Suuuurprise! It's me! I have updated and no, it's not an author's note explaining that I've lost interest in this story and never wanted to continue it! Quite the opposite in fact! I'll explain more at the bottom, but for now I just wanted to say one thing.

I have updated this story thoroughly and many things are different. That's why I encourage you all to go back and reread everything, but if you don't want to then that's perfectly fine! (You just might be a little lost and confused on some things haha)

Have fun reading!

I furrowed my brow and squinted my eyes open as the sun's harmful rays burned into my retinas. A yawn slipped from my mouth and I proceeded to sit up and contemplate why my body wouldn't let me sleep forever. Then again, my expectations shouldn't be so high since when I was five I wished to be a pterodactyl and it betrayed me back then too.

I looked to my left and found Tenta still there and still dead to the world. His entire body was sprawled out across the bed and his side of the blankets were tangled all around his legs. It was an honest miracle that I didn't feel any of his kicking during the night, knowing he must've done something to get the blankets in as big of a mess as this.

I stared at him for a moment, taking my time to draw in the details since I never really sat down and studied him before. Light peeking in from the blinds laid across his face and onto his closed eyes, but that didn't seem to deter his sleeping ability at all. His cheeks were dusted lightly with pink, upping his cuteness score by at least ten percent and therefore increasing his ability to beg for food at the dinner table. His mouth was open ever so slightly, with gentle snores escaping it from time to time as his slumber continued on.

Looking at the top of his head, I immediately noticed the scattered scarring on his forehead. A large, single scar sat on the left side, slanted ever so slightly, while smaller and less noticeable scars decorated his face all around, undetectable to the naked eye unless you looked carefully.

Speaking of scars…

Tenta's made a point before on how he didn't like it when I (or people in general) looked at his more recent scars, but curiosity made me want to at least take a smaaaaall peek, just to see what they looked like.

I never realized this, but the scars among his wrists had left intents into his skin, which gave me the deep desire to run my fingers over the scarring to test how they felt. I had started doing that, but a odd snort coming from Tenta that made me nearly shit myself ultimately gave me the decision not to.

The indents were all different, some were much deeper than others into the skin. Yet, they were all connected, almost like a river. If you poured a liquid onto the scarring, it could very possibly run through the indentions as if they were channels in a stream.

...What the fuck happened to him?

Shaking my head and sighing, I tugged the covers off of me and hopped off the bed, stumbling slightly due to forgetting that I had differently proportioned legs than before. Tenta remained as dead to the world as ever, changing positions subconsciously to get the light out of his eyes.

After a small trip through the hallway and stubbing my toe in the doorway to Tenta's room and turning into a mute sailor for a couple of minutes, I stepped into the room and opened the drawers, pulling out a black t-shirt with a cute little cartoon cat on it, some black shorts, blue socks, and a pair of underwear. Looking inside the shirt drawer I could see a lot of cat shirts, which seemed a little off at first until I remembered Tenta's large fascination with Salt. The kitten would always walk and tangle herself in his legs when we would be sitting on the couch and chatting. It was kinda cute, especially considering that while Salt loves all of us and is a very affectionate kitten, the attachment that she has with Tenta is one of a kind. It's also kinda funny, considering we raised her for a longer time than Tenta has even been here.

I smiled warmly as I shuffled to the bathroom, remembering the small moment when Tenta was lying face down on the floor and Salt kept using her tiny paw to gently tap him until he got up. I'm certain the other inkling was in love with her and would've definitely taken her home with him if he could. And we'd let him, but Salt and Pepper were best buds and I highly doubted that Inkopolis sold cat food in the stores publicly given Judd's the only cat.

Shutting the bathroom door and locking it, I stared into the mirror that was just a foot or two away from me. I was short, that was the most obvious thing by far. Apparently I was less than five feet tall now and... I didn't really know what to feel about that. I was now shorter and much more adorable than my little sister, and she'd always insisted that she's the cutest one in the whole family since she was eight, including our cousins, aunts, uncles, grandmothers, and all those other people I can never remember the names of.

A normal teenage boy would say that's a tragedy, being the 'cutest' one in the family and looking like a child made of jelly, but they just don't know the perks. For one, people were now my slaves and I could make them do my bidding with naught but a small lip tremble and teary eyes. I've been able to convince Alyssa and Terrell to give me so much of their food, I'd leave the dinner table feeling overstuffed and they'd leave it with two bites in their stomachs.

And two, I haven't experienced it myself, but Tenta explained to me some days ago that inklings were basically the lightest, fastest, and strongest species in his world, which over time made them the most populated sea creature on land. I had scoffed and told him that my limbs were weaker than a spider web and he proceeded to crush a watermelon in front of me and my siblings.

No, seriously. He insisted that he could crush a watermelon and he did. Turns out that the ink inside of inklings has a lot more abilities than just shapeshifting, which is what allowed him to crush it. The worst part about it was that Tenta was out of shape, and he crushed it with complete ease. Makes me terrified and excited, thinking about what I could do.

I glanced back at the shower behind me.

…Ugh.

Inklings are terrified of water, however, despite how badass they may seem. Showering is a huge pain in the ass because of it. I know what you fuckers are thinking. What? Aren't you not afraid of water since you lived your life taking baths and showers?

Ha.

no.

It's hard to explain, but from what I've managed to get Tenta to explain in one of our random conversations, inklings have this problem with... instinct, I think. Water used to be their habitat, but since they evolved to be land-dwellers they no longer needed to have gills and the like.

Along with that went their natural comfort for the ocean, apparently, which is stupid. From what Tenta's told me, inklings in their "last stage of growing up 'n shit" gain the ability to swim but often end up drowning anyway since nobody actually knows how to correctly move their limbs in water and for some reason water feels really goddamn awful on your tentacles. It was the feeling as if Death himself was in a liquid form and had no actual power to kill you. You'd feel the dread, but nothing could actually happen to you. Kinda ironic and sad at the same time.

I inhaled really slowly, then exhaled really slowly. I peered back at the shower, dread building up in my stomach. Lunging forward, I quickly turned the shower knobs to turn on the water and dumped my pajamas on the ground after ditching them. This is what happens when you shower in the morning rather than the evening. I could've done it last night and gotten it over with but noooo. I mean, Tenta had to use it to clean up so he took up all the hot water anyway. That's my terrible excuse.

I first put my leg in like a wuss, backed out of it like a wuss because it was too cold, adjusted the temperature like a wuss, then shoved myself into the shower and with all my will I forced myself to stay under there so I could be clean like a wuss. You could say I was being overdramatic about this, but every inkling reacted to water like this (definitely including Tenta), so fuck off.

After timing myself to spend a solid five minutes in the shower, I hastily jumped out and shook the water off of me. Literally. I had to clean the mirror off since water droplets got all over it. Inkling skin is loose like dogs for some reason.

I dried myself and put Tenta's clothes on, every item a little too big for me but still an okay fit. I looked into the mirror and while my vision was slightly fuzzy due to my glasses being unuseable, I saw a falsely innocent looking inkling staring right back at me. Golden eyes -not yellow- but golden stared right at me as I looked at my reflection.

.

..

...

God I looked like a dork.

I then opened my mouth into a big grin, showing my beak. The odd thing was that the beak wasn't teeth, it was one solid thing that had two 'fangs' and a tooth right in the middle on the bottom. Beaks needed care just like teeth, so I just did what I normally did and brushed it. Brushing one solid row of teeth with no gaps or dips or anything felt incredibly weird and odd, but that was just one of the many downsides to turning into an inkling and definitely not the worst.

Fiddling with my hair tie, I tied up two of my main tentacles in a loose little ponytail on the back of my head and let the third main one hang by the side like before. I was growing attached to this style, and when the second Splatoon game comes out you bet your ass I'm using it.

Glancing back in the mirror, a little smile was present on my face with my cheeks being slightly tinted purple. Turns out that since inklings are so ink based (and unstable?), their ink actually bleeds into everything. Their tears, their sweat, and their goddamn blood, which is the reason why my cheeks weren't blue instead. Or would they be red? Who knows.

I noticed my ears had perked up in comparison to when Tenta and I had compared our appearances, and I even saw and felt my left ear twitch as some stupid fucking mosquito that snuck into our house flew around it. I ignored the bug and stared at my face a little more, taking in all the changes and coming to a thrilling conclusion.

I was fucking adorable.

Shortly after coming to terms with my appearance, I angrily swatted at the mosquito for a couple minutes before finally managing to smash it against the sink. That's what you get, you little tiny asshole piece of shiiiIT BIT ME TWICE YOU MOTHER FUCKING PIECE OF SH-

Humming a small tune after that mini mental meltdown, I put my dirty clothes in the hamper and stepped out the bathroom, feeling refreshed and rather happy. I cautiously made my way down the stairs (I only fell THRICE) and started hunting for Salt. I had a mission and I needed her to carry it out properly.

I was hunting around in the living room when I heard the landline start ringing. That's right, we had a landline. We didn't really use it much, but it was there just in case someone's home alone and they weren't at their phone at the given time. After a moment, I remembered that my phone was dead and has been dead for at least two days since I'd forgotten to charge it. I blamed global warming.

After stumbli-walking into the kitchen to find the phone that was usually on the counter, I picked it up off the...thing and held it to my ear. After a moment of awkward fiddling I remembered that my ear was pointed outwards and couldn't really have a phone pressed up against it like normal, so I instead put the phone on speaker.

"Hey! I put your ice cream in the fridge, and Alyssa and I are out getting donuts and I just wanted to check up on you since you're usually awake at this hour. We would've woken you but you and Tenta were both extremely out of it and wouldn't get up."

I heard Alyssa chattering in the background.

"...Alyssa wanted to say that you snore like a pig."

I sighed.

"Tell her I said thanks for the input."

More chattering.

"...Apparently you -quoted directly from Alyssa-, 'Sounded like the devil trying to recite a satanic spell while recovering from recent throat surgery, was drowning, and had rocks in his esophagus' when she tried to shake you awake."

"Tell her that her similes would win her an award at a poetry contest."

I snickered as I heard my brother laugh on the other end with Alyssa yelling in the background.

"But yeah, I just wanted to check up on you and Tenta since you both are home alone while we're out getting food. How is Tenta, by the way?"

I laughed as I recalled the image of Tenta sprawled out across the bed with the blankets tangled in between his limbs, "He's still sleeping, but his mood's been better since last night."

I then rocked on my feet a bit as a wide and eager grin spread on my face, "Are you guys gonna pick two donuts for us?"

Terrell sighed on the other end, an unsure tone to his voice, "I don't know, I already got you two ice cream that's in the fridge. I'll think about it, okay?"

Inside my mind I was groaning and whining like mad, but on the outside I simply stated, "Okay."

You know how when adults say 'they'll think about it' for something you want, they usually always go with a yes and you usually end up with the thing you want? Not my brother. When he thinks about it, he really thinks about it. Even if he seems to be leaning towards a hard yes, there's been times when he'd eventually decide that no, he will Not get me the thing I want. I hate it. I hate it a lot.

"Glad to know Tenta's doing fine, though. Anyway, we're almost there so I'll have to hang up since I don't want to be that guy. I'll see you at home soon, Will. Bye!"

"Byeee." I sang quietly, hanging up the phone and putting it back on its...thing. Stand? Is it a stand? That thing that the mobile landline phones sit on to charge. That...thing. What is that?

After hanging up, I reminded myself of the mission that was accidentally put on pause. If I were a nosy little kitten who likes to get herself into trouble and needs help getting out most of the time, where would I be…?

This is a multiple choice question. A for backyard, B for bathroom, C for my bedroom, and D….

Wedged behind the fridge.

Right on cue, I heard a soft and pitiful mew come from behind the fridge. I rolled my eyes and walked to the appliance, peeking around it and- yep, there she was.

Her sharp blue eyes glanced up at me and I could see her start to wiggle, motivated by my dashing appearance no doubt. After a moment of no movement, she stopped and gave another sad meow, begging me to help release her from the grip of the vile electronic beast.

"This is the twelfth goddamn time, you stupid little snowball…" I muttered under my breath as I pushed the fridge away from the wall to free her. It took a bit of work with my noodle limbs, but after a couple of short decades she was freed, though she didn't bother to wait and instead scurried out of the kitchen to who knows where.

I looked in the direction she ran off in disbelief, before loudly calling out-

"Y'know, a 'Thank You!' would've been nice to say!"

Naturally, I got no reply.

Muttering bitterly, I walked out the kitchen and spotted Pepper playfully pawing at Salt, tail wagging like mad. The kitten herself was on her back and 'attacking' Pepper right back, paws up and showing off her little bean...things. I'm great with words, did you know?

Reluctantly interrupting their playtime, I walked up to the two of them and picked up Salt, cradling her in my arms. Pepper barked and jogged around me for a second or two, then whined and sat down on the carpet floor, staring up at me with those sad, dark brown eyes of hers.

"Hush, I'm doing important business here." I murmured, carefully maneuvering Salt in my arms so I'd have one arm free to affectionately scratch Pepper behind her ear.

I looked down at the cat in my arms, who looked back up at me, pink nose twitching ever so slightly, "We're gonna go up to my room and we're gonna do something important. Got it? The fate of the world's counting on you."

Don't ask why I'm talking to my cat. It's a cat owner thing.

I slowly went up the stairs, Salt sitting patiently in my arms and Pepper following closely behind, occasionally making those weird dog noises dogs do. No barks, no growls, just...dog noises. You'd understand if you had a dog. If you don't understand, then you don't have a dog. You have an impersonator.

Stopping in front of my room, I looked down at Salt, who looked back up at me with her crystal blue eyes, "I hope you understand this, but you're on a mission. An emotional mission. You've done great with the three of us in the past, but I want you to work with Tenta here. He's been with us for a while and has taken a liking to you and I want you to use that to your advantage. Go in there, win his heart, and be the the most affectionate kitten you can be. Can you do that?"

Salt mewed. I smiled and scratched under her chin before putting her down on the ground to let her accomplish her mission. She was like a spy, a spy kitten. Meowing and kicking ass or something. Sounds like something out of a kid's show.

She instantly dashed into my room and sniffed around while walking to my bed, Pepper following her inside and wagging her tail as she laid down on the floor and stared up at her. After a bit of preparation, Salt hopped up onto the bed and sniffed around some more before slowly stepping to Tenta. From there, she carefully stepped over any odd humps in the blanket and over Tenta's legs, eventually hopping onto Tenta's chest and staring him down.

After a moment's pause, she meowed and meowed over and over and began to start pawing at Tenta's face. It took a couple of gentle pats on Tenta's cheek, but eventually the other inkling began to rouse with a couple of sleepy murmurs about cheese.

Once his eyes were open, Salt started to rub her cheek against his face to welcome him back to the land of the living, meowing happily. Tenta gave her a blank, half-lidded stare as he slowly became aware of his surroundings after being dead to the world for so long.

The moment Tenta fully woke up, the light returned back into his eyes as a warm smile spread on his face. He immediately sat up, starting to eagerly stroke Salt across her back and scratching between her ears. After a minute or two of that, he gently took her into his arms and started whispering cheesy, loving things to her. Then, he straight up buried his face into her fur while laughing at a dumb joke he said to himself. The epitome of cat owners right here, folks.

After a moment, he paused and looked up, before turning his head and his eyes landed straight onto me, "...Will-ee?"

Back with that stupid nickname, I see. I flinched when he acknowledged me and stepped into the doorway. How did he even know I was there?

"How the hell did you know I was here?" I asked.

"...Inklings got spidey sense." Tenta muttered with a grin.

I squinted at him as I moved to climb onto the bed beside him, "How do you know who Spiderman is? And why does he have a word in your language?"

He started snickering, "School."

"...School."

"School."

"...Why school?"

His snickering turned into laughter, which made him struggle to continue talking, "H-H-History Class."

Ohhhh nooooo.

Despite what I just learned and how stupid it was, I felt a grin form on my face, "You learned about Spiderman in history class?! You're not serious."

"We learn about the Ancients in a part of history class and- and the biggest theory about him is... h-he was a God of the Ancients, capable of...of using spiders to his advantage and would 'sense' the 'sinners' that w-were committing crimes 'n shit, so he'd...he'd shoot spiders out of his fingers and gross out the criminals into submission."

My stomach was hurting from how hard I was laughing.

"That's...that's not even close!" I wheezed, wiping stray tears leaking from my eyes.

Oh, but he wasn't done, "Then they said this dude that was made…" he had to pause from how much he was laughing, "Th-they said that this dude...made of BATS-"

I started crying, the laughter was getting too hard. My stomach was dying, my cheeks felt hot as shit, and I was practically not breathing at this point. I was laughing so hard, in fact, that I forgot that I was the one closest to the edge of the bed and proceeded to fall right off of it.

There was a moment of silence, the impact having shocked me out of my laughing fit. Pepper jumped up from the floor and rushed over to me, sniffing me and making sure I was alright. Then she licked my face.

…

And then we started giggling again. We are mature, masculine, manly men, I tell you.

Tenta peeked over the edge, Salt still in his arms, "You okay, Will-ee?"

I picked myself up off the floor and climbed back onto the bed after giving Pepper a thank you pet, "Yeah, what's with you and that nickname for me, anyway? It's weird."

"Will-ee?" He asked.

I nodded, "Yeah, that one. You know my name's William, right?"

Tenta pressed his mouth into a thin line, before hesitantly saying, "W-Willlll...eeee-um?"

"Almost."

"Will...am?"

"Nope."

"Will-eeehm."

"Nah."

"...e-eh," I could see that Tenta was struggling a little more than he expected, "Will...eeyum."

"It's three syllables, Tenta."

"I'm trying, okay?" He whined, sounding genuinely frustrated. "We don't have words like that in our language, so I'm not used to making those sounds!"

"It's three syllables."

"Will...Wi...We.," Tenta stuttered, "...Well-ee-am."

"Okay, you can just stick to what you first called me. We should work on that." I murmured as I reached down to the floor and tried to pick up my laptop. That didn't go well, as I ended up losing balance and falling face-first onto the ground, startling Pepper yet again. Not a fun experience.

Bitterly picking up my laptop and plopping it onto my bed, I again strained to climb back onto the mattress, letting out a heavy sigh as I finally managed to get back on top. Opening it up, I could see that I had a couple messages along with some alerts from various social media websites.

Suddenly, an ultra brilliant idea came to mind.

Making sure Tenta wasn't looking, I did a quick google search that I knew would help.

"Tenta." I said simply when I was done, poking the other inkling in the side. He was zoned out, too busy petting Salt to acknowledge the world around him.

"Tenta." Poke.

"Tenta." Poke.

"Tenta." Poke.

"Tenta." Poke.

"Tenta." Poke.

"Tenta." Poke.

"Te-"

He snorted as he snapped out of his thoughts, "Wuh-Huh?"

"Welcome back to the land of the living!" I cheerfully stated, clapping my hands in a sarcastic manner.

"What do you want?" He asked with a sleepy smile, burying one of his cheeks in Salt's fur yet again.

I pointed at my laptop while staring him in the eye, wanting to see what his reaction would be.

He rolled his eyes and looked at the screen, then paused. I saw his eyes go wide and he gasped, sitting up while his pupils dilated the longer he stared.

"There's more?!"

Cats.

I googled cats.

The cutest cats.

After all, if one cat could turn him into a mushy mess, maybe a google search of them would turn him straight into a puddle.

It did.

There was around thirty minutes of us looking at various cat pictures, Tenta enthusiastically pointing to as many as he could and asking what breed they were. Me, a giant people pleaser, decided to try and look them all up on their info. Within that half hour I learned so much about cats that I could qualify as a cat expert and potentially a cat whisperer, though that was more of Tenta's thing.

Then, another brilliant idea came to mind.

Three words.

Too. Motherfucking. Cute.

Two words if you remove the swearing.

I knew that I was gonna have to play translator since the show was in English, but despite that I put on the show after going to Animal Planet's website. Though, I didn't get the exact results I was expecting.

Sure, I managed to get Tenta in an extremely good mood. What I was NOT expecting, was for him to turn into an absolute crying mess.

No joke, he was bawling.

Specifically, bawling extremely hard as he clutched Salt into his arms, crying even harder when he noticed that Salt was rubbing her small head against his cheek. I snuck a pic when they weren't paying attention, which I was totally gonna use for blackmail and not to look at later when I wanted to see something to smile at.

In the first minutes of the Too Cute episode, when they were showing the newborn kittens, he was constantly sobbing, "Th-Th-They're s-so tiny! Why are th-they so tinyyy?"

He was also constantly saying, "I wanna kiss them and hold them…" and "Ohhh look at them play around and flop everywhere!" and my favorite, "I really just...I r-really just wanna play with one for the rest of my life. I don't n-need anything anymore except a baby kitten. I wanna be a kitten. Kittens are so small and cute and I love them so much."

There was a knock on my door and suddenly Terrell popped in. Oh, they're home.

He looked like he was about to say something, then saw us watching Too Cute on my laptop, then saw Tenta still crying over the kittens, then saw Salt and Pepper right down at his feet, happily welcoming him to my room (though it was more like getting dog and cat hair all over his pants). In his hands were two cups of ice cream. Oh right, I forgot to get those.

We all stared at each other for a minute. Then a minute and thirty seconds.

"Everything alright?" Terrell eventually spoke up, walking into the room and handing us our ice cream.

I waved him off, "We're good, I was just showing Tenta some cats and he…," I looked back at Tenta for a moment and he stared right back at me, still sniveling, "...he got emotional. Inklings, amiright?"

Terrell chuckled, "You're an inkling, so you're implying that you're emotional as well."

I scoffed, "I'm not as bad as Alyssa during mother nature week."

Terrell grinned and shook his head, "That's different. Alyssa gets violent, not emotional. She turns into quite a beast when M.N. attacks."

"She gets into more fights in an M.N. week than all the guys at our school in a year."

Terrell shivered, "I've never seen so many detention slips in one place. It's a miracle she's never been threatened to get expelled. I should look into getting her some birth control."

I closed my hands over my ears, "I don't need to know Alyssa's medical life!"

My older brother rolled his eyes as he handed me the cups of ice cream, "Knowing the biology of yourself and the other sex is important, Will. Knowing that information can improve relationships with people you meet in the future."

"How about I watch baby kittens grow up with Tenta as we eat this ice cream instead? Sex ed's for people who have the ability to retain useful information."

Terrell shrugged his shoulders as he turned to walk out the door, Salt and Pepper following in his footsteps, "Knock yourself out."

I handed the ice cream to the still sniffling Tenta, and quickly got to work on devouring it. Ah, yes. Cake batter. The superior flavor against all others.

Looking over, I saw Tenta shoveling his mint ice cream into his mouth as he continued watching the episode. It was funny to see him so invested in watching the cats grow up, I could tell that he was trying to memorize different cat behaviors based on what he saw and what I would translate.

After the episode ended, Tenta wiped the remaining tears off his face and took my laptop into his hands, "Where's the next one?"

I snatched it out of his lap and shut it, earning a small whine from him, "Let's take a break from Too Cute for a second. I wanna show you something."

"Nooooooo." He whined in a childlike voice, pitifully reaching out for the laptop in my hands, "We only saw one episoooooode…"

I hopped off the bed and plugged my laptop in to charge it, "I really wanna show you something first. It's something important, okay?"

Tenta huffed, scooping a bunch of ice cream into his mouth and leaving the remaining in the cup on the bed before taking Salt into his arms and leaping off the bed himself, albeit with less enthusiasm.

Stepping my way to the door, I gestured for Tenta to follow me and walked out into the hall. I've been keeping this from him long enough, plus the idea of him screaming over seeing his home, even if it's just on a screen, would be a pretty funny and heartwarming sight to see.

We went down the stairs, Tenta having to let go of Salt so he could hold my hand and keep me steady as we went down each step. It was an embarrassing progress, but I could tell that I was getting more and more used to my new body, since I actually needed much less help than when I first turned into an inkling.

Once we entered the living room, I instructed Tenta to sit on the couch and wait while I went to Terrell's room.

I opened the door and spotted my older brother sitting on his bed with his laptop in front of him, typing away. He looked up at me, then tilted his head to look behind me.

"Tenta's in the living room." I answered his silent question, "Where's the stuff? I wanna get this whole 'telling a person they're from a video game' thing over with."

Terrell pointed a finger at the ground and didn't turn his gaze from his laptop, "There's a container under the bed with everything in it. It honestly surprised me when you guys didn't appear to notice it last night. Knock yourself out, but don't overwhelm him."

"Overwhelming people is what I'm good at." I grinned as I dragged the container from under the bed. It took a surprising bit of effort to tug it, my noodle limbs had very little strength and it sucked ass.

"I thought you were good at sleeping?" He smirked as a noise played on his laptop. Fucking Candy Crush.

I rolled my eyes as I left the room, struggling to drag the container the entire time, "I can be good at more than one thing."

Once I finished tugging the container out into the living room, I stood up and let out a hefty sigh, proud of my effort. I then turned to Te-

He's gone. Amazing.

I heard quick thumping coming from the stairs, and turned to see Tenta coming down them as fast as he could, a spoon in his mouth and the cup of ice cream he had earlier in his hand. Behind him was Salt, following him for whatever reason she had.

"I forgot my ice cream! I've never tried mint before, but it's reaaaaally good, almost as good as algae." He chirped as he reached the bottom of the staircase, taking another bite of the ice cream in his mouth.

I stared at the cup in his hand, "I've never had mint before either, actually, just cake batter and vanilla."

Tenta gave a short hum, scooping some of the ice cream into the spoon and holding it out to me, "Try it."

Without a second thought, I took the spoon in Tenta's hands and put the ice cream into my mouth. I let the ice cream and chocolate chips glide over my tongue to truly take in the flavor as I eventually came to a decision.

Mint ice cream tastes like shit.

I stuck out my tongue and made a face to show my distaste, and I quickly saw Tenta's face go from excited to offended.

"Why are you making that face? Mint ice cream is the shit!" He complained, taking the spoon from my hand and grumpily shoveling more of the shitty ice cream into his mouth.

I did my best to stomach the gross ice cream and pointed to the couch, "Siiiit."

"Stupid shortstack saying that 'mint ice cream tastes like shit', mint ice cream is the shit you bastard…" Tenta muttered in an angry tone, sitting on the couch with Salt curling up next to him.

As I stared down at the container on the floor, I changed my mind, "Wait, stand back up and come over here. I think you should experience this firsthand."

Tenta let out a loud groan.

"Just get over here!" I insisted.

After a couple rounds of bickering back and forth, Tenta eventually got back up and stood next to me in front of the container, after putting his ice cream on the coffee table of course.

"What is it?" He asked curiously, staring down at the container with wide eyes.

I shuffled my feet, growing a little apprehensive as I knew that things could change dramatically once the container was opened, "It's...a thing that I want to show you. You have to promise you won't freak out or think anything differently of me or my family, okay?"

"Uh…" Tenta started looking unsure, giving me an odd look, "...Okay? I won't freak out."

I looked down at the container, then back up at Tenta, square in the eyes, "...Swear on it?"

Tenta never stopped giving me that strange look, but gave me a thumbs up and a confident grin despite being a little weirded out, "I swear."

I smiled, knowing that he was being genuine. I gave him a thumbs up back, "Thanks, Tenta."

Taking a deep breath in and exhaling softly to calm my nerves, I bent down and pulled the lid off of the container, slowly sliding it off and revealing the contents.

Splatoon merchandise.

A silence filled the room as we both stared down at the assortment of items, taking in all the different colors and shapes. Reaching down, I pulled up an amiibo with Marie's plastic figure placed on top of the platform, green ink splashing behind her. Her hands were in the classic 'Stay Fresh!' pose and her mouth was open as if she were singing. Her average length grey tentacles were tied into a bow behind her head with dark green tips. Her dress sparkled with glitter inside the plastic and her eyes were colored a sharp gold.

I handed the amiibo to Tenta, who wordlessly took it into his hands. He studied the figure and twirled it around in his fingers, but otherwise said nothing.

Bending down yet again, I picked up another amiibo. This time it was Callie, who was all pink instead of green, like Marie. Her pose copied Marie's but was mirrored, and her mouth was in a wide, open smile as if she were singing as well. Glitter was scattered all across her outfit, which was alike to Marie's but ended in some sort of poofy shorts rather than a dress. Her eyes, while one was winking, the other was colored the same shade of gold.

After a time of staring at the two amiibos, I eventually spoke up.

"...Marie's my favorite." I stated quietly, handing Tenta the Callie amiibo.

The other inkling didn't say a word as he held the two amiibos in his hands, his green eyes flickering between the two as he took in their features.

Then, without a word, he placed the two amiibos on the ground (upright I must add) and reached back into the container. Feeling around for different things, Tenta eventually pulled out a blue box with a plastic covering on the front and back. It was the Splatoon game box.

Tenta stared at the cover of the box, taking in the appearance of the two inklings on the cover and the others in the background. Then he flipped the box over, looking at the back and all the little descriptions and pictures.

He then opened the box, the game disk appearing and spinning ever so slightly, sitting in its slot with the image of a purple background and little green squids lined up in a pattern on top.

There were no words, no talking. I was going a little crazy and I was worried about what would happen next. Would that black hole appear despite all odds? I sure hope not, I paid for the amiibos myself and to have them sucked up would be a waste.

"Both Squid Sisters are good." Tenta plainly stated, closing the game box and turning to me.

"So...A video game, huh?" He asked, that same, goofy smile that he always had reappearing on his face. "A video game starring inklings? That's kinda rad."

I studied his face to see if there was a sense of fear or stress or anything else that hinted that he was uncomfortable. But...there was nothing. Tenta was 100% on board with this.

"You're not upset? Or...scared? Or feeling like you're going to spontaneously combust?"

Tenta shook his head, "No. No. Annnd that ice cream might be messing with my stomach a little so I'll go with a soft maybe on that last one."

I gave him a funny look and bursted out laughing, "You're not lactose intolerant, are you?"

"I said a soft maybe, ice cream fucks up my stomach sometimes!"

"That is pretty much the exact number one symptom of lactose intolerance, man."

Tenta pointed at the Splatoon copy in his hand, "SO HOW ABOUT THIS VIDEO GAME, HUH? OH YEAH REAL SHINER!"

"Tenta, you should really get diagnosed by a doct-"

"SO WHAT'S THE PLOT? THE GAMEPLAY? ARE THERE WALKTHROUGHS? HOW ABOUT THE CHARACTERS?"

"Um…" I hesitated as I tried to remember the different parts of the game, "Multiplayer is turf wars, ranked battles, and private battles. Single player is when you collect Zapfish and defeat Octavio and-"

"Whoaaaa." Tenta interrupted with wide eyes, "Defeat Octavio?"

"Yeah! We play as this girl named Agent 3 and-" I was fucking with him at this point.

"I'm not a girl!" He shrieked, hitting me over the head with the Splatoon box in a joking fit of anger.

I started laughing yet again despite the light pain in my head, "I'm fucking with you! I know you're not a girl. The Agent 3 that everyone in this world knows is a girl though, since Splatoon was originally going to be an all-girls game."

Tenta narrowed his eyes as he looked back at the Splatoon box, "Then how come I'm not a girl?"

I shrugged, "I dunno, you're just like that. You are my Agent 3, after all."

Tenta started coughing and sputtering, getting his saliva all over the carpet. I had to reach over and pat his back a couple of times to help him stop choking on his own spit. It took almost a minute for Tenta to get himself back together, but when he did, he looked surprised as hell.

"What?!" He whipped around to ask me, nothing but disbelief in his voice.

I gave him a blank stare, "You're...You're my Agent 3. From this game. I created you with random customization and now...you're here."

Tenta sat in stunned silence.

"...No fucking way." He whispered to himself, a smile spreading across his face. "That's fucking rad!"

It is?

"It is?"

"Yeah!" He yelled enthusiastically, "You're like, my creator! My God! Or would you be like, my alternate mom? I already have a mom but you can be my second mom! Or maybe my very own dad? I'm not su-"

It was off-putting and yet kinda funny, seeing Tenta being so excited over something I thought would destroy the world seven times over. His eyes were practically sparkling as he looked at the disk inside of the game case, as well as when he was looking at the two amiibos I had shown him.

As he was rambling on about me being some sort of god to him, I stared down at the amiibos on the floor. While they weren't sentient or anything, I got a sudden urge to put them to use and show Tenta what they did. Tenta mentioned before about being homesick, so maybe if I…

"Hey, Tenta." I said suddenly to catch his attention. He snapped his mouth shut and watched as I picked up the amiibos off the floor and walked up to the Wii-U next to the television. From there I turned on the console and turned back to him, waving the two amiibos teasingly.

"Wanna see these two figurines in action?"

"They can do stuff?!" Tenta gasped, genuinely looking as though he were about to spontaneously combust, except out of happiness instead of some universe imploding thing or worse...lactose intolerance stomach problems.

After the Wii-U loaded and I selected my profile out of a choice between me and my sister's, I selected Splatoon after inserting the disk into the slot and watched it load. The sound of drums filled the room and we both began absentmindedly tapping our fingers to the beat. Inklings have some odd inner love for music and it was the most weirdest thing to experience for yourself. It was almost as if the music was controlling me, it was too hard to ignore and not try and dance to.

Tenta had pointed at the screen, eagerness clear in his voice, "That looks like my room!"

I glanced over it, then looked back at him with an unimpressed look, "Your room is as bland as a cracker, Tenta."

He made a face, "The landlord isn't a fan of letting us paint our rooms, okay? That's why I try to get a buncha posters and put them up everywhere. Plus, our apartments are much bigger than that. We get a small living room, a kitchen, a bathroom, and a bedroom. It's usually a one person apartment but siblings or friends can bunk to save cash."

"Huh," I hummed, "That's neat."

After pressing the ZL and ZR buttons on the gamepad, we were brought up to the screen which the Squid Sisters broadcasted from regularly. Right on cue, their opening chime played through the speakers of the tv, which resulted in Tenta bouncing in his seat excitedly.

Even though the cousins opened up with their opening lines that everyone knows and loves, the rest of the newscast was pure disappointment. The first lines were actually the same words as the text on the screen, but everything after that was literally jumbled up voice clips. Glad to know that there's nothing that changed into something magical in this video game, even after me magically turning into an inkling.

Tenta seemed a little disappointed by their voice clips being nothing but jumbled messes and not anything actually discernable, but that disappointment easily got overlapped by the overwhelming happiness of seeing the two idols again after so long, even if they were just characters on a screen.

After leaving the news, we were greeted by the scene of Inkopolis Plaza with the camera pointed down at our inkling. Well, it would be pointed at the inkling. Y'know, if he was there.

I sighed, "...Right."

Tenta gave me a quick glance, "What's wrong?"

"You're supposed to be there, that's why the game's locked like this."

"Ohhhh."

We sat in silence.

...

"...Soooo, what now?"

I groaned and pressed the home button, "We go onto my sister's account and reset the game."

"Sweet."

After going through all of that once more, we opened back up to the plaza and were presented with my sister's inkling. The inkling in question was only level one, and therefore wearing the classic newbie clothing. A white headband, a mustard yellow shirt with some odd writing on it, and cream colored shoes.

I noticed Tenta immediately began to make that same gagging noise as when he was picking out my pajamas.

"No! No no no no no! Get it off! Change her clothes! No!" He shrieked dramatically, covering his eyes with his hands as he writhed around in 'pain' on the couch.

"Stop being dramatic."

He gave me a repulsed look, "I'm not being dramatic, those clothes are actually causing me real pain. My body physically cannot handle the sight of those pieces of rags."

"Were my pajamas causing you pain too?"

"Oh, no. I was on the brink of death with your pajamas. I mean, what kind of self-respecting person would put that on their body? The most moldiest clothes to ever exist, in my opinion."

"God, you are such a fucking mess."

"I'm taking that as a compliment."

Rolling my eyes, I picked up the Marie amiibo and waved it to get Tenta's attention.

"I can make one or both of them sing, if you want."

His ears twitched, the pink inkling looking at me with utmost seriousness. "No fucking way."

"Yeah, yeah." I nodded with a wide grin.

Tenta looked at the tv, seemingly lost in thought, before turning back to me and reaching for the gamepad.

"Can I do it? Teach me how. I want to do it."

Chuckling, I handed over the gamepad and quietly instructed Tenta on how to maneuver the inkling and told him to head towards the amiibo box at the back of the plaza. I then handed him the amiibo and told him to hold it on the corner of the gamepad. He gasped in genuine awe as different colors of confetti swirled around and generated Marie, the girl seeming confused at first for how she appeared in the box but quick to accept it.

"Where's Callie?" Tenta asked, sounding a little fearful. Did he think they could only sing their solos?

I shook my head. "She'll come no matter what song you pick. If you choose Marie's solo, she'll just sit on top of her truck and watch her sing."

"I can choose more than one song?"

"...Yeaaaah?"

Tenta stared at the screen and pressed A a couple of times. Once presented with the choices, he squinted at the screen and then promptly handed the gamepad back to me.

"Choose 'Ink Me Up' for me please, I can't read."

I snorted, "Of course."

He started whining, "Please teach me to read and speak English, it looks like a fun challenge."

You know that inklings are a little more on the intelligent side if learning one of the hardest languages in the world is 'a fun challenge'.

After a bit of squinting by yours truly since my vision of the tv was still Very Blurry, I selected the requested song and watched as the amiibo logo came on screen and the entire scene went black.

Once the scene reloaded, Alyssa's inkling was back in the plaza, outfit almost exactly the same except a Marie themed splatfest shirt was in the place of the mustard yellow one. It was night time, with little brightly colored particles floating from the ground and into the sky. Two large trucks were present, each with their respective Squid Sister present on top, dancing to the song with enthusiasm.

I could see the game's reflection in Tenta's eyes as he watched the screen, his gaze never faltering. His eyes were wide and full of nothing but awe as the song kept playing and the girls kept singing. He slowly stood up, walking around the coffee table and stepping close to the television.

There wasn't much I could say happened next that was good, other than that as he got closer, he slowly reached a hand up and touched the screen. Nothing happened, despite what our hearts desperately hoped for. No magic light, no big bang, no electricity cutting off. Just...Tenta touching the tv screen.

The song repeated.

Once.

Then twice.

A third time.

...

"I miss you guys." A small, choked voice spoke up after such a long time.

Holy shit, that's right. Callie and Marie are Agents 1 and 2, they both personally know Tenta and they must've become good friends behind the scenes. They aren't just idols to him, they're both his closest friends and the people he's grown attached to over the year and a half they've spent together so far.

Eventually, Tenta lowered his hand from the tv. Then, he turned around.

Hot tears ran down his cheeks and he didn't try to hide them, instead letting them fall and soak into the carpet floor. His fists were tightly clenched as he struggled to keep himself from crying too much, and he'd occasionally use his forearm to wipe his eyes.

He took one step toward me. Two. Three. Suddenly, he was right in front of me.

Leaning down, he wrapped his arms around me slowly as he struggled even harder to keep himself from crying. I embraced him back, gently rubbing his back and trying to quietly reassure him that everything was okay.

After a moment, he backed out of the hug and rubbed his eyes once more. Even though the tears kept coming and coming and weren't stopping, he gave me a wide, happy grin without a hint of sadness inside of it.

"Thank you so much, William."

So, a shitload of things happened in this chapter. This one was a bitch to write but I'm honestly a little proud of it!

First things first: I am now sixteen years old, I'm a junior and upcoming senior in high school, and I currently own like 7 switch games and an actual switch console. Lot's of things has happened since this story last updated but I've remained dedicated to trying to keep this story alive by rewriting all of it so it could better fit my standards for good writing. Obviously, it's not PERFECT but I feel a little better about it than before, y'know?

One of my biggest fears in the process of rewriting it has been losing some of the humor you guys have praised me for in the past, as I feel I may have changed and my humor may be a little more dry. I'll rely on you guys' feedback to tell me if things have changed, though, so please leave a review and tell me what you honestly think!

Speaking of reviews, I've read each and every one of the reviews you guys have sent me and I'm honestly kinda flattered? I never really expected you guys to still comment on it even after almost a year of no updates, nevertheless you guys asking me to update it consistently. Because of those reviews, I've done my best to push myself to finish up this chapter as soon as I could so I can bring a nice surprise to your day! On the downside, I don't have a proofreader so there may or may not be some errors here or there hehe...

But really, thank you all so much for sticking with this story despite it taking so long to get something new! This author is still here and still fucking loves splatoon!

If you want to see me outside of fanfiction, I have a multitude of links to other social media sites where I (try to) regularly upload artworks and do commissions.

Instagram, Twitter, Amino: chubbidust

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