This chapter isn't connected to the main chapters in anyway, hence the "Bonus" designation. This will be the same for all other Bonus Chapters.


3 was confused when he woke up.

Generally, you were supposed to wake up in the same bed you fell asleep in.

Also, Generally, you weren't supposed to time travel back into your room, 2 years in the past.

And while there wasn't a rule book on the subject, you most certainly weren't supposed to do that TWICE.

"Seriously? Back here again?! I thought I had everything done!"

And he did. He saved the world, got the girl, got all his friends back, the works! But now what, he's in a time loop? Does he seriously have to do all of this again?

3 grumbled to himself and sat up when he heard his mom call him down for breakfast. He turned and swung his legs over the edge of his bed… and then saw himself laying on the ground, staring at him with more confusion than science realized was possible.

"…What the fresh fu-"


# of 3s: 2


After much internal panicking, and jumping out the window when they heard their mom coming up the stairs to check on them, the two 3s found themselves in an alley, going over the facts without freaking out as best they could. Eventually they managed to get things figured out, more or less.

"So, you have all my memories? From the first and second timeline?"

"Yes, but how do you know they're your memories? What if they're mine?"

"I don't know, I was in the bed so I assume I'm the original."

"How does that prove anything?"

"Dude I don't know. Does it even matter? If we have the exact same memories and experiences then aren't we the same person? Does 'original' even apply to us?"

"I… oh man you're right. That's… that's some quantum mechanics nonsense I don't know if I can deal with that."

"Well forget about it then. Look we both agree that we time looped and that created two of us, right?"

"Right."

"Okay, so what we need to figure out is what we're gonna do now."

"Right… That's a good question isn't it?"

"Yeah… what the heck can we do?"

"Well, not much, I think. We can't like… fuse together, can we?"

"I… I don't know. How would we even do that?"

"I don't know either. Touch? Isn't that how it's usually done in like movies and stuff?"

"I guess…" 3#1 looked at his hand, "Do you think this is one of those situations where if we touch the universe collapses?"

3#2 looked at his hand as well. "… Should we find out?"

The two 3s looked each other in the eyes, then slowly reached their hands out. Delicately, carefully, their hands came closer to each other, until they gently pressed their palms together. And then…

Nothing.

They both let out a sigh of relief and lowered their hands

"Okay good we don't need to worry about that."

"Yeah, that would have been a downer."

"Okay then, so what now? Far as I can tell everything is the same except there's two of us now."

"Eh… well… I don't think there's anything new we can do, is there?"

"I guess not… but we can't really walk around like it's no big deal. If mom or dad see the two of us, they'll flip."

"Right, so I guess we have to make sure anyone who knows us doesn't see us."

"That'll be tough while we live in the same house."

"True… hey wait, if everything's the same but there's just two of us, then that means Octavio is still going to steal the Zapfish?"

"Well, yeah, I suppose it does."

"Right, so, one of us, or both of us, are going to have to deal with that?"

"Ah, I see. Yeah, that stands to reason, but we can't just leave without making our parents think we moved out.

"Right, otherwise they'd panic. But since there's two of us now…"

"One of us can stay here, and the other can go to inkopolis early."

"Exactly. Glad we're on the same wavelength."

"It'd be weird if we weren't."

"Question is, who's going to go to Inkopolis?"

"… Rock paper scissors?"

And so, they played Rock Paper Scissors for it.


Another day, another series of hours spent gathering information and strategizing against the Octarian menace in his shack. No, Cap'n Cuttlefish was not obsessed, he just had his priorities straight. If he didn't battle against the Octarians, who would? Well, Agent 3, he supposed. Really was a massive stroke of luck that that kid saw the Zapfish theft. He was young, talented, and had no distractions keeping him from focusing on the war. If that wasn't a sign that fate was on Inkopolis's side, he didn't know what was.

A series of knocks rang from his door. "Cap'n! I'm back!" 3 called from outside.

Ah, speak of the devil, "Agent 3! Give me a second I'll be right there."

"Hey before you open the door you should know I brought someone with me."

"What?"

Darn it, he should've known a teenager would brag to his friends. They probably spread the story all over the internet by now.

"Agent 3, this is supposed to be a covert operation!" the Cap'n complained as he threw open the door, "Ya can't just go around telling ev-"

The Cap'n's words died as he saw just who 3 brought with him, which seemed to be himself.

"… A-am I going delirious or are there two of ya?"

The first 3 gestured towards the other 3.

"Cap'n, this is my identical twin brother… uh, Bill."

"Bill" looked at his "Twin" with an annoyed look. "Really?"

"You come up with something better." 3#1 whispered to 3#2, before looking back to the Cap'n. "He'd like to help out."

The Cap'n blinked at the two of them. Suddenly seeing two of a person when you thought only one existed was quite disorienting. The Cap'n shook his head, hoping to shake away the confusion.

"You uh, didn't mention ya had a twin."

"Didn't come up."

"No, I suppose it didn't. And you say he wants to help?"

"Mm-hmm. Can't leave my bro here to fight all by himself." Bill said.

"Well that's noble n' all, but ya know this isn't gonna be an easy battle, doncha?"

"Sure, but the two of us are equally skilled, so with two of us this ought to be a cake walk."

"Hrm. Well I'd warn ya against gettin' cocky… but I suppose the more troops we have the easier this'll be." The Cap'n looked to Will, "You vouchin' for your brother's skills? You'd know better'n me."

Will nodded, "The two of us can handle this no problem."

Cap'n Cuttlefish considered the two for a moment, then nodded. "Alright then. I assume yer armed? I only had the one gun."

"I have a Splatter Shot, it'll be enough."

"Alright, in that case, Bill it's good to meet ya," Bill nodded, "Will why don't ya take yer brother over to the next kettle, I'll be over there in a moment to explain the plan."

"Sure thing."

The brothers walked over to the aforementioned Kettle. The Cap'n watched them leave for a moment, then shook his head and went back inside to retrieve the notes he'd written from the shack.

"My goodness, those two take 'Identical' to a whole new level…"


From there, things were more or less the same, except there were two 3s instead of one, and yes they did insist that they were both Agent 3.

As you would expect the extra 3 made things easier, and the two "brothers" tore through the Kettles in record time. During their campaign against the Octarians they would eventually meet the Squid Sisters again, who were amused by just how similar the "twins" were, in appearance and mannerisms. Care was taken to make sure their parents never ever saw or heard the two of them at the same time, though they refined their "Identical twins separated at birth" story incase they found out they suddenly had two sons. They weren't really sure how to convince their mom she actually gave birth to two kids and didn't know it, but they had to come up with some kind of answer that seemed more logical than time travel, so they'd try.

The 3s became some of the closest friends possible. They were the exact same person after all, only way to make them closer would be to staple them together. Outside of turf wars and missions, their days were largely spent hanging out and talking about whatever. They took the oddities caused by their cloning as it happened, though occasionally they'd hit an issue they'd couldn't ignore.


"So… what do we do about Agent 8?"

Will looked up from the tv and looked over at Bill. He digested the question, and found that it didn't go down well. That was a very good question, unfortunately…

"… I… I don't… know?"

"Well, we have to do something… she is our girlfriend."

"I know… but… I have no idea what to do. There's two of us, technically we both dated her… do we… do we share her?"

"…I don't know what you mean exactly when you say that, and I'm going to go ahead and assume the answer is no."


Time moved on, as it tended to do, and questions they couldn't answer were put on the back burner to be postulated on later.

In no time, the Zapfish were retrieved, and even the fearsome Octavio was taken down with ease thanks to the teamwork and skill of the two 3s.

With Octavio down and the city safe, the two defaulted to chilling for the next two years (When they said they went back two years, it would be more accurate to say "two years and 7 months". Two years was just easier to say). Things were kept the same as to make the best use of their future knowledge. They did however, make the effort to keep the relationship between Callie and Marie strong. They'd never stopped being some of the closest siblings around (Second only to the 3s) but the low point in their relationship, where their individual responsibilities caused them to drift apart, was a sad thing to watch. If they could at least alleviate that by encouraging them to call each other or go out for lunch every now and again, why wouldn't they?

It was however, near the end of the second year, when the Cap'n invited the 3s out for a research trip, that they planned to make a big change in the time line. Only Will went with the Cap'n on the research trip, Bill stayed behind, and kept a close eye on a certain celebrity.

On the night that Octavio broke free, Bill made his move.


Callie cut through an alleyway on her way home. It was a long and tiring day thanks to the extra work load she took on to earn some time off, but was worth it if it meant she could see Marie and her parents and just relax for a few days.

Callie paused when four figures appeared at the end of the alley. They were all wearing hooded coats, their faces obscured by shadows, and they were all walking directly towards her. Pro tip, if you ever see people like that it's a good sign you should skedaddle. Callie turned around, but only made it a step when she realized another group of four were closing in on her from behind.

"Oh no…"

Callie pressed her back against the cold brick wall. As the figures closed in on her she tried desperately to think of a way out, but couldn't think of anything, not with how close they all were already.

Thankfully she didn't have to.

Just as the group was upon her, a splatbomb hit the ground behind them. Some managed to dive away but others weren't so lucky, and as soon as the bomb detonated the group was cut in half. Callie dropped down, pressed herself against the wall, and covered herself with her arms as the bomb went off. She heard a Splattershot go off and another two people being splatted, along with two sets of footsteps, very quickly getting quieter and more distant.

"You better run! Cowards!"

Callie lowered her arms and looked up to see Agent 3, it'd have to be Bill since Will was out with Cap'n Cuttlefish. Looking around she saw a lot of ink covering the ground and walls.

"Attacking some one unarmed in an alley, how low can you go?" Bill said with contempt. He looked over to Callie and started walking towards her. "Hey, are you okay? You hurt?"

Bill held his hand out to her. She looked at it for a moment, until finally the message "oh, you're safe" hit her brain. Callie let out a massive sigh of relief and sort of sagged against the wall.

"Oh my god, holy mother of… I thought… I thought I was done for… oh man…"

3 crouched down so he could be eye level with her. "Don't worry about that, your safe now. Sorry I didn't come sooner, I had to wait for them to group up so I could take out as many of them at once as possible. Are you hurt?"

Taking deep breaths, Callie replied, "Y-yeah, yeah no I'm fine… That was… that was terrifying…"

"You're safe now." 3 stood up and held out his hand again. After a moment Callie grabbed hold and let herself be pulled up.

"Thank you. How'd you know I was gonna be attacked?"

"I heard commotion at the valley, so I went to investigate. Octolings, a whole bunch of Octolings, were there. They broke Octavio out, I'm sorry to say. Before they left Octavio asked for the status of the Splatoon. They mentioned you were alone and they had sent some people to… uh, collect you," Callie shuddered at that, "So, I rushed over. Got here just in time."

In truth, he'd been following Callie ever since she left her workplace. He'd have intercepted the Octolings sooner but they were split up and only gathered into one spot as they made their move on Callie. He didn't want to risk the others attacking Callie while he was dealing with one of them, so he waited.

"Oh man… Thank you, thank you… We have to warn Gramps, and your brother. If Octavio's out again-"

"I'll call them as soon as I can. For now though, we should get you home."

"Right, yeah let's do that. Should I cancel my vacation?"

"No, I would go that far. Actually, getting you out of Inkopolis for a few days might be a good idea."

"Ah, okay I see your point. Plus, seeing my family would really help calm me down, 'cause I'll be honest I'm still freaking out on the inside a bit."

"That's understandable. Let's get you home." 3 held out his hand. "Shall I be your bodyguard?"

Callie grabbed his hand "Absolutely. Get me outta here."


Octavio made no attempt to kidnap anyone else again. Callie spent a relaxing two days with her family, only revealing the kidnapping attempt to Marie after they returned to Inkopolis. Bill went with her, as she was still nervous about traveling alone. Considering what'd almost happened, he didn't blame her. He returned to Inkopolis after a day and got to work.

Will and Cap'n Cuttlefish were called and warned, though he told them to stay on their research trip. Will convinced the Cap'n to do that, knowing they had to find Agent 8 and the Deep Sea Metro. Bill recruited Agent 4 once again, and helped her defeat the Octolings and reclaim the zapfish. Marie helped as well. In fact she demanded that she help, the attempted kidnapping of her cousin having thoroughly infuriated her.

Octavio was once again defeated, and in time Will, Cap'n Cuttlefish, and Agent 8 returned from the Metro.

Will, having been the one who went to the metro, was the one who 8 fell for eventually. Bill was somewhat saddened by the loss of first girlfriend, even though technically she was still dating him (Time travel mechanics are bull). However, this wound up not being too big a deal. Thanks to the alterations made in the time line, Bill wound up with someone else…


"Geeze, you just announced you two were official yesterday, and you're already moving in with her?"

"Her idea, but the apartment is too cramped with the us and Agent 8 anyways."

"I guess. Still surprised Callie would ever want to date an Agent 3."

At some point Agent 3 became a descriptor, rather than referring to one of them specifically.

"I guess she took a liking to me after I saved her from getting kidnapped."

"Yeah, if anything were to win points with a girl, it'd probably be that."

And so, time moved on and things were as close to normal as they could be.

Will enjoyed being with Agent 8 again, and Bill enjoyed being with Callie. Agent 4 was their friend again, albeit slightly more irritating thanks to her constantly pretending to confuse their names. Life was simple and easy. But as the months rolled by a sense of unease started to grow. They were getting closer to the point in time that they looped, and they had no way of knowing if they would or wouldn't loop again.

On the final night the two 3s got together and hung out.


It was 9:23 PM. The "brothers" had gone out for a late dinner at a fast food place, and were now getting ready to their respective homes.

"Well, guess this is it." Said Will.

"Guess so." Bill agreed. "I know we said not to talk about it, but, any idea what we should do if we go back again?"

Will thought for a moment. "Whatever we do, we'll do our best."

"That is such a wishy washy no commitment answer."

"Well if you got anything better to say I'm all ears."

They looked at each other, then just started laughing. Will held up his drink, Orange Cream Soda, the king of Sodas.

"Let's hope time keeps moving forwards."

Bill held up his drink, also Orange Cream.

"Here's hoping."

The tapped their cups together, took a drink, then walked home in opposite directions.


Agent 3 was irritated when he opened his eyes. He was back in his old bedroom. AGAIN.

"Oh great, back here again." He said as he sat up.

"That's not all." His clone said, sitting up… and pointing his thumb at a 3rd Agent 3.

The new Agent 3 waved. "Looks like we're a trio now."

The first Agent 3 flopped back onto his bed. "Freaking Fantastic."

They were, once more, the exact same person. Even the things that Will and bill had done separately were now divided up amongst the trio. With nothing else to be done about it, two of the 3 Agent 3's went to Inkopolis.

Here they go again…


Number of 3s: 3


"A-am I going delirious or are there 3 of ya?"

The first 3 gestured towards the other two 3s.

"Cap'n, these are my identical twin brothers, Bill and Ted. Before you ask, yes, our dad liked the movie."


Number of 3s: 4


"So, I'm not the only one who get's weirded out looking at all of them in one place, right?" Callie asked, watching the quadruplets as they ate lunch.

"No, no it's weird." Marie agreed. "I feel like I'm looking at a glitch in reality.

"I know quadruplets happen, but, they're so similar. There like literally the same person just copy pasted."

"Hmm… 10 bucks says they're actually clones made by the government."

"10 bucks says they're alien reploids."

"You're on."


Number of 3s: 5


"You know what we should do?" One of the Agent 3s said one day while they were all lounging around. "We should form a band."

The other 3s thought about it, then nodded in agreement.

"Absolutely."

"We have an opportunity literally no one else could have. We'd be fools to not take advantage of it."

"Question though, do any of us know how to play an instrument?"

"We'll learn."


After a few months of training, the rock band "5 3s" hit the scenes. At first their music wasn't too noteworthy, considered amateurish by most, though their gimmick of being identical twins made them somewhat interesting. In time however, their music improved and slowly but surely, they rose in popularity. They even became popular enough to do collabs with the Squid Sisters, whom they were rumored to have been friends with even before they'd become a band.

Although there was a period where the band was forced to go on Haitus due to family issues. Specifically, their parents swearing blind that they didn't have 4 extra sons.

When asked by the media, the band wisely chose not to comment on the issue.


Number of 3s: 8


"Hey mom?"

Jane, or J as her friends called her, who the readers might know better as 3's mom, turned away from her task of cooking eggs to see her son behind her, looking strangely serious.

"Good morning! Is something wrong? You have sort of a look about you."

"I kind of need to tell you something."

Frowning, Jane removed the eggs from the heat and turned to face Will.

"Did something happen?"

"Sort of. Um, you might want to sit down, it's kind of a big thing."

Jane crossed her arms. "Will? What happened?"

Will took a breath, and waved in some people from the sides. That was weird, who else could've been in the house besides her husband?

And then her son came in and stood next to her first son. Then another 6 of her sons walked in and suddenly Jane wasn't sure about her grip on reality anymore.

"Told you it was a big thing."


Number of 3s: 15


Today's Headline: Inkling Youth Cloned!

Scientists shocked as 14-year-old Inkling suddenly has 14 brothers

This week a family in the North Country didn't have a chance to have a normal day, as the mother woke up to discover that her only son, a young man named Will, had apparently been cloned.

"It was shocking, I didn't know what to think," the boy's mother told us in an interview, "They were just laying in the hallway, about five, I think. I though I was still dreaming, but they all woke up and another 10 came out of his room."

The mother almost called 911, but one of her sons stopped her, and instead had her call the private number of one Dr. Curone, a high-ranking member of the scientific community and a specialist in Theoretical physics. A group from an as of yet unnamed organization, described as belonging to an "Integrated Research Facility", came by and took the 15 young men away. Details as to what company took them, what exactly they're doing, and how the family's son was cloned have not been released to the public, we have however been assured by the father that his sons weren't worried. In regards to the event the father had this to say:

"Obviously I was concerned. I've only ever had the one son, so suddenly having 15, and furthermore having all of them call up someone we've never even heard of and being carted away by them was incredibly bizarre. However, my son… well, sons, explained a lot of things to us. I can't really talk about it since a lot of it is confidential, and I don't think I'd believed anyways, but this apparently isn't the first time they've done this. Our sons were confident that they'd be safe and they seemed to trust the scientist they called, so I'll do my best to trust their judgement."


Number of 3s: 28


Dr. Curone had a long career in the sciences, and had seen, theorized, and tested some strange things. As she read over the notes currently being written up by 28 versions of the same kid, all of whom had apparently time traveled, she was confident that the current situation was the strangest of all.

"These notes are incredible…" Said Dr. Curone. The notes were still being written, but what she was looking at was already the most complex and comprehensive look into the functions of the space time continuum and the fabric of reality ever seen. Until now the best look they had into the manipulation of time was when someone accidentally microwaved a Pizza Pocket backwards, and now they were having years of research dumped into their lap. And technically, thanks to time travel, she was the one who originally wrote it in the first place! It was enough to give a scientist conniptions.

"Don't let it go to your head." One of the Agent 3s said (They'd given up coming up with individual names once there were 13 of them.)

"Yeah, we'd rather not have to fight you again."

Dr. Curone looked up from the notes. "Fight me?"

"Yeah, last time you got high on your own fumes and tried to take over the world with the power of science."

"We had to gather our forces and take you down. You were riding around in a mech, wearing black leather, it was a bad time all around."

"I- did I really do that?" She asked, worried. She'd like to think she wouldn't have, she wanted to use science to help the world for goodness sake! But, like so many other nerds she had been bullied in school, and on bad days she did have those fantasies of violence…

"Nah, you didn't, just messing with ya."

Dr. Curone glared as the 3s laughed.

"Got the last page done!" a 3 in the back yelled. He passed it forward and it soon joined the pile. The 3rd pile, that is. The notes were long enough that it had to be separated into 3 parts to have any hope of being stapled together.

"Excellent." Curone stapled the final part together and lifted all the notes in her arms. "I'll get these typed, printed, and passed around to my colleagues. I'm sure that with this information, we'll have made progress into the field of… well actually I don't think there's a name for it, but whatever we decide to call it we'll have made more progress into it than ever thought possible!"

"That's fantastic!" the 3 closest to her said, him having become the groups spoke person by virtue of, well, being closest to her. "How much progress exactly do you think?"

"Um, well, a lot?"

"Well it's just that you said that last time, then a week later said that you and your colleagues 'barely scratched the surface'. Now I'm sure you guys are doing their best, but that wasn't the best thing for us to hear since we're all kinda tired of going back in time. Ya know?"

"Ah, yes well… This is an entirely new field we're looking at so I can't really say for sure. I can say safely that-"

"'Your notes have set us far ahead, and with each loop we'll get closer and closer'. Yeah, you said that last time too."

"Ah… yes… well…"

The 3 sighed, "No, it's fine, I get it, this stuff takes time. Just getting tired of having to write these notes down."

"… I can assure you we'll do everything we can to find a solution to your problem."

"That's all we ask for. Well, if you have your notes can at least 17 of us be released?"

"Huh? I mean, There'd be no adverse effects to releasing you besides some confusion so I don't see why we couldn't, but, why that specific number?

"We were hoping to try setting up a small family style restaurant managed entirely by 3s. We were thinking there'd be, 5 waiters, 3 cooks, 2 for food prep, 2 dishwashers, 2 janitors, floor manager, assistant manager, and manager."

"So, 17, I see… Why do you want to start a restaurant?"

"Something to do."

"Right… do you know… how to start a restaurant?"

"Yeah, we've been studying. Plus we tried to start one before."

"Really?"

"Yeah, that was loop 14."

"It was a disaster though." Another 3 said.

"Oh yeah, we had no idea what we were doing. That's why we studied. We think we can make it work now."

"Right… Well, I can speak to the overseer, I guess. He'll… probably allow it?"

"There shouldn't be any problem, you'll still have 11 of us to talk to."


A week and a half later, "3 Course Meals" was a decently successful local business, and the 28 3s had been gathered into a meeting room by Dr. Curone.

"Well, gentlemen… Wills, if you'll allow me to call you that, we've studied your notes, and we believe we've come to understand them as best we can at the current moment. And with that understanding I can say that…"

Dr. Curone's shoulders slumped a little.

"We've barely scratched the surface of what we can do in this field."

The 3s annoyed groans filled the room.


Number of 3s: 37


"We've scratched the surface of what we can do in this field."


Number of 3s: 50


"We've made decent progress in this field."


Number of 3s: 63


"We've made a surprising progress in this field."


Number of 3s: 74


"We'd have made more progress in this field if you hadn't taken a year long vacation."

"Hey, we've been waiting on you guys for a long time, we'll take a break if we want to."


Number of 3s: 84


"We've made great progress in this field."


Number of 3s: 96


"Gentlemen!" Dr. Curone said, slamming her hand down on the table. "We've made a break through!"

"Finally!" they all called out.

The 3s had taken to studying and learning whatever skills caught their interest, which combined with their memory sharing every time they looped made them collectively some of the smartest kids around. They'd seen and done so many things, it could be hard to hold their attention.

Today though, their attention was focused on the scientists and their diagrams, which were filled with figures and information that was too complex to describe in under a week.

Dr. Curone, who had become the head of the project, was explaining their findings to the 3s.

"We can't explain what sent you back in time originally, but we have managed to figure out that whatever did send you back ripped a hole in the fabric of space and time when it did. Now reality still technically functions, but the tear keeps it from functioning properly, hence the time loops. Now we've thought about how to fix this tear, and the best solution we have amounts to this: we need to break another hole in reality, one which connects to the old tear, and then close them both. Does that make sense…?"

"Imagine reality is like a creature with bones, like a seagull, and you going back in time is like a rock hitting it and breaking a wing." Another scientist explained. "The seagull is technically still alive and functioning, and the skin is still intact, but until it's wing is fixed it wont be able to leave the island it's on. So, we need to open the skin so we can re-set the bone, then close the wound again."

"Yes! That's actually a perfect analogy thank you!"

"Yeah, no kidding, nice." The 3's spokesperson said. "So, do you know how you're going to do that? Are we close?"

"Ah, well," Dr. Curone rubbed the back of her head. "This is just the hypothetical solution which our current evidence points us towards being hypothetically the best-case scenario."

"…So, we're not close at all, are we?"

"Nnnno, not really."

3s head slammed his head against the table.


Number of 3s: 127


"With the information you've provided, we believe we can begin designing a machine capable of opening a hole in reality. However, I will warn you, the complexity of the machines coupled with the amount of time and resources it will take to create even prototypes will be immense."

"Yeah, yeah, we're all resigned to the fact that this is gonna take ages. Like, literal ages. Just do what you have to do."


Number of 3s: 242


"This design, if our calculations are correct, should work."

"Finally! That took way longer than we thought it would. And were prepared to wait a long time!"

"Well, we are trying to punch a hole in reality. I think we can be forgiven for playing it safe… and anyways, we're not clear to start building yet…"

"Of course not- alright, what's the problem, how do we fix it?"

"Space and resources, mostly. The machine will have to be huge, complex and… frankly not only will we have to struggle to get enough equipment, not only will it be a struggle to find anywhere large enough to actually build the thing, I think getting it built in time is… optimistic at best"

"Oh no, no, no! I will not accept that! We're getting really bored, we've done everything, been everywhere, after all this time me and all of the other 3s aren't gonna accept 'can't do it'."

"I understand your frustration, but we just don't know how we can make it happen with our limitations."

"Well what do we need to get around those limitations? There are over 200 of us, that many brains should be able to come up with something."

"Well, as I said, we need space, resources. To build it in time, we'd need skilled engineers, and a lot of them. Also… if you're going to be looking for solutions anyways, if we could find ways to make the machine more efficient that would be a great help. We've worked it out as well as we can, but this is a machine more complex than anything we've ever tried to build, so it's entirely possible we're missing opportunities to simplify it."

"Alright, give us time to think, we'll figure this out."


Number of 3s: 253


Working with the 3s was fascinating and overwhelming in equal measure.

They appeared suddenly thanks to an anomaly in space time, then after nearly a full two days of writing them down, provided centuries of notes and plans for a field of science no one really knew existed. The scientific community was going to a lot of effort for them, though for very good reason. being stuck in a time loop meant each and every one of them was trapped living out the same events over and over again without even knowing it, which was just bad for everyone. And as the 3's pointed out, if they cloned every single loop, then with enough time there'd be too many of them for the world to sustain. Helping them helped everyone.

Aside from their status as temporal anomalies, they were also some of the smartest people in existence, all 253 of them. Every concern, every question, every minor criticism, they had an answer for it. To be fair though, they didn't have exceptional problem-solving skills, they just had centuries to find the answers. Which, Dr. Curone suspected, was the only reason they'd managed to convince everyone to start working on the machine, miles below earth in the Deep Sea Metro, with Octolings.

("You need space? The Deep-Sea Metro is miles and miles of underground facilities just sitting there. You need resources? Repurpose all the technology sitting and gathering dust. You need engineers? There are hundreds of 3s who will happily work for free if it means getting out of this loop, and believe me when I say we've studied engineering many times these past hundred years."

"And to design and improve our machines, you got the Octolings, who routinely build some of the most advanced tech currently available."

"Yep. And to think it only took us 11 tries to get this all underway."

"It took you 11 tries to come up with this plan?"

"Took us 1 try to make the plan, took us another 10 to figure out how to get Octavio to work with Inklings.")

It was impressive how well things were coming along, all things considered. The Octolings really knew their stuff and had already improved their machines 10-fold since joining. That Marina girl in particular, who the 3's spokesperson had personally recommended to lead the project, was very talented at what she did.

If they were lucky, the machine would be able to fix reality, and possibly even reset the number of Agent 3's back to one. If it didn't, well… they'd hope for the best.

"Hopefully, this will all be finished soon."


Number of 3s: 276


"It wasn't finished soon."

"Huh?" Dr. Curone asked.

"Just replying to something I heard you say once."

The Machine, which had a proper complicated scientific name but the 3s always referred to as the "Hole Puncher", was about to be activated for the first time. They had built the machine into the human statue that Commander TarTar once tried to use to kill everybody. 3 hadn't let that happen, of course, though as his focus shifted to ending the time loop he had let the government deal with it (A murderous phone was hard to believe, but with 276 clones clogging their streets they learned to keep an open mind to what he said). The human statue had been edited and redesigned to heck and back to accommodate the new machinery.

A new platform had been attached to the chest, which contained all of the safety shielding and control panels for the operators. Various large bits of heavy machinery were attached to and sticking out of the body at various points. The large nozzle in the mouth that would've fired out the beam of sludge that would have killed everyone had been gutted and replace with what looked like a giant megaphone. The eyes now had large machines that glowed green. Apparently, they helped focus the reality bending energies, but it had an unavoidable side effect of making the thing look like it was staring into your soul with bright green eyes, which the mainland had complained about multiple times. And finally, everything above the eyes had been removed and replaced with a large plexiglass sphere, containing an electrode from which occasional beams of colored light extended from the electrode to the outer glass exterior.

Some might say it looked like a giant plasma lamp, but that would just be silly.

Marina's voice reverbed through a speaker system. "Okay everyone, stand behind the shields and get ready, we're about to turn it on."

Everyone took their positions, and with some trepidation Marina hit the on switch.

The statue, and the ocean around it, hummed and buzzed as countless machines within came to life. Any device that had lights on it glowed even brighter, and within the statues head the globe became more active, beams of light multiplying and speeding up in their movements.

"Readings are green, devices are starting in the right order…" Marina said, reading over a dozen meters and readings at once.

As 3 watched the device power up he felt something in him he realized he hadn't felt in a while. Genuine excitement. The last couple of hundreds of years had been… lame, frankly. Just writing down notes and trying to help a bunch of scientists hurry up. And as each loop created more 3s, living conditions became more difficult. It wasn't horrible but finding room for so many people who showed up with no warning what so ever was difficult. For a while a lot of the 3s had to live on boats, recently they'd taken to converting parts of the Metro into homes. That worked actually, but it was short notice and wasn't quite the best. As soon as this machine was finished, they could focus on making life easy again.

According to the scientist's calculations fixing the loop would cause one final loop to occur, but after that they'd be free. That'd be fine if it meant they could stop dealing with all this stupid science and experience some new things again. Soon, everything would be done with, and 3 felt more and more encouraged as the statue powered up-

"Uh oh…"

"Marina?"

"Uh, we're having a few spikes in the data readings, shouldn't be an issue…"

"Your tone doesn't sound encouraging…"

The Hole Puncher started sparking.

"It's fine," Marina said as she furiously typed on a key board and adjusted switches and knobs. "Just need to decrease energy to some areas-" a series of loud pops and bangs emanated from the inside of the machine, "A lot of areas… Uh…"

"Maybe we should turn it off." Dr. Curone said, worriedly.

"Maybe we should turn it off."

Marina was now furiously typing and hitting just about every button on the terminal. The Hole puncher was now smoking and the glass dome on the head had cracked. The scientists and engineers on the platform hand begun running around, trying to find a way off. 3 had a feeling this loop wasn't going to end well.

"Why isn't it shutting down!?"

Marina started hitting the sides of the terminal. "Come on! Come on!"

A few massive explosions came from within the Hole Puncher, sending bits of machinery crashing onto the platform. The glass dome exploded open, and the electrode within started glowing bright enough to outshine the sun. They stared at the rising glow in rapt fear.

Then, with a castrophony that could be heard far away in space, the Hole Puncher exploded.

The blast obliterated the Hole Puncher, as well as 3/4ths of Inkopolis.


Number of 3s: 277


At 7:14 in the morning, half a city was woken up when 277 clones of Agent 3 jerked awake screaming.


Number of 3s: 299


"So you're sure that all the safety procedures are in place?"

"Yes, I'm sure, we've double and triple checked it."

"Are you positive? Because I don't want to explode again."

"I'm as sure as I can be. This will work, and if it doesn't, I can shut it down like that." Marina said with a snap of her fingers.

3 stepped away from her terminal. "Alright, I trust you."

"Thank you. Okay, if there are no more concerns," Marina pressed the button for the intercom, "Everyone, stand behind the shields and get ready, we're about to turn it on."

Everyone took their positions. From deep inside the Deep-Sea Metro the rest of the Agent 3s stood watching the proceedings on large tv screens. With some trepidation Marina hit the on switch.

3 watched the Hole Puncher nervously as it activated, waiting for the first sign of malfunction.

It never came.

Instead, the Hole Puncher came to life with a humming sound that gradually got loud enough to shake the ocean around them. The lights grew brighter and brighter until you had to squint to look at them. The glass dome hand numerous fast-moving threads of light connecting the electrode to the glass, changing colors from green to yellow, and growing brighter.

Finally, the megaphone within the mouth began lighting up and sparking.

"That's normal. Energy spikes in all systems, but well within acceptable bounds. Entering the final phase! Prepare for the discharge!"

The energy focused into the megaphone, charging into a glowing ball. A loud beep signaled from Marina's terminal, and she hit another large button.

From the speaker, a massive shockwave shot out.

For a moment, everything was black. 3 felt like he was falling and staying in place at the same time. Then the shockwave seemed to been pulled back into the Hole Puncher, and with it the world returned.


"Hold on to your tentacles…"

"It's Inkopolis news time!"

"Before we talk about anything else, we gotta talk about the event that's been sweeping the 'net for the last 3 hours."

"News hardly gets fresher than that."

The screen behind them displayed a blurry image of a massive silhouette with glowing green eyes sitting in the ocean.

"At around 9 this morning, this thing appeared in the middle of the ocean out of nowhere. No one knows what it is, or what it does, or even how it got there, but it sure creeped them out!"

"I'm creeped out just looking at the picture. What happened to it?"

"That's the best- or worse- part! After about an our it just sank right back into the ocean!"

"Wow. So hey, if you were planning on going out in a boat today, maybe don't!"

"The Coast Guard is launching an investigation and will report any information they find to the public."

"Until they give the okay, I think I'll stay out of the ocean."

"Onto other news…"


For the first time in a long time, Commander TarTar was feeling a little something called panic.

He was being shut out of his own systems. No matter the security, no matter the firewalls, someone forced him out. He'd lost control over the test chambers, then the Sanitizing Station. Even the train system was lost to him. Someone was hacking away his administrative capabilities, and somehow he couldn't fight back.

It wasn't long before he was effectively trapped within the telephone in the main station.

Someone walked before him, wielding a circular saw.

"I'd say sorry, but I'm not sorry at all. The Deep-Sea Metro doesn't belong to you anymore, TarTar."

"I cannot fail my prime directive. The new species are unworthy. They must be replaced, so someone better can take their place, and be guided to greatness." TarTar argued.

"We can guide ourselves."

Anything else TarTar might have said was drown out by the sound of the saw cutting through the base of the phone. In short order, TarTar was cut off from the electricity, robbing him of the ability to speak, hear, or even see.

Shortly after that he was unceremoniously chucked into the ocean, and the briny blue fried his circuits.


Iso Padre squinted as the heavy doors before him opened and sunlight hit his eyes.

"Alright, here you go. This door opens to a spot about 10 miles from Inkopolis. Keep walking south and you'll find a small town about two hours away. Talk to the officials there and I'm sure they'll get you sorted out. If you don't know what to do with yourself, stick around and wait for help."

He could hardly believe it. Being free from the Metro was the dream, but for freedom to come so suddenly gave recent events an almost surreal quality. He hadn't even lost all his memories (though the few he still had were pretty vague), he figured his head would've been completely empty before he got out.

Still, he wasn't going to look a gift seahorse in the mouth, and neither were the other residents of the metro, who had already started pushing through. Iso Padre went with the crowd, but stopped and turned to the young man who had opened the door.

"Young squire, before I go, I would like to say thank you for the freedom you've given us."

The young man simply nodded. "Get out there and have a good life."

Iso Padre did just that.


At 9:43 AM, an average family received this voice mail from the son they were having trouble finding that day.

"Hey mom, hey dad. Sorry to vanish, but I have a lot of important things to take care of. I'm perfectly safe, and as soon as they're done I'll be back, so don't panic. Love ya both, bye."


Deep underground in the hidden domes the Octolings had made their home, an unexpected guest brought an incredible gift to them.

"General Octavio, we've run as many tests as possible. The battery… it just doesn't run out of energy. As far as we can tell there's no reason it can't work… well, forever."

Octavio couldn't believe what he was hearing. "Forever… infinite electricity…"

"Well, it's less infinite and more, 'The values have been changed so reality thinks it has so much charge that the earth will die before the battery does', but you know, to-may-to to-mah-to."

Octavio turned to their guest. "You… nobody would give away something like this for no reason. What do you want from us?"

"Two things: one, no more hostilities towards the Inklings. Two, let's call it a partnership…"


Three months later

Agent 3 strolled casually towards the coast of Inkopolis. Everyone who had gathered on the coast, the bystanders, the news crew, and police, gawked at his approach. The fact that he was walking over ocean, on thin air, may have freaked them out a bit. Or maybe it was the 50 other Agent 3s behind him.

He was dressed casually, with his preferred style of a cap and parka. However, he also had the addition of a chrome gauntlet with a screen built into it on his right arm, a metallic square device worn like a back pack, and chrome boots, all of which had their fair share of glowing lights. The tech didn't strictly need to be chrome, and there were maybe a few more lights than necessary, but when you're going for the "Superior technology" look it was a good bit of visual shorthand.

The rest of the Agent 3s were wearing what they'd decided would be their official security uniform, a black jumpsuit with Yellow armor covering the torso. They also had the chrome boots, gauntlet, and back pack device. They didn't have the helmets, because he needed everyone to see that they were the same person. It would make it easier to believe him when he told them they were all clones.

See, once the goal of stopping the time loop was over, he discovered that the Hole Puncher had failed to get rid of the clones. It was a possibility they had considered, but didn't have the time to deal with. The hope was fixing the tear in reality would get rid of them, but well, it didn't. So with an entire species of themselves still knocking around, the 3s decided before they could go and enjoy life like they'd wanted to, they had to sort themselves out first.

They stayed underground and converted the Metro to their homes, and during this period of rebuilding that they realized they were sitting on incredibly advanced knowledge in the field of reality manipulation, and furthermore, that reality manipulation had many more applications than creating and repairing holes in reality. It was like having the console commands in a video game. As long as you knew what codes to type in, you could do almost whatever you want.

So they created portable reality manipulators, that was the devices strapped to their backs, and a device that let them input the codes, aka the gauntlets. With the devices they convinced reality that there was no reason they couldn't maintain altitude despite having no floor to stand on, and they made their way to Inkopolis to announce their existence.

He could have done that at the start and let the government figure out what to do. But there were a lot of them, and they'd all lived longer than anyone else and studied and became proficient in just about all artforms and skills available, so, hadn't they kind of earned something? Why shouldn't they be their own sovereign nation? It sounded like a good time.

Agent 3, and the rest of the Agents, stopped in front of the coast and he spoke to the crowd.

"Hello. Sorry for the theatrics, but I figured some kind of power move wouldn't hurt. My name is Will. I am the representative for the newly formed Republic of 3."

Agent 3 held his hand over his heart, with 3 fingers extended. All of the Agent 3s behind him mimicked the salute.

"It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance."


Number of 3s: 300


So last chapter I tried to fix a typo and wound up making the exact same typo. I know I can edit my stories, I tried to do that but it didn't seem to work and frankly I don't want to mess with things, lest I break something. If you're desperate to know the name of Callie's voice actress, just google it.

This chapter wound up being much longer than I thought it would. Still, it was fun to write, and hopefully it'll be fun to read. I have other plans for Bonus Chapters so you will get a few more chapters like these, though they'll all focus on a different plot. As said above Bonus Chapters aren't connected to the main chapters, so you wont miss anything if you decide to skip them.

I don't think I said this anywhere else, but in case I'm supposed to, and in case you couldn't already guess, I don't own any of the rights to Splatoon. Surprising, I know.

Thank you for reading, I hope you've enjoyed the story so far.