Chapter Twenty-five: Playtime in War
What had Plankton gotten himself into?
At least he had his own army. An army that could end him anytime, but an army nonetheless. Maybe, being the genius that he was, he could command these humanoids.
Based on the way the girl with the whip had controlled those two fish, probably not. Who was to say that the whip girl wouldn't do the same thing to Plankton? Unless she recognized that, with his genius, he was impossible to control.
Plankton rubbed his hands, chuckling. Of course he couldn't be controlled by a mere whip.
A blue head swept down from above, in Plankton's face. Plankton hollered, nearly bolted backward.
"Are you in your happy place now?"
His army members hadn't introduced themselves to Plankton, but he could guess their names. The one who had pushed her head into his face was named PallaPalla. The whip girl was VesVes. The young woman who did most of the talking and seemed to have sense, was able to be reasoned with, was called CereCere. JunJun had green hair, barely wore green clothes (all of the girls were barely dressed). Fisheye, whom Plankton felt the closest with and safest near. There were Tiger's Eye and Hawk's Eye, the two scariest-looking humans that Plankton had seen, both towering yards taller than Plankton, Tiger's Eye with his growling voice, wild hair, clawlike nails. Hawk's Eye's nails resembled talons, and his voice was airy, like it was soaring.
"As happy as I'll ever be," Plankton said, deadness in his voice. He had lost his chance at stealing the secret formula, had lost control of his own robots, had lost his brief control of these humanoids, had lost his dignity. And he was away from Karen. Normally, Plankton wouldn't feel like he was missing much by being away from his computer W.I.F.E. She teased him, mocked him, and had made him feel foolish in front of his hillbilly family. But the thought of any robot stealing her heart… She was the only one cheering for him in the cruelty, the idiocy of Bikini Bottom. Surrounded by these humanoids, Plankton was lonely. He knew all too well how being alone and ignored in a crowd felt.
Nevertheless, he led this group of humanoids toward…where?
They hadn't discussed before. So Plankton kept walking in the desolate area of Bikini Bottom, where he and the Dead Moon Circus had been blown into.
"Where are we going?" JunJun said.
"Guiding you around, like you asked."
"Doesn't look like you know what you're doing."
"Neither do any of you," Plankton shot back, not caring about his vulnerability, about JunJun's darkening expression. Might as well lose whatever else these cretons thought they could take from him. Thankfully, a place popped in his mind before JunJun could eat him or dispose of him however tightrope walkers disposed of their enemies. "Since I am a genius, I know what place would be most beneficial to you. I'll take you to Rock Bottom. I have a few…toys we can use to vaporize SpongeBob's army."
CereCere's eyes brightened, seeming to forget his outburst. "You have weapons of your own?"
VesVes snorted. "Unlike these robots, I hope your weapons obey you."
"I hope you're smart enough to know how to use them," JunJun said.
Plankton didn't let their insults pierce him. He'd been insulted many a time before. He may look insignificant and go unnoticed by the majority of Bikini Bottom, but his genius could not be overlooked.
He wouldn't let his army stand in his way, no matter how much they tried to intimidate him. Besides, they needed him more than he needed them. Well, not necessarily, but he wouldn't let them know that.
He needed to get to know them more.
Observing and talking to them about the weather, their hobbies, mundane things that he had to pretend that he gave a rat's behind about would be best. Plankton was a great people person. He had to build a W.I.F.E. only because everyone else brushed him off due to his small stature.
As Plankton led them toward Rock Bottom, he said, "So, what do you all like to do for…what's that word?" He put a finger to his chin. SpongeBob had sung a whole song about it that Plankton hadn't been able to get out of his head for six months. Now he couldn't remember. Perhaps he couldn't recall the word because, frustrated at not being able to purge his head of SpongeBob's blasted song, he had created a memory wiping device and erased the song from his brain. For good measure, he had washed soap between his ears, where his brain was.
"Our happy place?" PallaPalla bounced in front of Plankton. At least she seemed harmless.
"Sure," Plankton said. It was a start. "Where is it?"
"Mine is with my sisters." PallaPalla slung her arms around JunJun and CereCere. "We've always been together." Smiles flitted across JunJun's and CereCere's faces. VesVes stepped closer to PallaPalla, placing a hand on her sister's shoulder. A tight bond. Some would say that their bond would be a disadvantage to Plankton—he would be the first to go in a life-or-death situation—but their relationship was an asset. They would fight more effectively, quickly escort Plankton to the Chum Bucket.
"Aside from your sisters, where else?" Plankton said.
Tiger's Eye looked to the sky. "I miss the jungle."
"Have I got the place for you." Plankton stepped to Tiger's Eye, dared to nudge him with his elbow. A growl rumbled from Tiger's Eye's throat. Plankton stepped several yards away. "Or maybe not."
Tiger's Eye poked his head in Plankton's face, as aggressive as VesVes. "Now I want to know, you piece of sausage."
VesVes' eyes bulged, and the beast tamer burst into laughter. That insult hurt.
Plankton looked over himself. "Am I really shaped like sausage?" Took down his self-perception, but not that much. He was Plankton, who had the highest I.Q. in Bikini Bottom.
"You look as edible as sausage." Hawk's Eye ran a finger across his lips.
Plankton resisted the urge to shiver. Had to appear confident. "Ah, but if you ate me, you wouldn't be able to get to where you needed to be. Besides, my weapons can make you superior over SpongeBob's army." He puffed out his chest. Surely, he didn't look like sausage anymore. "And your happy place, Tiger's Eye, would be in Kelp Forest. But that's a distance away. I'd rather us go to Rock Bottom first, where my weapons are."
"I have a better idea," CereCere said. "Let's split up. I doubt those Guardians are going to stay all together. Besides, we can cover more ground and find the Golden Crystal faster."
Plankton cleared his throat. "I also have a request."
JunJun's eyebrow shot up. "You're in no position to request anything from us."
"Actually, I am. Because I'm diabolical. And a genius. And I'm the only one who can get these robots to fall back under my command. See, if you vaporize me and then pull the switch on my Duplicatotron to 'Obey,' the robots will still run rampant because they won't have anyone to obey. I could command the robots to destroy the Guardians, and they'll do it, without fail. So it's in your best interest that you keep me alive.
"I have no fear of you, so my request is that, on our way to the Chum Bucket, we stop by the Krusty Krab and steal the krabby patty secret formula. In return, once we reach the Chum Bucket, I'll turn my whole robot army against SpongeBob's army and have them help find your Crystal. But if this Crystal has special powers, I want in."
The Dead Moon Circus exchanged looks.
"That's a good deal," CereCere said. "Besides, the Guardians overpowered us twice, so it'll be better if we have the robots on our side. We accept. In the meantime, we split up. Where are those Guardians likely to go?"
"Wherever the robots are," Plankton said. "So anywhere, pretty much. But the three biggest areas are Rock Bottom, where my precious lasers are and where I must go to check on them; the Mermalair, which those two old superheroes think no one knows about but everyone knows about and is full of machines; and Sand Mountain, where people do a lot of skiing and sandboarding. Sports aren't my forte, so I'd rather not go there, but I'd be glad to point you toward it and the Mermalair."
"Plankton, I'll go with you to Rock Bottom," VesVes said. "Sounds full of creatures ready to come under my whip."
"Sports sound fun," PallaPalla said. "I'll head to Sand Mountain."
"Same," JunJun said. "Right up my alley."
"Then I'll go to the Mermalair." CereCere shrugged. "Whatever that's supposed to be."
"The bottom of anything doesn't bode well for me." Hawk's Eye's expression grew distant. "On the other hand, a tall mountain…"
"I'd like to go to the Mermalair," Fisheye said. "I'm not a big fan of machines, but I'm also not a fan of anyone building machines in the ocean, where they don't belong. I've love to destroy the Mermalair and restore that area to its natural glory."
"I don't want to leave my master alone with only a hotdog-shaped creature to protect her," Tiger's Eye said, "so I'll go with you there, VesVes."
Plankton laughed, throwing back his head and spreading his arms. "My very own army, smart enough to sort themselves out and to insult me. Wonderful. Soon I shall be invincible." His laugh turned into a cackle. VesVes fisted his head, screwing him into the sand so that only his antennae were visible.
"If you keep doing that, I really might have to kill you."
Ami was enjoying Goo Lagoon. It helped that being near the goo was amplifying her powers alongside Michiru's. Ami and Michiru ought to try combining their attacks. Ami ruled over water in general, while Michiru commanded bodies of water. Together, they would be unstoppable.
Despite their elements complimenting each other, Ami preferred to be with Setsuna.
Setsuna was striking, full of not only knowledge but also wisdom. There was a big difference between knowledge and wisdom. Ami's cram school classmates were knowledgeable, but they didn't have much wisdom because they didn't have the life experience. Being the Guardian of Space and Time, Setsuna had plenty of wisdom from watching kingdoms rise and fall, the follies of man, things that she normally wouldn't have seen, appearing to be in her early twenties but actually being centuries old.
She was observant from guarding the Space-Time Door. Ami liked to hide in books, but experiencing the world taught her more. Ami had learned more in her short time as a Guardian and from her friends than she had reading books her entire life.
Setsuna seemed like she had everything figured out, no matter how much she proclaimed that she knew nothing about the world and wanted to study it. While aloof, she was polite, perceptive, elegant. Had an air of royalty about her, like she was the princess of the moon instead of Usagi (while Usagi had matured greatly since Ami first met her, one wouldn't look at Usagi and think that Usagi was a princess).
Ami had a hard time reading others sometimes. Her self-esteem was a bit low, so she was afraid of rejecting others' invitations to do things together, what they would think of her. Before she met Usagi, she'd had a reputation of being arrogant. Didn't want to fuel that reputation.
But Usagi, Makoto, and her other friends were unique, teaching her that it was okay to be herself. They were beautiful; Ami would hate if they tried to be other people. Having role models was fine, but trying to be a completely different person was not. Ami loved them for the people they were, never compared them to others or wished they were different, that they would cover up their flaws because their flaws were beautiful, too. They saw Ami the same way.
Setsuna, though, was someone to be admired.
Maybe Ami would never be as wise as Setsuna. Regardless, Setsuna seemed to appreciate Ami's eye. Setsuna and Ami had engaged in conversation about the lab they had seen in Goo Lagoon, bouncing ideas off each other about the technology the robots were using to create fish-bots. Being an inventor, Sandy had joined the conversation.
Setsuna didn't appear surprised when Sandy had told her about building a rocket, creating a blueprint for and then building her treedome and deep sea dive suit, or by anything in Bikini Bottom. Perhaps Setsuna's stoicism was a result of seeing nearly everything when guarding the Space-Time Door. Nevertheless, Setsuna shouldn't have ever seen a place like Bikini Bottom, where physics were defied regularly and no one batted an eye. Physics were Setsuna's specialty, so Setsuna should have been infuriated or at the very least showed curiosity. But she kept smiling. Commendable. Ami had been twisting her face in all sorts of ways when she had first arrived in Bikini Bottom.
The calmness wasn't unique to Setsuna. Haruka, Michiru, and Hotaru were not alarmed by Bikini Bottom's tendencies, and they weren't much more experienced than Ami. Hotaru was less experienced than Ami yet digested everything calmly. Whatever the Outer Guardians were doing, Ami needed to start doing it, too.
The seven ran through Goo Lagoon, through another cave (briefly meeting Gary, whom Setsuna and Michiru didn't seem surprised to see, even when noticing his high intelligence), clearing out robots in one fell swoop with a shot of Sailor Neptune's amplified Deep Submerge, grabbing another Golden Spatula from a robot's remnants, and then emerging into the sunlight and onto a pier, where Mr. Krabs stood, gazing at a ticket booth on another pier, sighing. A Ham-mer stood inside the ticket booth, a boy and his mother trying to pay the robot with dollars but the Ham-mer bonking the dollars, nearly taking off the mother's fin, onto the pier.
"How dare he treat perfectly good money with such disrespect?" Mr. Krabs rolled up his sleeve. "I'll go teach that robot a lesson in how to treat money meself."
Bad things had happened when Mr. Krabs tried to fight the robots in Jellyfish Fields. Ami reached for him. "Mr. Krabs, please wait!"
Mr. Krabs was already running. When it came to money, the crab blocked out all outside influences and focused on the money—where it was, what it smelled like, had a nose like a bloodhound.
He jumped across a gap leading to a leaning pier, then to another one and then to the pier where the mother, boy, and Ham-mer stood.
This was not going to end well.
Ami ran toward the incoming fray, her Mercury Goggle etching in front of her eyes, concentrated on Mr. Krabs. "Hyperspatial Sphere Generate!" A bubble expanded from Ami, toward Mr. Krabs. The transparent, bubble-like shield engulfed the crab, who continued to run inside the bubble like he was going anywhere. Technically, Mr. Krabs was in another dimension, but he didn't need to know that.
Could Ami use her sphere to teleport Mr. Krabs to the ninth dimension, where the giant monkey man lived?
Ami shook her head of the thought, concentrated on whisking Mr. Krabs to safety. Her distraction could be fatal for the crab.
Besides, tapioca was the key to unlocking the ninth dimension.
Ami almost slapped herself. The fish's short attention spans were rubbing off on her. Usually, she had no problem focusing for hours on end, but Bikini Bottom threatened to make her attention span as short as a goldfish's.
Ami drew the sphere toward her, Mr. Krabs' eyes widening. "What?" He reached toward the ticket booth. "But me money!"
Mr. Krabs thrust himself, shoulder-first. Plowed through the sphere. From one dimension to another.
Every time Ami had thought she had seen it all in Bikini Bottom, something else proved her wrong.
The sphere popped like a bubble, and Mr. Krabs landed on his feet, didn't miss a step charging toward the ticket booth, pincers out. The crab stepped beside the mother and child, pulled the tent up with his pincer, leaving the robot bare. He snatched the money from the floor.
Shaking the money in his pincers, Mr. Krabs said, "That ain't how you treat money. You treat it gently, like you would a woman."
All thought whistled out of Ami's head. Better not think about what he meant.
The Ham-mer raised its head of ham over Mr. Krabs' head. Sandy's lasso lashed out while Makoto said, "Supreme Thunder!" Sandy lassoed the robot, dunked it into the water below. The lightning struck the pier. Cracks formed where the lightning had hit. The mother screamed, hugging her boy to her, while the boy cheered.
"Why do kids here think danger is fun?" Minako circled her chain around the mother, boy, and Mr. Krabs, knocking them against one another and opening Mr. Krabs' pincer, causing the money Mr. Krabs held to drop through one of the piers' cracks, into the goo.
"No!" Mr. Krabs yelled, agony ripping through his voice like someone had died. "Me money!" He broke into weeping.
Minako drew the three to her, set them upon the pier.
Mr. Krabs' struggled. "Let me go. There's still a chance for me to salvage me money."
Minako tightened the chain's grip. "You know that robot you saw earlier? That's exactly why I'm not letting you go."
Makoto twitched. "Oh, boy. Not again." She'd been partly responsible for creating the quicksand. More destruction from her attacks had to feel awful.
The cracks spread throughout the pier. The world quaked, and across the goo, cracks chipped through another pier. A Ferris wheel collapsed into the goo, a wave drenching the pier, nearly dousing the Guardians and Sandy. Carnival music echoed from the turning Ferris wheel.
A D1000 upon the second pier was unscathed. The machine pumped out Fodders near a separate pier in front of the seven.
Makoto rubbed her head. "Maybe I shouldn't attack anymore. Standing here might be better."
"Don't worry, Mako-chan," Ami said. "I'm sure there's a way we can repair everything."
"Might take a few months to repair all this."
"On the somewhat bright side," Sandy said, "there'll be a lot o' repairin' to do, anyhow. So it's not like this is much more damage." Seemed to catch how she sounded. "Um, well…"
"The sentiment is there."
Mr. Krabs' bottom lip quivered. "Me money, drowned. Dead. A shadow of its former self." He dissolved into fresh weeping. Minako released her chain from the three, likely because of the mother whose ear was near Mr. Krabs' mouth. The mother scrambled away from Mr. Krabs, taking her boy with her.
She waved to the Guardians. "Thanks for saving us." Groaned. "What a day at the carnival this turned out to be. Trying to get away from these darn robots, but they're everywhere." They ran into the sea caves.
Mr. Krabs flopped onto his back, crying.
"I feel strangely responsible for him," Makoto said.
"You shouldn't," Sandy said. "Trust me."
Ami cocked her head. "Should we help him at all?"
"As soon as he sees another dollar or Shiny Object, he'll forget all about the money he thinks he 'lost.'"
The seven kept moving forward. Sandy lassoed the D1000, making it explode.
"There's no helping the explosion," Sandy said, the Ferris wheel turning faster from the explosion, the carnival music emanating from it quickening.
The seven jumped to the second pier, Sandy karate-chopping the Fodders into the goo, where they burst. Without the robots and fish, the pier seemed lifeless.
"I bet fish love to come here whenever robots aren't around," Makoto said.
Michiru's eyes roamed the pier. She still glowed, her powers feeding Sailor Mercury's own, making Sailor Mercury feel more energetic.
The seven landed where the ticket booth had been, ashes piled in its place. The cracks in the pier grew wider like a lion's maw. Gasping, Ami scrambled away from the cracks. The cracks widened until the pier split, the halves tilting in opposite directions. The Guardians took to the air, Minako reaching for Sandy. Despite the lessons she'd learned, Minako felt solely responsible for Sandy being thrown into a robot. But Makoto grabbed Sandy instead, Makoto saying that she was used to carrying folks all the time.
The seven flew to the Ferris wheel, landed.
"It'd probably save more energy if we flew instead of jumped all the time," Michiru said.
Ami panted. "Astonishingly, Michiru-san, running and jumping saves more energy than flying. Usagi-chan and I were tempted to fly all the time in Jellyfish Fields. It didn't quite work out, based on how much energy we spent when we flew for short periods of time."
Setsuna smiled at Ami. "Nice observations."
Ami warmed. Another compliment from Setsuna. Perhaps Ami was closer to Setsuna in terms of skill than she had first thought.
She couldn't get a big head over two words. Had to stay focused. She had leagues to go before she reached Setsuna's caliber.
The seven reached a Whack-a-Tiki game. Looked like a Whack-a-Mole game but was three times bigger than ones in arcade parlors. Perhaps this game was more interactive than the others.
"It's too bad Patrick isn't here," Rei said. "He'd have a field day with this."
Michiru raised an eyebrow. "Do you actually like him, Rei?"
Rei blushed. "Of course. I just, he gets…he's Patrick." No other words could describe him.
Michiru chuckled. "Something I'll understand once we start working with him."
"I guess. I mean, yes."
So Michiru was Rei's role model, judging by how flustered Rei had become. Ami could relate. The Outer Guardians made Ami feel like the most flawed person in the world, as insignificant as a speck of dust. Everyone had flaws but the Outer Guardians.
The Outer Guardians took ruthlessness to a whole other level sometimes, which could be considered a flaw, annihilating first, asking no questions. Haruka and Michiru had wanted to kill a child, Hotaru, to save the world. Usually, no one wanted to kill another person, so sacrificing one girl for the world's welfare was difficult, to say the least.
Michiru smiled lopsidedly. "How about you play the game on his behalf?"
"I'd rather play it together with him." Rei blushed deeper. "Did I say that out loud?"
"You did." Michiru was rubbing everything in today. Like Setsuna, Michiru missed nothing.
Coming to Rei's rescue, Makoto said, "I wonder what you win if you beat the game."
"Probably one of Patrick's socks." Rei reddened more than a tomato. Being close to Michiru was bringing out her nervousness. Michiru's criticisms weren't helping.
"Socks?" Setsuna said.
Saving Rei again, Makoto said, "Patrick lost his socks, and they're scattered around Bikini Bottom. For every ten we find, he'll give us a Golden Spatula."
"These Golden Spatulas seem to be common. I wonder where they came from, or if they're simply sold in stores. They seem to have some value to them."
Setsuna brought up a good point. At first, Ami had thought that border patrol guards blocked certain areas of Bikini Bottom and that Golden Spatulas were payment for passing. Ami had never seen anyone patrolling any area of Bikini Bottom, and no one had ever asked her about Golden Spatulas. Being a fry cook, SpongeBob had an affinity toward Golden Spatulas, and he wanted to collect them for himself.
"Maybe this is all of King Neptune's game," Ami said. "SpongeBob said that the original Golden Spatula came from him. Maybe he wouldn't have appeared to us in the first place without collecting a certain number of Golden Spatulas. But if the original one was King Neptune's, then the Golden Spatulas that we've collected are likely duplicates."
Minako turned up her nose. "Seems like the type of god who would show up only to get on our nerves."
Rei peered at the sky. "If he's a god, can't he always hear us?"
"He probably doesn't care enough to watch us all the time." Minako scoffed. "Which is just as well. He's letting us go through a lot of stuff with these damn robots, but we don't need some selfish god's help to get through Bikini Bottom."
The pier was full of games that any child would like. Bumper Boats, a skee-ball game, the Whack-a-Tiki. Few robots wheeled and flew about. Perhaps most had left because their lab had been destroyed.
Regardless, the seven continued, destroying the occasional robot. Reached the end of the pier where a second box was, near a teeter-totter with a starfish painted on one end. Were starfish the only ones that could use it? The teeter-totter looked like a normal one, but Bikini Bottom's rules might require that only starfish use it or something awful would happen to anyone else who tried to use it.
"Is this the box you were telling me about?" Setsuna said. To Ami.
Ami started. "Uh, yes, yes, it is." Setsuna had only asked her a question. Nothing major. Except Setsuna was turning to Ami for help. Major.
"Transports you…" Setsuna knelt over the box. "It looks bigger on the inside than it does on the outside." She looked toward the first box, which stood near a wailing Mr. Krabs.
"It's taking him a long time to get over those three dollars," Rei said.
"Eh, yes, longer than usual," Sandy said. "Anyhow, let's take care of that there varmint." Pointed to the island, where the robot that Minako, Makoto, and Sandy had seen their first time in Goo Lagoon…was gone.
Makoto deflated. "Well, that's anticlimactic."
"Maybe it went somewhere else in Goo Lagoon," Ami said.
The Guardians flew once more, Makoto carrying Sandy. Empty sunscreen bottles were scattered on the island where the robot had been. The reflector towers had been turned away from the fish, compliments of Larry the Lobster; a note declaring, "Larry was here" had been planted near one of the reflector towers at the beach's entrance.
Minako wiped her hands on her skirt. "Seems like our problem's been solved for us."
"Larry, that dog." Sandy kicked the sand lightly. "Came and went like a hero."
"Thank goodness," Rei and Minako said at the same time. They looked at each other. Everyone looked at them.
Minako gaped and then closed her mouth. "Did he…like you too?"
Rei scowled, crossing her arms. "I hope not, because I certainly didn't like him."
"Good." Minako fake-laughed. "Because I didn't either. A human and a lobster would never mesh." Laughed louder. Trying to drown out her discomfort and her strangely specific denial wasn't working.
Regardless, Ami and her friends could return to Bikini Bottom's residential area with a report of Goo Lagoon being clear. She was ready to learn more with Setsuna and her friends at her side.