#dadodile

PROPAGANDA:

[Kinger]

"He just seems like a nice dad."

"I mean… just look at him! (Jokes aside, he’s a fantastic father-figure to a decent chunk of the cast."

[Crocodile]

"There's a pretty solid theory that he's the main character's birthing parent, so like he has prior experience.

Almost definitely transgender and we need more tmpreg rep.

World seems designed to give him a migraine, so he's the sort of person who would get knocked up for plot reasons.

It'd be hot, he'd be so flustered about it."

Luffy ending up at cross guild. Crocodile seeing Luffy as a little kid, first time seeing his son this young and is instantly in overprotective dad mode Buggy gets to close and he's thrown through multiple walls. Man is walking around with little Luffy constantly on his shoulders.

Zoro ends up somehow wondering there and even this little is trying to attack Mihawk who is looking at even feral-er version of his student coughsonscough, kid is basically trying to bite him and Mihawk is looking very proud.

Turns out they're deaged to worst moment of life so basically worst point in tragic backstories.

Cross guild (basically Mihawk and Crocodile) decide plans are to track down remaining straw hats before marines. Buggy is on finding them duty and he is just like what the fuck, surrounded by these traumatized kids and having to be responsible adult and- no wonder your all so crazy what the actual fuck!

He finds Brook and is like 'Oh thank god please take them I am not meant to be a responsible adult oh my god'

All of them end up back at cross guild while trying to figure this out.

All the other pirates are just staring at bunch of kids playing with each other all who look a fucking lot like all of the straw hats...and a man who chilling around who looks a lot the soul king if he was not a skeleton.

Sir Crocodile is just waking around with a kid who looks exactly like straw hat on his shoulders and refuses to acknowledge it.

Crocodad angst because i was in the mood.

I fully accept Crocomom / Dadodile as fact. If it turns out not to be the case, that's okay, because I will still like it and read and write it anyway.

My rationale (SPOILERS for Impel Down, Marineford, Dressrosa, and Cross Guild, plus a post-Wano reference):

1. Ivankov stated in Impel Down that they gave Crocodile something that Croc would not want to become public knowledge- a fact that made Croc instantly sweat bullets and STFU. Noteworthy because what does Iva give people? HORMONES. That suggests at what, but not why. Stay with me.

2. When Luffy's parentage (Dragon) was announced at Marineford, you could clearly see dots connecting in Crocodile's head as he executed the fastest goddamn face turn in history.

3. Croc then proceeded to identify one of the most dangerous people on the battlefield (Doffy, whom Luffy was at this point blatantly unready to fight), and keep him thoroughly occupied. This is of enormous significance because Croc at this point was also outclassed. Croc had not yet been shown to possess ANY Haki, while Doffy is a Conqueror, so Croc likely knew full well that he could get stomped. Plus Croc was likely half-starved and not at full strength, being newly escaped from prison. This was a desperate action, despite how cool and closed-mouthed Croc was trying to be. I suspect that he normally would not have been successful- but there is no defense against a fist (or hook) full of love.

I believe that Crocodile, under his dead name, was a Kuja at one time. I think he met Dragon, they got entangled, and Croc got simultaneously pregnant and lovesick.

Lovesickness is a real, physical ailment that can afflict the Kuja, and it can be fatal.

Unfortunately, Croc and Dragon's goals and needs drew them in different directions.

I believe Croc had the baby (Luffy), met up with Dragon exactly one (1) additional time to hand the infant over, told Dragon to figure it TF out, and marched his miserable postpartum ass straight to Momoiro Island and Ivankov.

Flipping his gender had two purposes in my mind: One, it turned potentially fatal lovesickness into a survivable but still wretched emotional state; and two, it may honestly be that Croc was trans all along and the change gave him some peace as well.

But because Croc last saw Luffy as an infant, he wouldn't know about Foosha Village or Garp or any of that. He didn't have a way to know that his son was raised by mountain bandits, wild animals, and other feral children including Gol D Roger's son. And I don't know if he would have wanted to know, either, because that might be super painful and possibly dysphoria inducing.

Consequently, what we see in Marineford is the culmination of these events. A trans man in his 40s discovering that he attempted to kill his own child more than once, and that said child is now both a colossal force for good, and a chaotic little shitgoblin with zero self-preservation instinct.

I also believe that Cross Guild is an excellent way to rebuild Croc's life while simultaneously addressing one of Luffy's most consistent problems- the Marines- without it being obvious that he is helping.

We can also look at Luffy's appearance for hints.

As he gets older, he looks more and more like Dragon and Garp. Gear 4 Bounce Man looks staggeringly like Garp, and Snake Man (thematic much?) looks a lot like Dragon. The thing is, though, look at Gear 5. Observe how the texture of Luffy's hair changes, his jaw gets sharper, his brow lighter, and overall his design is just a little prettier. I think that what we are seeing there is the ghost of pre-transition Crocodile.

Have this silly little comic. (Update: the title)