So.

This chapter is late. I know, but last week, I looked at it and decided it needed tons more work, so I took more than half of it and completely revamped it.

In other news, I just hit a Thanksgiving break, so I'll probably have another one of these up soonish.

Also my tablet is being weird and it can't highlight things correctly so from now on the author's notes will only have the first and last words bolded.

"...And the prisoners who do not serve in Akash's army are located here," Barry said as he placed his finger on a red dot on the map. "That's correct, sir?"

Octavio nodded.

"Which means the jellies and the rest of them. We don't know what they're doing with them. Pearl, Ms. Ida, you remember this part of the plan? Only you two are heading there. Amy more would easily set off alarms. It's on the surface, but it's concealed with really dense forestry, so you'll have to find a way through. You can use your private helicopters for that like you said. You want a few soldiers to guard them while you're down there?"

This was it, Rose thought. They had to retaliate now. Akash was scheduled to attack in two days at Sharktown, but the exact time was unknown.

They were taking a huge risk to assume that the attack would be similar to the one on Inkopolis, to assume that the Salmonid coolers would be used again, and not any Dualies.

Pearl and Marina were slated to free the rest of Inkopolis's citizens at the same time. Octavio knew through his espionage and said through the voice of Barry that it had to be simultaneous. If only one happened, either hostages would be taken or the attack would be moved somewhere else.

"Now, we can begin to mobilize the troops to the bullet train and get there as quickly as possible."

A sound of drilling and heavy footfalls entered the Plaza from the forest's direction.

"Widow!"

Rose's head shot up. The voice, she'd heard it countless times before.

But it had never been this urgent.

She broke free from the circle, unceremoniously shoving a few to the side, and swung around the tower to reach the metallic stairwell. Once she started up the stairs, she heard the clanks of someone else following behind her, but who, she did not know.

Rose nearly fell off the balcony with the speed she was moving at but managed to stop herself and catch a glimpse of another steel beast.

This one was of a spider, and from what she heard from Sky, this one was called the Widow.

She found Barry and Octavio next to her. Octavio whispered a curse in Ocarian.

"It burrows," said Sky. As the first one up there, she knew the most about it. All of the other three came to the same realization.

The camp was not safe.

"Distract it! Approach from the side! Barry exclaimed. A good plan. Coming from the side would seem to the pilot—if there was one—that they were defending that side. It would also prevent mulch more unnecessary destruction, as the city's outskirts were free of the tallest skyscrapers.

Some of the suburbs, however, were doomed.

If they were trying to get it away from the train station, the west would give the longest path.

She glanced at Sky, who gave her a slight nod.

Marie was already going after the Widow and weaving through the alleys. Her cunning mind also told her that the West was the optimal direction to approach from.

Both Rose and Sky, Dualies in hand, flipped off of the balcony to follow Marie.

"Get down there and the soldiers out!" Barry bellowed during his descent. Octavio followed his fall. "Get your team to prep the train," he said to Marina. "Then get your copter and go. It's a long way from here. The rest of you, lead your divisions to the train station."

Whatever was up there needed no questions. The two without any divisions, namely, Simon and Callie, went to the bunker instead to gather Cap'n Cuttlefish, Sheldon, and the 20 strong tech team, along with whatever creations they may have wrought.

The rest jumped down to the training camp, for they were clearly on a time limit.

Octavio stood outside anxiously. The ladder wouldn't be needed if everyone could just super jump out to him.

Barry would do the same, but after an announcement over the intercom.

Each soldier would take their own weapon and ink tank.

This was a race to the train station.

Marie took aim from the open area of a house's roof. Just a few more seconds, and that thing would be in range.

The transparent shield on the spider's head—at least, that's what she hoped it was—seemed to be one-way. The cockpit was too obscure for anyone outside to see in.

The trigger was released, and a diagonal line of shiny green spun its way out of the barrel. The ink didn't stick, as it did with most any clear material.

Sure enough, the thing stopped with an irritating sound of metallic scraping and turned in her direction.

Then she noticed a problem. Unlike the rest of the so-called "hidden weapons," this one had no glowing orange spots to shoot, and weaving around its eight appendages was too risky. She had to run.

Or swim, either way worked.

Judging by her observations earlier, this thing was fast. Not as speedy as the Eagle, but definitely faster than the one Simon had to pilot in the Lab.

It would be difficult, but she somehow had to avoid it.

Just then, a reticle appeared by her feet. She saw Rose rocketing to the spot and an octopus behind her.

The spider was close, but she wasn't about to abandon her.

Rose landed with her feet on the roof, jumped back a long way, and immediately shot back up again, gracefully spinning and leaving a spiral of ink. Before she could land, the Octoling touched the ground. Except that ground she touched was on the beast and not next to Marie. Marie braced herself for the oncoming torrents of the Skydive Rose was about to perform.

Thunder roared in the distance. A storm, which wasn't even visible half an hour ago, was fast approaching. A helicopter, holding Off the Hook and three guards, whirred away in the direction opposite the storm.

Simon, instructed to overview the training camp's evacuation, chose the view from the tower. However, the Widow was what caught his attention.

Not even its bulk could withstand the sheer power of a Skydive. It didn't topple over; rather, it staggered backward quite a distance and got caught in its own tangle of legs.

He saw Marie and Rose dive off of the roof. There was another one, but he or she was on the Widow itself and not fleeing with them. Whoever it was, they were too far away to identify.

"Hey, is everyone out of the Bunker?" Barry yelled. It was nearly drowned out by the soldiers pouring out of the hatch.

"Y-yeah!" He yelled back. Morgan, Cap'n Cuttlefish, Sheldon, everyone was out and either going to or already in the bullet train. Simon longed to somehow help the three dealing with the Widow. At least Callie was organizing the escape route to keep her busy. All he was doing was watching.

A gust of wind passed around him. The quick bluster was carrying the storm to Inkopolis. To pass the time, which was his only good option, he recounted everything up until now.

Sheldon, he and the weaponry team somehow pumped out enough Hero weapons for everyone. That meant multiple hundreds. Some even had several minor tweaks to suit the combat style of the many who needed it. They also found an easier way to develop Hero Suits and provided one for everyone, including Barry and Octavio.

Training was simple. Not much of note happened other than Marie nearly cutting one of the Charger recruits and sending him to the Slosher floor.

The tech team's ingenuity was scary. When working with the weaponry team, they developed a stationary cannon the size of two Inklings which could shoot twice as far and fast as the completed Rainmaker prototype.

And there were five of them.

The Widow managed to untangle its legs and start towards the fleeing division leaders.

But what was that one figure standing on it doing?

Sky nearly toppled off of the Widow's abdomen when it started to move ahead once more, but kept her balance. As far as she knew, the pilot had no knowledge of her presence on the hull.

Nothing she could use against the beast was on its cepholothorax, so she moved on to the abdomen. This was the larger part of the hull, so there must've been something there.

It stepped over a particularly large house, and she almost fell again. The wind helped her back up. Sky decided to crawl the rest of the way.

On the highest point of the rounded abdomen was a metal tile which stood out among the smooth, polished surface of the rest of the hull. It was screwed in tightly, so there was no prying it off, especially with bare hands.

Instead, she hoped the tile was thin and that it led to the electronics or whatever engineering was inside, for she stood up and stomped her heel into the tile.

Hopefully the high heels she was wearing would help with breaching the steel.

A dent formed in the center after a few tries. It deepened with a few more. It was a thin sheet!

After one more hard drive of her foot, a tiny hole formed in the dent. Alarms blared from inside the abdomen.

Sky was glad she got used to wearing heels like this.

After she fit the tip of the heel into the hole, she heaved her leg so the hole would embiggen. She twisted her foot every now and then to simplify the process.

Once she was satisfied with the progress, she removed her heel from the metal tile. She then pried the hole even wider by tilting her foot in several directions.

The pilot finally noticed the alarms. The Widow stopped and the abdomen lowered to the ground. It flung back up, launching Sky ahead. Her plan, which was to rip out a few wires or the like, was ruined.

Without any panic, she let her feet point to the roof she was hurtling toward.

Her shoes left an imprint on it. Without stopping, she pushed against the roof and allowed the forward momentum to give her a head start ahead of its lethal legs.

Lightning flashed in the distance.

"...thirty-seven, thirty-eight, thirty-nine, forty! Next car!" Callie pointed to her left, where a vacant passenger car laid. The line forming into the full one shifted to the opening to the next.

Another division leader approached her. "I'll take it from here. They need help at the camp."

Giving a short nod as an affirmation, she super jumped and soared through the open air. Landing next to Barry, she noticed that the last of the soldiers were leaving through an alleyway. "What next?" She asked, raising her head.

"Check for any more down there."

Immediately, she jumped down. Barry's office was empty.

The stairwells were vacant.

The nine floors for each weapon class were unoccupied.

On the bottom floor, the extensive bunking area, there were two left.

"I can't... I can't," one said. She was curled up on the floor.

"Did you hear them? We have to go!"

"Hey!" Callie yelled. "It's not safe down here, come on!"

"I can't fight, though," said the one on the floor.

"You don't have to, just get out of here!" Callie tugged on her Hero Suit, forcing her to stand. "Take her," she said to the other. He promptly picked her, who was now a squid, up.

"Come on, this way!"

Rose panted as she kicked down yet another door.

She and Marie agreed to split and sometimes venture into the houses. Making a perfect beeline to the train station would be impossible because the Widow would catch up.

It also seemed to have some sort of heat-seeking technology since Marie was almost skewered when she hid behind a couch for far too long.

As she flipped over a fence and nearly broke a child's playset, she caught a glimpse of the train station's logo between the walls and fauna.

Sky, as she saw, was not on the Widow anymore, for she saw her strategically leaping across rooftops earlier.

Her goal wasn't far, and the Widow was far behind enough for her to reach it before the Widow caught her.

She leaped yet again and broke an unusually high window, luckily avoiding any cuts. Then she had to turn down a hallway and break another one.

As she landed on the ground and passed a short distance, she felt the wind behind her as she put one foot in front of the other in a steady rhythm.

Rose scaled the wire fence separating the train tracks from the suburbs and found herself at the caboose. A raindrop hit her sleeve, and she raised her hood to protect herself from the water.

Sky was close behind. She didn't have to climb the fence and instead cleared the whole thing from a rooftop.

"What are you doing?" Sky said. "Get in!"

Rose held up a finger to signal her to wait, and, as if on cue, a reticle appeared around her feet. Marie landed in it.

The bullet train began to move,

The rain was becoming horrifyingly strong, and the three barely managed to catch the open door where Callie was with Simon, Morgan, Cap'n Cuttlefish, Sheldon, and five cannons on wheels using most of the space.

Rose allowed herself to release the tension and sit in one of the available seats.

The storm overhead roared, and the sound of rain was overpowering. Cap'n Cuttlefish said something, but Rose was too exhausted to reply or even decipher what he said.

Now Inkopolis was empty.

The back window showed the Widow as it picked up speed, for there were no more empty homes to slow it down. The train hadn't reached top speed yet. The Widow raised its leg to impale the back of the bullet train.

Before it could bring it down, a barely audible explosion came from its hull, stopping it, and the beast released smoke from various places.

The lifeless corpse of the robotic beast came crashing down, covering the rails with its size, and let out a final puff of smoke from its abdomen.

Sky smiled and glanced at her feet.

And as if that wasn't enough, a flash of blue light came from a cloud above and struck it, momentarily bathing it in a bluish flash.

And so the train moved on, abandoning Inkopolis to defend Skarktown.