Hello and welcome to Chapter 4! Thank you to everyone who followed, favourited or review the previous chapters, it means a lot to me and helps motivate me to keep doing the best I can. Sorry this took a bit longer to come out than the last three chapters, life has been hectic, but I am making a promise here. First off, this story will be completed, and secondly, I will post a chapter every Sunday from now on at the very least. I hope you enjoy the chapter and please leave a review telling me what you thought!

Disclaimer: I do not own Splatoon, Splatoon 2 or the Octo Expansion.

"Welcome to the lobby, the place where you choose what kind of battle you want to take part in." Katsuo said to 8, the two of them standing in front of the aforementioned room. Having spent far longer than he'd ever want to in Ammo Knights listening to Sheldon ramble on about weapons, Katsuo's spirits were at an all-time low for the day, albeit he was concealing this behind the façade of cheeriness he had decided to maintain to try and make a good impression on 8. His true feelings were in direct contrast to 8's, who'd listened attentively to everything the horseshoe crab had said, and she'd even asked a few questions here and there. "There's Turf war, ranked and league. There's two maps per mode and they rotate every two hours and so do the game modes for League and Ranked." Katsuo looked at his phone to see the current rotation. "Turf war is…Manta Maria…" He let out a sigh of relief. "And Moray towers… At least it isn't in Ranked battle. Huh it's Rainmaker…" He looked up at 8 and frowned when he saw the odd look on her face which seemed to be a mix of confusion and surprise. "8?" He asked.

"Huh?" She replied, sounding slightly confused as her eyes snapped from the screens showing the stages onto him.

"Did you hear what I just said?" He asked, almost snapping at her. 8 immediately realized that she'd been staring off into space when Katsuo had been explaining something to her, and her face heated up in embarrassment.

"S-Sorry! Y-yeah I did!" She stammered, nodding erratically as she did so. Katsu just raised an eyebrow and he glanced at what she was looking at, realization dawning on his face the moment he saw it. Huh… I guess she's never seen a ship before. He thought, pausing for a moment before he launched into his quick and detailed explanation of how the various modes worked, and the differences between Regular, Ranked and League Battles. He also made several lame attempts at humour during his explanation, which, much to his surprise, actually managed to draw a giggle from 8 once or twice. On top of that, he also declared he would be joining her for her Turf war games, so he would be able to give her advice during the match if need-be. What he didn't tell her was he silently hoped this would cut down the time he needed to spend helping her get used to Inkopolis, thus enabling him to get back to the ranked grind.

That and playing Turf war was much better than standing around in the square being bored to death whilst 8 was off having fun, but he didn't mention that either.

She listened with rapt attention for the duration of his explanation and threw in a question here and there regarding various details. "Right." He said upon concluding his speech, smacking his hands together as he did so. "You ready to jump on-in and turf it up?" He asked, making sure to exaggerate the fist-bump he followed up with as much as possible. He also flashed a fake grin at 8 who nodded and did a small fist-pump of her own. Whilst not as exaggerated as Katsuo's, it certainly had more genuine enthusiasm in it.

"Yeah!" She said as enthusiastically as she could.

"Great to hear! Now remember what I said, make sure you don't leave any ground uncovered by ink, and don't leave patches of enemy ink lying around. The smallest amount could possibly mean the difference between winning and losing. Now let's get going!" He added. 8 nodded and smiled at him, which caused his cheeks to heat up slightly.

"I'll do my best!" She said cheerfully. Katsuo led the way and entered the lobby first with 8 close behind. Excitement was practically radiating off the Octoling and there was a small spring in her step. Katsuo switched his .56 Gal out for Splat Duelies and spun them around on his fingers. Whilst he knew dualies were hardly the best choice for Turf War, they were only one of two weapon types he considered himself good at using, the other being the Gal weapons. Part of him wanted to show off to 8, partly to try and impress her and partly just for the sake of showing off. For a moment, he remembered all the times he'd tried to impress girls, only to end up failing miserably and make himself look like an idiot. He dismissed the thought and stopped spinning his dualies before he went over to 8 and was surprised to see what she was holding.

"8… which weapon is that?" He asked, eyeing the odd-looking splatter shot in her hands with confusion and interest. It seemed oddly familiar for some reason, but Katsuo couldn't put his finger on why.

"Oh this?" 8 lifted the weapon a little bit and examined it quickly. "It's an Octoshot, well a replica, since the original one lacks a built-in special ability. It's what I was mostly talking to… Sheldon about whilst we were in his… shop." Katsuo frowned and then his eyes widened. An Octoshot… never thought I'd see one that wasn't being shot at me.

"Wow… Really? I never heard you talk about it." 8 chuckled slightly and scratched the back of her head.

"Well… that's because I think you fell asleep when we started talking about it…" She pointed out. Katsuo blinked once before his face turned slightly red in embarrassment.

"I-uh-oh I see…" He stammered, glancing about embarrassedly. Woops. "I swear I just dozed off for a minute or so…" He muttered. "Yet it still felt like we were in there for ages..." He shook his head, lamenting the fact that he'd dozed for only a brief period and not the entirety of the time they'd spent in Ammo Knights. "Right, not important right now. Let's get to Turf war!" 8 gave a nod in reply.

"Right!" Thus, the two headed off for 8's first ever Turf war. Well, first Turf War where the fate of the world wasn't at stake.

Huh, we won.

Was the thought in Katsuo's mind as Judd and Lil' Judd announced the winners and losers. His thoughts reflected his attitude towards winning in Turf War, ever since he'd started playing Ranked, he'd more-or-less stopped caring about Turf War. Normally he wouldn't care too much about winning or losing as he tended to focus more on his own personal score, albeit he wouldn't play to the best of his ability.

But these were no normal circumstances, and Katsuo showed it in his efforts, scoring top of the team in points and splats with 8 in third for points. He smirked slightly as he saw his score and spun his dualies around in a small sign of celebration. He then looked at 8 and felt his hearts skip a beat.

8 was practically radiating joy and excitement, clearly having enjoyed her first Turf war. Katsuo quickly ran what he'd noticed of her performance over in his mind, and he had to say he was mildly impressed. Despite a few mistakes and the occasional avoidable splat, she'd performed solidly, certainly better than other people in their first Turf war that Katsuo had seen.

"Great work 8!" He said, walking over to her with a half-smirk half-smile. "Have fun?"

"Yeah!" She beamed at him, causing his cheeks to warm. "Turf wars are awesome… can we play more?" A quiet groan sounded in the back of Katsuo's mind before he answered.

"Sure!" He said, putting on the fake cheer once again, but this time it felt just a little bit less forced.

Katsuo blinked as he looked at the post-match results, a blank stare on his face as his brain processed what he was seeing. They had won, yes, but that wasn't what he was focused on. Specifically, he was focused on his position on the scoreboard.

8 did better than me.

He blinked again as he stared at the scores. An odd feeling was welling up in the pit of his stomach, something he didn't recognise yet did at the same time, and it intensified the longer he stared at the score. The fact they'd won again wasn't of interest to him anymore, he was just focused on the scores. Part of him was annoyed that 8, a total newcomer to Inkopolis and Turf wars, had beaten him, someone who'd been battling since the day he turned 14, in score in her second ever match. After all, he had more experience, so he should do better right? He was also partly amazed at how well she was doing, and these two conflicting feelings were clashing with each-other over which was more prominent in his mind. After a few more moments of staring at the scores, he reached a decision.

I'm going to do better than her in the next match.

If there was one thing Katsuo really liked, it was winning. His desire to win, to compete, to be the best, he'd always carried it into everything in life, even the silliest or most mundane of things.

And because of his competitive nature, getting a worse score than 8 was losing.

For a moment, he realized his current attitude was rather absurd. He then proceeded to swiftly abandoned dismiss this thought as absurd and he marched on to the next Turf War.

That's better… kinda.

Katsuo felt a muted sense of satisfaction when he saw his score was higher than 8's. Even though they'd lost, he was still pleased he'd managed to beat her in score, even though his 'competition' with her seemed completely one-sided. Well now I just need to keep ahead of her in score. Shouldn't be too hard.

Katsuo soon found out it was much harder than he thought.

Katsuo was by no means stupid, at least by Inkling standards, and he doubted 8 was either. If anything, he suspected she might be smarter than him, based purely on the fact she was an Octoling. So, when he'd noticed the pattern that their Turf wars had settled into after the first 5 or so, he'd came to a conclusion.

8 was trying to beat him in score as well.

The pattern was clear; he'd score more than 8, 8 would respond by scoring more than him, he'd respond by scoring more than her, then she'd respond by scoring more than him. Sometimes it would break, Katsuo would beat 8 in score two or three times in a row, then 8 would react accordingly, but then it would quickly return to normal for a few matches before it broke again.

But throughout it all, the differences in their scores were small, a gap of only a handful of points or so separating them. Whilst not all the games had been victories, Katsuo cared more about beating 8 than beating the enemy team, and he suspected she felt the same way.

Katsuo hadn't mentioned it to her of course, keeping their brief conversations between battles more focused on anything 8 needed help with. Except for one conversation after a game nearly an hour in, when their competition seemed to have reached its peak…

"Nice work 8!" He said, giving her a thumbs up and a small smile. They'd won the game and Katsuo had barely managed to beat 8 by a few points. Feeling rather smug, his mouth started moving before his brain did "Almost as good as me." He said with a hint of arrogance. When his brain fully processed what he'd said, he mentally kicked himself and opened his mouth to talk but before he could get a word in edge-wise 8 spoke up.

"Almost?" She asked, raising an eyebrow slightly as a small smirk snuck onto her face. "I'd say I'm as good as you." Katsuo blinked and stared at her as his eyes widened slightly. Sure, he'd noticed that over the course of the last hour or so that her shyness had been giving way to a much more confident attitude, but he hadn't expected this. After a moment of staring however, he smirked back, and gripped his dualies confidently.

"Well, let's find out, shall we?"

"Wait so Pearl just bought you an apartment?"

"Yeah!"

"I mean… I guess it makes sense that she's rich…"

Currently the two were outside an apartment building. After a further hour of intense competition in Turf wars with no real overall winner, he'd decided to take a break and introduce 8 to some of the more mundane parts of Inkopolis life, like public transport, how her phone works, gear ordering along with a quick explanation of how gear chunks work and other more uninteresting stuff that she'd need to know to go about her daily business. Since it was nearing the end of the day, Katsuo had decided to head home, and coincidentally, it turned out 8 was now living in the same building as Katsuo and his family.

"Well… I guess I'll meet you here tomorrow?" Katsuo asked. 8 nodded and the two started walking towards the building but just before they entered, 8 stopped.

"Hey Katsuo…?"

"Yeah?" He turned his head to look at her, stopping when he did so.

"I…" She paused. "Thank you. For helping me out with getting used to Inkopolis…" She beamed at him, causing his face to heat up.

"I-it's fine." He said, looking away as he blushed. The two started walking towards the door again and in the back of Katsuo's mind there was a lingering thought.

Well one day down… not sure how many left to go…

And that's the chapter! I'm so sorry this took ages to come out, but as I promised, a chapter a week at least from here on out until the story is done! I hope you enjoyed the chapter, please leave a review telling me what you thought, and I Hope to see you next time!