So this dragon walks into a bar... (open)

[Jyo]

It was a bright, peaceful and nice sunny day in Navalen. Very little was happening outside of the hustle and bustle of city life here. That was until an odd shadow appeared over the ground. It started out faint and got more pronounced very quickly. The people who had the sense to look up let out either screams or gasps.

This wasn't much in the way of a surprise really, after all, a dragon was swooping down for a landing in the middle of the city. This wasn't really an everyday occurrence. Some looked turned to confusion though. The dragon came in and landed, then people realized that the creature wasn't nearly as big as they may have thought. He was roughly the size of a human, aside from the tail which was as long as the body. The top of the dragon was covered in fur and it's yellow eyes looked around in wonder and confusion.

I wonder what their problem is? Thought Mason as he let his wings fold back against his body. Looking around the the people creating a circle around him, Mason gave a toothy grin and lifted one front leg to wave at everyone.
"Hello, just dropping in, how are you doing?" He said as he started walking around the town.

Most people gave him a wide berth, small or not, he was still a dragon, and this wasn't something people were really used to. before long Mason came upon a bar. He knew about alcohol, the farmer he viewed as his father drank from time to time, and he was a pleasant drunk. Mason hadn't drank booze before, he figure it sounded like an interesting idea.

Opening the door and walking in, he was a little oblivious to the people staring at him as he walked up to the bar. Rearing up he put both front legs up and had the hands/feet resting on the bar.
"Hey, what's a good thing for a new drinker to sample?" He asked.

The the bartender was a pretty open-minded guy, he was nice and welcoming o his patrons. When he came out from the back to get behind his bar again, he was in for something of a surprise. A furry human sized dragon was at the bar asking him for a drink. The bartender blinked a few times and stared harder.
"Well, uhh I guess a basic ale would do you well." He said pretty much letting his brain run on autopilot.
"Alright then, I'll have an ale." Mason replied with a big smile.
The bartender named the price and Mason tilted his head with a confused look on his face.

Mason never had understood the concept of money. He never needed it and it was totally foreigne to him.
"What's money?" he asked and looked a little non-plussed and looked around the bar for someone that might help make things a little more clear for him.

[gersemi]

Gersemi sat next to the dragon and slammed money onto the table. Her cheeks were red against her pale complexion. She reaked of strong ale, pipe tabbaco, and an ointment she used to protect herself from the sun. Her hands were wrapped in white strips of cloth and she held a mug of ale in one and a pipe in the other. She wore a plain gray longsleeve shirt and green pants. A gun holster was slung on her right shoulder. She looked at the bartender with glazed pink eyes.
"Barkeep," she said with a slur, "Get this fine gentle.... lizzzzard a pint on me."
"Do you know him, Ger?"
"Do I know him? Of course not, thatssss why I buys him a drink. And don't call me 'Ger'. Only Mommy callssss me 'Ger'......."
She plonked her head against the table. After each job Gersemi completes, she always feels compelled to give herself a little treat. usually it means she goes to a pub or zoomer race. in this town, all they had was the pub right now. She set her cheek against the cold bar counter.
"Mommy, why's a dragon in the bar?" she asked sleepily.

[Jyo]

While Mason was trying to understand the concept of money, a woman sat down next to him and had the bartender get him a drink on her. Mason looked over and gave a smile. Before he could say thanks she asked someone called mommy to answer why a dragon would be here in a bar.

Mason looked around trying to find this mommy person, his search yielded no results so his focused his eyes back onto the woman.
"Thank you for the drink, but who is mommy?" He asked with genuine curiosity. He didn't know much about the concepts of parents either. There was the farmer that raised him, but he never had anyone else to look out for him.

Mason was also thinking about something to trade with the woman and the bartender. He didn't really carry anything with him, but he could always scrounge pretty easily.

[gersemi]

"Mommy?" asked Gersemi allowed. She snapped slightly out of her drunken daze. She sat up straight and smoothed her pale blonde hair back, trying to regain composure. her face was still very red.
"Mommy lives back in the wastelands. I don't see her often. Every time I do see her, it's just 'Why aren't you married yet?' or 'you're not eating enough' or 'How ya gonna find a husband if your out gunslinging and drinking'. Anyway, where's that drink i ordered you? You like ale?"

[Jyo]

Mommy lives in the wastelands. That's a ways away. I wonder if she can talk with people far away Mason thought. He kept the puzzled looked during her little bit of venting. He recognized a few of the terms.

The drink arrived right as she asked where it was. Reaching up with a very humanoid hand, Mason picked up the glass and took a swing of the ale. His eyes went wide. It wasn't exactly a nasty taste, but is was very different from anything he had drank before. Mason found that after the initial gulp, he liked the drink and took another swing.
"It's very good, thank you." he said with a grin as he set the half full drink down.

"I'm Mason." he said as he held out one of his front legs to offer his hand in greeting. He made sure the claws were retracted and he didn't noticed the odd stares the two of them were getting. Mason still didn't really get the fact that he was an oddity and that the woman in front of him was probably too out of it to care.

[gersemi]

Gersemi put her pipe in her mouth and took the dragon's hand firmly.
"It's pleasure, Mason," she said while gripping the pipe with her teeth, "I'm Gersemi Duke."
She let his hand go and leaned her elbows on the counter. She took a long puff, then asked through a puff of smoke, "So what's a dragon like you doin' in a place like this?"

[Jyo]

Mason smiled as she shook his hand. He liked contact with others and this was the first person outside of his 'father' that he got to really talk with.
"Gersemi, I like that name." He said a she kept his big toothy smile in place.

Gersemi lit up a pipe and the scent reached mason's nose. he had a highly attuned sense of smell, and he could pick up everything about the smoke, he loved it. Gersemi asked why he was here and though he couldn't actually shrug, he made a good impression of trying.
"I'm meeting people. I've never been away from home before today. This city and the people in it are amazing." he said before grabbing his drink and taking another swing. The ale was starting to creep in and effect him. Mason felt lightheaded and warm. He could understand why his 'father' liked the stuff.

"This stuff is good." He said with a giggle that showed the childlike innocence that betrayed his age and what his personality was really like. Mason was a child in many ways, so this among many other things was a very fun experience for him.

[gersemi]

"You haven't had any ale before?" Gersemi asked suddenly, "You poor soul. We adults need a good pick me up sometimes."
her eyes narrowed at the dragon. he sure is a small dragon, she thought. She took another drag of the pipe and asked, "How old are you?"

[Jyo]

"A pick me up? thats what this is called?" He asked as his finished off the drink and chuckled a little and swayed at his shoulders slightly. he had a high metabolism, but he never had a drop before, so it would hit pretty well.

"I'm ten years old as of two days ago." He said as he looked around the bar seeing the other patrons start to chuckle a little. After all, a drunk dragon, this wasn't a common sight. He went into another small weave and smiled.
"But I'm already full grown, big and strong." He said.

[gersemi]

Gersemi nearly dropped her pipe. She started at the dragon with wide eyes.
"Ten? Mother ^#$%! I thought dragons were, I don't know, 500 years old or something. TEN! You gotta be kidding me! Put that drink down!"
She reached for the mug but it was already empty. She turned to the barkeeper.
"Barkeep! No more for this young fellow and none for me! We are cutting ourselves off. What was I thinking! Aw, hell...."

[Jyo]

Mason started to giggle again at her reaction. She seemed funny now and the look on her face at seeing the glass almost made him fall down. Normally he would ask what was wrong, but he was already pretty tipsy now and just talked to her about his race.
"Oh I can live to 500 easy. That's not a problem." He said smiling, not even phased by being cut off, he was having fun.

"The world got wavy." he said as his vision blurred a little. He chuckled.
"I think ale is fun. No wonder father likes it." he said as he let his front legs come back down so he could stand on all fours. He stumbled to the side a bit and curled his tail around him.
"Whoa, standing is weird." he said.

[gersemi]

"A drunk father, eh? no wonder your so messed up so young," she said. She stood up with him. Her legs were a little shakey beneath her, but she managed. She took his clawed hand and headed to the door. But it was like the blind leading the blind. "Come on, let me get you outta here."

[Jyo]

Mason let Gersemi start to lead him, but she wasn't really walking well. Being on four legs he was better off even being a lightweight.

He got his hand out of her grip and pushed his shoulders against her hip to help keep her steady and put his furred head under her hand so she could lean on him.
"Now now, 'father' is a good man. He drinks and reads me stories at night. This was my choice." he said. Mixed in with his childish nature, was the sense of responsibility for his actions and the need to defend his 'father'.

[gersemi]

Gersemi imangined a huge frightening dragon reading to a baby dragon, all tucked into bed. She couldn't stop herself from giggling. She leaned on the dragon and they reached the outside. the sunlight blared over her and she scrambled for some sunglasses.
"Fwhoo, it's bright," she said, "So do dragon fathers do all the same stuff as humanoid fathers?"

[Jyo]

Mason gave the woman a quizzical look before realizing he hadn't mentioned what his father was.
"I don't know about other dragons. i was raised by a human." He said with a small chuckle, finding it amusing that he had unintentionally made someone think the wrong thing.

"As far as I know, I'm the only one of my kind. My race of dragon dies when we have an egg." He explained. mason wasn't sure how he knew this, but the truth was that it was ingrained in his mind. It was simply how his race worked. They naturally looked forward to death, not being killed, but dying as they created a new life.

[gersemi]

"No wonder your so messed up," Gersemi said, "Sorry about your birth parents, though."
Gersemi looked around the town. Now that she'd finished her job and had her drink, it was time to get back home to the Waste. But what about Mason.
"Do you need help getting home?" she asked, "Your 'father' is probably worried about you."

[Jyo]

Mason looked curious.
"No I'm messed up from the ale." he said giggling.
"And don't worry about my parents, I had one and the fact I was born meant it was their time." He said. Mason was literally unable to feel remorse for his parent, in a sense he was a reincarnation of them, through him they still lived in a very literal sense.

He gave another giggle at her offer to help him home.
"Thank you, but I'm fine. I'll just fly when I'm ready to go home, but I want to explore a little more." he said. His gaze shifted to something on the ground.

He stopped and reached out with his front leg to grab it in the oddly human looking hand. It was a shiny thimble. Mason looked back up at Gersemi as he held it out to her.
"Here, want to trade something for this?" he asked as he gave a smile. Mason loved to trade things. They didn't have to be spendy or anything, they had no value to him in that way. He would be giving her something which made it so he gave her a part of him and he often liked something in return, that was how he hoarded things, he loved mementos.

[gersemi]

Gersemi looked at the thimble. Awwww, she thought, he wants to trade. Now that she knew what age he really was, she could see how cute and innocent he was. Even if he was a scary dragon.
"Well, let's see what I got," She said as she reached into her pocket. She pulled out a lighter, her skin ointment, a small pouch of tabbaco, and finally a piece of red rock candy.
"How about this?" she asked as she held up the candy, "Have you ever had rock candy?"

[Jyo]

Mason's eyes glittered with joy seeing the candy. He didn't care what the item was, he would have something from Gersemi that he could keep to remember her by.
"Wow, that's an interesting rock." He said as he craned his neck so his nose was a few inches from the candy and he gave it a sniff. It smelled sweet, not like any rock he had known of. Some rocks were shiny, but not sweet smelling, though the smells were interesting sometimes.

"I've never seen that type of rock. Where did you find it?" he asked, showing he clearly had no idea of what candy was. He ate wolves and sometimes a sheep if the wolves stayed away, not candy. Granted he would never eat it anyways, it was gift. Of course not knowing what candy was, he didn't even let eating it cross his mind. After all, who would eat a rock?

[gersemi]

"It's called rock candy, " Gersemi said, holding it up so he could see it better, "But it's not really a rock, just really hard sugar. It's tasty, at least to me. You might like it."

Gersemi felt like she was beginning to sober up. She could handle alcohol better than most human females her size. It ran in her family. Gersemi looked at the thimble. She had no real use for it, but there was no harm in having it. She couldn't sew to save her life and was terrible at other "domestic skills".