Superyacht - THE RP

"It-... It looks like a mech of some kind!!" Marina responded very quickly to Pearl's exclamation, stammering slightly in her excitement and surprise as she gazed up at the towering metal suit.

Relieved to find that they didn't seem to be in any danger, Mechanica brought her suit to an abrupt stop as she reached Pearl and Marina. "Hey again, guys...!" she greeted, making one of the suit's ARMS wave to them. Then, upon witnessing their shocked reactions, she couldn't help giggling a bit. "It's my custom-built fighting suit!" she went on to explain cheerfully to them.

"Your-... I-it's-..." Marina once again stammered, seemingly captivated. "It's AMAZING!" she cried out, her mouth spreading into a huge grin.

"Get out; you use that thing for FIGHTING?!" This was definitely more than Pearl could have ever expected from the human. "OK, I really underestimated you, kid; you're TOTALLY BAD!" Pearl told Mechanica with much enthusiasm, thoroughly impressed by the thought of the sturdy suit being quite literally a fighting machine. "How'd you get that beast, anyway?" she asked her, wondering how the young human even managed to acquire such a machine. "You know some people or somethin'?"

"Welp, specifically for a fighting SPORT, but if there was, like... a monster invasion or something, you bet I'd bring it along!" Mechanica began with a determined little grin, followed by lighthearted laughter.

"That's STILL AMAZING!" Marina chimed in, then proceeded to imagine Mechanica fighting against monsters using the mighty suit. As she did so, her near-childlike grin of excitement only widened even more as she eagerly awaited a response to Pearl's second question.

"Nope, I actually built it out of spare parts I got at the Scrapyard!" Mechanica enthusiastically explained in reply. "It was quite the project, but it was totally worth every minute in the end," she added with a smile.

"HOLD UP. You built it YOURSELF?!" Marina only became even more awestruck upon hearing that the young human had, in fact, been the one behind the construction of the suit. "I can't-... It's so-... AAAAHH!" she eventually descended into another squeal.

Pearl was somehow made speechless by what Mechanica had told them. When Marina once again broke into squealing, excited to the point where she couldn't even finish a sentence, however, she quickly burst out laughing. "Welp, it's official: we're gonna have to hang out now!" she remarked, grinning widely. "Just you wait: Marina's never going to stop talking to you! ... Well, once she's able to actually put together a coherent sentence, obvs."

Mechanica burst into giggling yet again--she hadn't been expecting a reaction quite as intensely excited as the one from Marina. "Heheh, fine by me...!" she replied to Pearl's first remark, then gave another squeaky, amused little laugh in response to her latter comment, glancing over at Marina. She was honestly really looking forward to getting to talk more with the Octoling.

"Heehee... Heeeeee..." Marina, still sounding extremely giddy, trailed off briefly with a sigh. "AAH, we're gonna have so much to talk about! I can't waitttt...!"

"You guys better not totally lock me outta the convo with all your geeking out," Pearl told Marina and Mechanica jokingly. "I might just end up having to ditch y'all and look for someone else to hang with for a while!"

"Aw, we're not gonna forget about you, Pearlie! Don't worry!" Marina responded with a lighthearted chuckle. "We'll TRY not to get too carried away; promise...!" she continued, then gave the back of her head a sheepish scratch. "... Buuut... Sorry ahead of time if, well... we do go a bit crazy. Heh..."

Mechanica nodded in agreement with Marina, turning to look at Pearl with a momentarily awkward grin of her own. "But hey, there are still plenty of things we can all talk about...!" she chimed in. "Like... I'm sure we still have sooo many questions for each other about our worlds and stuff!"

"Oh man, yeah," Pearl agreed, nodding once. "Like, you humans have got bones, yeah? What's THAT like?!" she asked Mechanica, standing on her tiptoes as she looked up at her. "I mean, we don't have 'em, so..."

"Ooh, yeah, that's a good question..." Marina remarked, staring up at Mechanica with a look of curiosity.

"What's it like... HAVING bones...?" Mechanica echoed back, pausing for a moment with an intensely deep-in-thought--almost to the point of looking somewhat comical--expression. "... Haah... I'm not really sure HOW to describe it," she admitted, thoroughly stumped. "What's it like NOT having 'em...?"

"Well, uh..." Pearl was stumped, much as Mechanica was by the Inkling's question just a moment ago. "I guess we don't really think about it, actually," she responded with a shrug. "OK, in hindsight, I guess that was actually a weird question. Let's try to forget about that one."

Marina--with a somewhat-blank look--gave a slow shrug, herself, appearing just as stumped as Pearl and Mechanica. "Yeaaahh..."

"Eheh... Good idea..." Mechanica nodded, trailing off as she quickly attempted to come up with another question. "... Sooo, uhm... What sorts of things do you guys do for fun?"

"SPLAT IT UUUPPPP!" Pearl cried, throwing her hands in the air and laughing. "Heheh, seriously, though; Ink Battles are, like, the number-one thing where we come from!" she went on to explain cheerfully. "See, we can make ink. Like, loads of it. In Ink Battles, we put the stuff to good use as ammo! There are a few variations on Ink Battles, but Turf War is the most popular. Basically, in a Turf War, you and your team just have to make a bigger mess than the other guys!"

Mechanica listened closely to Pearl's explanation, leaning forwards slightly with an intrigued look. "That... sounds SO COOL," she enthusiastically commented once the Inkling had finished speaking. "Heh, I'd so love to watch something like that!" she added, grinning brightly. Then, a thoughtful look coming to her face, she briefly went on to examine both Pearl and Marina. "... So wait; I've kind of been thinking about this since I first saw you two, but now I'm really curious," she began. "You have no bones, and you can make ink, right? And you sorta remind me of them, too, in a way... So... Are you actually cephalopods of some kind?? Or... something like that?"

"Yep!" Pearl eagerly responded to Mechanica with a grin. "I'm an Inkling, and Marina's--... Er..." Suddenly, she stopped mid-sentence. She knew how sensitive Marina was about publicly identifying as an Octoling--the Octarian counterpart to an Inkling. Not even Pearl--Marina's closest friend--had known the truth about her identity before Cap'n Cuttlefish ended up revealing it to the Inkling instead. This was due to the fact that, unfortunately, the Octarians had historically been bitter enemies to the Inklings, and the Octolings--with their humanoid form, as well as formidable intelligence, strength, and athleticness--were some of the most feared of them all. In truth, however, it was their leader, who brainwashed and controlled them with music, who really deserved the blame. Even to that day, the Octarians were a lurking threat, though a somewhat recent event had caused many Octolings--including Marina herself--to be liberated from the effects of their leader's brainwashing music, driving them to escape to Inkopolis in search of freedom.
Even though the human would likely be completely unaware of their world's history involving the "Octarian menace", Pearl didn't want to take any chances. Out of respect, she was going to let Marina be the one to reveal her own true species to their new friend, and only if she herself wished to. To indicate her intentions, she briefly glanced over at Marina as if silently asking how she wished to proceed--whether she wanted to continue where Pearl had left off or not.

Mechanica's expression turned into one of slight confusion when Pearl abruptly stopped speaking in the middle of her sentence, her head tilting gradually to the side as she watched her and Marina.

Upon hearing Pearl's sudden pause, Marina cast a glance in her direction, happening to meet her gaze at that moment. Seeming to understand the intention of her friend, the corners of her mouth spread subtly into a soft, grateful smile as she gave her head a single, small nod. After this, she took a moment to observe their surroundings, checking to see if anyone might be listening in on their conversation, before slowly returning her attention to Mechanica. "I'm-... I'm an Octoling," she explained in a somewhat quiet voice, her smile widening and almost appearing slightly nervous.

"Wowwwww...!" Mechanica once again sounded quite excited upon hearing this explanation. "I can't believe I'm actually TALKING to cephalopods!" she exclaimed, her eyes sparkling with amazement.

"You better believe it! To put it another way that you might be more familiar with, I'm a squid, and Marina's an octopus," Pearl continued to explain, then suddenly transformed into her squid form. "See? I'm all squid!" she chirped proudly, raising one of her tentacles in the air.

Marina paused briefly, glancing down at Pearl for a moment after the latter had transformed, then--deciding that she likely didn't have anything to worry about in demonstrating it to Mechanica, who seemed nothing but thrilled by the revelation--proceeded to transform into her octopus form. "And I'm an octopus, through and through," she chimed in, wiggling her tentacles a bit.

Mechanica gasped upon seeing Pearl's squid form, followed by Marina's octopus form. "Waaaah...! That's incredible! And-... And SO CUTE!" she squeaked delightedly, stepping back a short distance as she proceeded to climb down from her large suit. Then, she quickly ran back to the Inkling and Octoling on foot, bending down in front of them to get a better look at them.

"Ha! If you think this is sweet, wait 'till you see THIS!" Pearl's head appeared to swell slightly as she braced herself for a moment. Then, she suddenly shot into the sky, propelled by a pressurized stream of pink ink, cheering loudly for the entire flight. A moment later, she transformed back into her humanoid form just before landing perfectly on her feet, in roughly the exact spot she had taken off from.

Mechanica's eyes followed Pearl as the Inkling suddenly took off into the air, her jaw hanging wide open in a thoroughly amazed fashion. "Oh my gosh...!! You guys just keep getting even COOLER!" she squealed upon witnessing Pearl's perfect landing.

"Hehe...!" Marina giggled gently in amusement, then proceeded to return to her humanoid form, as well, glancing over to look at Pearl for a moment. "Hey, maybe we should show her what some of our ink weapons look like, too, sometime!" she suggested thoughtfully.

"Totally!" Pearl enthusiastically agreed with Marina, throwing her hands in the air. "But I think we should give her a break for now, before she goes and faints or something."

"Oh, uh... Right; heh," Marina agreed with another, rather awkward little giggle, returning her gaze to Mechanica.

"Haah, yeah, that'd probably be for the best..." Mechanica laughed a bit in response, followed by a soft, contented sigh. "... Sooo..." Idly, she glanced around, wondering what they should be doing at this moment.

"Ughhhh... Anyone got any ideas on what we should do now?" Pearl asked, quickly starting to look bored. It was only a matter of time before she would start complaining.

"Hmm," Mechanica gained a look of thought as she glanced around, trying to come up with some idea. "We could alwaysssss... Uhhmmm..."

In this moment of awkward near-silence, Marina quickly remembered that she was still hungry after her and Pearl had left the snack table earlier. In fact, her hunger had somewhat intensified by now, and she once again found herself looking longingly back in the direction where they had come from. "... Maybe we should just... go back to the snack table?" she suggested rather plainly, not feeling particularly thrilled about moving even further away from where the food was at this point.

"Ugh, again? We were just there!" Pearl groaned, still not feeling like going back to where the pretzel incident occurred yet. "I don't wanna just stand around crunching on snooty crackers!"

"Maybe some of us weren't finished there when you pulled them away, though..." Marina responded in a near-grumbling fashion. It seemed quite apparent that her rapidly-growing hunger was beginning to effect her mood, by now.

Mechanica quickly glanced back and forth at Pearl and Marina as the two spoke, beginning to feel a bit uncomfortable as the mood of the conversation started to shift. "... Er... Guysss...?" she murmured awkwardly.