Disclaimer: The Octo-Expansion is still kicking my arse.

GET RICH OR $QUID TRYING

Eventually their luck improved. Instead of singing for scraps in front of Crusty Sean's van, JaJa, Carmilla and Paul were snatched up by some big fish in a little pond. Their new manager – who happened to conveniently own a record label (JaJa was beside herself) – took the trio right under his fins. Before they signed anything Carmilla made sure they had a month's trial to work in their Manager's studio, and that he had arranged a few gigs for them to do under his guidance. Carmilla was the sensible one of the three, and frankly… she felt it was inkpossible for such a short turn around from when they were sleeping rough.

"Carmi," JaJa groaned when Carmilla shared her concerns with her bandmates, "You're such a wet piece of kelp."

Frowning, Carmilla tucked one long tentacle behind one pointed, pale ear. Paul followed the movement, eyes wide with fascination.

"I prefer 'practical' or 'mature', JaJa," Carmilla groused, feeling a bit offended that JaJa would blindly jump into a contract that was possibly shadier than Mr Grizz's 'shifts'. Of course, JaJa had never been one to look before she dived, but Carmilla had hoped her friend had more sense than to dash off before thoroughly checking she wasn't in shark-infested waters. JaJa couldn't be that desperate for a taste of fame, right?

Then again…

"All I'm saying," Carmilla began softly, feeling Paul's finger tips tracing lightly over the tentacle she had tucked back, "Is that we shouldn't enter this in a hurry. What if we can't work with him? I mean – I know you want this, and that you want a long career JaJa, but what if we get stuck with someone horrible? What if we get snagged in his net and are hung out to dry?"

"Ew," JaJa wrinkled her nose. Paul too made a similar noise of alarm. They'd seen one crispy elder Inkling scuttling about the Square just a week earlier, and the sight of no longer holding on to their freshness had given them all a moment of pause.

"Precisely! 'Ew'!" Carmilla exclaimed, pointing to her childhood friend. "We wouldn't want to end up like that, right, all because we acted like some giddy guppies experiencing freshwater for the first time?"

Her bandmates agreed, and well, for the time being that was that. Carmilla vowed to remain vigilant around their new Manager until the month ended, and they signed or went back to kipping behind Sean's van. One day his genial, closed lipped and promising smiles would reveal a set of mismatched pointed teeth – Carmilla knew it. It was fairly suspicious that he was slicking back his antennae, and that Carmilla had seen it dimly glow once when they had been later coming back from a evening gig.

And if she was wrong… Carmilla ran a hand down the waves of her tentacles and avoided meeting Paul's eyes. If she was wrong, then a drastic change in style was needed to snip away her shame.

As expected, Carmilla kept her tentacles inktact. A fact that she was rather pleased and relieved about – though she hadn't revealed her plan to chop them short and regret it later to anyone.

Now they were back to slumming it at Crusty Sean's, but honestly Carmilla couldn't bring herself to care. She made sure to stop a toothy grin from appearing on her face while JaJa was around though; the latter had had a face like a Rainmaker for the majority of the afternoon.

"Cheer up JaJa," Carmilla said, smiling as Paul placed a shake from Sean's van before the two of them before he too sat with them at the table; struggling to get the fiddly plastic straw to cooperate in his own cup. "We'll find someone else."

"I don't want anyone else! It was going so well Camilla! Why did you insist on that stupid month trial?!"

"JaJa-"

"Shut it!" JaJa cried, shoving her drink to the side and pushing her chair away from the table with a screech. She flounced away in the direction of Headspace and disappeared inside the store.

"Well, there goes our last paycheque," Carmilla murmured as Paul looked mournfully to the drink JaJa had spilt across the table. He pulled the straw from his own drink and quickly slurped up the mess. "At least you don't waste your money."

Paul hummed in return.

JaJa was probably one nose-against-the-glass-heavy-breathing session away from Off The Hook banning the inkling from standing outside their studio.

"You really need to stop this, Ja," Carmilla told her friend sadly. Softly. "We'll just have to leave Paul with Sean during the day and do a few dodgy shifts for Mr Grizz.

The trio were now subsisting on whatever pity Sean had for them or the scraps left on the tables by picky eaters. Luckily there had been a Splatfest not so long ago, and an influx of leftovers bought from the Crust Bucket. They'd filled their stomachs that night and had been trying to ration the less perishable items for as long as possible – to little avail.

JaJa looked like she was about to gut a jellyfish just because she could, consequences be damned.

"Seriously, we're all going to be banned from standing here if you're not careful and then where will I get an insight on the freshest trends?" Paul nodded along with Carmilla's words. Marina had been trying out an unusual style with her tentacles which Carmilla had tried to emulate, only for her tentacles getting tangled.

Paul had taken great delight in carding his fingers through them to untangle the mess Carmilla had made and would wholeheartedly back any more hairdo-attempts the inkling would make in the future.

"If I stand here for long enough, they'll have to come out and tell me to leave – then I'll ask them to give us a chance!" JaJa exclaimed, ramming her head against the glass once more much to the disgust of the Inkling and Octoling inside the studio.

(Pearl, admittedly, had found JaJa's squished face against the glass hilarious, but now it was getting to be annoying. Marina really just wanted to get on with their show without potential mantle damage occurring to an overzealous fan.)

"Sometimes I'm floundered by your logic," Carmilla muttered.

"Look," the more rational of the two Inklings sighed, Paul's long fingers wrapped around her wrist as though she were a life buoy in the thriving hubbub of Inkopolis Square. "We'll get there one day, we just have to keep trying."

With reluctance, Carmilla and Paul managed to drag JaJa away – to Marina's relief – pacifying the tempestuous Inkling with a busking session by the Crust Bucket.

"We just have to keep trying," Carmilla reassured herself once more when the others had drifted off into slumber.

A customer of Sean's had left their newspaper behind on the table once they'd finished their drink, so now the trio had impromptu blankets to cover them while they slept underneath the veranda behind Sean's truck.

Things were looking up.

A/N [4/7/2018]: How has it taken me so long to update this?! I don't think I'm going to take it any further than Chapter Three, but if you have head canons go ahead. Just message me about it first and make sure to credit me for this original work.