Chapter Text
Falling. It wasn’t really a sensation Agent 8 was overly familiar with. Whenever she fell off the edge during any of the tests, she would be splatted by her tank within a few feet of the ledge.
And while she’d regained a few of her memories from before Kamabo, they were still very fuzzy and incomplete. All in all, falling was essentially a new experience for 8. It was scary, sure, but nowhere near as terrifying as some of those tests had been. Falling…
It then occurred to 8 that when one fell, they would eventually hit the ground and splat. And she was concerningly close to one of the helicopters. Quickly, she super-jumped to the copter Pearl and Marina were on and breathed a sigh of relief. She had done it! She had escaped! And saved the world as well apparently.
Her relief, however, was short-lived as Marina spoke from above her.
“Enemy readings don’t indicate a full charge, but it looks like it’s going to fire anyways!” She said, frantically typing away on her keyboard.
8’s eyes widened in horror as she turned back to the giant statue that was now covered pink with her ink. What- what more could she do? She was exhausted. Barely sleeping in the facility, almost getting blended into goo, going through a ridiculous amount of infrastructure, fighting Agent 3 again, and then covering that entire damn statue with ink, she wasn’t sure she had anything left to give!
Nonetheless, 8 gripped her Octo Shot and got into a combat stance, ready to super-jump into the statue and take care of that damn phone herself if she needed to, as Tartar said something she couldn’t make out over the noise.
As it turns out, however, she didn’t need to. Right as she was preparing to leap, an unfamiliar but powerful song started to blare from the helicopters, and she heard a thunk from right next to her. She turned to see Pearl standing beside her, a mischievous grin on her face.
The smaller inkling clapped 8 on the back, “Great work, Eight-I’ve got it from here! VOCAL CHORDS READY!” She shouted, turning towards the statue. 8 wasn’t sure what Pearl intended on doing; she looked questioning up at the main body of the helicopter, and Marina gave her a thumbs up and smiled.
8 was about to ask Pearl what it was she intended to do, but didn’t get the chance as the inkling shot both of her hands into the air.
“AYO! STATUE!” She called out, suddenly glowing as she readied a special, though 8 still couldn’t recall any special that had even a chance of-
Oh
That was the only word in 8’s mind as Pearl manifested a heavily decorated Killer Wail that seemed like it itself was the size of the helicopter.
Yeah, that might do it.
The statue fired its beam of ink straight for Inkopolis, and in turn the helicopter in its way. That 8 was on. Reflexively, the octarian raised her arms to cover her head, knowing full well that it would be futile if she was actually struck.
Even more alarming, however, was the ear-piercing scream next to her.
“BOOOO-YAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!” Pearl shouted, knocking 8 back with she sheer force of the scream, and the subsequent impact of the ‘Princess Cannon’ (the name was engraved on the side) with Tartar’s grand beam of death.
After a moment of struggling, Pearl’s shout overpowered Tartar’s ink and blasted the statue to smithereens. 8 looked at Pearl in awe; she would never had guessed that the relatively short woman could have produced such a noise. It was impressive, really.
For a moment, there was relative silence. The speakers were silent, no one was talking; the only noise was the crash of the waves and the chopping of the helicopter blades. Everyone was waiting with bated breath to see if the threat was truly gone.
Slowly, carefully, 8 got up onto her feet. The statue was destroyed, its head blown clean off. All at once, the silence broke. Marina cheered as she leapt down and hugged Pearl, the two collapsing on the ground. Cuttlefish was doing a fun little dance.
8 took a deep breath as she collected her Octo Shot (it had been knocked from her grasp by the shock wave) and put it at her hip. She… still had a hard time unclenching.
She looked around, and her gaze was caught by a figure stirring, one that had previously been stationary. She offered a smile, hoping that this encounter would not be the same as the previous one
Agent 3 was waking up
[Line Break]
Warmth. That was the first thing Agent 3 felt as she began to return to consciousness. Not the suffocating, mechanical heat of some of those warehouses, either. It was a comfortable warmth. Almost like the sun. But that didn’t make any sense
Then, she heard a strange whirring, chopping noise. Immediately, her mind went to the blender Captain had been in, along with someone else she hadn’t been able to make out. It sounded like it was still going.
She had to get up. She was Agent 3 of the New Squidbeak Splatoon. While she thought she had destroyed the blender, she must’ve been mistaken. She had to get up, she had to-
She opened her eyes and was instantly blinded. She tried to scramble back from whatever the source of the light was, but her body felt like lead. She was only successful in flopping onto her back.
Slowly, she opened her eyes again, and as her eyes adjusted she saw that her judgement of the situation had been dead wrong. Thank goodness.
That warmth was, indeed, the sun. And the whirring chopping noise was a helicopter. She was a helicopter. She looked around and saw people celebrating. Cuttlefish was doing a dance of some sort, to people she didn’t recognize her rolling intertwined on the floor, and an octoling she didn’t recognize was smiling at her. She-
Wait a minute…
Agent 3 stumbled to her feet, panic coursing through her veins. She reached for her Hero Shot and… it wasn’t there.
Three cursed and made to charge at the octoling, who had stepped away, seemingly taken aback, when she was stopped by a hand on her shoulder.
“At ease, Agent 3,” the crackly, yet comforting, voice of Captain Cuttlefish said from next to her. “That right there’s Agent 8 of the NSS.”
3 turned to him in surprise. “What?” She said, “What are you talking about?” Agent 8? First putting off the implication of Agents 4-7 existing, why was an octoling a member of the Splatoon.
“Uh, hi…” a voice said shyly from right next to 3. She spun around to see that the octoling had approached the pair, a hopeful smile on her face. “I am called Agent 8,” she said in awkward inkling. It was impressively good for the average octarian, but still far from fluent. “I was hoping for our new start?”
3 looked to Cuttlefish for an explanation. The old man chuckled, “Agent 8 and I met in the metro. From what I gather, she was liberated by the Calamari Inkantation during your fight against Octavio a couple years ago.”
“How-“ 3’s questions were instantly cut off by Cuttlefish raising a hand.
“We can talk about it later,” the captain promised, “for now,” he gestured somewhere behind 3, “let’s just sit here and enjoy the sunrise. It’s been a minute since I’ve seen one of those.” He went and sat on the edge of the crate, and 8 joined him after a cautious glance at 3.
Agent 3 sighed. She wanted more answers. Why is she on a helicopter in front of a pink pile of rubble? Why is an octoling a part of the NSS? Why is freaking Off The Hook — as 3 had identified the pair, who had now joined Captain and 8 — with them?
Unfortunately, 3 was well aware that she wouldn’t be getting any answers until the Captain decided she would, so she joined the rest in sitting and watching the sunrise. Thought a part of her still couldn’t relax with an octoling right next to her.
Still, 3 had to admit that the Captain certainly had a point. 3 hadn’t seen any natural light in at least a month and a half.
3 glanced to the side, intending to get a look at 8 without her knowing. What she didn’t expect was for 8 to be the one already looking at her. But it wasn’t with the calculating, analytic gaze she had gotten used to the past 2 years. It was… soft. Warm.
3 averted her eyes quickly, feeling uncomfortable. This was… not how she expected this mission to go. Not at all.
Instead of focusing on that, she turned her eyes back to once again watch the sunrise.
And the sunrise was so very beautiful.