? I don’t like that.” His tone mixed with Crocodile’s still noisy breathing, suddenly uncomfortable because of Doflamingo’s absolute closeness above him. “I make a lot of people smile.”
He would have to get used to it, since Doflamingo knew he was capricious about the things he wanted and this time he would not leave so easily. The cold air conditioning above them moved his hair, partly covering Crocodile’s face with his freshly damp hair. “I didn’t say that, but maybe it’s also true if we take your work with the SMILEs into account. They’re starting to annoy me, everyone keeps talking about them.” Crocodile ran a hand over his own forehead to push him away. The SMILEs were a problem for another day, and the shift toward business matters was an obvious attempt to redirect the conversation. Even so, Doflamingo was amazed by how Crocodile could still seem completely dignified even in a situation like this. That was how Crocodile made others follow him, made them believe in him.
Was that what had happened?
“Let’s go to the bedroom,” Crocodile said after a few minutes spent catching his breath. “My back is killing me.”
And in the middle of a house far too large for a single person, in a desert filled with poverty and yet surrounded by luxury, Doflamingo became certain: Crocodile was already completely his, but not really.
“Do you want to join me? We could traffic smiles together.”
“No.”
…
“Did you see what happened in Alabasta?” Trebol mentioned, setting the newspaper down in front of him to look at Doflamingo. “They arrested Crocodile.”
…
“Forgive me.”
Those were the last words he heard before pulling the trigger against the filthy blond hair, disgustingly vile. His teeth ground together with absurd fury because it was no one else’s fault but the others’. He hated them, learned that every part of the world had its own way of screaming bastards at the Celestial Dragons, just as every person had their own expressions of fear and hatred.
His were different, in a way the others did not understand and could not comprehend. No one but himself did, and other people only became aware of it as soon as they noticed his presence in the room. It only took him a few more years of death to realize that every person also had different ways of calling him. Bastard, disgusting repulsive animal, boss, young master, master, master and master. He learned the cadence of the name beneath terror, with tears and wide eyes. His blindfolded eyes would never be blind again, and the glasses that covered his face from the world were nothing more than a way of displaying what should not be seen.
His arms hurt, the gun was too fragile and it was too easy to kill them all. His father, his brother, the citizens, the people and the weak. There was no forgiveness Doflamingo needed to consider because the resentment he held toward his father collapsed together with him, with a bag full of blood and the severed head inside it. With his brother gone and only strangers left to trust. There was no forgiveness for Doflamingo because he would not apologize for anything he had done, and the forgiveness they begged from him always came too late.
With fire surrounding him, crucified against the wall and ropes holding his wrists, he was only a small child dragged from the ruins of hell. Crying and writhing because it was not fair at all, the others did not understand who he was nor who he would become. He slammed the back of his head against the wall in rage, a bloody mess that left his breathing ragged from the heat. His brother cried beside him and he could feel the tears soaking the cloth that covered his eyes, always veiled from one side of the world.
“Do you want me to give you the strength, to take revenge?” The Devil Fruit dissolved in his hands. A woman cried from her eyes and bled from her gums, another failed smile once again. He pushed each index finger through both sides of her mouth and made her smile, only so her mouth would bleed even more from the side effects. Doflamingo would look at her through his glasses, and then she would spit red as a string sliced her head in half.
He had been born blind in his left eye, white at the cornea and with nothing else to truly see. The other an unnatural yellow, almost glowing in quality and amber at the edges. His mother wiped away the tears falling over that transparent, milky eye back then, when he was two years old and wearing a pair of glasses. He focused on her immaculate white feathers, focused on her face and cried because it was not fair. If he was meant to be someone superior, the others could not know about that secret genetic weakness of the Donquixote family. Later, he would be beating and beating filthy humans branded with the red symbol on their skin. They would cry, cry just as much as he did in the fire and scream with smiles on their faces:
“You’ll pay for this! I’ll get even, I swear it!” Doflamingo screamed, tears carving through the dirt on his scraped cheeks. “You wretches, I won’t die today! Remember my words.” The unstable energy inside his body made him tremble, tremble so much that rage poured out of him. “I look forward to the day I’ll hunt you down!”
People cried, they cried and broke apart easily and Doflamingo was not like them. That was why he screamed one last time:
“And I will murder every single one of you!”
…
Rising from his bed, Doflamingo breathed and breathed through the nightmare, sweat running down his forehead and darkness accompanying him. His bed was empty and he only remembered Crocodile’s words, six months and four days before his arrest.
“Hey.” Crocodile whispered against his mouth, removing Doflamingo’s glasses so he could look directly into his white eye and the yellow glowing crystallized in the room “Do you hate them too?”
…
Three months had passed since Crocodile’s arrest.
“Are you satisfied yet?” Viola spoke, as if she weren’t completely naked on the bed, as if this weren’t just a stupid deal to keep someone alive that Doflamingo had planned to spare from the very beginning. Her back was twisted to the side, her head held high with rage, and her brown eyes filled with deep contempt. Doflamingo tightened his grip on Viola’s waist and didn’t answer at all. “Do you want to inflict on this place all the pain you’ve ever known? We weren’t to blame for that.” She shifted her gaze to look at him, tears glistening in her eyes.
“Shut up, Violet,” Doflamingo said, his mouth curving into an ironic smile. “The agreement we had didn’t say you could talk too much, did it?”
She pressed her lips together and slid her hand down Doflamingo’s body once more, passing over his stomach until she reached his erection and pumped it harder. He, on the other hand, simply stared fixedly at the sight before him, jaw clenched. Looking at her—the woman who pulled his blond hair with enough force to try to take revenge for everything he had done to her family.
So that she would cry at the end of it all. With hatred in her heart, biting her lip because it hurt and because she refused to complain no matter what. She didn’t understand anything, and Doflamingo had no intention of letting Viola do anything beyond their transactional deal. She wasn’t anyone special, and he needed to stop pretending she was.
Because Viola and Crocodile were not the same person. The others weren’t her either, and all the rest usually cried when it got too rough. She was taking the news well; she hadn’t done anything about it, and he found it amusing when they told him Blackbeard would take her place. That man didn’t even want to be a Shichibukai, and the others were fools who didn’t realize it.
Sometimes he really thought about it. While he ran his large hands over Viola’s waist, he truly thought about it for a second. It reminded him of that last visit, when he was inside Crocodile in every sense of the word. It wouldn’t be different from anyone else, and he would enjoy the way Crocodile moved on top of him, one hand braced on his abdomen and that expensive perfume flooding the room. He remembered it because in those moments Doflamingo would grab his hair and pull him in for a kiss, listening to him complain about the action yet not denying the pleasure. Feeling Doflamingo come inside him.
That was why he could hold Viola’s face with more force than anyone had probably ever used on her before—a princess worthy of her title and her dignity. That was why he could grip her face and force her to look forward. Crocodile had never been someone incapable of refusing. He wasn’t weak, nor untouchable before the world. Feeling the weight of the body beneath him, the weight of someone with power similar to his own. With a different and unknown history, created and lived long before Doflamingo met him at seventeen. Now, at thirty-nine, things hadn’t changed more than expected.
There was a rush of adrenaline clogging his chest, and Doflamingo would succumb to it until the nausea won and he collapsed.
Letting go of Viola and clinging to the memory of her and her heavy body on top of him, her cold fingers, her saliva, the taste of her blood. His vision narrowed to a single point right in front of him and he breathed again.
“Stop, please,” Viola said in a whisper when Doflamingo finally came inside her and his mind cleared with the crash of the orgasm. Once again seeing who was in front of him, he clicked his tongue and dropped her trembling legs onto the bed. He hadn’t realized he forgot to use protection this time; he hoped he hadn’t fucked up too badly. But she would surely take care of it herself, since she said again: “Sorry, but I need you to stop.”
Doflamingo got up and, suddenly in a bad mood, pulled on his pants and coat, heading for the door. He wiped his hands on the fabric and tossed her dress onto the bed carelessly. Normally he didn’t act like this, but today he had gone almost completely insane. In these three months, he had lost more focus than he would admit, and he knew he needed to be alert about what was going to happen in Marineford in a month. He had a meeting to attend and had to return to Mary Geoise once again, then he needed to go back to Cesar and check the production.
He turned to look at her: her hands trembling as she pulled the dress over her body, heavy tears in her eyes that refused to fall.
“Try harder next time, Violet.”
And with that, he closed the door behind him.
…
The wind swept across his entire body, his coat moving through the air and the strings had severed the leg of that giant whose name he had already forgotten. His scream echoed across the whole island while Doflamingo let himself fall, bending his body to stare at the sky and arching his back downward in a drop of nearly a hundred meters. The whistling in his ears alongside the war cries, the heavy Moby Dick upon the frozen sea and Doflamingo found himself in an oddly good mood. Enjoying the chaos caused by reasons that, in truth, did not interest him at all.
Landing upon the rocks, his legs bent to withstand the impact and his laughter slipped out at the sight of the poor terrified marines watching someone like that giant fall with such ease. And it was simple, really, to remain at the necessary distance and not interfere too much in someone else’s battle. It was interesting, for example, to finally see Mihawk split the entire sea with a single strike. Or, for instance, to watch Whitebeard rise proudly upon his ship, like the man who had earned the title of the world’s strongest for a reason. Now hairless and old, with little life left ahead of him.
Doflamingo was not particularly interested for the most part, but things changed when he saw that ship fall directly from the sky. When he saw the giant gates of the Navy open for the intruders and saw Crocodile alongside the fool who had captured him in the first place. Arms crossed and a cigar between his lips, Crocodile looked down upon the others as though what they had done were not completely insane.
It was too amusing, and Doflamingo could not help laughing at the mere scene. Or beyond that, the irony of knowing that at some point between escaping the maximum security prison and coming here, Crocodile had somehow managed to get himself a damn cigar. Doflamingo was almost jealous, really. And he would never have allowed himself to say those words in real life if he had not been forced to spend these months in Crocodile’s absence.
It was necessary, completely. Which was why he did not care in the slightest about approaching Crocodile in the middle of the battle and making it known. Maybe he was busy with his own strange plans to kill Whitebeard for reasons Doflamingo would never ask about because they did not interest him, but he did not care at all. He sliced off Crocodile’s head with one of his strings, careful not to use Haki and still creating the dramatic effect. From the tension in his shoulders, Doflamingo noticed he was irritated.
Stepping out of the smoke, he walked toward Crocodile and inserted himself into his fight.
“Hello, Gator-guy.” He deliberately used the nickname Crocodile hated most, and the tightened hands in his pockets together with the Armament Haki now coating him made him seem increasingly affected. Normally, Crocodile would not fight on anyone’s side and would focus on his own objectives. Why he was extending a hand toward the Straw Hat boy was beyond him. “You turned me down and now, you wanna team up with Whitebeard?”
He also shoved his hands into his pockets, and Crocodile still had not turned to look at him at all. All those months and he had not even given him a damn glance. The rage in his chest grew larger, turning into something sick that he rarely ever experienced.
“It makes me jealous, you know?” Killing a pirate near him, Doflamingo continued. The marines watched the situation tensely because it was no secret to anyone how much Crocodile claimed to despise Doflamingo. Through his tone of voice, his actions, his face, his attitude and so many other things. “You’re still giving me the cold shoulder.”
“So it seems.” Crocodile said, turning to intercept the kick Doflamingo aimed directly at him, the shockwave making nearby marines stumble. Doflamingo released a bit of his Conqueror’s Haki, only so Crocodile would notice it and know who was speaking to him again. Crocodile’s brows furrowed in annoyance, just as they did in bed whenever something displeased him and he wanted to say it.
Doflamingo let out a laugh, and he knew Crocodile would come back to him.
…
Opening the door to his castle in Dressrosa close to midnight, with silence reigning and the rest of the Donquixote Family oblivious to everything, Doflamingo curled his lips upward when he saw who stood before him.
“Why did you come?” Doflamingo asked, staring directly at Crocodile standing in his doorway. The storm wind tousled the hair he rarely let fall freely across his face, the cigar now extinguished by the rain and four months had passed since Marineford. It was amusing because Doflamingo was perfectly aware of the weakness it represented for Crocodile to stand in the rain unable to use his Devil Fruit. That was why he continued, without letting him in immediately. Speaking in that sarcastic tone he used whenever he wanted to anger someone and make them leave, the one he used with Crocodile almost every time they met again. Because truly, they always would. “Did you feel lonely in Impel Down without me, Gator-guy? To come all the way to the New World just for me.”
Without giving any answer at all, Crocodile shoved Doflamingo directly forward. Closing the door behind him and yanking the pink coat downward to meet him in a kiss. If anyone else, for example, saw this, they probably would not have been surprised at all. Doflamingo was someone who hid what he felt but not what he did, so he had no reservations about returning the gesture with the same desperate intensity as the other man.
It was simple, in a strange and almost endearing way that neither of them ever named. Like Crocodile’s rough and calloused hands opening his shirt once they reached the bedroom, with the urgency of months and months without seeing each other at all. With his thighs resting against Doflamingo’s hips and his back straight as they undressed at the same time, while Doflamingo began working at undoing the belt. The sheets were getting wet too, and Doflamingo could not care less about something so insignificant.
Dragging his tapping fingers over Crocodile’s bare back, with new scars there that Doflamingo would not mention at all. The smell of rain mixed perfectly with the new perfume Crocodile had started wearing these past few months. The months where Doflamingo had been unable to track him down despite his efforts and where he had disappeared until reappearing again, because the one who decided when things began and ended had always been Crocodile. The thought amused him, considering the history between them both.
Because there was familiarity in moving Crocodile’s heavy body over him, searching for more friction and more contact. There was familiarity in seeing Crocodile let out a sigh and drop his head forward in surrender. In how he could remove his glasses without any issue whatsoever or any permission, and would look at him with both eyes with the same truth he had back in that nightclub.
It would be like this every time, in the future of those nearly two following years as well. Whenever Doflamingo found an excuse to cross the line Crocodile had broken first, he would do it again and again. He would take the King of the Desert for himself, the King of the Underworld who had returned and who had never stood at his side. Supposedly to keep an eye on him, he would tell the others.
“I only came to see you.” Crocodile answered, his hot breath against Doflamingo’s jawline as though implying that the New World was merely a matter for amateurs.
Tilting his face to the side with his eyes closed, sliding his hand down Doflamingo’s abdomen and preparing himself for what would come. “Don’t think too hard about it, or it’ll get embarrassing because I’ll start sounding like you.”
Doflamingo felt slightly dizzy because of what the sentence implied, what Crocodile had said and let slip without mentioning it to anyone else but him. In the stolen and usurped room of a throne that now belonged to him. He felt nothing beyond Crocodile’s physical body, the low growl when he squeezed him and felt him sink deeper each time. The height difference was something they had both known from the start and never commented on at all. Forgotten like the humanity Doflamingo had never possessed, like the empathy he had never developed and the desire to become someone with a different destiny.
And perhaps that night he kissed Crocodile with a little more force and his fingers dug into his hips hard enough to leave bruises difficult to hide. He fumbled with the buttons of Crocodile’s vest and finally looked at what the other man was doing once he was completely naked above him.
Upon a cold stone, at the bottom of the ocean and in the place forgotten by God. Doflamingo did not think it was such a bad idea in that moment to wish he had abused his title as a Shichibukai a little more and gone to fuck Crocodile during those months of waiting. Right in front of everyone, just like he had done back then in the crowd, and the others would know whose he was. Who he belonged to, and Crocodile would moan his name over and over until he ran out of breath.
“I think you were the one who missed me,” Crocodile commented, tilting his head to give Doflamingo more room to lick. Across his collarbone and then over the hardened nipple, scraping his teeth one by one. The other hand stroking him lower down, and Crocodile let out another one of those deep sighs he made when he didn’t want to make noise. There was something satisfying about breaking the untouchable façade the others had built around Crocodile. The man who escaped Impel Down, who survived the war at Marineford, who stopped the first execution of Portgas D. Ace, who faced Akainu and Mihawk; Doflamingo.
“I did, I was going insane without you,” he answered, surprisingly honest, even to himself.
Other people feel too many things, and Doflamingo was cynical because he truly didn’t feel them. Rage and contempt were emotions, but they didn’t always lead to an emotional response even if it looked like they did. For him, it was better to leave that to other people and not think about getting attached to someone who wouldn’t stay there, nor planned to remain. He had an attachment to Crocodile, from the beginning and into the present.
We all feel too many things, what matters is being able to handle them kindly, his mother had told him once while he complained about the beatings they received in the trash heap. Consoling Rocinante’s crying, he felt rage and nothing else.
Crocodile’s eyes slipped into his vision, the world moving alongside the other man’s quickened breathing as he was turned against Doflamingo’s body once more. He breathed deeply, as if he could feel emotion running through his body again. Like the centipede that crawled between the broken bricks of his house, the one that climbed over his arms at night. Crocodile gripped the sheets with both hands and tilted his head upward so he could keep looking at the blind eye staring back at him.
There was a glimmer of something in his eyes, a certainty that hadn’t been there before returning and had already been planted during the battle of Marineford.
“So you got your revenge, then? Whitebeard died, after all,” Doflamingo said some time later, swirling a glass of purple wine in the air and turning his head from the edge of the bed to look at Crocodile. Who, sitting at the other end, had started trying to light a cigarette. Failing, because all of them had been soaked in the storm that seemed intent on cutting through everything. “You can join me now, too.”
“Revenge is pointless after a while.” Throwing the cigarette onto the floor after several failed attempts, Crocodile hissed in frustration and drew one knee beneath himself to sit more comfortably. Still looking downward. “I watched that idiot Newgate die and never got that tiny feeling of fulfillment I’d been waiting for.”
“Hm, in my opinion revenge is always effective. No matter when it comes.” Saying this, Doflamingo took a sip from the wine he had kept aside for the occasion. He liked doing that after sex. Learning a little from Dressrosa after all these years, he supposed he might have become more passionate. Talking and talking until there were no waves left stuck in his throat. “Do you remember that client you killed at the club? It was so entertaining, it’s a shame the Marines found the place and shut it down seven years ago.”
“Have you ever taken revenge on someone?” With what sounded like genuine surprise in Crocodile’s voice, Doflamingo smiled at the distant but still vivid memory. Not to mention Crocodile had deliberately avoided commenting on his second sentence, surely because it had something to do with all the questions Crocodile intentionally avoided answering. He wouldn’t blame him; he did the same. Looking toward the window and imagining the sensation tingling across his palm. A Devil Fruit and a gun, he hadn’t needed anything else.
“On a lot of people, actually.” Crocodile glanced at him from the corner of his eye, his expression blank. The wind whistled softly beyond the thin windows, and the black emptiness on the left side seemed to give way to the mundane world of color it had always been. Not through the excessive purple filter that was always in front of him. “But I shot my father in the back, straight through the heart. For some reason I’ve always had good aim.” The drawer slid open again and Doflamingo noticed from the corner of his eye that Crocodile was still searching for cigarettes everywhere. If he opened two more drawers down, he’d find a pack of his preferred brand. Doflamingo wouldn’t tell him. “It was disappointing because I wish I’d aimed for the throat or somewhere like that. Whenever I imagined it, I always pictured a lot of blood and brains and my father suffering because of me. The only good part was that the blood splattered onto my brother too, like an idiot he kept hugging him and believing in him.”
“Incredible to picture that, I can’t imagine you killing someone,” Crocodile commented sarcastically, still trying to find the cigarette. It was in the second-to-last drawer, but it was Doflamingo’s fault for filling the drawers with useless junk. “So you prove my point, it didn’t do anything for you.”
Doflamingo fought against acknowledging the truth of it, setting the glass down on the chair near the foot of the bed before moving closer to Crocodile and resting his knees on the mattress.
“So you wouldn’t want revenge on Strawhat, then? He ruined all your plans.”
Crocodile’s mouth tilted upward at that, and he finally managed to light the cigarette. Doflamingo’s hands curled around his waist and from below, Crocodile’s face glowed orange in the lighter’s flame.
“You shouldn’t mess with him, that kid will kick your ass like he did mine.”
Suddenly interested, Doflamingo shifted his body and rested his head on the pillow beside him.
“Oh? And why’s that? I could kill him if he interferes too much with my business.” At that, Crocodile looked down at him with familiar disdain. He probably wouldn’t stop him, but the idea clearly seemed ridiculous to him. After that, Crocodile exhaled smoke through his nose and looked down at Doflamingo, suddenly serious.
“After all, that kid is my son.”
A ghost flickered across Doflamingo’s face, and the fragile smile vanished.
…
The orange lights of the bar flickered, bottles crowded along the shelves clinked as drinks were poured for different drunks, and soft jazz played in the background. Sitting directly on the wooden stool, Doflamingo bent his legs to fit properly. Hunching slightly in place and keeping his pink feathered coat from slipping off his shoulders. The owner of the bar watched him, immediately recognizing who he was and turning away to give him space once Doflamingo gestured. Beside him, a sip of aged whiskey proved the other person knew he was there.
“Marry me,” Doflamingo whispered, pulling the box from his pocket and opening it. The ring with a black diamond at the center gleamed, and the wood creaked the more Doflamingo pushed the fabric-lined box toward him.
Crocodile turned his head, studying both him and the box carefully. Other people would probably see them, but they would assume it was some kind of deal they shouldn’t talk about at all. And if they did see them, Doflamingo couldn’t care less.
The other man’s brow furrowed. “No,” Crocodile said thoughtfully, a note of surprise in his voice as if it were the first time he had heard himself say that word he repeated so often. As if the idea of rejecting Doflamingo of all people was happening to someone else and not the two of them in this forgotten bar in Dressrosa. “No,” he repeated, slower this time.
Doflamingo let his cheek fall against the table and closed his eyes, waiting to hear the justification that should come in these kinds of stupid situations. He had never planned to do any of this, but the idea had simply come to him and impulsively he decided to buy the most expensive ring he could find. Really, anything expensive reminded him of Crocodile, and he wouldn’t say it had anything to do with the idea of Crocodile slipping through his fingers. Ever since he learned that little secret involving Strawhat, the thought had driven him insane.
He let out a curse, snapping the box shut with his index finger and resting his forehead against the table.
In the end, he was the one who decided. And Doflamingo could force him, but that wasn’t the point because after a while, forcing other people the way he usually did no longer fully applied to Crocodile. Crocodile was more cynical, and he could hear the irritation in the other man’s voice when he grabbed Doflamingo’s white shirt and pulled him from the stool.
He could adjust his glasses and hear his own smile revealing itself once Crocodile shoved him into the liquor storage room behind the bar. And Doflamingo could lunge at him and grab him, pin him against the counter, touch his hand and cover his mouth so they wouldn’t make any noise. Crocodile, despite being strong, wouldn’t win. He was capable of killing others in cold blood, twisting people’s hearts to his will and stealing their ability to cry.
Leaving them with a permanent and false smile that didn’t satisfy him at all. Because once inside the cramped closet, Crocodile leaned against the table and pulled him closer, opening the box and sliding the ring onto Doflamingo’s ring finger. Then handing him the other ring in the palm of his hand and extending his own right ring finger.
“I can’t put it on myself, you damn idiot.” Doflamingo laughed quietly, feeling the hook scrape against the wood again and dig into it there. He didn’t care if it wasn’t public, he simply liked the idea of knowing Crocodile wore it, somehow. “And even less in public, it’s humiliating.”
He breathed deeply as he slid the metal over the finger, kissing him hard and feeling that same diamond ring on the hand now gripping Crocodile by the throat. The place was too small for the two of them, and the glass cases rattled, but nobody would come to check.
And that was how it would be over the following months, though he wasn’t aware of it yet. Doflamingo would take him home the way he had before. One hand on his waist, Crocodile’s low laugh sounding through the air and his uneven breathing whenever everything became too much. Doflamingo would end up kissing him in the bathroom of this very bar, pressing him against the sink while the orange lights turned his gaze a dangerous yellow. Alongside that malice that never left his features the more he removed the pink coat or began undoing his belt.
The same ironic laugh he would have one day while the two of them sat on the couch at Crocodile’s base, Doflamingo with his legs stretched out and his head tilted to the side, listening to Crocodile complain about everyone else’s incompetence. Someone who hadn’t paid their debts, or a delayed weapons shipment. A cigarette in his hand and the hook still covered in blood from torturing someone two floors below.
Maybe this time he would get the chance to watch him in his sleeping robe again, with his sleepy face buried in the sheets, and hold his hand in bed while thrusting into him just to feel the ring against his fingers. Or something simpler; Doflamingo would be satisfied with merely helping him extract information from a prisoner. Under the excuse of assistance and nothing more, if his subordinates asked. Everything was secret, and it would remain that way.
Even so, after finishing placing the ring that had originally been his onto Crocodile’s ring finger, the only one that still lacked jewelry, he said:
“Yes.” Doflamingo leaned back to pull away, licking his lips. “That would be very humiliating.”
…
The skull and bones cracked beneath the palm of his hand, the other prisoner’s face completely crushed against the wall while he kept pressing harder and harder. Doflamingo liked hearing the screams they made, the idea of breaking everything inside as he drove his fists into the other man’s cheek. As useful as the chains allowed him to be, gathered into a prolonged shiver that raised goosebumps across his skin, the echo of the corpse rang through level six of the world’s largest prison.
Down there, in Impel Down, Doflamingo twisted against his own bones from the immobilization. In a separate cell after the incident, they had placed him in a special area. He thought about the corpses, and how they resembled those same crying citizens because they couldn’t stop smiling. They ran, jerking their legs upward before dying. And the vertebrae in their spines twisted beneath Doflamingo’s hard strings.
He didn’t need them, really. He had never needed anyone in order to kill somebody. And if they took away his gun, his Devil Fruit, and his mobility, he would still find a way to do it. Leaving the last man dead on his long list, utterly destroyed. He had nailed the man’s limbs to the prison wall with the very chains restraining him, his eyes bulging from the force of the blows and both arms stretched outward. Crucified upside down so the guard would scream at the sight, and Doflamingo laughed at the amusing reaction.
He collected everything, every piece of news and every tiny connection to the outside world. Fingers, scraps of flesh, strands of hair, or teeth. All the things left behind when people died, and that was why he smiled when Magellan allowed him to keep his ring and glasses. It was a shame; the beautiful black diamond was now stained with dried blood. He used the ruined clothes of another prisoner to clean it, but it hadn’t worked at all.
Later, they chained him again and removed the ring from his fingers without letting him move. Shackled now against the floor, his wrists bruised, they made a point of taking it away and telling him he had lost his privileges. And by privileges someone in level six could have, they meant that. They almost took his glasses too, but Doflamingo began slamming his head against the floor over and over again, biting anyone who dared touch his face and expose his greatest secret. They stopped trying after he tore one of the guards’ fingers off, actually.
He knew the secrets of the others, of those bastards in the World Government. Pretentious and disgusting nobles who stayed behind in the Holy Land, pretending they hadn’t abandoned him here at all. He would mention it later, talking to himself because the guards eventually stopped telling him to shut up after a while.
He had mentioned so many things that he was starting to delirium. The darkness of the ceiling stared back at him, and he kept losing the thread of his own thoughts. That was how he had ended up here, forehead against the floor and fading in and out of consciousness after being defeated by Strawhat—just like Crocodile had warned him he would. And the idea that Crocodile had been right about that drove him nearly as insane as the thought of being trapped in prison while everyone else remained outside.
Turning his neck to try and look at one of the guards, ready to start threatening to murder him and skin him alive once he got out of there, Doflamingo saw it. In a newspaper—the damned announcement of Crocodile forming an alliance with Mihawk and Buggy the Clown, of all people. His face appeared off to the side, eyes cast disdainfully away and a cigarette hanging from his mouth. The thought amused him: Crocodile had not only formed an alliance, but had accepted being someone else’s subordinate.
He couldn’t believe it. Not even after knowing him for more than twenty years had he ever managed to make Crocodile do that. Not even as his husband, not even knowing his past, not even after adjusting the terms of the arrangement. And they had achieved it in only a few months, right after he had been taken down by some stupid nineteen-year-old brat.
All because of that bastard’s damned son. Doflamingo smashed his head against the floor again, and the guards jumped up in alarm when they saw him moving once more. He burst into laughter and heard the radio calling for backup to restrain him again. But he didn’t need to calm down—he only needed to get out of there and remind Crocodile who was supposed to be his damned owner. Not Buggy the Clown, nor Dragon the revolutionary whom he’d fucked during those years apart, like the damned whore he’d been from the very beginning.
It was so funny. The idea that Crocodile was now part of a Yonko crew without him. That his son had left him here, and that he would remain here a little longer. But he would come back, and he would kill everyone who had tried to stand in his way. He would slaughter them and break them until they suffered, until they begged for death. He would grab Crocodile by the throat and fuck him in front of his entire damned new crew, break his bones, and leave him hanging on his collection wall.
“Hold down his limbs!” one of the guards shouted, watching Doflamingo struggle violently against the floor, trying to break free. The chains creaked under the strain, and all he could do was laugh and laugh the way he should have from the very beginning. To take revenge on that child who pulled his blond hair so hard it felt like it would rip out, grinding his teeth together in fury. “He’s smashing himself against the ground!”
That eight-year-old child who wanted to kill, who wanted to hit and hit so hard he would hurt everyone else too. And who would eventually seize black hair as well, muss it up and wrestle him down against a creaking bed. Who would see the other man’s exposed throat—Crocodile’s—and bend it until he heard the thick snap. His skull slammed into the ground once more, and warm blood began seeping through the cracks he had made in the floor. He would keep going.
Until he could hear twenty-five-year-old Crocodile’s laughter again, and that bubbling, blood-filled cackle in the sheets. The same blood that ran down his face and along his cheeks to his eyes, to the white lenses of the glasses pushed back without revealing anything. That would drip from Doflamingo’s nose all across Crocodile’s bare chest and trail down to his solar plexus, where he would lick it away and tell him that in holy matrimony only death would separate them.
Doflamingo laughed so hard he finally spat blood, vomited to the side, and lay motionless again like he had at eight years old—because he had survived then, and he would survive now. He didn’t care that the guards were pumping him full of industrial doses of tranquilizers; his Celestial Dragon body was far more resistant to those kinds of drugs. They would not stop him, and Strawhat wouldn’t either.
He would return, and Crocodile would look at him through those glasses with the same gray eyes. Hidden in the darkness of the cell and perfectly still, like one of those ghosts that were supposed to appear when Doflamingo was a child. He would see him and understand the answer to the question Crocodile had asked the night after they married.
“I hate them,” Doflamingo answered, his glasses finally slipping off as his deranged laughter rose into a scream. “I always hated them!”
.