At Inkopolis, Edward, Callie, Marie, Cuttlefish, Sally, Jane, Pearl, Marina, Elena, Sheldon, Heather, and Charles all go into Tentakeel Outpost to carefully review what Clay had left. Sheldon left and came back 15 minutes later with more research equipment. Edward sat looking at the sheet of paper, looking the most puzzled of them all.
"I still don't understand why or how Clay did this." Edward says to himself, scratching his head. "This all just doesn't make any-" Edward then notices some glossy text that's revealed to him by the reflection of the sun. The text fills the entire sheet of paper, top to bottom.
"Why did it just show up?" Edward said to himself. "We were outside in the sun for a pretty long time. This isn't some ordinary writing ink, or invisible ink." Edward looks up at where the sun is and soon realizes something. He looks at the paper's glossy writing, which at the top says: The one who is always behind you always leads the way. Edward notices that the shadow at eye level reaches his feet.
"Hey, about how tall is that rock?" Edward asks to Marie.
"Like 60 feet, why?" Marie says. Edward grabs Elena's laptop and starts to type in numbers into the calculator. He then looks at his shadow. Mentally: "I'm 5'10". Few seconds of silence pass until...
"36.31!" Edward yells, making everyone look at him oddly.
"Great, what does that mean?" Marina asks. "Is it something very important?"
"It's the angle measurement of where the sun is." Edward says
"What's so important about it?" Pearl asks. "Is it a secret code or something?"
"It might just be. Hold on." Edward begins to think about those numbers. Mentally: "36.31, come on, think of something that might help... Edward begins to flashback to one thing that Clay had told him.
"The position of the sun had always reminded me of how something bad was."
"Hey Edward, you might want to stop thinking." Marie said. "There's more on the sheet." The sheet read afterwards: Si por alguna razón entiendes esto, para de pensar y usa tu lógica, no la matemáticas.
"Shit. Why'd he have to use fucking Spanish, I barely know any!" Edward said. "And not only that, but there are no translation books in the Institution."
"But didn't you kill every baddie in there?" Callie said. "Surely it's not dangerous anymore."
"That wasn't all of them. Those were the "unimportant". Those who couldn't think or fight as well as the leaders. Besides, the the database has been locked from any sources gaining access to it, so there also goes that." Edward looked to the group. "You wouldn't happen to know about Spanish?"
"We were surprised your kind had one." Elena responded. "To be honest, if anyone was to attempt to translate what it means, it would be you."
"I'll have to try my best." Edward said, reading the sheet very slowly. "If I'm correct, this translates to: Yes for any something something stop thinking and use logic no math. I don't think this is completely correct, but that's the best that we have."
"From what you said, doesn't it just mean to use logic and not math?" Sally said. "So, the thing you were doing with angles, stop doing it. Use "logic" instead of math."
"But what does logic mean here?" Jane asks. "I mean, some logic uses math, so it's a type of logic without math."
"I think what logic means here is to try to locate his GPS he probably placed in himself." Marina said. "He probably knew that whoever was able to read the paper knew Spa-whatever you call it, which only you know."
"But how did he know that I would use math in this?" Edward asks Marina. "Heck, everyone would use logic but...me. Oh! So he left that note since I'm the only one who would immediately use math and to kind of understand Spanish, to tell me to use logic. This means that the rest of the writing is for me." Edward looks at the rest of the hidden writing, which is all in Spanish. "Goddammit Clay, you couldn't have at least told me of a secret Spanish translator or something. Wait, the cracker!" Edward grabs his translator box in his hip and sees a red/orange button hidden at the bottom of the front side. There are small words written above the button reading Double-tap for instant Spanish translation. Edward does as it says and a voice is heard.
To translate Spanish instantly, speak the words out after the three beeps. When finished, press the same button once.
Edward grabs the paper and waits for the three beeps to sound.
Beep-Beep-Beep
Edward begins to speak. "Para usar el localizador, tienes que usar la frequencia que esta escrita al fin de esta hoja, pero primero, necesitas construir un transmitador y recividor. Despues de todo eso, podran encontrar mi position y venir por mi. Asombrosamente, este localizador fue hecho por ninguna razon en el momento perfecto."
Translating...Translating...Finished!
"To use the localizer, you have to use the frequency that is written at the end of this page, but first you will need to construct a transmitter and receiver. After all of that, you can find my position and come for me. Surprisingly, this localizer was made for no reason in the perfect moment."
Translation has been completed.
"Well, looks like we have to build a transmitter/receiver." Edward said. "And the frequency is here on this sheet. But don't worry, this is a simple machine. We'll have it done in no time!"
3 Months Later; Location, Unknown
"The hell? Where am I? Oh, that's right" Said Clay, soon propping out of bed. The monitor next to him was flat-line and still making noise. "Shut up already!" Clay grabs the monitor and breaks the screen, making the sound stop. "Finally." Clay looks around in the room to see Lela on another bed, vast asleep. Clay wonders that if she was asleep, then why hasn't she tried to escape.
"Hmm, maybe she did try to escape." Clay told himself. "She probably got caught and sedated." As if responding, Lela began to slowly open her eyes, noticing Clay out of bed.
"C-Clay? Y-You're alive." Lela weakly said. She began to slowly rise, gaining her strength back after a while. "How are you alive? When I last saw you, you were covered head to toe in blood."
"Why are you asking me? I was unconscious in that time. Who you should really be asking is the ones who operated on me."
"Wait, why would they save you?" Lela asks. "Weren't you like their main enemy or something like that?"
"They need me as I'm the only one who understands Inkling and Octoling biology."
"What about the rest of the Biology department?" Lela asks. "They too should know about their biology."
"They don't. I wrote them in very weird ways that only I can understand. I didn't release the information or make an attempt to give them a "translator", as I had a very strong feeling that the information would be weaponized."
"What are we going to do then? We won't be able to pretend being unconscious and they will do everything possible to get the information out of you. One way or another."
"That's where Edward comes into play. I left him a series of clues that only he will be able to figure out. The instructions tell him the necessary information to localize my GPS that I have in my body." Clay said. "The GPS was honestly a random thing I made that I'm glad I made. It shouldn't take them more than a few days." Lela checks a piece of paper on the table, telling today's date. "It looks like we've been here for 3 months."
"What? Three months? Seriously? Either something happened to them or Edward is just being dumb." Clay said. "The clues gave him more than enough information when solved." Lela turned around to him and raised a brow.
"Clay, how difficult were the clues?"
"Normal difficulty, why?"
"Is that all you did to the information?" Lela asked. "Did you do anything else that could've slowed them down?"
"I made the directions in Spanish, but told them how to translate them. Still, there's no reason why they should-" Quick footsteps are heard in the room. Both Clay and Lela approach the source of the sound, which was behind a hospital-like curtain. Lela quickly pulled it to the left, revealing Dustin behind it.
"AH! NOT ME!" Dustin screamed in fear.
"Dustin, shut the hell up!" Lela said while covering his mouth. "We don't want them to know that we're awake. Speaking of which, how long have you been awake for?"
"Uhh, like five days, why?" Dustin asked.
"Just wanted to know how you weren't captured again." Lela said.
"I just pretended as if they accidentally killed me by leaving a pool of ink in my hospital bed. After that, I just went place-to-place to hide from anyone else. But I wasn't just hiding, I was able to collect information about what the rebels were trying to do."
"Great!" Clay said. "And what did you collect?"
"You see, that's the thing, I did collect the information, well, recordings of the rebels speaking." Dustin said. "The only issue is that I can't understand a single thing of what they were saying, and it didn't even sound like your normal human language."
"Can we hear the recordings? Maybe Lela or I know the language." Dustin then proceeded to pull out an old voice recorder box. Dustin turned the volume knob to its second lowest setting and pressed a red button, which began to play the audio.
Gibberish-like sounds...Inkopolis...Gibberish-like sounds...Inklings...Gibberish-like sounds...Invasion...
After 5 minutes of audio, the recording ended.
"Did you not have more audio?" Clay asked. "That was only five minutes of talking, which sounded more like gibberish to me."
"Yeah, that isn't a human language, or at least one that we know of." Lela said "It sounds like they made up a language to keep things confidential."
"Good thing that I took pictures." Dustin said while pulling out his phone. He then showed them pictures of a map of Inkopolis and lines representing troop movements. Another picture showed an advanced version of a trooper, along with a missile truck. More pictures of possible captains/generals and soldiers were shown. But one picture seemed to frighten both Clay and Lela the most. In that picture, a rough sketch of a thermonuclear weapon is seen, along with a drawing of two mushroom clouds. The mushroom cloud to the left, which was much smaller, had the initials TS. B. The other mushroom cloud, looking about three times bigger, was shown.
"They cannot be serious." Clay said. "We must be misunderstanding the drawing."
"I don't think we were." Lela said. 'And I think the one to the left was suppose to be the Tsar Bomba."
"Why would they make them again?" Clay asked Lela. "We've seen their effects once, and we never want to see them again."
"Well, maybe WE don't, but they do." Lela said. "Besides, the reactor in the Institution kind of helped them think about this."
"Hey, why is this drawing so bad?" Dustin asked. "I mean it's a bomb, but how bad is it?"
"If we're correct, the bomb is three times stronger than the Tsar Bomba, the second strongest bomb ever made, behind whatever the hell was made that blew Antarctica the fuck up." Clay responded to Dustin. "The Tsar Bomba is already overkill enough, and they're making one three times its power? And how will they be able to launch it without killing themselves?"
"That's what we hope that they haven't figured out." Lela said to Clay. "That detail might be holding them back from making it."
"Let's put aside the bomb for now." Clay said. "Our main priority now is to alert everyone in Inkopolis about the invasion, and if at all possible, stop it before it even happens." Suddenly, footsteps are heard, getting closer and closer to the door. The door know begins to turn and the door is slowly opened. Dustin begins to panic and grabs a needle with fluid. He runs to the person entering and pierces it through their neck. The person, a nurse, tries to scream, but Dustin is covering their mouth. The nurse later shuts their eyes and falls unconscious.
"I think you stabbed the nurse with a sedation needle." Lela said. "Well, there's no time to waste, we need to hide the body and go on out."
A/N: If any symbols/signs are missing in Spanish, I apologize in advanced (unless you finished the chapter, which is the most probable thing now.), as many signs kept getting rejected.