AN: Sorry to keep you waiting for so long, but I have returned with a new chapter (after putting it off again for another college semester)!
Hope you all enjoy it!
Splatoon 2: Next Wave
Chapter 10: From Better to Worse
Hey, it's Finley speaking again. Now, it's time for me to finish up my flashback. Now, where was I...? Oh, right, I was knocked out.
I woke up to Marie shaking me.
"Fin! Fin! Wake up!" she said worriedly.
"I'm up," I groaned painfully. "My head hurts like crazy, but I'm up."
"Callie told me what happened. Are you okay?"
"I think so. What did happen exactly? I was out for most of it."
"You were knocked out by some Octolings, and they broke Octavio out of his snow globe!"
"What?!"
She pointed to the remains of the snow globe. It was smashed to bits and glass was everywhere. But there was no sign of Octavio...
"Oh, this is bad...where's Callie?" I said as I stood up.
"Here I am," I heard her call. She came over from the shack wearing some new sunglasses on her head.
"Did you always have those sunglasses, Callie?"
"Uh, yes. But I feel like that's not as important as what just happened..."
"Sorry, you're right. But I'm glad you're okay. Now, where's Octave?"
"I don't know. I took cover when those Octolings showed up. When I saw the aftermath, everyone was gone. I tried waking you up, but you wouldn't move. So I called Marie to come help."
"You don't think that they kidnapped him, do you?" Marie said.
"Maybe," I said. "But whatever the case, we should probably find him and Octavio."
I took one step forward and almost collapsed. The girls came to help me stay standing.
"Okay...we'll find them...after I get some more rest..."
"We can probably hold off on searching for a while," Callie said. "I mean, how much can he do? Most of his forces are gone anyway. Plus, the Great Octoweapons were destroyed."
"You might be right, Callie," Marie said, "but I still don't like the idea of him being free..."
"Me neither...but she's got a point..." I said to Marie. "How much can he do in one or two days?"
Eventually, we settled on trying to find Octavio and Octave later.
"Let's go home," Callie said. "It's been quite a day already."
"You said it..." Marie and I said.
With that, we left the valley and arrived back in Inkopolis. As we all went home, I could feel the overwhelming sense of dread that we all had with the knowledge that DJ Octavio was set free...
To move this part of the story along a bit faster (because even I think that it's been dragging on for a bit...), I'll give a brief overview of what happened over the next few months that followed the incident...
As time went on, we did everything in our power to try to find the missing DJ and Octave, but we could never find them.
We mentioned the problem to Cap'n Cuttlefish, and he also became concerned...after he chewed us out for not keeping a close eye on Octavio. (We argued back that he should've let us know that he was out on a research trip to begin with...but we still lost the argument...) Anyway, he gave us some good news. During his travels, he went to a beautiful canyon on the outskirts of the city, but he started to see that the air and water there were beginning to get polluted. He suggested that we search there for some suspicious activity. Also, the cap'n had asked me to join him on another short research trip that he will go on some time later. I accepted the offer and planned to get ready early. The Squid Sisters agreed to scope out the canyon for some signs of Octarian activity.
Speaking of the Squid Sisters, things got complicated in their lives really fast. Along with the search, they still had to keep up with everything else in their lives, so they really had to balance their time. Eventually, one day, they both threw a fit about how everything was going too fast for them. Once they calmed down, I suggested that they take a well-deserved vacation. They were one step ahead. In a rare instance, they both managed to get some vacation time during the same few days, and they were planning to return to Calamari County for a family visit. I thought that it was a good idea and that it might help them reconnect a bit more.
As for me, my life took a unexpected turn (well, more than it already has) when my parents called me one day. They heard about my exploits (minus my Octo Valley adventure) in Inkopolis and were happy to hear that I was doing well. They then made an odd request. Because they felt that I wouldn't be able to support myself solely by competing in Turf Wars, they wanted me to start seeking another means of providing for myself. With little experience with work, I suggested that I enroll in Inkblot Art Academy in Inkopolis to see if I could learn how to make art into a profession. They were up to the idea, and after applying, I was accepted. However, I planned to actually begin my classes several months later in order to give myself time to keep searching for Octavio.
Okay, at the moment, I think you're mostly caught up. Now, I'll start again at about a few weeks before I started my first day at the academy. I had finished having breakfast with Callie and Marie at a café near the train station before it was time for Marie to go on her vacation that day.
"Ah..." Marie sighed contentedly. "Those were some good waffles. Your pancakes were a bit too syrupy for my liking though, Fin..."
"That's what made them good!" I retorted. "Honestly, your waffles were too dry to me..."
We then stared at each other in realization.
"HEY! Who said that you could eat some of my breakfast?!" we said simultaneously before breaking into laughter. Truly, neither of us cared.
Callie, however, was strangely quiet. She looked down at her empty plate lost in her own thoughts.
"Uh, Cal?" I said. "You okay?"
"Huh?" she said. "Oh...uh, yeah, I'm fine. Just thinking about this appointment I have later."
"Too bad you can't skip it..." Marie said. "Now, I have to ride the train by myself. It's gonna be so boring..."
"Don't worry. I'll be up at Calamari County tomorrow. Then the vacation can begin."
"Yeah, I guess you're right. Just try not to oversleep, okay?"
"Heh, look who's talking..." I murmured. Without another word, Marie stood up, came over to me, and flicked my ear. "Ow!"
"My train comes in an hour," she said nonchalantly. "I'd better get going."
"Okay," Callie said while standing.
"Really?! You're just gonna ignore-?!" I started before Marie flicked my other ear. "Gah! Stop it! That kinda hurts, you know?!"
"Oh, did I do that?" Marie said innocently with a mischievous smirk. As I stood up, I looked behind her.
"Oh, look! The Chirpy Chips!" I said while pointing behind her.
"What? Where?" she said as she looked behind her. I quickly flicked her ear. "Ouch! Hey!"
"What? The was a bug," I said while stifling a laugh. She then pinched my ear really hard in response. "OW! Why?!"
"Okay, guys, break it up," Callie attempted to say in a serious tone (She was trying her hardest not to smile at our quarrel). "Marie has a train to catch, remember?"
"Right," Marie and I agreed. We traded small glares as if we were keeping a close guard on our ears. (Like I said, we had a strange relationship...)
We headed to the train station and waited until Marie's train arrived. She gave us both goodbye hugs, and she boarded the train. We waved to her as she looked out the window. She looked a little sad but still managed a small smile and wave.
Callie and I then left the station.
"So, Callie," I said. "What's happening at this appointment?"
"Oh, you know, the usual manager meeting and other stuff like that," she said. "Nothing too special. But I have other errands to do after that like packing up to meet with Marie tomorrow."
"Oh, right. Almost forgot..."
My attention then shifted to the sunglasses on her head. There was something...off about them...
"Okay, I really need to ask. Where did you get those shades?" I said.
Callie looked a little flustered when I asked.
"Uh, I saw them on Annie's online retail shop. Remember when she made it a while back?"
"Oh, yeah! I'm still waiting on some new headphones I ordered from there."
"These arrived when I found Marie to come help us after the Octavio-escaping incident."
"Okay, that makes sense. They look nice on you."
"Thanks," she said while sliding them over her eyes.
While she did look normal, something about her was different. She seemed calmer than her usual self and a lot quieter. I speculated that it was her trying to keep her excitement about spending time with her cousin contained.
Soon, she went to her appointment, and I went about my business for the rest of the day until I went home.
However, I never realized that after parting with Callie, things would seriously go downhill from there...
Two days later, I was startled slightly by a frantic knocking at my door. I hurried to answer it, and when I did, I saw Marie standing at the door.
"Oh, Marie! You're-" I paused when I saw her face. She looked like she had finished running up to my apartment and looked very concerned. She was still carrying her suitcase. "W-What's the matter? Is everything alright?"
"Did you see Callie recently?" she asked.
"Uh, no. I thought she went to see you for your vacation with each other."
"Did you go with her to the train station?"
"No. She said she was running late and that she'll see me when you two got back. Wait, why do you ask?"
"That's the thing! She never showed up!" she exclaimed.
"What?!"
"The day after I got there, I expected her to come off a train, and I waited for her at the station. But she never came at all that day. I called her manager to ask if he knew, but he said she went home after work. I figured you saw her at some point."
"I didn't. Come to think of it...I haven't heard from her or even saw her since she left for that appointment she had the day you left. She never answered my calls or responded to my texts either."
Our eyes met when we both realized that something is terribly wrong. We both hurried to their apartment down the hall and called out for Callie as we searched all over. The whole place was silent, and it clearly let us know that she was not here. Now, I was getting worried.
"Where could she be?" Marie asked with her voice getting increasingly anxious. "If she's not here, where else could she have gone?!"
"Marie, now's not the time to panic," I said. "We need to slow down and think this through. This isn't like her. She usually lets either of us know where she is if she's going out, and she rarely forgets to do that. But she hasn't been doing that at all ever since-"
It then hit me. And Marie got the same idea.
"Octo Valley," we said.
After gathering our agent gear and weapons, we made our way to the valley as fast as possible.
Once we reached it, the place was still deserted and had pieces of glass from the broken snow globe still scattered on the ground. However, Marie noticed a pink paper with a large green 'x' stuck on the base of the globe and picked it up. Upon a closer examination, we saw that it was a poster advertising some kind of upcoming concert.
It had "RELEASE THE REMIX!" printed at the top with the 'x' below it. At the bottom in smaller letters, it said that the concert was coming soon at Octo Canyon.
"Octo Canyon?" I questioned. "Weren't we supposed to check out that place?"
"Yeah," Marie said. "But things got so hectic, I guess none of us actually managed to get there."
"We really need to work on setting a schedule...that's just sad even for us..."
"Seriously..."
"Actually, Octo Canyon might be exactly where we need to go. Octave told me about that place before."
"He did?"
"Yeah. He mentioned that bad Octarians moved there. So that must mean..."
Marie's eyes widened in realization, and I had the feeling that we may have had the same idea. We finally figured out what might've happened to Callie...
"Fin..." she said quietly. "If what I'm thinking is true, then that means...Callie's there..."
"Yeah...and if what I'm thinking is also true...it also means Callie's there with...him..."
Marie then growled and crumpled the paper. "I swear, if he hurt her in any way, he's gonna be sorry!"
I nodded.
"Well, I guess that settles that," I said. "Time to go to Octo Canyon."
With this situation seemingly getting worse by the minute, we began our journey to the canyon hoping and praying to the Great Zapfish that Callie was safe and sound.
But before we actually went out, we decided that we'll need a solid plan first...
AN: Well, this is looking really bad...but it'll all work out (probably). Anyway, hope all of you enjoyed this chapter, and I'll see you in the next one!