Marie and Callie had left the huge group that was gathering where the plan was to be discussed, and in a few hours, they will be off to take another part of Inkopolis back and cure a huge amount of infected, the usual planning that they put into work. The Squid Sisters were relaxing in another part of the survivor base, which was a small farm, with a few greenhouses for growing fruits and vegetables, and one of the many essential ingredients of the cure which was the juice of grapes. The green houses however were regular buildings that had been altered to be repurposed. Needless to say the caretakers of the plants tended to sleep with the very thing they grew.
"I bet you're enjoying the snow, aren't you?" Callie hummed while petting a cow, which were a few of the many livestock. The survivors had taken two homes that once feuded with each other, and bashed down the sides of the walls to make it into one big barn, with a wooden fence set up outside it. There were also sheep, chickens and horses which served purposes of their own, but today the only animals out were the cows. Marie smiled, watching her cousin talk to the black and white cow, glad to know that her good spirit was still inside her.
"It shouldn't be much longer before we start with the plan," Marie reminded her cousin. Callie nodded, as so far all their attempts at taking back parts of Inkopolis went smoothly, but sadly, they took a lot of advanced planning before they put them into action, so it was quite a slow process.
"I'm nervous… but I'm sure it'll be fine," Callie admitted while walking away from the cows and returning to her cousin, but then that voice in her head decided to speak up once more while Marie was talking, trying to inform her cousin how they were going to go about this plan themselves and what their parts in it were.
"Nervous? Please… we both know you're going to be bitten out there, and no one will be there to help you," the sarcastic voice chimed, making her eye twitch. The voice only repeated her worst fears beyond stage fright; losing Marie and being alone.
"S-shut up!" Callie shouted, the voice in her head having struck a sensitive nerve. She noticed a shocked expression on her cousin's face. Marie immediately refocused her attention on her loved one. She climbed over the wooden fence, approaching her cousin walking around a few of the cows while the snow fell around them.
"Marie… I-I'm sorry, I wasn't…" Callie didn't know what to say to cover this. She had tried for the longest time to cover this split personality she had gained, and sadly, the stress of the zombie apocalypse almost completely taking all of Inkopolis had gotten into her head. Marie was affected by the stress as well, having gained paranoia for her surroundings. If someone was directly behind her and tried to get her attention, they would be subdued on the ground in half a second.
"Callie… what's going on? I hear you talking to yourself a lot lately, and it's worrying me," Marie expressed her nervousness for the black inkling's mental state. Callie knew pretending it did not exist might give only more trouble. Marie had assumed her cousin's deal was because of fear, and talking to an empty environment might help relieve it.
"Um…" Callie bit her lip, looking upset. She decided to be honest.
"I-I hear voice's Marie… well, no, I hear one voice! It sounds like mine, but it's in my head instead… but it's really mean," Callie explained to the best of her ability. She could almost feel that voice in her head trying to think of some witty insult. There was a silence between the two of them now that the truth was out. The only thing filling the empty sound was the wind howling as it blew, and the sounds of the cows from afar.
"I knew something was wrong… guess it was stupid of me to think we'd both be completely fine in this situation," Marie sighed, rubbing her head. They both had problems at the moment, what with being two of the main leaders of the uninfected survivors, and being without the comfort of their best friend or grandfather, they were left with just each other. Their few other friends around had little idea what kind of pressure they were under.
"Does the voice bother you all the time?" Marie quirked, wanting to know if her cousin at least had sanity, or if her nights had been damaged or sleepless.
"No… it gets really quiet in the morning and toward bedtime," Callie shook her head. When spoken aloud it sounded weird. Her cousin was relieved to hear that, believing that maybe when the zombie situation got better, her mental status will recover just as much as well. Suddenly the white Squid Sister had an idea that sounded horrible in her head, but she could not deny that she wanted to do it as well. The two of them synced up well once more.
"How about this, Callie. When this mission is over, we'll go on our own mission," Marie suggested as the two were climbing out of the wooden fenced area where the cows were kept in.
"Our own mission…? Isn't that dangerous? And what is the mission you have in mind?" Callie asked. It was a scary idea for the two of them going alone anywhere in Inkopolis. The zombies were slow and stupid though, and anyone who could move fast and keep their wits about them, but making sure to not get trapped in a corner would be fine, and even if they were bitten, they had the cure ready to go.
"You know what it is. Pufferfish Park has a small shortcut to the main plaza, and at the plaza is the way straight to Octo Valley where gramps usually is. Hopefully Agent 3 might be with him," Marie went through it step by step with a devious grin, to just sneak out on their own and go find their grandfather and best friend. Her cousin wanted to immediately shut the idea down. However, they synced up too well. She wanted to desperately find their relative and close ones.
"You up to it?" Marie added.
"Ye…yeah, I'm in! Anything for grandpa and Agent 3!" Callie agreed in a cheery manner, her optimistic mood shining once more until that all too annoying voice decided to shoot that down.
"Funny how excited you are to go to a place overrun with the infected. I'm sure the old man and that dumb kid have been bitten fifty times already. You'll find them roaming around very dangerous places in Inkopolis, with soulless looks in their faces," the voice repeated the biggest fears, aware that at any moment the infected could be in grave danger or accidentally harm themselves by shambling mindlessly. Callie felt tears jerk out of her eyes, not sure how she would go on if her grandfather or best friend was hurt. She suddenly got a painful smack across her face.
"Ow! What was that for?!" Callie whined, Marie putting her glove back on her hand.
"You were about to cry. Whatever that voice in your head says, tell it to shut up or else I'll give you a quick reminder of how much I care," Marie stated while the two were heading off to another area of the survivor shelter. Each step they took left a footprint in the snow, thus leaving a trail behind them that would quickly become covered up with more snow. Callie understood what her cousin meant. Marie only had smacked her because of that voice in her head. The white inkling refused to allow some imaginary voice to take over her cousin's mind and steal that cheerful spirit away.
"Thank you, Marie…" Callie said, pulling the other Squid Sister into a tight hug, the two of them just standing out under a leafless tree as the snowflakes fell around them. Marie sighed, rubbing her cousin's back. She was glad to be of help, but she was mentally begging fate to not make her have to hit her again. The embrace ended shortly after, and they continued on, holding hands tightly to exchange reassurance.
They arrived to an odd mechanics' facility. Three metal doors greeted them, all of which required a good bit of strength to open, and only one was open. The Squid Sisters stepped inside the mechanics' workshop, the room illuminated by a few dangling lights. Inside housed various young-aged inklings and octolings doing their own tasks. Some ran right past the Squid Sisters going out to play in the snow. There were a few elders in here with the children as well.
"J'ello ladies!" they heard, seeing an anthropomorphic jellyfish in a baseball cap and a striped sweater. Before the zombies had arrived, Jelonzo was just another merchant of Inkopolis's famous main plaza. He sold clothing, but mostly shirts, the freshest available to anyone, though when things started to head south and the zombie infection grew, he chose to donate what was left of all his clothes to the survivor shelter for them to use. He was the only merchant from the main plaza that made it into the survivor shelter. The fates of the other merchants were unknown.
"Hi Jelonzo how's everyone doing?" Callie greeted. This mechanics workshop was, for lack of a better word, the play area for the young. While the youth went to take back Inkopolis the elders stayed behind to take care of any squishies, blobbies or unhatched eggs there were. Squishies were newly hatched squids, and blobbies were newly hatched octarians. It was mostly just squid or octopi children that had not become fully developed inklings or octolings yet here, and any elders in need of medical assistance had the guards that defended the survivors shelter to help them. The mechanics workshop doubled as a safe house, with a secret entrance to a few long tunnels underground that connected to other main buildings.
"Oh, we're doing just fine! We owe ya a thanks. You two announcing that Secret Santa thing really lifted a lot of these squids' spirits," Jelonzo exclaimed. Marie felt a bit embarrassed to be hearing this. She only did it to try and cheer up her cousin, but was glad it was helping everyone out.
"It was nothing...I just hope everyone gets something they like" Marie muttered, rubbing her arm. Suddenly she felt a hand on her shoulder. Like a violent wrestler, she immediately grabbed the wrist and forearm and threw them over her shoulder and onto the snow, before stomping on their throat while twisting their arm painfully.
"Grah! Ma-Marie! It's me!" a choked Emerald whined. Callie and Jelonzo were especially startled by this. Marie and her cousin had learnt a lot of special moves from their grandfather in hand-to-hand combat, but sadly the white Squid Sister's newly developed paranoia had made her go all out recently on anyone standing behind her without warning.
"Oh so-sorry!" Marie apologized profusely, taking her foot off his throat and letting go of his arm, letting him stand up. Emerald rubbed his shoulder sorely. The three of them could see an ink tank on his back full of green ink and a Tentatek splattershot on his side with about four bottles of the rainbow mixture hanging off his belt. This, indeed, was the cure.
"Gosh… you owe me another autograph for that," Emerald declared. He had made track of how many autographs the Squid Sisters owed him for each injury or other problem that happened, and so far Marie was at twenty-five autographs in debt while Callie was only at a measly four. The two cousins brushed his statement aside.
"I came to get you two, because it's time to start the mission," Emerald simply stated. The Squid Sisters nodded.
"Bye, Jelonzo. You take it easy," Callie said, bidding their jellyfish friend good luck as she and her cousin followed Emerald to get to the others. It was time to start the mission and take back another part of Inkopolis. Eelectric Avenue was nothing more than a standard suburban neighborhood that would make for a nice housing residence, but Pufferfish Park was a huge amusement park, which housed a countless number of infected, which either way they could handle with ease, or so they hoped. Marie and Callie were keeping their personal mission secret from everyone else, not wanting them to worry about the two of them, or attempt to stop them.
