Maize bit his lip. He was standing before the inkling who was accusing him of murder. He relaxed, doing his best to keep calm. Fulvous looked on the verge of tears, and each sentence she spouted deeply wounded him.
"I can say I'm sorry a hundred times, but I know it won't change anything," the yellow squid said, expecting another hard slap or punch from her, but did not receive that. The photo of the blue inkling was still in his hand.
"It's not fair… you did all this, and you didn't suffer retribution. I had to deal with this all my life!" Fulvous sobbed, pushing him into the wall. They were hiding behind a small area, the turf war still going on, but it was going to end soon. They both had already carelessly left their teams to a 3v3.
"I know you did… I suffered a lot for it, too, but the cap'n changed my life," Maize stated, referring to Captain Cuttlefish. The old squid had saved him and had done so much to change his life. Fighting the octarians was just one chapter of what Maize had considered a new beginning.
"You got luxury! …why did you get luxury? I can't go one day without imagining your hands around his throat… you bloodsucking monster!" Fulvous exclaimed, beginning to sob hard. At this point, the yellow inkling was sick of being held against the wall. He grabbed her left wrist and her right forearm, turning things around easily and pinning her to the wall.
"I don't care if you don't believe me. I don't care what you saw. You had your chance years ago in court, and it was already enough," Maize reminded her. The two of them felt the same atmosphere of hatred, but the yellow squid did not appear to show any aggression back toward her rage. He seemed more intent, on calmly handling the situation, rather than escalating it.
"And before you say you'll kill me, I'll have you know, I've gotten more combat experience than ever," Maize added. He did not want to hear the same thing over and over. The orange inkling spat in his face. He thought he had that coming. He seemed like he was trying to just scare her off, but he did not notice her stomp on his foot until it was too late. He yelped in pain before she tackled him to the ground. They both wound up splashing in a mix of purple and orange ink, his glasses getting messed up.
"Get off me! I'm not going to hurt you!" Maize growled, trying to wrestle the other squid off him, feeling the purple and orange ink splattering onto him. He got punched in the side, but he refused to punch her back. He tried hard to get her off, but she got on top of him and kept him pinned down.
"I don't care if you can't hit a girl! You will pay!" Fulvous opened her mouth wide. Her three sharp teeth shined, before she sank them into the first thing she could bite.
"Grahhh!" Maize screamed in pain. The orange squid's bite kept getting deeper. His entire body was hurting. He grabbed her jaw and head, his eyes that expressed nothing but worry gazing back into hers that showed a blazing flame of rage.
"I won't hit you… because I promised Cyan I wouldn't!" he exclaimed, feeling another sharp wave of pain course through his body, but it felt like it was coming from his head. Fulvous heard this and began to release her bite. Things seemed to relax a tiny bit. He was panting, lying flat on his back with her on top of him.
"What are you talking about?" Fulvous quirked. She had blood running from her mouth. Maize could feel a constant throbbing pain from his head.
"Get off Maize! Or I'll bash you into a daze!" they both heard a rhyme ring out. From one direction, they saw Fallow. Maize did not say anything looking up to the orange inkling.
"Please give up. I'm sorry," Maize told her. The orange inkling instantly got bashed off by an ink brush, being splattered into a purple blast. The yellow squid was happy to see his sister. Fallow was panting as she reached into her bag and increased her oxygen, taking in a deep breath and trying to calm down.
"Bro, don't go and scare me like that…" Fallow hugged him. Maize sighed, glad to have some form of comfort for once. When their embrace broke however, she gasped in horror.
"Ahhhhhhh!" she shrieked in terror, confusing him. At least she could scream without having to rhyme. She pulled out a small hand mirror from her pocket which she normally used to fix her makeup. Her brother's eyes went wide upon seeing what had happened. He had a cold chill run down his back. He had a wet feeling on his shoulder. It was his own blood. He grabbed the bandanna around his sister's head and took it off, beginning to tie it onto his own head.
"Please, Fallow, I need you to be calm…" Maize pleaded, seeing how upset she was. She was aware of this mess of a history, that it was engraved forever into the Dagenhart family tree.
"This can't be happening! I was hoping things were wrapping up forever after the trials…" Fallow sobbed. Her brother was hurt. What he lost was the same as a poor squid losing their entire limb. They heard a loud whistle, indicating that the turf war was over.
"Fallow, look. You can't tell Callie or Marie what happened. This isn't a mission. You don't need to worry about it," Maize explained, aware that if the Squid Sisters got involved, they would press this and would not rest until they knew the truth. Even if it was out of good intention or not, he did not want to upset them.
"No! You're hurt! We can no longer invert the past," Fallow counter argued. This was exactly why the Special Squid Services was founded; to help every squid in trouble that needed help, and to discover the truth.
"Fallow, you're the best sister anyone can ask for. I think you'd be a perfect agent for the Special Squid Services. But I need to lay low," Maize explained. Fallow's lip quivered as she wondered how he was handling this situation so well. They were both beginning to head back to the starting point, that bandanna on the yellow squid's head wrapped tight and hiding everything on it.
"Me? An agent? That's absolutely reagent!" Fallow agreed to becoming an agent, aware that her little brother probably only sprung this up because of the current stress of the situation. The past was making itself blunt once more.
"Good! You can be Agent 6 of the Special Squid Services… unofficially of course" Maize told her. This comment confused her, as she knew her brother was Agent 3, and Callie and Marie were Agents 1 and 2.
"Agent 6? Talk about the Styx! Why can't I dive, right into four or five?" Fallow questioned. Maize was glad that she was very easy to make happy. She knew the situation was horrible, but he always told her that panicking never could help in a situation, and at this point, the yellow inkling was not wanting to rely on his luck, but this was a situation where he had no choice but to hope his luck could go well for him. However, Fulvous had wounded him horribly.
"There's two agents with those numbers already," he stated as they began to approach the starting platform. Fallow sighed, agreeing to taking up the tagline Agent 6. She could be a good squid to show that being damaged did not mean the end of the world for any inkling, though right now, Maize wished he could have some of that positivity.
"There you two are! Where've you been?" Callie greeted their two friends. All four of them were now on the starting platform
"We've been waiting for a while," Marie added, agreeing with her cousin. The two were in one of their better syncing moments, though the white squid was more curious why their friend was wearing his sister's bandanna. He was hiding the blood on his shirt, too.
"N-nothing. Meet Agent 6; the newest member of the Special Squid Services," Maize gestured a hand motion to Fallow. She clapped her hands in joy.
"Six? Why not Agent 4?" Marie chirped the same question on everyone's minds.
"Or five?" Callie added. Maize rubbed his eyes.
"Not right now, please," the yellow squid retorted while fixing his glasses. The Squid Sisters gave a look to one another out of worry before the platform sucked all four of them within it, beginning to return them back to the battle tower.
When both groups appeared on separate platforms in the battle platform, they could hear erratic whistling volume. It was a lot different than what the judge normally would use with his whistle.
"Alright, little guy, you did good," Judd hummed while coming out. Bondi was still happily playing with the cat's whistle. Before the anthropomorphic cat could state who won the turf war, Maize had already started to run away, out of the battle tower, shocking any passing inkling and his best friends.
"Hey, wait! You didn't hear if we won or not…" Callie called out. Fallow kept quiet, just trying to keep a smile on her face, forcing her own mind to find the positives in this situation. So far she was finding none, but she had no intention to stop trying to find the better side of this horrid accident.
"He probably just ate too much," Marie reassured it was nothing they had to worry about, though that was what she wanted to believe. Her nerves were bugging her, telling her that she was wrong with her initial thoughts. She hated it when her nerves did not let up. Usually it meant something bad was going on. Callie took her son back happily from Judd.
"Squee!" the squishie giggled, happy to see his mother again.
"Okay… purple team, you covered 53%. Orange team, you covered 47%. The winner is… Team Purple!" Judd raised a bright flag of the team color.
"Yes!" Callie cheered, hugging Bondi tight. Marie giggled while patting Fallow's back.
"You're pretty mean with that ink brush. Good work!" the white inkling claimed. Fallow nodded, looking at the door her brother had run out. Her brain was beginning to complain that she needed to inform the Squid Sisters of everything that had happened, but she bit her tongue to restrain herself from rhyming the truth.
"Come on, let's go do a mission for our new team member!" Callie suggested they all go on a mission. Bondi seemed very excited to go on a mission since she had no one available to watch the squishie. She was going to make sure this mission would not be dangerous either.
Maize ran for quite some time. He made his way back to his home. Clouds were filling the sky and making it darker, and it would soon be raining. He opened the screen door and unlocked his regular door, snatching the spare key from outside before stepping inside, locking everything behind him.
"No, no, no… she couldn't have…" Maize was muttering to himself, the bandanna falling onto the floor of the living from, being covered in blood. He began to stumble into his bedroom, looking into the mirror. He couldn't believe it anymore. He almost collapsed upon seeing the sight again.
"…she did. She bit it off!" Maize screamed. Fulvous's strong bite had left its impression. In the mirror, the yellow squid's head was bleeding for one reason. One of his tentacles had been entirely bitten off during that struggle, his right one specifically. He was terrified to the core. He had no idea where the missing limb went, either. Maize didn't know what to do. He went over to grab some cleaning materials. The past was rearing its face once more, and he was scared out of his wits' end. This was the gravest injury he had ever received, and it was going to leave a nasty scar on what now was the stump of a tentacle.