Chapter 5: An Unearthly Child
His father’s empty apology rang hollow in Doflamingo’s ears. He was sorry. He was sorry they had a father like him? He was sorry?
Doffy was the sorry one. Sorry he hadn’t known what to do to protect himself and his brother sooner. Sorry he hadn’t been able to save his mother. Sorry he’d had to feed Rosi filth because his father couldn’t find a way to feed his children.
Rosi was still clutching at their father as Doffy aimed the gun at his head.
His fingers were shaking. He’d never fired a gun before. He’d seen it done, in Mary Geoise. He’d seen death and justice come from the barrel. A swell of fear rose up in his belly like bile, along with his hatred. He had to do it now, before he lost his nerve. Before he let everyone down. Before he became a failure and a coward.
Trebol had told him he was a god, and Doffy needed to act like one.
He waved his hand and silvery threads pulled Rosi away– he didn’t want to hit him.
He held the jumping, shaking gun and he pulled the trigger.
Hot blood covered Doffy’s face, and he felt cold and empty.
That felt better than the gnawing anguished fear that had come before. He felt— not good, but satisfied. In control. Like he had been able to actually do something for once.
Then Rosi started screaming.
Vergo found Doffy, blood covered, stumbling down the road with a lantern in one hand. His handsome face was twisted with a mixture of what seemed to be fear and anger. He was limping and there was quite a lot of blood on one of his legs.
“Doffy!!” Vergo hurried forward to loop his arm around his shoulder to take the weight off his leg. “What happened? Y’alright?”
Doffy winced as he rested his weight on Vergo’s shoulders.
“Rosi ran off. I- I was cutting fa– I was cutting the head off and he took off. I ran after him, but I slipped on a rock. I don’t know where he went!”
Vergo looked out into the brush with a low hiss of breath. “…shit…he could have gone anywhere.”
“Will you help me look for him?” Doffy asked plaintively.
Even people like them could get in trouble running around the woods at night. Kids at the orphanage had— Vergo thought he had better get Trebol and the others for this.
“Yeah, I’ll help” he said breathlessly. “But we gotta get the gang first. Trebol…Diamante…Pica they’ll help you too.”
Diamante didn’t like that Trebol had insisted on just giving Doffy the precious devil fruit. But he found he had trouble complaining, because Trebol was right. There was something kingly– no, something entirely unearthly– about Doflamingo. Beaten and starved and wounded, his grace and poise were unmatched and fierce and every time Diamante looked at him he felt like he’d rather be on the boy’s side than against him.
He had rendered a hundred people unconscious with a thought. With his will. Without a devil fruit power. Diamante was not nearly as superstitious as Trebol but even he had to be impressed. Even he had to feel like that meant something. Maybe the boy really was destined for greatness.
Maybe that was why he forgave him when he and Vergo came back in a twist that same night, waking him out of the dead sleep of a catnap. Maybe that was why he let himself get caught up with it all, out in the dark with thieves lanterns, hunting for Doffy’s brother who had gone haring off somewhere.
They never found him.
Not in hours of searching. Not in the woods. Thankfully, not in the town. They all knew they’d know if the townies had found the kid. None of them had forgotten about the mob.
The first grey fingers of dawn were peeking over the sea when Doffy finally burned through the last reserves of his fearsome energy, and Dia watched Trebol carry him into the shack, muttering promises that they’d keep searching when it was light, and they’d gotten some rest.
Dia got the feeling that they wouldn’t see the kid’s brother again, though. He figured if he wanted to be found, he would be.
Diamante sat outside the shack and lit a cigarette. He offered one over to Vergo, who was outside too. Darger was still fiercely tracking back and forth across the treeline– stubborn as ever.
Vergo took the cigarette without hesitation. It’d been one of the first vices he’d picked up, right next to the hunger for knowledge and violence. He lit up with a frown and took a long drag.
“…I should have gone in with him.”
“Gone with him?” Dia’s brow furrowed. “I thought you did go with him. You lose track again?”
Vergo was smart. Dia knew he was smart because Trebol was teaching him to read, and more. His thoughts just got a little lost sometimes. Had to be redirected.
Vergo shook his head.
“No…no… all the way, to where he went to kill his old man.” He put the cigarette to his lips and took a long pull, eyes unreadable behind his glasses. “He wanted to do it alone… but I promised I’d be there waiting but I still somehow missed his brother.”
Dia sucked on his own cigarette and shook his head. “And? So his brother took off in the other direction. Not something you could prevent you know. Besides…”
Vergo huffed quietly. “I could if my observation haki was better…besides what?”
“I like Doffy,” Diamante said, blowing a long stream of smoke out from his pursed lips. “And he seems to like us, yeah? He seems a lot like us. But I didn’t exactly get that same feeling from his brother.”
The night they’d pulled Doffy and his family down off the wall, the kid brother had seemed as afraid of them as he was of everything else. Not like Doffy at all.
“He was jittery.” Vergo’s eyes closed behind his glasses. “…he acted like we were monsters or somethin’.”
“Like a rabbit,” Dia nodded. “So I ain’t exactly surprised that he went haring off at the first sign of something hard. No constitution for it. Not like us.”
“Not like us,” Vergo agreed with a nod. “and not like Doffy. He saw how hard that was gonna be and he did it anyway.”
“Damn right.” The more Dia thought about it, the more he suspected that Trebol was right, on some level. “Probably gonna be a great man someday. And I’m sure he’d love to protect his brother. But there are some people you can’t always protect.”
“I wouldn’t know…you guys are the closest thing to anything I’ve ever had.” Vergo took a long pull off the cigarette.
He sighed. “Yeah, me too, Corazon.”
Dia chuckled ruefully and shook his head. It sure wasn’t what he pictured when he’d set out on his own.
“I’ll make sure I can always protect you guys, okay?” the young boy murmured around his cigarette.
“We take care of each other,” Dia nodded. “That’s the whole point, right?”
“That’s what a gang is…yeah?” Virgo looked up at him as if he legitimately forgot the definition.
He put his arm around the kid’s shoulders. “Yeah, that’s what a gang is. Least that’s what this gang is.”
Vergo grinned widely with a nod “No matter what. Think Doffy’s gonna join us?”
Dia glanced at the door. “I donno. Guess we’re gonna find out.”
Trebol dampened the cloth in the basin and wrung it out again before laying it once more gently over the forehead of the fitfully sleeping boy. Doffy’s face was twisted with pain and sorrow even as he slept.
He had used up every ounce of his fire and energy, and then some, blazing through the night trying to find his brother. And that was after he’d already killed his father. It was after a long and surely miserable day of hiding in the woods. Chronically starved. Still severely injured.
It was some kind of miracle that had kept the boy going like that. Truly, it could only be explained by the fury of a destined king– a god.
A poor, little lost god thrown out of heaven. A god who knew suffering like a man knew suffering. But still one who refused to bow.
How could Trebol not admire him? How could he not want to worship at his feet?
If Trebol had had half the regal fire in him that Doffy had at his age, he would never have been a slave so long. Never have had to cringe and cower and wait for his opportunity. He would have made one.
He imagined all the opportunities that Doffy could make, if he had someone to guide him. To show him his strength and opportunity. Doffy hadn’t hesitated for one moment when Trebol had suggested he kill his father. He had simply done what needed to be done.
Trebol stroked his fingers over the sleeping boy’s cheek as exhaustion started to overtake him too. It would be wonderful, a miracle, if Doffy could stay with them. But one couldn’t ask a god to turn away from heaven. Trebol wasn’t stupid. If there was a paradise waiting for him, he wouldn’t linger on the filthy earth either.
Doffy didn’t join them. Not right then, anyway. He stayed a few days with them, hoping for his brother to come back. But after it became clear it was hopeless?
Doffy had already killed his father, and he said he wasn’t’ going to let that be for nothing. He’d go to Mary Geoise with the head and deliver the Celestial Dragons’ justice. Regain his rightful place. He’d force a ship bearing celestial tribute to take him there.
He told him he’d be back– to find his brother, and to thank them.
“I don’t forget my friends.”
Trebol of course had lavished him with praise over it, and he wasn’t the only one. Pica had been difficult to disengage from the lingering hug, and Diamante had seen the way that Vergo looked at him.
Even Diamante had to admit that he didn’t like saying goodbye. There was just something compelling about Doffy. Something that made you want to be near him.
Diamante hated to admit it but the longer the kid was gone, the more that Diamante missed him. It was ridiculous. He’d known him for what? A week?
But there was something unfinished between them. Like Trebol had said— a red string of fate.
Diamante wondered if Doffy had made it to the sacred land alright. He wondered if they would ever hear from him again. He knew that Trebol was delaying their departure from the island— moving from city to city and town to town instead— in the hope that Doffy or his messenger from heaven would be able to find them.
Diamante couldn’t complain. He was hoping for that, too.
Unlike his trip from the North Blue to the Sacred Land— which had, thanks to his power impressing on the captain that he really was a Celestial Dragon, been a comfortable one as an honored guest— when Doffy fled Mary Geoise his trip began as a stow away. There had been no other option.
Only his haki and his devil fruit powers had allowed him to survive his flight from Mary Geoise. The blood drops along his strings, the way the guards fell to his waves of haki– he’d always remember those things. And every use of his powers sharpened them. He’d hidden on one of the huge tribute ships leaving the sacred land, and fled that ship too as soon as it had made landfall..
Running through the alleyways of the unfamiliar island he found himself on, Doflamingo knocked out some men, and stole the coin in their pockets. He spent it on a nervous meal, and passage on a merchant ship back to the North Blue.
There was nowhere else for him to go.
Doflamingo had stayed with Trebol, Diamante, Pica and Corazon for three days while they looked for his brother. Searching and waiting and hoping for his return. Even sick with worry for Rosi, those three days had been the happiest he remembered since being pulled from Mary Geoise. It wasn’t only the good food, and the comfortable bed, and care for his wounds, though all of those would still have been enough to make it so.
It was the way they treated him; enjoyed his company, praised him, seemed to actually like having him around. After so long being told that everything he did was wrong– when he stole food for Rosi it was ‘wrong to steal’, when he tried to defend them it was ‘wrong to hurt others’– it was a sharp relief to feel understood. To feel accepted.
Bold, flamboyant Diamante talked to him like an adult and had shown him a better way to hold a knife. Friendly, forthright Corazon had shared his cigarettes– though Doffy quickly learned he didn’t like the way too much made his head spin– and talked with him all the time. Quiet, determined Pica never stopped looking for Doffy’s brother. And soft, crafty Trebol lavished him with attention and praise,listening to all his thoughts and troubles and giving his advice while brushing his hair, taking care of his wounds, even bathing him.
If Doffy could never go home– if he had lost everything, miserable, and cast out— he wanted to go back to that. He wanted to go back to them, where he was loved and accepted and treated like a person, instead of like a demon or a naughty child.
It was all he wanted, and the thought that he could have it— the hope that they would still be there when he arrived— was the first thing that sustained him from despair on his lonely voyage.
The second thing was his burning, ceaseless rage.
When Doflamingo returned it was in almost as shabby a state as Vergo had seen him depart. It certainly suited the place of their meeting. They were still on Downs, and operating for the moment out of a ramshackle series of rooms in the bad district, where Trebol was running a supposed ‘scrivener’s service’ as front for their activities.
Vergo had started coming into his own, he’d started to nail down the ability to read— he didn’t even forget it during his lapses in memory. He learned the art of blending in, of getting information without being noticed, and used it to further their criminal activities.
Theft. Ransom. The occasional bone-breaking violence. It was all part of their trade as they waited. It wasn’t the greatest place they had ever lived, but Vergo would have refused to leave even if he was asked.
He had to wait on a sign from the ‘holy land’ of Mary Jane, or whatever it was called. The home of the Celestial Dragons where Doffy had vanished to. He had to know he was at least alright, even if he wasn’t ever coming to the gang again.
He’d almost given up hope when he felt a sudden rush of it well up inside.
It must have been his haki that told him– Vergo had just known to come outside. He’d urged the others to follow, and sure enough, there was Doffy, looking exhausted and windswept on their doorstep.
“…Doffy,” Vergo said, pushing up his glasses to make sure he was seeing it right. “You’re back.”
Miserable and begraggled as he was, he still didn’t look as bad as he had the last time they had seen one another. His wounds were healed; there were no more bandages. He was in a shirt and pants that were dirty and roughly worn but not torn to shreds. But, aside from the expression on his face, nothing about him looked like one of the rulers of the world.
He tilted his head up toward Vergo and the others.
“They tried to kill me.” There was anger and resentment thick in his voice. “I brought them the head of my father, and they turned me away. They laughed at me.”
Vergo felt a sick turn in his stomach as he frowned. “…they didn’t accept you, Doffy? Even after all that?”
He’d heard… some… about the way the Celestial Dragons had separated themselves from the ‘rabble’ of the world. Could it have been that they saw Doffy that way too? Rabble, to be discarded even after he did so much to be one of them again.
“Even though you brought them your father’s head?” Dia growled from behind him, as incredulous as Vergo.
“And they tried to kill you?” Trebol stepped forward. “It’s a miracle that you’re still alive.”
“I don’t know if I’d call it a miracle,” Doffy said, taking a step toward them. “If it wasn’t for my power– and the power that you gave me– I would have died. There were so many of them…”
“But you didn’t die,” Pica said quietly.
Vergo clasped his hand near his heart with a firm nod. “You survived. You fought back against the people everyone says are gods and you survived. I’m glad, Doffy. We were worried about you.”
“Terribly, terribly worried,” Trebol murmured, putting a hand on Doffy’s shoulder. “We were waiting to hear from you. We had no idea that it would be so dire.”
“It looks like nobody wants me,” Doflamingo’s voice was cold and hard as he shrugged. “Not the Celestial Dragons. Not the people here. Not my brother.”
Vergo hesitated only a moment before stepping forward. “…we’d like you, Doffy. Before you left , I’d hoped that you would stay.”
Pica stepped forward too. “We all hoped.”
Even Diamante stepped forward too. “It’s true. You have something great in you, Doffy. Like the bearing of a king. If nobody else can see it, we can.”
“Guys,” Doflamingo murmured.He rubbed his cheek under his good eye. “Do you really mean that?”
Trebol squeezed his shoulder. “Of course, of course we mean it, Doffy. Hey, hey, stay with us, we’ll support you! Help you become the great man you could be.”
Doffy looked around at all of them through the dark lensed glasses. Even without seeing his eyes, Vergo understood his expression.
Vergo gave him his smile, reaching out his hand to him like he had months ago, this time without the armament in the way. “A gang looks out for one another, like a family. Heh…you’re gonna be a great man? Then we all wanna help you get there. I know I do.”
Doffy took his hand, and a moment later, they all put their hands together.
Years later it was easy to look back on that moment as if swearing fealty to a king– though Doflamingo’s true kingship wouldn’t come until much later. But there was a feeling in the air at that moment, and Vergo was sure the others had felt it too. Something had changed. Something important.
Doffy let them bring him into what Trebol called ‘the offices’, all fussing over him and asking about his journey. He was nervous to talk about it at first, but Diamante’s (and the rest’s!) excitement to hear him recount the bloodbath and escape in Mary Geoise pushed through his humiliation. For the first time since it had happened, he felt like a hero, a champion, instead of a coward and a fool on the run.
Diamante– Dia, they all called him, and Doffy was starting to think of him that way too— draped his coat over Doffy’s shoulders and set him down at the table, fetching him something to eat and crowing about his success in escaping the sacred land.
“What can I say, Tre,” Dia said, popping a bottle of wine and pouring it into thick metal cups. “You were right. Doffy’s destined for greatness. How many of them did you say it was, again?”
“At least a dozen,” Doffy repeated in all seriousness, taking the cup he was offered and taking a long drink. “A dozen guards in armor. They were ordered to kill me.”
Pica stood at his shoulder looking at him with large eyes. “You said your string cut so far through one of their necks their head almost came off? I want to see you do that.”
“I’ll show you some time,” Doffy promised, feeling a smile work its way to his lips. The blood and gore had made him sick at the time, but looking back on it— it had been cool, hadn’t it? Something only someone powerful could do.
“You’ve already come so far with your power, young master,” Trebol cooed. He wiped his face and hands with a handkerchief before sitting down beside him and petting his hair. “Hey, hey it’s a pity we couldn’t see you in action then, eh?”
“Maybe we’ll get lucky and someone’ll give us trouble and we’ll get to see it!” Corazon leaned on the table near Doffy with a wide grin. “You were like something out of the newspaper comics, Doffy! I bet you looked amazing.”
Doffy preened a little. “I guess I’ll have to show off a bit when I can,” he said, smiling over at Corazon. “Did I miss anything around here?”
“Marines showed up a couple times,” Dia said. “Damn strange, but they didn’t make any trouble we noticed.”
“What’s it mean that the marines were here?” Doffy asked. He got the sense he wouldn’t like the answer.
“Nothing good,” Pica murmured.
“This island is unaffiliated with the world government,” Trebol explained.”So whatever the marines are here, is unofficial. They don’t have authority, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have power.”
Corazon huffed.
“They got power wherever they go. I hear that if they don’t like an island they just blow it up with the push of a button.” He leaned closer to Doffy. “…honestly they’re probably just scoping out the locals for tributes or something.”
Doffy leaned closer to him in return, their shoulders touching. Being around Corazon, Vergo, felt comforting. Familiar, even though they’d known one another for such a short time.
“Slaves, maybe, too,” Diamante nodded. “Now that you’re back, we’re probably gonna be picking up from here fast and moving on just in case, right, Tre?”
“Right, right,” Trebol murmured, still toying with Doffy’s hair. “I’ll get started disentangling us in the morning, and we can be on our merry way in less than a week. Sooner, if we happen to need to.”
The idea of leaving tugged a question Doflamingo had been avoiding asking from his lips. “Rosi— you never found him, did you?”
“I kept looking, Doffy,” Pica said quietly.
Corazon rested shoulder-to-shoulder with him, and huffed softly and sadly. “Pica was lookin’ every day…I helped look too. We never saw a trace of him. I’m sorry, Doffy.”
“None of the locals saw him either,” Diamante added, “I kept an ear out.”
Doffy put on a brave face, fighting the urge to sink down in his chair. The truth was, he didn’t even know if Rosi could have fed himself without him. The thought of his brother dying– alone and frightened without him— flashed through his mind and he fought down a whining noise. But rage followed despair like thunder follows lightning. If Rosi had died, it wasn’t Doffy’s fault. Doffy had done everything he could have for him.
Even his new friends had done everything they could, it seemed.
“It’s alright,” Doffy said, trying not to let his voice shake. “I lost my whole family, I guess. But I found all of you.”
He looked around the table at them, remembering the warmth of their hands on his as they stood together outside.
Vergo’s hand patted against his back, and the young man was giving him his best smile , his glasses tipped down his nose.
“I’m glad you did, Doffy. We never met someone half as amazin’ as you…I kept hopin’ we might see you again. Remember guys? I kept asking if he was gonna join the gang..”
“He did, he did,” Trebol nodded. “And I would have never wished you bad luck on your journey but I’m glad you came back here, Doffy. You belong with us.”
“Sure seems like,” Diamante added. “Cheer up, Doffy. None of us here have anybody but each other. And you’re an amazing addition to our ‘family’.”
“It’s true,” Pica said, softly.
Doflamingo smiled, basking in the attention, and the praise, and the feeling of warmth and acceptance. It was exactly what he’d been longing for on the endless nights on his flight from Mary Geoise.
“I’m glad then,” Doffy said. He lifted his chin. “We can leave whenever it suits you all. There’s no use waiting up for my brother any longer.”
Vergo rubbed his back with a small nod. “Getting excited for our next destination? Next stop… wherever it is…we can pull a job together.”
A flash of excitement shot through Doffy at the thought, eager to show the others what he could do since they’d seemed so impressed. And if they were criminals, and if he was becoming a criminal, so what?
Doflamingo’s father had been wrong about everything he’d ever said, as far as Doffy was concerned. If he thought that criminals were the bad sort of people, Doffy thought that it was obvious that he was wrong about that, too.
He smiled brightly. “I can’t wait!”