Edit Nov 7 2018: made some minor changes and fixed a few errors
He'd been seen.
He only got a brief glimpse of his future hero and agent but he already saw the promise in the young inkling girl. He saw long orange hair and a curious expression that only intensified as she walked closer to him. A gait that spoke of hidden strength, perfect for the trials ahead.
Fleeing through the pipes, he could hear the girl giving chase. His old tentacles weren't as fast as they used to be but that suited him well enough. His new agent was taking her sweet time. He could hear her bumping into every corner and edge along the way.
A little clumsy, but he could work with that.
"So… you gotta help me rescue the Great Zapfish!" Finished with his (very rushed) speech, he looked over at the girl to gauge her reaction.
She looked more than a little bewildered. "Ah… c-can you repeat?".
Oh. No wonder then.
She had an accent thicker than a kelp smoothie! Probably understood less than half of what he'd said in his hurry.
He could still work with this though. Reaching under his hat he took out his trusty index of Octarians (with him at all time, of course) and gestured for the girl to come over.
He opened the book to a picture of an inkling soldier about to splat an octotrooper. He pointed to the Octarian in the picture, "This is an Octarian," he said, enunciating his words carefully, then moved his finger over to the inkling. "This is us, the inklings!", glancing at her he saw her nodding slowly before she slowly pointed at the Octarian.
"This is Octarian?"
"Yes! These baddies stole…" The captain quickly reached under his hat again to get the newspaper clipping about the missing zapfish, and brought the article to the girls face, "They stole the Great Zapfish!"
"They take zapfish?" The girl was starting to look a little nervous. "They are bad?"
"Real bad girlie. But! We need to take the zapfish back before Inkopolis runs out of power. And I need yer help to do that!" He stepped back and reached into one of the boxes behind him. Picking up Callie's old suit and hero shot, he turned back to her.
"I'll give you some special gear to keep you safe from the Octarians, you don't have to worry about going in unarmed. You understand?"
She slowly took the jacket and runners before looking up at him. "I understand. I help with Octarians, and we help zapfish?" she said as she started putting on the jacket over her basic tee.
"You got it girlie! Now put on that hero suit and get ready to go! We'll go over the basics quickly before your first mission. It's an easy one, even a beginner should be able to handle it no problem!" He handed her the hero headset, "Now follow me!"
As the girl finished putting on the runners and headset, he started walking toward the first kettle, currently hidden from sight. He pointed at the seemingly empty space with his cane. "Try shootin' yer weapon right here for a surprise."
He saw the girl hesitate, taking a deep breath and pointing the hero shot, before yelping in shock as the ink she shot landed on what appeared to be thin air.
The captain nodded and opened his mouth to speak again but was interrupted as the girl grinned, and began rapidly firing at the kettle. Good initiative then.
The captain pulled the map he'd prepared earlier out of his boot and turned to her again. Holding the map between the two of them he started to explain. "I need you to find the zapfish right… here" he pointed to the little zapfish symbol he'd drawn there. "You'll have ta superjump to each platform to get to the zapfish though".
The girl nodded with wide eyes and said "Yes! I will find it!".
"Hold your seahorses there, I still need to tell you where the Octarians are hidin'," The captain pointed to the octo symbols scattered on the platforms, "Watch out for these. Try to hide if you can, an' if you can't, then use that hero shot of yers to splat 'em".
She seemed eager to rush ahead, "I go now?"
"One last thing," He tapped at his head, where the girl was wearing the headset. "I'll be speakin' to you through the hero headset, I need to know that you understand me well enough for me to guide you."
The girl paused before grinning and spoke her unsteady words in her strange accent, "Ah… I understand many things, but I do not talk very good. Talk slow and I will understand".
Good enough, the captain thought, we'll get to the rest later.
"Then go and kick some octo butt!"
Welcome to my first fic in years. I'm already uploading this on AO3 under the same name, and I'll probably update there first if anyone wants to get faster updates.
Here's the notes I put on AO3:
I only know one other language and it's conversational level french. I'm basing Agent 3's own learning off of mine.