#snailvibes

“Re-kest?”

“Dude, what d’ya wanna sing? We got some Raft Punk, Diss-Pair - Squid Squad’s got a sorta easy metal song, y’wanna do that?”

Marina stared blankly at Pearl.

“Ok...I’ll pick first.” Pearl flicked through the selection. “Here, Metalopod’s pretty good, we’ll start there.”

The screen lit up with “MUSIC” and the song began. Pearl started tapping her foot to the killer drum beats and guitar riffs. Within twenty seconds “MUSIC” was replaced with lyrics, white then changing color to yellow.

Marina didn’t usually have a particularly terrible time understanding Pearl, but the words she was singing were nigh incomprehensible. The on-screen lyrics might have helped, but she wasn’t as familiar with Inklish text as she’d like to have been. Still, Pearl was a pretty decent singer. Marina smiled at the short squid. This “start a band” thing was going to be fantastic.

And then the chorus started.

Marina threw her microphone at the karaoke machine and shoved her fingers in her ears as Pearl belted out earth-shattering notes. The microphone in her hand popped and the TV turned to static. Marina fell to the floor in a ball as the speakers hooked up to the monitor blew out. She would have sworn the room was actually shaking from the sheer magnitude of Pearl’s voice.

The music came to an early end long before Pearl realized what she’d done. She ended her part of the chorus and went to breathe for the next part of the song, then stopped short and looked around at her work.

“Oops.”

~~~

“Ok, so that’s another karaoke bar I’m banned from. Man, I gotta get my own machine.”

Marina couldn’t take her eyes off Pearl as they walked down Conch Street, away from the wreckage she’d caused.

“Yeah, so when I said I don’t actually play a lot of venues...that’s kinda why. No one’s got good equipment.”

“The ‘quipment.” She’s blaming the equipment? Really?

“I haven’t found one place that actually has a mic that can handle me! The owners are always like ‘You’re too loud,’ or somethin’, well maybe your machines are too wimpy, ever think about that?” Pearl poutily shoved her hands in her jeans pockets and hunched across the intersection.

Marina played with her glove. “You’re good singer. Maybe try quieting…?”

“I’m not gonna just say my bars, Marina.  I get in that zone, I’m not holding back! Takes away from my realness. You come for the authentic Pearl, none of that fake stuff.”

“I see.”

“That’d be like asking you not to spin sick beats, like, that doesn’t work!”

“Ok, I get.”

“Yeah.”

SIlence fell between them until they reached the intersection where their paths diverged. They bid each other goodnight and Marina headed home on her own.

If Pearl could do that to all the equipment in the karaoke room, then all their aspirations, not to mention Marina’s turntables, were in jeopardy.

Marina closed the door to her apartment and leaned against it, slid down the wall and sighed.

She wondered just how long the list of venues Pearl was banned from actually was. Would anyone in the city book them? How were they supposed to actually get their stuff out there if they couldn’t actually record? If this was how things were going to go, maybe they should throw it all in now.

“What are you saying?” Marina asked herself out loud. Throw it in? Give up?

She didn’t give up.

When her first attempts at flooders were spinning out of control, falling off platforms and completely drenching her test squadron, did she give up? No! She went back to the drawing board! She tuned them, she fixed their rotational speed, she adjusted their ink pressure! She made them work.

She wrote music by ear on a half-broken keyboard. She helped find the most efficient way to cultivate wasabi underground. She clawed her way up here to chase that something more she didn’t know she was missing.

A cacophonic inkling should be no problem at all.

Marina got to her feet and moved a stack of music sheets to uncover a pad of blueprint paper. She rummaged around a few piles of other nonsense to find the microphone that the seller of the old turntables threw in. On her tiny kitchen table she found a nubby pencil.

Vowing to spend time cleaning the apartment...eventually, Marina got to work.

~~~

“So it’s like a fancy pop filter?” Pearl asked, turning the microphone over in her hands.

Marina blinked sleepily at her. “Yeh.”

“Sweet. Turn this sucker on, test it out!” Pearl plugged the device into an amp in her recording studio. Marina made no attempt to hide her fingers going right back in her ears. “Marina, have some faith in yourself. If this works, you’re a genius!”

“If.”

Pearl turned the microphone on and mulled over what she should sing. After a few seconds, she shrugged. “Imma just freestyle. Can I get a beat, DJ?”

Marina started drumming slowly on the table. Pearl bobbed her head to the rhythm and started.

“Yo, check it, got a brand new mic, yeah, my partner made it and it feels alright, yeah / not gonna break $#!%, not gonna get banned, look out Inkopolis, cause here the #$@* comes our band!”

The noise levels still hurt Marina’s ears, but the world wasn’t shaking - only the amp, and maybe the lights. Noise-cancelling earphones were easier to get her hands on than noise cancelling amplifiers.

Pearl shook a tentacle out of her face and looked Marina dead in the eyes. “Test one two?” she said in an indoor voice. Both their faces broke into huge grins as they realized the words were coming out of the amp and not just Pearl’s mouth.

Pearl threw her hands in the air and let out a whoop. “Told you you’re a genius!” she yelled, throwing her arm around Marina’s shoulders. “Girl, this city isn’t gonna know what hit it! Could even polish those bars, maybe fix ...Marina?”

Pearl shook Marina’s arm and she jerked back to reality. “Yeah?”

“Alright, dude, let’s let that big brain of yours rest a bit, you can use my room, I’ll keep my brothers away.” She laid the microphone on the table, pulled Marina to her feet and led her out the door and up the stairs to the main house.

“Hey, so, like, I don’t wanna ask too much of you right now, but you think you can make a headset model? Obvs not this second, but like, one of these days?”