#cp9 doffy

[ladyluscinia]

Here's a bare bones explainer for the One Piece DonSwap!AU that me and @carrioncreations have been kicking around as we watch together, because I want something to point to if I start talking about it in posts:

So... Donquixote Swap AU:

Doflamingo and Rosinante's childhood happens the same as in canon up to the point that Doffy leaves for Marie Geoise (though technically it happens a few years later in the world timeline because we pushed some birth years around for certain age gaps). Rosi is left behind very upset, and Marines soon arrive to sweep the island. However in this AU instead of finding Rosi, Sengoku's squad thoroughly spooks him while searching for "the Celestial Dragons". Insert domino effects leading to Doffy sitting in a cell at a CP9 base while Trebol & co. are accepting they have to make it work with the 8-year-old crybaby. Both assume the other is dead.

11 years later, Rosinante is a notorious up and coming pirate in the North Blue when his dead brother miraculously reappears. He folds him into the crew as Corazon, and starts carefully ignoring that Doflamingo is possibly the most suspicious man he's ever met, won't give a single solid detail about his life before now, loves to disappear for weeks with vague explanations, and is crystal clear on the fact Corazon needs to be a fucking ghost - no government eyes, ever. Because Rosi loves his brother. And if he has to confront him, then he's a little concerned that what comes out is going to irreparably blow up their relationship. Surely this will be fine and no dying Trafalgar Laws will be traumatized.

Highlights of this AU include:

The CP9 Child Soldier Program

This Rosi meme:

Rob Lucci and other dubiously brother-shaped figures

Doffy being king of cognitive dissonance and plans that are great and will work forever so long as nothing ever goes wrong

Crime boss Rosinante being exactly as terrifying as canon Doflamingo with extra arson and immolation for spice

Rosi's grown adult brother wanting to murder his new dying 10-year-old because he's absolutely seething with jealousy and Rosi is the only one who realizes this 🤣

Law's beloved "dead" savior being a gleeful psychopath in pink feathers who has done coke in front of him and was absolutely not hiding a heart of gold, but also spent six months and nearly had a manic breakdown saving him and seemed possibly more panicked about the thought of Law dying than Law was and extra panicked that he cared in the first place, so Rosinante definitely needs to die for killing him

Doflamingo sort of faking his death to put off definitely killing his brother for as long as possible

One man's determination to protect his career slowly sprawling out into a giant cover up at the highest levels of Marine command, entirely because everyone is trying to make someone else be the guy that triggers the lose-lose timebomb of getting caught by / informing the World Government

Law rationalizing to himself: "Doffy says I'm not allowed to make the call on killing his brother, but Doffy is an idiot about Rosinante AND I'm not killing him if I destroy the factory, so..." #PlanStillOn

Dressrosa Family Screaming Match + Collateral Damage, feat. Strawhats / Revolutionaries / an Admiral / etc.

Sabo: "You've killed over 25,000 Revolutionary Army soldiers and associates that we've been able to confirm" / Doffy (fondly): "I did do that"

[ladyluscinia]

Addendum to my long DonSwap!AU post from last night about Law's time as a Donquixote Pirate and the turning point from "Corazon!Doffy sucks" to "Kill Joker!Rosinante"

So most of that post was favoring Law's perspective of events, and especially after Corazon "dies" little Law does start putting some words in his mouth to justify his own choices and recently reevaluated opinions. Canon!Law does this too. It's fun. But Law is lacking a lot of critical info back then and reaching a lot of conclusions post-Minion, so naturally there will be misunderstandings. And one in particular is worth highlighting.

Doffy is doing a lot of projecting on Law as he starts bonding with the kid properly, both as a mini-Doffy and also as a nice little brother-shaped second chance. Both versions slot nicely into the Save Law mission. But the thing is Doffy isn't just projecting his suffering as a tiny 10 year old, because Doffy's life even at 25 really sucks.

The CP9 Child Soldier Program is not in the business of taking volunteers, and graduates go straight into CP9 - an organization you can't exactly quit. Doffy has been a prisoner of the government he hates since he was 10 years old, and he's been coerced into working as their living weapon since he was 13 and understood his alternative is death (or if that's still off the table, being locked away in a windowless box until he's more convenient to get rid of). The long leash he's taking advantage of at great personal risk doesn't change that, earning the leash was literal years of effort, and if Spandine decides to pull the leash tight again he still can't stop him. The only thing he can really do about this situation is pretend it isn't happening and that he's choosing to keep doing this on a purely reward based system.

Doffy is perhaps more than a little invested in Law being free to do whatever he fucking wants, forever, without the slightest hint of being tied down. And Law being happy. Which is the natural result of the first thing.

So when Doffy finally gets around to the "learn about Law as a whole person with opinions and dreams" bit, he is sort of fishing for what would make him happy. Or what he would choose to do if he truly believed he could do anything. If that is continuing with the piracy / burning the government stuff, that's great! Doffy can ensure that easily! And Law certainly ranks it pretty high in his options. But as someone who pointedly isn't thinking about how killing people is the best part of his job but it still gets soured by the implicit coercion, he's also considering Law might want to fuck off to medical school and never do piracy again. Which he should do if that's what he wants. And it is really important he understands that he's even free to leave Rosinante if that's what he wants. But Doffy never got to the "asking Law straight out what he wants" part of the planning.

Cue Law post-Minion going back through every idle thing Corazon ever brushed off or talked around from the perspective "he was lying to me about Rosinante being a danger because he was an idiot with a giant brother sized blind spot, but he was also trying to keep me safe" and deciding some of these vague conversations and Rosinante mentions meant he probably was worried about Law working for his brother even before Rosinante killed him. And he did know Rosinante and his plans better than Law did. He was an Executive. Maybe Rosinante had nefarious plans the whole time (<- really convenient assumption for making the revenge quest as black and white as possible).

Doffy would be absolutely baffled about when exactly he supposedly tried to encourage Law to run away from his brother.