Mikoto's Escape Plan...
And the Jail's Final Strategy!
Mikoto turned his head upwards ignoring the four guards at his feet and the other three or four charging at him now. "HEY! CREW!" If Rosa's voice had carried throughout the prison then so will his. "LET'S BREAK OUT!" the entire crew reacted to this news along with several of the prisoners who were on the crew. They jumped up and grabbed a hold of the bars and started to shout like monkeys. Zesiro smirked, a little bit amazed by his captain's personality once more. It was bound to come down to something that was this stupid when you put his mind to something like this. However, in the end wasn't that why he had joined up with him in the first place to see how far that crazy kid could go?
Hiro-shu shuffled forward. He was a little bit sore from the heavy onslaught of gunfire he had faced when they first entered the floor, but he was ready for it. He moved towards the iron bars and readied himself for the break-out, whatever was Mikoto's plan was bound to be complete and total trouble. It would make a mess out of his prison and whatever else they planned on touching, but Hiro-Shu just chuckled and laughed. This is what he had signed up.
Maria was relaxing, the guards had took extra preventive measures in removing her limbs, but that was how they had met in the first place. She was locked up with her limbs removed after some stupid fight and they came and rescued her, so once more she found herself placing her trust and her life in these guys' hands, however this time she knew they'd pull through. There wasn't any doubt in her mind about that. She had lost count the number of times she had come to rely on these valuable friends of hers.
"Hear that?" Ridley boasted to the rest of the prisoners, "my escape plan in action!" He nodded proudly with his eyes only slightly open, where he can see the faces on the prisoners around him. They all looked very impressed, although some of them didn't seem to be completely buying Ridley's posturing. However, in the end they didn't want to risk not being accepted in the prison riot by turning him down, so they all cheered. Ridley paused for a second as he noticed one bellowing voice was strangely absent from the raucous cheering. Surely if he had been cheering Ridley would be in the corner of his cell, cringing in pain from the loud laugh. "What's the matter, Monsuta? Don't you wanna be free?"
"It has been awhile…since I've dreamed of freedom," he said as he shifted uncomfortably to the side, his massive bulk made it impossible for him to get out of the small confides of his cell. "But now I can see it…WE'LL BE OUT OF HERE BY SUNRISE!" His loud voice shook the entire prison as he let it out running at full blast. "FU HA HA HA HA! I look forward to getting out of here and seeing how much the sea has changed."
"How long have you been locked up?" asked Ridley walking over to the side of his cell to listen to Monsuta's story. He sat down and just started to relax, not much else he could especially not until Mikoto gets his butt in gear and starts going. He suppose it was worth his time to hear somebody else's story.
"Well," began Monsuta, "it has probably been half a year to a full year." Ridley nodded, Monsuta had mentioned earlier he had heard about Zesiro and Mikoto, but no one else. Mikoto and Zesiro had had bounties for about that amount of time now. It made perfect sense that he would've heard of them, especially since their bounties were fairly impressive for two newbies. Unlike his which he admitted didn't showcase his full talent, but who knows with him beating Karasu now his bounty would probably take an unexpected jump. He smiled as he thought of that. "Before that I was trying to walk in the footsteps of the heroes! Fisher Tiger and Jimbei! I freed many slaves and amongst the Fishman community people even started calling me the 'Freedom Giant'. Imagine that...me, someone that people actually look up to…you know, figuratively rather than literally, everybody looks up to me literally. Fu HA HA HA!
"I suppose though, I wasn't necessarily doing this to become famous. I just wanna free my fellow brethren, become like my hero, and also there is a very special person I want to meet out on the seas," Monsuta's voice fell solemn at that last notion. "Some people say it's just a dream…a kid's fantasy, but I say that man does exist…the man who will become the next King of the Pirates. He's out there somewhere and when I meet him, I'll be able to return home with my head held high. My title and bounty means absolutely nothing to me compared to that dream." Suddenly the entire prison floor erupted in laughter.
"Ha ha ha!" the laughed in unison, the pirates all getting up to get the bars and jabbing their fingers at the dreamer. "Listen to this bloke, man! The King of the Pirates! Hah! Why don't you tell us about unicorns next!?" Monsuta's face fell, he was apparently used to this kind of bashing and just reclined himself to take it. "I swear every so often there's a dreamer like you out there, who plans on seeing the next King of the Pirates. Here's the thing in case you haven't heard. There is no future for the King of the Pirates! The One Piece doesn't even exist! Remember the last pirate king's ship, it was a wreck, if I were them and I had my hands on the ultimate treasure I would've replaced that wreck the first chance I got! Conquering the entire seas like the last crew did was just a rumor cooked up by the Marines. They found some high-priced Pirate, called him Pirate King, and then executed him as a show of force. Believing in fairy tales will you get killed out here, man! HA HA HA! The sea's no place for dreamers!"
Ridley smiled and laid back looking up at the ceiling. "Anyone who just laughed…just stay in your goddamn cells." The prisoners around him shut up instantly and looked over at him, even Monsuta rolled around a bit forward to try and look at him. "If the One Piece doesn't exist, then we'll just make it ourselves. If our dream is impossible, we'll make it possible. The title of Pirate King exists only to those who have never stopped believing, not even once! You say that 'the sea's no place for dreamers'? I say this sea is a pirate's dream! And I challenge anyone of you to say differently!"
"What the?" asked one of the pirates, "what makes you think that you are so high-and-might?!" The pirates suddenly turned on their would-be savior, walking up to the front of their cells and reaching for him in a futile attempt, but they did appear to be an angry mob the entire cell who once thought of him as their friend, suddenly found him as their enemy.
"He's my Musician!" shouted Mikoto as he rounded the corner and up to Ridley's cell. Ridley mouthed the words 'First Mate', holding on to his imaginary title. "In other words," Mikoto turned to face the pirates within their cells and shot them a beaming look that could only be found on someone who hadn't given up on their dreams, "He's the Musician of the next Pirate King's crew!" The prisoners growled and sneered at them. They waved them on muttering about how they wouldn't want to be saved by some lily-livered boys any way. That is until they heard the sound of their jail cells being unlocked. Mikoto had apparently nabbed the jail cell key from the torturer after Rosa 'knocked him out'.
With that the first prisoner stepped outside of his cell, he bent down and picked up the nearest chunk of stone he found. "King of the Pirates, eh? Let's see if you can withstand this!" He shouted as he brought the stone down, aiming to break Mikoto's skull open. He swiped air. He brought the stone down and hit absolutely nothing, he stood there a few more seconds, wide-eyed and mouth agape. "Where did he-?" a small brown blur came crashing in from the side, smashing into the prisoner's jaw and sending him flying right back into his jail cell.
"Like I said the next King of the Pirates is ME!" Mikoto proudly jabbed his own thumb at his chest, puffing it out while he was at it. The rest of the pirates quivered back into their cells, suddenly deciding that they probably shouldn't continue to badmouth people like these guys.
"That's why he's my captain!" laughed Ridley as he stood up and walked towards the door. "By the way the guy in the cell next to me is someone you would like so he's cool to let out as well. The rest of these suckers can just stay in here!" Ridley stuck his tongue out at them, apparently still upset at them for suddenly changing their minds and betraying. The prisoners' faces immediately fell, looking down to the ground with agony as they realized this meant another several years in this prison.
"Nope, sorry," Mikoto said as he fumbled with the keys once more, despite his quick hands he certainly seemed to have a tough time working the keys, "We need them." The prisoners' faces lit up again, happy that this just proved that there is a kind and benevolent god out there. "I figure they'd make decent cannon fodder." C-cannon fodder? The prisoners' faces fell once more, it proved that instead of a kind and benevolent god out there there is certainly is a devil. The term cannon fodder meant having them march in first to tire out the enemies, find traps, and force them to waste their ammunition. "Now we just need to find a cannon to shoot them out of." Wait…he meant to use them as cannon balls!? That was even worse!
Ridley shrugged. He didn't particularly care how the prisoners were used as long as they didn't enjoy it, they had laughed both at him and his captain's dreams! Finally the lock broke off and Ridley stepped out of it. "Any idea where my guitar is, cap?" Mikoto paused for a second and looked back up at him.
"Did you drop it somewhere?" Mikoto's question was fired off with a completely serious expression on it apparently he didn't quite understand that the prisoner's wouldn't be allowed to actually keep their weapons on them just in case of a break-out. Ridley didn't even bother replying to that message and instead just shrugged and moved out of his cell. Mikoto went over and started working on Monsuta's cell door with the keys.
"It's probably over in the guard quarters for this floor," explained Monsuta as Mikoto finally found the right key and twisted it the right way. "You guys did a pretty big job on the prison from what the prison guards had said, so they probably didn't move your weapons from this floor due to lack of hands." Ridley nodded said a quick 'thank you' and rushed off in direction of the guard quarters that Monsuta had kindly pointed him in. "Now, you might want to stand back little buddy. This won't be pretty!" Suddenly the bars on the front of the prison cell started to bulge forward as Monsuta's entire body started to return to its regular and uncompressed size. Mikoto dashed away as quickly as he could, choosing not to be in the way of the impossibly large Fishman as his entire body exploded onto the floor. "Finally…" Monsuta said as he started to stand up, "I CAN STRETCH!" Monsuta shot up, hitting the ceiling and stopping against it, forced into a hunched over position, that probably wasn't even equal to half of his true size! He expanded his arms all the way, revealing eight massive branches of arms on each side of his body. A slimy substance slid down his pure brown body as he looked around and breathed some semi-fresh air. "Man, talk about your itty bitty living space. Although I suppose it is not so itty-bitty to you normal folk. I should introduce myself again, I am Suzuki D. Monsuta, a Kraken Fishman."
Kraken Fishman? Did those things really exist? The kraken is a mythical gigantic beast that dwelled at the bottom of the sea in other words a Kraken Fishman's strength, size, and all around power level must be on a level normal beings couldn't experience. A regular Fishman's strength is said to be at a level 20 times that of a normal human. However, factor in that this man was about the size of eight hundred Fishman and you had to figure his power was thousands times greater than most regular human beings would ever be able to achieve. "Well, I suppose I ought to let you all out now." He readied a punch, surely with all this new room he may actually be capable of exercising his full-power. And at full-power…he may be capable of smashing the entire cellblock.
"WAIT!" shouted a single voice. Monsuta seemed to have barely noticed the cry as he stopped his punch and looked down at Mikoto, who was giving him the 'stop signal'. "I let you out because Ridley said you were a good guy, but the rest of these guys got to pay a price." Mikoto stated matter-of-factually. The rest of them paused, was he really thinking of money at a time like this? He really was the devil! "Okay, the price for your freedom is…one good riddle!" The entire prison block immediately fell face first to the ground at the sheer stupidity. Not only was their savior the devil, but he was idiotic devil.
"This isn't the time for you nonsense!" they shouted all of them reaching through the bars to tear apart the idiot devil. "We don't want to be a part of your stupid game!" They looked up to the gigantic Fishman, "hey, Monsuta, buddy, just forget about him! Let us all out of there like you were planning to do! Come on!"
"Actually I wouldn't mind hearing a good riddle either! Fu ha ha ha!" The prisoners once more looked depressed as none of them could figure out how to get out. Even if they did they would get stuck with these two guys leading them and which one of them wanted that?
Out of nowhere the entire ground shuddered. Mikoto managed to get his balance just in time for another shuddering shockwave shot through the ground. "What's going on?" Mikoto shouted as he looked up and at the ceiling. Something was going on, but Mikoto had no idea what and from the look on the other pirate's faces they were all clueless as well. They turned their attention to the left and saw the small window that certain cells had that gave them a clear view outside. And what they saw on the other side of the window was definitely not very reassuring.
"We're falling!" shouted the entire group of prisoners who could see outside. Mikoto quickly bolted towards the window and pounded on it. It was hard to be one hundred percent certain as the only thing on the other side of the window to base their judgment on were clouds, but it was fairly obvious. They could see the clouds drift upwards above them. And those with a decent knowledge of Skypiea's qualities knew better. The clouds didn't just suddenly shift up especially not this fast and the prison definitely wasn't placed in a danger zone like that. Which meant that they were falling!
(-With Taisho-)
Taisho, the large imposing prison warden, smiled. He stretched back and let his body let up off of the lever. There were five levers placed all around the first floor of Zenith Gaol when flipped the second floor of the prison actually descended down a few miles using thick chains to keep it tethered to the first floor where it can be recalled at the slightest whim of the prison warden. However, while the second floor was dropped it made escape impossible. Now that the second floor was completely submerged beneath the clouds they were trapped. The main staircase between the first and second floor had been severed. There were emergency override cranks located on the second floor just in case, but in order to do so they needed his, the Vice Warden's, and the Head Jailer's key cards to be pressed into the cranks. If all three of them weren't placed than the emergency override couldn't be activated. In other words, they would remain his eternal prisoners.
Taisho turned around and went to the escape pods…however, this one was made for someone like him to transfer from the first floor to the second floor in a case like this. He could just wait here and let them die when they run out of food and water, but there was no telling when that would be. If this prison came under review in that time his reputation would be tarnished and he couldn't run an efficient prison with a tarnished record. So his option was obvious…he would defeat them.
The Jailhouse Party
Oh, you guys were expecting an actual strategy and not just something that Mikoto would think of which is basically nothing, but a wild helpless charge. He's just that kind of guy. Also, um...I'm running out of things to say here. Read the chapter, review, make me a happy fanfiction author!