The group had made it to the fifth floor and were walking down what felt like an endless corridor, one door after another. It all looked like a floor that would have nothing but meetings and discussions on it. They began to approach the door where their meeting was to be held.
"And you're sure you don't want to wait out here?" Marie repeated the suggestion since Maize had been doing his best to suppress his obvious fears and put on a brave face. He adjusted his glasses.
"I lost that choice when I stepped in here," the yellow inkling claimed with a bead of sweat running down his forehead. Callie shook her head, feeling bad. It was like they had forced him to come along for this meeting. He grabbed the doorknob and reluctantly opened it, the three stepping inside. This office had a general wooden design to it, two leather couches facing one another with a glass table in between them. Beyond it was a desk with a huge window in behind it which the chair was turned around staring out it.
"Hey! We're here," Callie called to the squid in the chair. They saw it spin around, revealing a female red-eyed inkling who had short light blue tentacles for hair with a light pink tinge at the end of them, all done up into a ponytail. She was wearing a purple shirt that had a rainbow of colors in various places randomly across it. The room fell into an awkward silence upon the meeting of Maize and the CEO of Tentatek.
"Maize?" she raised an eyebrow. Now his nervousness was at its limit, and he was regretting not taking the offer to wait outside.
"H-hi, Aero…" Maize sheepishly greeted the female squid. She was Aero, the current CEO of the Tentatek Corporation. She came off as friendly but with a hostile aura at the same time, which certainly was confusing.
"Wait, you two know each other?" Marie asked. It was surprising how many powerful or famous people their good friend knew. She pondered on if he had valuable connections that he kept secret from the Squid Sisters Maize rubbed his eyes under his glasses.
"Yeah. I've known her since I was nine," Maize stated. That was eight years ago. The Tentatek CEO had a bright smile across her face.
"He is also my husband," Aero added. It surprised both of the Squid Sisters. They looked to him, wondering if it was the truth.
"It's… true," he nodded. It indeed was the truth, but he sure did not seem happy. They never had gotten him to discuss this with them. It took a long moment to absorb.
"Oh… well, uh… it's nice to meet you, Aero," Callie said, breaking the awkward atmosphere, but the air felt thick enough to cut with a knife at this point. The two cousins took their seats in one of the leather chairs, Maize staying where he was standing uncomfortable.
"Did your investigation turn up anything?" Marie asked while simultaneously forcing the conversation back on track. The CEO took a seat across from them, reaching into her pocket and pulling out a piece of paper, lying it on the coffee table. It seemed to be a map showing part of Inkopolis with a red x marked on it.
"I hired our companies… err, a personal private investigator, and he wound up tracking matching numbers that sent the text message to these three locations," Aero elaborated, tapping the marks. These places were where the phone that had possibly sent the text was. They had the exact location and the chance to find it. All they had to do now was go there and check out each spot.
"Good! we'll head over and see what this squid is up to," Maize volunteered instantly. His dear friends felt that awkward layer of the conversation return. The white inkling rolled her eyes. If they wanted to get anywhere, they had to get through this conversation and find out what was going on here. There was a lot of this story the Squid Sisters were being left out of.
"Alright. What's the deal with you two? You don't look or act like a married pair," Marie questioned. There was no ring on the blonde squid's hand even, yet Aero had two different rings one on each hand. This topic upset their dear friend emotionally.
"After a year into our marriage, we both realized we weren't happy," Aero begun. Her supposed husband sighed, aware she wanted him to finish the explanation.
"So we made it an open marriage," Maize added, looking depressed by that. The Squid Sisters did not know how to respond. It was a change where both husband and wife were able to keep dating or having affairs with no care or worry about each other getting upset or betrayed.
"Or at least I'd like to say it was a decision we both made," he muttered.
"I don't feel proud to have pressured you like that, Maize, or take advantage of it, but we're both happier now. I'm sure I've got Onyx in my life now, and you have these two lovely…" Aero stopped speaking when Maize punched the wall. She had triggered him deeply by bringing up the name of Onyx, but implying Callie and Marie were just romantic toys was an insult he wasn't going to stand.
"…look, I don't have anyone else. But I'm glad you're happy," Maize sighed in frustration. Callie and Marie knew this situation was going to begin going out of control the longer they let the pseudo couple continue talking. The black inkling took the map.
"Thanks. We'll let you know if we find anything," Marie thanked the CEO before she got up with her cousin, the two motioning Maize that they should be leaving now. The yellow squid calmed himself before heading out the door with his two close friends behind him. Aero stayed in her same spot, looking saddened to see him go, thinking they could catch up later.
"I've never seen you get that angry before, Maize…" Callie commented.
"I have," Marie claimed. She had seen him a lot angrier and less restrained when he met Bondi's father. That was certainly a scene she would not want to witness again no matter what. Just being out of that office made the yellow inkling feel a lot better.
"Sorry… I know I can be scary when I don't mean to be," Maize apologized, though his friends were very understanding on this matter. Neither of them could see themselves tolerating a situation like that either. They reached the elevator, waiting for it to reach their floor.
"Wait… I hate to upset you again, but if you don't like this open marriage so much, why did you do it?" Callie worriedly questioned while they waited. She was indeed worried for his health that and she was confused. Wondering why he did any of this if his marriage was not happy before or after making it an open marriage. Maize hesitated for a moment.
"I had to keep a promise," he then spoke. That was all he could really say in the matter. Callie didn't know what to say about it, neither did Marie, especially over this promise talk. He quickly spoke again.
"Back on subject, I think it'd be best if we split up to check out all three of these places," the yellow inkling recommended since they were on a time limit. If they did not solve this by five in the evening, then they would be forced to try and tackle this so called threat during Splatfest. None of them wanted that, if they could help it. The elevator opened, someone already standing within it.
"Oh? I did not expect you to be here," the squid in the elevator said upon seeing Maize. The person was tall and had black tentacles for hair that were wrapped around his neck, and was wearing a suit. The Squid Sisters had a feeling who this was.
"We were just leaving, Onyx. Aero wanted you," Maize lied. Onyx was the chief of security for the Tentatek Corporation, and practically the second husband to Aero.
"Alright. If you need anything, call me," Onyx handed over a business card to Marie before continuing past them to get to the CEO. The trio just boarded the elevator, hitting a button to go back to the ground floor. They had to hope that they could catch the mysterious squid that sent these threats off guard. It didn't take long for them to arrive back outside.
"You know the drill. First one to turn up anything, call the others," Callie smirked while viewing the map. Maize nodded in agreement, while Marie had a look of uneasiness. She had to trust their decisions to tackle this separately. The three began to head in separate directions to go check out their locations on the map.
Maize walked through the streets. His mind drifted into another area entirely. He thought he had moved on from everything, or at least he wished he had, but all those emotions overwhelmed him once again. He did not even realize how long he had been walking until he started to notice his surroundings change. He saw a small car shopping mall ahead, not what he expected to come to.
"This is the right place… but why here?" Maize wondered aloud. He had not ever been to this mall, because it was horrible. Every kiosk sold cheap items, and the stores within sold flimsy knock off clothing and even weaker weapons. He could never see any squid coming here unless they were very poor.
"Now how am I going to find out who made the threatening text?" another problem presented itself. Maize had no idea what to do now. He adjusted the splatterscope on his back before he pulled out his cellphone.
"Good thing the cap'n made me install these odd apps," Maize smiled. Captain Cuttlefish had taught him that a lot of good tools could be on a phone online or offline, but he was taught never to rely on it unless he had to. He tapped one of the applications which pulled up a number tracker. The teenager hated using this app. Half of them were illegal and had to be acquired through special merchants. How Captain Cuttlefish had so many that he could install for the agents was beyond him or anybody's guess.
"Now just to punch it in… aaaaand there we go!" Maize chuckled to himself. Now his cellphone had pulled up a small map of his surrounding area and was sending out a wave of signals, reporting a red dot within the mall. Maize stepped inside, keeping his eye on his phone, ignoring every merchant he passed by who were begging him to buy something. He hated this place immensely that he didn't wish to spend a single penny on it.
"What?" Maize quirked. He had followed the tracking completely, but he found himself standing in front of a trash can by a small bench. He got an annoyed look across his face.
"The things I do for missions," Agent 3 huffed, pocketing his cellphone. He began to rummage through the garbage. Thankfully it seemed to be fully of plastic cups or tin cans, nothing too dangerous. He finally got a grip on something. Maize pulled his hand out, making a mental note to thoroughly wash it. He had pulled out an old flip phone.
"Wait… this is really old," he quirked, now entirely confused. He opened it and hit one button. The phone turned on without much delay, even if it was old. He pulled his cellphone out of his pocket and dialed the number of the threat sender. Sure enough, the flip phone began ringing.
"Oh for the love of… it's a disposable phone!" Maize came to the revolution, when he started to get worried.
"If this is what I found, what did Marie and Callie find?" the yellow inkling fearfully muttered immediately. He sent out two text messages one to each of his friends, both questioning if they were alright. He felt silly for this. They had been trying to keep him calm and well lately, but now he was afraid of them stumbling onto something bad.
"I need that phone back, friend," he suddenly heard behind him, followed by a light smash. Maize turned around. The yellow ink tank he had been carrying on his back was broken, and the ink was pouring out around him. Not one chance to react when he got punched hard in the face, being knocked over. Agent 3 dropped his cellphone and the flip phone that slid nearby. He tried to reach for it, but then his attacker got on top of him, pinning him down and wrapping their fingers around his throat. Maize began to lose his breath fast, trying to punch his assailant off of him, but he was not able to get this to stop. No merchants were nearby to help. He couldn't even see his attacker's face. His vision was beginning to get blurry. He felt like his luck had just run out.
"Don't cry, my friend. When you wake up, you'll feel calm… relaxed… happy," that same voice continued, seeing the tears that were welling in Maize's eyes, perhaps at the fear of dying. Things began to go black for Maize as he slipped away into unconscious, his head hitting the tiled floor. His attacker got off him before going over to the phones on the floor. Maize's cellphone was beeping, indicating the Squid Sisters' responses.
"I'm fine. I turned up a young girl with the same phone number, but now I am stuck dealing with her dad because he thought I was acting shady," Marie's text read. Apparently those that had not heard about it did not really care much for the tagline Special Squid Services.
"So far alright. I turned up an old squid with a similar number. She offered me great cookies but not really any useful info," Callie's text read. The anonymous squid looked over both of these messages before beginning to write their own text to reply.
"Good news. I found out it was a prank made by some brat. Everything is under control. The parents are dealing with them. Go on ahead with the Splatfest," the text they had manufactured read. This assailant was pretending to be Maize now. The attacker pocketed the cellphone, and then picked up the flip phone, raising it up high and then slam dunking it on the floor, breaking it into small pieces. Shortly after, Maize's unconscious body was being dragged along the floor toward the emergency exit of the mall.