Work Text:
Incis4: Granpa?
Incis4: Granpa, do you have some time?
Incis4: I really need to talk to someone right now
Incis4: and I can't say this to Marie
Incis4: Or Callie
Incis4: or Ashti, or Marlin
Incis4: or anyone in my comp splatoon
Incis4: I mean
Incis4: I guess I could?!
Incis4: but
CraigCuttlefish: 
CraigCuttlefish: I'm in the valley.
CraigCuttlefish: Come on over.
It's a nice August day, breezy but still hot even here, so hot chocolate's out. Craig gets to his feet and checks the freezer. Sure enough, there's ice cream in there. He knew he could count on Callie to ignore his 'no junk in splatoon storage' rules. And with the blender recently moved here from the canyon to make Ashti more comfortable, he should have everything he needs. Fresh blueberries, delicious strawberries, milk, ice cream, sugar...
When Lucky emerges from the drain, Craig hands her a homemade berry-berry milkshake with whipped cream. “Sorry, squiddo, the other agents didn't stock sprinkles.”
“Oh! There are some—uh,” she says. “I mean, uh...”
“You helped stock the cabin with hidden junk food, didn't you?” Craig raises one eyebrow.
Four looks at the ground. “They said it was tradition.”
“Was 'they' Agent One?”
The awkward blush confirms it, but she isn't cringing like she did when she lived with her parents. The past two months have been good for her. “What sort of sprinkles?”
“Well, there's chocolate, and rainbow, and, uh, bright green big ones shaped like small fries and cohocks and even some of the salmon run bosses.” She blushes an even brighter blue and scuffs a foot on the ground. “Agent Eight really likes just. Biting their tiny heads off after bad shifts.”
He chuckles. That does sound like Ashti. And Lucky, too, no question. “All right, squiddo, get salmonids for both of us then.”
Four scampers into the cabin and is out again in seconds, holding a vial. Craig shakes some out onto his hand first. The sprinkles vary in size, flat green sugar-impressions ranging from proper sprinkle sized to twice that, and he drops his handful on top of his whipped cream. Lucky adds so many they start sinking into the milkshake. She'll just have to chew.
Craig sends Four to put the sprinkles back (he'll find them later, he's sure of it) and carefully lowers himself to the ground below the tree. His muscles protest, which means he needs to exercise them more. Serves him right for letting his age get to him. When Four emerges, he beckons her over, and she sits next to him, her back to the tree, so their arms touch but they don't have to see each other. Craig sits side-on to the sewer, but Four sits with her back to it, so she can lean against the tree and push her legs beneath the fence and dangle them in open air.
Perfect for Four, who shies away from eye contact. “All right, squiddo, what's on your mind?”
There's a long slurping noise. “Well... I mean... it's not...”
“You texted me wanting to talk about it, youngster.” Talking to Four sometimes requires a firm hand. “And it doesn't matter if it's unimportant to everyone else in the world. It sounds important to you, so I wanna hear about it.”
“I... it...”
By Cthulhu, if she doesn't get on with it by the time he's finished this milkshake he's taking her to the nearest bounce pad until she's too tired to evade his questions. “Just talk, agent. Say anything. Don't worry about what I may think, or if it makes sense—”
“Uncle Drew and Aunt Linda have been going over all my sponsorship offers for ranked every day, and talking with Lexi, but today he said he wanted to take me someplace and we went and it was awesome but I've never even thought about it but they'd really like me and I was kinda scared going in but then they had me do stuff and it was so cool and, and, but, but I can't be a ranker if I, and the splatoon and everything. ”
Craig moves one hand to squeeze her leg.
She squeaks. “Your hand is cold.”
“It was on my shake.” Craig tries to sort through the words. “Sounds like it's something you'd really like to do, youngster.”
“It's... it'd be...” Lucky lets out a breath. “I just... it's my choice, it'll be, but I don't, I do, and...”
“What is it?”
More silence from Lucky. From the corner of his eye, Craig watches as her neckflaps unfurl, then close, then open again. Watching a flying squid wrestle with her thoughts can be highly entertaining, but he hopes she figures them out soon.
“They aren't allowed to officially train kids younger than fifteen for the Olympinks, and you have to be seventeen to compete.”
That makes so much sense Craig sits up straighter. He releases Lucky's leg and moves one hand to her nearest neckflap, so he can stroke along the surface in the way she likes. “That's impressive,” he says.
“Yeah,” she says. “And—and I have to decide soon, or well, not really soon , but they wanna start training me as soon as I can but. But I've always wanted to be a famous ranker . But...”
Craig feels her flap quiver under his fingers, and massages the muscle until she sighs and sags back against the tree. He takes a sip of his milkshake and hums. “Never thought about being an Olympiscian? You're quite the athlete, and the autumn team tournaments are legendary.”
“Of course not!” Lucky pulls away from his hand. “Olympink athletes all have a lot of free time and they don't have to worry about anything except how they play.”
“Nonsense,” Craig says. “They have families, parents and squiblings and sometimes significant others or children they care for, and friends, and they go out to dinners and clean their houses just like normal people.”
“I lived in Fort Mariner. No one famous comes from Fort Mariner.” Her neckflaps start twitching at the ends.
Craig can shoot that one down, too. “So your goal was to be a famous ranker when no one famous was ever from Fort Mariner? You'd be the first, either way.”
“I just—you need, uh, need to be all sorts of things I'm not! ”
“Such as?”
That makes her stop, and she glances back at him, her mouth twisted and eyes glistening. “Smart.”
“You're highly intelligent.”
“I'm not!” she cries. “The other agents are always giving me new words, and Marisol, and even Minceling. She's only really spoken Inklish for a few months.”
“Vocabulary isn't intelligence,” Cuttlefish says. He keeps his hand out, an offering. “I imagine they want you for their team for many of the same reasons Marie wanted you for an agent.”
The tips of her flaps stop twitching.
“You have a very good sense of when to move and when to stay put,” Craig says, “possibly the best of any agent in the splatoon. You look at the difficult and see inkredibly creative solutions, things that catch others off guard and work more often than they don't. You can adapt to working in a huge variety of situations, and with a large number of people, due in large part to your childhood and your experience with your comp team and with ranked, which will no doubt be a bonus to any Olympiscian.”
Lucky flushes and looks away. “They, uh, want me in the swimming event too,” she says. “They had me... I did twenty-five meters, and fifty, and two hundred, and they timed my mile. I've never just swum a mile before, and they... I guess... did you see the match where I reached X rank?”
“Did I?” Craig doesn't laugh, but he does smile. “Several times now. I've got a few pictures from it on my fridge.”
Her flush gets deeper. “I did a... a jump-turn that really shouldn't've worked but did during that and didn't lose any speed, and I guess that's... when they're doing laps, that's the turn they try to teach athletes, to avoid losing any time. They said it was a squid roll, it was pioneered in the splatlands and they're having a hard time teaching it but they really need people who know it because the Autumn Olympinks will be in Splatsville two years from now.”
Craig whistles. They're always coming up with new techniques, here and around the world, and that sounds like a doozy. “Probably by the time the Olympinks come about all the top X rankers'll be using it anyway,” he says. “And everyone on a team above Division Six.”
Lucky nods, and scoots towards him again; he rests his hand on her shoulder this time. “So, they saw you do that, and...?”
“They were already planning on asking, when I turned fifteen, but that clinched it,” she says. “And they want me to try some other events, too. Tumbling isn't an official Olympink event, but the splatlands are famous for it, so as a gesture of goodwill they want some of their younger athletes to participate in a tournament a bit after the Olympinks end. Maybe I'll be in the SCR, too, either the relay or the full haul.”
Craig always did love watching that event. Seeing the best athletes transition from a hairpin-tight obstacle course of swimming to climbs up walls around obstacles and shifting paths to dead sprints around tight corners... few manage to be good at all three skills, but then, Four's been an agent for a full year now. She's climbed more than a few walls with clinging Squee-G's, shifted forms to get through nets before continuing to fight, and any number of maneuvers that would, frankly, make the typical SCR course look easy.
Of course, the typical SCR course is five miles long. There's a reason few try to be triathletes that way.
It occurs to Craig that he's stopped hearing Lucky give reasons why she shouldn't do it. “Well, Squiddo?”
“Well what?”
“Do you want to be an Olympink Athlete?”
She goes silent. Then, she moves his hand from her shoulder back to her neckflap. It's tense under his fingers, and he goes back to massaging the muscles the way she showed him a few times, takes another sip of milkshake.
His milkshake's half gone, and Lucky's had two brainfreezes and long since finished hers, when Lucky's pained hisses turn into sighs of relief. She must've really been working her flaps this morning.
“I...” Lucky says. She sets her cup down, grabs a handful of grass, and throws it. Again. “I... I'd have to quit playing tournaments with the Dueling Dualies.”
“You are an amazing sub, and their friend, and practically two of them's adopted sister, but I am absolutely sure they'd understand,” Craig says. He stretches his arm to her far neckflap, and she shifts a little closer. “They've been encouraging you to try new things and see how else you can be happy now that you're out of your parents' house, they'd be cheering you on.”
Lucky grabs another handful of grass, hissing as he digs his fingers into a knot in one muscle, then sighs as it relaxes. “I... I don't know how it'd work, being there and in the splatoon at the same time.”
“Callie and Marie did the news and were on the splatoon for years, do you think they had that much time for it?” Craig moves his fingers along her flap as she keeps edging closer. “We adapt. Honestly, youngster, your duties would probably change, but it'd be things the splatoon needs anyway. I imagine you'd be traveling to various competitions; seeing things is the easiest way to gather information and bring back news, things we can prepare for and deal with. The NSS was never meant to be an Inkopolis-only operation. We can help other places better if we know there'll be trouble before it blows up.”
That gets her to smile. “I don't think I'd be good at that.”
“The Octonozzle's sneakers say otherwise. Yes, I noticed you wearing them still. You'd have to learn some new skills, but that's never stopped you before.”
She picks up her cup again and stirs the straw in the bottom, sucks air with a rattling noise. “I won't make as much money doing that as I would in tournaments.”
“Tournament prizes are good, but Olympink Athlete pay is steady, and more than enough for a family to live off.” Craig doesn't even have to look this up. “The better you get at ranked, the better the prizes, true, but you have to win to get anything. If you only place once a year, then the Olympinks is better. You don't have to worry about money, though.”
“Of course I do,” she says.
“The Sepias are happy to support you.”
“Sean has his eye on this really fresh private school for history and languages, and Millie wants to take wrestling lessons, and everyone needs new clothes.”
“None of which is your responsibility,” Craig reminds her. He's been doing that a lot. “Your older squiblings, who are adults, and the Sepias have it handled.”
Four reaches inside the cup with her fingers; Craig passes over his milkshake, still a quarter full, and she sucks down several swallows. “Do you think they'd, I mean, I live in Inkopolis so I wouldn't need to live in the training dorms. They'd wanna see me every day if they could, at least until I know all the exercises to do every single day all by myself so I'm warmed up right, and I'd be there allllll day at least three days a week.”
Craig can see this well enough. “You can't do that and be a profreshional ranker,” he says.
She shakes her head. “I didn't even know I wanted this,” she says. “But—but they'll never ask again, if I say no. This is a one time thing, and I have to let them know by the end of the month, so I can start getting ready.”
“Giving up a dream can be a hard thing, even if it's for something just as good or better,” Craig says. He thinks back, years and years, to raising his children, and even to before the war. “And forever decisions can happen at any age. You've laid out some good reasons for it, and against it, already. Anything else?”
Lucky looks at her hands. “I think my parents would be proud to have an Olympink Athlete in the family.”
Craig grips her shoulder. “I thought they lost custody?”
“They did.” She stays far too still, never a good sign. “My parents never took time off, but they're not allowed to be working at the prison with what's going on, they've both got paid absences or something I don't really get it. So they come up every Saturday for, um, supervised visitations.”
First Craig's heard of this, and it makes his ink run cold. “They get to see you after all they've done?”
“Not me,” Four says. She sucks another gulp of milkshake through the straw. “But they always spend time checking the egg, and they've been bringing puzzles and spelling games to do with Moe and Millie, and they've been playing math games with Harhar and trying to get Benji to stop lisping altogether, and Sean won't tell me what they do with him he just comes home and shuts himself away in his room.” She sucks in a breath. “I mean—I mean he goes to the Sepia's place, the Sepia's house, and it's not really his room even if Liz insists she and Lizzzzzard don't need a room there anymore now that they're grown.”
Craig relaxes a little and removes his hand. Just her younger squiblings, then. Four still lives with Eight in their apartment, but she has a home with the Sepia family if she chooses to live there (very appropriate now that they're her guardians) and he's grateful they decided not to put many of her squiblings there as well. Sean, Craig's heard, is mostly self-sufficient, and certainly the closest to Four in age, so the one she's least likely to sacrifice her own well-being for; one of her older squiblings is there as well, but she's usually living at inkblot. Her other younger squiblings are doing well enough, living with other members of her family.
He really needs to work on memorizing all her squiblings' names.
Four slurps up more milkshake as Craig tries to think. He can't tell her not to worry about her parents and squiblings. He'd have better luck teaching a Squee-G to sing.
“Augh!” Four drops her milkshake and clutches both hands to her head.
“Third time today. Slow down ,” Craig says, picking up the cup (empty but for some whipped cream dregs) and setting it aside. This gives him a moment to think.
With a quiet sucking noise, Marie emerges through the gate, looking around. Craig presses a finger to his lips and locks eyes with her; she blinks and steps back, just in time for Callie to come through. Marie wraps a hand over Callie's mouth before Callie can say anything, bless her. With one hand, he shoos them both into the little shack. He's also thought of what to say, and she seems to have recovered from her latest brain freeze. “So, youngster, did it matter to you when you decided to come to Inkopolis and become a famous ranker?”
“It did,” she says. “But I did it anyway, because I really really wanted to. And they...” she clenches her fists.
“They did,” he says. “What about agent work? How would they feel about agent work?”
“They...” she has to stop, and her neckflaps start twitching again. “I... I don't know, I mean, they hate having any of us doing things we may not be able to do in twenty years because a career is supposed to be for life and all my strength and speed will just get worse as I get older but they also always talk really good about police officers and flood workers and other people with dangerous jobs.” She picks and throws another handful of grass. “I think... I think they wouldn't like it because it was me, but...”
“But?” Craig asks.
“I don't want anything I do to make them proud,” Four says. “They're miserable, evil, hateful people who shouldn't have a thing to do with me.”
“And they don't need to,” Craig says. “What about the sort of distant pride they have for police officers or flood workers, though? The type where it's not personal, just that they like having those people around?”
Four throws another handful of grass. “I... I think that would be okay,” she says. “And... and I could still play ranked on my days off, once I know the exercises I have to do when I'm not there.”
“You could,” he agrees. “What about if other people were proud of you, too? You for being you, while you do it?” His grandsquids are peering through the door now, Callie's head just above Marie's, clearly eavesdropping. They duck back when they notice him looking. “Your new guardians will be, of course; they wouldn't have brought you if they weren't, though I know they'd be delighted to have you as a ranker, just like their egg-children.”
She's quiet for a while. “Would... do you think Marlin would be proud, too? And Callie? And Marie? ”
“I'm sure of it,” he says. “And I'll be proud of you either way.”
“Promise?”
“Of course.”
Four looks at him and smiles a little. “Lucky Sepia-Todarodes, Olympiscian Rainmaker Player,” she says. “That sounds kinda nice.”
“You're gonna do WHAT?”
Lucky's neckflaps go stiff, but she can't get up fast enough to avoid Callie tackling her in a hug. “You're gonna be in the Olympinks?!”
“I—maybe! They wanted to ask—”
“Well, that's sure something to think about,” Marie says, walking over a little slower. She grabs one of Four's tentacles and gives it a quick tug. “Need someone to talk you through it?”
“I, I think Granpa helped.” She wraps her arms around Callie. “I... but is it really okay? After I've worked so hard to be a ranker?”
Craig gets to his feet. “I'm gonna make some more milkshakes,” he says. His grandsquids have it from here.
Once he's in the cabin, he lets himself smile. An Olympiscian in the Splatoon. What will they think of next.