AN: With Sax beating out Violin by one vote, I'm actually kind of sad that nobody picked Base or Sheet Music. Oh well.
AN2: This update was delayed by paying work. Please buy my books so I have less interruptions like this!
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Smirking, you went inside to your instruments rack. Time to jam! Hands flowing over the strings, you stopped at the saxophone. A little cheap, sure, but the cracked lacquer hadn't played with the tone yet. Grabbing a mouthpiece and a decent reed, you set the ligature up quickly and ran through a fast C scale. Wincing at the discordant mess, you held the instrument out from yourself. Diagnostics said… stuck E-flat key. Pulling out a bottle of mineral oil and a micro-driver, you quickly greased it up and started flapping it. Perfect- now you wouldn't get those squawks. Another test run said that nothing else was malfunctioning, so you were good to go as soon as you found your neck strap.
Since naturally you put said neck strap in with your clothing instead of your musical supplies, it took you a few minutes to get suited up and ready to jump balconies. Just as you'd put on your treble clef eyepatch (best comedy buy you'd made in months), you stopped. Was he-
-That was, in fact, Metallica. Wow. Your opinion of the nerd went up several notches as you jumped balconies. With your final leap, you ended up about a meter from his stool, eyes screwed shut as he made sure the minor scale didn't break down mid-riff. Applauding, you watched Shinji start like a cat at the sound.
"I've never actually heard it done as a solo before." you commented, grinning. "Metallica, of all things?"
"Technically not my own composition, but yes." Shinji said, flexing his hands. "My- eto, er, the first cello chair of the conservatory gave me the music. I had to keep my hands in, he said. For after."
You nodded sensibly, before shifting your sax to let the light gleam off it. "How do you feel about jazz?"
Shinji chuckled a little. "Ambient. It takes a lot to get me into the swing, but once I'm there it's no problem. I did a good amount of stuff with big band arrangements, but it'll take me some digging to see where I left Tuxedo Junction."
"We can start easy, then." you said, smiling. "Maybe something simple, like Sinatra?"
Shinji sighed, but put his bow down and started a deep, thunky picking. You rolled your eyes, considering how much sheer undiluted cheese that was the ol' crooner's love songs were, but well… they worked. Hell, Fly Me To The Moon at least had a good brass and sax part you could steal, even if it was a little on the nose for most things. Once you were finished, though, you grinned. While you might not be a great sax player, if you stole a little bit of trombone and a little bit of clarinet…
Grinning, you had to suppress a laugh as Shinji started flushing as he picked up his bow and started sawing along. Glenn Miller was fine too, and he probably hadn't meant to be as forward as he was with that last song. Oh well- now you were In The Mood, and in lieu of someone to play drums you were going to drag that idiot through the musical minefields. It wasn't long before Rei stuck her head out to the balcony, though, and looked at you. Once you were done, the blue-haired girl stared at you, before deciding to handle a known factor and not your chimera of issues.
"That sounded beautiful." she said, smiling. "Could I stay, or-"
"Of course!" Shinji said, grinning. "As a matter of fact, you might even be able to join in!"
Schiessen. Well, she lived with a cello virtuoso, so unless she was Misato Two and just as banned from attempting anything with rhythm, it couldn't be that bad. Then Shinji started digging around on the corner of the balcony, pulling out a series of old paint cans and tubs that had been tied together to an old piece of rebar, several with strategically placed cuts in them. "We'll need something to use as mallets…" Shinji muttered, before pulling out a pair of well-used paint sticks.
"You could have told me we were doing post-industrial grunge." you grumbled. "I have a perfectly serviceable washboard and I'm sure we can throw together a tub fiddle."
"It's a raincatcher." Rei said simply. "Except I will be the rain."
Shinji nodded, before leaning it on the side of the building and popping a squat on a twenty-liter paint tub to check the reach on everything. Credit to where credit was due, the tubs were amazingly well tuned for being literal metal and plastic scraps. Even if it was a pythagorean tuning, well, thems the breaks. Not like they made pitch pipes for Paint Tin, One Liter.
Once Shinji was satisfied with the arrangement, Rei took a minute to check it over, an experimental series of taps leading into a minute of sheer, absolutely bloody-minded experimentation as she did doubles, sticking patterns, scales, and chords. If there were any following fouls, you decided, they'd be stomped out with the same ruthless precision usually reserved for turning Angels into pavement smears. Leading in with a steady sax solo, you and Shinji spent a few sweet minutes bouncing riffs and glides off each other to figure out how Rei backed you up. The answer? Closely. It was like getting wrapped up in a drum kit that knew your every twitch before you made it, and it took three or four repeats of a motif for her to let you free so she could support the music instead of engulf it.
"Let's try something live." you muttered, before looking at Shinji. "Feel up for a little Goodman?"
"I know what you're thinking and I deeply resent having to thunk on my baby here a skinny minute longer than I have to." Shinji replied, before grinning. "That being said, I also think it'll be perfect."
And with that, your comrade-in-arms started thunking away on the face of his cello with his palms, just long enough for Rei to get the pattern when you came in like a freight train. Sing, Sing, Sing was not a song for the faint of heart with the drum solos or the fact you'd be carrying waaay too many moving bits while Shinji nursed Rei through the complicated solos and beats, but at the second drum section your improvised percussionist was doing great. When the piece was done, you didn't even think about it- you just started segueing right into Rhapsody in Blue. Shinji shot you an odd look, since there was about one and a half solos in it for the both of you, but you kept going doggedly. It was a favorite of yours, especially the strings. You pushed through your part doggedly, but as Shinji's crooning strings struck you, your fingers started sticking to the pads in that hammer-handed fashion that was the sign of exhaustion. It wasn't the same without the piano, or the brass, or your friends in the background as you wailed away at the jazz bar that you picked up tips in. Letting the saxophone loll against your chest, you sighed.
"Sorry." you said, looking around carefully. "Just thought of home."
Shinji looked at you for a second, and the faint glimmer of recognition shone in his eyes. That was the end of it though, before Rei looked at you.
"I do not know what the problem was, but this is my home." Rei said, standing up to bundle you inside. "You must be cold, or the dirt is getting in your eye."
"I'm fine." you grumbled.
"I'm sure you are." Rei said, pulling out an extra place setting. "Shinji, do we have enough rice to lay out an extra portion?"
Shinji chuckled, pushing you inside a little. "Of course. I don't mind making extra, since we can just have the rest after tomorrow's synch test."
Your brain screamed like a skipped needle. "We have a synch test tomorrow."
Shinji and Rei both nodded, even as you mentally started screaming. Chuckling slightly darkly, you started edging for the door. "Well, gee whiz, I have to go, got to get an early rest y'know? Just get a nice eight-"
"It's six in the evening, Asuka." Shinji said, raising an eyebrow.
"-twelve hours of uninterupted sleep." you said, eye twitching. Synch tests were the worst. The absolute worst. Nightmares and delusions stalked your mind for hours, and phantom pains and halucinations were fairly par for the course. Worst were the memories, though, haunting things with insubstantial and etheral connotations you could never scry the meaning of. Going into the Synch was a psychadelic dream… and coming out was the post-high nightmare. Lysergic acid had nothing on what you believed when you came out of the plug- you'd tried to find a way to deaden one with the other, once. It hadn't helped.
So yeah, your plan was to go back to your room, take two melatonin, and crash with an empty stomach so you didn't have anything to throw up except LCL tomorrow. It normally blunted the worst symptoms of synch. Now, if only you could get past Shinji to get to your bed…
[] Leave. No explanation, no nothing, just go.
[] Politely exit stage left, throw them a bone, you have plenty of leftovers.
[] Make an excuse about having a dinner date to escape.
[] Damn tomorrow, and stay.
