Archive of Our Own

1.

“People like us are the enemy of the gods, Law,” Xebec had said to him once, a long, long time ago. “That ‘D’ in our name is an omen to the Celestial Dragons. We’re godkillers, Law.”

One day, when Law was twelve and alone and had believed in nothing anymore, Rocks D Xebec had reached out a hand to him and said, “We’re family.” The pirate, on the day he found Law, looked more demon than man in his delirium, and Law—who had wanted nothing more than to spend the last of his days on this wretched earth destroying the world—had taken the hand.

“It is a powerful name, Law,” Xebec, a powerful man, had said. “A name with no parallel. A name that will put a target on your back for the rest of your life.”

The rest of his life, Law had concluded, was going to be very short anyway, and Law was used to being hunted by the World Government. He’d been dead for a long time before this already. When they took to sea, every one of the Rocks Pirates had a bounty on their head, and Law’s one had displayed the ‘D’ in his name proudly.

Now, Law is twenty-five and alone and still believes in nothing. He’s older than he thought he’d ever be and he’s outlived Xebec by seven years and he is telling a former Celestial Dragon, “My name is Trafalgar D Water Law.”

The former Noble is only a boy. There is golden blood on his hands and he holds his father’s head in his hand, and at the proclamation of Law’s name, the boy’s sneer turns tense. His brother stops crying, and Law knows it is out of fear. Here, looming over them, Law is more death than man. He is an omen.

“Yeah,” Law says flatly, knowingly. “I’m one of the people destined to kill you.”

There are many instances in his life that he should’ve died and Law thinks God Valley was one of them, because he wanders the world like a ghost after Xebec. He travels aimlessly, kills anyone in his way, and he’s barely a pirate. Law stagnates while Newgate’s fleet grows, Shiki’s and John’s bounties start rising, Stussy is doing God knows what with MADS, and Kidd wreaks complete havoc in the New World. The Rocks Pirates are a crew of Conquerors and monsters and not even the death of a Captain they’ve never loved is enough to stop them—if anything, it has only freed them.

Law is not a Conqueror. There is nothing he really wants, no dream worth reaching for when he has always been a dead man walking anyway.

And then, there are fallen Celestial Dragons in North Blue. Law is not a Conqueror, but he is a D and he knows what he has to do, what Xebec has always said that people like them would do. Law has survived everything that should have killed him and it was all for this moment.

The gods he’s fated to kill are children.

“Get out of my way,” the boy says through gritted teeth. Veins bulge on his forehead from rage too big for his tiny body. “I don’t have time to deal with you.”

Law knows the kind of person this boy will grow into. It will be the kind of person who believes they are a god above all else. It will be the kind of person who sets up hunting competitions of actual human beings. It will be the kind of person who would rather kill a whole people than give up their commodities. Killing him here would be ridding the world of an irredeemable evil. Law draws Kikoku.

“No!” the brother screams, throwing himself at the boy.

“Get off,”  the boy hisses. “I’m taking us home, Roci, stop crying. Stop crying.”

The brother wails, “No! You can’t take him from me! You can’t take anyone else from me!”

There was a boy, a long time ago, with a little sister.

“No!” he wails. He is talking to Law.

The older boy pushes him away. The younger one stumbles and falls back onto the ground, just as the older one brandishes the still-fresh head of their father. “I will take this to Mariejois and they’ll take us back.”

Curious. “Really?” Law asks. “You really think that will work?”

“Of course they’ll take us back,” the boy bites out. “Now get out of my way.”

Law does not bend. Law does not buckle. The raw will of a child doesn’t even compare to Xebec’s or Roger’s.

“And what will you do,” Law asks, “when they send you back here?”

The boy is not thrown that Law doesn’t react to his Conqueror's Haki. He says, “They will take us back. Or they will regret it.”

Either they will be accepted back as gods or they will be truly human. Law lets him go with fascination. The younger boy is left alone.

Law learns that the younger brother’s name is Donquixote Rosinante. He is eight years old to his brother, Doflamingo’s ten years. He hates bread. He can cry forever.

And his greatest wish in life, he tells Law, is for it to stop hurting. There is something in this confession that resonates with a dying boy who has only ever known grief, and who, underneath the anger, has only ever wanted the hurting to end.

The fallen godling returns two days later. He is rage incarnate.

But he is no longer a Celestial Dragon. So Law reaches out a hand like Xebec had done to him many, many years ago. And the two children, as lost in the world as he had been, takes it.

2.

Law is twenty-eight and - not alone.

“Thank you, Lord Law!” the family kneels before him, thanking him profusely. It’s a little distasteful but Law doesn’t do anything about it, just sighing under his breath. He did just remove a brain tumour for the price of a bag of blood from each member of the family, so he supposes he must seem like a benevolent entity to them.

He leaves with little fanfare just as Shachi places the last of the blood snugly in a suitcase and closes up. His crew had formed and gotten bigger before he even realised it as he crossed the North Blue and entered the Grand Line, and Shachi was one of the first people that joined him. Law instructs him to return back to the Polar Tang while his own Observation leads him away. Bepo’s large form is easy to see from afar even without it.

When Law was eighteen and he had just lost the only thing that’s been home for a long time, he met Bepo. The polar bear mink had fallen off the back of Zou, had been lost and trying to find home for so long, captured by slave traders and thrown into a deadly game—and he was in the perfect position to save Law when God Valley fell apart.

It had been just them, two grieving people—one a kid and one barely an adult yet—drifting through West Blue and up back into the New World. Bepo had helped him as he extracted the lead from his blood with a Devil Fruit he’d been fed. Law had delivered him back to Zou in turn, and he was given a promise of devotion he wasn’t ever going to ask for. Until now.

Bepo is the only person Law will ever trust to do what he is doing now. From afar, Law watches as Bepo lets someone down from his shoulders, and a small figure crosses the field of wildflowers to slam into Law’s unbudging middle.

Rosinante looks up at him.

“What have you got there?” Law asks. Rosinante smiles and holds something up for him to take. When Law examines it, he finds it’s a beaded bracelet, with a wooden shape as its pendant. The shape is peculiar to him—like a rounded triangle with two bumps instead of two corners.

“There was this group of kids making these cute accessories,” Bepo tells him when he catches up with Rosinante. “Roci wanted to make one for you. Tell Captain why, Roci.”

Rosinante looks down shyly. Law kneels down to be level with him. “You made this for me?”

Rosinante doesn’t speak for a long moment before finally finding his courage. He’s always been a shy kid. “You’re the Heart Pirates,” he says with a private smile, “so I made you a heart bracelet.”

It takes Law a while to realise the shape on the accessory is a heart. Law doesn’t even remember a time when he doesn’t immediately think of the literal beating organ when someone says heart but he supposes a kid like Roci wouldn’t think of anything but the cartoon symbol of it. It’s endearing.

Law says, “The reason we’re called the Heart Pirates is because I regularly rip people’s hearts out of their chests.”

Rosinante stares at him in shock. Then, tears start to gather. Law is startled, looking at Bepo for help, but his first mate just hovers uselessly as well. “Oh,” Roci says in a watery voice.

“I love it though,” Law blurts out, anything to stop Rosinante from crying like those early days again. “I think this is a good symbol. Right, Bepo? We can add it to our Jolly Roger.”

“Yes, Captain!” Bepo nods enthusiastically.

“Come on,” Law coaxes Rosinante into his arms. “Come on, Roci-ya.”

“I’m not crying,” Roci says, burying his face in Law’s coat.

“Of course not,” Law says indulgently. “You just gave us a new Jolly Roger, you know that?”

“Why?”

Law blinks. “Well. It’s a good symbol.”

“I mean,” Rosinante says quietly. “Why do you rip - rip hearts out?”

Law and Bepo trade a glance. Bepo shrugs helplessly. Law stalls for a moment before he blurts out, “You’ll understand when you’re older.”

Rosinante looks up at him, blinking large teary eyes. “Really?”

“Yes,” Law tells him. “It’ll be easier to understand when you’re older. You don’t have to worry about anything right now.”

(There had been a boy and a hospital and a sister who hadn’t understood why they couldn’t go home—)

“Okay,” Rosinante says. He rests his head on Law’s shoulder, and Law stands up with him in arms. Law sends a questioning glance to Bepo.

“Did you vet those kids?”

Bepo sighs. “They’re just kids.”

“Kids are mean,” Law says. “If they bully Roci-ya I might really have to kill them.”

Rosinante whines, “ Law.”

Bepo says, “I was with him, Captain.”

True. No one is about to bully the kid with a giant polar bear mink looming protectively over him and that’s why Bepo is Rosinante’s chosen guardian. Law huffs anyway, “Kids can be evil. I would know—I was one.”

“I’m sure you were a perfectly nice kid, Captain.”

“No,” Law says, “I really wasn’t.”

3.

Law is twenty-nine and teaching Doflamingo how to perform surgery on a live human patient.

It is not the first time Doflamingo’s cut someone open, but it is the first time he’s cutting someone open for the express purpose of saving them. Being a doctor is not fit to Doflamingo’s… personality, but the boy actually likes cutting things open, if the amount of animals Law’s walked in on him dissecting is proof enough. Still, Doflamingo will never be a surgeon and his God Complex is wired a different way than a doctor’s usually is, and ethically Law shouldn’t be having him practise on someone dying either—though Law hasn’t cared about ethics in a long time.

But - they’re bonding. Rosinante’s easy enough to please—just give him affection and he’ll roll over. Doflamingo on the other hand is a terrible child and there’s not much they have in common—so Law’s pleased there is something they can do together.

“I can drain the pericardial fluid with my Fruit,” Law tells him, pointing to the beating heart of the body laid out between them. Law has instructed Doflamingo on how to open up their patient’s chest cavity and now he’s skillfully holding them open with his strings, all the organs bare and ready. Doflamingo’s learned all the names of the organs and their functions under Law’s only stipulation before they started this and now Law won’t have to teach him everything from scratch. “I’ll do that myself and you can learn later, but now I want you to focus on the haemorrhage. Normally we leave the bullet in, but if there’s internal bleeding we need to do this anyway. Shambles.”

Law discards the liquid in a biohazard bag. Doflamingo puts the scalpel down and Law makes a note to test if he can use solely his strings for surgery.

“Hopefully, you’ll never have to use actual sutures, because I’m not teaching you that,” Law says. “If you don’t have access to your Fruit, you’re in no position to perform surgery on anyone anyway.”

“ You don’t have to open them up,” Doflamingo points out absently, focusing on his strings, “yet you know how to do it anyway.”

“The difference is that I’m a surgeon,” Law says. He’s right in that Law barely ever has to actually use scalpels to open the patient up when his Mes can remove their organs with ease to work on them—but Law needs to know anyway. There’s not a single world where Law is going to be caught off guard in any way in the middle of surgery.

(And he’s a Trafalgar. He’s a doctor. Even if he hadn’t already learned it before he got his Devil Fruit, he’ll still learn it either way, just to know.)

Law was fourteen and Xebec had just thrown him to the ground again, Law’s sword clattering on the deck.

“Get up,” Xebec had said, and in moments like these Law will never forget how much of a monster this man was.

“Isn’t that enough, Captain?” Newgate had said without emotion and Law didn’t have the energy to look up and see his expression. He’d been getting weaker, and this was unacceptable to his Captain. He needed a way to stall the amber lead.

“Don’t you remember how it was, Ed?” Xebec had laughed, then kicked Law’s middle, making him choke. “We didn’t have the privilege of anyone holding our hand when we were younger. That’s how we got strong. That’s how people like us got powerful. Isn’t that right, you bastards?”

The question was directed to the rest of their crew, and a chorus of cheers went up with it.

Xebec came to crouch before him and he pulled him up by his hair, making Law yelp at the pain in his scalp. He had felt so heavy, so slow, lead weighing him down, and it was shame that swamped his fevered body when he was held up like that. Xebec had said, “I’ll make you worthy of your name, boy.”

Doflamingo asks, “Why do you coddle Roci so much?”

Law sighs. “I don’t… coddle him.”

Doflamingo’s gloved hands are much less bloody than any surgeon’s usually is, but that’s mostly because he doesn’t need to touch much. He says, “Then why do you never tell him anything about what you do?”

“He knows,” Law defends, because it’s not like he’s lying to Rosinante about them.

“I mentioned the Heart Chamber and he asked me what that was.”

“Your brother is - gentle.”

Doflamingo looks up at him incredulously.

“Don’t take your eyes off your work,” Law chides him.

Doflamingo rolls his eyes behind his dark glasses and returns to his stitches. Doflamingo has always been a focused boy when working on something, so Law didn’t expect a conversation during the practice surgery, and he certainly doesn’t expect Doflamingo to continue. The boy thrives on exceeding Law’s expectations, however.

“You mean fragile,” Doflamingo says.

“That’s not—”

“Roci is a Donquixote,” he stresses, closing up the last of the sutures. Law silently instructs him to start stitching the chest back together, and he watches in fascination as Doflamingo’s strings move it closed. Doflamingo continues, “He has my blood in him; he’s not fragile. That means he could be great too, if you just - stop sheltering him.”

They close up the last of it in silence.

Once done, Law says, “Post-op care is unnecessary, but we can keep them to see how your work fares long-term.”

Doflamingo looks down at his victim. Their eyes are half-closed in delirium from the pain, an oxygen mask covering their mouth, and every muscle in their body is rendered useless to Doflamingo’s strings keeping them still and manually making them breathe at the preferred pace. Doflamingo says, “I don’t care.”

“Next time you shoot someone again we can practise more,” Law says. “Penguin will dispose of them. Now throw the gloves away.”

They’re not in the operating theatre anymore, and Law reaches for Doflamingo’s sunglasses. The teenager bats his hand away with a hiss, and Law knows anyone else would lose their hand for this, but Law isn’t anyone else. He says, “Let me see.”

Doflamingo acquiesce unhappily and silently, his single eye darting away once Law takes the sunglasses off. Law moves Doflamingo’s jaw to get a better look at the empty socket.

“Have you been rubbing it?” he asks clinically, frowning.

“I haven’t,” Doflamingo bites out, annoyed at the manhandling.

“Any itching? Phantom pain?”

“No,” he snaps too quickly, and Law narrows his eyes.

“I’ll get you another ointment for it—”

Doflamingo wrenches his jaw from Law’s grasp. “I’m fine. ”

“Doffy-ya.”

“I’m not Roci, ” he hisses, snatching back the glasses to put them on. “Don’t fucking coddle me.”

Doflamingo has always been an angry child. He reminds Law a little bit of him when he was younger, to be honest, even if he’s been more regularly blowing up since he turned fourteen. Law remembers being fourteen.

He doesn’t respond to Doflamingo’s provocation and starts musing, “People have been predicting our path and routine to try and ask for service. It might have some merit to find an island and settle down some.”

“To make it easier for the rich ones to find you,” Doflamingo concludes with a raised brow.

“Of course.”

“It’ll be easier for the Marines to find us too.”

“Doffy-ya,” Law says in the voice of a lesson and Doflamingo scowls. “Do you think any Marine is strong enough to touch us?”

Doflamingo doesn’t answer. Law has never let anything touch these kids, and he’ll never let it happen now. Doflamingo has seen his power first hand; he knows just as well.

Law says, “I’ll think about letting you take Roci with you next time.”

“Without Bepo.”

Law rolls his eyes. Bepo’s appeal as Rosinante’s one guardian gets better and better as the years go on, because Bepo hasn’t stopped growing. But since Doffy asked: “Sure. Without Bepo.”

Doflamingo doesn’t smile, but Law sees triumph in the way he hides his expression anyway.

4.

Law is twenty-nine and Rosinante is missing.

The slap rings out in the room, and everyone who is witnessing this is silent. Doflamingo’s head is still turned, hand holding his cheek in shock. He slowly looks back at Law, face expressionless.

“I shouldn’t have—” Law cuts himself off, knowing he’ll regret the words as soon as they leave his mouth, but it doesn’t matter because Doflamingo hears it anyway and his expression shutters further.

He grits out, “I’ll get him back—”

“You’ve done enough,” Law says coldly. Doflamingo’s expression twists, humiliation colouring his face.

“No, I’ll bring him back. Law, I’ll find him; he’s my brother. I’m worried about him just as much as you—”

Faster than Doflamingo can react, Law grabs him by the collar, wrenching him close. “Are you? Are you really worried? Because you can’t feel anything, Doffy-ya. For all I know you let him get taken.”

Doflamingo’s face is stricken. “I didn’t— ”

“ You were supposed to look after him. You lost him.”

“I thought Gar was looking out for him—”

“Well, Gar is a traitor. God, Doffy-ya you—” He shoves Doflamingo away just so he won’t have the chance to strike him again. Logically, Doffy couldn’t have known Gar was a traitor. None of them did. But he shouldn’t have taken his eye off of Rosinante for even a second. Gar was nothing to Doflamingo’s strings and Haki and this shouldn’t even have happened in the first place. 

God - what are they doing to Rosinante? Where are they taking him? God, Law doesn’t want to think, but he can’t help it, every kind of torture he has ever seen and known superimposing itself over the image of Rosinante’s small form, his terrified eyes, his soft crying - God. There was a girl waiting for him in a burning hospital and the sky had been the colour of ash and rot and lead and he had been too late.

Law looks away so he doesn’t have to see Doflamingo’s expression, and he says, “You’re so - irresponsible.”

When Law was fifteen and his hands wouldn’t stop shaking from the disease, he’d lost something important. It had been a valuable Devil Fruit they’d plundered, some mythical zoan that would sell for at least a billion - and he’d lost it.

He had been scared. So scared. Xebec had disciplined him in front of the whole crew, a humiliation that would live with him for the rest of his life, and at the end Law had been curled around himself on the ground, beaten and bruised and swearing this would never happen again. Xebec had been so, so angry.

Law is twenty-nine and his hands shake. When he speaks, it echoes with his first Captain’s voice, “Fix it.”

The rest of the Heart Pirates that have been waiting in the room and averting their gaze finally start moving to prepare the Polar Tang. The Chrome House, another submarine under his fleet that Bepo has momentarily taken control of, is already running a search grid in the direction they suspect Gar took Rosinante in, but with Law joining the search with his Haki, Gar will not escape. Doflamingo leaves the Tang and takes to the skies with his strings.

They find them on a Marine ship. A Marine ship. Not only is Gar a traitor, but he’s also a rat. Law lifts the battleship up into the sky with Takt and Shambles himself up into the carnage that Doflamingo has wrought, limbs and entrails painting the ship red. Gar is tied with strings and alive—good—but Law doesn’t spare him more than a glance as he follows Doflamingo into the room he feels Roci from.

Doflamingo is standing still in the middle of the room. Streaks of red splatter across walls, ceiling, and floor, but Doffy is standing frozen in the middle of the room. A horror seizes Law’s heart and he shoves Doffy out of the way and—

Curled on the far side of the room is Rosinante, shaking and whimpering. A relief only eases half his horror—the other half occupied with what they did to make Roci so small like this—and Law rushes forward, sweeps the twelve-year-old entirely into his arms, cradling him.

“Oh, Roci-ya,” Law whispers into his hair, pressing a kiss to his temple. “You’re safe now. We’re here - you’re safe.”

Roci hiccups, his fingers curling in Law’s shirt.

“What did they do?” Law asks, holding the side of his little face. “Tell me. Let me fix it, Roci-ya.”

“N-nothing,” Rosinante says. “They didn’t do anything.”

Law stands up with Rosinante in his arms and turns. Ah. That will do it.

Doflamingo is still in the middle of the room covered in blood, blank-faced. Rosinante is only able to look at him for half a moment before he ducks his head back into Law’s chest. He looks a sight.

“It’s just Doffy-ya,” Law says.

“I know,” Rosinante whispers. He still doesn’t look up.

Law says to Doflamingo, “Wait outside.”

“Law—”

“You’re scaring your brother.”

Doflamingo grits his teeth, then steps outside.

Law smooths Rosinante’s hair over. He says, “Your brother is a little rough, but he was worried about you. So was I.” Rosinante says something. “Speak up, now.”

“You didn’t have to kill them.”

They did. Law says, “You know how your brother is. Doesn’t think before he kills.”

“They were nice.”

There’s a moment of pause. “The Marines?” Law asks, confused.

Rosinante nods.

“They’re only pretending, Roci-ya. If you made it to one of their bases, who knows what they would’ve done to you for being my - for being connected to me.”

Rosinante shakes his head. “Gar just wanted to help.”

“... What?”

“I told him I was fine. I told him I liked being here with you guys, but he was trying to - to save me and he wouldn’t listen.”

“Save you from what, Roci-ya.”

Rosinante doesn’t answer.

“Roci-ya.”

“You,” he whispers.

Law stares at the pattern of blood on the walls, still wet. He steps over severed limbs on his way to leave the room, emerging out onto the deck with a sharply ordered, “Doffy-ya.”

Doflamingo steps beside him, his fingers twisting to bring the captured Marine to hang in front of them. 

“Do you have anything to say for yourself, Gar?” Law says, steel in his voice.

The traitor breathes heavily, limbs suspended and probably nearly tearing itself apart with Doflamingo’s sadistic glee. He glares at Law. Says, “That boy deserves better than this.”

Law lets out a breath. He’s kept Rosinante away from the messier parts of being a pirate, but he cannot let this slide. “Do you want to see what we do to traitors, Roci-ya?”

The man’s eyes widen. “Wait - no—”

“Let him go.”

The strings let Gar drop to the ground, and he starts to run. Rosinante tries to hide his face in Law’s shoulder again but Law gently yet firmly holds his jaw so he must watch.

“Bepo.”

The traitor lets out a cry as he’s pinned by a giant paw, claws caging him in. Bepo puts his whole weight on the man, his bones creaking against the wooden deck. “Roci belongs with us, Gar,” Bepo says, growling his words out. “You will never lay a hand on this family again.”

“No no no NO—!”

The traitor screams as Bepo digs into him. Tears him limb-from-limb. The sound of flesh torn apart is music to Law’s ear as Bepo eats.

Doflamingo watches with a curl of a smile. Rosinante is paralysed.

“You’re safe now, Roci-ya,” Law says. Rosinante shakes his head minutely. “I’m never letting you go again.”

Law will have to hide him. He will have to make sure no one can ever get to Rosinante again. He will have to build an impenetrable fortress around his heart. He will have to make it so Rosinante never leaves it.

He will have to bring him home.

Interlude I.

(There is a Marine outpost stationed on the border of a dead country. The outpost’s purpose is to ease the minds of the neighbouring countries, even when nothing has ever happened here in the past two decades. It’s considered a dead-end posting to the Marines of North Blue, somewhere you’re sent as punishment to live out the rest of your days in boredom. It’s not like anything alive is going to leave, and it’s not like anyone living is willingly going to step foot in the poisoned land either. The Marine outpost has always been there just for decoration. Today, it is here as witness.

The world is bathed in blue. A Marine barely notices this before their vision is upended and the cubed section of their face rolls on the ground. A single eyeball is staring at the city in the distance, the very horizon covered in a blue film. A long moment of silence follows the sudden dismemberment of every Marine in the vicinity, an unnatural calm falling over the world. Everything is still—deathly still.

The earth shakes. Rock and dirt and mountains crumble in on itself, bedrock and amber lead sliced through as if with a sword, and across the islands it is as if the very air itself trembles with the magnitude of power. The White City of Flevance is ripped from the earth, tearing itself away from its neighbours in complete severance.

On this day, the citizens of North Blue can only watch as the tomb of a people is moved across the sky in an act of God. The deliverance and salvation of a doomed population comes twenty years too late, but it is here at all. No matter how hard the World Government tries to bury it, Flevance will be forever immortalised in history.

Days later, the New World trembles as an island lands itself in its waters, completely altering the magnetic field of the latter part of the Grand Line, rendering hundreds of maps and methods of navigation obsolete. Log Poses are disrupted, leaving sailors stranded far from home; undersea currents shift, completely cutting off fishman trade routes; the very winds themselves part to accommodate what can only be called a miracle.

On the grave of his dead, Trafalgar D Water Law builds a home.)

5.

“Ikakku says I have the potential to be the best sniper in the crew,” Rosinante informs him happily over dinner.

The walls Law has built around his little family is the exact replica of his childhood home, and he’s placed it in the most secure location of The White City, the space that used to be the royal palace. It’s located behind what used to be the university campus inside the wider research district that has since transformed into the face of his operations, with the ruins of the former Royal Hospital smack-dab in the centre that he’s since turned into his main base. Every single part of the city Rosinante is allowed to roam is purged of any trace of amber lead and the chemical weapons used in the purge.

Law says, “That’s great, Roci-ya. Your brother and I always thought you’d excel at whatever you chose to do.”

Law will never let Rosinante near battle of course, but honing his skills as a sniper also means he’ll never have to actually be in danger when worse comes to worst, so it works perfectly well to Law’s intentions—he’ll have to commend Ikakku for pushing Roci’s interest in that direction. Although he would much prefer for Roci to never set foot off of Flevance at all, not since that disastrous day he took his eyes off of him and he got stolen, Law knows keeping him cooped up forever will be detrimental to the boy’s happiness and teenagers never react well to being told ‘no’. When Rosinante is older—much, much older—Law will take him on some harmless excursions. After all, there is no safer place for Roci than right next to Law.

Rosinante beams. His voice has been cracking for a while now, fourteen years old and in the midst of puberty, but it still comes out high and hopeful when he asks, “Really?”

“Of course,” Law says.

Rosinante looks over to his brother for confirmation. Doflamingo doesn’t say a word over his dinner.

“Then,” Rosinante starts, “does that mean I can go to sea with you guys again soon?”

Silence. Law glances at Doflamingo, who continues to not look away from his food.

Rosinante sighs. “Yeah. I figured.”

“It’s dangerous in the New World,” Law says.

“But I’d be with you guys,” Rosinante argues.

“Nowhere is safer than Flevance,” Law says, and there must be an edge to his tone because Rosinante very noticeably holds himself back from saying more. There’s dissatisfaction in the line of his mouth still, so Law turns to Doflamingo. “Doffy-ya.”

Doflamingo blinks at him, having tuned them out as he ate. Law gestures vaguely. Doflamingo doesn’t sigh, but he very much is metaphorically sighing with that expression. He says to Rosinante, “If anything happens to you again Law will freak out catastrophically and probably sink an island or two. And also probably die from a heart attack.”

“Doffy!” “Doffy-ya.”

Doflamingo shrugs, annoyed. “No one was going to say it.”

Rosinante groans and says, “It’s not like I’m going to shatter the moment I step off this island.”

He just might. Law says, “I’ve done my best to keep our enemies’ eyes off of you, but if they find out, they won’t give you peace.”

“They go after Doffy all the time.”

Well. “Yes, but—”

“But they learn not to,” Doflamingo says.

“They’d much rather not see him at all,” Law finishes.

Rosinante makes a frustrated noise and makes to argue, “But if you’d let me out in the first place—”

“Rosinante,” Law snaps, his tone final. Rosinante’s jaw tightens.

“I’m full,” he says, standing up.

“Roci-ya,” Law starts, but Rosinante is already leaving the room. “Roci-ya!”

The dining room is left in silence.

Doflamingo snorts.

“Doffy-ya.”

He rolls his eyes.

“He listens to you more than me,” Law says. “Please just - he needs to know this is the best place for him to be.”

“I’m not arguing with you,” Doflamingo says. “But he doesn’t know enough about the real world to realise it.”

“I’m not taking him.”

“Of course not.”

“Just.” Law sighs, leaning back. “I know what you think about him, Doffy-ya, but you’re brothers. You have to be there for him when he refuses to come to me.”

Doflamingo looks at him.

“He’s your little brother. You have to protect him no matter what.”

There was a boy and a sister and a hospital.

“Of course I will,” Doflamingo scoffs. “He’s blood.”

6.

“Fucking hell, Trafalgar,” Kidd says, taking in a space that is more mausoleum than room. “This is a whole other freak of crazy you got up in there. More than your usual, anyway.”

“I should kill you for even being here,” Law says flatly, then Shambles Kidd out of the room and into the hallway, shutting the door and locking. It is not the only room in the building with endless rows of glass cases lining the wall, mummified bodies pinned up like dead insects on display, an immortalisation of Law’s own history salvaged from the ruins of his home—but intrusion into even a single one makes Law want to scatter pieces of Kidd’s body in all four Blues. He’ll have to move his lab further away from the storage wing and integrate it into the research wing so visitors won’t find these rooms, but the location of his lab came to be in the first place because of the amount of time Law spends in the storage wing.

Kidd seems to find amusement in this, or he’s not even listening to Law at all. “Man, you’re still a little freak, aren’t you?”

Law doesn’t respond and keeps walking down the hall to the lab. Kidd towers over Law so entirely that Law takes not a small amount of satisfaction in seeing Kidd bend his head to even fit in the building. When they get to the lab, Law takes a moment to watch Kidd duck through the door as well. It’s half the reason he didn’t just Shambles them here directly.

“You know, I expected you to snap a couple years earlier,” Kidd says conversationally, surveying the room and the jarred organs on the shelves, still writhing and beating inside the cube of Law’s own Fruit. “Killer said it would be apocalyptic - I said I was willing to pay to see that.”

“You have five minutes,” Law tells him then turns to Penguin, who was waiting for him and is currently eyeing Kidd up suspiciously. “Who’s next?”

“Kor Gwen,” Penguin says, handing him a clipboard. “Gave a sizable donation to our institute in the name of ‘research for the future’. She has… heart-sickness.”

Law looks up with a raised brow.

“Five minutes and you’re not even giving me your full attention,” Kidd says, amused.

“I can multitask,” Law says. “Noble?”

“Daughter of a business tycoon. Father has fingers in every pie, including—” Penguin reaches over to pull the paper up, “—slave trade. On the down-low of course.”

“Hmm,” Law hums. “How’s the activity on subject XV1278.”

“Is that that bald pirate? Uh - we’ve achieved complete emotional severance. Not a tear shed when we killed his first mate in front of him.”

“Hmm. Good.” Law glances momentarily at Kidd. “That’s one minute gone.”

“Hey, my minutes haven’t started,” Kidd says, raising his hands in mock-surrender.

Law had been the weakest member of the crew and Kidd had taken extreme delight in tormenting him about it the entire time they’d known each other. Killer, in comparison, had always been a mild person, but the more Law thought about it, the more he remembered Killer being just as mean—it was just that next to his partner, he seemed almost nice. No matter what Law would do, Kidd teased him relentlessly, and there was not a single moment Kidd had ever taken Law seriously—except maybe for that one assassination attempt that one time he was fifteen.

“We’re crew,” Xebec had said. “Family - don’t you remember, Law? We don’t assassinate each other here.”

And to Kidd, who was fuming and holding his bleeding throat, he had said, “Though I would’ve been disappointed if you’d fallen to a teenager.”

Now, Law is thirty-one and he has his thumbs on every pulse of the world. Law is thirty-one and it’s not like Kidd is ever going to see him as anything other than that pathetic, sick boy that Xebec favoured, empire be damned.

“We’ll swap their brains, then I’ll perform a persona swap,” Law says. It is essentially two different types of swap that will result in simply moving the consciousness there and back, retaining memories and the same body and yet operating entirely with a new brain. “This… heart-sickness might come in handy.”

A Shambles has Kor Gwen sitting on the operating table, and it’s quick work to do what he needs to do. “Don’t look at him,” Law instructs her when she gapes at the billion-bounty pirate behind him. The moment the brain and persona is switched, the shock quickly leaves her eyes and she blinks, all emotion probably leaving her. 

“Shachi will escort you to a room to monitor your reaction,” he tells her and Shambles her away again. He turns to Penguin. “Sell 1278’s data to Germa.”

Kidd whistles. “Should’ve joined MADS, you sick bastard.”

“Pot, kettle,” Law says. “Your minutes are starting.”

“Touchy.” Then Kidd takes a bag of something that looks like plants out of his pockets. Law’s attention immediately zones in on it.

“Is that—”

“Yup. Organic, Wano-specialty.”

“What the fuck are you doing in Wano?”

Kidd doesn’t respond and takes something else out of his pockets instead. Law turns to Penguin, who is watching silently.

“Thirty minutes,” he says.

Penguin stares at him for a moment. “Aye aye, Captain.” He disappears from the room, leaving Kidd and Law alone.

“Excited, aren’t you?” Kidd teases, taking out a rolled joint from the new bag and lighting it up.

“Shut up,” Law says, waiting for Kidd to take a hit and snatching the joint from his hand.

One hit and it’s so potent Law can fall over. He breathes for a moment. “What do you want?”

Kidd takes the joint. “I just came in possession of a - vast amount of land, let’s just say.”

Law eyes him. “I can manufacture as many illicit substances as I want without you.”

“You can make all the freaky shit in the world, Law,” Kidd says. “And let me farm it.”

Law considers this.

“There’s no reason to refuse,” Kidd continues, nonchalant. “It’s not like you have to do anything other than be your true, creepy self and make weird shit.”

“And sell it.”

“You’re the one with the connections.”

Law narrows his eyes. “So that’s what you wanted.”

Kidd doesn’t seem bothered by being figured out in the negotiation. It really seems like it doesn’t matter that much to him. He might have less connections as a consequence of his reputation as a warmonger, but he’s still a prominent power in the New World. He’ll probably take this elsewhere if Law refuses, and it will only be a negligible inconvenience to him.

Law sighs. “Send someone to talk with Clione.”

Kidd grins in triumph, an ugly, jagged thing. “That was easy. Thought I’d have to rip something open. Remind you why you’re still alive.”

The Op-Op Fruit had tasted vile and a little bit like vomit shoved into his mouth suddenly, if he was to be honest. Law doesn’t point out that it’s not really in Kidd’s favour that Law is alive at all.

When Law doesn’t respond, Kidd rolls his eyes. “You used to be more fun to tease.”

“It’s called growing up, Eustass-ya. Not all of us can stay as immature as you when we turn into adults.”

“Hah?”

“You can leave.”

Kidd scoffs, but doesn’t move. There’s a moment of silence as he takes another hit of the joint. He says, “Well, Killer was right about apocalyptic. There are so many things wrong with you.”

“Pot.”

“You might as well dig up an occupied grave and lie down in it.” Kidd gestures vaguely to everything. “What a fucking bummer of a place.”

Law glares at him.

“Must be miserable for the kids.”

Law freezes.

“What’s his name, the brat you try to keep hidden. Ro—”

“Don’t say his name,” Law snaps. Kidd gives him a flat look, but Law continues. “Don’t talk about him—don’t even think about him.”

A pause. “Yeesh,” Kidd says.

Neither of them say anything for the next five minutes, the joint passed back and forth. Law’s feeling it now, but Kidd doesn’t stop for a long while, needing way more than Law what with his significantly larger size.

Kidd says, “They took the ‘D’ initial out of Roger’s name. Gold Roger, they’re calling him.”

“You’re talking around it,” Law points out. He’s lying on the cold operating table now while Kidd sits on the ground and still manages to tower over him.

“You and Xebec always made a big deal out of that initial,” Kidd continues. “It means something, doesn’t it? That the World Government would go so far.”

“We’re godkillers, Law.”

Law closes his eyes. “He was… wrong. About a lot of things.”

Kidd huffs. The silence stretches again. Kidd is the one who brought up Roger, and yet he’s not going to breach the topic they’re talking carefully around.

Law says, “I don’t care about it.”

Kidd looks at him sceptically. “The initial?”

“The One Piece.”

“No?”

“Hmm.” It’s been a long time. But Law knows Kidd. “You’re going for it.”

“Of course I am. Any self respecting pirate would.”

Law is barely a pirate. Some days he’s barely a person. He says, “I’m perfectly happy where I am.”

Kidd scoffs. “You’ve never been happy a day in your life.”

“God, you’re annoying.”

“And being near you makes me want to fucking hang myself.”

“Please do.”

“Your fucking… assistant guy is coming back. You gonna work like that? High as balls?”

Law tilts his head in the direction of the door. “Sure.”

Kidd laughs. It’s an ugly sound. “You’re a real piece of work, you know that.”

Law sighs. Closes his eyes again. Says, “Kettle.”

7.

Law is thirty-two and his eldest is leaving the nest.

“I thought it would take more convincing you,” Doflamingo says, looking out the window of Law’s office into the courtyard of what used to be the university. Flevance is visible over the laboratory buildings.

“You’ve been ready since I met you,” Law says, not looking away from his paperwork.

There’s a momentary pause before Doflamingo says, “You still made me wait until I’m seventeen.”

The scratching of his pen on paper stops. It’s true he could’ve left Doffy to those thugs on Downs the day he came back from Mariejois and the boy would’ve been fine—he might even already be keeping a chokehold on North Blue’s underworld with his specific brand of ruthlessness and power-hunger by this time. Doflamingo’s influence would have already been spread far and wide, but it wouldn’t have been Law’s influence. If Law had not taken Doflamingo with him on that day, the child would’ve been stuck on his delusions of grandeur as a former Celestial Dragon and Law would’ve been the enemy D who took his brother from him. His loyalty would not have been Law’s. In the end, this course of action gave him a loyal monster.

But Law hadn’t been thinking about the potential future on that day. There had just been an angry kid who wanted to destroy the world—an angry kid who still had a brother. Since, there was always an unidentifiable ache in his chest when he thought about Doffy leaving, but it still has to be done.

He doesn’t say any of that. Instead, he says, “Roci-ya needed his brother growing up.”

The scratching of his pen continues. “Just him?” Doflamingo asks.

“He’s a sensitive boy,” Law says. “You, on the other hand, have always been self-sufficient. You don’t need your brother.” Law thinks about it, then adds,  “And God knows how long Roci-ya would have kept crying if I hadn’t taken you too.”

Doflamingo’s a self-sufficient child—though he’s only a child in the literal sense of the word, seventeen years young. Law doesn’t think he’s human enough to be a child. There has always been something distinctly inhuman about Doflamingo, in the way he eyes all the other Heart Pirates like they’re not real, how he only goes through the motions of living, how the only times he’s genuine is when he spills blood—it reminds Law of his teenage years and at the same time makes his skin crawl. Different from him, Doflamingo is, in the simplest terms, a narcissistic psychopath. And yet, the research and definition of that label does not do any justice to the fascinating complexity of Doflamingo’s psychopathy that Law has studied since he’s known him: the way he preens under Law’s praise instead of scorning it, yet he chafes under his control; the way he delights in bloodshed and other’s suffering yet dislikes when Rosinante cries. Though that last point Law thinks has more to do with Doflamingo’s distaste for Rosinante's weakness than any real empathy he is not capable of.

Law had done his best to foster Doflamingo’s obligation as Rosinante’s brother in the time he’s had him, but it’s time for Doflamingo to thrive away from that.

“... Huh,” Doffy says under his breath.

“Are you meeting your entourage at Loguetown?” Law asks.

“No. I’ll cross back myself and they’ll meet me in North Blue.”

Law frowns. “The Marines know your face.”

Doflamingo makes a movement of his brows that means he’s rolling his eye beneath his glasses. “I’ll be fine.”

“Hmm.” Law puts his pen down and pushes his chair back to stand. Doflamingo stands up straighter in turn despite towering over Law by two feet (and he’ll get taller still, Law thinks). “I guess I’ll give you your leaving present now. Room. Shambles. ”

Doflamingo’s eyebrows shoot up.

“Glasses,” Law commands. Doflamingo doesn’t complain like he used to, but he’s still distinctly uncomfortable as he slips off his glasses. Law reaches out a hand and his son obediently bends down to put his chin in it to allow for Law’s easier manoeuvring.

It takes a simple application of Law’s fruit to implant the eye into Doflamingo’s empty socket. Doffy doesn’t flinch other than a twitch of expression when Law knows it would’ve hurt, but he still blinks in quick succession. There is surprise on his face.

“You’ll have to relearn depth perception,” Law tells him, then lets go of his face. Doffy unfolds back to his full height and puts his glasses on.

“You could’ve done that any other time,” Doflamingo says, accusing.

“I could’ve,” Law agrees. There’s a recording device in the eye but Doflamingo doesn’t need to know that. Despite what Doffy thinks about his casual attitude towards him leaving, Law’s not letting him go without any precautions. “But I’m doing it now. Tell me how the execution goes.”

It’s a clear dismissal, and Doflamingo only tightens his lips before heading for the door. Law sits back down and pauses before he goes back to his work.

“Doffy-ya.”

Doflamingo stops on the threshold of Law's office.

Law says, “Be careful.”

Doflamingo lingers. When the scratching of pen on paper starts again, Doflamingo leaves.

8.

“Did you send Doffy away?” Rosinante asks.

Law only glances up from his work. They’re in the living room of their home as evening falls, Law catching up on work in his usual armchair while Roci reads a book on the loveseat. He never takes up the whole couch space on habit. 

Law says, “Of course not. Your brother wanted to set sail on his own.”

“Right,” Rosinante says. “But - it didn’t have to be all the way in North Blue, did it?”

“I didn’t choose it. Have you been sitting on this for two years?”

“I’m sure Doffy would have wanted to stay in the New World.”

Law sighs, taking off his reading glasses. “Doffy-ya’s executives have already built a foothold of power in North Blue. Now it’s up to him to build his own reputation outside of me, and become a formidable presence on his own.”

They’re calling Law an Emperor of the Sea now. He, Kidd, and Newgate have all respectively built up enough individual power to rival the military strength of the Marine Headquarters itself, and although the nickname was a fanciful invention of Morgans’, it seems even the World Government itself has taken to calling them that. It’s grand, but also very conspicuous. If Doflamingo goes around flaunting connections it can get him many places very quickly, but it will also make people not take him seriously, hence why he’s starting from scratch himself.

Rosinante frowns. “I know but…”

“You miss him,” Law finishes.

Rosinante ducks his head down.

It’s to be expected, Law thinks. Rosinante has always had so much love in his heart that he’s capable of loving someone like Doflamingo or Law at all.

Rosinante says, “He said he was gonna call. But he’s always busy.”

(At least you still have him, Law doesn’t say. At least you’re not thirty-four and so homesick you’re nauseous. At least you’re not curled up in bed atop the corpse of your country and trying in feverish desperation to remember your mother’s voice, or your sister’s hair colour, or why you are alive in the first place. At least you still have him. Law doesn’t say this.)

“You have to understand something about your brother, Roci-ya.” Law says, “He’s… he doesn’t think like the rest of us.”

Rosinante looks at him, eyebrows pinched. “What do you mean?”

Law hesitates. “When he was born there was something - wrong with him. He doesn’t understand that you miss him, or that you might want to talk to him.”

Rosinante still looks at him in soft confusion.

“I’m sure you’ve noticed. A lot of the emotions he might show is just pretend for him. Doffy-ya doesn’t understand love.”

“You’re wrong,” Rosinante blurts out. Law raises a brow.

“On the contrary. It’s a psychological condition, and if anything I know about his childhood is to say anything, then it’s mostly genetic. A psychopath isn’t capable of empathy. He was born wrong—”

Rosinante stands abruptly, his book falling to the carpet. “Don’t talk about him like that!”

“Don’t raise your voice at me.”

Rosinante shrinks back momentarily, but his face is set in determination. “I’m sorry. But he’s your - he’s my brother. He’s not one of your experiments or your - those medical abominations you keep around because you’re curious .”

“Well.”

“You—” Rosinante groans in frustration, his hand coming up to tug at his hair. Law reaches out on instinct to stop him, but he drops it, too far away to do anything. Rosinante says, “You’re always talking about him like that behind his back, and you always just - expect me to agree with you. That’s my brother. And - and—” Rosinante falters. “I’m just wondering if you talk about me like that with Doffy too, about how weak or naive I am and that I don’t belong here— ”

Law stands up, alarmed. “Of course not! Is that how you think we think of you?”

“I just—” Rosinante puts his face in his hands. “I don’t understand why you took us with you if you hated us so much.”

“I don’t,” Law says, serious. “I don’t hate you or your brother, Roci-ya.” He reaches up to take the boy’s face in hand and guide him to sit on the couch while Law sits beside him. “I could never hate you.”

Rosinante hides his face in Law’s shoulder like he’s done a hundred times before. “Then why do you talk about my brother like he’s a monster?”

Law looks up at the ceiling, putting his hand on Rosinante’s head. “Doffy-ya is family. But his… differences make him a monster to the rest of the world.”

“You kill just as much as him anyway,” Rosinante mutters, but this close Law can hear him still. “I don’t understand how that’s any different from Doffy.”

“You’ll understand when you’re older,” Law says. Rosinante is seventeen now, and he still misses his brother. Law supposes the two years apart might make the memories of Doflamingo seem sweeter, gentler to Roci who has always only looked at his brother through rose-tinted lenses. He might be nearly an adult, but he still needs a few more years of experience before he can look at his brother and know objectively that there’s something fundamentally wrong with him. Hopefully it will take him a few more decades before he realises the same thing about Law.

Rosinante is quiet for a moment before he scoffs under his breath, sardonic. He says, “You always say that.”

He stays there, slumped into Law’s side, but Law doesn’t mind. His son is taller than him now—he’s still not as tall as what Law knows Doflamingo is now but he’s growing at a faster rate than Doflamingo was when he was this age. Law doesn’t remember the corpse of their father being of any particularly impressive height so it was either their mother or their grandparents with the New World typical height—or the regality chooses the Celestial Dragon.

(They’re not Celestial Dragons, because otherwise Law would have killed them on that day.)

Rosinante is tall, and yet he is still so small curled up against Law. The world has broken his too-kind heart already and Law knows it will continue to do so no matter how many precautions Law puts in.

“Will you ever send me away?” Rosinante asks.

“Never,” Law says.

“What if I wanted to set sail on my own like Doffy?”

Law doesn’t answer that.

Rosinante breathes out and says softly, “Right. Do you want tea?”

It’s an abrupt change of topic, but Law allows it. “Please.”

Rosinante extricates himself from Law and Law mourns the warmth. There is something about his son that eases the dead rage Law carries inside him, something about his gentle kindness, his insistence on seeing people at their best that makes the world seem a little more worth it for as long as Rosinante is in it.

It is worth it, Law thinks, to endure the ordeal of being alive at all if Rosinante is here.

He comes back to the sitting room with tea. He trips on the carpet, always clumsy, but Takt keeps the tea from spilling everywhere. Rosinante smiles at Law sheepishly as Law takes the cup. The fireplace crackles and Rosinante sits back down, picks up his book. Law sips his tea. He is warm again.

There was a boy and a sister and a hospital that was still intact.

9.

When Law was seventeen, one year before Xebec had died at God Valley, he ran away. Seventeen was three years longer than he had predicted himself making it to, and seventeen years longer than he wanted to even be here for. Dialysis and the medical miracles he’d forced his body through were not going to be enough and Law had the final thought: I'm going to die on my own terms.

Xebec had gone out to find him personally and dragged him back by his throat. He’d told him, “If you wanted to die that badly boy, I could have done it for you.”

His Captain had ordered him to live and Law had gritted his teeth and resolved to wait out his painful death.

Law is thirty-four and Rosinante is missing.

“Captain,” Bepo says nervously. “Maybe you need to take a moment—”

“Fourteen hours,” Law says. “I slept for fourteen hours. Now whoever took Roci-ya is fourteen hours ahead of me. “

It was the longest Law’s ever remembered sleeping, which means his tea had been drugged. Which means someone had snuck through all of Flevance and into their home, had ducked beneath Law’s Observation, had drugged the tea without Rosinante noticing, and then they’d taken him. It had to have been someone skilled— or a traitor— and his mind supplies him Cipher Pol finally finding the choking point of Law’s weaknesses, or Kidd, the bastard, trying to get a hostage for whatever reasons that power-hungry warmonger wants. Flevance is compromised, the Heart Pirates have to be purged again, there was a boy and a sister and the ruins of a hospital—

“Captain,” Bepo says again. “I think you need to read the note.”

Law whirls on him. “Roci-ya did not leave!”

Bepo shrinks but does not step away. “I’m sorry.” He holds out the piece of paper anyway.

Law did not read it when he woke up and saw it sitting alone on the coffee table. He did not read it when he reached out with his Observation and found Rosinante had just not been in his range—which was pretty fucking far. He did not read it when he set off the intruder alert. No matter how far they run, Law will track them down and get Rosinante back.

Law snatches the ransom note from Bepo’s hand and starts reading.

By the time he’s finished, the paper is crumpled in his fist.

“Captain…”

“No,” Law says.

“Roci ran away—”

“No!” Law yells. “He would never - why would he leave? He has everything he could ever want - I don’t - this doesn’t make sense.”

Bepo looks down, timid. He says, “He always hated how we do things.”

“He loves us,” Law argues. “He won’t just leave. Someone must be forcing his hand or - or—”

“Roci probably wants to be free.”

Law freezes. “What.”

“Sorry! But the note says—”

“I know what the note says,” Law says. “But Rosinante - he - this isn’t a prison. Flevance is a paradise.”

“Roci probably didn’t think so,” Bepo says meekly. “We might have been too restrictive. He probably thinks we don’t trust him to take care of himself.”

“Of course I don’t!” Law throws his hand “That boy is too good for this world—he’ll get himself killed trusting the wrong person. God, I should’ve taken precautions. He’s always wanted to go with us, I just didn’t think—” Law growls in frustration. No matter what Rosinante wants, Law will drag him back by his hair if he has to.

“We’ll find him, Captain,” Bepo says.

“Of course we will,” Law says through gritted teeth. It’s been a long time since anger’s been hot like this. Rosinante disobeyed him. Rosinante. “Ready the Polar Tang!”

10.

Law is thirty-seven and he hasn’t heard from his son in three years and—

“A Marine?” Law says, incredulous. His clothes are days-old and his hair is just as unwashed. “ A Marine?”

Doflamingo says, “He just became an Officer. Ensign. That’s how we caught wind of him.”

Law puts his face in his hands, jaw clenched. A Marine?

It’s been years, the search, and Law doesn’t remember the last time he slept easy - no, he does. It had been the night Rosinante drugged him and that had led to him disappearing. Law’s not sleeping well for another decade, and probably not at all for another few days if the boosters in his veins have anything to say about it.

“Where is he?” Law asks.

“Marineford.”

Law shouts wordlessly. “That ungrateful brat!”

“It will be… difficult to retrieve him,” Doffy continues. “Penguin’s spies in Marineford probably don’t have the ability to contain him.”

Yes. Rosinante, despite how much Law restricted his training, had still been trained at all by both Law and Doflamingo—and he’s Doflamingo’s brother; Law has no doubt he’s brilliant. That, coupled with the security in Marineford and the possibility that all their spies will have to blow their cover, will only result in a monumental loss.

But it’s Rosinante.

“He’s not using his surname,” Doflamingo says. Law looks at his face carefully again. “It’s possible someone high up in the command chain is aware of his background and helped him become a recruit by covering it up.”

Looking at him properly, Doflamingo is pissed. His expression is stern, the corner of his lips tilted down, and the veins on his forehead are prominent. He is taking the betrayal just as badly as Law maybe.

Law says, “What are you thinking?”

“He’s already been a distraction for years,” Doflamingo sneers. “He’s forsaken his name, his connection to us. He joined the Marines.”

It’s just teenage rebellion. He’ll come back.

“For all we know,” Doflamingo says, “He could be telling them exactly how to get into Flevance. Every weakness in our islands. Your weaknesses.”

Law’s hand tightens around Kikoku’s sheath.

“He betrayed you—”

“He wouldn’t,” Law says firmly.

“Roci’s soft. You remember why that rat took him that time. Who knows what the Marines told him about you, and who knows how much of it he believed.”

“He wouldn’t,” Law repeats and Doflamingo stops.

But it’s in his head now. What did Gar tell Rosinante about Law? How long has doubts been sown in his mind? And now, surrounded by Marine propaganda, by the Marines’ perception of him, how does Rosinante even see him now?

“He’ll come back,” Law says. “This is just a phase.”

Doflamingo raises a brow.

“Roci-ya knows who his family is. He’ll come back.”

“Of course,” Doflamingo says. “You’ll return to Flevance then?”

Law steps off the pile of bodies to join Doflamingo on the ground. It has been a couple months since he’s been home. He’s neglected a lot of his work, pushing it off on Ikkaku and Clione ever since that day for years already. If he can’t go to Rosinante then Law will have to wait for him to come to Law. It won’t do any good to stagnate.

“Can your crew clean up?” Law asks, looking off into the distance.

“It should be just a Vice-Admiral,” Doflamingo says. “That’s nothing.”

“Good. Good work, Doffy-ya.”

Doflamingo grins, taking to the skies with his strings. Law turns to head back to the Polar Tang.

Rosinante will come back. Law can wait.

11.

Law is forty and he misses Rosinante.

“Oh yeah, that’s the good shit,” Kidd says from where his head is resting in Killer’s lap. They’re piled up on the floor of Law’s lab while Law sits on his work bench, pushing everything to the side.

“The back-grove Saobody shit you put in my lungs last time was inspiring,” Law says sarcastically, holding a hand out for Killer to give him the joint.

Kidd cracks open an eye. “This your interpretation?”

Law takes a drag, feeling it immediately go to his limbs. He feels heavy. It is exactly what he was aiming for. “I took a few samples,” Law says. “Made it better.”

Kidd bares his teeth. “Yeah. Yeah, this is the shit.”

“I did prefer the Saobody one,” Killer says.

“Oh, shut up,” Kidd shoves his partner’s chest back playfully. 

“Your opinion is usually irrelevant in this,” Law adds.

“Yeah, you liked the bear’s fuckass edibles, Kil, you don’t get to speak.”

Law frowns. “Bepo’s edibles were great.”

“They were weak,” Kidd rolls his eyes. Law remembers something.

“Speaking of weak—”

“Oh don’t even start—”

“I am asking about the arm now.”

Kidd huffs. It looks like he won’t be answering.

Then Killer says, “It was Oden.”

“Kil!”

Law does not laugh, but Kidd knows him well enough to know he is very much laughing. He snarls at Law, “Oh, don’t even start.”

“Flew a little too high there, Eustass-ya?”

“I killed the bastard already,” Kidd says, bitter.

Law hums mockingly. He places the joint back in Killer’s hand. He waits for Kidd to take a drag. And then he says, “Sure, but a Roger Pirate?”

Kidd coughs. “Fuck off.”

“I didn’t lose my arm to a Roger Pirate.”

“You’re such a brat.”

To anyone else, Killer would normally back Kidd up without fail, but they’ve both also known Law since he was twelve years old, so Killer says, “You have to admit it was a little arrogant to keep him around like that.”

“You’re a filthy traitor, Kil.”

Killer shrugs.

“A Roger Pirate,” Law repeats just to be a little shit.

Kidd sneers. “At least I’m not trying to kill myself.”

Law rolls his eyes at Kidd’s dramatics. “I’m not killing myself.”

Killer says, “You should get that diagnosed.”

Law kicks out at his head, but he just smoothly dodges.

Kidd says, “Give me a week’s notice before you actually kill yourself. I want the Barriss Islands before Newgate can get his hands on them. He can have Flevance—I don’t want your depression pit.”

“Bepo has instructions to destroy Flevance if I die.”

“Fucking hell. You’re a real piece of work, you know that? You’ve been no fun—or even less than you usually are—since that kid of yours left.”

“Kidd,” Killer says warningly.

“What? It’s whatever. At least your pet psychopath seems like he’s having fun. Heard the other one’s a Marine now. Hey, when are you gonna kill him—”

Kidd disappears and a stray pipe lands in Killer’s lap. Killer is unbothered that his partner is who-knows-where and merely asks calmly, “Where’d you put him?”

“In the sewers.”

“Ah,” Killer says. Then, “He might break your city.”

Law takes the joint from Killer again. “He can try.”

12.

Law is forty-two and he misses Rosinante.

This is probably how it’s going to be for the rest of his life, Law thinks. He’s going to miss Rosinante forever and—

Fuck. Law throws his arm over his eyes.

This is probably betrayal, Law thinks. It’s been eight years and yet - and yet—

There is no sign of Rosinante returning. Law has had so many photos of Rosinante taken by spies and people who follow his unit’s missions just to report back to Law, and he’s grown. He’s an adult now, Law can see, but—

But he’s just a boy. He’s Law’s boy.

Law doesn’t remember what he took that’s making him feel like this, that made Doffy lead him to the couch—the couch that Roci and Doffy always sat together at—that made Doffy go get him a glass of water. He’s been putting a lot of things in his body these days.

It doesn’t matter.

“Here,” Doffy says.

Law looks up at him. Law wonders if Roci’s features still look like this too. Wonders if he’s still clumsy. Wonders if he still smiles the same. Law pushes himself up off the couch with Doffy’s help.

“Something needs to change,” Doffy tells him. His forehead is so furrowed, so strained it looks like it hurts. Law reaches out to smooth it over with his hands, but it doesn’t work. He frowns. Doffy takes his wrist and leads it to the glass of water.

Law drinks, a hand guiding him.

“What can I do, Law?”

“Doffy-ya,” Law says, just to say his name. “Roci-ya would never hurt me, right?”

“Of course he wouldn’t.”

“Then why is he hurting me now?”

Doffy looks stricken.

“This is a betrayal, right?” Law asks. He doesn’t know what his face is doing, but it seems to incense Doffy even further. Doffy’s always been angry. An angry child. It might be the only thing he’s capable of feeling.

“Yes,” Doffy says. “It is.”

“So he’s a traitor,” Law says. Oh no. He groans. Roci’s a traitor? That can’t be right.

“Yes,” Doffy says again. “He is.”

“No,” Law moans, leaning back to rest his pounding head on the couch. “I don’t want him to be a traitor.”

“What do you want me to do, Law?”

What does he want? He wants Roci to come home. He wants to see his son. He says, “I just want it to stop hurting.”

Interlude II.

(“... Ah.”

“Hello, little brother.”

“... What did you do to my unit?”

“What we always do to Marines. What we were taught to do.”

“... I see.”

“Oh, don’t look so glum, Roci. You knew this was always going to happen the moment you left.”

“Don’t do this, Doffy.”

“You can’t just leave us without consequences. Leave me. Leave Law.”

“... Did Law send you?”

“Law’s much too soft on you. Did you even stop to think about what you were doing to him? Were you so ungrateful for everything he’s done for you that you would do that to him?”

“Doffy, Law is using you.”

“Is that what you think? Were you jealous he thought you were useless?”

“No, you don’t understand - you didn’t deserve that. I know you love him and he - he’s thinks you’re a monster. That you’re incapable of it.”

“Shut up.”

“Leave him, Doffy. Please. You don’t deserve to live like this—”

“I said shut up!”

“... Doffy…”

“Recognise it? I’ve only ever used it once before. On my own flesh and blood.”

“Don’t do this.”

“Are you begging?”

“He’s never going to forgive you for this.”

“You’re a traitor. He said so himself, did you know that? A little. Marine. Rat.”

“Don’t do this.”

“Say, Roci. Do you remember what we do to traitors?”)

13.

Law is forty-three and looking up as Doflamingo barges into the living room. He sighs, taking off his reading glasses, slightly miffed at having his routine interrupted so suddenly.

“I have something for you,” Doflamingo says with a bared grin, throwing something onto the floor. The object rolls to a stop, leaving a trail of blood on the carpet. That’s annoying. “To ease your mind once and for all.”

Law opens his mouth to reprimand him for dirtying the carpet when he finally registers the severed head and its blond hair—

No.

Law jerks out of his armchair—

Oh, God, no.

—drops to his knees—

Oh God, please, no, if you’ve ever listened to anything.

“He was a Marine Commander, did you know that?” 

Let this be a dream. Oh God, if you’ve ever loved me, let me wake up. 

“Had his own unit and command and everything.”

Just this once, please, God, oh God please let me wake up.

“It wasn’t a ruse. It wasn’t some - teenage rebellion as you seem to think.”

Do not take him from me, God, God, I am begging, please don’t do this to me.

“No, he truly believed in the Marine’s bullshit. Justice and goodness and all they’re fed by the World Government.”

God. Please, oh fucking God, please don’t do this to me.

“You should’ve heard how he was talking about you, Law, the ungrateful rat.”

God. Oh, God.

“He begged for his own—”

“What have you done.” Someone is speaking with his voice, but it’s not him because he’s not here. This isn't happening. Oh, God, this isn’t happening.

“What did I do?” Doflamingo scoffs, mocking.

Law is dying, he thinks. This is dying. It is not sick and fever and lead burning him out from the inside, but here on the red-stained carpet. Law is forty-three and he finally knows what it feels like to die.

“I killed a filthy traitor is what I did.”

An animal sound leaves his throat. God. God.  

“Fucking hell, Law.”

“No.” This isn’t happening. “No no no no no no —”

“I watched you rot away for years because of him,” Doflamingo snarls, throwing his hands out. “Look at what he’s done to you!”

“God, Doffy-ya - what have you done — ”

Law is picked up by his collar, brutally yanked off the floor. Something thuds to the carpet and Law realises he had picked up Rosinante’s head without noticing - oh God Rosinante’s head—

“You’re pathetic, Law,” Dolfamingo hisses in his face. “Look at you. You’re a fucking Emperor of the Sea and some - some filthy rat brought you down to your knees?”

Law stares, paralysed, because God does he look like his brother—they could be twins, with the same blonde hair and sharply hooked nose, the same hard jawline that Law was cradling in his hands earlier because - oh God no—

“You’ve always had a soft spot for him, always letting him get away with everything—he made you weak. He made a fool of the both of us.”

But that expression would never be on Rosinante’s face - oh, Rosinante. Oh. Gentle, kind Rosinante. Rosinante who is—

Law is staring at the face of Rosinante’s murderer.

“I should have killed him when I killed his father.”

“I can’t even look at you,” Law says softly. He allows one second for Doflamingo’s expression to twist before he raises a hand. Room. Shambles.

Law drops to the ground, no longer held suspended. Silence rings out. Law stares.

His son stares back, unblinking.

God.

God.

There was a boy. And a sister. And a—

Law lets out a moan like dying and he takes his son’s face in hand. God.

Rosinante isn’t dead. Law wraps his arms around his son’s head. Rosinante is right here, because this isn’t happening. Law isn’t screaming, because the hospital is still standing. Because there is no fire. Because Law’s heart is still beating.

“Roci-ya,” Law says. “You’re home. Roci-ya.”

He curls around his son.

“You’re home.”

13.

“Shachi and Penguin started a little undersea garden since you’ve been gone,” Law says.

Rosinante doesn’t answer.

“You might not remember, Roci-ya, but I had to put Flevance on top of a coral reef so it didn’t sink.”

He’s encased in the blue of Law’s Room , the stasis of Law’s Devil Fruit in effect.

“It’s a new hobby of theirs. They’re very enthusiastic about it. It’s like cultivating a whole ecosystem on their own.”

The sky above Flevance has not been blue for a long time.

“Bepo’s as big as a house by now, you know that? He finally moved out of that old room.”

It’s cold.

“I found that bracelet you made me so long ago. God, you probably don’t even remember. It was when we changed our Jolly Roger.”

Rosinante is cold.

“God, Roci-ya.”

God.

“God, I think. I think. I think I’ll wake up soon.”

13.

Law is - he doesn’t know how old he is. Law is alive and he is a very logical person.

“When I was younger—long before you were born—there was a building in Flevance called a church. It was where people worshipped and prayed to God.”

Bepo had frozen the body Doflamingo brought back and Law had put the head in stasis. It’s not like he’s insane or delusional enough to wholeheartedly believe Rosinante’s body isn’t dead.

“Not just any god, Roci-ya. There was one true God—almighty and all-knowing.”

Rosinante’s heart isn’t beating. His brainstem has been severed, a neat and precise work; Law taught those skills himself. There is no pulse.

“We were good children. We were good people. Logically - logically God would have saved us.”

Medically, Rosinante is dead.

“The building is gone now. So are His priests and His nuns. When I was younger I kept asking myself the same question—if God was all-powerful, then why did he not save us?”

With Law’s Devil Fruit, he can put Rosinante’s body back together, reattach the head and brainstem, and stimulate a heart into beating.

“It is not that God doesn’t love us—because if He exists then He surely loves you, Roci-ya.”

Doflamingo’s strings can control him, but that’s not reanimation.

“Just not enough.”

The problem is stimulating the brain. If the brain is dead then all else fails, doesn’t it? Law can make him breathe but Law can’t make him alive.

“But I do. So I will do what He cannot.”

But Law knows what can make him alive.

“The soul exists. It’s scientifically proven through the existence of many Devil Fruits. Gecko Moria’s Shadow-Shadow Fruit. The Revive-Revive Fruit. The Soul-Soul Fruit. The Life-Life Fruit. If it exists out there, then I will find it, Rosinante.”

But until then, he’s talking to a corpse.

“Ah,” Law says. And stops.

0.

Law is alive and Gecko Moria cannot bring the dead back to life. Dr. Hogback is a fraud and that thing inside the body is not Rosinante. Neither of them will ever set foot in the New World again.

0.

Law is alive and the only light in the room comes from the cryodine in the tanks. He stands, unspeaking. Save one, none of the bodies in this room are worth looking at, and yet Law cannot bring himself to look at it either, most of the time.

He’s nearly as tall as his brother. He’s kept his hair long, shaggy over his eyes. Lanky, awkward limbs. Law wonders if he is still clumsy, tripping over everything. Wonders if he smiles the same, wide grin.

Law can synthesise ectoplasminite on his own relatively easily, but the cryodine system they’ve built into the pipes needs constant replenishment and it’s getting costly to make it on Flevance. If he moves the ectoplasminite manufacturing out to the outskirts and employ the sick that have immigrated here using the promise of a cure then that’s one problem down, but he will have to out-source his cryodine factories.

Law stares at the glow reflecting off the floor. The shadow of a body.

Dressrosa will do.

0.

Law is alive and he is saying, “I wish I did kill you that day.”

Doflamingo does not flinch, and oh, how Law wishes he did. Doflamingo does not flinch, because he cannot feel anything.

“I knew what you were, you know? The moment I met you I knew you were born to ruin the world.”

Doflamingo sighs, probably tired of Law’s bullshit. Law is too, if he’s being honest. He says, “The first cryodine factory is finished. We can expand research if you send a researcher our way, or if you train one of Dressrosa’s.”

Law says, “I’ll have Penguin train one of yours.”

Law has always taken his audiences in his office, but he’s also barely left the research wing in months, so Doflamingo has come to find him instead. The man who is now a Warlord of the Sea stands in the middle of the room, waiting for his instruction patiently despite the disdainful quirk of his lips.

If Doflamingo is capable of hate, Law thinks he might hate Law.

“Ikkoku has the work to transfer our business with Eustass-ya to be under Joker’s purview,” Law says, turning away from Doflamingo to tend to the subject on the slab in the middle of his laboratory. The subject’s heart is beating but she is brain-dead and Law is here to find a way to fix that. “Go see her on your way out.”

Doflamingo doesn’t leave. He says, “I’m surprised you trust me with that operation.”

Law’s hand tightens on the scalpel for a moment. “Trust has nothing to do with it. Your only purpose has always been to be an arm to me.”

Doflamingo scoffs. “I thought it was to be Roci’s pet brother.”

Law slams the scalpel on the metal tray, and the sound rings out through the room.

Xebec had said, “You’re a little monster, you know that?” Law’s hands had been stained with blood since before they’d even met, because anger had always been the option that hurt the least.

So Law knows anger. Law knows the ugly, writhing thing that claws its way out of his throat, the burning, raging fire that uses his own grief as kindling.

This feeling is a much colder one.

Law says, “I’m not illogical enough to throw away a tool when it still has half its use.”

A pause. “Did you know Rosinante asked me to leave you?”

Law slowly turns around to face him again. “Keep his name out of your mouth.”

But Doflamingo doesn’t stop. “He had this delusion about you hurting me. Said I didn’t deserve to be ‘treated this way’. What would he think of us now—”

“He loved you,” Law says, voice flat. Doflamingo looks him in the eye. “Despite everything, he loved an unfeeling monster like you.”

Law doesn’t want to keep talking, but he wants Doflamingo to hurt more. The words come tumbling out of his mouth unwillingly for that purpose alone.

“That boy loved you so much that it hurt him to not understand why his brother doesn’t love him back. He loved you so much it got him killed. He loved you so much when not even your own parents could. When not even I could,” Law gasps, “and God did I try to love you.”

(Maybe he did. Maybe he still does. Maybe the painful cavity that Doflamingo had dug out in Law’s chest is a symptom of love too. Maybe it does not matter anymore.)

Something finally twitches in Doflamingo’s expression.

Law pulls himself back together, composed, the satisfaction vicious and empty. He says, “But it means nothing now. You are an Emperor’s pawn, Doflamingo. There is no relationship between us.”

Another twitch. A small reaction, but a reaction nonetheless.

Law looks away, returning back to his bench. “I made the mistake of trying to play family with you for Rosinante’s sake, but I’d always known what you were. You cannot feel, nor are you capable of love.”

(A boy, a sister, a hospital. He would’ve done anything.)

“Because if you were,” Law continues, “then I would still have a son.”

0.

Law is alive and he needs more dead bodies. The number of people heading to Flevance, camping out on the poisoned land in hopes of getting cured by the Hands of God have been decreasing. Law doesn’t know if that’s from him using them for the project or the people themselves being too scared of him to brave the poisonous lands anymore. Bepo probably keeps a record. Bepo’s good like that.

It doesn’t matter. He’s not experimenting with that body, so he needs new ones immediately.

Law grabs Kikoku, and calls out the order to prepare the Polar II.

0.

Law is alive. Joker almost exclusively manages the underworld dealings of the Heart Pirates alongside Ikkoku. Kidd doesn’t visit, but he sends his satisfactions for every new strain or drug Law’s developed. His neck hurts constantly.

Penguin and Shachi are perfectly fine partners in a blunt rotation. Better than Kidd anyway.

“Did you know,” he starts, so thoroughly stoned his tongue is numb, “that the most coveted part of my Devil Fruit is the Eternal Youth Surgery?”

Penguin hums, taking the joint from Shachi. The three of them are - somewhere in the sprawling complex of their base. A sitting room where they turned off the white overhead lights. He says, “That’s what all those Celestial Dragons contact you for, yeah?”

“Yes,” he says. He curls and uncurls his fingers. He has so many of them. “It’s why we found it at God Valley.”

Shachi says, “It’s not like anyone can force you to use it.”

“Yes,” Law says. Penguin gives him a side-long look.

“It’s not like you’re using it on anyone,” Penguin rephrases Shachi’s words.

“Devil Fruits are a mystery,” Law says, then pauses. “Mystery.”

“Mystery,” Shachi repeats with a giggle. “ Mystery .”

“Mystery,” Penguin joins in. “Oh. Mystery. Mystery.”

Shachi kicks him.

“Mystery. No.” Law stops again, recalibrating his thoughts. “Yes. The possibilities and limitations I have found of the Op-Op have never been recorded before. Which means there are hundreds of other possibilities I haven’t found yet. I just have to keep trying.”

The room is silent, save for his breathing. Shachi says, “What are you thinking, Captain?”

He says, “The Op-Op Fruit is a miracle Fruit. The ultimate Fruit.” He looks at his curling hands, at the tattooed DEATH on his knuckles. “It’s a Fruit that’s meant to save lives.”

“You think your Fruit’s the key to…” Penguin trails off.

“Yes,” Law says. He thinks he needs something stronger. “I can feel it.”

It’s within reach, that miracle. God has never given him one, so he has to make it himself.

“Soon.”

0.

Law is alive and Eustass Kidd continues to be the most annoying person on earth.

“When was the last time you showered?”

Law thinks Kidd doesn’t have a leg to stand on when it comes to that.

“At least I don’t smell like an apothecary.”

Law is surprised Kidd even knows that word.

“Yeah, eat shit.”

What is he even doing here?

Kidd is moving somewhere in the room. “I was in the area.”

Ah. So he came here for the express purpose of being a nuisance.

Kidd laughs. “Sure. If you were any fun, maybe.”

The ceiling is bright. White. Law is probably in - his lab.

“Are you fucking high?”

Law feels - well. He feels. Something grabs his arm, large thumb pressing into the crook of his elbow. It sends pain signals to his brain, Law thinks.

“Graduated from testing on other people now?”

Kidd is missing an arm. Oh yeah. He lost that to Oden.

“Stop gawping, Trafalgar. I can probably kick your ass blind and without any limbs. Fuck, a toddler can kick your ass right now.”

Law hasn’t seen Kidd in years. Since before Rosinante—

Ah.

“Damn, it fucking sucks looking at you. You really need to just kill yourself and get it over with.”

Fuck off.

“Tell me which one’s the good shit and which one kicked your ass first. Killer and I could use some on our way back to Wano.”

Test vial Beta-03. No - it’s vial Gamma-01 final. 07 with the same ratio as Alpha-09. Redux. None of this is useful. Alpha-01 failed, Alpha-02 failed—he’s on Beta-03 - no, Gamma-01.

“I have no fucking clue what you’re talking about.”

The world sways, and Law gets up to walk towards the bench. There is a syringe there. Yes, Gamma-01.

“Yeah. Yeah, Killer and I are getting fucked up like that. That one?”

Find a vein. Room. Scan. A vein.

“What are you - oi, Law!”

0.

Law is - he doesn’t know if he is. The cot Bepo put in his lab creaks as he turns his head on the pillow to look over at the sound of the door opening, and the figure standing there—

Law whispers, “Roci-ya?”

He woke up, Law thinks. He must be cold and wet if he walked all the way here from the tanks.

Rosinante walks closer and Law barely has enough energy left to keep his eyes open—just barely. Long fingers brush over his forehead, and Law leans into it. Cold hands, Law thinks. That’s to be expected.

“Bepo called me. You’re wasting away,” Rosinante says. His voice is hard, uncharacteristic. Whatever’s left of Law’s heart probably breaks.

He sighs, sinking into the cot. Rosinante’s hand moves down. It’s large enough to circle around and wrap entirely around his throat. 

“We’re godkillers, Law,” Xenec had said and Law had believed him, but what Xebec did not know was that when those gods you’re supposed to kill are your kids, it will always be the other way around. Nothing has ever undone him as much as God or a son has.

So when the hand starts squeezing around his throat, Law thinks, Oh. Finally.

“This is mercy, Law,” Rosinante tells him. “This is mercy.”

Law’s own hand comes to hold Rosinante’s wrist gently. There was not a moment in his life where he had not wished it had been him in that hospital instead. Where he had not wished it was Lami who survived, even if she must endure what he has had to. It is the same now. 

Law rasps, “Rosinante.”

The hand recoils as if burned. Law’s eyebrows furrow in confusion. He says again, “Roci-ya?”

Rosinante takes in a shaky breath. He steps away from Law, and Law reaches out for him. “A present,” Rosinante says, setting something on the bench. “We make toys in Dressrosa. Happy fiftieth birthday, Law.”

0.

Law is fifty-four—or so Bepo tells him—and he says, “It would be good to get bodies from there.”

“Captain!” Bepo cries out. “It will be a warzone!”

“I’m an Emperor,” Law says.

“Sorry,” Bepo says on instinct. The ground shakes with every lumbering step he takes to follow Law as Law heads for the Polar II. “But it will be chaos!”

“Bodies, Bepo.”

“We can always ask Kidd—”

“I’m not looking to owe Eustass-ya.”

“Sorry.”

“Besides,” Law starts, stepping down into the Polar II. It’s his flagship—still a submarine but as big as a galleon, employed with cutting-edge engines and weapons fit to survive in New World waters without having to rely on unpredictable winds. “If I can reduce Marineford to rubble, it’ll be worth it.” He still owed the Marines for taking him.

“Oh,” Bepo groans. “What about Whitebeard?”

“I could care less about that fossil. Though…” Law thinks about it. “That first mate of his—he has an impressive mythical zoan, doesn’t he?”

Bepo snaps into his most professional mode. “Marco the Phoenix. He ate the Bird-Bird Fruit: Model Phoenix, which renders him effectively immortal as long as his fruit is in effect.”

“He heals others?”

“Yes, though not to the extent he himself can regenerate limbs in seconds.”

“Hmm. I’ll see if I can get my hands on him anyway.”

Bepo snaps back into worry. “Captain! Whitebeard is already raising war for one of his crewmates; we can’t just take another!”

“Bepo,” Law turns to look at him. “Newgate isn’t making it out of this war. His territories may have faith in him but most of their dignitaries have already reached out to us—the other half to Eustass-ya.”

Bepo hesitates. “The Seven Warlords will be there.”

Law’s hand pauses on the controls of the Polar II.

“They’ve been summoned,” Bepo adds.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Law—” Bepo cuts himself off and sighs. “Okay.”

“Set course to Marineford,” Law says, and the familiar chorus greets him.

“Yes, Captain!”

0.

“—and Caesar Clown requests increased funding for his research.”

Law comes to attention, lifting his head off where it was resting in his palm as he turns to look at Ikkaku. He’s been working in his old office more often in recent years (Bepo decreed a limit on lab-time after he overdosed that one time) but it hasn’t been any less miserable of a place than his labs. At least the sofa is more comfortable than the cot.

“I know,” Ikkaku says preemptively, but that doesn’t stop Law from continuing anyway.

“Those decisions go directly to Joker,” Law spits out the name. “Why am I hearing from Caesar Clown directly?”

Ikkaku sighs, then hands him a small folder. “Here’s his proposal for a new avenue. He admits it’s pricey and - Joker would rather have your professional opinion on the project’s worth before they go through with it.”

Law’s eyes rove over the proposal. “This is what Hogback suggested,” Law points out.

“Apparently it’s worth looking into.”

Law grunts. “That jester isn’t any better than that hack if that’s the case. Rejected. Tell him it’s not possible—” Law freezes as his eyes catch on a section of the paper. “Huh.”

Ikkaku says, “Captain?”

Law stares for a moment, mind running over the possibilities. Like this… “Give the go-ahead,” he says.

Ikkaku takes back the folder, nodding in affirmation. “Yes, Captain. There’s also the matter of the islands requesting an Emperor’s protection.”

“Have Bepo single out the ones that are worth protecting.”

“He already did.” Ikkaku holds out another folder from the stack she’s got in her arms. “We just need final confirmation to sign off and we’ll send in a flag.”

Law glances over the list momentarily. “There’s a war in Noming, isn’t there? Since Marineford was a bust because of Red Hair,” Law spits out the Roger Pirate’s name with vitriol, “I’ll head there myself.” Law stops at the bottom of the list, head tilting. “What is this?”

“Ah. They requested an alliance under the guise of protection.”

“No one’s going to believe that,” Law snorts, unamused. “They’ll lose their seats on the Reverie either way. They don’t need an Emperor’s protection.”

Ikkaku shrugs. “It won’t be our problem. They believe they can offer their… services. That man was part of MADS.”

“So was Caesar Clown, and I already have him.” Law sighs. “I’ll sign off on it.”

“Are you sure?”

Law shrugs. “It’ll pass the time.” He pauses to think about it. “I always did prefer Sora, but they’ll have to do.”

0.

“Doflamingo has been arrested.”

Law lifts his head. Shachi is expressionless as he delivers the news. 

“Apparently he was defeated by the supernova pirate, Strawhat Luffy, with the help of Kaidou the Beast. They’ve formed an alliance.”

“Huh,” Law grunts. “The brat whose brother died at Marineford. He survived?”

“Yes,” Shachi says. “He returned to the public eye a month ago at Saobody and put Fishman Island under his protection.”

Law makes a non-committal noise. “Eustass-ya is pissed, then. Doflamingo is still alive?”

“Admiral Fujitora has arrested Joker.”

“And the cryodine factories?”

Shachi’s face tightens. “All destroyed and… the Strawhats have taken Caesar Clown hostage after destroying the facilities at Punk Hazard as well.”

Law lets out a steady breath and Shachi flinches. “Why am I just hearing about this now?”

“I assume Joker meant to deal with it on his own without bothering you.”

“And now he’s arrested.”

Shachi nods.

Law sighs, rubbing the bridge of his nose. He has a migraine the size of the Red Line and now this? “That boy…”

Shachi shifts on his feet. “Should Penguin and I intercept Doffy’s prison transport?”

Law doesn’t answer immediately.

“Captain?”

“No.”

Shachi’s face goes slack in surprise for a moment. “Law, it’s Doffy.”

It’s Rosinante’s murderer, Law doesn’t say. Instead, he says, “Leave him in Impel Down for a few years. We can break him out whenever anyway.”

Shachi says, “I know you want to punish him for what he did to Rosinante but you’ve already—”

“Shachi.”

Shachi stops. Smooths over his expression. Law has to remind himself that the Heart Pirates raised those two as well. Shachi says, “Yes, Captain. What should we do about the Strawhat Pirates?”

Law rests his cheek in his hand languidly, leaning on the arms of his office chair. “Well. Eustass-ya won’t let that slide, especially if they’re rookies. Moving now would be useless.”

“We can’t let them go free. Everyone in the underworld knows Joker was ours.”

“Yes,” Law says, “I suppose.”

Shachi stays silent this time, waiting for Law’s verdict. Law turns in his office chair to look out over Flevance. The Strawhat Pirates are… insignificant in the grand scheme of things. He has much more important things that require his attention, though Caesar Clown’s loss is an annoying setback.

“They’re ants,” he muses. “I’m not going out of my way to crush them. But if they survive the next few islands - if they near Flevance…” Law shrugs. “We will show them the might of an Emperor’s crew.”

“Yes, Captain.”

Shachi leaves Law to his own musings.

“Monkey D Luffy…” he says the name out loud to himself. Two years ago, the World Government tried so hard to wipe the two brothers out—the two holders of the D initial—and yet here the boy is, despite everything. Despite the whole world wanting him dead. They have always been resilient, if Law’s continued survival is anything to go by.

We’re godkillers, Law.

He supposes Doflamingo had still been a Celestial Dragon, in the end.

In a way, he is also thankful to Strawhat for relieving him of the burden that is Doflamingo, doing what Law could never bring himself to do despite everything he feels towards him. And Law has always thought well of the Revolutionary Army’s ‘fuck you’ to the World Government, even if he doesn’t care enough to actively support the cause; the boy is Dragon’s son so Law can also be a little biased in wishing the pirate well on his way to tear down the strongholds of the World Government like he had been doing when he was wreaking havoc through Paradise. 

Yet those factors will not spare him from Law’s wrath. Caesar, the factories, Doflamingo… 

(The boy should have finished Doflamingo off so Law can be done with him once and for all. As long as he is alive Law still has to feel —)

Still. It is unlikely they will survive Warmonger Eustass Kidd in the first place. They will be crushed to dust by another Emperor within the week. He will probably never think about the Strawhat Pirates again. Law shrugs, and puts them out of mind.

He has work to do.