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Elite Octarian Sessel Brine removes her hypnogoggles, checks that her seaweed is properly secured, and walks briskly down the hall. If she doesn't hurry, she'll be on time. That's inexcusable tardiness, under the circumstances. It isn't Brine's first audience with the DJ. But it won't be her last, if she has anything to do with it.
She reaches the command rooms with five minutes to spare and lets herself in, standing at attention just inside the entrance. “Sessel Brine, Commander. You asked for me?”
“I did, Brine.” The DJ doesn't leave his table, full of maps and charts; he uses a stalk of wasabi to shove one out of the way. “You've done a lot of mighty fine work, the last ten years you've worn the seaweed. Don't think I haven't noticed.”
She doesn't let herself smile. “All for the glory of Octaria,” she says, striding forwards to stand beside him. Most of his plans have to do with the Great Zapfish retrieval she assisted in last week, with a number detailing the placement of the lesser zapfish to enhance defensive capabilities and power new, offensive weapons. The Great Octoweapons are in the last stages of testing.
She looks forward to seeing The Mighty Octostomp make short work of any intruder who tests their weak points.
“You've given your all for the glory of Octaria,” Octavio says. He looks up at her at last, and regards her with his soothing green eyes. “I can only ask someone who's already proven themselves, sacrificed so much for our cause, to sacrifice a little bit more.”
This sounds like an honor. If Sessel could straighten further, she would. “Sir?”
With one stick of wasabi, her DJ slides forward a file, then flips it open with one sucker. The first picture is of a desert, under a light so bright it hurts even in the picture. Flip to the next picture, a bustling city the likes she'd only dreamed of, covered in sand. Flip again and... Octolings? And Inklings? “The Great Turf War was for Inkopolis Territory, a verdant land we can support ourselves on. Deserters, the sick, and the stupid refused to join; they remained in The Splatlands, a desolate piece of scrub. For all that it's above ground, it's in a state far worse than our domes, particularly because there is no order to their lives.”
A place where the outcasts from both species struggle to survive. “I see,” she says.
“It's possible we can sway such people to support us,” the DJ says, flipping the folder closed, “or at least prevent them from joining the war on the wrong side. But I am too visible a figure to see for myself. I cannot go.”
He wants her to—
“And neither can any of my elite. I need you here.”
Now Sessel frowns. If he doesn't want her to do this herself, then what is he asking?
“We need more information,” he says, tucking one wasabi stalk behind an ear. “I need someone to put together a small, trusted team of informants. No more than eight Octolings who can blend into the world there and pass as natives. Who can insinuate themselves into their news stations, their weapons' manufacturing. Any and every piece of information will be valuable. And I want you to lead it.”
Sessel sucks in a hard breath. She was prepared for an honor, but this?
This is what she was made for.
“Do you have a list of candidates?”
“I do,” he says. He hands her the folder. “You'll find more pictures, as well as a list of proposed candidates, within. But, Elite Brine, anyone alone in the Splatlands will stand out. You must be prepared to send them in groups of two or three, not alone. Family groups would be best: the children would make excellent camouflage, if they can keep their mouths shut, and we've already devised ways to prevent them from succumbing to the Inkling's brainwashing.”
Sessel attaches the folder securely to two suckers. “I'll study it and have my choices soon.”
“You have a week,” he says. “We want them in place in a month. You cannot join them, Brine. Your job will officially switch to training recruits; every year, you should select one or two Octolings you believe would be well suited to our task, out of those you trained, and integrate them into the splatlands. Those sent to the surface may never return, a worthy sacrifice. You, however, will travel there at least every month, possibly more, in order to gather the collected information, bring it to Octaria, summarize it, and get it to the Octarians who can make best use of it.”
That's a lot of work. That's...
She can do this. She can, and she will. For Octaria.
“I'm honored, DJ Octavio,” she says.
“I know you deserve the honor, Elite Brine,” he says. “Dismissed.”
Brine salutes him and walks off, her heels clicking smartly on the floor. She retrieves her hypnogoggles and walks to her family's assigned quarters. Her husband is undergoing another round of inkfusions; her daughters are at school. There's no one to interrupt as she opens the folder. She's already seen the first three photos; there are a handful of others, none from within the city itself, before she gets to candidates.
Kursee Brine's face stares up at her, and it's a good thing she's sitting down. She rests a hand on his face.
The picture was taken before he got injured during the Zapfish Retrieval. His seaweed is on clear display, he still has all his tentacles, and he's standing up straight.
If she chooses him, she'll lose her husband. Not lose—she'll be able to visit often. But it won't be the same.
He's already chafing at his restrictions and knowing that while he'll live, he'll walk again, and he'll likely regain the ability to change forms, but he'll never be in combat. He's confessed to her, more than once, how useless he feels now that he can't support Octaria.
She already put her children at risk once, for her beloved empire. Amelia may never be the same. Is she willing to do so again, to send them with her husband?
Sessel stares at the document, at her husband's picture, for an eternity of heartbeats. What is she thinking?
Nothing is as important as Octaria and DJ Octavio.
Sessel lets out a hard breath, that may have been a sigh in a weaker woman, and closes the folder. She'll talk to her husband tonight. Start making plans.
Octaria will rise, and the surface will be theirs.
The children will understand.