The First Lesson is Always the Hardest

[SnowDog]

“Hey! C’mon, let me go!” a young voice called out between the jingling of chains. “I didn’t even do anything!” Two marine officers had the restrained half-blood held up by his arms, carting him down the line of barred cells.

“Like hell you didn’t!” One of the marines retorted back, “Disrupting the populace by declaring yourself a pirate?! Then fighting back against the on-duty officers?! You got a lot of nerve to call yourself innocent!”

“They attacked me first...” Goji weakly responded, unaware of the sea stone cuffs they had restrained him into was the reason he felt his strength sapped away. Curse these Marines and their magic shackles! If he could transform he’d be able to break out of these in no time!

Their brief walk soon came to an abrupt end as the marines had reached the cell. After unhatching the lock, Goji was unceremoniously tossed inside like a sack of dirty laundry, the half-blood slamming back first onto the ground with a loud thud.

“There, you can hang out with the other troublemaker for a bit while we sort out what to do with you.” The marine stated matter-of-factly while brushing the dust off his hands. Both officers turned their backs to the cell block and made their departure. Goji struggled to worm his way up against the wall, grunting and hissing as he tried his best to lean up against it with what little energy he had. He took a couple of exasperated sighs before looking down at his cuffs, tugging against the chain to see if he could remove them.

“What kind of magic is this...” He wondered aloud. Well there wasn’t anything he could do about it now, looks like he was locked up and going be here for a while. Might as well make the most of it. The half monkey turned his attention to the other denizen of the cell block, a shaggy red headed fellow about the same age as himself. Goji’s eyes brightened at the sight, at least now there was someone he could converse with while they waited.

“Hey there, buddy!” The monkey boy happily exclaimed, “Looks like we’re gonna be cell mates for the time being! I’m Goji, by the way!”

[Flame]

"Unfortunate ..." He said to himself as he sat alone in his cell. To be honest, he was not quite sure what he was doing here. He was not a wanted man, at least not yet. What he'd done was a bit, excessive perhaps, but in jail? Even one as simple as this one, it was quite unfortunate. Ahh well, to live and to learn, he was certainly proud of what he'd been doing at the time of the arrest.

Mars tipped his cap towards the marine who was walking by checking on the other denizens of the lockup. Given that they didn't consider him a pirate the practice about how the marines were treating him was slightly better. Though he'd still prefer his freedom to whatever this was. The marine glanced at him for a moment and thne kept on walking. "Hey friend, don't ignore me now." He didn't know the exact details but he'd heard he was gonna be in here for at least the night, if not more. Which in some ways wasn't a particularly bad thing. Despite it being cramped and uncomfortable, it did give him a free roof over his head. He glanced up at the ceiling and grinned to himself. Maybe he should more-

The clinking of chains and the clang of the bell as the prison door opened up alerted him of the arrival of someone new. Escorted by a pair of marines the character was brought up to Mars' exact cell and then tossed in. Mars blinked, he'd not been expecting company, not at all. He glanced at the character realizing now what he'd seen was stranger than he'd thought in the moment.

Whoever this was they were furry nearly all over, showing fur about their face and definitely about the limbs. It was as strange as any sight he'd seen thus far in his life. If not more. His attention paid to the man was quickly matched by the new cellmate meeting his eyes. As he looked straight on Mars was unsure of what about this man seemed familiar given how off he looked. And then he spoke, naming himself Goji. Mars smiled back, not to be outdone at the veryy least.

"Nice to meet ya Goji. You can call me Mars, Mars B. Lizst." He said with a wave of his hand. "Not to be blunt but, what the hell are you? Definitely don't look human ..." It was the first question on his mind and he wanted to get it answered soon enough.

[SnowDog]

Goji looked at his fellow cell mate somewhat puzzled. The red-headed fellow introduced himself as Mars B. Lizst. Well it was good to get his name at least, know who exactly he was locked in with.

“Well, you’re half right!” Goji said, letting out a chuckle before the draining effects of his seastone cuffs cut him off preemptively. “But I’ve also got parts like a monkey does. I never met my dad before so I can’t say if I got it from him or what. Maybe he had some kind of it Devil fruit and this is just a byproduct of it? You know anything on if it works like that?”

While he awaited for a response from Mars, the halfbreed weakly lifted his arms up to study his restraints. Something like this should’ve snapped apart from his strength alone by this point yet he felt more exhausted than he’s ever felt in his life before. Looking at his arms he noticed his fur was also darker than usual. Looks as though someone at the center of the incident had thrown ink or something on him, turning his fur a dark black hue. Goji internalized a groan at the sight, hoping it wouldn’t dye or permanently stain his fur.

“So what’re you in for?” The monkey boy inquired, changing subjects.

[Flame]

Half right? "More than I expected to be." He slid in the self-deprecating comment as Goji started to chuckle. But that did mean that the furry man was half human as well. He raised an eyebrow in appreciation of that. A halfbreed, between a human and a what? That was the real question. He'd only seen humans and maybe a few fishmen, he'd heard of merfolk, but none of them as far as he knew were furry. Well maybe some humans were ...

"Nope I can't say that I do." He responded with a shrug of his shoulder. As far as he knew he did not think he'd ever even met a devil fruit user. Unless ... "Don't think I've ever met a devil fruit user. Or a child of one for that matter" He knew what the accursed fruit were, just did not know any user of one in particular or any offspring of such either. While he considered himself an experienced man of the sea at this point. His experience was pretty limited to the North Blue, and a bit of his hometown of Cinna. The furry man groaned distracting Mars from his internalized thoughts. Mars glanced up towards the man once more earning himself another question.

The questioned brought pause to Mars. Not because he did not know the reason that he'd been brought in. He knew very well the reason that he'd been brought in, though not for the reason one might guess. "Would you believe acts of piracy and destruction of property?" Mars asked curiously. They were reasonable reasons, that surely applied to him. They just were not the truth in this case. But the swashbuckler waited for a few moments to see if he'd get a response before continuing.

"Because those were not the reason." He grinned and smiled. There was no reason to lie about something like this. "I've never been pinned to a reason like that." He did not deny that he didn't do it, but the point was there was no bounty on him for something like that. "I'm in here for a bout of public indecency in town."

Mars burst into laughter remembering fondly the moment. Also the painful headache that had followed it, but he was close to over it by now. He could look back fondly at the moment. "Too much booze. Is the short of it unless you want the long tale?"

[SnowDog]

Goji's ears perked up upon hearing the mention of piracy. Despite quickly following up with a quick retort stating he never actually took part in any acts of it, Goji adjusted himself to where he could sit himself up crossed-legged and diverted his full attention towards Mars.

"Only if you want! It still sounds pretty wild!" The half-blood responded to Mars' offer to the whole story with a cheerful smile, quickly switching to share his own tale for imprisonment in an effort to relate, "I got thrown in cuz I'm looking to be a pirate! I'm here looking to start up a crew but I guess it's frowned upon to openly ask around." Goji looked back down at his shackles and pondered any other ways he could escape their magic hold. He weakly jangled his chains against the ground trying to break them against the floor to no avail.

"I mean if you don't ask, how are you suppose to get a crew going?"

[Flame]

Mars considered for a second, if only he wanted to huh. "Maybe I'll tell you the story some other time then. It's a good one, but a bit personal and definitely not first meeting material." He said with a cackle of laughter. He hummed happily to himself remembering the time.

The furry-human, Goji, in turn related his own reason for being here in the cell with Mars. His eyes shifted, an eyebrow raising in reaction to the explanation he was getting. Not a pirate but looking to be one? Honestly Mars was not sure what that meant. The latter part was definitely more understandable. He laughed amused by the concept of just going out and about openly gathering a crew. Especially here at a town that clearly had a marine base.

"How indeed. Unfortunately I'm not really the one to ask for that. My sister would know better than I." He said with a roll of his eyes. His sister was already out leading a crew of her own, he on the otherhand had been part of two dead crews, both captains gone. But he smiled for he liked this kid's optimism and enthusiasm for it at the very least.

The swashbuckler glanced up and down the jail cells eyeing the area for any sign of marines nearby. While he was still under the radar he'd prefer to not out himself. "But yes as you suspect, you cannot just go around openly asking people if they want to be a pirate." Mars said sticking his finger forward. "At the very least, not in public in towns where the Marines operate. That's just asking to be captured." Maybe he could help this kid a little. Teach him some lessons on what Mars had learned through his own experiences. Because while he'd never gotten a crew going he had been recruited twice, though not under normal circumstances he had to admit.

He paused thinking about how he was going to convey this properly. Perhaps he should start simpler. "The how you do it, I suspect will be unique to each person. But maybe I can help nonetheless. Maybe we should start with thos. Why do you want to be a pirate?"

[SnowDog]

Goji listened to the red-headed man intentively as he told him about his first mistake as a pirate. There was a moment where the half-breed couldn't really comprehend why exactly he was wrong here. "Why wouldn't I just ask people? Surely there are some people out there looking to join a crew, why not just be upfront about it?" The next question Mars had asked him snapped him back into reality. His dream? With only the briefest moment of hesitation, the half-breed responded.

"I'm after Gold Roger's fortune." He answered very matter of factly, the usual happy-go-lucky tone he had been speaking with prior disappearing into a sterner tone. "Growing up, money for my mom and I was always tough to come by. I'm going to find that treasure so that we don't have to worry about such things anymore." He looked down at his restraints once more and remembered the conversation he and his mother had shared a few years ago, the day he learned his dad wasn't coming back. He didn't want to leave his mother as his dad had before, he was going to return with the treasure he had promised her.

The serious tone he had delivered to Mars faded just as fast as it arrived before Goji returned his focus to trying to remove his magic handcuffs, bringing the shackles to his mouth as he made an attempt to try and gnaw them off to no avail.

"Sho yeah, dash my dream." He said amongst brief moments of chewing. "You phink I might have a chansh?"