"Alright, team, listen up!" Cassie said, one of her tentacles pointing towards a white board. 'STRATEGY' was written at the top in big block letters.
Ink Blast had their first match of the tournament scheduled in just a few short hours, so Cassie had called them to go over some last-minute strategic stuff. Keri was practically shaking in her seat—this was about to happen! She couldn't wait!
"Our first match of the season will be up against the Warinkers," Cassie said, scrawling 'Ink Blast v Warinkers' on the board. Under each team, she listed out its four members. "They're not exactly the top seed, so we don't need to be super paranoid, but nobody in this tournament is bad. We still need to be on our game."
"Cassie, come on," Orion said. "It's the Warinkers. They've got Ronald."
Ronald was a bit of a joke among the pro scene: he had no theme, and no technique. He used a shooter. He was just… Ronald.
"Despite his unoriginality, he's still a good player," Halley said. "Don't underestimate him."
Cassie made a so-so gesture with her hand. "Yeah, but also don't, like, focus him? Just kind of splat him if you get near him." She turned back to the board. "Anyway, we really need to worry about Squidbird and Bowler." She circled those names.
"Do we though?" Keri asked. "Squidbird's all about super-jumping higher than people can shoot, but if you're on high ground with your charger, you should be able to shut him down super easily. And Halley's AOE attacks are really well matched against Bowler, since she doesn't need a direct hit on him."
"Yeah, but they cover for each other," Cassie explained. "If Bowler reaches me, I'm screwed. Since he can just kind of roll around everywhere, my charger's never gonna hit him, and he's too quick for me to run away from. And on the flipside, neither Halley nor Orion are going to be able to hit Squidbird when he's doing his thing."
"Not true," Halley said. "I can launch myself upwards high enough that I think I could get a pretty decent shot on him."
"Halley, your airshots are not nearly good enough for that to be consistent," Orion said.
"Excuse me, I've hit Bullet mid-flight before! I'm plenty good at air shots!"
"Yeah, like, once."
"Anyway," Cassie said, giving them a glare, "If we can guide the fights the way we want, we're sure to win. It's just a matter of doing that. Fortunately, we have a secret weapon—you."
She pointed at Keri, while one of her tentacles picked up a marker and circled Keri's name on the board.
"Nobody's fought you before," she went on, "so they don't know how to prepare against you. Especially since you're a flex, which is already pretty much impossible to prepare against."
"I mean, you're not wrong," Keri said. "But also, I don't exactly have a lot of tricks up my sleeve. I'm… kind of like a Ronald in that sense."
Orion gasped. "Keri! Don't ever say stuff like that about yourself!"
"You don't need squat up your sleeve if your using your head. Let's go through what the fight will probably look like." Cassie quickly erased the board, and then started drawing a lot of lines and figures, which, frankly, made no sense to Keri at all.
But that didn't stop Cassie. "Halley and Bowler have the fastest rollouts on either side, but that match up is favorable to Halley, so Bowler might stay back with his team. Either way, we likely will take initial control of the middle part of the map. Their next move is to do an organized push into the middle with Tornado and Ronald, while Squidbird supports from above. However, they know that I'll easily take out Squidbird if I'm left alone, so Bowler will flank around to ambush me. Orion shouldn't have trouble holding his own against Tornado, since you need accuracy in order to beat Orion, and Tornado is anything but accurate. And then Halley will do her usual thing where she bounces around our territory to keep things inked and crush anyone who's too out of position. But what I want you to do, Keri, is to go roller and hard-focus Bowler."
Keri raised an eyebrow. "Really? Isn't that kind of strategy usually, you know, real bad?"
"Usually, yeah. But if I get splatted, we're giving Squidbird free reign, and once that happens he'll start poking all sorts of holes in our defences. Those blaster shots from that high up hit like a freaking splashdown."
"But a roller is a terrible match up against the rest of the team," Halley said. "Sure, it's great against Bowler, but bringing a roller up against Tornado's splatling is asking to get sent back to spawn. Plus, good luck hitting Squidbird with it."
"But Tornado isn't a flanker," Orion mentioned. "If she just stays out of the main fight, it shouldn't be a problem."
"What about Squidbird?" Halley asked.
Keri shrugged. "I can dodge a few blaster shots. No worries."
"See? This'll work fine." Cassie turned back to the board. "So, recap: Orion, you're just pushing the front line like usual. Tornado's their main pusher, so focus on denying her ground. Keri, you're focusing on making sure Bowler doesn't get to me, and you're also going to be doing a lot of inking around the extremities of the map. Halley, you're doing your usual thing: back up Orion, catch anyone out on their own, and keep everything nice and inked. And then I'm going to be making sure Squidbird doesn't cause any problems, as well as doing the battlefield monitoring stuff I normally do. Got it?"
They all nodded.
"Alright. Let's do this."
As the bell to start the match rang, it was accompanied by Cassie's charger going off and one of Halley's blaster shots exploding in all their faces. As Orion ran forward and Halley took off into the distance, Cassie and Keri jumped into the ink trail left by her charger and swam off towards the battlements.
Keri was practically vibrating as she felt the ink wash over her. She was fighting in an actual, real life professional turf war, in a stadium and everything, with the Squid Sisters commentating, and a humongous audience, and giant screens displaying the map and the player statuses, and it was honestly a miracle she wasn't hyperventilating.
As Cassie inked her way up a wall onto one of the preferred sniper spots, Keri kept moving, flanking around the edge of the arena with her roller. If Cassie's planning was correct, then pretty soon she should run into—there!
The inkling that rounded the corner was wearing a helmet and heavy knee and shoulder padding, but it was hard to make out with the way he was constantly rolling. And firing his dualies. I mean, seriously, how do you not get dizzy rolling around that much? How do you aim?
Apparently not super well, because Keri didn't even have to dodge his first few shots as he barreled—or, rather, bowled—towards her. She used that time to crouch down and leap up as high as she could, letting Bowler roll under her and pulling back her Hero Roller. He quickly tried to adjust his aim, but he was too slow. Keri swung her roller in a harsh arc below her, splashing ink wall to wall in the hallway and leaving no trace of Bowler behind.
"Oh, and that's an early splat from our newcomer, Hero," came Marie's voice over the speakers. "Bowler's always had trouble with rollers, and it looks like that's still something he needs to work on."
Keri took off towards the enemy's side of the field; with as many missions as she'd had to go on, she'd gotten pretty good at infiltration. It felt dirty, but if her job was to stop Bowler in his tracks, then spawn camping seemed like a pretty simple way to turn one splat into two.
She peered around a corner just as Callie's voice entered her ear. "The map at the moment is looking pretty orange, thanks to that early kill and Bomber's quick start."
A quick glance at the screen confirmed that. Seems like everything was working out according to plan so far. Just then, something shot over her head, and she reflexively leapt backwards as a blaster shot crashed down where she'd been standing.
"And there goes Squidbird!" Callie called.
Keri looked up and saw the inkling in question soaring above her. He flew over to the middle of the stage, raining blaster shots down below. Just as he was about to fall back down, he dropped a suction bomb at his feet, and then somehow managed to super jump off of it, sending him even higher and spiking the bomb down onto the field.
"There's the bomb, and—Wow! Quick reactions from Brella Knight there, swinging his shield around just in the nick of time," Marie said.
"Squidbird, lining up another shot," Callie said. "Oh! Shot down by Tentaclaw! Sneaky! Oh, and that's Tornado downed by Brella Knight!"
"This is a rough start for the Warinkers," Marie said. "But they're not out of it yet. Anything can happen in a Turf War."
A green squid soared over her head, towards the middle of the field. Probably Bowler super jumping to Ronald, if she had to guess. Better head him off. She ran off towards the center, just in time to see Bowler rolling over a bridge towards the location Cassie had shot Squidbird from. She flicked her roller against a nearby wall and scaled it, then threw out a curling bomb towards Bowler, swimming through the ink trail it created.
When she jumped out, however, he was ready, and immediately began firing. She twisted in midair, the bullets just barely grazing her spine, and pushed off the ground with the tip of her roller to reposition herself. She sprinted in a tight circle, trying to get behind him, but Bowler just rolled around to face her, hitting her square in the face with a blot of ink she hadn't been able to dodge.
It stung like crazy, but she powered through, flicking her roller hard towards him. He rolled backwards, but was still caught by a hefty amount of the blast. He couldn't have much left in him. She dropped into the pool of ink her attack had created and sped as close to him as she could get before bursting out once more. He thrust a gun right into her stomach and shot, but those Tetra Dualies of his just weren't powerful enough to splat her. With a pained grunt, she slammed her roller to the ground, and pushed it over him, causing him to explode into ink. Just as she did, however, She saw Ronald standing below her. Before she could react, she had a splat bomb in her face, and everything went green.
"Hero manages to take out Bowler once again, but is then taken out in turn by Ronald. By Ronald," Marie repeated. Her voice was dripping with amusement.
"Oof, and Squidbird is once again shot down by Tentaclaw," said Callie. "She isn't giving him any room to breathe here, Marie!"
"It almost seems like target practice to her. And without his aerial support, Ink Blast has been able to hold their ground. But Brella Knight is the only player to have brought out a special so far, so anything could happen."
Keri respawned already super jumping, desperate to get back into the fight. Bowler was a lot faster than she was; if he'd already spawned by now, there was a good chance he could find Cassie before she could find him.
"Oh, wow! Bomber just launching herself right into Tornado's warpath, and got splatted for it—I think she thought Tornado hadn't respawned yet, but she's got an abnormally fast solidification rate! Looks like Tornado is gonna take another shot at breaking through Brella Knight's defenses, maybe get some revenge for that early game splat."
Keri's super jump slammed her right into the side of a building where Cassie was clinging.
"Oh, yeah," she said as Keri rubbed her head. "I should've told you, you super jump to me at your own risk. Good job with Bowler, by the way. Keep it up."
"Whoops, Ronald just tripped one of Bomber's ink mines," Marie said. "How unfortunate."
Keri gave a small laugh. That was so Ronald.
Suddenly, she noticed a shadow at her feet. Looking up, Bowler was hovering in the air; a splashdown.
"Shit." There was nowhere to run to, but Keri tried anyway, bracing herself for the wave of enemy ink, but it never came. Confusedly, she turned her head, and saw Cassie smiling smugly.
"Wow!" Callie called. "Tentaclaw showing her dominance by sniping Bowler straight out of a splashdown!"
"…Thanks," was all Keri managed to say.
"It's what I do," Cassie said. "Now let's get going." She disappeared into her own ink, heading off silently to who knows where, and Keri took off towards the middle. Maybe she could help Brella Knight out a little until Bowler respawned again.
"And there it is!" Callie exclaimed. "Tornado just activated her inkjet; and, of course, that's not gonna stop her from spinning! She's a whirlwind of destruction!"
Hmm. On second thought, perhaps not.
"Oop, looks like that's just too much ink for Brella Knight's Brella to handle, and without his shield, he's a lot more vulner—yep, there he goes. Looks like it's goodnight for this Knight," Marie said.
"Bomber managed to launch herself out of the way before she could get splatted, but that means there's not one left to stop Tornado from inking all this prime turf. Could this be the opportunity that the Warinkers need?"
While Keri was trying to think of an acceptable course of action, a blaster shot whizzed right over her shoulder, and she looked up to see Squidbird high above her. He did that bullshit super-jump-midair-on-a-bomb thing, sending him upwards and propelling the bomb straight towards Keri. Fortunately, suction bombs were, like, the easiest thing to dodge in the world, since they didn't even move. She just ran past it, letting it explode behind her, and ducked under a nearby overpass to gain some cover. That inkjet had to be gone by now, right?
She heard an inkstrike go off in the distance, but all of her teammates were alive according to the screen, so Ronald must've been using it to support Tornado or something. He probably activated it from spawn, which meant that Bowler would be spawning pretty soon too.
And she had her splashdown ready. Maybe she could make something happen.
It wasn't long before she came across the both of them. They were right outside their spawn point, talking about something. Strategizing, probably. Jackpot!
She hid behind a corner, and threw out a curling bomb.
"Watch out!" Bowler called. "That must be Hero's!"
She took that as her cue, immediately bursting around the corner and throwing herself at them, her eyes glowing with the built up ink aura of a special. They managed to dodge out of the way of the curling bomb, but were too busy with that to properly shoot at Keri. A second later, she landed hard right at Ronald's feet, causing both her opponents to go up in a blast of orange ink.
"And that's a big splashdown from Hero, taking out both Ronald and Bowler," Marie said. "With Brella Knight coming back into the field now and Bomber putting the pressure on Tornado with that inkzooka, Ink Blast is looking like they'll easily recover from that slight upset from earlier."
Keri listened intently as she set about inking down the Warinker's side of the field. She figured she may as well just wait for the two of them to respawn; her team could hold their own.
"But there's Squidbirds famous play, the double super jump into Inkjet!" commented Callie. "He's flying even higher than our commentator booth!"
"I think he just wanted to get out of Tentaclaw's range," Marie laughed.
Just then, Keri heard a faint buzzing, and watched as the unmistakable beam of the Stingray slowly moved up towards the sky.
"Ooh! Just as Bomber manages to finally splat Tornado, she gets nailed by Squidbird's aerial barrage!"
"Wait, Callie, is that what I think it is?"
Callie burst out laughing. "Wow! It is! Tentaclaw is breaking out the Stingray, specifically to keep denying Squidbird! What a counter!"
Keri watched as Squidbird frantically strafed back and forth on his Inkjet, desperately trying to avoid the Stingray. It was pretty funny. Cassie's aim proved too good, however, and Squidbird soon burst into ink that showered back down to the ground.
"Time's running out, Callie, and it looks like Ink Blast has this match in the bag."
"Well, I hate to say it, but I think you might be right," Callie said, not sounding nearly as heartbroken about it as her words might have implied. "The Warinkers would need a miracle to turn things around here. And they're not known for pulling out many miracles."
They kept talking, but Keri tuned out their voices as soon as she heard the telltale sounds of solidification. Sure enough, Ronald and Bowler popped out of the spawn point not a moment later. It didn't take very long before Bowler noticed Keri, and his eyes lit up in fury.
"YOU!" he screeched. "Why are you still here? Are you focusing me?"
Keri shrugged. "Yeah."
She threw out a curling bomb, but Bowler countered by launching an autobomb at her.
Ugh. She hated autobombs. Like, they weren't dangerous, per say, because you could just kind of walk away from them, but they took up so much space that they really limited her dodging options.
Bowler began rolling towards her, neatly avoiding the path of her curling bomb. Ronald backed up and began firing at her from a distance, but she easily dodged his shots. She flung her roller out towards Bowler, but he rolled to the side and started shooting at her.
Keri cursed, weaving in between all the fire before ducking down into her ink and swimming around a nearby pillar. She was grateful she'd taken the time to ink up all the area here; she really needed the room to move. She chucked out another curling bomb, letting it bounce off a wall towards where Ronald was standing. She swam after it, and not a second too late, as the autobomb had just found her hiding spot.
She wove between globs of ink as she approached Ronald. She burst out to take a swing at him, but he swam backwards out of range. Keri grumbled to herself; she needed to take care of at least one of them quickly before she was overwhelmed.
Just as she was thinking that, another autobomb landed a ways in front of her, and Ronald threw out a splat bomb of his own.
Great. Fantastic.
With a roar, Keri slammed her roller into the splat bomb at her feet, knocking it straight into the closest autobomb. The splat bomb went off with her just outside of its range, and the autobomb was laying on its side, uselessly wiggling its legs.
"What? You can't do that!" Ronald protested.
Keri responded by running him over with her roller.
The stinging feeling of enemy ink erupted on her back, and that was all she needed to remember she was still fighting. She ducked to the side, letting the rest of Bowler's shots fly past her harmlessly, and threw out another curling bomb, using it to swim away.
When she emerged, Bowler was quickly rolling his way towards her, and, to make matters worse, Tornado had just respawned, and she was already beginning to rev up her splatling.
Keri didn't even have time to think about offense; she just thrust all her mental energy into dodging. She danced around Bowler and his bullets without too much trouble, but now Tornado was here, spinning around impossibly fast while her Nautilus 76 sprayed pretty much the entire surrounding area green.
Keri took a hit on her shoulder, then another right on her thigh, and that autobomb was creeping ever closer. But just as she thought she was done for, two things happened in rapid succession.
First, Cassie dropped down from a nearby overpass. She was hanging down from its underside, her muscular tentacles straining from supporting all of her weight. She raised her charger, and, just like that, Tornado was once again gone.
Second, an orange squid flew in from over Keri's head, transforming back to Halley in midair. She twisted so that her blaster was pointed straight down, and, right as she was on top of Bowler, she fired. She transformed back into a squid and rode the resultant explosion, sending her flying straight up. Bowler had managed to roll into the periphery of the first attack, but from her new vantage point, Halley easily nailed him with the second before landing smoothly onto the ground where he'd been splatted.
"Ha! Drink my ink, bitches!" she shouted.
She was a very different person on and off the battlefield.
"Ink Blast comes in clutch with the last-minute team kill!" Callie exclaimed. "I'll tell you what, they came into this match prepared for everything the Warinkers had to throw at them."
"Thanks for the save," Keri said, absentmindedly walking in a big circle to kite the remaining autobomb. "That was about to get ugly."
"No problem. You did a great job holding up Ronald and Bowler for so long," Cassie complimented as the autobomb finally detonated. "Brella's inking up anything we may have missed right now, so we just need to hold for the, like, twenty seconds we have left."
With a schlorp, Squidbird respawned. He looked at the three of them, looked at the screen displaying the map and the clock, and sighed.
"I fucking hate you, Tentaclaw. You merciless she-beast."
Cassie laughed. "Oh, come on. You don't seriously want me to go easy on you, do you?"
"Well, it might be nice every once in a while, yeah," he grumbled.
Another schlorp later, and Ronald respawned. With a warcry, he rushed out of spawn; as soon as he left the protective barrier, Halley hit him direct with her Luna Blaster, and he was gone as quickly as he appeared.
"Come on, that wouldn't be any fun," Halley said.
"Time!" the Squid Sisters called in unison.
There was a beat, and then Callie's voice rang out. "With Judd reporting, the official winner of game three of this years Splat League Tournament is Ink Blast, with 73% of the field inked! That's a pretty decisive victory!"
The rest of the Warinkers respawned shortly afterwards, and the players went through the customary hand-shaking that ended every tournament match. When Keri was shaking Bowler's hand, she looked at him a bit guiltily. "Um. Sorry about all that."
He shook his head. "It was strategy. Really fricking annoying strategy, but also really fricking good strategy. You joined a good team, kid."
Keri smiled. She agreed.
"It's so damn weird seeing you on TV," Ben said.
They were chilling at her place after the match, at his insistence, because Keri couldn't remember the last time she initiated social interaction with anyone. Ben was the only individual besides herself to lay his eyes upon the inside of her apartment, and, assuming the Squid Sisters didn't, like, track down her address and break in (which wasn't outside the realm of possibility), it would, hopefully, stay that way.
"I mean," he continued, "they were broadcasting that match on pretty much every screen in the square. And I know they do that for every match every year, but it's still so surreal. I'm super happy for you, you know?"
Keri, sprawled out on her back on her bed, lazily flipped through the latest issue of Splat Battler Monthly. "Yes, I'm so glad that all of Inkopolis got to see me get splatted by Ronald."
"Aw, c'mon, we all get Ronalded once in a while," Ben reassured. "Besides, overall, you were great out there! That thing you did with hitting the splat bomb into the autobomb? Everybody went wild when that was shown! And that double splashdown was beautiful!"
Keri hummed, and kept flipping. Flip, flip, flip.
"You guys totally crushed them."
"I mean, yeah," she admitted. "But it's the Warinkers. They're like third least likely to succeed, and we're like the number two or three seed." Flip, flip.
"Correction: Ink Blast was the number two or three seed last year. Nobody knew how you'd affect things. But I think they're really impressed with you!"
"I guess that is pretty neat," Keri said.
"It's very pretty neat." He paused, frowning. "Why aren't you super psyched? I thought you'd be super psyched."
"I am!" she insisted. "Sorta. I mean, you know. I am."
"Well, shockingly, an answer like that does the exact opposite of convincing me. Seriously, what's up? You guys killed it out there!"
Keri sighed. "Okay, like. So I am really genuinely happy we won and everything. I'm amazed I got to fight alongside the squids I idolized so much growing up, and I do think I gave a good showing, and I'm really excited to do more in the future. It's just… I made so many mistakes."
"Are you kidding me?" Ben said. "Keri, you got splatted, like, once. From what I understand, your main goal was to keep Tentaclaw covered, and she got splatted literally never. You held your own against multiple opponents multiple times. If that were me up there, I would've been tasting ink left and right."
She tossed down the magazine. "No, but like—I never should've been splatted by Ronald. I should've seen him, and dodged. I should've seen Bowler approaching with the splashdown before he was literally on top of me; if Tentaclaw hadn't been so on the ball, we both would've been splatted there, and that would've been a huge problem. And I shouldn't have engaged both Ronald and Bowler at once at the end there, especially knowing how quickly Tornado respawns, and knowing that there's no way I can go against her with a roller. There was a lot of sloppiness."
"Keri, your perfectionism is showing. You did great, and you're gonna keep doing great. Those mistakes you listed were barely even mistakes. None of them set your team back at all. Hell, your overextension fighting both of them at their spawn is basically why you guys crushed them so definitively!"
"I know. I just… can't help but think about, like, what would happen if I made a mistake like that when it mattered. I could die."
Ben laughed. "Excuse me? I know you're just being metaphorical, but this is a turf war we're talking about, not a fucking gladiatorial match. Mistakes are okay."
Keri fake-laughed. She wasn't being metaphorical.
Her phone rang. "Oh, shit. I gotta take this. I'll be right back."
"No prob. Bet you've got all sorts of important phone calls now that you're a pro."
"Oh, don't you know it."
She quickly exited her bedroom and went into the kitchen—far enough away that Ben shouldn't be able to really hear her. This was not, in fact, a call about her pro battling situation, but one from her other boss.
She put the phone up to her ear. "Hey, Cap'n. What's up?"
"How's it crackalackin, Three? I saw your match on the ol' tele. You were hella fresh out there!"
Oh my god she hated this man so much but she had to be nice because he was her boss and also old and also could very easily kill her if he wanted to. "Uh, thanks. Please tell me that's not why you called me."
He laughed. Any time Cap'n laughed it sounded a bit like he was dying, and there was always this brief moment of panic where you couldn't tell which one it was. "No, no. Agent 1 was investigating another baby zapfish theft—from Greentide this time, small little town to the West—and she found an Octarian base."
"Mmm. Standard recovery mission then?"
"Pretty much," he wheezed. "But I think it'd be pretty dope of you to take Agent 4 along with you. Maybe show her the ropes a bit, you catch my breeze?"
Keri scratched her cheek. "Uh, yeah, that's fine with me. But you're sure you want to send her on a real mission like this so soon?"
"Eh, did that with you, and you didn't even have another agent there with you. Plus, Agent 1 already set up a spawn point outside the base; she says it's well hidden and has plenty of power. So this should be a relatively safe mission to start on."
"Alright. I'll be there. Bye."
"Later, alligator!"
He hung up after saying that, which was probably for the best, because Keri was having a visceral reaction to the fact that a hundred plus old man just literally said that to her.
A mission with Four, though. That should be fun. She seemed like a pretty cool person, at least the first time they'd met. Plus, she could really go for a good mission right about now. While professional splat battles were super fun and a great challenge, nothing could really compare to the thrill of a real mission.
She shoved her phone back into her pocket. Anyway. That was for later-Keri. Right now, she had Ben over, and she should try to make the most of that.
Keri sighed, put on a smile, and returned to her room. She would deal with fighting wars and stuff tomorrow.