The Rise of the Scream Queens

The Signing

Screaming Vultures were sitting at a coffee shop table anxiously, Bongo kept drumming on his legs, Keila kept messing with her hair and Marceline kept trying to drink from her cup before realising she had already drunk it all. Guy, on the other hand, seemed at first glance but from time to time you could see a nervous tick on his eye. They were all so nervous that they didn't notice at first when a 40ish man in a suit approached them until he dragged out a chair and sat on it, immediately the Screaming Vultures stood up in unison to welcome him.

"At ease," The well-dressed man spoke. "It's normal for you to be nervous, you're getting signed to a record label after all."

"Thank you, Sir!" Keila exclaimed as she sat down too hard and hurt her back, she then proceeded to badly hide the pain.

"This is a great opportunity, Mr. Prismo!" Guy followed up.

"Please, call me Billy," Prismo said calmly. "Now tell me, who is the leader of the band?"

"That would be me, sir," Keila answered. "I started this band with our ex-vocalist, Jacob."

"Now then...let me ask you a question." Billy leaned in. "What do you want to achieve?" The table went silent, deep in thought, at last Marceline spoke.

"We want to make music that moves people, Billy." Prismo turned to Marceline and met her eyes.

"Who might you be?"

"Marceline," she answered. "I'm the new singer."

"And bassist, I know, I just needed a reminder of your name," Billy stated. "Now, tell me what exactly do you mean by that?"

"Simply to move people, I guess," Marceline started. "Whether that's mentally, physically, or emotionally. I want people to dance and thrash to our music, I want people to work out to our music, I want people to think about our music, I want people to analyze our music, I want people to smile to our music, I want people to cry to our music, I want parents to disapprove of us, youngsters to idolise us, critics and public to praise us, media to antagonise us and future dads to pester their uninterested offspring about us. I want to move people"

"I can certainly help you with that," Billy said after a while, sucking everything Marceline had just said in. "If that's what you all want," Billy looked around the table watching all of them nod before reaching into his suitcase and pulling out four contracts. "Would you mind lending me your autographs then?" He handed them out and the contracts and the band read through them.

"So you guys will give us free reign on the production of our first album under a certain budget but you guys can market us however you want?" Guy asked after he read it through.

"Indeed, and if your album makes us enough money we will offer you a five-album contract with more budget for each album and more freedom on your public image," Billy explained. "That doesn't mean that we won't take your suggestions into account and we will do our best to transmit your essence, just in a more commercial way. We tend to find that small bands don't really know what they're doing outside of music, so it's a safety net to ensure that your first album won't flop."

"Sounds good to me," Marceline signed her name onto the contract. "How do we start?"

"With the problem that is your band name." Prismo stated as he collected the signed contracts.

"What's wrong with it?" Keila asked.

"It's taken by a British duo and we'd rather avoid confusion." Billy answered plainly.

"I see..." Keila trailed off. "I quite like the scream element in the name so I think we should keep that."

"Sceam Team?" Guy offered.

"Ew." Keila responded and Guy's face fell off.

"Scream Queen?" Marceline offered jokingly before realising it was a decent name.

"Scream Queens!" Guy lept out of his chair.

"YES!" Keila lept out of hers. "That's it!"

Scream Queens...I like it. Bongo signaled with a smile.

"Scream Queens it is." Billy noted it down. "Now the next thing is, I want you to do a collaboration."