Certainty
But I like math, Cal!
If you do it right,
You always get the same answer.
You can be sure of it.
You can't get that
with people.
One more post on social media, and Callie sets down her phone. Marie is across the table, on her laptop. It's as good a time as any. "I think we should plan a concert."
Marie looks up and blinks, as though she's forgotten Callie was there, then frowns. "You haven't touched your pancakes."
"You haven't touched yours either," Callie accuses. "They're all cold now anyway."
Marie gets up. "I'll reheat them."
Callie snags both plates from Marie. "I'll do it. On the stove, not in the microwave. Now quit changing the subject."
Marie sighs and follows Callie. She leans against the counter while Callie heats up the pan. "Are you sure you're ready for it?" she asks. "You've still got Calamari Inkantation playing in your ears just to know things are real, and you keep sneaking out at night, trying to find those glasses."
Callie winces. She knows the hypnoshades are in one of Sheldon's shops somewhere, and in the middle of the night, when she wakes up and the speaker's off and the need burns in her hearts and tentacles, she can't stop herself. It's lucky there's so much stuff in Sheldon's shops, or she'd have found them already. "I have to be ready sooner or later, and Fresh Start is in the top ten. It may as well be now," Callie replies. She focuses on the pancakes, and keeping her voice steady. "The longer I'm out of sight, the more rumors go around, the harder a comeback later will be. We do a concert now, and I can start auditioning for movies and TV shows again in a few months. At a much, much less stressful schedule."
"That much, I can agree with," Marie murmurs.
Callie finishes reheating the pancakes and hands Marie her plate. The two sit back at the table. Marie pours syrup on her pancakes, while Callie pokes at them with her fork. "You need to eat, Cal."
"It just..." Callie's voice wobbles. "It smelled the same, and looked the same, but it never tasted the same, and..." she cuts a tiny piece of plain pancake and puts it in her mouth. Just like it should be. "Or it squished weird, or something."
"Maybe that's another way you can tell the difference between real and hypnotized," Marie says. She reaches across the table and pours a small puddle of syrup on the edge of Callie's plate. "Come on, you need to eat more."
She needs to show Marie she's serious, so she cuts the tiniest bite of pancake and dabs it into the syrup, then touches it to her tongue. Delicious. "You still haven't said anything about a concert."
"I'm concerned about your stamina," Marie says, eating more pancake. "We do a lot of dancing. You couldn't even do two turf matches in a row yesterday, the doctor only cleared you for normal activity a couple days ago."
Callie dumps more syrup on the pancake pile and takes a proper bite. "We can work with that," she says, her mouth full of pancake. "Let's make it a big thing. Four or five bands, and after each of them does two or three songs, we go on stage and do one or two. So we just keep coming back." And Callie can rest between songs.
Marie grins. "That'd give the audience something to look at, especially if we kept the set list a secret. We could grab all the old favorites, too: Chirpy Chips has a new album I adore, Hightide Era's got something coming out in a few weeks. We could have every group do one new song and two old ones."
Marie's going along with it, awesome, but there's one more thing Callie wants. She swallows her next massive bite of pancake. "I want Off The Hook doing the opener."
"Absolutely not," Marie snaps, setting down her fork. "You've nearly had a panic attack every time they've come on the radio, or anything even remotely sounds like Octarian—"
"And I can't let that keep happening," Callie replies. She stabs the next bite of pancake. "How many more pancakes have come to the surface since my retrieval? And they're all out there, speaking their language. I can't avoid it forever. I have to learn how to live with it. Or no leaving the apartment alone, no splatfest, no life." She shoves the pancake in her mouth.
Marie covers her mouth with one hand. "Did you just call them 'pancakes' instead of 'Octolings?'"
"Shut up, I'm hungry."
Marie giggles, but she pokes at her own stack of pancakes, her brow furrowed. "I... you have a point," Marie admits. "There are a lot more Octolings coming to Inkopolis, now that we've done two concerts. I bought the old News building and it's being remodeled as apartments for them." She taps her closed laptop. "It's hard."
"You softie," Callie says, grinning.
"Shut up, cameras in the hallway and one or two I vetted before I even found you will make finding any fakes a lot easier," Marie snaps. "And it gives them a safe space to learn Inklish and other stuff while they're adjusting, so they want to live there. It's just common sense."
"Softie," Callie says again.
Marie scowls at her.
"Anyway, I need them at the concert," Callie says. "They're a good group, nice rivals for our comeback. It's good media for past and present news hosts to be seen together."
Marie raises an eyebrow. "And?"
Callie scowls. Marie knows her too well. "I... want to ask Marina. A few things."
If this feeling, this not-knowing, will last forever.
If Marina knows where Callie can get another pair.
What will make the tattoo fade faster.
How much she regrets coming to Inkopolis.
"We'll do a special thing," Marie says, startling Callie out of her thoughts. "Every group will do Calamari Inkantation, putting their own spin on it, as one of their numbers. We'll do Calamari Inkantation almost last, and invite Off The Hook, as the start of it all, to finish things off with Now Or Never." Marie rubs her finger around her plate, collecting syrup. "But if you want to talk to Marina, that means revealing our identities."
Callie winces. "When you put it like that-"
"We can trust her," Marie says.
Callie's jaw drops. "Who are you, and what have you done with Marie?" Callie demands.
Marie smiles, just a tiny one. "And I'm giving Sync and Drown backstage passes. You need to be nice."
'Be nice'.
Oh, Callie is going to have some fun.
