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Octo Canyon was a bit of a lonely place when alone. Marie Cuttlefish sat, her prop umbrella sat discarded to the side a she ran a needle through torn fabric. She wasn’t the best at patching the hero suit up, not like Gramps had been, but she was the only one left, so she supposed she better start getting good at it.
Her agent had a lot of trouble with those last kettles. Her brellas and charger skills definetly needed some work. Maybe Marie should take her to a test range and give her some tips-
The shuffle from behind wouldn’t ring any alarm bells normally, but Marie was by herself in enemy territory. She pointed her charger directly at the enemies chest, and Marie’s finger rested on the trigger, before she stopped.
Callie?
No, she realized an instant later. This octoling simply had the same swoop of hair opposite her own. Instead of Callies black hair, this one had a deep purple. Shades covered her eyes, though the ones she wore were slightly different from the other octoling soldiers, and instead of the armor plate, she wore a more casual outfit. There was no weapon in her hands, and she brought her arms up slowly.
Marie refused to lower the charger.
The octarian started speaking, though Marie was too rusty in Octarian to really understand of it. She simply narrowed her eyes, and the Octarian raised her arms higher yet, flashing a smile, a clear attempt to negotiate some sort of peace.
Octarians were the enemy. Marie should just splat her and be done with it. But that smile…
She thought to a few months back, when she’d met Marina. After interrogating her, the two quickly decided she wasn’t a threat, though Callie was more convinced then Marie. It was only after a few weeks did Marie truly believe she was a fan of theirs.
“When I heard your song, I realized I wanted to leave.”
Marie decided to test this theory. She opened her mouth and began to sing.
“Ya Weni Marei…”
The Octoling gasped, and she immediately responded, singing the inkantation with Marie. Their voices mixed together surprisingly well, and Marie found herself singing a bit past the first verse before she abruptly stopped. The octoling kept going a little longer before fizzling out.
“That settles it.” she sighed, lowering the charger. The octoling relaxed in turn, shoulders slumping. She held out a hand to Marie to shake.
Marie raised an eyebrow, refusing to take it. Even if this wasn’t her enemy, she was still an octoling.
An almost comically upset expression crossed the others face as she was left hanging, before she huffed and stomped off. Marie kept an eye on her, ready to shoot at any sign of trouble, but the octoling simply looked around the camp with curiosity. As she got a little too close to Marie’s agent files (Which she had created to keep track of Four’s progress), Marie casually tightened the grip on her charger, and the other backed off.
What to do with her, though? Marie couldn’t let an octoling run free in Inkopolis just because she knew the inkantation. She had chosen not the splat her, but this could very well still be a trap. Eventually, Marie came to a good conclusion, one she often came to in these sorts of situations.
Make it someone elses problem.
Gramps was gone, Three was gone, and even though Four would agree to pretty much anything, Marie wasn’t going to add anything else to her plate (she could see how much coffee her agent drank to get going in the mornings). That left one other person who was aware of the octarian threat and the new squidbeak splatoon.
Marie pulled up to Pearls mansion, and when Marina answered the door, Marie shoved the Octoling in the house.
Okay, she explained a little more then that. Marina was weirdly okay with the setup, and as her and the octarian chatted about, Marina helpfully translated for Marie.
Apparently the octoling, whose name was Lilac, hadn’t been a soldier at all, just a member of the Octarian band Turquoise October. Marie smirked when Marina and Lilac started talking in excited tones, reciting the Inkantation together the same way she’d seen fans do during performances. It seemed her hunch was correct, as Marina told her that the octoling had suddenly wished to leave after hearing the heavenly melody her and Callie had performed during their battle with Octavio.
“I can convince Pearlie to let her stay,” Marina assured. “I feel terrible lying to her, but…” Marina looked back at the other octoling. “I’d never just leave Lilac to stumble around Inkopolis like I had to. We can help her get her footing here.”
“That’s nice and all. I just want you to let me know if anything about her seems shady.” Marie replied.
Marina agreed, and Marie excused herself out.
That was that sorted out, then. Marie wouldn’t have to think any more about weird octolings except for a minor check in now and again.
Marie was very alarmed to see the octoling back at their camp the next day. She almost brought out her charger again, but then the other waved at her, a wide smile on her face.
“Lovely. Just what I needed today.” she said. As she arrived the octoling seemed to chuckle to herself. Marie frowned. What was she laughing for? Some kind of scheme? The shades made it hard to pinpoint her exact expression.
Marie pointed to the exit. “Sorry, you can’t hang with us.” Especially not when agent Four would be arriving soon.
Oh, and speak of the devil, a flash of yellow popped out of the grate. A short, slightly plump inkling holding a bag with delicious smelling food inside appeared.
“I brought my breakfast so we can start earl -” Four trailed off, looking at Lilac with confusion. “Who’s this?”
“No need to attack her…yet.” Marie said. “I think she-”
Four and Lilac were already shaking hands, the young inkling looking amazed at the others appearance. Marie was left with no choice but to introduce the two to each other. One thing lead to the next, Fours puppy dog eyes swayed her, and she found herself sitting next to the octoling as she monitered Four’s progress through the kettle, the young inkling eating her breakfast and fighting octarian troops at the same time.
Sometimes she felt like recruiting Four was a good idea. Not today. It was a good thing Marie had a lot of experience with idiots getting in over their heads.
Still, having someone next to her was nice. Every so often, the octarian would chime in, and though Marie didn’t understand a lot of it, she could intuit what the other might have been saying, and relayed that back to Four.
It was the last kettle of the day when an octarian solider popped up from the enemy ink, launching towards Four. Marie tensed, and the octoling next to her frowned as well. Marie focused on giving her agent advice, telling her to dodge roll, reminding her to use her subs, making sure she got it into her head to retreat when her armor broke (Cod, that squid was too reckless), and only relaxing when the last agent was splatted, though she never let it show in her voice.
For a first encounter with octoling soldiers, Four had performed well. Not as well as Three had, but Three was the anomaly in that case.
Marie looked up, only to see she was alone, the octoling nowhere to be found. She shot to her feet, until she heard rustling. She was able to pinpoint it to the supply shack she had hastily set up for Four, four sheets of metal with a tarp strung over the top. The backup weapons were in there, as well as her agent Four fact o pedia.
The snacks were also in there, and that seemed to be what the octoling had been after, shoving a sugary sweet ‘protein’ bar into her mouth, before turning to Marie, chocolate still on her cheek.
Marie could recognize that as stress eating, no doubt about it. She’d seen Callie do the same thing enough times to tell. Whether it was because the octoling was worried about Four or anxious over seeing her own kind again, Marie couldn’t tell, but either way, she wasn’t doing anything harmful over it. After Lilac had finished her snack, she left the shack, and Marie took another minute to made sure all the backup weapons were accounted for before leaving herself (Though she could have sworn the roller was in a different spot).
As she left the shack, she saw Lilac helping wipe away a splotch of enemy ink Four had gotten on her face. Four’s short bob of tentacles bounced as she turned to Marie.
“I recognized the weapons those octarian soldiers had been using…”
Marie glanced back at the footage, rewinding to see the fight play out. An octoling soldier fired off some kind of brella, while another charged forward with dualies. They definetly didn’t look like normal octarian weapons, but Marie didn’t recognize them as anything specific.
She looked back up to Four.
“And you recognized them as…?”
“Those are the weapons we get at Grizzco.”
That was a name Marie recognized.
Mr. Grizz. A voice without a face, he was the CEO of Grizzco. The buisness was a bit murky in terms of legality, but Marie had never cared enough to look into it.
Now that would change.
There were two uses for Grizzco helicopters. One was to transport the workers to salmonoid grounds. The other was to transport golden eggs to…somewhere. Maybe a warehouse, or maybe even directly to the CEO himself.
Marie boarded the egg - carrying helicopter, noting no one was in the drivers seat. The helicopter was self flying, it seemed. Even more suspicious. Marie couldn’t say she wasn’t interested now. There was clearly something this Mr. Grizz wanted to hide.
The copter landed earlier then Marie would have thought. There was no warehouse in sight, instead baren, empty land.
In front of her was a wooden statue of a bear with a salmon in its mouth.
Marie cursed, pulling out her charger.
“We at Grizzco have a strict no weapon policy outside of shifts.” the voice said. “Direct your questions at me. I will be happy to answer.”
Marie didn’t want to put up with this buisness talk squit, but she wasn’t in a position to argue. Not when she needed information. “Fine, then. How did Octarians get Grizzco weapons?”
“You are aware of that? Interesting…yes, Grizzco enjoys having multiple buisness affiliates. Maximizes profit. I take a small cut of the Octarians golden eggs, and in turn they are provided with Grizzco weaponry and…other perks.”
“What ‘other perks’?”
“That is something under a strict NDA.”
Marie almost growled.
“Do you know where Callie Cuttlefish is? Do you know if the octolings squidnapped her?”
“I am unaware of anything to do with that event.”
Marie was quiet for a moment.
“Do you have any other questions?”
“Why do you need golden eggs?”
“A personal project of mine.”
“You’re real helpful, you know that?”
“If that is all, you can board the Grizzco copter. It will take you back. Do not try breaking and entering again or I will have to take legal action.”
Marie looked around. Middle of nowhere. She could always bust Grizzco, but she had a feeling that it would accomplish nothing other then risking the secret of the octarian threat becoming public.
She boarded the helicopter, feeling more frustrated then she had an hour earlier.
Marina helped her cross reference over the phone: Yes, there had been Octarian contact with Grizzco, though that had started just when she first decided to leave, no, she had no information on what this crossover entailed, and she said that she was sure that Grizzco weapons alone wouldn’t be worth any golden eggs, especially since the salmonoids finding out about this buisness venture would lead to them ending any trade relations. So whatever the deal was, those ‘other perks’ must have been the main reason for it. Lilac had little clue either, Marina said. She hadn’t been very high ranked in the octarian military, just a singer for Turqouise October.
“Does she know anything about where Callie could be?” Marie asked, feeling a little dumb that she hadn’t asked earlier.
“She says she never even heard of her.” Marina said. “If they have her, they’re keeping her far away from anyone else.”
Marie hadn’t expected much, but this complete lack of helpful information made her more worried then ever.
Could Callie actually be…
No. Marie refused. She couldn’t be gone like that.
It wasn’t Octavio’s style to just quietly splat his enemies, anyway. If he was going to do that, why not finish Gramps when he had the chance? It had to be something else, some special plan he was cooking up.
Suddently, a crash come from the other line. Marie startled to attention as Marina cursed, and the line stopped.
Marie was out the door and on her way to Pearl’s mansion in a flash.
By the time she got there, it seemed to be a bit too late. The couches were overturned, the room transformed into a battlefield. A quiet battlefield, one which had just endured a fight but was now able to rest. Ink was everywhere. Marina was breathing heavily, snapping her brella to face Marie.
“It’s just me.”
The brella lowered, and Marina seemed to relax.
“And the Octoling?” Marie asked.
“Lilac,” Marina corrected with a frown.
Lilac peeked up from behind a couch, straightening her slightly crooked shades, looking just as tense as the other until she caught sight of Marie. Marina exchanged some words with her fellow octoling, and then turned to Marie.
“She thinks they were after her.” Marina said. “And it’s not the first time.”
…What?
Lilac had woken up bright and early, but something felt missing. The mansion she was in was big and all, but it was so empty. She needed to see someone. Marina had been kind to her, and Lilac enjoyed Pearl’s energy, but someone else came to mind.
The woman with white and green tentacles. Yes, that was who she was thinking of. She’d been the one to sing that heavenly melody, the one that had wormed its way into her mind since what felt like forever. That song was the only reason she’d ran away to the surface, after all. Without it, she’d probably still be down with her fellow Octarians.
She didn’t miss Octo Canyon much, honestly. She remembered being as thick as theives with the other members of Turquoise October, but recently, it felt like that spark had just died out. They laughed awkwardly when she brought up their in jokes, whispered behind her back, and had stopped calling her Lil or Lily. It had hurt, and a sudden loneliness had taken hold of her.
That was also around the time Octavio had recruited her for a special mission. Maybe her bandmates had become jealous when she was chosen over them? No, she knew those guys like the back of her hand. Maybe Urchin would get his tentacles tangled over it, but no one else. Definitely not their drummer…what was her name again?
There went her terrible memory.
Back at the matter at hand, she found it easy to retrace her steps down Inkopolis from the day before, until the sewer was right in front of her and she was back at Octo Canyon.
The white haired squid - Marie Cuttlefish, that was her name - wasn’t there yet. So instead she looked around. There was a shed filled with all sorts of weapons, including a roller, a charger, and a brella. The roller was propped against a file cabinet, and next to that were snacks, a fact Lilac noted before leaving the shed.
As she opened the door, she could hear the sound of approaching footsteps - four octolings. She ducked back inside. Why were they here?
She wasn’t a fighter, but there wasn’t anyone else here to protect her. Her eyes darted to to weapons, and by instinct, she grabbed the roller. The mechanisms were locked by something, yet her hands seemed to move on their own - twist here, pull there - and the roller was ready to go. She flipped it in her hands, the handle feeling perfect in her grip, and turned towards the octolings.
After the fight (Which went by in a blur, she didn’t even know how she did that, she’d never even touched an ink weapon other then the most basic of them), she was able to find some ink remover in the shed and cleaned up all the spilt ink. She didn’t want to worry Marie, and if she saw the mess, she might think Lilac had pulled something.
Just as she finished and put the ink remover away, Marie appeared. Lilac grinned wide and waved.
“I knew that roller was in the wrong spot.” Marie said, after hearing the story. Putting aside her desire to chew Lilac out for not telling her, there was another problem.
Sheldon was very (in Marie’s opinion, overly) serious about keeping his weapons in the right hands. He added a safety lock that could either be remotely deactivated by himself, or undone by a series of steps only New Squidbeak Splatoon agents were aware of.
So how did this octoling, who was supposed to be barely trained in weaponry, know it?
“Dumb luck?” Marina guessed.
Marie shrugged. It was late, and if there wasn’t any need for alarm, she wanted to get to bed. She quickly checked her phone, seeing a line of texts from Four.
Agent 4: Please stay safe, Marie!
Agent 4: Did you find anything out about Grizzco?
Agent 4: Marie please tell me you’re okay
Marie huffed in amusement. She quickly sent back what she’d learned, closed her phone, and went to leave when a hand fell on her shoulder.
“Wait, Marie.” Marina asked. “I think Lilac should stay with you from now on.”
Marie turned. “What?”
Unlike Pearl’s mansion, Marie lived in a tiny apartment with only two rooms. And it wasn’t like she didn’t want someone else living with her again, it was just that she wanted that person to be Callie.
“Octavio’s forces know she’s staying here, and if they’re targeting her, they might come back.” Marina said. “We need to hide her if that’s the case.”
That did make sense, though Marie was still against the idea. She opened her mouth, but Lilac started speaking in Octarian, sounding overjoyed, and Marie didn’t need it to be translated to know the others opinion on the subject.
Maybe Four was rubbing off on her.
After Lilac unpacked her single bag with everything she owned (A toothbrush, a copy of her and Callies first album alongisde Tide Goes Out, and her clothes), Marie turned to her, stopping her as the octoling started towards Callie’s room.
“You’re sleeping in my room,” she said, gesturing the octoling over. “I’ll bring out the inflatable mattress.”
She might have asked Lilac to sleep on the couch, but Marie wanted to keep an eye on her. Marina had said there was nothing fishy about her (Other then being deathly afraid of needles), but Marie wanted to see for herself.
Only after she had went to get the air mattress did she realize that even getting it out of the closet might be a daunting task. After all, it was in Callies room.
No. It would be easy. She just hadn’t been in there since her cousin had gone missing, that was all. Easy. She took a deep breath, standing in the doorframe, before diving in.
Dust bunnies had started to grow on the ground, the rooms months without care catching up to it. Just another painful reminder of why Marie was waking up at an unreasonable hour, trecking to Octo Canyon with a 14 year old and an octoling. She caught sight of a few pictures on Callies nightstand. In almost all of them, Marie was right there next to Callie.
Was Callie feeling as lonely as Marie was? Certainly, wherever she was, Marie could imagine her cousin missed her. She hoped.
That or she was permasplatted, and wasn’t feeling anything anymore.
Marie turned away from the pictures.
She opened the closet, taking out the air mattress for the first time in months. As she went back into her own room, she saw Lilac lounging on the floor. She had changed into a loose Tentatek T-shirt, tied up so it exposed her belly. Marie’s eyes caught the odd tattoo on her side, but she didn’t ask.
As they prepared for sleep, Marie noticed something much more odd then a tattoo. Lilac hadn’t taken off her shades yet. Was she going to sleep with them on?
Must be an octoling thing. Or perhaps she had an unhealthy obsession with them. Marie wasn’t going to judge. She dimmed the lights, and made sure to watch her guest carefully. When she was sure the other was asleep, Marie let herself do the same.
When Marie came to, she felt something warm pressed to her side. She could hear her cousin snoring. Callie hadn’t snuck into her room for…how long? Her nightmares must have really been bad this time. Half awake, she squeezed Callies hand.
She let herself fall back asleep again, Callies breathing from behind a pleasant reminder that everything was okay.
[Image Description: Marie and Lilac on Maries bed. Lilac is tightly wrapping her arms around Maries torso, nuzzling against her back. Her eyes are closed but her eyebrows are slightly creased, though it is not very visible under her shades. Her tentacles are slightly curled. She is on top of Maries blanket and her own blanket is falling off the bed. Marie is facing away from Lilac, eyes half open. Her hair is down. Art by Thunder_Jake]
Marie was woken up by the sound of someone humming the Calamari Inkantation. She looked over, confused at why someone was in her appartment, but then she remembered the previous night. Oh, right. Lilac was staying with her now.
A delicious smell was coming from the kitchen, just as the humming had, and Marie watched with slight amusement as she realized what Lilac was cooking.
“Burgers?” Marie asked. “That’s not really a breakfast food.”
“Burgers.” The octoling smiled under her shades as she cheerfully flipped them with a loud sizzle. Marie let out an amused sigh. She couldn’t remember giving her guest permission to use her kitchen, but the smell was delicious enough that she didn’t complain.
Though they were certainly nowhere near as delicious as pizza, the burgers were pretty good. If Callie were here, she’d be in love with these.
Right, Callie. Marie felt her pleasant mood drop a bit. There had still been no sign of her. Maybe today would yeild something different, but she’d learned to not expect much. The looming fear that her cousin was actually, truly gone had been slowly sneaking up on her since last night, and she could feel her appetite ebb away.
She pushed the plate away before getting ready to go to octo valley. It felt like the most natural thing in the world when Lilac followed her as well, and Marie felt a half smile creep on their face as she felt her dread start to dissipate. Being with her like made her feel less alone. like they’d done this a thousand times over.
Like Callie was back.
Marie froze, smile falling off her face.
She was not going to replace her cousin with an Octoling. She tried her hardest to pretend the other octoling didn’t exist for the rest of the way.
When they arrived, Marie could feel the Octolings eyes boring through her. A hand fell on her shoulder and she quickly pushed it off with her elbow.
“You okay?”
Marie didn’t say anything, still unable to look her in the eyes.
They stayed quiet until Four appeared. Her and Lilac shared a high five, and Marie forced herself to shoot them a half smile. It was time to begin the day.
The awkwardness between her and Lilac slowly melted over the course of the morning, both focusing more on Four then each other as their agent started getting to work on collecting zapfish.
Then, in the middle of the day during Fours lunch break, she found herself off to the side with her agent.
“Whats going on between you two?” Four asked, concern flashing in her eyes. “Did something happen?”
“Nothing happened,” Marie said, “Just focus on getting through those kettles.”
“It’s harder to focus when I know somethings up,” Four grumbled. “You seemed happier then before, now that she’s around.”
That was the problem, Marie thought, but she didn’t say it. “Just focus on your job,” she gently repeated, “and I’ll focus on myself, okay?”
Four nodded, but a moment later perked up. “I also found a sunken scroll on my way back!” she cheered, holding up the rolled up sheet of paper. Marie took it, skimming over it like she had all the others Four had presented her, but this time something caught her eyes.
A model of a pair of shades with a Grizzco logo on its side. She didn’t understand any of the octarian language there, but the shades gave her a sudden realization. She snapped a picture and sent it to Marina, hoping she wasn’t too busy at the moment. Marie needed answers.
Fours eyes lit up. “Does it have anything useful?”
Marie shrugged. “Maybe.” she said, voice a bit dry.
Lilac peered over her shoulder, but Marie quickly shoved the paper into her bag. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Lilac, but as she got a glimpse of the Grizzco logo on those shades of hers, which were the exact same design that had been on the blueprints, a sinking feeling permeated in her gut.
Four finished her lunch and superjumped into the next kettle with a ‘booyah’, leaving Marie and Lilac in silence.
Then Lilac was gone as well, off into the shack to grab some of those sugary sugar bars, and Marie was alone. The only thing she could do was think about how they were almost to the center of Octo Valley, and yet. Nothing. Not a single hint of Callies whereabouts.
It started as a single choked sob. Tears started falling next, until a wail wrenched itself from her mouth. Marie felt her head spin after she’d lost all control, sobbing loudly to empty air, until arms wrapped around her and though she wanted to push them away she did not.
She stood there, nuzzled up in her companions embrace for a full minute. She was glad Four wasn’t able to hear her cracking like that, but soon her agent might start getting worried at her silence. She tried to catch her breath, and it took a few tries, but eventually she was able to pull herself together, but Lilac suddenly took her hand, reached for Marie’s phone, and turned the communication on.
“Marie?” Four asked. Marie tried to respond, but her voice caught in her throat.
“Four.” Lilac said instead.
“Wha…Lilac? Did something happen to Marie?”
“Marie is, er, good,” her companion said, struggling a little to find the words.
“Well, I’m a bit stuck here. Theres one of those bomb throwing running guys.”
Ah, Tentakooks. That always meant they were in for a long, tiresome wait. She had kept on trying to remind Four to use her sub weapon the previous times Four had faced the little octarians, but Four always went charging straight ahead. This time was no different, and Marie could already hear her agents frustrated curses as she continued on her wild squid chase. Marie sighed, turning off the communicator as Lilac giggled a bit at Fours struggle.
Their humor was soon drained as Marie caught the sound of octarian marching in the distance, ink hitting the ground. She shot up, wiped her eyes, and grabbed her charger. This had to be the worst possible time to be raided.
Marie was a little surprised to see Lilac rush for the hero roller, and stopped her with a hand.
“You’re not part of the NSS,” she stated firmly. “Stay back and let me handle this.”
She sent a distress message to Four, but her agent was all the way at the other side of Octo Valley. Marie was most likely going to be on her own, and with that optimistic thought she surveyed the enemies.
Ten octoling soldiers, the seaweed in their hair indicating their high rank. They were about twenty seconds away. Marie frowned deeper. Those were bad odds. Maybe if she had Callie around…her thoughts went to Lilac.
No. Marie felt herself reject the idea. She didn’t want to put the other in danger.
Stay calm. She pulled the charger over her shoulder, aimed and shot. One down. She reloaded. Another down. Now they were about ten seconds away. She was able to take down another two before they were right on her.
She created a line of ink trailing back to retreat, which bought her enough time to charge another shot, taking out one more.
The path behind her was blocked off as she tried to repeat the tactic, trapping her, and there were still another 6 octolings, all firing at her. Burst bombs barely helped, and then she was out of ink as the enemies fired upon her.
Marie felt the ink sink into her skin, burning from the inside out, and Marie held up an arm as she felt her vision go fuzzy and dark.
A splash of ink crushed the two firing off at her. Marie glanced behind, seeing her savior had also left a trail of ink to safety, and dipped under, feeling the burning sensation fade as ink flowed back into her system. Her heart stopped beating so quickly, and she popped back up. She was quickly able to dispatch the last few, Four using a roller to crush the rest.
She went to thank her agent, but then realized that Four did not have suckers on top of her tentacles. Lilac, not Four, panted, then pulled up the roller over her shoulder and turned to Marie, looking strangely exhilarated. Not a reaction Marie expected from an octoling who just splatted several of her own kind.
She frowned, opened her mouth to object to Lilacs intervention, but she found nothing to object to. If anything, she should probably have said ‘thanks for the save’.
She didn’t.
“You’re pretty good with that roller.” she said instead.
“The roller is….” the Octoling seemed to fumble for words for a moment, until settling on, “good.”.
Her phone buzzed. Marie quickly opened it, intending to skim Marina’s message, but after she caught several alarming words, she read through it again. Then again.
The sunken scroll, which Marie had forgotten about in the action, was a blueprint of a something called ‘octoshades’, a collaboration of Octarian and Grizzco tech. Flashing lights would shine across the lens, which would be able to alter the wearers thoughts and even memories. Grizzco’s ‘secret ingredient’ would enhance the brainwashing, though it didnt specify how.
And, of course, the shades came with a camera, so everything the person wearing them saw would also be viewed by whoever was behind the scenes.
Lilac had never taken her shades off, had she? Marie turned to her, once again confirming that they were the exact same as the blueprints. Everything clicked as the truth sunk in.
Marie took a single second to decide what to do.
With a swift movement, she reached forward and grabbed for Lilac’s shades.
Pain dug through her arm as the roller that had moments ago been her saving grace now ripped her arm off. Marie gasped in shock as Lilac frowned, though she didn’t lower her weapon.
Marie had left her charger a few feet away when she was looking at her phone. She stayed deadly still for one second, two, and then dipped in her own ink, feeling her arm reform in it. She dodged the attempts to crush her, jolted to the left, and reformed to grab her charger. She was able to charge just as the Octoling swung towards her again.
She had done this with so many other octolings. It should have been as easy as breathing to shoot straight for the heart, or through the forehead, and leave Lilac as a splash of ink on the ground.
But for some reason, at the very last moment, she found herself moving the barrel a little bit to the right.
At such a close range, the shot was able to easily knock the roller out of Lilacs grasp, and Marie had her on the ground a moment later, pinned at gunpoint. Though the octoling was still writhing, trying to escape, looking exactly like every other enemy octoling they had faced, she couldn’t do anything as Marie reached forward and grabbed the rims of the shades.
It took a surprising amount of force to pull the shades loose, almost as if they’d been digging into her head. Marie noticed a strange heaviness to them first, then seeing that at the edges of the glasses was a line of needle, the ends dripping a strange kind of ooze. Gramps had shown her and Callie a picture of fuzzy ooze once before, and that was the closest comparison to whatever this was. No fuzz, but instead a texture more reminiscent of an octolings hair, tiny rings visible at the edges.
Marie turned back to Lilac to make sure she wasn’t going back for her roller.
Even if Lilac had simply been a spy, the shades making her act more like Callie so that Marie would grow attached, she still felt a bit sorry for the octoling who might have been just as caught in the illusion as Marie herself.
Lilac had curled up on the ground, shaking. She clutched her head, and Marie blinked in shock as her octarian claws seemed to just…sink into her fingers?
She walked towards Lilac, prompting the octoling to look up at her, and at that moment Marie froze.
Her eyes were gold.
Her eyes had a star shape, the same as Marie’s, the same as -
As -
Those were Callie’s eyes.
Before that could sink in, the octoling grabbed her head again with a cry. Marie’s hearts stilled as the octolings tentacles started to shift and grow, two new ones snaking out of her head and curling onto the floor. The purple color faded to a darker, almost black, though the ends retained their magenta coloring. The suckers folded in on themselves with a wet sounding sklurp, and new ones emerged on the undersides of her tentacles. The bridge between her nose darkened, and then her eyes were connected with a mask.
And as the changes seemed to finally finish, Callie Cuttlefish lay, shaking on the ground. She slowly brought her hands down, staring at them in bewilderment.
Marie stood there frozen, unable to process what in cods name had just happened. Callie was in front of her. No, Lilac? Which one was it? Because right now the squid in front of her was unmistakably her cousin, despite moments ago being someone else.
Callie(?) shook he head, stumbled to her feet, still looking at her hands. Then she started looking herself over, the tentacles, the hands, before speaking in panicked octarian.
Marie ran forward and wrapped her arms tightly around her. Callie didn’t seem to know how to react for a moment, before she returned the gesture slowly.
When she spoke inklish, it was slow, like she was painstakingly trying to remember what each word meant, but the pronunciation was spot on.
“Where’s…what happened to me? Why do I look…”
“Sit down.” Marie said, and Callie did so, knees shaking. “I have no idea what just happened, but…” Callie was sitting there, and she choked down a sob as it hit her. “Callie, it’s really you?”
This couldn’t be some kind of trick, could it? Or maybe a dream?
Callie clutched her head. “Argh, why does my head hurt so much? And isn’t Callie that cousin you’re looking for -” she froze, realization flashing in her eyes. “Marie -” she froze. “Marie. MARIE!”
Callie sprung up with sudden energy, circling around her like a hawk, inspecting her as if Marie had been the one to suddenly morph and shift into a completely new person. Marie kept her eyes on her cousin the entire time, until she couldn’t take it anymore and grabbed her shoulders, forcing her to stand still.
Callie stared right back at her. “I…I think I know you.”
“Of course you do, Cal,” Marie said. “We’re cousins, remember?”
Callie stayed silent for a long moment, still looking at her with a lost expression.
“You have to remember.” Marie said.
“Marie?” a new voice asked.
Four stood there, looking exhausted from running all the way back to camp.
“What happened? Where’s Lilac, whose this?” her agent paled. “Oh cod, did Lilac get splatted?!”
“I’ll explain, but…” the words she’d wanted to be able to say for so long now soured in her mouth. “I think we found Callie.”
