Hours seemed to be dragging on like years. Minutes even, seemed like they would never end. He had signed up based on the spirit of adventure, this seriously wasn't what he had in mind. Sitting atop of his stool, the official Marine stool, looking down the street, he couldn't help but think that he had made a mistake in signing back up. Sure, the pay was great and it sure beat what he was doing before, but he couldn't sink the feeling that he might be wasting his time. Leaning back against the tree he had placed his stool by, his eyes scanned over the park once more, searching out for anything that might prove to be slightly interesting. 'Protect the park from law-breakers.' That was literally all he had been given as an order, something that seemed completely ridiculous considering how far spread they were right now. Maybe that was just the usual job they gave to the newbies? But it wasn't his first time with the Marine's either. "Fucking management." He scowled under his breath, arching out his back and feeling his bones crack from the strain. Still, it wasn't like it was hard work at all. Sitting here under a tree while the clouds rolled past, it could almost be called relaxing if he wasn't checked up on every hour. Dressed in his Marine uniform and with how docile this park usually was, he doubted there would be any trouble.

It was a nice day to be outside in Loguetown! The clouds rolled by slowly as the sun shone down on them; the blue sky making her feel cheerful as the swimsuit-clad woman happily skipped into the park so that she could start playing her guitar for those that wished to stop by and listen on such a nice day. Hure Verkehr had no intent on doing any kind of singing today, unless someone wanted to pay to do so of course, and fully intended to just keep this as an instrumental only ordeal.

The female fishman found a place that had plenty of shade, so that those that may gather could have some cooler places to hang out with her. There seemed to be one person, just far enough away for her to not realize what exactly they were, that was sitting down in the shade a little ways down. They were in a chair so they must have been there for some time, or at least planned to be. After getting her guitar tunes and ready the girl would begin to play a few notes and chords before beginning to play a song that she found pleasing to her ears, a song that went by the name of Stairway to Heaven. While the lyrics had a creepy way to them, in her opinion at least, she really enjoyed the entirety of the guitar part to it; a fitting thing to play for a relaxing day in the part.

Shading his eyes from the harsh sun as he looked out over the park, the deep green grass swaying in the wind had an almost hypnotic effect on him, like the pendulum from a hypnotist, slowly sending him into a slumber. He felt his lids grow heavy. How long was it till his next checkup, thirty minutes? That was more than enough time for a snooze. He could recall something similar happening in a few fairy tales, usually just as the bad guy went about putting their plan into action. Shaking his head, as if to bring himself out of his boredom induced coma, he returned to focusing on his duties, no matter how boring they may be.

His attention was pulled away however, by someone breaking the one rule he had put in place in the park. It was such that he had even put signs up for the bloody thing. How you could go out of your way just to break that, you would have to be some piece of shit. Pushing himself off his stool, the anorexic Mink stride towards her, with a swagger of someone who finally after hours of waiting had something to do. "Hey!" He shouted out as he increased his pace to a brief run. "Can't you read the damn sign?" He thumbed towards the blue sheet of metal which read 'NO STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN' in large bold white letters. Honestly, some people could just be misfits of the absolute worst kind around, goodness gracious.

She was about a quarter of the way through the job when the person in their chair got up. Enjoying herself as she played, a few people sitting around and listening to what she was playing, the woman paid no mind to what the being moving in her direction might be doing. It was not until the other shouted that she would focus on him, still not missing a note, and listened to him start to yell at her for something silly.

"Oh. I am terribly sorry my good sir! I wasn't really paying attention to any signage and what not when I was making my way over here!" It was as she was saying those words that she realized it was a marine standing before her, his clothing giving the mink away. "In apology, I will gladly play any song you like. If I have not heard of it you can sing it and I will play along behind you the first time so that I can memorize it." The female was good on her word for that. One did not get to be a professional musician without having an ear for music. The guy probably could have farted and she would make a song out of it. Though that would be one, very, odd song to have to sing to a crowd. And just imagine those instrumentals! All that bass that would have to be used, and then maybe some trumpets and a few other special instruments to get the other notes you would need!

"Stairway denied." He smirked watching as she succumbed to his orders, like some kind of dog trained to chase after a ball or bring the newspaper in. It was obedience like that you could rely on, the kind of people who wouldn't do so much as speak back against you when you ordered them around. He didn't know how they worked, he probably never could. If he was in her shoes he would almost certainly, after some groping, tell himself to fuck off. Yet, instead she joined the masses who saw the 'No Stairway to Heaven' sign and didn't question it in the slightest. They may only be masses of four people, but it still counted god damn it.

"I don't give a rats ass what it is that you play." He snarled, malice and cockiness dripping from the tone of his voice, as if he was that one kid at Show an' Tell who was bragging about how great his holiday past the Grandline was to all the poor kids. "You could play Rule Britania for all I care, you fish faced fuck." His eyes narrowed at the disapproving looks he was getting from the crowd, annoyed that they would disagree with him. "That's the problem with people these days, they can't just say 'yes sir, sorry sir, won't happen again sir.' They've gotta push their fuckin' life style down your throat. I don't give a fuck if you're some traveling hippy, as long as you're not some traveling hippy playing Stairway to Heaven."

Well someone had gotten up on the wrong side of bed, or maybe he had just born that way. At the point it may be Maybelline with how much of an attitude the guy suddenly was giving to her simple attempt at trying to avoid trouble. The urge to reach out and touch somebody was strong, real strong. The thought to lay the smack down on the marine would not be carried out for real, but it would be there for a while with the racist comments spewing from him. Even her little crowd that was here was seemingly surprised with his statements. Maybe he was just that bored. Amusing himself by yelling at her and degrading her in person to a point that was just plain disrespectful. "Well then, guess I'll play a different song than. Sorry for trying to be polite." It was hard to make the words come out without an attitude, and maintaining a soft smile at the same time. Even so, the woman began to start strumming some of Rule Britannia as some of the crowd began to calm down and look back at her. She did not want a fight here, even if the other guy only wanted to fight. Irrational hatred and racism was just uncalled for. It made you appear ignorant, stupid, and the woman hoped that the man could change his ways so that the mink  would be able to see the beauty in life for once. A small group of children came running through as she played, two girls and a boy, and continued to run around in the area they were all in.

He have a short approving nod, looking much like a toddler who had just gotten exactly what he wanted. A very big toddler, sure, but a toddler none the less. It would almost be comical if not for the thousand yard stare on his face. Finally satisfied with the situation as it was, he turned ready to leave, only he still had one thought nagging at his mind, like a small thread threatening to pull a blanket apart. He slowly lumbered back to his post while the cogs inside his brain turned, trying to dig up whatever it was about the girl that had seemed so familiar. He was certain he hadn't seen her before, not in Logue Town at least, that was for sure. You didn't see many fish fuckers around here, and he would certainly remember it. As Rule Britania hit its high, it finally clicked. Spinning on his heel, he hurried back, but this time with as much of a dorky smile as he could manage. One hand over head in a wave he yelled out, "My god, cousin Petunia, how could I forget you." It had been too long since he had seen this part of his family, it was natural that he might forget a few details, like her being part fish. "I'm so sorry. I haven't seen you since the wedding, god you look so much older, not in a bad way of course, just more, uhh, mature. Bloody hell, how's Craig doing that old dog?" He sounded jovial, pleasantly surprised at the situation.

Rule Britannia was actually amusing to play. It was much different than what she played most of the time. It wasn't as fast paced, nor did it have gritty or dark lyrics with it. Just as the female fishman was getting into it she would be distracted, startled really, by the marine that had just finished messing with her. At first she thought he was going to say something else racist, or some other kind of hate speech. Instead, he had a retarded ass grin on his face as he began speaking to her as if she was a familiar face.

The familiar face was that of a cousin, oh boy. This was about to get weird. The girl had had no family outside of the fishman race, so this one was obviously misunderstanding who she was. But if she said so he would be embarrassed in front of a lot of people, and she could not do that to him; even if he did deserve it. "Wait, is that really you? Leroy? Larry? Damn it's been so long that I don't remember how to say your name! I...uh...I'll take that as a compliment on my beauty, at least I think I should right? And Craig? He's still being Craig. Is there any better way to describe him? Well, other than being even grumpier than he ever has!" The woman would keep a happy look on her face the entire time. If there was something she was good at it was acting, it was a life-saving skill when a slave.

"That fucking Craig, dude. I'll tell you what he got into some shit, you know what I mean, dude? Like, a lot of fucking shit. Not in a like, bad way, you know? Like, he was a fucking busy man, saw some busy things, got shit fucking done. He still tryin' to keep that hair up, the crazy fucking bastard, we were tellin' him to shave back when we still worked in the coal mine together. It used to look jet black back then, too, because of the soot and stuff, right? Jet black hair, but balding like a desert. Like, his hair is, like the water for the desert, you know? Don't even think about it actually, just forget it. You know how we do it, huh? You know we got it on, yeah. We tight, we tight." He paused, to rub the spit that had accumulated on his lips, wishing he could stop being terrorized by the black strand of hair firing one bolt of injustice from his nose, piercing into the heavens. He felt it godly, an experience unique in its own, to be commanded to shame by something so small, so insignificant. He wore this evil with a look of honor, of justice, or so he would believe, in truth his embarrassment was completely childlike. "You two still get around like you used to, back when the train still went through. We used to ride it to work, when you were at the bakery, can you recall, Paige?"

It seemed this marine was going to talk her ear off. That wasn't good, not at all. Hure was not sure she could keep up the facade if this Mink decided to keep on talking about more people that he knew. Unfortunately for her that was exactly what the Marine did. Well, looks like she would have to do some more ad lib and hope for the best. If anything he would take what the female mermaid said as truth, or at least not think much of it, due to how long ago he seemed to be acting like it was. If she got found out she would just have to run, and with as fast as she was there was a good chance she could escape without being injured in the process.

"Yeah, Craig is still like that after all this time! Though you'd be surprised how much better he looks with a shaved head! It took so many people to talk him into it. The anger he had at first was insane. He HATED how he looked at first, swore up and down he would get payback for getting talked into it. He stopped after a week or so, kinda got used to it ya know?" The last part worried her. It was starting to get even more personal. "We still get around, just not like we used to. I tend to travel a bit more so I can play for people and enjoy myself. Gets a bit dangerous, but I just gotta hope for the best." The woman put on a look of deep thought. "I'm trying to remember a Paige. It's been so long now."

His jovial smile fell away, revealing a narrow glare underneath, a gaze that could kill a man firing out streams of daggers. "Paige." He repeated, followed by a silence that fell over them like a cloud of molasses tugging them into an awkward mess of anger and unspoken sentences. His eyes closed and narrowed, as if trying to send some silent message through his eyes to the young girl, a personal sentence from him to her. She would understand, Petunia would definitely understand, there was no way that she couldn't. "Sleep was necessary for man when his waking and unconscious lives were separated. As Eternals achieved total consciousness. Sleep became obsolete and Second Level meditation took its place." His hand moved to his chin, waiting for her response, waiting to see just how she would take the news. It was never easy getting bad news from home, but something like this was even worse. "With me died Adonais; till the future dares forget the past, his fate and fame shall be an echo and a light unto eternity!" He ran his hand over his head, wondering if there was anything that he was missing out from the situation. He turned, waving over his shoulder as he strutted away, not wanting to be around when she figured out exactly what the bad news meant. “Goodbye! Goodbye! Nice to have seen you again.” With that he headed off back to his seat under the tree, relishing the silence in his isolation.

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