Hologram

Crowley closed his eyes and let his violin bow run slowly across the strings, producing a high, wavering note that seemed to hang in the air long after he stopped moving. Across the rehearsal room (which was actually a disused school classroom), Astron opened his eyes.

'Dammit, Lee,' he grumbled. 'Everyone in the building probably heard that.'

Crowley turned to grin at him, reaching up casually to brush his overlong, glossy blue locks out of his face. 'What's the problem? All the teachers know we have a band, and they haven't done anything to stop us yet.'

Astron just shook his head and leaned back against the wall. He was sitting down, reading a sheet of paper containing the lyrics to their newest-written song – As Yet Unnamed. Their singer, Stalgator, had written them as usual, but the rest of the song was up to Astron (the guitarist), Gray (the bassist) and Rick (the drummer). As he read through them, a thought came into his head, and he looked up at his bandmate.

'We don't have a lot of songs you can play in, do we?' he said. Crowley played violin, though he also played drums whenever Rick was absent, which seemed to be fairly often. He was good at both, but his violin wasn't used in many of the band's songs, usually leaving him with nothing to do.

To Astron's surprise, Crowley was still grinning.

'I know!' he said. 'That's what I'm doing right now – I'm creating a violin part for a new song, and then you guys are gonna turn it into a thing.'

Astron considered this, frowning a little in concentration.

'You wanna make a new song that has a violin solo?' he said.

Crowley nodded. His expression had turned pensive, leaving Astron to wonder – not for the first time – how the other boy's moods seemed to change so rapidly. 'Yeah. It's gonna be a violin-based song.' He played another long, trilling note on said instrument, closing his eyes thoughtfully as he did so.

Astron stood up and went over to him, grabbing his electric guitar from where it lay, leaning against the amp. 'Is it going to have lyrics?' he asked. Persuading Stal to write another song wouldn't be hard – the frontman seemed to be in a creative mood right now – but everyone was aware that he wasn't overly fond of Crowley. While Astron was often frustrated by this barrier, by couldn't entirely blame Stal. Crowley was a cool guy to hang out with and a great violinist, but he was also known for doing extremely questionable things, and he wasn't always the nicest guy.

Crowley wrinkled his nose. 'Nah. Stal wouldn't want to write anything for me. Besides, I want it to be an awesome instrumental song, like Teeth of the Trap.'

Sounds great to me, man, Astron thought, but even if Stal's not making lyrics for this song, it's still going to be a part of our repertoire. If he doesn't like you then he's not gonna like that, either.

He didn't voice any of these concerns, but simply got into position beside Crowley with his guitar. He swept a hand down the strings, making a powerful noise even louder than the violin. Crowley slowly opened his eyes and gazed at him, then, after a long moment, smirked and lifted his bow.

'Wanna hear my solo first?' he said. 'It's still in development, but I think I've got it aaaaalmost how I want it.'

'Sure,' said Astron. 'Then we'll try to work out the rest of the song together.'

Nodding in agreement, the younger boy began to play. As he listened, Astron found himself increasingly in awe of his friend's musical skill. Crowley hadn't been playing for very long, yet he was already good enough to play in a band. And despite not knowing a single thing about reading notes, his ability to grasp the structure of songs – and remember them – was unlike anything the guitarist had seen before. It made him realise that, for all of Crowley's personality flaws, he was still a valuable person to have in the band. Nothing would ever change that.

When the solo finished, Astron grinned appreciatively and made a thumbs-up gesture.

'That was amazing,' he said. 'I wasn't expecting that at all. It sounds great. I don't think you need to change a thing.'

Crowley was staring off into the middle distance, his expression difficult to read. 'Yeah, maybe,' he said at last. It was only then that Astron's mind began to digest exactly what he'd just heard, and to his surprise, he realised there had been a hint of sadness in Crowley's playing. He was sure he hadn't imagined it. But he couldn't think of any reason why the younger boy would write sad music.

Choosing to ignore it, he looked thoughtfully at his guitar. 'I think I've got a few ideas for things we can add to that,' he said. 'In fact... you know what, Lee? That was so good, I'm not going to tell Stal until the whole song is finished. I don't want him to tell us we can't do it, just 'cause he doesn't get along well with you. I wanna make this song a reality.'

'Thanks, Astron, I love you too.'

Astron sighed and rolled his eyes, albeit lightheartedly. He'd been expecting that.

'Let me try this...'

The two of them played together for close to an hour, coming up with several new ideas for the song, until finally the lateness of the night convinced them to put away their instruments and sneak upstairs to bed. Just before they parted to go to their separate dorms, Astron touched Crowley's shoulder to get his attention.

'Hey, I never actually asked you... what are you calling this song?'

Crowley blinked, as if in surprise, before his expression shifted back to its usual smug grin. 'I thought of a name for it ages ago, 'Stron. And it's a cool name.'

'What?'

'Hologram.'

Astron continued to ponder this as they parted ways. By the time he'd gotten to his bed, he'd given up trying to figure out the meaning of Crowley's cryptic song title and the emotion he'd heard in his violin playing. Crowley probably wouldn't explain anything; he rarely did. Stal often didn't explain the meaning of his songs either. Maybe it didn't matter.

It was a cool name, and that was all that mattered to him.