(Warning I have no idea what I’m doing when I draw, if something isn’t accurate or anatomical/shading wise correct, oops. I apologies to the people who had to study this stuff for hours, I ain't built like that)
Spoilers for KANGVCD ahead
So recently I was re-reading my all-time favourite fanfic KANGVCD (@okiedoketm) and there was this one line that stuck out to me towards the end of the Drum Island Arc.
“I recognize a soldier when I see one.”
It got me thinking. If Koby could clock Dalton as ex-military who's to say other soldiers (ahem ahem marines) wouldn’t notice that in Koby?
Maybe Smoker didn’t pay too much attention to it at first, but that little pink dude carried himself in a way that almost seemed... familiar?
Maybe when Koby barked orders on the marine ship or when he disciplined the rookie marine squadron, they had the instinct to listen, to obey his orders?
I think it would be cool if this was explored later on (and maybe even caused problems for Koby). Like, the first time Koby runs into Garp this timeline Garp recognizes his own training and movement on this punk his no-good pirate grandson has on his crew. He searches for any record of enlistment, any documentation of a pink-haired, scrawny kid from the East Blue joining the marines but nothing.
Maybe Garp will investigate, maybe he'll just look away and pretend he hadn't seen it.
Or maybe another marine notices? One who won't turn a blind eye? Who doesn't care that there's no record they know navy when they see it (and few “missing” files is easy to accept when the marines have a practice of “disappearing” unsavory members). One who when he looks into Koby’s eyes sees a traitor. A deserter. One who notifies the head office and has Koby’s bounty raised, because there is nothing worse than a marine-turned-pirate.
And then the whole world would know.
All it would do is feed into Koby’s insecurities.
He DID abandon his dream. He DID betray his friends, his mentor, himself.
And what would the crew think when they find out?
How could he explain? How could he deny? When it’s etched into every muscle in his body.
It explains why he knows so much about the Grandline, why his eyes flit around the room in trained assessment, why even zoned out he stands stiff, as if he’s waiting for orders.
Would a crew so affected by the system stand to have one of its cogs aboard the ship?
(Of course they would, they all have their secrets, but Koby wouldn't see that.)
Luffy knew though, he believed as much when Koby first told him. He had no problems with this. How could he when all Koby wanted was to follow his dream? To do good without orders or protocol to stop him (To be free). Because Luffy would never interfere in his Nakama’s dreams. He would never command or order them in the way a marine would.
Luffy may have been Koby’s captain, but Koby wasn’t his soldier.
And yet Koby in the eyes of the world (and himself) would be just that.
Koby who loves his life with the Strawhats. Who has only ever lived as a pirate in this timeline. Who has finally begun to move on, is forever marked by his past lives. He will always be a marine one way or another, he can never forget, and the world will never let him.
How nauseating it must be to forever live in your own shadow. How comforting to never change in a way that matters. How terrifying to be defined by what you no longer are.
(I wrote this at 3 AM if you couldn't tell)