A/N: When the story mentions playing music, play the song "Underwater Frigate Reactor Core", preferably the extended version. Stop playing it when it mentions stopping the music.

Thanks to Voltare and Joule's help, Aenon was able to get enough power to the medical bay to start healing his wounded shoulder. He was thankful that the first thing the equipment did was ease his pain; While he was able to hide it from Coral and the others, the pain from the wound was becoming unbearable. The equipment the went through the process using medi-packs and another healing apparatus to super-speed the wound's healing process and not only close it, but repair any nerves and blood vessels that were ruptured/damaged.

The wound didn't hurt anymore, but it was infuriatingly itchy for those long 30 minutes of letting the equipment work its magic. Aenon noted that the back of the medical bay had some sort of containment pod that looked like a cylinder of glass with a LOT of machinery attached to it. Aenon questioned why that's there if the equipment outside can heal wounds without it, but then figured it was for patients who were on the brink of death.

The two zapfish watched Aenon during the process with worried eyes as they powered the equipment the best they can. They never expected him to get hurt they way he did, especially considering he wasn't made of ink and could take most ink shots like they're nothing; with Marie stating how he was injured, they were worried that he was far more vulnerable without his suit than they anticipated.

When the healing process was done, Aenon did a few stretches to make sure his shoulder was perfectly fine. When that was done, he disconnected the two zapfish from the machines and cuddled them. "Thank you, Voltare and Joule, for being here during this. I can't promise that it won't happen again, but I'll be more careful from now on; the existence of ink bullets that can hurt me blind-sided me in more than one way." He got two happy warbles from that.

After a quick snack, he headed back towards the cabin in Octo Canyon. When he landed, Coral was gone and Marie was inside with a confused look, as if she was once again baffled by something. "What's wrong?"

"Agent 4 left to find the final kettle besides the one Perch went into and the boss kettle a short while ago. However, she's been having difficulty locating it for some reason; she's looked everywhere from what I can tell."

"I think I know where it is. If it is there, I'm going to be very upset." Coral's unamused voice came up on the headset. On the screen, she started heading towards one of the corners of Beaker's Depot in her ink, having inked the area in her attempts at finding the kettle. When she got to her destination, she looked into a nearby reservoir and saw the kettle. "Are you squidding me? How am I supposed to get down there?"

Marie felt like she was going brain-dead from all these questionable decisions the Octarians were making. This one made zero sense because every kind of Octarian were just as weak to water as Inklings were.

Aenon sighed at the image as he got up. "Guess you really don't have a choice but to have me go in with Neptune. I guess the silver lining is that I can't go into that kettle without the suit; I can swim, but I can't breathe underwater."

"Such a wonderful silver lining." Coral stated sarcastically before sighing. "Are you well enough to be out here again?"

"I'm back to how I was before getting shot, if that's what you're asking." Aenon sighed as he approached Beaker's Depot. "I'll try to help you on missions where I can be in Neptune, but I'm willing to bet that the lab isn't going to be the last time I'll be on foot and you need my help."

Sheldon hummed over the radio. "I have a gut feeling you're correct, Agent 5. Like I said before, that's just how the cookie crumbles; if we need to do something that'll help us end this war sooner, then so be it."

Aenon was about to dive in with Neptune when Coral stopped him. "I don't care if I can't help you while down there, I'm going with you in that suit!"

This baffled everyone as she started climbing the suit, especially Aenon. "Wait, what? You do know that if water starts seeping into the suit you'll be the first one to go."

"I have full confidence that won't happen."

The human sighed as he opened the hatch to let her in. "Where was that confidence earlier?"

"We don't talk about that."

Marie managed to recover some of her thought processes. "Be careful down there, you two. If the kettle is underwater, then I have no doubt the zapfish will be as well. There's no telling what will be down there."

"Duly noted, Marie. At least we won't be dealing with Octarians at all." After Coral was comfortable on his back, Aenon jumped into the reservoir and opened the kettle. What greeted them going down was a long pipe that seemed to go on for half-an-hour. "Riveting…"

Sheldon wasn't too pleased himself. "Just where is that kettle leading you? If the Octarians wanted to lead you into a trap, they should have done so with a kettle that WASN'T submerged."

Marie groaned. "Please, I just gave up trying to figure that out. Don't make me start again."

"Hang on, I see a light at the end of the pipe."

Like Aenon said, the kettle pipe was almost to the destination. Right as he exited the pipe, the suit started playing a song titled "Underwater Frigate Reactor Core". It was perfect for what the duo inside the suit beheld.

Before them was an expanse of coral reefs and various underwater flora and fauna inside what looked like a room. Above them looked like a glass ceiling that went on for a long time that was occasionally punctuated with machinery, though the rocky walls reached up to it in certain places.

Coral was the first Inkling to ever be underwater and live. She was blown away at how much color was down here. "This is… so beautiful…"

Aenon moved forward slowly as he looked around before a realization hit him. "This place was supposed to be a massive aquarium built by humans! It was designed to be a mini ecosystem and, based on everything here, it's been self-sustaining ever since Humanity's fall."

Marie couldn't believe her eyes; all Inklings ever thought of the ocean was a giant death pit to their kind. The feed she was getting from Neptune was breathtaking, to the point of her starting a recording of it. "I think this is the first time Inkling kind has ever seen below the waves ever since we evolved to live on land and became mostly ink-based. To think such beautiful scenery is no longer within our reach…"

As they traveled, Neptune went through some schools of vibrantly colored fish. Some instantly scattered away from the suit, others began swimming along side it. Various flora like anemones and even a few strings of kelp waved in the water, reacting to their presence, but never interrupting them. As they moved from room to room, the set-pieces remained largely the same, but the fauna in each room differed to a degree.

Aenon felt warmth in his heart has he heard everyone, including Sheldon, softly gasping at all of the scenery. Despite Neptune being outfitted for war instead of exploration, it's ability to explore even the ocean depths has managed to give some people, especially Coral, a once in a lifetime chance to see the beauty the ocean had to offer. The music only served to accentuate the feeling; the calm, mysterious, yet peaceful tunes helped convey a sense of wonder.

As they went on, the peaceful atmosphere suddenly vanished when a few unmarked, automated drones spotted Neptune and attacked. "Guess there were threats down here after all. This couldn't just be a serene dive into this aquarium." Aenon moved to engage the drones with the suit's hands; despite the water limiting movement, he still could move his appendages fairly fluidly thanks to the suit's advanced hydraulics.

"Wait, Aenon! Activate that flashing icon next to your ink tank gauge." Sheldon spoke up quickly. Sure enough, a symbol started flashing when he said that and Aenon deactivated tracking for one arm to press it.

-SWITCHING INK PRODUCTION TO HIGH-TIDE INK

This appalled Marie. "Sheldon! You do realize that-"

"It's incredibly taboo and I shouldn't have installed it on Neptune? I realize that, but I had a gut feeling for the longest time that we would have to deal with non-Octarian threats sooner or later. Case and point here with these hostile drones. Besides, the Octarians made it clear that they don't care about the taboo anymore, so why should we as well? An eye for an eye, as my grandpappy always said."

Coral shot a worried look at Aenon, who sighed. "Guess we don't have a choice, do we?" Activating the inkzooka on his right arm, he shot at one of the drones. The drone tried to dodge, but got blown up by the hyper-concentrated ink that shot out. "I'm surprised that my shot didn't just instantly dissipate."

"High-tide ink has enough viscosity to maintain it's shape underwater for at least a few seconds before dissipating." Sheldon breathed a sigh of relief. "I'm just glad your ink weapons can still function underwater, though you have to be relatively close to your targets here; you can't just blow them up a mile away with your inkzooka and your tentamissiles' homing is hindered."

"Right, my missiles." Aenon launched a couple off at the remaining drone and despite the drone having better evasive maneuvers, the missiles hunted it down long enough to destroy it. "I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that there's going to be more drones. Guess I'll keep my combat systems online."

Despite the sudden inclusion of combat, the music never changed from the serene soundtrack, which was slightly jarring for everyone listening. Marie made a mental note to cut out all of the combat when she moves to upload the footage she was getting here onto the internet for all to see; this scenery was too breathtaking to keep locked away in the New Squidbeak Splatoon's vault of secrets.

Aenon noted that the drones had rather poor armor and ineffective weaponry despite being hostile, leading him to conclude that they were more-so recon units rather than anything built for combat. His suspicions were confirmed when they happened across a slightly larger drone that had more intimidating weaponry and better armor; it took 5 missiles to destroy as opposed to the two for the recon units.

Despite the increasing combat frequency, Coral remained astonished by her environment and was ever looking at everything that caught her eye. She noted that the glass ceiling had started developing cracks as they went deeper down the linear pathways. "How structurally sound is the glass roof?"

Aquarius, having been silently trying to discern the origin of the drones, spoke up. "I've identified this glass as being an advanced form of acrylic glass mixed with glass carbon for resistance to weathering. While highly durable, persistent attacks from the local fauna will eventually break the glass."

Aenon eyed the cracks with skepticism. "I don't think it was the wildlife that caused these cracks."

Sure enough, they came across what looked to be a large human battleship, haven sunken and destroyed the end of the aquarium, explaining why the ecosystem was still thriving without human caretakers. It also somewhat justified the song's name as the side of the ship read: Aegis Destroyer.

What slightly disturbed both Aenon and Aquarius was the fact that, despite being sunken around 12,000 years ago, there was barely any signs of decay or hardly any coral attached to the ship, like someone or something was keeping it cleaned. Marie took one long look at the ship before saying, "I'm willing to bet that's where the zapfish is and also where all these drones are coming from."

It didn't take long after entering the ship to detect the zapfish. However, Neptune also picked up a disturbing amount of drone signals; this was indeed a launching platform for them. Aenon remembered how close this was to Inkopolis and realized with horror that, perhaps, the Octarians wanted to launch human drones at Inkopolis, made from the cobalt and nickel mined nearby.

All the more reason to shut this place down; I can't let the Octarians use this tech, else they'll destroy both the Inklings and themselves!

Thankfully, getting up to the zapfish wasn't much work with just 2 combat drones guarding it. Coral was actually kind of sad to leave the area; she almost wanted to fall asleep here, though she booted that thought out of her mind when Aenon stopped the music.

When they got back to Beaker's Depot, the lock on the last regular kettle suddenly exploded off, allowing Coral to access it. Sheldon was quick to pick up on this as she disembarked from Neptune. "Agent 4, I'll give you the option to pick whatever weapon you feel most comfortable with again. If this kettle is anything like the one you first met Perch in, you'll need every advantage you can get."

Coral decided to go in with the slosher due to its ability to hit over walls better than most other weapons. She took one look at Aenon as he disembarked and shook her head. "I'd rather not get you involved in this particular fight, Agent 5. I am still not over you getting hurt like the last time you went with me, and I doubt there's anything I need you specifically for."

"But-"

"No buts!" She lets out a sigh. "I get that watching me suffer through these kettles is harrowing on you, but can you allow me this one selfish request? I don't want to see you get hurt on my account again…"

Aenon tried to think of a retort to that statement, but couldn't think of anything and slumped over a bit. "Okay… I won't join you this time…"

Coral felt a bit guilty doing that to him, but it was for his own health. After seeing him fly off in Neptune, she dove down into the kettle.

When she landed, the first thing she noted was that she was surrounded on all sides by cyan Octolings, followed by realizing her own ink color changed to cyan as well. Many of the Octolings jumped at her presence, but a familiar looking one smiled. "Glad you could finally join us, Agent 4. The last few days have been harsh, to say the least."

Coral nodded at Perch. "I would have come sooner if it weren't for that stupid lock."

"I understand. I think it might have been a trap designed for you, but I triggered it when my coming here; they clearly didn't expect me to survive that other warzone."

Marie hummed at that. "So, your presence allowed Agent 4 to rescue more zapfish faster than she would have been if she came here first. I thank you for your sacrifice, Commander Perch."

"I do what I have to. Anyways, I'm going to give you a status report. I've been able to cut casualties down to 10% when I got here by having every squad retreat back to here and entrenching ourselves by this spawn point. While this gave the enemy total reign over the rest of the battlefield, we've been able to create something of a safe zone.

"That being said, they have started using a much darker ink compared to how light their purple ink normally looks. This has had the effect of making wounds caused by them heal much slower, hindering our ability to fight back. We may have cut casualties down, but out of the 20 Octolings still alive here, only 5 are still capable of fighting."

Coral adopted a dark look. "So, they've started using high-tide ink against you guys as well. Octavio really has gone off the deep end."

Sheldon sighed at that. "That means you've got your work cut out for you, Agent 4. Even a single hit from high-tide ink will cripple you, so make sure to pick your fights carefully."

"Don't worry. I managed to unlock autobombs from the Ammo Knights Enhancifier while Agent 5 was off healing, so I can play more tactically."

The "Agent 5" mention confused Perch as Coral swam away. "Agent 5? Did you guys managed to recruit another Inkling?"

Marie giggled. "Not really. I made Aenon into Agent 5 due to all of the help he was giving us. A lot of these kettles have been leading to where humans used to be and he's been instrumental in saving zapfish from those areas. He even managed to save one from an entirely underwater kettle."

Perch nodded at that. She did think of Aenon as the type who prefers helping directly as opposed to over an intercom or radio. She was about to change to topic when she did a double take at the "Underwater kettle" Marie mentioned. "They seriously stuck a zapfish underwater?!"

"Yup. If it weren't for Neptune being built for underwater exploration, we would have had no way of progressing forward. I guess it shows how desperate the Octarians are at keeping the zapfish out of our hands." Perch shook her head in distain. Octavio is shaping up to be even more insane than she thought.

Coral was able to rescue at least one mini-zapfish from the recreation of the Humpback Pumptrack, though she was very cautious in moving forward. Not only were Octoling super jumping from somewhere out of sight, but there were a mix of them using both regular and high-tide ink. She can rush the regular ones, but the high-tide ones she used her auto bombs on to try and make sure they couldn't land a shot on her.

When she managed to save the second mini-zapfish, Perch suddenly contacted her. "I'm sending you some back-up to help give you an edge in taking back the other six mini zapfish."

This surprised Coral. "Didn't you only have five battle-ready Octolings? Aren't you making yourself more vulnerable?"

"I only had five to begin with, but ever since Agent 5 arrived with "medical stimpacks", our injured have been healing as fast as they used to, albeit with bad itchiness. They're not quite 100%, but they can fight again, both in case we get attacked again and when you need more support."

Coral facepalmed at hearing Agent 5 being mentioned. "Of course, he wouldn't stay away. What was I thinking?" Sighing, she directly contacted Perch. "Can you make sure he doesn't leave your encampment? We found out that he can be hurt by high-tide ink and it was really bad for him the one time he got wounded. I don't want him risking his life anymore than he needs too."

"Duly noted. I'll keep an eye on him. If anything, he's busy being a medic to everyone who got injured by high-tide ink."

Thanks to the backup she got from the Octolings on her side, Coral had a much easier time getting at the next two mini-zapfish. She noticed that after those, the enemy density increased a bit, though most of the reinforcements were regular Octolings.

Unfortunately for her, during one of their skirmishes, the higher density of regular ink fired at her managed to hide a high-tide bullet that managed to hit her in the leg, causing her to go down in a cry of pain. Her allies managed to disengage and drag her away from the fight before anymore damage was sustained. "In the leg of all places…" She felt like she wanted to cry, both in pain and in frustration.

"Agent 4, let's get you back to our entrenched position." A female Octoling said as she put Coral's arm over her shoulder and gave her a lift, allowing her to walk on one leg. "Our allies here can work on thinning out the enemy for when you come back out."

When Coral got back to the encampment, Aenon was administering a medical stimpack on another injured Octoling when he saw her come in. He immediately started fussing over her after finishing with the Octoling, though he quickly found out that she hates needles. "Coral, unless you want to sit the rest of this mission out, you need to take one of these."

"I'm well aware of that! I just… I really hate needles!"

"Then perhaps I should go out there and-"

"No, not allowed! What would happen if you got hit by a high-tide bullet?"

Aenon huffed in irritation; he was getting sick of that argument. "The same thing that just happened to you. I get that you worry about me in regards to that, but what about my feelings? I worry about you as much as you worry about me; the only reason why I let you do this by yourself is because I didn't think there was as much danger and look what happens!"

Perch watched the two bickering as Aenon tried to help with a small smirk on her face. Marie contacted her directly with a giggle. "Despite being two different species, they look more like brother and sister, don't they?"

"Actually, they look like a bickering couple to me." This earned a snort of amusement from the squid sister. "I guess my opinion is an unpopular one."

"Moreso that I've already teased her about having Agent 5 as her boyfriend."

Now it was Perch's turn to snort in amusement. "Is there something you're not telling me?"

"I refuse to say anymore."

Coral finally relented and allowed Aenon to use a stimpack on her though she had to close her eyes to let him do it. Luckily for her, he didn't have to go in too deep near the wound to properly inject the medicine, which had the effect of giving her wound the ability to regenerate as if she got hit by a regular ink bullet. "Wow, this stuff is pretty potent… now can you fix the untold amount of itchiness my leg feels?"

"No dice on that. You're going to have to bear with it; it's part of the healing process for us humans and I suspect the same for your kind as well."

Coral groaned at that. "This is going to be so distracting… no point in complaining though, it's back to rescuing mini-zapfish for me."

When she got back to where her support was, they confirmed that they were able to take out a fair number of enemies in her absence. She figured that these particular Octolings were actual solders at one point and were fairly competent, though she would never want to throw shade at any of them; they weren't there exactly by choice.

Rescuing the rest of the mini-zapfish took no time at all, more than likely because the Pumptrack's proportions weren't blown up like The Reef's were. Coral had an encounter with an elite Octoling, but it wasn't anything she couldn't quickly take care of.

With the final mini-zapfish rescued, the allied Octolings retreated to the cabin, where both Marie and Perch gave them full authorization to move to Inkopolis. When they were all gone, Perch turned to Coral. "I hate to say this, Agent 4, but I was unable to discern the identity of the protector of Beaker's Depot. You'll be going in blind this time, though my intel last time wasn't helpful anyways."

Coral patted her on the arm. "You tried and that's all that matters; I just hope it isn't another Octo Berserker case. Regardless, I'm feeling pretty tired from today's excitement, between the lab, the underwater kettle, and that last kettle."

Perch nodded. "I'll head back to Beaker's Depot and see if there are anymore Octolings who aren't too keen on joining Octavio's mad cause."

Aenon stopped her before she super jumped away. "I just wanted to deliver a message. Tetricus Squad did their best in their mission."

Perch looked at him with wide eyes. "No… they didn't get wiped out, did they? I sent them there because I didn't think there would be anything too dangerous there!"

"Sadly, they were almost wiped out by a human mining robot that the Octarians managed to reactivate and reprogram. One did survive and he helped us destroy that thing, but almost at the cost of his own life. He's in Inkopolis now."

Perch squeezed her eyes shut before nodding at Aenon. "Thank you for saving his life. And thank you for helping all of us, Agents 4 and 5. Your acts of heroism will not be forgotten, no matter what any other Octarian says." She salutes them before super jumping away.

Aenon simply closed his eyes as Coral left Octo Canyon for the day. It's the legacy of my species that's causing so much suffering to you guys.