Author's note: I wanted to write a silly fanfic, and trying to keep the characters in character. It's a challenge to write in a cartoony way but very fun! If the accents of the characters sound funny it's because I'm not a native English speaker. This is going to be a multichapter fic.
Ah, a beautiful day in the Bikini Bottom. Bubbles bubble after the title cards. The French narrator disappears from now on because he sounds annoying in the written form.
The Krusty Krab was bustling with customers. A slouched, tired looking cephalopod behind the register sighed and looked at his watch. An hour until the closing time, his favorite time of the day. And Spongebob's least favorite time of the day. Speaking of the little yellow devil, Spongebob had been laughing more annoyingly than usually that day, driving Squidward insane. Squidward had become quite passive over the years and didn't tell his co-worker to shut up so spicily anymore. He had given up hope for things ever looking up for him.
His depressing musings were interrupted by the shrieking sounds of table moving half an hour later. Spongebob was arranging the tables to a big circle in the dining area.
"SPONGEBOB!" Squidward yelled in annoyance. "What are you doing, you barnacle brain?! I am NOT going to clean after you!"
"Ta-ahahaha!" Spongebob laughed his trademark laugh. "Oh Squidward, tonight is gonna be so amazing!" He then giggled with glee and with a lightning speed he put two chairs on every table to face each other.
Squidward was just about to yell some more when he heard the familiar sound of his boss' little crab feet approaching.
"MR. KRABS! Spongebob is ruining the interior decoration order of The Krusty Krab!" Squidward exclaimed in a melodramatic fashion.
"Ek ek ek ek!" Krabs just laughed jovially. "Oh Squidward, don't you remember what day today is, me boyo?"
"Annoy Squidward day?" Squidward answered with a deadpan face and started to slurp his drink.
"No, silly!" Krabs smiled. "It's the Krusty Krab's first speed date day ever!"
Squidward drank the kelp juice down the wrong pipe and spitted the drink out in shock. "A WHAT?" he asked, not believing his ear holes.
Spongebob ran in front of the register smiling like a dumb sun. "A speed dating event here at the Krusty Krab!" he waved his arms in excitement. "It's gonna be soo wonderful!"
Mr. Krabs pushed the over-ecstatic fry cook out of the way. "Didn't I remember to tell you?" he asked teasingly.
Squidward crossed his tentacle arms in frustration. "APPARENTLY NOT!" he said with not a soft voice. Just when he had thought his day couldn't get any worse, universe proved him wrong, once again. "My shift is about to end in 15 minutes, and then I'm outta here and from this madness!"
Krabs' whole demeanor changed when he heard Squidward's words. His face darkened and his long eyeballs bent so much that they almost touched Squidward's face. "Did I also forgot to tell you lad", he said with a low, menacing voice while squinting his eyes, "that the participation for the event is MANDATORY for all of the Krusty Krab's employees if they are to keep their job?!"
Squidward gulped and tried to back away from the angry eyestalks that successfully invaded his personal space. "But sir! Why on Neptune are you doing this? Is this another one of Spongebob's stupid ideas?" he then said and glared accusingly at the said sponge who smiled stupidly at him.
"Oh, Mr. Squidward", Krabs spoke with his jovial yet a bit demeaning tone again. "It's me own idea! And why am I doing this, you ask? Well, since there are so many lonely fish in the sea here in Bikini Bottom, I thought I would help to bring the romantic souls together!"
Squidward eyed him suspiciously. "And?" he said and waved his other hand in the manner that told Mr. Krabs to continue.
Krabs straightened himself and cleared his throat. "And… well, there is a 10 bucks participation fee for the speed dating."
"I see."
"And to show some spirit of the event, I want you, Mr. Squidward, to participate in the event as well."
Squidward's eyes almost popped out from his head for those words. Before he could open his mouth to say his objection, a crowd of eager looking fish were flooding from the door of Krusty Krab. Delighted from such a beautiful sight of paying customers, Mr. Krabs scuttled close to them and started charging them the fee.
"Oh go sit down, the event is just about to start!" He encouraged them. A tear came from his eye when he saw the amount of dollars in his claw. Money tended to make him very sentimental. He felt touched, but more importantly, rich. So much money for him to count before the bed time! That always helped him to fall asleep.
The happy looking fish went to sit around the tables while Spongebob sat on one table outside the circle with a timer in his hand. Mr. Krabs pushed Squidward on one free chair.
"Hey! How come Spongebob is not participating in this idiocy?!" Squidward protested.
"Ek ek ek!" Krabs laughed and patted his cashier's back roughly. In such a force that almost smashed Squidward's inner organs to pieces. "Spongebob is of course the one who is in charge of the timer! Every date is only two minutes long, ye see!"
Squidward rubbed his aching back and still tried to continue his objections. "Why couldn't I do that instead of that yellow ray of doom?!"
Mr. Krabs nudged Squidward's side and whispered: "Because you are in more desperate need of a date, I'm sure me lad!" He then winked and scuttled away.
"Gee, thanks." Squidward rolled his eyes and snorted. The nerve of that guy!
Almost all of the chairs were occupied now. Squidward held his head in defeat, not looking around him when Spongebob announced that the event had started. The ticking sound of the timer started.
"Hi ya there!" a voice said in front of Squidward.
Squidward raised his head from the surface of the table and looked up. A gold fish with pearl necklace was sitting in front of him. She was in her forties.
"Isn't this exciting?! I have never been in such an event before!" she continued with a wide smile.
"Me neither", Squidward said with a bored tone.
"After a divorce from my husband I thought why not trying something wild? Ahaha!" the gold fish said with a gleam in her eyes.
"Uh-huh."
The fish leaned closer to Squidward. People sure liked to invade his personal space today, Squidward thought. The fish lady moved her chair right next to Squidward and then she whispered: "I am into younger men, you see." She touched Squidward's hand.
"Uh-huh."
"And you know, I have never been in a closer relationship with an octopus before", the fish said flirtingly and continued touching his hand.
"UH-HUH." Squidward was sweating now. Just his typical luck to get a total crackpot as his first speed date. "You know, I think the time is already up, I better start moving to the next table!" he said nervously and tried to flee from the fish's touch.
The gold fish didn't let go of Squidward's hand and just tightened her grip. Just when Squidward was near a panic attack the timer made a sound to indicate that the time really was up. Squidward sighed in relief and quickly hurried to the next table.
He breathed deeply to calm his nerves and swiped the sweat from his large forehead. Then he took the closer of look the person sharing the table.
"Oh hi Squidward!" a pink starfish said happily and waved his hand.
"PATRICK?!" Squidward shouted in disbelief. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?"
"Oh, one Krabby Patty, please. With extra big fries", Patrick said.
"THAT'S IT! NEXT!" Squidward yelled and walked to the next table his hands balled up into fists, violently pushing a purple male fish from the chair and then sitting on it himself.
"Well howdy partner!" a perky voice with a thick Texan accent said.
Squidward looked at the scientist squirrel in surprise. "Sandy? You are here too?"
"Of course I am! This is an interesting scientific experiment!"
Squidward looked at her. He hadn't really talked with her that much, only briefly on those occasions when Spongebob managed to drag all of his friends to do something stupid, usually to some stupid party of his. Sandy was one of those few of the more level-headed Bikini Bottom inhabitants, Squidward mused. And I guess she has an exotic mammal charm to her, he thought while watching her fur which unsurprisingly was a rarity at the bottom of the sea.
"Oh you look fancy tonight, Squidward!" Sandy said just after when Spongebob had somehow sneaked next to him and put a stylish bowtie on Squidward's neck. Squidward then blushed for the comment and Sandy's eyes on him.
"Soo… Sandy, have you seen any nice art exhibitions lately?" Squidward then quickly asked before he felt too awkward about the whole situation.
"Art exhibitions? Why would I go to those? Such useless nonsense!" Sandy said with a puzzled expression.
Squidward felt his spirits sunk. He had seen some potential in the squirrel but hearing her saying that visual arts were "useless nonsense" was unacceptable. "Umh, how about music then? What is your favorite type of music? Mine is-"
"Music? I have no time for music, except when I make a scientific breakthrough and sing a happy little country song!" Sandy interrupted and stared in the distance, imagining how her next inventions would look like.
"Oh", Squidward said sadly. He possibly couldn't date anyone who had so different interests than him and who so openly disliked the focus of his passion. For a brief second he had thought that maybe he could have gone to an actual date with Sandy. Sheesh, I must be desperately lonely, Squidward mentally scolded at himself. Maybe Mr. Krabs was onto something.
The timer made the sound again and Spongebob giggled happily. "All right, time to move again! Maybe you'll find your true love at the next table!"
Squidward shuddered for Spongebob's tacky words. "I somehow doubt it", he muttered under his breath with his usual fed up voice while he lazily dragged his feet to the next table. He didn't even blink when he saw who was occupying the other chair.