Inspired By @st-osmanthus Most Recent Post, Do You Think Luffy Spent The Two Year Timeskip, And Everytime

inspired by @st-osmanthus most recent post, do you think luffy spent the two year timeskip, and everytime he looked at rayleigh he saw so much of zoro?

he saw a man as powerful, as incredible and as kind as zoro is, but there is an air of tragedy that hangs around rayleigh with every step he takes. do you think he looked at rayleigh and saw a mirror of themselves apart from rayleigh had lost roger. zoro had lost him.

do you think every time he looked at rayleigh he felt reinvigorated to get stronger, not just of his own motivation, but seeing the aftermath of a righthand man without his captain. aimless, impossibly strong, yet lethargic somehow. never quite completely recovered from the loss that roger was to him, lonely and wondering, like zoro had been when he first met him.

and when zoro came back after the timeskip with the same scar that he had looked at for two years on rayleigh’s eye. do you think that cemented every parallel luffy had ever pondered between them?

on a sweeter note, do you think everything he admired about rayleigh as the righthand man of the pirate king, he smiled knowing zoro would become just like him, if not cooler? he was taught so much of what he knows by a man that echos zoro completely, and he must’ve felt so proud knowing what they will become. rayleigh *is* zoro’s counterpart to luffy, because luffy will become pirate king, and rayleigh is the righthand man of the pirate king that came before him. do you think he was happy whenever he saw rayleigh complain about getting old, imagining a day where zoro would get grey hair too.

the ache he must feel looking at the grief that encompasses rayleigh whole, silently promising to never do that to zoro, the pride he must feel when rayleigh showcases unquantifiable strength, the happiness when rayleigh laughs just like zoro. i wonder