Scandinavian Heartstrings, in Drop D.

Chapter 7.0 Second Jump

The record release date was looming, so Nathan, Pickles and Skwisgaar decided to put all of their bullshit aside in favour of the musical collaboration that allowed them to bare the deepest, darkest hatred festering in their souls... plus it made them a metric-fuck-tonne of cash.

"It sounds feckin' brutal but I recon ye made it too hard for 'im. Poor lil' guy was shaking like a leaf the whole time." Pickles said to Skwisgaar over a surprisingly early breakfast.

"Overs two hundreds fifty takes! Fucking two hundred fiftys!" Skwisgaar put his head in his hand and glared into his oatmeal. "I ams sicks to dyings of hims. I gives him de tabs ages ago but he waits untills we ams fucking recordings to finally picks up hims guitar. Ams bullshit."

"So that's what you were screaming at him." Pickles slotted this information in with yesterday's events. Nathan had banned Snow Speak from the recording studio in an attempt to keep control over the room, but the moment he'd step out, Skwisgaar had buried the rhythm guitarist up to his neck in a breathless blizzard. "Well that's ironic cause he's been down in tha practice halls almost every night this week. Him and Murderface are working on something, apparently."

"Ares you fuckings kidding mes? Dat little dildos!" Skwisgaar slammed his fist into the table. "He ams never takings responksibilieties for hims acktions!" He dropped his spoon into the porridge having lost his appetite.

"Okay, did something happen?" Pickles asked, picking up on the undertone in his comment.

Skwisgaar looked down at his bowl before responding with a very affirmative sounding "Nos."

Pickles decided not to push it. "Well good luck today. Hope Knubbler knows what he's doing."

"Mes too." Skwisgaar said, still pissed off. He finished his coffee then went to meet their producer at the Helipad.

That evening, Toki sat in the dark at the soundboard with only a solitary light from the isolation booth illuminating the knobs and dials in front of him. He was hiding from Knubbler, who, after Toki had accidentally deleted all of Skwisgaar's freshly recorded guitar tracks earlier that day and then tried to replace them with his own inferior recordings, had forbade him from going anywhere near the studio without his personal supervision. Toki had finally worked out how to mix the levels properly and was running through some tracks he and Murderface had recorded on the sly. He had headphones on and so didn't hear Skwisgaar walk into the studio late that night and sit in the middle of the couch behind him. He only realised someone was there when the glass of the isolation booth caught the glint of the Aquavit bottle Skwisgaar was swigging from.

"Fucking hell!" Toki jumped in his seat as he turned to see Skwisgaar staring straight at him, rolling the half empty bottle between his hands. Toki pulled the head phones down around his neck and very quickly hit pause on the playback. "You scared me half to death! What the fuck are you doing down here?"

"What are you?" Skwisgaar asked in a low voice. Toki made a few noises that sounded like the beginning of sentences. "If you have deleted my tracks again I will actually murder you." He said plainly and leaned back heavily in the couch.

"I didn't, I'm not, Knubbler backed those up straight away this time." Toki fumbled. Skwisgaar continued to stare at him from the half light. "Is that Akevitt?" He said, trying desperately to change the subject.

"Akvavit, ja."

"Sounds stupid when you say it." Toki said with a cheeky smile. Starting the Scandinavian pissing contest was always a good diversion but Skwisgaar didn't rise to the bait. He simply continued to stare at Toki, not breaking his gaze even to take another long swig from the bottle. Toki shifted uncomfortably, it was giving him the creeps. "Um, did you want something?" He asked.