"Just give up already, Annette!" These words escaped Ezra's mouth as he dodge rolled out of the way of Annette's charger blast.

Annette scoffed at this as she continued to fire at Ezra relentlessly. "I'm the one who needs to give up? You clearly haven't looked in a mirror lately!"

Ezra continued to dodge roll out of the way of Annette's fire, not taking the risk of firing at her. "You're right, I haven't! And I don't plan to, either, since unlike you, I'm not all looks!"

Giggling, Annette gave a sly reply to the purple inkling. "Just you wait, Ezzy! Soon enough all that dodge rolling will become too much for your hearts to handle and cause them to explode!"

"That's literally impossible."

Annette snickered, a smile plastered across her face. "Maybe it is! But if I manage to convince you it isn't, it won't be anymore! After all, Ezzy can do anything if he just PUTS HIS MIND TO IT!"

With that, Annette fired directly above Ezra's head, causing him to be bathed in a pool of yellow ink. He couldn't move in the slightest, and could barely even see. What he could see, though, was Annette walking up to him and then harshly holding her Splat Charger against his head.

Annette let out a short laugh. "I wasn't expecting you to break down that easy! How pathetic! A weakling like you isn't worthy of fighting me." She smirked malevolently. "Any last words?"

Ezra, seeming to accept his fate, smiled blissfully. "Tell Isla and Amelia I love them."

A gleeful blush colored Annette's face as her smile grew bigger. "Thanks! I won't!"

With not even a shred of remorse, Annette fired at Ezra.

Ezra, as expected, had completely disappeared, without a trace.

"Yaaaaay!" Annette rejoiced. "Now that he's finally gone, I can-"

That was when Annette felt a sharp, stabbing pain in her back.

"W-what... the hell... is this..?"

She fell to the floor immediately. Standing directly above her was Ezra.

Annette, in utter shock and disbelief, screamed, "BUT YOU'RE DEAD!"

Scoffing and rolling his eyes, Ezra responded. "Or so you thought."

"H-HOW ARE YOU ALIVE?! MY CHARGER SHOULD HAVE K-KILLED YOU! AND WHAT IS THIS THING?!" Annette looked down at the large object that was piercing out of her chest.

Ezra smirked. "That's my custom-made Splat Knife. The blade's made entirely from ink. Once you shove that thing through an opponent, it's game over for them."

Annette's eyes widened. "T-that's... barbaric..!" She paused for a moment to take a deep breath, and then continued. "But it still doesn't e-explain how you're alive!"

"Oh, right," Ezra began. "That. Although, shouldn't you already know..?"

"What are you talking about?!" snarled Annette.

"Don't you remember?" Ezra asked. "Back when we were best friends?"

The year was 50786.

Ezra and Annette were both at 6 years of age.

Annette beamed gleefully. "My mom made a really cool thing that makes it so you're completely immune to ink attacks if it's in your body!" She giggled and continued. "She wanted to know if she could perform the surgery to put it inside on you! You'd be, like, a test subject! Isn't that cool?!"

Ezra's eyes lit up. "Heck yeah, I wanna be immune!"

"Great!" Annette chirped. "The surgery's tomorrow!"

"Sounds aweso- wait, tomorrow..?"

Ezra chuckled. "Sure, it doesn't work during battles, but, well... our little feud wasn't technically a battle, now, was it?"

Annette's body began to shake. "Y-you're telling me that piece of junk actually still works..? Then... THEN WHY DIDN'T IT WORK FOR ME?!"

Ezra sighed and shook his head. "For someone who claims to be capable of terminating the entire octarian species, you aren't very bright."

"What's THAT supposed to mean?!" Annette hissed.

Ezra facepalmed, putting one hand on his hip. "The Splat Blade, Amelia. It pierced directly through where the device was located and rendered it useless. It wasn't made to withstand that much ink at one time."

Annette froze. "But... the device... it was in my biggest heart..."

"Exactly."

Ezra pulled the Splat Knife out of Annette's body, and purple ink began spewing out of the wound.

Annette screamed in pure horror. "WHAT THE FUCK?! WHAT THE FUCK?! WHAT THE FUCK?! WHAT THE FUUUUUCK?!"

Annette exploded, leaving only a pool of purple ink.

Ezra smirked.

"What a child."

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: Sorry for the short chapter. I just published chapter 2 but I wanted to get this one out tonight as well. Hopefully the content quality makes up for the word count. Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed.