Stan (Pearlina Story)

Usernames and Passwords

The first (and fortunately only) time she saw the danger of one of these "stans" was a long time ago; back when Into The Light was in production.

She distinctly remembered the moment - Marina was upstairs trying to find her DJ equipment when she could hear her Pearlie cackling from downstairs for a worrying three minutes; and when Marina came tumbling down the stairs to see if her Pearlie was alright, she was splattered on the floor choking in coughs and struggling to breathe - her phone was cracked right next to her too!

Her eyes glowered in anger at the memory... those evil stans! They tried to kill Pearlie! She knew these 'laughing' tactics were secretly assassination attempts; she's read all about it in those action books. They even brainwashed Pearl to say that she didn't need a saviour, and how stans were completely harmless - she hated them so much!

But enough of that, she had her best friend to cheer up. "Anyway, if Pearl starts choking, I'll be there to save her again..." she thought to herself, as she opened up her laptop.The Octoling got to work.

She quickly logged on and immediately typed in Squitter; the place where the attempted murder allegedly took place... The Octoling had heard off all the terrible deeds that were performed on this site from multiple lessons in the Octo Canyon - and couldn't help but feel nervous as she clicked the link.

She jumped at how quickly it loaded up, and the sudden white and blue light jumping into view blinded her for a few seconds. Marina shielded her eyes in fear; they were already trying the brainwashing techniques! Thank cod Marina was an expert...

After a few seconds of Marina's cowering, she peeked her eyes open at the computer screen and stared blankly at the mess; it looked pretty... normal. She hesitantly darted her eyes at all the confusing buttons on the screen, confused about all the words present. "Sign up?"

She took one hand off her face to drag the mouse to the registration button, and she was greeted by another link, resulting in Marina letting out a quiet shriek, and to quickly bring both hands to her eyes once again. She wasn't scared! Just... dubious about all the 'genocide' that had been said to occur on social media.

Once she got the courage to take her hands off, she squinted at the computer screen; it was asking for a username and password. Marina smiled confidently; now this was her type of area! She knew all about this from her chat room!

Marina started to reminisce about when Pearl taught her about making her own chat room; her warm body snuggled ever so closely next to hers with her ticklish breath. She remembered how Pearl put her hand on top of hers to drag the mouse to the right places. When she-

Her eyes started bulging once she realised what she was saying; she loved IT... not Pearl ... not her...

She shook her head to herself as she stared at the first box.

                                                                              Username

                                                                        [                              ]

And already the Octoling's head was lost; she couldn't think off any names from her head? She was the smartest student in Octo Valley at one point - and she couldn't think off anything? She grumbled Octarian profanity at herself, as she stared at the screen emotionlessly. She looked down at the other two boxes...                                                                              Password                                                                        [                              ]                                                     

                                                                           Email Address

                                                                         [                              ]

She sighed contently - these weren't as hard as making a username... her hands hovered over the keyboard for a vulnerable few seconds, thinking of Pearl hugging a tear stained pillow; bringing more confidence in the Octoling, as she started typing in nonsense Octarian words until they hit the password limit.

She huffed cockily, only a genius like Marina Ida could think of such a powerful password - six long hard years of struggling in the military comes down to create this password. She started imagining hearing Pearlie's cute laughter ringing from upstairs in her bedroom after a few days of Marina mastering the stan language, "Watch and learn Inklings, here's a real Stan for you guys!" She looked up to the screen, letting out a horrible gasp in the progress.

"Weak! My password is weak!" Marina couldn't believe what words were painted in red, right in front of her very eyes. The Octoling wanted to snap the laptop in two, but instead all the anger went to her bottom lip, which was severely losing a battle against two sharp sets of teeth. How dare they challenge Marina like this; she wasn't weak! She could... make breakfast in record time and create an entire Splatoon map!

She dejectedly typed an email address; grumbling even more profanity to herself.

As she tried thinking of a username, she could feel her entire body temperature starting to rise in pure stress - and Marina did NOT like that. After a few seconds of bland thinking, she promptly decided to get something to drink.

She stood up and basically ran for the kitchen, internally hoping that the coolness of the room could cool her down just as much. She quickly slammed the fridge open, and poured out a refreshing glass of unskimmed milk, the coldness of the drink cooling her burning hands thankfully. She tried to stay focused, yet her mind was wondering all around the place.

She was thinking about Pearl.

She walked upstairs, and stood outside of the door. She could hear Pearl snoozing from outside the door - hearing her best friend's soft breaths always helped calm down Marina's rapid ones in any situation, so as soon as she felt her heartbeat slow; she started smiling. She, with hope buzzing through her, checked to see if the door was open... it was. Marina slowly opened the door, trying to make as less sound as she can.

Oh my cod Pearl, what happened to you?

This wasn't the same Pearl; and if it was the exact same, then she couldn't believe it at all. The room was dark, but Pearl's ragged silhouette wearing the same tear-drenched clothes as she was in the concert was sleeping quietly in a corner of her bed... she never seen Pearl look so vulnerable ever; she usually takes up the whole thing! Yet here she was, almost hiding in a corner.

Marina stared solemnly at the poor girl; all anger rushing out of her body, only overwhelming sadness remained. She watched her for a few minutes, hearing the inkling's slow breaths, and her unusually stoic posture as she sipped her milk.

A she could think was how could she make her duo partner happy, when she couldn't even think off a password! She berated herself before walking out to fill up a glass of orange juice (without pulp of course) and sat on the soft couch downstairs, as imaginative usernames and passwords started flowing through her mind.

This was going to be a long night.